The Sunday Read: The MacKenzie Poltergeist

Edrof

Edrof

Edrof

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Good hello, chums!

To help those of you lucky blighters who have a lazy Sunday to kill, I'm posting another spooky tale to aid in whittling away the hours. This case is notable for being very well-documented, at times surprisingly violent in nature and utterly baffling.

"The period between the first recorded sightings in 1999 and the present has seen over 450 documented 'attacks'. Over five years there have been numerous reports of cuts, bruises and burns appearing on witnesses' bodies - often under their clothes. Photographs have been taken of these marks as well as many pictures of an unidentified shape in the tomb. There have been sightings of a white figure, unexplained smells, and auditory anomalies - including knocking noises under the ground and inside the tomb itself. Dead animals are found, unmarked, in front of the Mausoleum. Something in there pulls hair, grabs legs and arms and hits out. The area has been exorcised twice - both times unsuccessfully. Poltergeist activity has even been reported in four different houses around the graveyard".

As before, instead of posting a huge wall of text I've uploaded the article to my blog for easier reading (plus it lets me pop some illustrative pictures on there), but I also include the opening paragraphs below to whet your appetite...


The MacKenzie Poltergeist

What terrible evil lurks within this infamous Edinburgh mausoleum?

In December of 1998, a homeless man wandered through Edinburgh’s storm-lashed streets. Seeking shelter from the night’s downpour he staggered into Greyfriars Kirkyard and broke into one of the old mausoleums in the Covenanter’s Prison section—no doubt attracted by its intact roof. Inside, the vault was pitch-black and the brave (or foolhardy) vagrant decided to explore his surroundings with what meagre light he possessed. He removed an iron grate in the floor and descended a short, twisting, stone staircase and entered a second chamber. There, he came across four wooden coffins. Perhaps looking for valuables to steal, the man began to smash open the dusty caskets. As he did so, a hole suddenly opened beneath his feet and he fell through a wooden division into a third chamber—the existence of which had been previously unknown. The unfortunate intruder landed in a deep pit that had been used for illegally dumping those that had died from the plaque. Despite being hundreds of years old, the pit had remained well-sealed and the corpses that greeted the luckless tramp were far from skeletal. Semi-putrefied and covered in green slime, the rotten carcasses had sunken features, ragged clothing, matted hair and emitted an overpowering stench.

Not surprisingly, the man desperately fled the tomb, not stopping even when he cut his head on the tomb’s entrance in his reckless flight.

A nearby security guard and his dog had heard strange noises coming from the Covenanter’s Prison and were in the process of exploring the graveyard when they saw the wailing vagrant hurtling towards them. The sight of a bloody, filthy and bedraggled man charging out of a crypt in the middle of a stormy night was too much for the guard and both men fled separately into Edinburgh’s darkness.

The security guard turned up for work the next day, related the tale of his terrifying encounter and promptly handed in his notice. The tramp, however, was never heard from again.

And frankly, he couldn’t have chosen a more sinister vault to break into, for its name is the Black Mausoleum and to this day it houses the remains of the most notorious resident of Greyfriars Kirkyard: the 17th century judge and Lord Advocate Sir George MacKenzie, otherwise known to the Scots as “Bluidy MacKenzie”...
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So grab a triple-filtered decaff latte macchiato and read the rest here.



(I'd just like to say here a big old thanks to everyone who has got around to reviewing or 'liking' my Eerie Britain ebook on the Amazon site - love & kisses!)
 
I'll give this a read later. Related, have you read anything about gef the talking mongoose ?
 
NeilMick said:
So wait, this is ficton right?
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Nope, all true! George MacKenzie is an easily researchable historical figure, the injuries sustained at the Mausoleum are fastidiously documented and you can visit the place yourself if you're ever in Edinburgh. Of course, the cause of it all is under debate - but whether you believe in ghoulies and ghosties or not, it's a very weird case.

LOAM said:
I'll give this a read later. Related, have you read anything about gef the talking mongoose ?
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Yes, I've done a lot of research into Gef the talking mongoose. Weird tale that. In fact, by coincidence, it's chapter 8 - 'The Mysterious Mongoose of Cashen's Gap' of my ebook.
 
"Remarkably, she was just examining five large scratches under her Adam’s apple [that were] identical to my own."

Remarkable indeed.
 
n111ck said:
"Remarkably, she was just examining five large scratches under her Adam’s apple [that were] identical to my own."

Remarkable indeed.
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Lol, I think the quotee means the mother's scratches appeared in the same place as his own, which were on his Adam's apple. But yeah, it's rather clunky.

NeilMick said:
"One man, an ex-police officer who prefers to remain anonymous"

Why?
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Probably because his colleagues would take the mickey about it forever. A lot of people are scared of being labelled as weirdos when it comes to having so-called paranormal experiences.
 
Edrof said:
Nope, all true! George MacKenzie is an easily researchable historical figure, the injuries sustained at the Mausoleum are fastidiously documented and you can visit the place yourself if you're ever in Edinburgh. Of course, the cause of it all is under debate - but whether you believe in ghoulies and ghosties or not, it's a very weird case.



Yes, I've done a lot of research into Gef the talking mongoose. Weird tale that. In fact, by coincidence, it's chapter 8 - 'The Mysterious Mongoose of Cashen's Gap' of my ebook.
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Ahh Goodo, gef is a story that has always left me feeling rather odd truth be told. I could never decide if it should be pigeon holed as poltergiest or not as most disturbance aren't accompanied by a physical entity, especially not a mongoose. Always made it more sinister somehow.
 
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Where are all the photographs as proof? Presumably nowhere because of this:

"Henderson says that the fire—the cause of which insurance investigators could not identify—destroyed “five years worth of letters, photographs, records and statements concerning the MacKenzie Poltergeist as well as every possession I had in the world"

The way in which the fire has been subconciously linked with something to do with ghouls when infact, there are plenty of other fires where the source can't be found.
 
NeilMick said:
"Henderson says that the fire—the cause of which insurance investigators could not identify—destroyed “five years worth of letters, photographs, records and statements concerning the MacKenzie Poltergeist as well as every possession I had in the world"
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You would think he had a copy of everything stash away elsewhere?
 
Nightglow said:
You would think he had a copy of everything stash away elsewhere?
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Personally I wouldn't think that at all. I guess he should have uploaded it all to google apps. But then that could have brought down google with unexplained power outages and data corruption. They wouldn't like that.
 
Nightglow said:
You would think he had a copy of everything stash away elsewhere?
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From his site Black Hart Entertainment. There are some photos on there too. You can ask the company for a copy of all the accounts and they will send it to you - at least they did with me.

Fortunately I had saved most of the sightings and eyewitness accounts on a computer in another building - about the only thing that did survive.
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