This story is amazing already because it lasted for ten years and all this time its main characters were not only people, but also spirits.
It all began in 1907, when the Anglican Church bought the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, which had a rich history and seven centuries ago was at its zenith thanks to the crowds of pilgrims rushing to the burial place of King Arthur.
But by the time the abbey was acquired, no one knew where its main sanctuaries were. Excavations were needed. Their organization and implementation, the church appointed a recognized authority in the field of Gothic architecture, 43-year-old archaeologist Frederick Bligh Bond.
He was entrusted with finding two chapels, whose location by this time had become an insoluble mystery for everyone. However, due to lack of funds, excavations were carried out much slower than the archaeologist would have liked. And therefore, in order to solve the problem as soon as possible, Bond, who was also an ardent admirer of parapsychology, decided to resort to contact with the other world through automatic writing.
On the afternoon of November 7, 1907, Bond and his friend John Alleyn Bartlett, who had a solid background in automatic writing, sat down at Bond's Bristol office to try for the first time to negotiate with the long-dead.
Bartlett lowered the sharpened point of his pencil to the white sheet of paper, and Bond gently touched his free hand. After wandering aimlessly over the paper for a while, the pencil began to draw outlines in which Bond recognized the plan for Glastonbury Abbey.
Frederick Bligh Bond
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Then the pencil drew a rectangle in the eastern part of the monastery, and after being asked for details, the pencil (or the creature that controlled it through Bartlett) confirmed that it was Edgar's chapel built by Abbot Beer.
Then the pencil marked another chapel, north of the main abbey building.
When asked who wrote all this, the answer was: "Johannes Bryant, monk and free mason" (that is, a freemason). After four days, they managed to find out that Bryant died in 1533 and was the keeper of the chapel during the reign of Henry VII.
Besides Bryant, other monks of Glastonbury Abbey came into contact with Bond and Bartlett, each of whom had his own individual handwriting, faithfully reproduced by Bartlett on paper.
During those few months of spiritualistic communion, the long-dead monks gave the archaeologist and his friend a number of very useful information about the ancient buildings of the monastery.
Finally, in May 1909, Bond began excavating. But before starting them, he still doubted for some time: whether to follow the instructions from the other world, or just rely on luck. And Bond chose the first option.
At the appointed time, exactly in the place where the pencil drew the first rectangle, the excavators dug a trench and discovered a high, ten meters long, wall, the existence of which no one had ever suspected. Further excavations led to the emergence of the skeleton of an architectural structure, which could not be anything other than the Edgar's chapel.
The longer the excavation continued, the more Bond became convinced of the reliability of automatic writing. So, for example, the spirits told him that the roof of the chapel was painted in gold and crimson. Indeed, workers began to come across arched decorations with traces of gold and crimson paint.
Or else: the monks claimed that the chapel windows were made of blue mosaic glass. Indeed, among the ruins, the corresponding fragments were found. This was especially surprising because only white and gold glass was characteristic of that period.
Bond was even more surprised by the monks' assertion that there was a door in the eastern part of the chapel leading to the street. This was hard to believe, if only because in most churches there are no doors at all behind the altar. But Edgar's chapel was an exception.
Bond's "Gate of Memory"
The spirits of the abbey monks even told Bond the size of the chapel. This already exceeded all conceivable expectations of the archaeologist, and he, naturally, was rather skeptical about this information. But the monks in this case were right …
For ten years, Bond kept secret the source of his amazing ability to literally see underground.
And he was cautious not because he was afraid of the ridicule of his colleagues. The reason lay in something completely different: the Anglican Church could not stand spiritism.
And when in 1918 Bond published his book "The Gate of Memory", where he described in detail the history of his communication with "eyewitnesses" of historical events, everything was over. Bond's career collapsed.
Provisions for further excavation have been cut. In 1922, the archaeologist was permanently suspended from work at Glastonbury Abbey.
Frederick Bly Bond spent the rest of his life in the United States, doing, however, not archeology, but spiritualism. He died in 1945 in loneliness, poverty and anger.