The quiet residential street of Park Crescent in Sauchie is believed to be the most paranormally active street in the wee county of Clackmannanshire.
Many people have at least heard in passing about the Sauchie Poltergeist, but if maybe you have not, let's tell that tale as well as a few others from the very same street.
The Original Sauchie Poltergeist
Eleven-year-old schoolgirl Virginia Campbell became the focal point of several disturbances in 1960. Virginia and her mother had moved to Sauchie to live with her aunt Isabella and Uncle Thomas, while her father stayed at home in Ireland running the family's farm. Viriginia and her mother both worked in Dollar.
Virginia and her cousin Margaret shared a room, and the family lived a happy and normal life until the night of Tuesday November 22nd. Whilst lying in their bed both girls began to hear strange noises in their room. Despite being the only people in the room, the girls could hear what sounded like a ball hitting the room wall. With no explanation the girls could think of, they went downstairs to tell their parents, who reassured them the noise would be nothing to worry about. Eventually both girls returned to their room and their bed. However, very shortly thereafter they started to hear their headboard banging against the bedroom wall. Upset with the strange noises the girls moved into another room for the night, but the banging noise moved into that room too, the banging only stopped when Virginia eventually fell asleep.
From then on, scratching noises could be heard at times anywhere in the house, as the night passed things became stranger and stranger as items would go missing only to reappear later in a different place or move around the rooms independently.
On Wednesday November 23rd Virginia's Aunt and Uncle stood in amazement as their heavy sideboards moved out from the wall unaided a few inches and then returned to its original place. This time when the ball banging noise started the next-door neighbours could hear the noise too. As the family became increasingly worried, word was beginning to spread around the village of the strange events in Park Crescent.
Mr T. W. Lund, the local Church of Scotland Minister, was begged to try and help the poor family. He visited the house and looked around it carefully examining the bedroom where the noises had started originally. After his inspection of the house, he came to the conclusion that the banging was coming from inside the bed's headboard and frame. It is said that he watched a laundry basket moved independently across the room then back to its original place. In the end Mr Lund decided he could do nothing to help the family. Young Margaret then fled from her home terrified by everything that had happened.
For a few hours everything in the house quietened down and Margaret eventually returned home. Both girls had eventually been reassured that their room was safe, so Margaret and Virginia headed off to bed that night. All of a sudden, the banging recommenced.
On Thursday November 24th even more strange things began to occur, as though the banging and moving furniture wasn't frightening enough for the family, the sewing machine suddenly turned on by itself, to then be followed by other objects moving independently including an apple and a vase.
Everyone became aware that wherever Virginia went, the poltergeist seemed to follow. Whilst at school Virginia was seen by her teacher Miss Margaret Stewart to be having problems with her desk. Miss Stewart asked Virginia what the problem was, eventually she instructed Virginia to lift her hands off the desk at which point the lid suddenly flew open then slammed closed again. Virginia's classmates became very frightened and started screaming as the desk began to levitate.
On Monday the 28th further strange events occurred in Virginia's classroom. On an occasion when she walked by the teacher's desk without touching it, Miss Stewart felt the pointer and then the desk start to vibrate. Having coped with nearly a week of events, Virginia became hysterical, and her mother called for the local GP. Dr Nesbit of the Tillicoultry Medical Practice arrived for a home visit and decided that Virginia needed to be sedated. Despite Dr Nesbit sedating Virginia, banging was still heard.
Whilst Dr Nesbit made his house visit Mr Lund the Minister was also present. Both the Dr and Minister watched on in disbelief as they watched the pillow Virginia's head was on began to ripple before it then rotated under Virginia's head. In the hope of removing Virginia from whatever was causing all the unexplained activity, the decision was taken to remove her from home to a house that was unaffected by the activities. Dr Nesbit then request that two of his colleagues who were also a married couple should visit and examine Virginia.
In the new property which Virginia now lay, all three doctors witnessed the knocks commencing. In the hope of capturing some of the events on film Dr Nesbit and Dr Logan set up a cine camera. Surprisingly they managed to record the knocks as well as furniture moving around. Later that night, Mr Lund arrived with another three colleagues. All four Ministers spent some time saying prayers.
On Friday the 2nd of December the local newspaper, The Alloa Journal ran an article about the strange situation in Park Crescent. In the article it was stated that Virginia's Aunt Isabella had tried to comfort her niece but was shoved off the bed, as the sheets and blankets began to flap wildly in the air. Throughout this episode Virginia seemed to be in pain as she lay making moaning noises through this episode. The reporter had also spoken to James Henderson of Alloa's Spiritualist Church who commented that he believed Virginia had psychic abilities and that she might be aided by a visit from a “responsible medium”.
After the Ministers had spent time praying in the house, all the activities began to settle down and Virginia seemed much happier as it would appear the Poltergeist was leaving her in peace.
Further Events in Park Crescent
It seems that the paranormal world did want to involve Virginia Campbell and her family, over the years there have been lots of other paranormal activity within the street, as well as the house the Campbells used to live in.
1970 saw another episode of paranormal activity in Park Crescent. In another property within the street, episodes of scratching could be heard from somewhere in the living room as well as loud clawing noises too. This was in addition to plugs suddenly popping out of electrical sockets while no one was near to them. A child who lived in the house also had strange dreams. The activity continued for the whole time the family lived in the property, which spanned over a decade.
2000 strange events began to be reported in the street again. This time the events were at times more violent than previously. The occupant of the house reported being pushed down the stairs and tossed across a bedroom by a force/entity they could not see. At times a baby could be heard crying although there were no infants in the house. On another occasion a cupboard door which for some reason had been nailed closed suddenly flew open. A dark figure was also glimpsed in the house at times.
2001 The house in which Victoria Campbell had lived in previously and experienced lots of paranormal events in, decided to welcome its new tenants a few months after they moved in. At the time there was still an old coal cellar in the kitchen and there would intermittently be horrible smells coming from it. Also, in the kitchen, the kettle would be often turned on and off with no people nearby or at times in the room. However yet again the entity seemed to be drawn to the children of the household more. The whole bedroom the children shared had a horrible feel about it. The eldest of the children was affected the most, they began telling their parents about a lady who would sit on the end of their bed. The mother also experienced this when she slept in her children's bedroom a few times. Unfortunately, the eldest child also experienced nightmares and stated that the bed sheets would change colour at times. In a bid to try and protect the children, their parents swapped bedrooms with them. The swap did make life easier for the children although the noises, smells and kettle activity would continue whilst the family lived in the house.
The stories which follow has been exclusively told to www.Clackmannanshire.scot .
We would like to thank the lady who told us her and her family's story
No. 56 Over Many Years
Another Park Crescent family experienced decades of paranormal activity at number 56.
The family was made up of a mother, father, two daughters and 2 sons. All members of the family witnessed activity over the years. This is a small collection of the family's experiences: -
With four children in the house, the home was clearly a busy place. So, the first time the mother thought she saw a little girl running from the girl's bedroom to the boy's bedroom one night when she was awake during the night, she obviously thought it was one of her daughters. That was until she went into the children's bedrooms to check on them and all four were in their own beds sound asleep. On another night the mother and father both woke to find a little girl standing still at the bottom of their bed. The father told the youngster to go back to bed assuming it was one of his own daughters, but the children remained standing still. As the father then rose from his bed, he and his wife watched as the little girl just disappeared before their eyes. As the children of the household got older the little girl was seen more often and the family got used to her presence and felt no threat from her.
One evening as the mother and her four children were all in the living room watching TV and the father was out, the noise of a running bath started suddenly. Automatically the mother asked who was running the bath but realised no one had left the living room and her husband hadn't returned home yet. On this realisation she headed upstairs accompanied by her eldest daughter to take a look and find out what was going on. As they approached the bathroom, they heard noises that sounded like someone was splashing in the bath, they could also hear what sounded like someone was hitting the sides of the bath. Instead of these sounding like a child playing and splashing happily in the bath the noises seemed to have a terrifying tone. As they reached the bathroom door, they carefully opened it and swung it open for there to be no one in the bathroom and no bath had been run.
Until this point the family had not seen or heard anything that made them fearful of being harmed and no one worried about living in the house, after that night the mother began to struggle living in the house despite previously reassuring her children “nothing in the house would harm them”. The bathroom noises were heard again several times over the years.
A common event within the house which over time the whole family would hear on numerous occasions, was the sound of newspapers being shuffled over as if an old lady was walking across them throughout the house.
One night whilst sleeping four members of the family all had the same horrific dream. The father, mother, a daughter and a son all dreamt that in the space between the roof and the ceiling above the stairs a woman dressed in red was being hung. This dreamed disturbed the family so much that the father had to go and check the space in case there was something/one there or any sign of a hanging.
Fortunately for the family there were no signs of anything having ever happened in this space. The electrical lights within the house seemed to almost have a mind of their own. On one occasion whilst the family were all watching TV together the bulb in a floor lamp suddenly popped out and fell on the floor. Despite having been a delicate glass bulb which everyone would expect to have been broken by the fall, this bulb still worked when put back in the lamp.
The mother was by now struggling to cope with all the strange things happening in her home and began to spend her evenings sitting in her bedroom, her eldest daughter sat with her most night to give her company and comfort her. Most nights while they sat in the room the lamp on the mothers beside table would flicker. The mother believed this was her dead sister communicating with her and would sit and happily talk to her “sister”. No matter how many times the bulb or lamp were changed this flickering persisted.
All the children have now grown up and moved from their family home, but their father still lives there. Sadly, the mother has passed however before her death she told her family if there was a way to come back, she would be back.
It seems the mother's determination to get back to her family however seems to have settled on communicating with her eldest daughter, just as she believed her dead sister was communicating with her. Sometimes on either her birthday or on the anniversary of the day and time she died, the mother seems to be trying to communicate with her eldest daughters by making the lamps in the daughter's house flicker, this has been seen by numerous people over several years.