A Miscellany of Merseyside Mysteries
Everyone in Merseyside seems to have at least one strange story to tell – and they often seem to tell them to ROB GANDY, who returns to FT with another armful of anomalous accounts, this time including phantom planes, time-slips and a ghostly ARP warden...
Readers of my FT articles will know that I have a particular interest in collecting and recording testimonies of genuinely weird first- and second-hand experiences that people have had. I infer that my articles and presentations mean that individuals are comfortable approaching me, knowing that they will receive a sympathetic ear; although I always ensure that I ‘test’ their stories as far as is reasonably possible for authenticity, consistency and completeness. Following my “Strange Stories From Southport” article (FT370:42-45 )I received a number of stories via FT itself and through direct communication (see Rob Bray’s ‘It Happened to Me’ accounts, FT375:77, for example). I was also given new stories by attendees at my occasional fundraising events. As a result, I found that I had an eclectic collection of extraordinary testimonies, where the only real connection between them is that they all have some link to the Merseyside area. Therefore, I present herein a veritable smorgasbord of the bizarre for your delectation.
PHANTOM CONCORDE
It was mid to late August 1975, and Len Chester (pseudonym) was 15 years of age. Together with his mother and father (now deceased) he had gone on a weekend trip to Shropshire in the old ambulance that his dad had converted into a mobile home/ caravanette. They stayed at a campsite in either Arley or Hampton Loade, and visited the Severn Valley Railway, where there was a locomotive that he was particularly interested in. It had recently arrived in an un-restored state and was at Bewdley Station that weekend. They travelled on a steam train, which got delayed for a while at Hampton Loade station. Everyone disembarked onto the sunny platform until the delay was over, including, as Len recalls, a carriage full of nuns. Just then, a Spitfire aircraft flew past and someone remarked that they thought there was an air show in the vicinity.
Later that day, a fine Sunday afternoon, they left for their home on Merseyside. They had not travelled very far, perhaps 15-20 minutes into the journey; Len’s father did not drive fast and therefore they were probably north of Bridgnorth on the A442, which was the most direct route. This is reinforced by Len’s clear recollection that nearer home they passed an overbridge of the old Ellesmere branch line, which is situated on the A525 between Whitchurch and Wrexham.
They were in open countryside when suddenly to their left, behind a low hedge, they saw the quite unmistakable shape of
Concorde appear! What was remarkable – or ridiculous – about this was that its height – some 10-15ft (3-4.6m) above the ground – speed and angle made it appear that it had only just taken off. (Len remembers that the undercarriage was still deployed, but he accepts that he may be filling gaps in his memory). This was strange enough in itself, but all three of the family commented that it had seemingly taken off from what was just an ordinary farmers’ field. Len is very clear about this fact because what struck them as being very odd was that they were not near any airfield. Len recalls that Concorde was parallel to them, also heading north, and about 100 yards away. He cannot remember whether or not they heard any noise from the aircraft, despite its close proximity; again, this might just be his memory. The aircraft disappeared from view behind hedges and trees as they continued up the road, and was then nowhere to be seen.
Len has tried to rationalise this event over the years. Perhaps it was part of the air show that had been suggested by one of the people who had seen the Spitfire (although spotting a flying Spitfire does not automatically mean that it is part of an air show). But then why had it been so impossibly close to the ground? Enquiries have ascertained that Concorde was not involved in the Cosford Air Show, the main large air show in the area; indeed, there appears not to have been a Cosford show in 1975 (the modern event only started in 1978) and the one in Sleap, Shropshire, 30 miles away, was cancelled that year.
Behind a low hedge, they saw the unmistakable shape of Concorde
Concorde only flew at two Cosford shows,
1 in 1986 and 1987. Maybe it was taking off from an airstrip somewhere in the Severn valley beyond the field. But no other airstrip can be found anywhere nearby there that would be capable of accommodating Concorde, which required a runway that could handle a Boeing 747
2 jumbo jet. Maybe it was on a normal flight but was experiencing trouble, and had to fly very low for a period. But, if Concorde had experienced such serious trouble in its flight then it would surely have been reported in the national press. Perhaps it was something else altogether… but on this point Len has no doubt in his mind: it was unmistakably a Concorde! Therefore this episode must be filed as both ‘strange’ and ‘unsolved’.
THE GOOD REVEREND HAYES
In the 1970s, St Thomas’s church in Melling used to have an elderly vicar called Reverend Hayes, who was probably in his 80s and readily recognisable by the hats and cassocks he wore. Reverend Hayes was having problems with the petrol mower used for maintaining the church grounds, and the father of Jeff and Glen Preston (pseudonyms) was asked to check it over and repair it. Unfortunately, their father was a little lax and didn’t get round to dealing with the mower before he was admitted to hospital.
On his discharge, Mr Preston found himself walking up the long footpath between Rock Lane and Waddicar Lane, known locally as ‘The Pads’, towards St Thomas’s. The footpath is about 700 yards long with a clear view, and it was at this
point that he saw Reverend Hayes walking towards him, wearing his distinctive attire. Feeling embarrassed that he had not sorted out the mower, Mr Preston dipped his head so as to appear not to have seen the vicar. But when he looked up, Reverend Hayes was nowhere in sight, even though there were no turn-offs by which he could have left the path. Mr Preston was completely flummoxed by this turn of events – but he was even more confused when he got home and was told that Reverend Hayes had died three weeks previously while he himself had been recuperating in hospital.
A BOLD STREET TIME SLIP
John Moonan of Wirral tells a story about a fellow Music Technology student at Liverpool Community College from back in October 2005, when they were both 22 years old. That morning, while John and colleagues were waiting in class, Paul arrived for the lesson looking quite shaken. He explained that at around 8.30am he had been about to cross Ranelagh Street/ Hanover Street, at the top of Church Street, ready to walk up Bold Street. It was cold and raining, and he was looking down at the pavement as he had no umbrella or hood. It was then that he heard the sound of a horse and cart. He looked up to see a very old fashioned horse and cart crossing his path and carrying passengers dressed in Victorian-style dress; the surroundings were also different, and consistent with that era. His immediate reaction was to presume that he had stumbled into a filming location, and so he hurried a little further up Bold Street, again looking at the ground because of the weather. When he reached the steps on the left, he paused briefly and turned back to look if he could see anyone filming. But everything appeared normal once again and there was no sign of the horse and cart or any period clothing and surroundings and certainly no film crew.
Paul was so shaken by his experience that another fellow student decided to search for similar stories. This resulted in him finding other accounts of similar ‘time-slip’ sightings on Bold Street, of which there are many examples (see FT126:9).3
THE GATEHOUSE GHOST
Mrs Jones (pseudonym) of Southport regularly travelled by bus between Liverpool and Southport. Back in the late Spring of 2010 Mrs Jones, a very sprightly 70-year-old, was on her way home to Southport, travelling upstairs on a doubledecker. She had collected her grandchildren from school and delivered them safely to their mother, and caught the bus home around 4pm. It was about 15 to 20 minutes
As they passed in the passage, the man said: “All is quiet tonight”
into the journey, and the weather was good, when the bus was on the long stretch of road (the A565) through Ince Woods, passing the gatehouse of what is now a care home. She looked in through the upstairs window of the gatehouse and clearly saw the white figure of an old woman, who appeared to be sitting at a spinning wheel or loom. The bus was travelling at what Mrs Jones considers to be about 35mph (56km/h), but she is certain of what she saw. This was reinforced by the fact that a few weeks later, passing on the bus once more, she again saw the same vision. In fact, she has seen this apparition four times in all. She accepts that prior to the first sighting she had heard schoolchildren on the bus asking each other if they had seen “the ghost”, and that this was probably what encouraged her to look into the gatehouse. She dismisses the possibility of suggestion, though, or that it was an optical illusion because she has frequently passed the gatehouse around the same time and an optical illusion would almost certainly be repeated regularly. However, this was not the case. She recalls the clarity of the image, and added that the lady wore a white hat and had a white pinafore covering her chest, perhaps such as an old-fashioned maid might have worn.
A GHOSTLY ARP WARDEN
I came across the following story when undertaking research for my article “Uneasy Riders” (FT358:42-47) and it was subsequently published in The Ghost Club Journal.4 My source was Peter Bishop, who had worked with Mersey Tunnels for 30 years up to 2013, rising from Technician to Acting Assistant Engineering Manager. It was Peter who kindly gave me details of police interactions with phantom hitchhikers in the Kingsway (Wallasey) Mersey Tunnel. He then mentioned this ghost story, which he considered to be genuine.
There is an area in the basement of the George’s Dock Building which was nicknamed the ‘bedroom passage’ on account of its being where Air Raid Precaution (ARP) wardens would sleep in between their round-the-clock shifts. The 190ft- (58m-) tall George’s Dock Building was one of the highest buildings in Liverpool during World War II, strategically placed near the docks, and therefore ARP wardens would climb to the top and watch for incoming German bombers.
Today, the area bears no trace of its former use and simply hosts enclosures with computer equipment and associated work spaces and passageways. However, according to two of Peter’s most trusted Mersey Tunnel staff – one a Tunnel Control Engineer and one an Inspector of Works – they each independently encountered an ARP warden when down in this area. The events were about three years apart, and in essence the stories they told were the same. They had each been walking down the corridor in the late evening, when a man came towards them. The Inspector of Works said that at first he thought it was just one of the maintenance staff. He then noticed that the man was wearing a greatcoat and carrying a metal helmet, binoculars and a torch. As they passed in the passage, the man said: “All is quiet tonight. Jerry has stayed home.” It was only at this point that the strangeness of the situation struck home, and each witness turned to see the phantom disappear through the next airlock door.
What is clear is that the phantom actually spoke to the two witnesses, or that they both imagined they heard someone speak. Both men are down-to-earth characters, neither given to romancing or believing in ghosts. Peter has known them for many years and provided their names. He vouched for their honesty and their belief that they’d had genuine and inexplicable experiences.
RADIO CITY OF THE DEAD
I was interviewed by broadcaster/journalist Howard Hughes for his excellent radio
5 programme The Unexplained on Talk Radio on 30 September 2018. I was talking about phantom hitchhikers and road ghosts, primarily in the Halsall Moss area between Southport and Ormskirk. Much to my surprise and delight, Howard said that he had grown up in that area, in Formby, and always found the Moss to be quite disconcerting, particularly at night. He then mentioned, as an aside, that he used to work for the local Radio City, which is based in St John’s Beacon6 in the middle of Liverpool. One night he was going around the station on some errand or other when he saw before him what looked like a caretaker in a 1960s-style cloth coat and
cap and heavy-duty black boots. He saw him clearly, taking in his appearance, but then the ‘caretaker’ simply vanished. Naturally disturbed by this event, Howard went to find his colleague, who on seeing his face said: “So, you’ve seen him then?” Apparently, this phantom had been witnessed by many people at the station, and the general theory was that it was the ghost of an old (unnamed) worker who ‘checks’ on the building. There was never any feeling of malevolence. Howard thinks that probably everyone at Radio City knows of the ghost in the tower, but that there is a general reluctance to speak about it.
FURTHER TALES OF THE OLD MAN OF HALSALL MOSS
In “Strange Stories From Southport” [FT370:42-45] I provided details of three more phantom hitchhiker/road ghost stories from around the Halsall Moss area, referring to them as cases I, J & K, so that they fitted with those (A to H) in my original article “The Old Man of Halsall Moss” [FT328:3239]. I can now add two new cases, L & M.
CASE L: THE SOLID SILHOUETTE
Mr N is a 51-year-old specialist motorcycle courier who covers large areas of Merseyside and Lancashire. It was 12.30-12.45am on a weekday night in September 2018 when he was on duty and riding through the Westhead area of Ormskirk, heading south towards Junction 1 of the M58 motorway. The weather was clear, but it was very cold, with the temperature down to about 4-5°C. His route took him down Lyelake Lane, which has open farmers’ fields on either side. He was approaching the sharp left bend in the lane, at the junction with Latham Road (which is to the right), and therefore kept to between 20mph (32km/h) and 30mph (48km/h). Just as he arrived at the bend he noticed a figure standing at the side of the road to his left; he was very close when he saw it because he was concentrating on the road and it hadn’t been picked up in his headlights (possibly because of the bend).
He describes the figure as being like a solid silhouette of average height, but he couldn’t tell if it was male or female. But when he looked in his rear-view mirrors to check, there was nobody there. He said to himself that “something’s wrong here!”, but couldn’t stop to check, given his timetable and responsibilities. He was very disturbed by the apparition, and its possible nature, and admits that he “freaked out for the rest of the shift”. Mr N goes past this bend in Lyelake Lane very regularly, possibly twice a shift, so he is entirely familiar with it. He has subsequently checked the spot; there is nothing there that could produce such a lifelike image, and he has never seen anything similar on any other journey. He considers himself to be very rational and knows that he saw something that night, but cannot explain what he saw.
CASE M: A TALKING PHANTOM HITCHHIKER
One night in August 1983, 27-year-old Mr M left his home in Crosby to pick up his wife from work in Southport. He was driving alone in his Austin Allegro along the coastal road, which links Ainsdale to Southport. It was around 11.30pm and raining heavily, and so Mr M was concentrating on his driving. He was about 300 yards past the Pontins roundabout with Shore Road, when in his headlights he spotted a man thumbing to hitch a lift, standing right on the edge of the road. Mr M pulled over and wound the passenger side window down, saying that he could drop the man off in the centre of Southport. The man was wearing a parkatype coat and was soaking wet, and wasn’t carrying any bags. He had stubble on his face and dark eyes, and Mr M guessed
It took about 20 seconds for him to realise the man had disappeared
that he was in his mid-30s. Although his behaviour was normal and calm, he had a troubled expression, which Mr M put down to him being out in such bad weather. He was quietly spoken, with a local Southport accent, and asked if he could bring his girlfriend with him into the car, to which Mr M agreed. Staying on the passenger side of the car, the man then stepped to its rear without making a sound, although the heavy rain was making a lot of noise. Mr M then realised that the man was nowhere to be seen; he opened the driver’s window and saw that there was nobody there. He stepped out of the car for a couple of seconds and still could not see anybody. It took about 20 seconds for Mr M to realise that the man had completely disappeared, and that there was no sign of any girlfriend. The road at that point was edged with high sandhills and there was quite simply nowhere the man could have gone.
The whole episode took about two minutes, and left Mr M feeling completely befuddled. He got back into his car and continued on his journey. When he arrived, he was told by his wife and her work colleagues that he looked as if he were in shock.
SPITAL PHANTOM HITCHHIKER
When I gave my charity talk about phantom hitchhikers and road ghosts at Tranmere Rovers Football Club on 8 November 2018, I asked whether anyone in the audience was familiar with the phantom hitchhiker that was supposed to haunt Poulton Road at the point where it leaves the Poulton Lancelyn Estate. It is said that a young female has been seen late at night and on several occasions has entered a car before disappearing. Appearances peaked in the 1970s and 1980s.7 I was particularly interested because the location is a couple of hundred yards from where I live [FT358:42-47], and because my eldest son remembers the story being told when he was at senior school in the 1990s.
After the event I was approached by a married couple who were both ex-police officers. They told me that there was indeed a story about a female phantom hitchhiker in Spital; however, this was at the bridge across the Birkenhead to Chester railway at Spital Station, about a mile from the location. They had both been told about it when they started work at the local Bromborough Police Station in the 1980s. They had never seen anything themselves and were not aware of anyone that had had such an experience.
Two things strike me. The first is that I cannot find anyone who has actually seen this phantom hitchhiker; and the second is that the location mentioned in the stories is variable, sometimes including the Dibbinsdale Bridge in Bromborough, which is about a mile beyond the Poulton Road location. Also, it looks as though every new officer at Bromborough police station was told the story, which means that it would then be widely disseminated among the local population. But this was just at the same time that Jan Harold Brunvand’s classic book The Vanishing Hitchhiker 8 was published. The popularity of the book, with the obvious consequence that it helped further disseminate the very urban legends it describes, leads me to suspect that someone at Bromborough police station had either read it or at least picked up on its classic ‘phantom hitchhiker’ story. Did they then attach this narrative to a nearby location as a way of winding up new police officers?
Obviously, I can’t prove that this was the case, but unless and until I get a genuine first- (or even second-) hand testimony, this will be my suspicion.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Bar the last one, the stories collected above are all first- and second-hand testimonies, where the people concerned are convinced, and puzzled, by their odd experiences. They cover a wide spectrum of strangeness, and illustrate that forteana can present in lots of different ways, even in a comparatively small geographical area such as Merseyside. Based on these stories, and others that I continue to collect, maybe the county should be renamed ‘Mysteryside’…
REFERENCES
1 Royal Air Force Museum Cosford, Pers. Comm., 22 Nov 2018.
2 www.concordesst.com/faq.html.
3 See www.parascience.org.uk/PDFs/ Time%20Slips.pdf, and https://exemplore. com/paranormal/The-Liverpool-Time-SlipsThe-True-Story-Of-Mysterious-Occurences-InBold-Street. 4 Mersey Tunnel Ghost Story, Ghost Club
Journal, Issue 1, 2017, pp24-25. 5 http://theunexplained.tv/ 6 https://planetradio.co.uk/city/local/news/ radio-city-viewing-gallery/
7 www.parascience.org.uk/PDFs/Road%20 Ghosts%20and%20Phantom%20 Hitchhikers.pdf
8 Jan Harold Brunvand, The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends and Their Meanings, WW Norton & Company,
1981.
✒ ROB GANDY is is a visiting professor at the Liverpool Business School, John Moores University, and a regular contributor to FT.