Spectre inspectors Are you troubled by strange noises? The caretaker of a former Fife mill certainly was, so who did he call? Two novelists and part-time ghost hunters, that’s who, as Michael Alexander found out

The first suggestion something peculiar was happening in the converted 17th Century Fife flax mill house came two weeks after Hugh Mackay started work there as a caretaker. The building, in countryside near Kennoway, had been deliberately chosen by the directors of a German foster care company because they liked its Scottish heritage while its relatively remote location was seen as ideal for the needs of their young clients.

However, a series of unexplained episodes left them wondering if the historic structure was haunted.

“The first incident happened less than two years ago,” says Hugh, who originates from the Outer Hebrides and now lives in East Wemyss with his wife Anya and their five-year-old daughter.

“I was upstairs doing some initial paintwork inside. My wife went out to B&Q and left me working.

“Twenty minutes later I heard someone coming up the stairs.

“The stairs in winter time sort of creak and I heard someone stop at the top. I shouted ‘is that you Anya?’ And all I heard was ‘No’.

“I thought, ‘oh that’s a man’s voice’, which made me get up on my feet and have a look around.

“I checked inside the house. I checked outside. But there was nobody there.”

Hugh did not think much else of it. However, a week later his daughter, who was four at the time, claimed she saw a figure standing at the bottom of the stairs.

She also described a ball of light which passed through the hall door into the bedroom – and later told her parents it had a face on it.

Later, says Hugh, a co-worker visiting from Germany awoke and reported seeing a figure sitting at the bottom of the bed saying her name. She was so upset she locked herself in another room and stayed awake all night.

Hugh believes in ghosts but accepts there could be logical explanations. However, he says the final straw for him came two months ago when he came up the driveway one morning and was shocked to see an upstairs window fully open and the curtain flapping out.

With the building empty at the time and as the only key holder, this alarmed him – especially as the windows are difficult to open. Days later when he was in the property alone, he says the TV volume fluctuated violently up and down, apparently by its own volition.

“That was the only day I got out of the house quick,” he says. “I didn’t even have my lunch – I just left.”

Now his wife won’t be left alone in the property. And, to use the oldGhostbusters movie adage “Who you gonna call?”, she picked up the phone and contacted the professionals – a pair of Fife authors and part-time paranormal investigators with a reputation for recording “real” evidence of spooky activity.

Anya had first got to know St Andrews-raised Haunted Kirkcaldy writer Greg Stewart, 46, now of Cupar and Leven-based The Weem Witch writer Lenny Low, 49, when they gave a talk on local ghost stories a couple of years ago.

After making several visits to the property, the pair – who operate without charge under the title The Ghost Writers – now claim to have hard evidence that something unexplained is going on in the mill.

After setting up motion sensor cameras in the dead of night, they claim to have captured an unexplained image which, they believe, could be a human figure. And Greg says he also saw a hooded figure for himself.

“It’s a bit like a fishing trip,” says Lenny, who has investigated numerous paranormal incidents and insists he and Greg are “not mugs”.

“You can sit there for hours with nothing then when you least expect it, something bites.”

Describing himself as an “open minded sceptic”, Greg says: “I believe (in ghosts). But I don’t believe. I know what I saw and I’ve heard the evidence.

“But I can’t say 100% it was a ghost. I think the term ghost is too wide. What is a ghost? We can’t categorise ghost if we don’t know what a ghost is.”

He prides himself in historical research and that is where his focus has now turned – not only into the history of the mill but also statistical records of who lived in the area over the centuries.

Already, some progress has been made, with records of a farmer called James Swan, who lived there around 1852.

“There’s no point in just saying the house is haunted,” he adds.

“We need to know why is it haunted, who’s haunting it, what happened here?

“A ghost – if it is a ghost – doesn’t just go ‘I fancy popping in here for a laugh.’ There’s got to be a reason it’s here.

“We trawl the record books. It’s about trying to get to the original stories and just piecing it all together.” malexander@thecourier.co.uk

A ghost – if it is a ghost – doesn’t just go ‘I fancy popping in here for a laugh.’ There’s got tobea reason it’s here