Rarely have I been terrified to the point of immobility or had concerns for my incipient demise. Getting stuck unprotected by climbing gear on a close to vertical mountain side and afraid to move as a twelve year old is one incident that comes to mind. Worse was crashing a motorcycle at 50 mph in my mid-teens. Certainly in that single vehicle accident a lack of mobility was hardly the issue as, clinging to the bike, I watched the rapidly unfolding event seemingly in slow motion. (a common experience during perceived threats). To this day however the incident which scared me the most involved not dangerous natural features nor speedy man made machines but the paranormal or supernatural if you will.
The site for this also youthful shenanigan was the ruins of Furness Abbey, a former Cistercian monastery dating back almost nine hundred years to 1123. It is located just north of my home town of Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria in the northwest corner of England. The gothic-style structure was built of local sandstone and has long been roofless and reduced to a collection of large and small fragmented sections of its many inner and outer walls. In the late 1950s, when the incident took place, the ruins were rarely officially open to the public and were not enclosed by a perimeter fence. There was therefore nothing to stop anyone from climbing on the walls and wandering the site at will which my friends and I quite often did. Popular with visitors today and regarded as an important piece of English history second only of its ilk to Fountains Abbey near Ripon in Yorkshire, there is now inevitably and rightly a security fence and an admission charge.
Growing up in Barrow, it was generally accepted by most locals (myself included) that the Abbey was haunted. We were convinced that the ghosts of monks who had lived, prayed, studied and brewed beer there wandered the grounds and cloisters at night. For this reason most of us would not even consider visiting after dark especially given Barrow’s cold, wet and windy climate. Too spooky by far.
The minimum drinking age in the UK was and still is eighteen. However that did not stop us from about sixteen on visiting pubs, claiming to be eighteen (ID was and is unknown in the UK) and consuming the weak (3% alcohol) inexpensive draft beers of the late 1950s. The relative affordability was a national government ordained ploy to appease and, they hoped, mollify the burgeoning post WW11 proletariat. Excise taxes went up very steeply on all forms of alcoholic beverage the higher the alcohol content.
I was sixteen when one late summer afternoon on my 1954 BSA 250cc motorcycle with a friend astride the pillion seat, we headed out into the nearby village pub dotted countryside for beers, ‘crisps’ (chips) and to play darts. When we set out, the weather was, by northwest England standards at least, ‘fair’. Just as we left the pub at the 10:30 closing time the worsening weather quickly engulfed us. Gusty winds at times reaching 40 – 50 mph, driving rain and finally thunder and forked lightening became the status quo. One of the frequent and massive low pressure systems which, typically having crossed the Atlantic from the US and Canadian east coasts, was moving inshore off the rarely still Irish sea. A cliché but it really did become a dark and stormy night.
Since neither of us owned any clothing which could remotely be described as motorcycling foul weather gear, heading back to Barrow we soon became cold and wet. We toughed it out for about ten miles, roughly the halfway point, before deciding we should try to find shelter. I had, what at the time I foolishly as it turned out considered to be a bright idea. I remembered that the Abbey which we would soon pass had a gate house with unlike the Abbey itself, a roof. I recalled from riding by numerous times but never stopping there, that it also had a covered entrance archway rather resembling a tunnel with the main structure built around it.
Throwing caution to the winds (Although we did give passing thought to the possibility of ghosts) I rode the bike deep into the sheltered area, shut the engine down and turned the lights off to save the old and unreliable battery lest we had trouble restarting. Instantaneously it was so dark we could not see our hands in front of our faces. It was also utterly silent save for the gusting wind. We both felt tense and soon developed a sense of foreboding. We wondered if this had been a good idea.
Remaining seated on the motorcycle and with only the wind for company, scary feelings aside we quickly became bored. To liven things up and with an element of juvenile bravado, we talked about the possibility of seeing a ghost or perhaps more than one. Would the ghosts capture us and take us into another dimension? We discussed all kinds of paranormal possibilities. We soon made ourselves very scared. The still driving rain showed no signs of stopping, neither did the wind diminish although the lightening had at least backed off. Then it happened. There had been a reason for our initial unease and was about to reveal its jaw dropping hand.
During a lull in the still gusting wind, we both thought we heard the sound of a rusty hinged door slowly opening. Then there was silence for some time. Perhaps we were mistaken or were our imaginations playing tricks on us? But there it was again. This time befitting an Alfred Hitchcock movie. A rusty creak here, a dry squeek there, a long pregnant pause then another, louder creak. I was by then fumbling for the keys I had stupidly removed from the bike’s ignition. But now absolute silence reigned. Was that it. Was it just the wind that had blown a door partly open? Were we doomed or not? Were we in fact alone or did we have unseen ghostly company?
We were by then gripped with fear and almost afraid to breath. I found the keys but how to put them in the ignition in total darkness. How stupid was I? How stupid does it get? No, neither of us had a flashlight. Now a more substantial creak and from very close by. Far too close for comfort. Good the key went into the ignition. Kickstart. Get a foot on the kickstart. No electric starters on 1954 BSA 250s. One kick, second kick, third kick. No go. One more kick but now a very substantial clang that rang in our ears over a ghostly barely audible voice – this cannot be. Surely we are alone. The gatehouse is unoccupied, derelict in fact, abandoned.
But now a very loud voice. Out of the darkness angry words are uttered. In the familiar Barrow dialect! (Think Manchester and Coronation Street – close enough). Verbatim they were:
EY (as in HEY with the H dropped thus EY – meaning hey you). WILL YOU BUGGERS (Buggers used colloquially as a slang term of abuse) in this case the intent being ‘stupid idiots’ SHUR UP? (shut up. Along with H, T is often dropped in the North of England) WE ARE TRYING TO GET SOME SLEEP!
Hence: HEY. WILL YOU BUGGERS SHUT UP. WE ARE TRYING TO GET SOME SLEEP.
A first panicked thought. So ghosts sleep together. But wait a minute. That was for sure a regular Barrow accent. 900 years ago monks might have brewed beer here but they didn’t have Barrow accents. Barrow didn’t even exist at the time. A new thought. We are in a Gatehouse. Hence Gate Keepers, Caretakers, Cleaners, etc. We have awakened a Barrow couple who live and work here looking after the Abbey. Presumably the ghosts do not bother them and perhaps vice versa.
Kick, kick. The bike starts. We are out of there like scolded cats. We no longer care about the inclement weather, Cistercian abbeys, monks, ghosts or anything else. We just want to get to our homes, dry off, thaw out, forget the whole fiasco and sleep in a warm bed.
Epilogue:
Likely the most famous ghost (there are a several) of Furness Abbey is a headless monk on horseback who rides underneath the very sandstone arch we sheltered under. Had we known that at the time, there is no way we would have ventured in. I did not know the headless monk connection until after I had finished this story. Perhaps as I wrote, he was directing my thoughts from ‘the other side’. Probably he knows I am from Barrow-in-Furness and wanted to help out a fellow Barrovian.
And this from Wikipedia:
There are many stories and sightings claiming that Furness Abbey is haunted. There are several ghosts which supposedly been seen numerous times at the Abbey. Firstly, it is said that the spirit of a monk has been seen climbing a staircase and also possibly walking towards the gatehouse before vanishing into a wall.[9] Another sighting is that of a squire‘s daughter. She was known to meet her lover at the ruined abbey after the Reformation, although one day her partner took a journey out to sea from which he never returned.[9] It is thought that the girl went back to the Abbey every day until her death to the site she and her partner once loved; the track she walked is today still known as “My Lady’s Walk.”[9] There have also been many sightings of a white lady, although due to possible conflicting stories, it is unclear whether the White Lady and the ghost of the squire’s daughter are the same person or not. Possibly the most famous ghost of Furness Abbey is a headless monk on horseback, who rides underneath the sandstone arch near the Abbey Tavern; the death of this individual is linked to an invasion by the Scots in 1316.[9]
A tunnel is said to run underneath the Abbey to both Piel Castle and Dalton Castle, allowing the monks to receive supplies and keep watch upon the local settlements. It has also been rumoured that the Holy Grail and King John’s missing jewels are actually hidden somewhere inside the ‘Ley tunnel‘.[10]