Fact is Stranger than Fiction Friday (1) The story of the Enfield Poltergeist

How often do we hear of a horror film being based on a true story only to find out that it's merely loosely based on several different events that may or may not have happened? You get the idea. I started this blog because, since I was a kid I’ve been fascinated by apparently true stories about ghosts or tales of serial killers that have made it in to our history books. So this will hopefully be a regular event!

For anyone who doesn’t know Enfield is a large borough in North London. In August 1977 the Hodgson family, consisting of mother Peggy, her two daughters Margaret (12) and Janet (11) and two sons Johnny (10) and Billy (7) began to experience what they called poltergeist activity. They reported furniture moving, toys being thrown around the room and becoming hot to the touch, interference with bedclothes and knocking on walls. And more interestingly, physical assaults, levitation's and possession. Two passers by even claimed to see one of the girls, through her bedroom window, floating in the air in a horizontal position.

Very soon journalists came to visit and they also reported strange goings on like objects moving of their own accord. One of the journalists reported their sightings to the Society for Psychical Research who sent Maurice Grosse and Guy Lyon Playfair to investigate. Possibly the most disturbing part of this is a recording, an excerpt can be heard in the film below, of Janet apparently channelling a man named Bill, who had died in that house. It has been said that she is using her false vocal chords which I imagine is something that is very difficult to do, especially for an 11 year old girl.

Police officers also witnessed the strange goings on and later signed statements confirming this. Also, their next door neighbour tried to test Janet by asking her to draw a circle around her light fitting. They left Janet alone and a minute later they were called back in. Janet told them that she had travelled through the wall and had gone in to her neighbour's bedroom and had dropped her book in there. The neighbour went next door and found a book and a circle drawn around her light fitting.

With all this “evidence” from reputable witnesses surely this just had to have happened just the way they said and that it had to be true? The problem is, the human mind is very complex and what we think we see isn’t always what we actually see. We can be susceptible to all kinds of suggestion. For instance, when I was about 5 I was sitting on our very brown rug and my dad lifted it up with me still on it. At the time I thought I was really flying and even now looking back that seemed the only logical explanation. I know I was only 5 but it felt so real and still does. Also, it was 1977 and what film would have been fresh in people’s minds? The Exorcist!

An elaborate hoax on a grand scale? The fact is though, most of the happenings have never been disproved. Many officials are not even condemning it, preferring to have more of an open mind on the subject. Whatever side of the fence you sit on here you have to admit, the recording of Janet and the ghost voice is terrifying and the photographs are amazing. I suppose it is something that will never be solved but it gives you the willies, right?