“Before I died, I went blind, I had a hemorrhage. I passed out and died in the corner on the lower floor”- such a revelation from the other world makes me numb with horror. Even scarier, that rough, husky male voice sounded from 11-year-old Janet Hodgson. Preserved tape recordings made 2 years after the death of the owner of the voice, Bill Wilkins.
Everything that happened in the distant 1970s in Anfield, located in the north of London, was very similar to the script of horror films. But the events, unfortunately, were quite real. The phenomenon was named the Enfield Poltergeist almost immediately. The public was shocked, agitated and puzzled by this scary story.
The street in Anfield where it all happened (modern photo)
About 30 people witnessed the poltergeist with all the classic moments of its manifestation. The room was getting colder, things and furniture moved in the air, making inconceivable sinusoids, inscriptions suddenly appeared on the walls, puddles on the floor, and matches ignited by themselves.
In addition, an unknown force grabbed those present either by the leg or by the arm, preventing them from moving. But the most eerie sight was the girl, who began to speak in the voice of the late Wilkins. And even after his death, he did not skimp on obscene expressions.
Of course, there were also skeptical people who believed that all this was just a well-prepared rally, a trick. But no one was able to prove that this is so. But the son of the deceased fully confirmed the words of his father, coming from the girl.
Recording with conversation. The girl answers questions in a male voice and calls herself Bill.
Promotional video:
FIRST CALL
The characters of the tragedy that unfolded on August 30, 1977 were the mother and four children of the Hodgson's: Johnny, Janet, Billy and Margaret. The family, shortly before the events, moved to a small apartment building in Anfield. As usual, in the evening the mother put the children to bed and was about to leave the nursery, when Janet began to complain that her and her brother's beds were vibrating strangely.
Mrs. Hodgson did not attach any importance to the girl's words and, as it turned out, in vain. In the evening of the next day, upstairs, where the children’s bedrooms were, there was a vague noise. The alarmed mother rushed into Janet's room, from where, as it seemed to her, this sound was coming.
Entering the room, the woman froze with fear. The heavy chest of drawers moved on the floor by itself. Trying not to scare her daughter even more, she tried to put the furniture back in place, but it didn't work. The chest of drawers resisted, someone or something continued to push it towards the door.
Later, Janet mentioned this evening in her notes and added that when the chest of drawers moved, she clearly heard the shuffling of someone's feet. And her sister Margaret recalled that the house was increasingly filled with strange sounds, so the children could not sleep for a long time.
And sometimes it became so scary that they were forced to run out into the street in only dressing gowns and slippers so as not to hear or see what was happening.
NOTING TRACES
The woman and the children were very scared and turned to their neighbor Vic Nottingham for help. It seemed that nothing could frighten this strong, big man. However, entering a neighbor's house, he heard the same sounds, which, according to him, were carried from everywhere - from the walls, from the ceiling.
Then Margaret recalled that she had never seen a neighbor in such confusion and horror. The police, which Mrs. Hodgson called after Vic left, did not help them either. The perplexed police officers said it was not their responsibility to investigate such cases.
A shot from the British mini-series (3 episodes) "The Enfield Haunting", released in 2015 based on this story.
We can say that all this looks like a fiction, a rigged trick, as the skeptics claimed, only some of the eyewitnesses managed to take a few pictures of what was happening. One of them shows how the poltergeist lifted Janet and threw her with such force that the girl flew to the other side of the room. In the photograph, the distorted face clearly shows that she is in great pain. It is unlikely that a child would deliberately hurt himself.
The photographer Graham Morris himself said that when a poltergeist appeared in the house, a real chaos was created, people screamed with fear, things moved through the air, as in telekinesis.
Janet during another attack of poltergeist
But not everyone is lucky enough to receive video and photographic material. Later, a camera crew from a local TV channel was specially invited to the house, which installed cameras throughout the house to record the appearance of a poltergeist.
When, a few days later, they began to look at the footage, they found that all the equipment was defective, and what they managed to shoot was erased.
THIS HOUSE WE HAVE
It became clear that one cannot do without specialists here. The unfortunate family turned for help from the Society for Psychical Research, which had existed in Great Britain for over a century and was engaged in the study of human abilities, namely psychic and paranormal.
As a result, two specialists of this society, Guy Playfair and Maurice Grosse, began to constantly stay in the house. By the way, on this occasion, they later released the book "This House Is Obsessed".
In his book, Grosse wrote that as soon as he was in the house, he immediately realized that all this was not anyone's joke. He noted the constant feelings of anxiety, fear and anxiety that the whole family was in. The author saw with his own eyes how parts of a children's designer and a shard of marble were flying around the room. Grosse was surprised that the items were hot.
And then the poltergeist, apparently, got used to new people and made a real orgy: the sofa flew from wall to wall, the rest of the furniture crawled around the room, and at night someone pushed sleeping household members and their guests out of a warm bed.
One day the men heard Billy scream. The boy shouted that someone was holding his leg and he could not escape. In the literal sense of the word, adults had to fight an invisible force to take the child away from her.
The family was at the limit, especially the knocking that did not subside for a minute was on the nerves. It became louder and quieter, moving from walls to ceiling and back. In the end, the inhabitants of the house began to sleep in the same room and never turned off the lights.
For two years the researchers worked at the Hodgson home and carefully recorded their observations. As it turned out later, in two years they witnessed more than 1.5 thousand cases of poltergeist.
UNIT Tightens
I must say that paranormal activity was directed not only at family members, but at everyone in the house - guests, police officers, neighbors, journalists. But the biggest hit was 11-year-old Janet. When the girl plunged into a state of trance, it was an eerie sight. After Janet did not remember anything and was very surprised when she was shown pictures of the poltergeist. She had her own point of view on what was happening.
She believed that the power that possesses her is not evil. And the poltergeist did not want to harm the family, rather, he wanted to become a member of the family and find peace of mind in this. And he had no other way to express it, except through Janet and Margaret. Once a curtain wrapped around the girl's neck, and the mother with difficulty unraveled the knot that had begun to tighten.
And on another occasion, someone with force tore out the grate and threw it into a far corner. Janet believed that it was the deceased in the Wilkins house who was angry at the misunderstanding and was defending his territory. Why did Janet choose the poltergeist? In her opinion, the reason is that she was playing with the Ouija board.
There were, of course, moments that cast doubt on the authenticity of the events. For example, researchers once found that children were sitting quietly in their room and bending spoons. Or they are not allowed to enter the room when Janet speaks in a male voice.
But a few years later, the children admitted that if they had rigged the pranks, it was only a couple of times to see if the researchers could distinguish a real poltergeist from a rigged one. To the credit of Playfair and Grosse, they always succeeded.
LIFE AFTER CONTACT
It should be said right away that Janet is currently doing well, she got married and lives in Essex. But the girl had to undergo treatment in a psychiatric hospital. She now describes her experiences of those years as traumatic. Her portrait featured on the cover of the Daily Star with the caption "Possessed by the Devil."
At school, Janet was teased by her peers, at home it was just scary, plus enduring concern for her family, and, as it turned out, it was not in vain. Her brother Billy was called "a freak from a house with a ghost", no one wanted to communicate with him. He died of cancer at a very young age, at the age of 14. Soon her mother also died of cancer. And Janet's son died in his sleep when he was only 18 years old.
Now Janet continues to argue that all the events of those years are real, this is not an attempt to earn fame and money. She recalls that even when everything in the house was calm, there was still someone's presence and a studying look. And I am sure that if the poltergeist is not provoked, as in her case, with a board for spiritualism, then you can completely coexist with him.
Currently, new residents live in the house, but it is not known whether something is happening there or not.