POLTERGEIST TERRORS | The True Story of The Black Monk of Pontefract | Paranormal Podcast (Ep 339)

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We're gonna be talking about the black monk of Pontifract in the most haunted house in Britain. She finds her gloves walking into the room. So Ma screams and she begins singing a song from church hoping it would repel the evil. But instead, the gloves dance along to the song and then they start conducting her singing.

No way.

They didn't think that the spirit meant any harm until the night the house tried to steal Diane. Yeah. Yeah.

Very spooky.

Hello. Hey, this is two girls, one ghost. Two girls, one ghost, and we are

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your ghostesses. That is Karen.

Hello.

I'm Sabrina. Hello.

live show announcement

I have kind of a horrifying story that feels horrifying, but it's not paranormal.

Okay. Well, before we get into horrifying things, can we talk about exciting things and then terrify everyone?

Okay.

Okay. So, we have exciting things to talk about. One, we have a live show coming up.

Mhm.

October 8th, Wednesday. It's in Boston or outside of Boston. It's in Somerville at the Arts at the Armory. It's one night only. Just a little dabble. Dipping our toes again in the in the show space.

We're trying to be spooky. It's Halloween. It's spooky season.

And we realized we have an investigation that we did and we've done talked about.

It's just been sitting in the vault beyond

and it was a really scary one,

especially for you.

Yeah. So, now we're going to talk about it and maybe we'll give you some tips on how to be a paranormal investigator. And the tips are you can just do it because we can do it. If we can do it, you can do it. Um but yeah, so come join us.

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There are a limited amount of tickets available. So get your tickets and I don't know, maybe if we sell it out, we'll do another. Cut that. I'm kidding. We're not. But yeah, come see us. Uh and there's some meet and greet tickets, too. So yeah, come see us in less than a month. during spooky season.

Spooky

Salem.

Corinne's horror story

Okay, here's my spooky spooky creepy thing that happened to me yesterday.

So, a little backstory. Maybe five weeks ago, 6 weeks ago, my car started smelling like mildew and I was like, "Ew, this is so gross." And I thought it was a box that I had in the back of my car that I meant to like do returns for like 4 days and hadn't. So, I was like, "The cardboard's like reeks." Took the cardboard out, still smells, and it's getting like worse and worse and worse. And I was like, "This is so nasty." And I was like airing out my car, windows down. I couldn't figure it out. Then I had someone come and like detail my car. It's better for like one day and then

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the scent returns.

Okay.

Then a few weeks ago, the nastiest like sulfur smell and then like gross dead animal body starts coming through

my air vents.

And I was like, I recognize this smell because my parents had this one time in Vermont where like a mouse makes a nest. So it's like there's a mouse nest, but the mouse nest is different from this other smell. So now I have two rancid smells in my car.

Oh, so they're both coexisting.

They're coexisting. So yesterday I bring my car in and I'm like, there is just horrible odor coming from my car. I think there's something dead in here. You guys need to figure out what's going on. The whole thing reeks. They come out. They were like, "Okay, the appointment's going to take about like 2 hours probably to diagnose what's wrong and then we'll make a plan from there." diagnosis. Find what's in your car.

20 minutes later, they come out with a pair of goggles and say, "Put these on. You have to come back."

It's a double whammy.

I go back. There's what I expected,

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right? Like a mouse nest is in the like cabin filtration system or whatever, which normally they can get it out, clean it out, whatever. The odors.

I'm like so nervous where this is going and I don't want it to be what I'm scared it is.

What do you think it is?

Like a cat?

No. Oh,

they peel back cuz like it, you know,

snakes.

No.

Okay, sorry. I'm just

My brain is going to so many different places. The suspense.

Oh my. It's something I had never heard of. And when I told my parents, they were like, "We've literally never heard of that happening." But they said it happens all the time. Like the dealership was like, "This is so common." And I'm like, "What the fuck?" So the passenger side seat, like the where you put your feet, they peel up the plastic mat and there's like an inch and a half of water just sitting there because spiders crawled in to my air conditioning like filter and built such a big nest. There's like a horde of spiders in my car deep within it that it

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backed up all of the condensation and was dripping back into my car. So, I'm so lucky that mice and spiders didn't just suddenly bust out of my air conditioning. Isn't that

I'm so horrific.

So, they had me wear goggles and then they're like, "What do you need from the car?" I was like, "The car seat." And then they just like quickly put me in a loner and we're like, "We'll see you in a few weeks from now."

Okay. Brian needs to get his car checked out. I'm going to go get my car checked out spider infestation in your neighborhood. But the weird thing, well, we do live in a very wooded area. But like the weird thing is when I first was talking to like I told the technicians like here's what I think is wrong, whatever. And then I'm talking to the woman at the front who's like putting in all my information and doing all that and I was like, yeah, like I have this really weird mildew smell and I can't figure out what it is. And she's like, hm. She's like, well, I don't know. But one thing we get a lot is like the spider thing. And she had already told me that. So she said it happens all the time.

I'm sick.

Which isn't that disgusting? I've never

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heard of that.

I've already been terrified of dying in a car and now I'm adding this.

Yeah, there was nothing I could have done to prevent this. Like my car is super clean. There's not like crumb. Like you'd be Well, no. I was too young to like make a huge mess.

Like spiders. Like spiders don't necessarily go to crumbs. They just

parking outside. And then my mom was like, "Oh, okay. Well, maybe that makes sense because apparently in Vermont, I'm sure this is everywhere."

I'm sorry. I just need another second to process. You've had you've had the night. I'm not okay.

It's nasty. I had an infestation of spiders and mice in my car

and I was breathing in their nasty scent. I was like, every time I had to drive, I had the windows down and they could have had access to me. Can you imagine driving and just

they have access to you?

Yeah. E Do you think they are watching me through the vest?

Yeah, they've been watching you. Nasty. I really like this is going to take days for me to process

and it's all because I parked my car outside for like a month

and I parked my car outside all the

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time,

right?

I'm throwing my car out. I'm walking everywhere. Oh my gosh. Okay. Well, I have different horrors to share with you today cuz I need to move on. I have actual

Sabrina's Marblehead house encounter

ghost horrors to share.

Great.

And I have one personal which I've shared with you already.

Mhm. But I'm going to share it with everyone else because it's not fair if I just keep it to myself or we keep it to ourselves. So I've shared the history and the hauntings of the house that I own in Marblehead. How there's just like

mostly very positive energy, but there is one space in the house that has been confirmed by a psychic who came to do a reading of the house. Chris, whoever I talked about on the podcast before, she's great, fabulous. Works at Pentagram in Salem,

Massachusetts.

If you guys ever want to go get a reading, check her out. Go visit Chris. Tell her I sent you. But there's one space in the house that just kind of has like a weird vibe, weird energy.

When Chris was at the house, she's like, this she's doing the reading outside of the house. She's like,

it feels like this like rock and it's in

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a corner. And I was like, there's literally a rock like that in the basement of the house. I mean, you can see the literal stone that the house was built on top of. So, my dad comes to visit and my dad is famously paranormally in tune. And I don't tell him anything about the house. And he goes, "Tell me about the spirits." And I was like, "You know, they're all good, positive. Um, but there is one area of the house that's got a weird vibe." And I was like, "But I'm not going to tell you what area. Like, I want you to see if you can figure it out."

And he looks at me, he goes, "I think I know what it is already." Cuz he had at that point like done walked one lap through the house, right?

Wow. Oh, I didn't realize that.

He takes me back into the house and he's showing me. He's like walking directly to the space and he walks towards like the back door area which has a door down to the basement where that corner is. Like it's right above that corner.

He's walking towards it. His entire body, I'm watching it happen, gets goosebumps. His hair is like standing up on his arms and he's like, "It's right

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here, isn't it?" I just can't believe it. Like it's just so wild that he's that tapped in. Yeah. And it makes me wonder what your like how your dad interacts with all the other places that he goes. Like how I mean you told the story the other day about like when he just saw he was at like a party and

right like the little girl and then the guy that wasing right like what is your dad's life anyway? But what do you have a ghost?

I thought you were gonna tell the story about your mom.

Oh it's small. She was listening. She pressed play on Two Girls on Ghost the other day like on the podcast and then she nothing happened except for just it was like dead air and then a man who she said sounds like he's in his 20s or 30s saying hey and she was like that's weird and she looked down and the podcast had paused. So then she went back and played it again thinking like maybe it was just like an ad and it timed out or something. There's nothing. It was just Sabrina talking about Scotland and haunted bars and places saying hey.

Yep. Did you play the EVPs of the voice

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saying, "Hey." Yeah.

Oh, no. I didn't.

Okay. So, we have so many EVPs of Sven or who we think is Sven saying things on our podcast from over the years. So, we have to play that for Deb.

Yeah. Because there was one spe we we've had many EVPs on

Mhm.

that people have identified, but there's specifically like a few years apart, there's an EVP or EVPs of what sounds like the exact same voice speaking through. And that was like different apartments, different states, like different places that we were recording from. And so it makes no sense.

Mhm.

That we'd get the same exact voice if it like happened to be someone just like walking by or something. It's Sven.

It's Sven. And that voice sounded like a man in his 20s and 30s. So stay tuned.

Stay tuned.

It's a continuing experience of hauntings here at Two Girls One Ghost because we're spooky and we're haunted.

intro Black Monk of Pontefract

Um, and so too is this house that I'm going to tell you about.

Ooh, okay.

So, a couple weeks ago, I told you about

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Scotland's most haunted house.

Mhm.

I didn't realize that this was Britain's most haunted house, but here I am two weeks later telling you about Britain's most haunted house.

Sounds like that little cluster of islands is coming back to you.

I got to go. Actually, this is I I don't think this is a place where I will go visit, but

Okay. It's 30 East Drive in Pontifract, West Yorkshire, England.

Wow. I'm just super impressed that you were able to say that without looking at your notes.

Oh, thank you. I don't think I would have been able to.

This is one of those episodes where I feel like I'll hardly look at my notes because it's just like within you now.

And it's it just like researches and reads like a movie. Like it feels fake.

Yeah.

It reminds me a lot of the Surreal Possession. a lot of different poltergeist possession type stories we've talked about in the past.

And I will give a little warning that I in doing the research for this episode

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had some weird paranormal activity and not like paranormal activity. I'll say weird electrical interference or technological interference.

Oh, interesting. off writing with writing like when I was trying to download the episode, it kept like short circuiting and like not allowing allowing me to download because I I have my Microsoft on so I have to download my research onto my desktop. It wouldn't download. I was trying to watch like a couple YouTube videos about it and they similar to like how your mom's podcast like would pause and just do things.

I was sitting in my house with all my Wi-Fi. every other web browser was working. But when I would play the videos, it would like, you know, when you have no internet connection, it will basically time out and go to a web page that says like no internet connection. It would do that a couple times, but every other browser would work. And I'd open a new tab and I'd go to the video again and it would work. But when I would press play, it would say no internet connection. I tried to listen to a podcast episode about this topic. Same thing. It kept saying and I was on

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my phone that I had no service. Okay, that's a lot. You just said like there was a little bit of said like that's a ton.

Normally we have no idea which episodes are going to be haunted.

Yeah.

Like when people experience things, but I think we can probably safely guess that this is going to be one of them because the other times we've had tech issues.

Yeah.

Trying to tell a story, people have experienced a ton.

Right. That's true.

So So hold on to your butts and Oh, I'll tell you a funny story. real quick.

Okay.

Cuz you came to Campfire Stories yesterday, so you didn't get to hear this. But one of my favorite things that I have done as an aunt is teach No, and I'll play two short videos.

No, guess what?

Chicken.

Chicken butt. And then this one.

No.

Yeah.

Guess what?

Chicken.

Her little voice. Are you kidding me?

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I'm obsessed with it. I feel like I'm watching an episode of Bluey. Like, this feels fake. This is so cute.

Yeah.

Chicken.

Oh my gosh, she's so cute.

She's so cute.

I feel like you're so happy whenever you see her.

I think we're soul tied. Okay, so we're going to be talking about the black monk of Pontifract and the most haunted house in Britain. Driving by you would see an unassuming brick house beneath a cloud covered sky. And driving by this house, you probably wouldn't even notice it because it is along a street with very, very similar brick houses.

They all look the same,

right? But today, while listening, you will hear of a violent poltergeist that terrorized an innocent family, tearing their life to shreds. It is a true horror story that'll leave a lasting impression, taint your dreams, tarnishing their picturesque landscapes, their sunny dispositions, and turning them into horrific nightmares. It is a

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house so haunted, it has even inspired a horror film.

Oh, and like most horror films, especially paranormal ones, how do they start? A bright sunshiny day, it's move in day.

I was just going to say family moves in.

move in day

Yep. Oh man,

move in day.

It never starts with like the last family scrambling out of there. And I feel like it should start with that now.

It should, but but in this story and so many others, the previous families don't experience anything, which is so bizarre.

It's so bizarre. And and that's like again with the Smural possession case and with what we'll learn with this case, like it doesn't make sense

how it starts, how it ends. It's just like we don't have answers. Um, and this is one of those cases that so many people witnessed paranormal activity for themselves that it is really, really hard to discredit it. But then there's also no like I wish that they had record of everything. And it's like, how can

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things like this exist? How can stories and real life experiences like the smurl possession cases take place and people have such doubt about the paranormal?

I don't know. That's why I wish there was so much more evidence.

Well, it's in so many of these cases there is a lot of evidence. Like teams will be brought in and they'll record all this stuff, but still it's like people just choose to not believe. Still they're like, "Oh, these 10 or 12 experts like they were just looking for something. They're making it up." Like it's just so much easier to believe that this doesn't exist when it's this terrifying because what can you do?

You're I mean that's what the family helpless.

Yeah. Okay. It's August 1966. Move in day for the Pritchard family. The couple, Gan and Joe Pritchard, are standing before their new home, a modest, semi- detached council house at 30 East Drive in Pontifact. Their two children, Phillip, who is 15, and Diane, who is 12, are standing beside them, and they are all really excited about moving in. Their aunt and cousins like live

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right down the road. Their grandmother lives close by. Like, they're moving closer to family.

Um,

it's going to be fun and nice and Everyone's going to get together and barbecue and

tea. She's really excited to like raise her family here, watch her family grow, watch her kids grow up.

So, there's a lot of dynamics here with this family, right? Philip is 15.

Philip is also just like that's a horror movie name.

Well, yeah. It's like Conjuring Phillip, too,

right? Like Philip the Goat.

Like it's like Reagan, Philip.

Phillip, Damian. Like those names are

But truly, this episode is going to make you say poor Diane because you'll hear in a minute. But so he's 15 and when you're 15 you're not like best friends with your parents. You're kind of rebelling. You are trying to make your own name for yourself.

Yeah. You're maybe spending time in the basement.

Yeah. And Philip is a very studious book forward kid where he doesn't get along that well with his dad because his dad is more of like a man's man. A sports

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dude.

Yeah.

That him and Philip don't really have a ton to connect on.

Yeah. And Philip's just like busy reading Game of Thrones and

Exactly.

didn't exist back then, but yes. The equivalent of what I mean.

1966.

Okay. 1966.

Yeah.

And Diane is 12 and she's in a very childish place. Still, like really excited. She sees bikes at a house nearby. She's like, "Oo, there's going to be other kids that I can hang out with." But they're moving in. There's something very inviting about this home, something hopeful. And it's a symbol of a fresh start, new beginnings. And Joe walks to the front door, keys in hand, and he unlocks the home, unknowingly stepping into and welcoming his family into what they think is their dream home,

but turns into their very own prison of nightmares. Dusk falls on the very first day, and something in the house shifts as it decides it's going to reject its new owners. Something lurks in the air as the home studies the Pritchard family, deciding

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just how it's going to torture them over the next few years. Okay, right up front, I'm going to try to do a spin on what these really horrifying demonic hauntings could be. What if these demons aren't trying to be bad and harm the family and target them, but instead the reason this family is experiencing something so horrific and other families and tenants haven't before is because this is almost like a dark spirit guide where like something horrible might happen to one of them in the family or the whole family if they continue to stay here. like they see something in the future and so they're giving their best shot at scaring the [ __ ] out of them to make them leave this home or leave this town

like a final destination like you you cheat death. I give you one gold sticker for effort

but a D minus on predicting what happens.

This feels like my freaking philosophy class all over again.

Oh my god. Philosophy was impossible.

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And I think like philosophy teachers like failing you to see what happens to you.

They do. And it's like it's philosophy. Like

how can you be wrong?

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the first outbreak

get into the first outbreak. So, almost immediately after moving into the home, their dream home, the Pritchard family starts to realize that they're not alone. There's a sense of being watched, like someone or something is lurking in the shadows. But to them, they're like, "Oh, it's a new house. We just moved in." You know, who knows? We're adjusting. We're learning this new home. And I think it's like September. There's a holiday weekend. Joe, Jean, and Diane all go on a vacation. I don't know why Philip didn't go. Maybe he didn't want to go, but he stays home. with grandma

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Sarah. And it's just the two of them. They're at home.

Mhm.

And during her first night, Sarah wakes up to a cold gust of wind blowing through the house. And she's like, "Weird. Did I just like get a shiver and wake up?"

Yeah.

Or what is it? So, she doesn't really think it's

draft coming through open window somewhere.

Exactly. So, she doesn't think anything of it. She goes back to sleep. She thinks it's just her imagination. But, as she's going back to sleep, she feels this unsettling feeling that someone is in the room with her. Mhm. Again, new house, first time staying here. Doesn't think anything of it. Then the next morning, she goes into the kitchen. She's making breakfast and she starts hearing like rattling and banging as if someone's like running around and someone's slamming at a door. She thinks it's Philillip. He's 15. Maybe he's like running about upstairs.

Yeah, but that's also weird. Likeif a 15-year-old, they're like hunched over and lugging their bodies around the house.

Sure. But like slamming a door make, you know.

Yeah. Yeah, I guess. So she goes to go tell him breakfast is ready and she's

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surprised to find he's still asleep in bed. So another weird thing again doesn't think much of it. Later Sarah grandma is sitting in the living room and she's knitting and Philip walks into the living room and sees I don't know how to describe this but basically she's sitting knitting and he sees this like layer of dust pouring down on her and it's not pouring from the ceiling. It is coming from like she's sitting. It's coming from right here. And it's almost as if like a cloud was like in the atmosphere pouring this little dust particles down on her.

Ew. I hate that. Like there was actual like debris sediment

to the point where when he brings this to his grandma's attention, they like she notices it

and looks in her coffee mug and there's an inch of dust that has settled in her coffee mug. Which scares me because it's like she's she's saying dust but like it makes me think it's ash or something. You know

what is this?

Yeah. No idea. So grandma is now like

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what the [ __ ] is this? This is weird. Her daughter. So Philillip's aunt and I think it's Joe's sister.

There's a lot of people. I'm already I'm already like trying to figure out.

It's going to be confusing. But basically there are a lot of players here and a lot of family that lives in this neighborhood. So grandma calls her other daughter Marie to come over who lives across the way. Okay.

And is like

Philip's aunt.

Philip's aunt is that

Philip is our main

Okay, we'll go off the kids. Okay.

So, Philip's aunt to come over. Marie comes over and she sees this and she's like, "Well, yeah, that's that's weird. What is this?" But then like more than anything, she's like, "Okay, well,

that's weird, but it stopped."

Mhm.

And now there's just like this dust laying around and Jean, Joe, and Diane are going to come back in a couple days like, "We got to clean this up." So, she goes over to the kitchen to get cleaning supplies. And as she's walking over there, she slips in a puddle. Which also I have to say, like if I were them, I wouldn't think anything paranormal at this point. I would totally be like, "My

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family has just bought this house with their kids to move into and it is falling apart."

100%. So, she slips in this puddle. She's like, "Well, that's annoying." You know, she doesn't think anything of it. Maybe there's just a puddle.

So, then she mops it up. But the second that she gets the like towel up with the water and sees that the water has been cleaned up off the floor, this water puddle rematerializes out of thin air continuously. This happens over and over. Every time she wipes it up, puddle appears again.

Is it water? I wonder.

I don't know. But then a weird green foam starts to appear, too. So they're now they're like, "Is there also a leak in the house? Like is this like a pipe or something?" So there's some sort of like weird chemical like Yeah.

Cuz why what I'm like trying to wrap my brain around like what could even possibly be a green foam

other than like a building material or some sort of like chemical

or like Yeah. What's in the what's in the pipes?

Yeah,

this is concerning, right?

So they call the waterboard to investigate. The waterboard sends

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someone over immediately. There are no pipes that are broken. There are no leaks. They literally lift up the lenolium floor. There is no cause for this mysterious continuous appearing puddle. Keep in mind also if there's a leak this puddle would be growing,

right? And you would hear some if it was coming from up above you'd be able to clearly see it. You'd see the condensation and like the drip.

If it's from underneath like

there's zero explanation. They cannot find a single thing. So the waterboard leaves. So Marie goes home now leaving Philip and his grandma alone at the house again.

Okay. and they're like, "Okay, well, I guess we just like continue with our lives." And they're in the kitchen when all of a sudden like tea is starting to be like thrown. And then they're like, "What is this?" And as they're trying to figure it out,

it's funny cuz it's like so UK. Yeah,

it's so British. As they're trying to figure out what the heck is happening, they hear a loud crash from another room. So they run over towards the sound

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and they look and find a plant has been ripped out of the pot and thrown out of the pot.

The poor plant.

The poor plant.

It's probably screaming in terror

or maybe it really needed to be repotted and this is the ghost way saying

like root rot,

take care of your plants.

Then they're like investigating this plant that has been uprooted. Mhm.

And as they're looking at this, they start hearing banging and like cutlery and plates crashing in the kitchen. So then they go back to the kitchen and nothing is a mess. Like it's all fine. They're like, "What is happening?" Sarah's like, "Grandma, this is a semi- detached house." So they share one wall with neighbors.

She's like, "It's got to be the neighbors. They must have been doing something over in their house that caused a ruckus like to rattle in our kitchen." Yeah.

She goes knocks on the door. again. I'd be like, "Weird noises in the pipes. Like, there's got to be leaking. Like, something crazy is going on in these pipes."

Yeah.

Yeah. Knocks on the door. Neighbors aren't even home.

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Great. So, that doesn't mean it's not coming from the neighbor's house. Like, maybe neighbors aren't home and there's something that broke on their side.

Mhm.

Scared, Sarah calls Marie back, Philip's aunt. Immediately upon her arrival, the house goes quiet. So, Philip goes into bed. Grandma goes to go tuck him in. She's tucking him in. She's saying good night. She's like giving him a kiss on the head. And as she's getting up, the wardrobe starts to violently shake to the point where it looks like there's a human being inside of it, moving it back and forth. Philip and grandma get up and haul ass out of the house across the street to the aunt's house. They call the police.

This is all happening in one day, one night.

They call the police to check on the house because they're like, "Someone has to be inside. Someone has to be causing all of this stuff." Like that seems like now the only logical explanation.

Please find nothing and no one in the home. So then I guess Marie the aunt is a spooky ghoul like us. And she's like,

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you know, me thinks it's a poltergeist. Oh, she jumps to that very, very quickly. And she happens to have a friend who's a paranormal investigator. His name is Mr. O'Donald. So she calls him and she's like, "Hey buddy, I've got

He thinks we have a poltergeist.

He thinks we have a poltergeist. I've got something for you to check out. He comes immediately. He's on call. He stops by 30 East Drive and stays for a couple of hours. Him and Marie are just talking, chatting about Poltergeist and he's like, "Yeah, it makes sense this is happening. Philip's 15 years old. Poltergeists are known literally the literal translation is noisy ghost."

And there have been some beliefs and speculations that they're attributed to teenager energy creating ghosts.

So he's like, "This has to do with Philip. Philip's not here now." So, the house is going to be quiet, right? Sure enough, the house is quiet. And at 1:45 a.m., O'Donald is like, "Hey, I'm going to go head out." Yeah.

So, he leaves Marie, Aunt Marie, and Uncle Vic alone in the house, they're

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going to lock up and go back across the street where grandma and Philip are sleeping. The second that O'Donald leaves, keep in mind, the last thing he says is this is directed at Philillip. The second Oddonald leaves and Marie and Vic like lock the door behind him,

they hear a loud crash upstairs.

They go up to the hallway and they find a photo has been knocked on the floor. But it's not just knocked on the floor because they look at the wall where the like the nail is.

This frame is across the hallway. So, it has been picked up, thrown,

upside down. They go to pick up the framed photo and it is a photo of Jean and Joe Pritchard on their wedding day and it has been slashed through the middle like as if something with a long talonlike nail has dug its nail across the photo

and

this is horrifying.

It's as if the spirit or whatever this is is commenting directly back on the statement of this is only about

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Philillip. Whatever this entity is that is plaguing the house wants to make it very clear this is not just about Philip. They are targeting the entire family and they are set on shattering their blissful lives. Keep in mind this is all happening with Jean, Joe and Diane not in the home.

Mhm. So a couple days later Jean, Joe and Diane return home and are immediately greeted by grandma, Phillip, aunt and uncle with these wild stories. And prior to leaving, yes, they might have felt a little bit weird in the house, but they had not had any experiences that they would have qualified as paranormal. So they are like what?

Right. They come back and then Omar is like, "You've got a poltergeist."

Yeah. And they're like, "Puts were like thrown. Your painting was whatever." Like they're all just confused.

Yeah.

They're asking a bunch of questions naturally as you would. And they're like, "Okay, what do you mean? Like what what happened?" And everyone's saying, "Oh, there were all these sounds." And so Jean, I think, asks like, "Oh, can you give any example? Like, what would

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what did the sound sound like?" And not two seconds later, is there an example given by the ghost? As she asks, "What did they sound like?" They hear three very loud bangs that shake the house that every single window rattles. Oh my god.

Three bangs. It's so wild, too, because it's not like they're moving into a neighborhood that they don't know, right? Like it'd be one thing if you're like, is there like a train or like metro or something that goes by somewhere and it like this is just the aftermath? Like their family lives across the street and down the street, right? So you would think that they've probably been here before.

Yeah. So following these three loud bangs is a gust of wind that every single person feels and then silence for two whole years.

What? Two whole years.

Huh. Absolutely.

It makes me wonder if it Yeah. if this was just like the house ghost that was Well, I know it's not cuz obviously I like him.

You said last night, too, that this is

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going to be a really scary one.

But there are some moments of levity and kind of hilarity and I'll tell you when they're coming and you'll also you'll get why you'll you'll juggle. You like, "Oh, that's silly ghost." But yeah, no, it's scary. Yeah, because otherwise like up until this point I'm like, "Oh, is this just a spirit who maybe was like attached to the old family or loved the old family or or tenants or whatever and it's just reacting in like a very confused and upset manner that there's new people there and this is how it's manifesting."

Well, and I think this is one of the other confusing parts of this this whole case is why did it have such a burst of energy and then go silent for two years? Yeah.

And I don't think we'll ever have the answer to that, but okay. So, now it's

escalation & poltergeist activity

the summer of 1968, 2 years after the first disturbances. Philip is now 17. Diane is now, what was she? 12. So, she's 14.

Mhm.

And life for the Pritchards had settled into something close to normal. Philip

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was out of school and he was working. Diane, oh, I guess at this point she's 15. Diane had grown into, you know, a more mature young woman. And these strange hauntings from two summers ago were basically distant memory. Like it was a blip in their lives. But then seemingly unprompted and out of nowhere, the hauntings returned fiercer and stranger than before. It started with one night a weird hammering sound started occurring.

So different than the bangings, but still kind of like a similar sort of display.

And then this became a nightly occurrence. H. The walls would shake. Lights would turn on and off on their own. Objects would just move across the rooms. It truly went from 2 years of silence to overnight unrelenting poltergeist activity. Again, so confused. Not to blame Philillip, but I'm like wondering if there was something that happened to him in his life when he first moved in that house and then two years later like something

35:00

else like some sort of like relationship with like a friend or a love interest or like just like something where his own anxieties or something were like heightened.

So, I'll just say like upfront, no one really knows. I do think there were a lot of family dynamics at play here

and there's a theory that one person will share like toward the end of this. But so there's a book by this guy Colin Wilson called Poltergeist, a classic study in destructive hauntings, and it's all about different poltergeist activity. And he talked to the family specifically, interviewed them, and wrote a book about their experience. But it also has a bunch of different poltergeist cases in it. And his belief along with a lot of others from what I found in my research is that the first occurrence like in 1966 when they first moved in was a poltergeist relative to Philillip. He's 15. Now Diane is 15 and they think everything that happens from

36:00

1968 towards the end of the hauntings had to do with Diane going through her own life changes. Or is this poltergeist a 15year-old maybe who's really upset about the reminder of like what happened to them when they were 15? That could be part of it and we'll get there eventually.

Okay, that could be. And no one's really like theorized about that, but it could be. Okay, just days after the activity starts, the family is like, "Okay, this is different than last time. This is way more intense. We need help." So, they call in the church and Reverend Davey is sent to look at the home for himself. And let's just say he was very prepared and I'm sure a lot of church members would have felt the same way. They He's prepared to be like, "This is not paranormal."

Mhm.

He almost immediately tells the Pritchard family, "Don't worry, it's subsidians. It's just the shifting of the old house's infrastructure." But as he says this, the ghost is like, "No, no, no. Let me tell you otherwise." As the reverend says this, a candlestick

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that is on top of the mantle lifts up, levitates, floats off the mantle right in front of the reverend's face. And as the candle and surely the reverend's jaw drop to the floor, there is a loud bang in the kitchen and every single dish is thrown out of the cupboard. When they go into the kitchen, every single dish is on the floor. Not a single one is broken. Bizarre. But also now this really is making me kind of double down on my theory that it's a 15-year-old because if anyone here watches the show Ghosts, there is a ghost of some of a girl who died on prom night who like wakes up every so often in the house and all the ghosts like grown cuz she just brings absolute chaos. Like she lies, she's drama, she's chaotic, things are everywhere. I kind of like this idea. I like this idea and this pitch that all poltergeist spirits are actually teenage spirits.

Yeah. And they just awaken, you know, cuz teenagers like you sleep like 12 hours and then you wake up, but in the spirit world maybe that's like two

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years,

right?

And you wake up again and you're like, "What the

got to wreak some havoc."

Slam doors, run around,

bang new posters of InSync on your wall.

Yeah. Or rip them off cuz you're no longer fan of them.

Right. Exactly.

Yeah, maybe. And I appreciate you get two gold stars now. I appreciate these takes,

guys. Pat on my back. I think that that's a good theory.

Okay. So, then this happens and the reverend obviously has to accept that this is not just the house settling. But he, I think, was scared.

Mhm.

And the Pritchards look at him are like, "Do you now understand? Like, what are we supposed to do?" The reverend gives one little nugget of advice before leaving. He looks at them and he says, "I would move out." The horrors. And he left. But the protrudes weren't in the position to move. And I think there's a lot of dynamics here. I think they didn't want to believe that this was negative or bad, right? And the last time they experienced it, it happened and it stopped very quickly. So I think they're

39:00

under the impression that

this will be the same thing. You know,

it'll be over in minutes,

right? I mean, like even thinking about my parents house, like there would be a ton of activity and then like nothing for a long time.

Yeah. But it didn't stop. It got worse. Great. And the family, kind of similar to you, I think, wanted to have a more playful interpretation of this and they started nicknaming the spirit Fred. They gave him a name, hey, Fred. Cuz at this point, nothing was malicious. Nothing was malevolent. They the hauntings didn't seem harmful. Didn't seem intent on hurting them. There was one instance where I think Jean had woken up to a noise and Jean was the type of person where she hated a mess. It almost felt like the spirit was making a mess to piss her off. Again, teenage, very teenage energy.

But she would wake up in the middle of the night if she heard something and she would go clean it up because she didn't want to wake up in the morning to have to deal with a mess.

Oh wow.

40:00

So one night she hears something, she wakes up. When I was really drunk in college, I would always take care of my future self.

How nice of her. I had to do laundry in the middle of the night and I was drunk. This morning me I knew would not be into it.

Yeah. Know. So she wakes up this one night and she goes out into the hallway and I guess that they had been taking off some wallpaper or redoing wallpaper

and so there was like a little jar of plaster and a paintbrush. She was walking out into the hallway and they both get like thrown towards her

but not in an aggressive manner. Not and it's like

she recalled it being playful. So, she runs back into the into her bedroom and closes the door and she's like, "I'll deal with this tomorrow." Clearly, like, "I don't want to deal with this right now." When she slams her bedroom door, it wakes up Diane, 15-year-old Diane. So, Diane goes out into the hallway and now this paintbrush goes to Diane, but Diane recalls it feeling like super playful. Like the way the paintbrush came over to her, it would like tickled her face. Like, it felt playful.

Like maybe they like the wallpaper choice,

41:00

but things change. And I think they wanted to believe it was playful. They would leave the house and come home to find entire rooms reorganized and things like thrown everywhere to the point where it looked like the home had been burglarized.

Okay, so not reorganized.

Not reorganized.

Cuz I was like, "Wow, that's amazing. Maybe they had some great ideas."

Reorganized as in like couches upside down, dressers knocked over.

Okay.

Yeah.

Disheveled. But it would also happen right in front of their eyes. It would also happen like as they're sitting in the living room, they'd hear things upstairs, they'd go upstairs, everything's thrown about. Fred is getting more and more powerful and he seemed to always be listening as these paranormal happenings are continuing and ongoing.

Keep in mind, they live near family. Everyone now knows about it. The family is telling friends, friends are telling neighbors. This is now becoming, it's a small community. Pontifact, everyone knows about the Black Monk of Pontifact. Even today, you can go to that town and

42:00

ask people about it. And

so this cuz you haven't said the black monk yet. So like this is what they call

that's what they call it now. So I don't know Fred,

but they call the haunting the black monk of Pontifract.

Okay.

And if you were to go to the town today and ask people about it, I feel like the way that they would recall it is like, oh yeah, um there was a summer where Grandpa Joe was living on that tree. Like it's very like oh one relative attached to it.

Oh interesting.

So it gets to the point where the mayor of Pontiffract and his wife mayor S come to visit the house and they're looking around. They're seeing everything. It's gotten to the point where furniture has been moved so many times that they're kind of living a little bit disheveled. The mayor Russ makes a comment and she's like, "Wow, at least your grandfather clock hasn't been touched."

Uh-oh. Seconds later, what is thrown down the stairs?

No, they're so expensive and the wood is

43:00

usually such great quality and so old and it was the 60s. What? Now I have beef with this teenage girl who I think is Fred.

So Fred was basically like, "Yeah, I heard you. You're right. I did forget to knock down the grandfather clock. Let me do it now."

There's no way it survived that, right? Probably

no way. It broke.

call for help & Fred's hunger

Yeah. So now the family is getting a little worried. Yes. They still want it to believe that it's a playful, not harmful thing, but it's progressing. Things are becoming a little bit more intense, and they want help. So, they bring in a friend whose name is Renee Olden. She had a reputation for being a bit psychic.

Mhm.

And she's like, "Let's try to communicate with Fred." I'll tell you more about Renee a little bit later. Like, she has a crazy story where like she's psychic.

Yeah.

Damn.

She thinks, "Let's communicate with Fred."

Mhm. And this is a trend where every person who has kind of come in to try to help, it seems like makes Fred rebel even more. So she tries to communicate with Fred and it makes the activity get worse, intensify. She's like, "Let's set

44:00

boundaries with Fred."

Mhm.

And Fred is like, "I hear your boundaries. I see your boundaries. I do not respect your boundaries. I will not follow your boundaries. And I will break your boundaries." All of them. So then Fred responds with more destructive activity, levitating furniture, disappearing objects. One time the poltergeist made a white coat disappear and it was found months later lying under the coal in the coal shed, but the coat was still completely white. There was no dirt, no coal on it. It was gone for months. It would throw food and it would eat food. What? There was a night when Jean Pritchard was making sandwiches and she left the room for a minute and came back and found one of the sandwiches had bite marks in it as if someone had taken a big bite.

This like randomly reminds me a little bit of Jeff the Mongoose cuz they little snacks out and stuff for Jeff.

It does have similar energy. Then Fred would throw food which I could imagine

45:00

is so messy.

But there's one night where Fred decided they didn't like eggs. The family is sitting in the living room. The door to the kitchen is closed. Shut.

Through the door, they watch an egg appear and then explode. So, this spirit can make solid objects go through solid objects.

It's one thing for a spirit to go through a wall, right?

Right.

For an actual object to like materialize, dematerialize, somehow move through. But this is making me wonder because we have talked about this before where it's like what are hauntings? Could some hauntings actually just be glimpses into alternate timelines or like dimensions? And so now me thinks, what if the first one when Philip was 15, there was also a teenager going through puberty or whatever. And that was that cluster of hauntings. And now the second one is like the next child in this other timeline. And all kids are

46:00

different. Maybe this kid had a lot more of a struggle, you know, like more of like a twoyear of chaos.

Well, I will say situation

to that. I do believe that is true to Philillip and Diane. Like I think Philip might have been going through something. He moved into the house, didn't get along with his family.

His family goes on a vacation without him. Whether he wanted to not go or not, I don't know. But like the activity happened then for Philip stops. And I do believe Diane was going through a lot more as she's in this phase of her life,

which does seem to line up with the heightened

paranist really just mirrors what the kids are going through mentally.

But again, physical theory display.

Yes.

And that's what people believe poltergeist activity is. Like it mirrors intense psychological emotional turmoil.

Yeah. But also, I feel like sometimes people move in and there's nothing and then someone gets singled out

and then they become that because of

47:00

what's already happening to them.

What's first, the chicken or the egg

or the egg through the wall? Well, speaking of the egg, back to the egg. So, the So, this one egg now solid egg somehow goes through solid door. It explodes. And apparently with the explosion, it smells like flowers. Like, very nice.

Weird. That's another thing about Fred is unlike a lot of paranormal, especially violent evil things that come with sulfuric gross smells equivalent to Karen's car.

Spiders and mice.

God, so gross. Fred comes and brings a lot of pleasant smells like an egg exploding and the smell of flower. Strange.

It's very strange.

But so unless it's a teenage girl and she's like got her Justin Bieber perfume and she's spritzing it around. spraying a lot of perfume. But then this happens with another egg. Goes to the door again. Jean is just annoyed. She hates the mess, right? So she grabs this carton of eggs from the kitchen, brings it into the living room and truly like sits a top it not sits physically, but like holds closed the

48:00

carton of eggs. There's 10 eggs left, right? If it was a full dozen, there's 10 eggs left in this carton. Egg after egg keep appearing in the room and exploding until 12 eggs have exploded in this living room in front of the family. She has not taken her hand off of this carton since bringing it into the room. She takes her hand off, opens it, every single egg is gone. Like this is a magician,

right? And it makes me curious like what the family is saying like as this is happening, right? I can't even imagine to be a fly on the wall. terrified watching this or is this like some sort of entertainment where like no pun intended but like they're egging him on you know

but you know kind of like a dance monkey dance like if someone was like whoa that's so cool and then the spirit's like

oh you think that's cool there is some entertainment to it right and it's not violent it's not harming them yes it's annoying and a mess to clean up for poor Jean

but if I'm a kid I'd be like this is

49:00

crazy Right. Or is this like truly just someone who passed and is like, "What can I do as a ghost and is experimenting with all the different things?"

An experiment it does.

One time Fred opens the fridge, empties it all, and then like throws a string of sausages into a room. Like I am imagining this as a cartoon where a string of sausage like all attached to each other.

Little birds are like carrying it.

Right. So now this is again more and more people are hearing about this. more and more people are experiencing the hauntings for themselves.

Mh.

And one of their family members, her name is Ma Pierce. She works for Salvation Army. She's very, very staunchly religious. She is fed up by all of this because she's like, "You are tarnishing my name."

Mhm.

By making up all these lies. She thinks that the Pritchards are lying. So, she

gets her coat on and her favorite fur gloves, which are important. Keep that in mind. and goes over to the Pritchard

50:00

house and she is determined to basically prove that all this is not true.

It always blows my mind when people who are like deeply religious don't believe in the paranormal cuz it's like what do you think your entire Bible or like your whole religious text is? It's all

spirit.

Woo woo and hocus pocus spirit.

Yes. Yeah.

You actually believe a lot like heavily more than a lot of people. So Ma comes over to the house and there's a lot of things that happened to her while she's here, but I'm going to share two kind of major instances. She's sitting in the house and I think all of the lights turn off and she thinks the again, she thinks the kids did it.

Mhm. Which I understand that one like Yeah, I think the kids did it. She's sitting there and an entire jug of milk is poured over her head. This is a teenage girl. You cannot tell me differently. Are you kidding me? Like she gets pissed off and she has the

51:00

ability to just grab something and just like pour it over all the satisfaction.

Yeah.

I'm not encouraging that or condoning that behavior. But like I can see from someone with like raging hormones and all of this energy and just be like, you know, like that's her burn book, right? She's taking a picture of this lady

of Mod. Yeah.

Yeah. And she has to pour milk on her. But so Ma is one pissed and covered in milk and she thinks that Philip and Diane are responsible. But only thing is when the jug of milk was poured on her, no one was there in the room with her. But she has to believe this because she's so staunchly against everything, right? So she has to believe this. She's blaming Philip and Diane. She's so angry with them.

And then she has a very strange and I think one of the most hilarious encounters that Fred is responsible for. Like I said, Ma came over with her favorite pair of fair gloves.

Mhm.

And she had left them probably nearby her coat. She's sitting in the living room when she hears a noise. She like looks around the room trying to find the

52:00

noise and she finds her gloves walking into the room. Does a turn and then go. At first she thinks they're hands like she thinks someone's crawling in. But then creepy. But then she realizes no. So, these are her gloves that look like hands are inside of them attached to nothing. They're coming into the room. She is probably in shock, right?

Cuz trying to process this, she's very confused. They are disembodied, detached from any body, kind of like thing in Winston or the Adams family.

And what ensued is chaos as one glove moves up on top of the doorframe and another one moves at the bottom of the door frame. And in recollection, I think the way that she described it, it was almost as if a giant was wearing the gloves, which is very intimidating.

Beetlejuice

or Beetlejuice,

which is intimidating, but in my mind, because things get way more intimidating. This is a very hilarious

53:00

moment. One glove like kind of does this almost like beckoning her and then another one kind of goes why I ought to. It is very cartoonike, right? Very cartoon-like. So she's in in terror. Shouts, "Get away. You're evil." The gloves continue to move, so she throws her boot at the door. The gloves disappear for a moment. Ma tries to gather herself. Like she she's like, "I must be losing my mind." But then the gloves reappear floating in the air.

What is happening? She comes over and she's just left alone in this sitting room for a while.

Well, I think she's staying with the family for a couple of days. And

why would you want her staying there if she's being so mean? Maybe she didn't share that with them. That that was her intention. I don't know.

But so then the gloves reappear and they're floating in the air and I think they're doing the why I again. So Ma screams and she begins singing a song from church hoping it would repel the evil. But instead the gloves dance along to the song.

54:00

And then they start conducting her singing.

No way. Guys, I kind of love this guys.

Right. So, like this relieves the tension, right? There's like there is you can understand why with things like this happening, the family isn't scared of it.

Yeah. It's so entertaining.

Ma though was not amused. And after the gloves were recovered from the spirit, she burned them believing that they were tainted with evil. You know what this just reminded me of is the story we read where someone trying to attack someone else and the spirit came out and like beat the [ __ ] out of them or like drag. Sounds familiar?

A spirit dragged like the perp inside.

Yes. It was in England, I think, in the UK.

And it was someone drove a little

Yes. It was It was someone's aunt spirit

in the house that got someone who was trying to like burglize.

Yeah. Like from like the back alley like grabbed him and dragged him into the

55:00

house to like beat him up. But like this is where I feel like the family despite being startled and having such like extreme displays of paranormal activity. I feel like if you befriend this spirit like you kind of almost have your own guard dog like you have protection because this thing it's about to take a turn. Damn it. Okay. I want to love it.

I know. And with things like this I understand why you want to. And at the the family is very much like they want a joke. They're finding laughter in this. And sure, Fred's wreaking havoc and causing a mess, but not everything he did was bad. And okay, this is the one like really good thing that Fred did. So, while the paranormal and poltergeist activity was at its peak, the home experienced dramatic drops in electricity usage to the point where the electric department thought that the family was tampering with their meter. Like, their bills were dropping so dramatically,

which is so interesting because normally you would think that there'd be it would be the opposite because there's so much energy being used and tapped into. And

56:00

so Jean wrote in to the electric company about their poltergeist and was like, "We swear we're not tampering with this and like we have no idea why the meter is being like dropped so low. Like we have no idea. The electric company believes them. We we believe."

But they're also probably like, "These people you can't even argue with. Like they're deranged. Just let this one go." Or is it also, you know, everyone in town in Ponttoifact knows of the hauntings that are happening here, so they hear of them, but Gan truly believes that the spirit of Fred was turning back the meter for them, which is Thank you. Thanks, Fred.

Yeah.

Um,

Fred is so busy.

So busy. The hauntings continued. And every time the family did seek help, hauntings got worse. Like animal and breathing sounds began to emanate throughout the house.

What kind of animal?

I don't know, but it was like day and night. M

they asked a priest to come perform an exorcism on the house and I'm pretty sure this priest did the most half-assed exorcism ever and literally told the

57:00

family that performing an exorcism is is too much paperwork and that the local dascese would reject it anyway. So he'll come over and do his version of an exorcism without all the paperwork. Again, I think he didn't believe in it. M. Mhm. He comes to the house, he does something yada yada, and apparently as he's doing some, I don't know, holy practice, ritual, a crucifix lifts up off the mantle and I think goes to Diane, the 15-year-old girl's back and like like stays on her back by itself. I'm so confused by it because I'm like, this is very confusing messaging because normally like a crucifix being taken or put upside down or like anything like that is kind of like a display of the poltergeist rejecting religion and and showing its power. But the fact that it put it on the teenager's back almost makes me feel like, no, I'm protecting you from this other person who maybe doesn't understand what we've got going on over here.

58:00

Well, yeah. I don't know. And I also

they want an exorcism right now because I feel like so far it's kind of fine.

Well, I'm leaving some details out because I'm going to get into them, okay,

in a second cuz they I think they so deeply wanted to believe it was playful prankster.

My creative mind wants to say that the crucifix was actually upside down on her back. I don't know if that's actually true. I might be making that up. But I want to say that because a few days later is Easter. And on the morning of Easter, instead of the family waking up to cute little Easter baskets and like an Easter egg hunt, they wake up to inverted crosses painted in gold on every single door of the house. They're painted in gold.

In gold paint. See, now it's like for every one thing that if it was just that you'd be scared of, then there's like an extra detail that makes me think, well,

well, it was because the gold paint uh Philip was painting his bike, repainting his bike, so the gold paint was out.

So now these hauntings are being picked up by the local press. Publicity is

59:00

bringing a bunch of crowds. People are like camping outside of this house hoping to catch sight of it. There are reports of this house like glowing at night. Yeah,

you know, I think it's natural that some of these accounts are probably a little bit dramatized as it becomes all the hoopla around it and everyone wanting to have their version of a story,

right?

But Fred enjoyed the energy and the attention,

probably using it to build its own energy working its way to something worse.

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poor Diane

The press starts to call the spirit Mr. Nobody. And I don't know why. Maybe because they

Mr. Nobody.

Yeah.

You're now you're taunting it.

I know. And for the most part, while terrifying, the antics never seemed violent. Although I question that because of what I'm about to share with you. Over the months of activity, they gathered that the spirit seemed to be

1:01:00

targeting the youngest, 15-year-old Diane. They didn't think that the spirit meant any harm until the night the house tried to steal Diane. And it changed everything and forced the Pritchards to acknowledge that they were dealing with something evil. But before we get to that night, I'm going to revisit the details that I did kind of leave out,

okay? And that I think the family overlooked a lot. Maybe because it was intermixed with so many different things, right? It feels pretty clear to me that the entity was being violent towards Diane.

One night, a heavy sewing machine was levitated and pushed up against Diane, pinning her to the stairs. And in the book Poltergeist, Diane told him that she was really anxious in that before it happened. Like she was dealing with something internally.

And as she was feeling all the feelings, her furniture started to like move and pin her down. And obviously she got more and more anxious, but it wasn't hurting her. And so she in that moment tried to calm herself. And the moment she was

1:02:00

able to relax, the furniture let go of her and she was unharmed.

Bizarre.

So I think she was like, it didn't feel violent,

but it was

an aggressive display.

There were also multiple occasions where Diane was literally thrown from her bed in the midst of sleeping. It started with invisible hands shaking her awake. It progressed to her being thrown from her bed. I think on multiple occasions she was thrown from her bed. She'd wake up being on the floor and she looked up and her mattress was now flying off of her bed too and landed on top of her

multiple times. And then came the night. Like how is she how is she still sleeping there, right? Like they have other relatives houses seemingly walking distance across the street. like how are you still there?

I don't know. It's your heart.

Which does make me start to I'm never a skeptic and I believe everyone's story, but I can understand why other people

1:03:00

started to not believe it cuz it's like you had options for where to sleep and reside.

Yeah, I guess. But you're not going to move your whole like Yes, you have relatives down the road, but you're not going to move your entire life over there.

I am a couple thrown out of uh my bed in the middle of attacked. four person family. Like you can't move a four person family into a home with another family. Like it's just you could go for there.

Yeah. But you don't know where she lives. I don't know. I Yes, I I hear you. But I think there's also a lot of reasons why that does that's not a long-term solution. You might also be hearing banging and that's probably adding really spooky ambiance. But it's not a ghost. It's construction in Krin's basement. Just wanted to help people if they are hearing it and scared by it. Okay. So then this is when the night that they had to realize that they were dealing with something a little bit more evil. I actually like the banging. It's adding a good ambiance. It's late evening. The house had been restless all

1:04:00

night. Lights were flickering. Floorboards were shuttering with bangs coming out of nowhere. Diane retreated to her bedroom, probably hoping to escape all the noise. But then the force that was haunting 30 East Drive turned on her in a way it had never before. Philip and Jean are downstairs when all of a sudden they hear a scream. They bolt towards their staircase and freeze, finding Diane is not walking. She is not stumbling. She is being dragged by an invisible hand holding her, hauling her up the steps by her throat. Her feet are kicking against the carpet as she is trying to fight back. She cannot let out like anything out of her.

She's truly being suffocated.

Strangled. Yeah.

Philip lunges forward, grabbing his sister's arms. Jean grabs her waist. So, Philip and Jean are pulling Diane down towards the bottom of the stairs while this spirit is tugofwar pulling her from

1:05:00

her

from her neck. Oh my god. It is two humans against a presence they couldn't even see. Dian's face twists in terror, her body straining against the pole of an attacker that wasn't there. That's where you need buckets of holy water. You just [ __ ] douse it onto her. And then just as suddenly as it began, the force lets go. All three tumble backward down the stairs in a heap, gasping for air. Diane was okay, but hysterical, sobbing, confused, unable to explain what had happened to her. It reminds me of what was the story I'm blinking on. The house where that guy was like almost hanged.

Was that the small possession?

Oh, yeah.

Oh, the house in San Pedro. All the investigators were named the same thing.

Yeah.

They were like all

San Pedro Polist.

San Pedro Polist.

Diane knew that she had not been playing tricks. She had been taken. She had been dragged by something powerful enough to rip her from the grasp of her own family. And for most members of the family that this was the final proof

1:06:00

that they needed that whatever was haunting their home was not just a figment of their imagination. It was a distinct violent entity and it really felt like it wanted Diane. By this point, the preachers were desperate. They tried hanging garlic in their home as if battling a vampire. They kept asking priests to come in and help. Nothing was helping. And then the haunting took shape. Literally. Jean and Joe Pritchard were in the house when they at the same time saw the same exact thing. A hooded figure tall and cloaked. The face shrouded in shadow. Days later, Philip and Diane saw that same apparition in the kitchen. Black robes, silent, watching them. We'll come back to that in a moment.

Okay, I see where the monk imagery is coming from.

And I'm sure, like you were just asking, why the hell did they not leave? It's not that easy. They tried to seek help, but also as quickly as things ramped up, they also just stopped. Summer of 1966,

1:07:00

they move in. Poltergeist activity begins for a few days, goes quiet for 2 years. Summer of 1968, it begins again for a couple of months, but it's sporadic and most of the occurrences are annoying but not violent.

By 1970, majority of the paranormal activity had basically stopped for no reason. Similar to the Smur family, it just stopped.

backstory

So, similar to many poltergeist stories, this leaves us with a lot of questions. Why? Who? What? When? But mostly, huh? Why?

What the [ __ ] What the [ __ ]

How'd you go from being like the buddy of the house to the attacker in the middle of the night?

So, now we're going to get into the backstory. So, with very little to go on and very little answers as to why the paranormal stopped, why the activity stopped all of a sudden, people turned their focus onto what, or rather who the entity was that was causing all of these years of chaos. Which brings us back to the hooded figure draped in black shrouded robes. Upon further

1:08:00

investigation, it was learned that the Pritchards were actually not the only members of the neighborhood to see this figure.

The neighbor, Mrs. May Mountain, had actually seen and had her own share of hauntings.

Okay, so this is like the smurl possession or like the whole neighborhood was getting little bits of

but like I think most of it was in the house and it almost feels like it seeped into other places.

Trickles through.

Yeah,

it leaks. It leaks. So Mrs. May Mountain, I just like saying Mrs. my mountain cuz it's alliteration. Heard pounding drumlike noises in her house that were so intense they left cracks spidering through her ceiling.

One morning in her kitchen, she felt like someone was standing behind her and she turned and saw it too. She described it as a monklike figure in a black habit, but there was no face, only a hood and darkness within the hood. She felt no fear, just shock and curiosity, and then poof, it was gone. Other people described seeing a trailing robe, like a dark dressing gown gliding out of sight.

And then people started looking into the

1:09:00

history of this land. Pontiffact is pretty old. I didn't do a ton of research into like when it dates back to, but it's England. It's the UK. It saw a lot of history.

Yeah.

And Pontifact had once been home to a priaryy and war monks. So these were not

war monks. What are war monks? I don't necessarily know, but they weren't peaceful. Like they're not monks as we would imagine them, right? I don't think they were like very peaceful.

So, I feel like they don't deserve the title of monk. We might not like these monks. So, this has not been able to be confirmed by historians, but this is the legend that kind of been bu was built out of this.

So, it is true that there used to be a priaryy and a lot of monks living on this land. And I believe this part's legend. people believe the like area where there were hangings in that time is where the house now stands. I think that's a little bit too coincidental and it makes it paints a good story, a spooky story.

1:10:00

And also, I would have thought there would be more hauntings, right? Exactly.

If that were the case, than just this like one cloaked poltergeist.

So then this story was born. And this is content warning. There's a lot of violence and sexual violence in this one encounter or story. Again, there's no record of it happening, but the story goes that there was a monk living at the priaryy who had attacked a young girl, raped and murdered her, and that he was then sentenced to death for his crimes. Then there's added layers to it where one version says that the wrong monk was hanged for the crimes, which could have caused some like turmoil with hauntings in this property. But most people have attributed the activity to this monk who like almost was choosing Diane as like his next victim.

But you brought up a theory that perhaps it is the spirit of a 15-year-old girl.

Yeah.

If this is true, which again there's no evidence of it being true, people have

1:11:00

tried to validate it and without any success. if it is true is this 15-year-old girl her energy being reactivated by another 15-year-old girl living here and she's confused and she was so violated in her life and killed and she doesn't really understand it and all of this activity is just like an explosion of energy rather than like really but the hard thing is that some of it sounds and feels so intelligent in the way that it responds

like the grandfather clock

the

but it still could be Because if you if you go through something so traumatic

Yeah.

sometimes there can be, you know, like blackouts or confusion as to like what what your actual reality is.

Mhm.

And so like perhaps a lot of this is her consciously doing things. Whatever it is, the Pritchards, the neighbors, and every witness who had seen the cloaked figure left with the same image. A black robed phantom haunting a simple council

1:12:00

house. a vacant hood where a face should have been, an unblinking shadow that came to define one of the most infamous hauntings in Europe and gave birth to the name that it is now referred to, The Black Monk of Pontifract. It was so

movie: When the Lights Go Out

infamous, it is so infamous that it inspired a film called When the Lights Go Out. This movie came out in 2012 and it was written and directed by Pat Holden. Do you remember that last name? Do you remember the woman Renee Holden who came in and was a psychic, a friend of the family?

Well, Pat Holden is the nephew of Jean and Joe Pritchard.

Oh, so it's kept within the family.

Yeah. Pat Holden grew up hearing and knowing all about the terrors that his cousins, his aunt, and uncle were facing at 30 East Drive to the point where he was literally not allowed to go into the home by his mother, Renee, who is a psychic. But he will never forget seeing his cousin Diane a couple days after she was dragged up the stairs and the

1:13:00

bruising around her neck that looked like a hand had wrapped itself around her neck and tried to strangle her. I feel so terrible for this family. But like let me tell you, like if this happened to some of my family, even if they were like 5 hour drive away, I'd be like, "You're living here. Like we're all bunking up. Like all the kids are in one room, you have another room. you figure out ways to keep people safe cuz the alternative is someone getting like strangled almost to death and beaten. But see, that's the thing that's confusing is so that happened and then the hauntings kind of settled and that's why it's so confusing. It's like leading up to that, yes, there were a couple questionable moments that feel violent. And in retrospect, it's easier to say like that's terrifying and violent.

Mhm.

But in the midst of all the like playful things and them wanting to believe it was a playful entity, I think they didn't read into it too much. And then this violent thing happened. Diane was obviously shook shooken shookth by it. And then all of a sudden, the haunting

1:14:00

stopped. But Pat grew up with these stories and he was inspired to make the movie When the Lights Go Out. And his mom, this is the side tangent that I told you I wanted to go down.

Renee was a psychic and she was a local psychic who read tea leaves and cards for people and had an uncanny accurate description of things that she came up with. She had actually contacted the police saying that the Yorkshire Ripper was a Lori driver years before they actually caught the Yorkshire Ripper, who is Peter Sutcliffe, who was a Lori driver.

Isn't that wild? She was just getting all of these messages and to like trust her intuition enough

to know or to like have the confidence of actually like calling something in.

I know. But so Pat was inspired by the family's encounter with the black monk of Ponttofrag to make the film. He was interviewed in a lot of like the stuff I'm about to share with you is from this article for it was like a whole feature on the movie and on Pat. He said that he

1:15:00

believes the poltergeist that the family dealt with was actually a manifestation of the pain the family was going on like was dealing with. So that does imply that there was something going on with the family internally that

hasn't made it to like media.

Yeah.

The film has a 36% on Rotten Tomatoes. So I don't know if I can personally recommend it. I have not seen it. But it's inspired by the events of the Black Monk of Pontiffract, but it's a dramatized version.

Mhm.

And the movie itself might be haunted.

No way.

So

and apparently this episode since it was hard for you to even write it.

Right. So they had filmed the movie fine. I mean, I'm sure they had some like creepy occurrences just because they're filming a horror movie, but nothing paranormal.

But so the movie's ready and they have to have a distributor viewing. And this is like really, really important. They're basically showing the film. It's an independent film. They're showing it to the people who would buy it to then distribute it.

You need to do this. Like if you don't if people don't want to buy it, your movie is failing and you're you've lost

1:16:00

a lot of money. So they plan this viewing. They organized it in Soho for about 30 distributors and when the lights went out, the movie began. All was fine. 20 minutes into the movie, there was a total power failure and the lights went out. The power went out. But only to that room. Like the rest of the rooms in this facility totally fine. The rest of the screening house totally fine. But that room was in total darkness. No lights, no projector, nothing. They literally had to abandon the screening. So then they scheduled a secondary screening for the next morning. They had to like scramble to put this together. It's

Why couldn't they just move to a different room?

I think they were all occupied.

They planned this secondary screening in a different room for the next morning.

Mhm. Starts totally fine. 20 minutes in, all the power goes off again. Same exact thing. Everywhere else in the building, power is fine. Just that room.

Oh my god.

And it ended up being distributed. So it's out and it's available for you to watch.

Yeah. I wonder like what the thoughts were of the person who bought it after

1:17:00

that screening or did they even go to the screening? Right.

Right. Yeah.

But so naturally there's been a lot of skepticism surrounding this case. Many people have been accusing the Pritchards of fabricating the whole thing. You know, people are like, "Oh, they're using sound." Whatever.

Okay. Well, but

explain the screenings.

Well, that's that's the movie, right? That's different.

Is it?

Yeah.

It's about the case.

True. But either way, I think there were countless people who witnessed things in person.

Yeah.

visiting britain’s most haunted house & current hauntings

That there's always good to have healthy skep sk skepticism, right? But this is one of those cases where so many people experienced it that it is really hard to discredit it. But one of the producers of the movie When the Lights Go Out bought the house, 30 East Drive, and it is available like you can go visit the house. There are events there. He hosts like paranormal investigations. He hosts tours. You can experience it for yourself.

Do people experience things or is it fun?

I am about to share with you there is a

1:18:00

website called 30 eastdrive.com

and it has a page called recent and it's all about recent happenings. There are 288 recent happenings on this page. Oh my god. There's a thing called untaken photo and there's a photo of like three people standing in a room in the house and I guess the phone had died while they were trying to take a photo. It's set up I think on a tripod and when they turn the phone back on there's no photo but weeks later this photo shows up in their camera roll and it's not like a it's just a blurry photo. It's not like there's any ghosts or anything in it.

Yeah. There was a glowing ball of blue light in a corridor that was seen from a window and has been seen by a few visitors on occasion. Police were called. See, this is one of those things where I'm like, are the current hauntings manifestations of like everyone else who goes in there? Like, is it haunted because now people are going and calling upon spirits,

right?

Like what happened to specifically Fred?

1:19:00

That's the hard thing. I don't Yeah, I don't know.

Yeah.

And also, what are people bringing with them? There are lots of photos caught. There are lots of videos. I have one photo of like this shadowy figure that was taken on the stairs of the home

that like looks fake.

Yeah, cuz it looks like

it's so dense. It's completely black.

But there's also videos. So, there's a group of researchers who witnessed a shadow in a corridor and I can link the YouTube video and it's at minute 21 and 43 seconds. their heavy bangs, phones being drained, headaches, wooden crosses in the parents room were lifted off the dressing table and placed back onto the window sill. Like 288 recent hauntings at the house. And if you go to 30 eastdrive.com, you can look at all the events that they have. You can go participate in a paranormal investigation there yourself. Whatever is haunting that home, the one thing we cannot deny is that this family, the Pritchard family, did experience some

1:20:00

really, really horrific and intense paranormal poltergeist activity. And Diane was truly traumatized, especially from being strangled and dragged up the stairs by the spirit. You can also read the book Poltergeist, a classic study in destructive hauntings by Colin Wilson. It's a fascinating read. I read some of it, not all of it, but he goes into his take on what poltergeist are based on all the studies that he does, which you can read about those cases. But yeah, that is the black monk of Pontifact and the hauntings of this poltergeist that tormented the Pritchard family. And I do want to shout out Eric, who is one of our admins, who is on our campfire stories all the time.

He's very haunted.

He's very haunted. I'm pretty sure Eric told us about this case.

Oh, did he? I bet he knows all of them.

He knows everything. That's the black monk of Pontto Frack.

Dang, this is so confusing. I'm confused by the black monk. I'm confused by Fred. Teenage girl Fred.

I'm confused by a lot of it.

1:21:00

Well, it was her photo too that was like ripped off the wall thrown. And

so there are people who were like, was it something following her? But then why did it not haunt her prior to this house? Like it was silent for so long. also what was going on in this family's lives that we don't know about

that it's easier for them to focus on since it's like the whole family was going through something

and it's easier to say like oh these hauntings are crazy than to work on maybe what was stirring up the activity

right

listener story

yeah h okay well I had a couple different emails but I will share one okay

the title is called monk in her car so I guess you know what happens.

Okay,

dear ghostases, I'm this is not my story.

Okay,

my teacher, I'll call her Karen, told us this story about a year ago. She was our music teacher and she told the story in our drama class and it happened when Karen was about 22 and she was in

1:22:00

college. She didn't have the money to insure her car, so she would take the less busy road home. I do love that we started with your car horror story story and we're ending with a different car horror story.

Yeah. No, don't drive.

I'm going to call this road old mine road as that is basically what it is. Old mine road is very wellnown because of the amount of crashes that have happened on this road.

Jeez. Karen didn't believe that this was a bad omen like people said and she still took this road every single day with no problem until one day

and the fact that she's taking this road because it's safer.

But it's like the road with all the accidents and if you're not insured like we what? Okay, so she's driving around driving down this road and suddenly she gets the feeling that someone is in the car with her. She drove a Mini, so there was room in the back, but there were no seats. Her mind started racing and she realized that when she'd stopped to get some gas or the petrol station earlier, she had not locked her car doors and now it was pitch black outside. She started

1:23:00

slamming on the brakes every once in a while to act like the car was broken. She pulled over, she got out of the car, and then she ran. Halfway down the road, she realized how stupid she was being, and she went back to the car. Okay, this is that's clever. I thought she was randomly slamming on the brakes to like injure the person in the back.

I promise you this gets paranormal soon. So, she checks all over the car and sees that there is no one in the car with her. She got back in. She continued driving until she looked to the left of her and over here the driver's seat is on the right. And I am not joking, and neither was she. There was a freaking monk. A medieval monk, but not like a sweet, innocent monk. He was smiling the most horrific smile. His teeth rotten. Ew.

This time she got out and she ran. She later got back in and went home and she jokingly told everyone that she had seen a ghost. But her story does not stop there.

No.

She was in a local pub near the road one night and she overheard a police officer talking about a recent crash on Old Mine

1:24:00

Road. She decided to pull this guy aside and tell him what happened to her. And the officer proceeded to tell her that he had been working on this case for over 30 years. Now, this would be 50 years. And that from all of the crashes, there have only ever been a few survivors, and all have said the same thing happened to them, but they just didn't get out in time. And the monk attacked them, which is what caused them all to crash. I don't really know how I feel about this story. Sometimes I think it's probably not true, but my teacher never lied before.

It's true.

So stay spooky, stay safe and protected. See you on the other side. Blessed be Leila.

I need to know where this is because

Right. Everything's in code. It's like I'll choose a name for the road. I'll choose a name for my teacher.

But driving on the right side, that's European.

Mhm. Well, it's it's like anywhere except for America,

but it could be the UK and Pontifactory. Well, they said petrol station, so it's like

that feels very UK.

That feels UK. The pub

1:25:00

could be like South Africa.

Pontif Australia

is known for its old minds.

We need to know. Tell us, Laya. We need to know.

Um, and this is a good reminder, ask your teachers for their ghost stories. Ask your friends for their ghost stories. Email all of the ghost stories to us at two girls podcastgmail.com. Let us know if you got haunted by this episode. We hope you stay safe. Shout out to Fred and check your cars for spiders.

Thank you Jamie for editing and producing this podcast and thank you to all of you. We love you

and we will see you on the other side.

Very spooky.