A true story from the ex-president of the British interdenominational exorcist foundation

(Taken from an exorcists chronicles, a book in preparation)

Lea Bridge Rd. in Leyton, east London, was the venue of a bizarre incident which ranks as a text book case of a most macabre haunting, in the early 1970s. Just past the rail station on the bridge itself stood a batch of early Victorian houses, which had been empty for some time having been purchased by the council in a road widening scheme. The end house was the “Jailhouse”, rock and roll club, and was a magnet for motorbike lads from a wide area. It was these lads that informed me that a house next door had a peculiar and scary feel to it.

On entering this house, like a lot of houses of this period, the smell of must and damp tickled the nostrils; this can be attractive to a certain types of spirit. Walking the house I made the assessment that if it was haunted it was of a very minor category say a 2 or a 3. Stopping outside to look back at this large old house, which must have been an impressive building in its day, I noticed that like the others it was a 3 storey building, and for some reason I had seen only 2 in that house.

So, I went back searching upstairs and I could find no sign of a third storey. I then began tapping round the walls and came across a hollow sounding panel, which felt like it was plaster boarded over with flowery wallpaper on top. The houses were due to be demolished anyway so I put my foot through the hollow sounding false wall to be amazed by a small upper staircase standing behind.

After mounting the stairs and assessing the wallpaper as perhaps pre-war (1940), which gave an indication of age, I felt it would soon give up its secrets as to why someone would block off a whole top storey. Standing at the top of the house and taking in the fact that I was the only person to be here for decades and looking at newspapers strewn over the floor for the dates on them, they were all discoloured wartime papers, and I listened to what I thought were the increasingly noisy pigeons in the loft. It was then that I realised that this room also was smaller than it should have been and obviously there was a false wall here too.

Very suddenly the atmosphere in the room changed, my hackles on the back of my neck felt as if there was a cold hair dryer blowing up and down my back, my legs went weak, and I almost lost control of my bowels. My aura quickly drew in very close as in situations of great danger, the feeling that there was a wild animal threatening was quite similar, the knowledge that hate filled eyes were watching me from a walled off room overtook my curiosity, the noise from the so called pigeons in the roof rose to a crescendo, and my only feeling was one of utter terror.

As I ran down the newly discovered stairs, I did not stop until I reached the street to analyse my feeling; the thought dawned on me with deep humiliation that here was I who was regarded as an expert in these matters, who gave talks the length and breadth of the country, brought in to placate and understand things such as this and I ran away in great fear, and cowardice. The correct procedure is to re-enter the haunted property say the lords prayer, while burning certain herbs and grasses, throw holy water and get out quick, while arranging a rescue circle to come in later to clear up any infestation.

But on no account, as I threw up my dinner in the street outside, was I prepared to go inside again. It was actually several weeks later when a couple of demolition workers who had been knocking down the houses for the road widening scheme, told me excitedly that up in the sealed off top of the house, had been found a skeleton of a man sealed into the wall, and I was presented with the ancient handcuffs that held his wrists together, which I have to this day, and as my own children remind me when they were small and naughty they would have to spend one whole minute in the handcuffs, which now adorn my fireplace.

Funnily enough visitors to my home are instantly drawn to them, yet all say they still have a sinister feel to them. I heard a story going round some time later that during world war two, Winston Churchill emptied the prisons to serve on the Russian convoys, because the British had broken the German intelligence codes. We knew which of our ships would be sunk, so Churchill in his wisdom bought at great cost an out of date First World War fleet of battle ships from America, solely to act as decoys for the German U-boats, thus keeping them off the ships he wanted kept safe.

Anyway the upshot was that it was believed that several of these criminals had escaped, not wanting this appointed fate, and one had come to find his mother who lived locally, made demands for her savings to get away, and ended up in the wall. For the spirit of a man to remain with the body,  shows that the  usual fear of having to pay for ones sins prevents the soul from passing through what the bible refers to as “the second death”.

I do feel in this case, that the sense of solid evil, which is not that normal in matters such as this, is telling inasmuch as this soul refused to go on perhaps because it needed a Christian burial. Sometimes people who have led crime-ridden lives, on realising that even at death they must face their actions, can be spiritually indigestible and can strike cold fear into the hardest heart; so exorcism should be primarily a healing experience.

Souls such as this need closure in order to progress, how they sustain themselves in this twilight zone, between worlds for sometimes many years, is one of the secrets of vampirism. But the tale of the hunt for the Waltham Cross vampire is another story.

What skeletons do you have in your cupboards?

© copyright T. Stokes, 2001