Running boy ghost seen again yesterday

When I arrived at Penrhyn Castle this morning I was greeted by Dafydd who works in the Railway Museum. He told me that yesterday he saw a young boy running away from him in the coach house area of the Railway Museum. He has not seen him for a long time. He has appeared to him about five times now. Dafydd told me that he was very real to him, "not like a puff of smoke". He saw him very clearly, in exactly the same way that he has seen him before. He wonders whether there is anything significant about the date when he appeared and will keep a note of it in his diary, in case it happens again the same time next year. I wish I could find out who he is and what happened to him in the coach house which would make him want to run away. Dafydd said that he is leaning forwards as he runs as though he is in a hurry to get away from someone or something. Very interesting.

Ghostly Garden Guides

A friend called Shan visited Penrhyn Castle for the first time on a school trip in the Summer of 1984, when she was about 7 years old. She told me this evening that she wandered away from the rest of the group, as she often did as a child, and got hopelessly lost in the Walled Garden. She was very scared and sat down under a huge bog plant crying "inconsolably". She did not know what to do or how to get back to her group. She suddenly heard two voices trying to calm her down, telling her which way to go to get out of the garden and onto the right path back to the entrance. She described them as having "posh English voices". Shan is Welsh speaking. She said that they sounded like a man and a woman, "very old fashioned, like Edwardian people." She caught a glimpse of the man out of the corner of her eye and saw that he was wearing a striped jacket and straw boater hat. She did not see the woman.

Shan felt very safe with them as they guided her through the bog garden, out of the Walled Garden, and back onto the path which led her to the castle entrance. The voices stayed with her all the way back. She could hear them talking to each other, as well as giving her directions and reassuring her that she would be all right.  She was not at all scared by them and said that they were a "comforting presence". She said that they were very "motherly and fatherly" towards her and made her feel looked after, "as though they were walking on either side of me, holding my hands". When they reached the entrance gate and she was reunited with her school group, who were just about to board the coach, the man and woman left her. Her teachers asked her where she had been, and how she had found her way back to them. She told the teachers about the ghostly guides, but they did not believe her. She also told her mother about them when she got home, but she did not believe her either. Shan said that there is no way that she could have found her own way back to the coach, because she did not know her way around the grounds at all.

Shan also told me that her sister saw a woman in grey in one of the bedrooms when she visited Penrhyn Castle. She is going to ask her sister to phone me with more details, so watch this space...!

A spooky cold spot in Lord Penrhyn's Sitting room

On Thursday last week I was asked to take a group of secondary school teachers around the castle. It was the first time most of them had visited Penrhyn. I took them to see the newly opened Lord Penrhyn's Sitting Room. One of the room stewards was a lady who helped to get the room cleaned and ready for opening to the public with me a couple of months ago. She spotted me as I came into the room with the teachers. After I had explained to them what the room was used for, she came over to me and asked me to walk along the floor between the settee and the huge marble fireplace. She said that there was something she wanted to show me. I was obviously very curious and walked to where she had directed me. As I got near to the right side of the marble fireplace the air became noticeably colder. It was freezing! I stepped out of the cold area and felt warmer. I walked back into the same spot and felt cold again. She asked me what I could feel there. I said that it was very cold. She said that she had felt exactly the same thing in that spot. We both wondered if there could be a draught from the fireplace, but I dusted and hoovered the fireplace a few weeks ago and had not felt a draught. The chimney is closed. We both felt that perhaps there was someone in the room, whose presence could be felt by the coldness we experienced there. I will be asking other room stewards in Lord Penrhyn's Sitting Room if they have had any comments from visitors or other staff about similar feelings in that spot. The school teachers were very interested to know what was going on and I explained about the cold spot. Some of them were fascinated to hear about the ghosts. I hope they will read this blog and comment on the stories I have collected so far!

Play it again Sam

On Monday this week I started my new job at Penrhyn Castle as  a Learning Assistant in the Education Department. As I have been a volunteer there for more than 10 years I thought it was about time I tried to get a paid job! I was lucky enough to be considered for the post when a vacancy was advertised. I was at Penrhyn on Monday for an induction meeting and as I was leaving one of the Conservators asked me if I had been told any new stories recently. He said that he had experienced something very strange that morning. I told him that I had not had any new stories for a few weeks and would be very pleased to hear about his experiences. He was in rather a hurry to get to a dentists appointment so I was told them very briefly. I will try to get more details when I next see him. He said that he had been in the Grand Hall playing the piano, when he felt that someone was watching him. He could see someone standing behind him out of the corner of his eye, but did not turn around straight away to see who was there because he presumed that it was one of the other conservation staff. As soon as he had finished playing the piece he turned to speak to the person behind him, but nobody was there. He looked around the Grand Hall but he could not find anyone in the area at all. 

John also told me that he had been upstairs in the corridor near the Nursery Bedroom in the Keep. He could smell alcohol very strongly, "as though someone had been drinking heavily in that area." He wondered if it could have been the last Lord Penrhyn who was very fond of his drink. He died on 26 June 1949 at the age of 54 in the Breakfast Room.

I will be keeping a close eye on things going on in the house now that I am going to be there four mornings a week. I wonder what interesting stories I will hear next time? 

Smoking ghosts seen in the Breakfast Room!

Ethne is a room steward. She was working in the Breakfast Room last summer when a visitor appeared at the door. She told me her story a couple of weeks ago. I asked her to write it down for me which she did, and she gave it to me last week. She said, "A gentleman stood in the doorway and he did not seem to want to enter the Breakfast Room. The room was empty at the time. I went over to speak to him and he told me that he could smell cigar or pipe smoke in the room. Surprised by his statement I explained with reference to the smoke alarms that there could not be any smoke in the room. He reply was, "Oh, I don't mean now, but in the past!" He said he could see or sense three gentlemen sitting around the table holding a "convivial" conversation. I explained that the Breakfast Room was used as the family dining room when not entertaining. (If the family was entertaining guests they usually used the Dining Room). I asked the man again whether he would like to come into the room to see the paintings, including the Rembrandt, but he declined. I asked whether he was a spiritualist and he said that he was. He seemed genuine. He refused to come into the room and I was left there alone feeling very spooked!" The Breakfast Room is where the last Lord Penrhyn died at the breakfast table. This is the first ghostly story I have been told about it. I wonder whether anyone else has ever seen or sensed the ghostly smokers?

Fascinating new story

I was at Penrhyn Castle today to help clean and prepare Lord Penrhyn's sitting room and his valet's room for the  public to see when the castle opens in March. It was a fascinating experience and I was very excited to meet some of the room stewards I have not met before as they were also there to help with conservation and cleaning.  One of the stewards told me about an incident which happened last Summer. She has promised to write it down for me and give it to me next week. I will add it to my collection of stories when I get it.

Some interesting new stories

On the 17th December 2010 I attended a Christmas dinner at Tre-Ysgawen Hall near Llangefni, Anglesey with other volunteers and staff from Penrhyn Castle. During the meal I was able to talk to several people and heard some new ghost stories. Elaine (Education Officer) told me that a couple of days ago she was in the women's' changing room on the Education corridor after a schools Christmas hands-on session had finished. She was alone as everyone else had packed up and left. She was getting changed ready to leave with her back towards the door to the ladies toilets, when out of the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of a foot wearing a black Victorian style ankle boot and the hem of a black skirt stepping through the door, which was shut! She said that she did not see anyone coming into the room and there was nobody in the toilets. She thought about it later that night as she was lying in bed and decided that it was very strange. She did not look up to see the rest of the person, and only saw the foot and bottom of the skirt. I wonder if this could be the ghost who sighed in her ear when she put the lights off in the same room a few weeks ago.

I also chatted to a room steward called Jackie who told me of an experience she had about a year ago in the same ladies toilets. She said that she has always felt uncomfortable in there, and senses that she is not alone. She was in a cubicle one day and felt very strongly that there was someone in the room. She heard the rustling of a dress, as though somebody was walking around the room. She came out and looked around but there was nobody there. She was not aware of Elaine's experiences, so I introduced them and let them compare notes!  She also told me about the visitors who came into the Drawing room and as they passed her near the Medieval Tower doorway the man suddenly shouted and fell back against the wall. She asked if he needed to sit down but his wife told her that he was a Medium, and that he had felt something there. This was the place where Cheralynn saw a man in medieval clothing standing and looking very stern. I wonder if it was the same man who startled the visitor.

The new Property Manager had a strange and startling experience in the Education Corridor a few days ago too. He told me that he was going to make a cup of tea but he realised that he had forgotten his mug which he had left on his desk. He turned back to get it when he heard a loud noise from further up the corridor. He was working there alone and knew that nobody was in the department. He went to investigate and found that the door to the men's changing room had been slammed shut. He checked to see whether there was a window open which could have created a draught, but the windows were closed. He said that it was a very loud slamming of the door, as though someone had been behind it and given it a hard push, not just the click of the door swinging shut. It really startled him and when he was in his office early on the day of our dinner, on his own, he made sure that all the lights were on and that they stayed on!

Later I was talking to Mike the Head Gardener who told me that when his children lived with him in the rooms which are now the Education Department, his young son who was 3 or 4 had an imaginary friend who he called "Gunner". He would say that he was going to talk to Gunner in his bedroom, which was the room we now use as the Toys and Games room. Mike said that he used to think that his son had a good imagination but Gunner seemed so real to him that he wondered if there really was someone there.

When I came back to Caernarfon I went shopping for some Christmas gifts and called into a shop in the High Street called H & H where they sell perfumes and hand made soaps. I mentioned to the lady who runs the shop that I had been to a Christmas dinner at Tre-Ysgawen Hall with the volunteers and staff from Penrhyn and she told me that she loves visiting Penrhyn and often calls in for tea and a scone in the Tea room. I explained that I was writing a book about the ghosts of Penrhyn Castle and she said that something strange had happened to her there. She told me that her friend Jenny grew up at Penrhyn because her parents worked in the castle. They had an apartment in one of the towers. One day when she had been visiting Jenny they came down the stairs to go outside. Jenny came down ahead of her, leaving her to walk down by herself. As she came down to the bottom of the stairs she said that she had an overpowering feeling of dread which seemed to suffocate her. She was terrified and ran out of the area to catch up with Jenny. I asked her which stairs she had used and whether it was the Grand Staircase. She said that it was a back staircase. I asked if it was the one which comes out near the tea room and she said that it was. I explained that it was on those stairs that a maid apparently fell down and that she had died at the bottom of the stairs. She said that it would explain the awful feeling she had there. I will go back to see her again and get some more details from her, including her name! I will also talk to her friend Jenny who runs a shop in Palace Street, Caernarfon. I will be very interested to hear of any ghostly experiences she or her family may have had whilst living at the castle. Quite an eventful day! I never know when I will hear a new story. Watch this space......