IS THERE ANYBODY THERE BERTIE?

by

Shileen Rodgers

As most of you know, Derek Acora is truly an amazingly divine medium of our time, having seen him in person, and he also has an energy that is inspiring. His series of Most Haunted gave me the idea to set up a ‘night’s haunting’ in one of the most haunted public houses in Essex as many people had approached me with this in mind.  With the aid of my daughter, Mel, and before we knew it, we ended up with quite a crowd of people.

Having first tried a séance with many orbs and knockings that we managed to catch on video camera, we all decided that we wanted to explore further. I asked the manager of the public house if we could explore some of the rooms upstairs. He said, “By all means, but do not go into Room 5 – it is so haunted that no-one will sleep in there”. That was the worst thing he could have said to me!

I divided the group into two, and I led my group slowly up the creaking stairs. The lights were off, and I could only see the light of the video camera. All I could hear was the giggling of those behind me. We reached the forbidden Room 5, and I gently opened the door. The room was pitch black and felt ice cold as we slowly entered one by one. Everyone was holding onto each other and I could feel that the atmosphere was by now electric with anticipation as to what we might see.

Suddenly, and without warning, a body appeared to spring up from the bed in the room. A voice boomed out, “Who the f*****g hell are you?” My whole group, including myself, stood frozen in time. A second voice then sprung from the darkness and said, “Is there anybody there, Bertie?”  We all screamed, the bodies in the bed screamed – I do not know who was more scared, them or us - as we had no idea there was anyone in the room. We quickly dived out of the room, stumbled back down the creaky stairs, trying not to fall over each other, and once we got over the shock, we all ended up crying with laughter.

The poor manager, who by now thought we had all lost our minds, requested that we please be quiet, instead of which he was greeted with thunderous laughter once again. 

I wonder why no-one in our group stayed for breakfast??                         

Winter 2004