Haunted doll coming to spooky museum
A HAUNTED museum in Hinckley will soon be welcoming a truly spooktacular guest -a ‘haunted’ bride doll whose owners claim it scratched their bodies during the night.
The ‘possessed’ doll hit national news in June after its owners, from Norfolk, were forced to lock it in their shed after claiming it haunted their home and even attacked them.
Debbie Merrick, from Norfolk, bought the doll as part of a set-of-three from a charity shop earlier in the summer.
Debbie and husband Cameron were then forced to contact a medium to investigate after the creepy toy rocked their lives. The pair claimed that it scratched them and also set off fire alarms.
When the medium warned the pair that the doll had ‘something in it’, Debbie says she put two and two together – and fearfully sold the doll on eBay for £866.
Lee Steer, from Rotherham, ‘won’ the haunted doll, but claims that just a few days later, it struck again at the paranormal investigator’s home, where he lives with his parents Paul and Amy Steer.
The haunted museum in Hinckley, which is not currently open to the public, will now welcome the doll so that its resident team of ghost busters can conduct experiments and discover whether or not it is haunted.
Although the museum is not open, weekly live feeds are streamed on its Facebook wall.
Neil Packer, who runs the museum, said: “I’ve been talking to the owner who has agreed that the doll will be coming to my museum for a short time in order for my team and I to conduct our own experiments and research into the doll.
“I’m thinking of new and different ideas whilst she is with me. During her stay I will be doing live feeds of the experiments on the haunted antiques Facebook wall.
“One of the experiments will be one of my team actually sleeping in the museum with the doll and all my other items. Another one is I will be using a mirrored box.
“I don’t have a date yet but hopefully it will be soon.”
Neil said that he has plans to one day open the museum to the public, and is currently looking for a building to house his spooky objects in.
He added: “I firmly believe that energy from its previous owner can be retained in an item, and this is how my idea for the museum originated.
“By tapping into this energy, spirits can be invited forward to communicate with us. I’m always looking for new items that can be added.
“I’d recently been contacted by a lady in Coventry who had been getting some strange occurrences in her home after she’d found a couple of items in her attic.
“She had no idea where these items had come from. I went over and removed these items to my museum where my team and I spent a few hours conducting research on them, gaining lots of information that I passed onto the lady.
“She confirmed that any activity has ceased since the items were removed. This is something that I would like to expand on in the future.
“I have a small team who I’d been investigating with for a few years helping me in my research. The important thing is that I trust these guys completely.
“Another very important part in all this is to give the spirits respect and treat them as people. After all they were people when they were alive. They are all happy to be here.
“I find myself drawn to items as if I’m being guided by my spirit guides, after all that’s what they do, they guide us, it’s up to us to listen to them.”
For more information on the museum, email neil_packer2@hotmail. com, or visit https://www. facebook.com/hauntedresearch/