The last three investigations at the mansion have produced some of the most fascinating results for the group with phenomena such as physical attacks, EVPs, audible voices, apparent apparition caught on film and in one instance full manifestation leading to a channelling.

7^th October 2005

The last investigation was spread over three nights starting on the 2^nd of October. A small group of us were invited down to the mansion to set up a paranormal investigation for a group of artists. We set up equipment and while the artists walked the mansion with Wendy Milner (National Trust event co coordinator) along with Trystan Swayle a colleague from Severnside Centre for Fortean Research, the rest of us set up in the cellar.

The initial start to the night was very quiet with no apparent activity, or so we thought. Eventually Wendy’s group joined us and we retired to the drawing room for a break. On review of the cctv footage from this vigil we appeared to have captured a hooded figure appearing very briefly in the Chapel corridor. This was noticed on review of the film the following week and initial reaction was that it could be torchlight from the group wandering around. I spoke in depth with Trystan who had been with the party walking the mansion to ascertain where they would have been at the time of the anomaly. We concluded that the group would have been in the corridor by the bathroom on the opposite side of the building or maybe the 1^st floor corridor. At this point we still only had the torch light theory and we posted the footage onto several websites including the BBC site to ask for comments as we were due back to the mansion the following Friday and wanted as many theories to discount as possible. As you will read later on the anomaly caught is not torch light, infra red light or car lights (as was also suggested to us).

At around ten oclock the artists left leaving a team of eight to carry on investigating the mansion here we split into two groups one in the Chapel and the other on the 2^nd floor corridor. During this session Trystan Jamie and Steve on the second floor witnessed blue lights travelling along the corridor. The first was a ball of light the size of a ten pence piece, which travelled along the corridor towards them, and left Trystan with a felling of déjà vu, on the second occasion the corridor was dimly illuminated for approximately three seconds by a blue glow descending from the rafters. Unfortunately these were not captured on camera and so we only have the testimony of the three individuals involved however it is worth noting that Trystan, who is always dubbed the group sceptic and has to be admired for his scientific theories on unexplained phenomena, does not yet have an explanation for these lights.

The rest of the evening was fairly uneventful until two o’clock in the morning when I had to go and let two of the members out of the mansion. After closing the back door I walked up the corridor and as I turned to go towards the Chapel a stone was thrown at me. This to the uninitiated can be quite frightening but it is a phenomenon you get used to especially in Woodchester Mansion and so this did not frighten me. What happened next was odd in the fact that I cannot remember starting to run but  soon realised that I was half way up the corridor sprinting as fast as I could. When I got to the end I was spun around to the left and fell in a heap blood pouring from a wounded knee. This goes to show that although TV programmes show bravado from individuals doing solo investigations it is not always safe to do so even for experienced investigators.  This really was the end of an interesting night although the group eventually down to four die hards did another vigil on the second floor corridor we had no further activity and so left at around four o’clock.

14 October 2005   

The following Friday GPRG were hosting a group event where we thought the energy levels could be raised by taking a group of 30 people to follow up our investigation. The downside to this many people in one building is that extraneous noise pollution made for a difficult nights work however it did give us the chance to try to recreate our cctv footage from the previous week with torch light. Myself Pete Mould from SCFR and Steve Jones walked around the mansion with a variety of torches while other members sat in front of the monitor with a two way radio guiding us. We tried ever window to try to get a light source on to the area in question to no avail. As hard as we tried we could not recreate this footage. We ascertained that due to the radial spread of a torchlight the torch would have had to have been held very close to the area to create the same effect. Whether you believe it is a spirit or not as a group we have no rational explanation for this footage. The atmosphere in the mansion tonight was definitely tense it was almost as if something was waiting to happen but never quite got off the ground. Myself and medium friend Darren Bruton did pick up on the energy of a tall man in the chapel area moving between us but nothing evidential was caught. Other vigils throughout the night were held and the only evidence obtained was in a group led by Craig when they captured an EVP on asking the question how old are you a response was obtained ‘That’s not fair !’ The evening was rounded off by a trip to the lakes for those fit enough for the mile or so walk through the valley. No evidence of paranormal activity was captured for this part of the investigation.

2^nd December 2005

This night was to be a personal turning point for me as an investigator of the Paranormal. Up until now although a transformed sceptic to believer I did still hold onto a ten percent rationality and a questioning that ghosts could still all be in the mind. After tonight I will categorically state that in my own experience spirits exist.

The evening started off as usual in the drawing room, which had been set up, as base camp and people introduced and split into groups. Tonight there were 15 of us who were split into two groups. The first group went down to the cellar and my group went up to the 2^nd floor corridor. We started the vigil at approximately nine thirty and initially it was very quiet, after around half an hour I started to sense something/somebody moving half way down the corridor and moved forward in front of Scott our cameraman for the night and started to call out. Although sensing something in the corridor I wasn’t prepared for a full manifestation of a man, which appeared from behind the doorway, I was leaning close too. It is from this point that the video footage shows what happened next.

As a narrative to the scene to what happens after my initial shock and stepping back into Scott, which incidentally explains the erratic camera action, all I can tell you is that as I turned around to face Steve Jones my body was channelled by the spirit of a very angry man. I say channelled, as this is the only description I can give. This is the first time I have ever experienced anything like it in my life. The only way I can explain the sensation is to say that I felt an energy push through me and start shouting at everybody to get out, it was at this point that I felt somewhat detached from my body. It was only when Steve started shouting back at me that I started to gain control again. Needless to say after I was shaken and very closed off for the rest of the night.

The feelings I got were of a very large man who is fed up of all the intrusions to what he regards as his home. If you think about it ghost hunting now goes on most weeks at the mansion and wouldn’t you be pissed off if week in week out you had people coming to your home asking you to show them a light, make a noise, talk to them…….

Following this experience we immediately retired to the drawing room, initially one member of our group had thought myself and Steve had made the episode up and can be heard suppressing a giggle on the footage, she changed her mind when she saw how white we both were. I now know what the phrase means ‘you look like you have seen a ghost !’

The second vigil again involved activity on the second floor corridor. Craig held a group séance and had to stop when one of the ladies in his group started crying and sobbing out ‘don’t lock me in’ over and over again. When they got her out of the energy it started to react through GPRGs newest member Sharon who felt faint and again started to cry. She described it as a very emotional energy that just came in out of the blue. An interesting EVP was also recorded during this session the first voice seems almost child like then a shhhhh shhhh shhhh noise followed by ‘its ok’ from a different older person.

After a coffee break we decided to do a large group séance on the 2^nd floor to see if we could clear any of the energy. The results of this was of an energy not willing to enter the circle although several people had sensations of a person walking around them.

The next area for my group was the cellar while the other group again concentrated on the second floor. It was during this session that we could all here the voices of two females gigging as they walked along what sounded like the ground floor corridor. We got in touch on two way radio to the other group but nobody had left the 2^nd floor and they too had heard voices.

This to me was the most active night we have had down at Woodchester Mansion. All of the activity was mainly located on the 2^nd floor corridor, which is a major shift from when we first started coming down here when the cellar seemed the most active area.

It is also worth noting here that the areas of activity are consistent with other groups investigating the mansion this was confirmed by Wendy Milner when I spoke to her after the events. It just makes you wonder what the Mansion has in store for us for 2006.

All video and evps can be located in the evidence section of our website.

Chris Howley

12^th December 2006