Ghost Ships

[Lou Barron]

as most of you guys know that seamen are the most superstitious of all people one of the things we use to do is tell ghost stories and we always said that when you use to go on lookout on the fo*c*sle head at night time you could not stay looking ahead all the time you had to look behind you every now and again and the relief man came to take over he had to give a whistle to let you know he was coming but we kept a look out for the white lady

[happy daze john in oz]

I know i take the urine now and again but i actually live in a haunted house? nothing scary but when the kids were young an old lady {ghost} would sit on the end of their bed true. some years ago we had visitors to our street and the tenants that lived in our house knocked on our door introduced themselves and we invited them in they started asking questions about the house not wanting to come right out with it i just said oh you mean the old lady? then they started telling my wife and i about the times they lived here the lady used to sit on her younger brothers bed he became the lord mayor of somewhere down south anyway of all the houses i have lived in this is the most peaceful place i have ever lived in and she is most welcome on a footnote i have not had any ale for 15 years and it is a true story. so strange things do happen.john

No Ale for 15 years John, that is realy letting the side down mate.

[happy daze john in oz]

Not quite a ghost story but very odd. About three years ago a catamaran was found floating off the Queensland coast. It had set out with three very able sailing men aboard, there was food on the table, all else was in order but the men were gone. No trace of them was ever found and to this day no one can explain what happened.

[Ron Kendall]

On lookout on the Table Bay in mid Atlantic around 2am, my relief didn't show up, I thought no more about it, and carried on walking up and down, as it was quite cool, all of a sudden, the lid of the flag locker lifted, and my relief popped out and asked the time, I answered him from half way down the ladder!

[Alan Gale]

I've not seen ghosts on a ship but we've got one at home! Our place is a big old victorian house and several people including myself have seen the spirit of a small black cat flitting round the house. Our cat Nina also sees it and and will often give chase. We always know when its about as your feet go cold and Ninas hackles come up. I call it George but what it really is and why it's here I've no idea. It seems to be a benevolent spirit as we've never had any problems.

[Lou Barron]

I see a few ghosts after a good few G&T

[happy daze john in oz]

I see a few ghosts after a good few G&T

Don't we all Lou???

[Captain Kong]

When my step daughter got married they bought a Manor in the Derbyshire hills,
It dates back a thousand years, it is mentioned and recorded in the Doomsday Book.
Modernised in 1646 by RW, on the wood carving in the Hall. Suits of armour and swords on the wall in the large hall, A Title of Lord and Lady of the Manor came with the house.
Anne and I used to stay there a lot.
A Lady Ghost , hair tied back in a bun and wearing a long bottle green velvet gown would walk around the house and then disappear into a bed room. There were six bedrooms. That one was Ice Cold at all times. I went in and felt the evil in there, my hair stood on end. and told her never open the door and do not let the kids go in. Some terrible tragedy must have happened in there. I have never ever felt anything as evil as that room. all the other rooms were lovely and warm.
Later we discovered a grave of a lady in the Gardens.
When our granddaughter Naomi, was six, she had a friend, Chloe, who was also six, Chloe was always with her, I could not see her but Naomi could, I said one day, when I was helping Naomi with her homework, Where is Chloe, she never looked up from her writing, She`s here, cant you see her, ? I said, Oh Yes, Hi Chloe, didn't see you there.
I said to Naomi, Has she no parents? she said , No her parents were dead.
Then after a year , I said to Naomi, Where is Chloe these days , not seen her around. She said, Chloe told me she has to go now, and will not be coming back again, and then she said Good Bye.
In the Village I did some research, and saw the local Vicar, He told me a few years before, a family of two parents and a six year old daughter were killed in a car crash with a lorry.
The child was name as Chloe, She had never been baptised, and so her spirit was now in Limbo with no where to go. She latches herself onto another child of the same age, and stays until the child outgrows her then she will leave and go with another child of the same age.
So that is another kind of ghost story.
They do not live in the Manor House anymore, She divorced her husband for playing around with other women. and lost the title of Lady,
Cheers
Brian.

[Rodney Mills]

In 1960-62 I lived and worked in Marathon, Ontario, Canada; on the top shore of Lake superior and I was employed by the Marathon Hotel. I was 21 years old at the time and originally hired as butcher/gaurdmange, but due to the rapid turn over of employees I was promoted to sous chef, and later the head chef quit and I became the temporary Head Chef. Part of my duties was to purchase the foods. Once a week, traveling salesmen would call on the hotels in the small mill towns along the coast of Lake Superior to take orders for various foodstuffs, e.g. meats, dry-goods, frozen foods, etc..

I have previously mentioned in a post, a story about my grandmother and I, and the Ouija Board, and how she wrapped red paper around the light bulbs for special atmosphere effects...and the paper caught fire in the middle of the séance and scared the heck out of everyone. Well I told this story and our neighbors decided we should have a séance. So I cut out alphabet letters and numbers and made a circle of them, placed an upturned wineglass in the center and all placed an index finger gently on the glass. It took a bit of time for the giggles to stop, and then the bloody glass started to move. Anyway we went through a bunch of daft questions and strange answers, and I asked the board for someone else to answer. After roughly a minute, the glass went rapidly around the table then "JUMPED" off the table onto the floor. One couple got up and hurriedly left

We started again, and again rapid circling the table, then it stopped then slowly spelt out the name Keith. I ask when and where did you die? The glass spelt out a first century date and said he was a priest. Again the glass rapidly circled the board, then forcefully, sort of angrily, spelt fire, death, kill, over and over. I said what did you do, meaning were you killed, did you kill? The board then rapidly spelt out a word over and over...P.E.R.D.O.C.O, perdoco, perdoco, and then jumped again off the table. Now if someone was manipulating the glass by pushing it around the table, that's kind of possible, but how could it be lifted up by fingers laying on top of the bottom of stem on a glass and, with enough force to hurl it onto the floor?

The next day at work, the staff were sitting around eating lunch (before the rush) and discussing the happenings the evening before. A German dishwasher asked to see the spelling of the word "Perdoco." It seemed he was a pharmacist in Germany and was taking any job he could get to improve his English and study for the Canadian Pharmacy test.

"Perdoco" he told us, "is Latin for to teach, or to be a teacher." We were stunned. Priests in ancient days were the teachers!

I've read over the years on the power of suggestion, autosuggestion, the paranormal, you name it and I cannot explain what happened.

That's not quite the end of the story. Two salesmen arrived for their respective food orders, apparently they traveled together to share expenses. Anyway, they had found out about our experience the night before, and having to stay the night in boring Marathon begged to watch a séance. One of the two was a skeptic and firmly beleaved one of us had been pushing the glass around. Anyway, we set up the séance at my apartment, and it worked. While the glass was moving, I and the others gently removed our fingers from the glass until just the two salesmen were making the glass move. When they broke their concentration on the glass and saw it moving they were flabbergasted.

The next week they came for their orders somewhat sheepish. It seemed they left Marathon for their next stop Terrance Bay, checked into the hotel, had a special smooth topped table set up in a private room, invited the chef, hotel manager the mayor, civic leaders, logging mill manager and their spouses to a séance. They laid on the booze and hors-d'oeuvres and had everything set...except for Keith, he didn't show up and the glass never moved, and they got laughed out of town.

Cheers, Rodney

""You'll be as cold as Finnegan's feet on the day they buried him.""

"Finnegan's Wake"—James Joyce

[John Arton]

I guess the most famous Ghost Ship was the Marie Celeste. Watched a program about its mystery on the Discovery Channel. The story that goes around regarding crew mutiny etc. were perpetrated by the Admiralty Wreck Commissioner in Gibraltar who altered/ignored the account the eye witness account of the mate of the ship that discovered the drifting Marie Celeste and whom sailed it to Gibraltar.
The Marie Celeste was carrying a cargo of barrels of industrial alcohol but there was no evidence of fire on board. Scientific tests showed that the vapours given off by this alcohol could be ignited and flash off without causing any burning of the structure of the ship.
This explosion would have led to the Captain being afraid that the cargo was going to ignite and set fire to the ship, so he ordered all into the lifeboat which the attached to the ship but as they had failed to lower the sails, the ship sailed on towing the lifeboat with all on board in it until the tow rope parted. The lifeboat would have the drifted away and eventually all crew members perished.
rgds
JA