Paranormal experts encounter ghost ‘angry George’ at Alcester Town Hall
THERE’S something strange in the neighbourhood – or at least at Alcester Town Hall.
An angry ghost in the 500-year-old building has vented his wrath on four paranormal investigators, leaving them breathless, in pain and with red wheals like burn marks.
Matthew and Becky Evans, and Andy and Tracey Lindon spent seven hours from 7pm until 2am in a bid to find out if the place was haunted.
Using night vision cameras, thermometers, an electromagnetic field monitor and electronic voice phenomena digital voice recorder, they captured what they believe are ghostly voices and a video of a mysterious glowing orb dancing around the top of the stairs.
As well as the angry elderly ghost, dubbed ‘George’ by others who’ve come across him, Matthew, Becky, Andy and Tracey also detected other spirits including a young girl and a six-year-old boy, who kept repeating the word ‘Lord’.
They also picked up vibes from the spirit of a prisoner named Sullivan, who may have perished in the basement holding cell, known as ‘The Hole’ when the hall was still the town’s magistrates court.
Andy said: “If it was a prisoner wrongly accused, sometimes all they need to pass over is to get that message out there.”
All four of the ghosthunters agreed that as soon as they went upstairs, they noticed “an eerie feeling”, “a completely different sort of energy”, as though they were being “constantly watched and followed around”.
Tracey said: “It was a strange, heavy feeling, when we got to the top of the stairs.
“A male spirit, an elderly male voice, said: ‘I was left here’.”
They believe George’s real name is probably Henry, Harold or Philip.
Tracey added: “If spirits are not happy, they’ll make it known and do anything to make you leave.
“We backed off after a while, we didn’t want to anger him anymore but we’ll keep going back to get more answers.”
Andy explained: “When we investigate, we go in with an open mind and call all spirits forward, but he became more prominent throughout the night.
“There’s a throne chair, and as soon as we sat on that, it became very apparent he didn’t want anybody in that chair.”
Becky was most affected when she sat in the ‘throne’ chair, describing sharp pains down her back and a feeling someone was leaning over her and pressing down.
She said: “When I sat in that chair, I couldn’t breathe.
“My chest felt tight and it was like I was gasping for breath.”
But she said the most frightening moment was when her husband was targeted.
She added: “Matthew was sitting on the floor, calling to the spirits, when he suddenly started touching his chest, like he wanted to rip his clothes off and he kept saying, ‘I feel like I’m on fire, something’s burning me’.”
He ran into the kitchen and when they pulled off his top, she saw “big thick red burn marks” across his chest, as though someone had thrown boiling water over him and she says this took an hour to disappear.
At one point in its history, the town hall housed fire engines and during the Great War it was used as a hospital to treat soldiers with burns.
Becky, who lives in Cheshire and runs paranormal investigation business Duo of Darkness with Matthew, added: “When the four of us were upstairs at 1am, we could hear doors banging downstairs, even though there was no one else in the building.
“At one point we heard such a loud thud, Andy and I ran downstairs but there was nothing to see.”
Andy, who runs Conjure Quest investigations with Tracey from the couple’s Telford home, added: “I had to use my guardian angels to remove the negativity from Matthew, asking the spirit to back away and leave him alone.
“It was really strange how it affected him.”
The four, who carried out their investigation on 29th March, plan to return in July.
Other ghostly sightings at Alcester’s hall, which dates back to the 17th century, include the Grey Lady, a woman ghost spotted standing at the top of the stairs.
Alcester town councillor and former mayor Vaughan Blake, who handles the bookings for the hall, said: “We’ve had clairvoyants and paranormal groups coming here for years, including a witches coven and daytime ghost hunts.
“There were three paranormal groups just last week.
“They always ask, ‘How long can we stay?’ and I say, ‘It’s fine, as long as you're gone by dawn’.
“Andy told me they’d had a particular problem that night with one ghost – an elderly man who didn’t want them to be there.
“I repeated this to someone else who said several other paranormal groups had reported this, and they call him George.
“He doesn’t seem to like the paranormal groups being there.
“We think he might have been an old magistrate, and if you sit in the large, throne-like chair which might have been his, he gets very annoyed.”
He added: “Andy said it was an insane evening, because they had the angry ghost, two young children and a chap who died in The Hole, as they called it.
Vaughan is sceptical but thinks if there is a ghost it might be that of a former Lord of the Manor, Fulke Greville, Lord Broke, whose picture hangs in the hall.
Fulke Greville was fatally stabbed by a disgruntled servant in London in 1628.
“I’ve never seen anything, and I won’t believe it until I see it, Vaughan said. “George will have to come up to me and say, ‘Hello, I’m George’, before I’m convinced.”
