Haunted Places: How Do Haunted Houses Become Haunted - Part 2

Another Tower of London prisoner was a young woman called Lady Jane Grey. Grey was the niece of King Henry VIII, and became Queen of England for nine days in a coo to change the royal line from the then Tudors to a family of Dukes in Northumberland called the Dudley's.

In the attempt by the Dudley's, Jane was told that she was to be married to the Duke of Northumberland's son, Guilford Dudley. The marriage took place on May 1553. Her accession to the throne took place on the 10th July 1553 and ended on the 19th July 1553, when Mary daughter of King Henry VIII, had Jane and her husband Guilford Dudley arrested. Mary had them sentenced to death; they were both beheaded on the 12th of February 1554. Both their ghosts have been seen in and around the Tower of London.

Haunted Places: How Do Houses Become Haunted - Part 1

Often over the years I have spent in the paranormal industry. I have been asked many times 'what makes a house haunted'. This is a very difficult question to answer because there are various different factors that come into the answer itself.

Some of the main factors include the history of the house, like was there any violent deaths, abuse or cruelty done to any, man,woman or child on the property. The age of the house or how old the house happens to be is also an important factor because, if there happens to be a lot of families that have lived in the house then there is a good likelihood that there were events and situations like death, un-happiness, betrayal, sickness etc.

All these things seep into the walls of the house and can leave an impression, energy or ghosts in the house. There can also to be said about the land that the house is built on. For e.g. people who were murdered, who fought in battles and whose blood seeped into the land upon there death, can leave unsettled ghostly energies or entities not only on the land but also in any house that is built on that land.

With a little more detail I will try to describe, 'what makes a house haunted'. I will do this by giving you several story examples of haunted houses and buildings so, that hopefully you can better understand what I mean.

Anne Boleyn was one of the many wives of the English King Henry VIII. Henry ruled England during the 15th century and is well known throughout history for being fickle when it came to woman. Boleyn replaced Catherine of Aragon as Henry's wife, because one woman was never enough for him. A few months's after Anne gave to birth to their first and only child, Elizabeth I. Henry's eye was already roving towards a young girl called Jane Seymour. So, he got rid of Anne by getting one of his Archbishops's to bring up false charges of adultery and incest on her. So, that she would be sentenced to death and he would be free to marry his next wife, Jane Seymour.

Anne Boleyn was beheaded at the Tower Green, which is outside the Tower of London in 1536. With her death being so violent and the falsehoods that lead to her death, it is not surprising that her headless corpse has been seen near and around the Tower of London. You would think that being headless that she would be difficult to recognize but believe or not, she has always been easily identified by her clothes. Her ghost has also been seen at Blicking Hall situated in Norfolk, which at one time in the 15th century was once her family home. It would appear that Anne's ghost has always been most active on the Anniversary of her death.

Ghosts: Famous Ghosts and Haunted Places - Part 2

Another famous haunted place is that of the Borley Rectory in Essex. A book called 'The Most Haunted House in England' by the famous Psychical Researcher, Harry Price.

The facts surrounding this particular house are that anyone who has lived in the house has never been able to stay living it. This is because of the paranormal phenonomen that has occurred in the house from 1900 to 1939. The house burnt down mysteriously in 1939, and from that time no one has lived on the site that is now a burnt out shell, so you could say that there has been no reported paranormal phenonomen since the house became ablaze.

Facts and history have been so deeply intertwined in this particular case that after so many years it is difficult to separate out the facts from the fiction or folklore. Therefore in order to give you what information I can, I shall give you everything I have read and researched on the rectory and perhaps if you are interested in the story then perhaps you can research it more on your own, and share any findings you make find.

In July of the year 1900, Ethel Bull the granddaughter of the Reverend Bull who built the rectory was out walking with the daughter of the then current Rector of Borley, when suddenly Ethel saw a figure of a female dressed in a nun's habit.

Throughout the years that the rectory was in use, many people saw the ghostly nun. It was said to float over the land and disappeared as soon as anyone got close. Many called the area in which the ghostly nun was often seen as the 'Nun's Walk'. Throughout the years there was and have been many theories and explanations of the ghostly nun were. Some people said that the rectory was built on a 13th century monastery. A monk was supposed to have fallen in love with a nun from a nearby convent. The monks and the other nuns discovered the lover's secret love and the nun was killed by the other nuns because of her broken vows, and some people say that is why she haunts the place that she died.

The second explanation for 'Nun's Walk' is that at some point during 1667, a nun was forced to abandon her calling to serve God in order to marry one of the sons of a family call the Waldengrave family who at that time lived in Borley Manor. It is said that she was murdered on the site of the rectory and so haunts there.

The third and last explanation for Borley Rectory is that there was once a French nun called Marie Larre, who ran from her convent in France to be with the man she loved. Unfortunately for Marie, not long after arriving in England and at Borley she had an argument with the man she loved. In a moment of violent rage her lover killed her and buried her body in the basement/cellar of the house that was on there before Borley Rectory was built. Many people believed this third theory more than any of the others. This may have been because a female jawbone and skull where found on the site as was a selection of religious artifacts.

Ghosts: Famous Ghosts and Haunted Places - Part 1

For many people seeing a title like 'Famous Ghosts and Famous Haunted Places', brings to mind images of celebrities like long deceased actors and actresses of stage and screen like Marilyn Monroe, Montgomery Clift, Carole Lombard to name but a few. Some people believe that there is nothing more to this subject of 'Famous Ghosts and Haunted Places' that old movie stars haunting movie studios and their former homes. This is most definitely not the case, because what if I told you that these older movie and stage stars is merely a thin layer of ice on a larger frozen lake.

For example; take 'The Bell Witch' evil Ghost or Poltergeist? No-one will ever know for sure. Unfortunately the story of John Bell, his family and 'The Bell Witch' was changed and the story was twisted when the story became a movie known as 'The American Haunting'. In most of the information that I have found over the years on 'The Bell Witch' there was never any mention of child abuse.

When dealing with the paranormal you need to be able to set out the facts from the fiction. In the case of the 'Bell Witch' the facts are this, that in the year 1817 in Robertson County, Tennessee, USA. That a man called John Bell, his wife, four sons and his daughter Betsy had several paranormal experiences with a negative forces. That this negative force seemed to focus at first only on Betsy and then late on John himself.

At first these paranormal experiences were just noises were just noises like scratching on the walls and knocks that were from no physical person or animal. Then without warning bed clothes were being pulled off the beds while the family slept in them, and their was the sounds of some one choking in the middle of the night. There were sounds of furniture being moved and stones being thrown.

It was a period of time when all this happened already that the physical attacks started on John's daughter Betsy. The facts state that Betsy was slapped across the face so hard that you could hear the blow, and that a pattern of a hand appeared in red an her face. That her hair was pulled violently on many occasions causing her a lot of pain to Betsy. To everyone that was involved there was no doubt that the main focus of the attacks were against Betsy.

The facts also state that the person John Bell approached was in fact a lay preacher who called James Johnson. That the negative malevolent force began to communicate with the family first by whistling and then with actual words.

When the negative and malevolent forces started in on John, it told John and his family that it would now attack John with such force that it would kill him. From there John was attacked violently, first his jaw swelled up and then he began to suffer from severe spasms and convulsions. Finally John Bell's body could take no more he fell into a coma and never awoke.

When the head of the family John himself died, it was said that the negative force could be heard to cry out with a wining roar that repeated just days later at John's funeral.

After John Bell's death the malevolent force seemed to leave that was until one night in 1821 as Betsy, her mother and four brothers were having dinner, that the family heard the malevolent force cry out that it was going and would never return and that is exactly what happened.