0:00

This is the BBC.

0:03

This podcast is supported by advertising

0:05

outside the UK.

0:09

BBC sounds, music radio

0:11

podcasts. Hello.

0:50

Hello. Hello. Hello.

0:58

Which farmers? We

1:00

are back for a very special

1:02

bonus episode recorded in front

1:05

of an audience. Here at the Millennium

1:07

Center in Cardiff the capital

1:09

of Wales. It's

1:20

been two months now since the last

1:22

episode, and we have a lot

1:24

of new information to share. But

1:27

first, can you do something

1:29

for me? Close

1:31

your eyes. Imagine

1:34

you are in that lonely farmhouse. At

1:37

the foot of the Breckenbeacon's mountains,

1:40

Haile Vanoc,

1:41

as we remind ourselves of

1:44

this journey that we have been on.

1:47

Jesus. It's astronomical. Seven

1:49

hundred and fifty pounds for the quarter here.

1:51

It it should be what? A hundred?

1:54

We could have been powering every house in wheels

1:56

for this. Within a few weeks,

1:59

all

1:59

our animals, but either gone

2:01

crazy and run away. We'll die.

2:05

The boy, what? The teenager.

2:08

No. He is the reason.

2:10

If you want to rid yourself of this thing,

2:13

the boy must leave the

2:15

house. As I

2:17

open the door and looking direct play out

2:19

an armchair just by the

2:21

window. I see the armchair and

2:23

someone is sitting in it.

2:27

Hey. Don't don't lock talent. Don't

2:30

lock. Don't lock.

2:31

Who was in an armchairlift? The old

2:33

woman.

2:35

This is your fault. One,

2:38

where we found him. It's

2:40

the field who draws your

2:43

backdrop. You

2:45

fell and die in the exact

2:47

spot you painted. For

2:51

a house to have at least two days, converge

2:54

you on it, then that

2:56

is a powerful

2:58

spot. And if

3:00

you cannot handle it, then

3:02

it's disastrous.

3:05

This, do you believe

3:07

that Jesus Christ is your lord and

3:09

savior?

3:12

No. Nothing to do

3:14

with me. It's

3:16

not her bit. It's

3:18

here.

3:21

The actual murder took place

3:24

just a few meters in front of us. James

3:26

crept up on him and when he was just

3:28

behind

3:29

him, took the ax and

3:31

smashed it into the back of Thomas's head.

3:34

I know why all this is happening is because

3:36

of me. Something I did.

3:38

Bill for God's sake, were you stopped, please?

3:42

There's something I got involved in when I was

3:44

very young I

3:47

was a witch.

3:51

Is it just me? Or did it get a little cauldron

3:54

here? What a

3:56

ride but so many questions remain

3:59

to help us answer them. We

4:01

have our experts Kieran O'Keefe

4:03

and Evan Hollow. Evelyn,

4:21

looking with Blended. Very good.

4:23

Kieran, good to have you here. So

4:27

Kieran, Kieran, we will be

4:29

hearing your theories tonight. What

4:31

you too think really

4:32

happened? Yes, you will. But

4:34

also, we got to bear in mind this

4:36

is an amazing case even

4:38

from my perspective. You can go a whole career

4:40

as a ghostbuster and a power psychologist

4:43

and not come across a case like

4:44

this. You know, it's like being well,

4:46

a kid in a toy shop is so much that

4:48

has happened, but a haunted toy shop.

4:51

Yes, a haunted toy shop. Evelyn,

4:54

what are the chances that you too

4:56

will agree. Well, you know me? I

4:58

don't like to see anything as possible, but that

5:00

might just be impossible. Let's

5:03

dive in there because we've got a lot to get through and

5:05

I wanna start with Bill

5:08

because I feel like Bill is the

5:10

heart of all of this and yet we

5:12

haven't actually heard from him at all.

5:14

We told you at the end of episode eight, the

5:16

really sad reason for 4, how his alcoholism

5:18

led to his early death. But we have

5:20

been able to go through the BBC archives.

5:23

And we have found some incredible interviews

5:25

of Bill and Liz recorded in the

5:27

nineteen nineties at the time the case

5:29

became national news. So,

5:32

for the very first time this

5:34

series,

5:36

Here is the voice of

5:38

the real bill rich. There

5:41

was a very great fear,

5:43

something that one couldn't

5:46

fine. It wasn't tangible. You couldn't chase it

5:48

down. You couldn't pin it down. But

5:50

it was there,

5:52

drumming up the

5:53

fear. Yeah. Terrifying. So

5:55

amazing to actually hear Bill at Long

5:57

lasting. And whilst we've got to know Liz,

6:00

it feels like Bill's remained this elusive,

6:02

unknown quantity. And so this episode,

6:04

I wanna bring in somebody who knew

6:06

Bill really well. The first

6:08

of our new witnesses. His name

6:11

is also Bill, helpfully. Bill

6:13

Caelus, he's an antique dealer. And

6:15

for a period in the nineteen nineties,

6:17

whilst the haunting was ongoing, and Liz and Bill

6:19

was struggling for money, our bill,

6:21

Bill Rich, worked for him

6:23

doing furniture polishing. So

6:26

I went to meet Bill Caelus at

6:28

his house in the hills outside Brecon.

6:30

He's a lovely guy who reminded me slightly of

6:32

an aging rolling

6:33

stone. Have I listened

6:35

to this? You

6:38

knew Bill well. Yep.

6:40

He worked for me for a little

6:42

while off and

6:43

on. Yeah. He was a good polisher

6:45

and a good worker when he was here.

6:47

You

6:48

you mean he didn't always turn up when he said he

6:50

would. Well, he he was quite

6:52

regular with me, but there are other people

6:54

that he helped out that I've heard

6:56

since he was very unreliable.

6:59

I like to think that we got on well

7:01

and he liked coming here because we would

7:03

have long conversations

7:05

during the coffee break and tea break. When

7:07

he would tell us about Helvanberg

7:09

and his life and his work. What

7:12

did he say to you about Helvanberg? There

7:15

was somebody else working for me here as

7:17

as well. His name was Steve,

7:19

and let's be able to sit down

7:21

and have cup of coffee

7:23

and the chat basically

7:25

about our lives. And so

7:27

it sort of slowly came out that it

7:29

was living in this house that had

7:31

a funny feeling, and the electricity meter

7:34

was whizzing around on various things.

7:37

And Steve actually went out to hell

7:39

and out to have a feel of the bloody sea

7:41

what he thought. And Steve

7:43

was saying that he went to the

7:45

certain parts at the house. And

7:48

he felt a a very

7:50

cold chill in a very strange sensation.

7:53

And so you

7:56

do start to wonder how true it all

7:58

is, but I didn't

8:00

really want to get involved so I

8:02

didn't go up with Steve to have a look

8:04

at the house. The idea of it scared

8:06

me that there could be something that

8:08

would affect somebody like Bill who

8:10

you know, wasn't shy of life.

8:13

How

8:13

do you think it affected him?

8:15

I think it made him slightly angry,

8:17

really. He found it difficult

8:21

to communicate to people

8:23

how serious he thought it was

8:25

because myself included

8:28

were possibly fairly cynical about

8:30

it. And to

8:32

him, it was

8:34

real and happening. I think he

8:36

felt a bit frustrated. Talk

8:39

to me about how Bill changed

8:42

his time went on he

8:44

got more and more unreliable and

8:47

tended to drink more and more as

8:49

time

8:49

went. Do you think it still troubled him at that point?

8:51

I think it was owned by Alka homo

8:54

and Hermann. Whether

8:56

the two were linked, I don't

8:58

know. It's quite possible

9:00

I suppose he drank because

9:02

of what and hell of Anogue

9:05

and perhaps he drank to

9:06

forget. Definitely we

9:08

can say that this period of his

9:10

life that time at Haile Fenagh,

9:13

that was a profound experience

9:15

for him to grow

9:15

through, and it it left its

9:16

mark. Well, of course, it does. Yes.

9:19

Yes. I mean, the strange going is all about

9:21

to leave that Mark community would do with

9:23

anybody

9:23

unless, of course, he was making the whole thing

9:26

up completely. Do you feel

9:28

that Bill was telling the truth? Do

9:30

you think there was something in

9:31

that house? I don't

9:33

think he would have been able to

9:36

pull the wall over our eyes

9:38

to that extent. And

9:41

I believe that still fundamentally

9:44

was telling the truth. Really

9:47

interesting. You can see that Bill is convinced

9:50

that Bill Rich was telling the truth. And

9:52

I think also really interesting to hear about

9:54

Bill Rich's frustration as well, that

9:56

frustration that he might not be believed.

9:58

There's one other moment I wanna play you

10:00

for that interview. It came just as

10:02

I was preparing to leave. Bill took

10:04

me into the workshop where he and

10:06

Bill used to work together.

10:10

Oh,

10:11

well, that is the smell

10:14

of furniture polish. Fair enough

10:16

polish indeed. Yeah. Yeah. So this is

10:18

where Bill and I worked

10:20

policy in

10:20

furniture. Does the furniture polish go

10:22

to your head? The furniture polish

10:25

does go to your head. Yes. But

10:27

the the polish these days is a lot better

10:29

than it

10:29

used. Be these, but some funny ingredients

10:31

in it in the past. Can it

10:33

make you feel quite funny then? Well,

10:36

yeah, I I guess it could. Yes. I

10:38

mean, if you were susceptible. The

10:41

Polish these days is a lot better than it used to

10:42

be. There used to be some honey ingredients in

10:45

it in the past.

10:46

Kieran, do we have another

10:48

potential skeptic theory for what happened?

10:50

Intoxification by furniture

10:52

polish. Well, he

10:54

fell off, but I think we do because In

10:56

Power Psychology, we have this whole group

10:58

of possible explanations, intoxicative,

11:01

inhalants. We talk about the

11:03

furniture polish, which could be another

11:05

suspect. Robert McDonald, who was an artist friend

11:07

of Bill, he talked about the

11:10

paint and inhaling the paint there could

11:12

be. We talked about some for them. Spelling

11:14

sulfur. Carbon monoxide as

11:16

well is a common explanation

11:18

that's put forward in ghostly

11:19

case. That

11:20

is often cited in Holland. But where

11:22

carbon dioxide come from in the half a year. It

11:24

could be faulty boiler, you know,

11:27

faulty furnace. There could be a number of

11:29

different places it could come from. But

11:31

it's that sort of thing that can cause things like

11:33

dizziness, confusion, and can

11:35

lead to auditory and visual

11:37

hallucinations.

11:38

Evan, it feels like the problem

11:40

with the theories based around personal

11:43

intoxication, paint, oil, alcohol,

11:45

is that it only applies to Bill. It

11:47

doesn't explain how all the other

11:49

witnesses who came into Health Analc also

11:51

experienced things.

11:52

Correct. So we've got lots of

11:55

witnesses in this case, and we're going back

11:57

decades, possibly even centuries. So

11:59

you had the vetless Jones, you had

12:01

the plumber who came to house to fix the

12:03

radiators that have been ripped from the walls.

12:05

You had Marion Harbour and you had Bridget

12:07

Bieskem. So if

12:09

we can explain what happened to Bill in

12:11

terms of some sort of toxicity, some sort

12:13

of

12:13

substance. It doesn't explain away all the other

12:16

phenomena or all the other people

12:17

who experienced it. Let's

12:20

talk about which is

12:21

let's. So we heard the theory at the

12:24

end of episode eight that the

12:26

haunting could have been some way caused by

12:28

Bill backing out of that witchcraft

12:30

ritual involving Alex and

12:32

Maxine Sanders, the so called king

12:34

and queen of the witches. The question that

12:36

this theory hinges on

12:38

really is does witchcraft really

12:40

have a power? Well,

12:43

it seemed like there was only one way to

12:45

find out. I

12:47

needed to take part in a ritual

12:49

myself. So,

12:51

I decided to contact a

12:53

witch. Oh,

12:56

come on. It deserves more than that. Come

12:58

on. This is exciting. I

13:00

decided to contact her

13:01

which. I found her. Through a

13:04

portal used by many witches,

13:06

Instagram.

13:09

Her name is Halo Quinn.

13:12

She's based not too far from Brecken, and she

13:14

agreed to take me to her

13:16

local forest. So

13:19

we're standing in a magical circle. Yes.

13:21

This is a sacred space.

13:23

And you're a witch? I

13:24

am a witch. Yes.

13:26

It feels like there's a lot more interest

13:28

in which features these days. You see, which is on

13:30

Instagram. Now it's kind of cool,

13:32

isn't

13:32

it? Yeah. So

13:35

you'll find a few people or or take on

13:37

the aesthetic and then a few people

13:39

will then follow through and they'll

13:41

pick up a Decatara cards or they'll

13:43

pick up a candle. They'll start

13:45

practicing and then they find that their life changes

13:47

and generally for the 4.

13:48

That's really interesting because luck plays

13:51

a big role in my case. Bill

13:54

believes he's cursed and he thinks that it

13:56

might possibly stem from the fact that he

13:58

took part in

14:00

this initiation ritual sure into

14:02

witchcraft, but he didn't see it all the way through.

14:05

So if he started the process of

14:07

opening up to the other world,

14:09

and then didn't properly put in place

14:11

the protections and

14:13

the understanding of how to interact with

14:16

that properly. Then, yeah, he's gonna be open to

14:18

all sorts of things that

14:20

he doesn't know how to manage.

14:22

And there's a thing through a

14:24

lot of cultures where you get people who

14:26

are called to this part. And if they

14:28

don't walk on it, if they don't

14:30

actually engage with it consciously,

14:32

then the spirit world doesn't leave

14:34

them alone because it can see

14:36

them. It's like, you know, you're a bright shining

14:38

light. So I wanna

14:40

try and get my head around what being

14:42

a witch means. So could you give

14:45

me a lesson in witchcraft?

14:46

Okay. So what I'm gonna

14:49

do is I'm going to cast

14:51

a circle. I'm going to

14:53

call in some energies and

14:55

some spirits. And then we'll start singing.

14:57

Does everyone take a deep breath?

15:00

Cara Edwin, which

15:02

mother and goddess of this land?

15:05

Bless our work and I'll

15:08

play today. And

15:10

we sing and we step

15:12

on the land for healing,

15:15

that every step we take

15:18

is a healing and

15:20

a sacred step

15:23

Every step I take is

15:25

a healing step. Every

15:29

step I take is a

15:31

great step. Healing,

15:34

healing, healing my

15:36

body. Healing,

15:39

healing, healing, healing the

15:41

land. Every step by

15:43

team. What does being a witch mean to you?

15:46

Being a witch

15:47

for me is about listening

15:49

to the spirit world into the next

15:51

a

15:51

world around me. Which

15:54

craft is the act and the

15:56

craft of magic in relationship

15:58

with the

15:58

world. I like the idea that

16:01

magic exists. So

16:02

do I? And and my date

16:05

is a great stuff. Healing,

16:07

healing, healing, healing, healing, healing,

16:10

the land. How

16:13

are

16:13

you feeling? Very good. I

16:15

I feel nice and tingling all over. I

16:17

feel I feel really light. A

16:19

nice actually.

16:20

Yeah. It's a good feeling. Are you

16:23

driving? No. That's good.

16:25

Whatever you do, on the

16:27

drive

16:27

home, if you are the one behind the wheel, do

16:29

not start chanting because it puts

16:31

you right back in that in that magical

16:33

space So

16:33

after a ritual don't operate heavy machinery.

16:36

No. Kieran,

16:43

I did feel something quite profound

16:46

there. Was it through

16:48

Peonachron? I

16:48

don't think so. I think what your your

16:51

illustrating there. It's about

16:54

rituals. I think it's about the ritual. That's

16:56

what I think it is. You know, rituals

16:58

can put you into an altered state for

17:00

a number of different reasons. And I think the setting,

17:02

the personalities of the group, the breathing

17:04

that you go into, the induction,

17:07

process, all of that can slip you into a hole to stay

17:09

almost as though it's kind of a hypnotic

17:12

induction. I wonder if Bill has had a

17:14

similar sort of experience quite

17:16

early on in his life. We haven't mentioned it,

17:18

but he jumped ship from the navy

17:20

when he was very, very young. And he ended

17:22

up living for several weeks

17:25

with a tribe in Borneo, a

17:27

tribe of headhunters, not HR

17:29

specialists that will get your job. The

17:31

actual headhunters. And as part of that, he

17:33

would have been involved in rich role. And I

17:35

think he had this propensity very, very early on

17:37

to believe and be part of that process.

17:39

Bill did have this amazingly eventful

17:42

life before he met Liz. And how

17:44

is this for a fact about him? During

17:46

the Second World War, Bill's

17:48

Dad was one of the dambusters squadron,

17:50

the pilots who flew into bomber,

17:52

German dam, and changed the course of the war.

17:55

Amazing as you read his biography, there's so many

17:57

interesting

17:57

details. It feels sometimes like the story

18:00

reads like a Hollywood movie, but it is all real.

18:02

I

18:02

think it's time to introduce

18:05

a brand new theory.

18:08

And things could be about to get

18:10

a little weird here because like the Witch Theory,

18:12

this involves the impact of something

18:14

that took place before Bill and Liz moved

18:16

into Hale Valoc. So they started renting in

18:18

May nineteen eighty 9. And earlier that year,

18:20

Bill Lids and Bill's teenage son

18:22

Lawrence went on a holiday.

18:24

It was a chance for Liz to get to know

18:26

her new steps on better. And

18:28

knowing that it was somewhere that Lawrence was

18:30

fascinated

18:30

by, she suggested Egypt.

18:33

So they're visiting on the most impressive

18:36

ancient sites, the great pyramid of

18:38

geyser. They're catering excitedly as

18:40

they enter the dark

18:41

corridors. Of its

18:44

inner chambers.

18:50

This is so amazing. Are you

18:52

excited? It's literally been a dream since it

18:54

was tiny, isn't

18:55

it? Yeah.

18:56

I used to

18:56

have a poster

18:57

with the whole hieroglyphic health

18:59

a bet on my

19:00

wall. Look at this stat. Wanna see if you

19:03

can decipher it. Go on. Hey,

19:05

I'm gonna carry on. I'll see you in the main chamber.

19:14

Water. That

19:16

is so weird. What's

19:20

up? Can you see them lights?

19:22

Lights? Tiny little lights, like

19:25

lasers, shimmering around the

19:27

walls. There.

19:30

I

19:32

can't see anything,

19:34

but I don't like

19:37

it in here. Oh

19:40

god. It feels horrible.

19:41

Maybe we

19:42

should go back. Oh god. There's

19:44

something in here. You're right.

19:47

There's something in

19:49

here with us.

19:51

Can you

19:52

feed it? Yes. Oh

19:54

oh,

19:54

we have to get out of here. Now quick,

19:57

quick, run, run.

20:02

Oh, god. That

20:05

was bloody horrible. There's There was

20:07

something inside that place, something

20:08

that meant

20:09

real harm. It

20:12

was evil. Deeply

20:21

odd. That sense of presence left and feeling

20:24

really shaken, but could it be in any

20:26

way linked to our haunting? Well, those

20:28

lights that they saw in the

20:30

pyramid Liz described it as being blue and white and almost

20:32

like lasers. She saw

20:34

those again

20:35

in the barn at Hale

20:38

Vanoc. In the wake of the animal

20:40

deaths. Now we might have consigned this

20:42

as some sort of strange coincidental unconnected

20:46

experience. Except

20:48

there are some other

20:50

really odd links between what happened at

20:52

Hale Van Aag and Egypt.

20:55

To discuss them with me, we're gonna welcome a

20:57

brand new expert. Egyptologist,

21:00

Ken Griffin, who is curator at

21:02

the Egypt Center at Swonto University,

21:05

not too far from Please welcome Ken to the

21:07

stage. First,

21:20

can you just give us a little sense of that

21:23

pyramid? Bill, Liz and Lawrence were in at Giza. What is

21:25

it

21:25

significance? Yeah. So the the grid pyramid is the

21:28

largest pyramid ever constructed

21:30

in Egypt. It was built

21:32

around about four thousand six hundred years

21:33

ago, and it was built specifically

21:36

to how is the body of

21:38

cheese ups or kufu as he was called

21:40

in there in the

21:41

Egyptian. Does

21:42

the experience that the rich have had

21:44

there surprised you? Well, there's a lot of people

21:46

who go into the grid pyramid and especially

21:49

in the burial chamber where you have the

21:51

sarcophagus of of Cufu

21:53

in there and they often say that

21:55

they feel this energy which is

21:57

inside the place. So I'm not

21:59

surprised really that there is this

22:01

can of connection But

22:03

there there's a history

22:04

there. There is a theory

22:05

that they have parhanol exclusively. Yep. As

22:07

I

22:07

said,

22:07

there are some really interesting links between our

22:10

case and Egypt. The first one, Ken, I wanna look

22:12

out with you. something that we talked about

22:14

in the last of our case update

22:16

episodes. It happened at Liz's mum's

22:18

house when they went there to escape

22:20

from Hale Van

22:21

Hook. Let me just play you a reminder. We were just

22:23

in the living room and

22:25

there was a circle table

22:28

and underneath it, man

22:31

found this pendant,

22:33

a necklace pendant without

22:35

the train. Ancient

22:36

looking thing. So nobody

22:39

recognized

22:39

that old necklace remember, but then

22:42

something really really weird

22:44

happens. They'll pick

22:45

did it I only felt something like an

22:48

electric shock coming from it,

22:50

but took it outside and just smashed it

22:52

up into

22:53

nothingness. So there we hear Liz describing

22:55

the necklace as ancient, but I want

22:57

you to listen to this outtake

22:59

from that

23:00

interview. Where did

23:01

it look like it came from? Looked Egyptian.

23:03

But, I mean, even when I

23:05

was in Egypt, I didn't buy anything like

23:08

that. Could it have been Egyptian surely

23:10

can? It is impossible that an ancient

23:12

Egyptian necklace would just turn up

23:14

randomly in the middle of

23:16

rural

23:16

whales. With some objects that you'd

23:18

be surprised where they end up. So

23:20

in the eighteen nearies, lots

23:22

and lots of mummified cats were discovered

23:24

in Egypt. And They were shipped

23:26

back to the UK. Run about eight tons

23:28

of them were shipped back, and then they were

23:30

sold off to

23:32

people, to farmers. Probably eight

23:34

tons of mummified cats.

23:35

Here are tons. Here are tons of mummified

23:38

cats. How many mummified cats is

23:40

that?

23:40

I

23:40

have no

23:41

idea. We're we're talking thousands like

23:44

hundreds of Yeah. Yeah. But you do have catacombs in Egypt that

23:46

have millions of cats that were mummified

23:48

as vote of offerings to the

23:50

goddess basket, for example. And

23:52

these were shipped back to Liverpool. And

23:54

obviously, people didn't really know what to do

23:56

with them, but I think one of the ideas was

23:58

that they could also be shipped back and

24:00

use this fertilizer. So --

24:02

Wow. -- eat

24:02

yum. -- not money done. Yeah. And

24:05

sometimes, of course, these mummified cats may have

24:07

had beads or necklaces or

24:09

any other kind of jewelry with

24:11

them. Inside the band inside the bandages, so they

24:13

could have been crushed up in the field.

24:15

Maybe this was found in the field.

24:17

I don't know. love story. This is

24:19

a potentially a rational explanation for an

24:22

ancient Egyptian necklace in the African

24:23

whales. But

24:26

there is something else in this case with a strange

24:28

potentially Egyptian angle that

24:30

is less easy to explain

24:32

rationally. We have talked about the two presences that

24:35

Liz and Bill felt in Hale Van Hook,

24:37

first, the old woman, and then

24:39

that extremely tall shadow

24:42

figure. Normally,

24:47

it's behind to discover

24:50

you.

24:55

Lif and Bill see this figure on multiple occasions

24:57

and they become aware of

24:59

something. It's head. It

25:02

is not the form of a human head.

25:04

They describe it as bird like

25:06

it. It's almost as if this thing has a

25:09

man's body. a bird's head, and

25:11

that would sound ludicrous

25:13

if it hadn't had such a terrifying impact

25:15

on

25:15

them. And

25:16

can't this figure reminds

25:19

us of images of the Egyptian god

25:22

Horus?

25:22

Yeah. A Horus is just one of a number of gods

25:24

that it could have potentially

25:26

be associated with. The Egyptians had a

25:28

lot of theerythropic gods, which is

25:31

where you have a mixture of the human body and

25:33

then the head of an

25:34

animal. Is it just a coincidence? Is

25:36

this a rabbit hole Probably, but

25:38

there's one final stunning

25:41

connection, the most unexpected of

25:43

all. Bill's grandmother, his

25:45

mother's mother, was an

25:47

egotologist. And whilst we have not quite been

25:49

able to confirm this yet, Bill's

25:51

understanding within the family was that

25:53

she had been present. With

25:56

Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon

25:58

in nineteen twenty two

26:00

at the opening of Tutankhamun's

26:03

tomb. Now, Ken, this might be one

26:05

of those family myths that gets

26:07

passed down, but we know for a fact

26:09

she was present in

26:11

Egypt during that time. We've got a marriage certificate that said she was

26:13

married in Egypt in nineteen twenty. She

26:15

definitely went on digs, definitely went on

26:18

expeditions. We've talked about curses

26:20

throughout this entire

26:21

series. Here we find ourselves brushing up against

26:24

the most famous curse of

26:26

the wall. Yeah. The the the curse of tutankhamun is

26:28

one that has fascinated people for over a

26:30

hundred years, and the whole curse

26:32

idea really came from the death of

26:34

Lord Canarvan. Which took place just a few

26:36

months after after the tomb is

26:38

discovered, Lord Carnarvon was the

26:40

financial backer of

26:42

Howard Carter. He nicked

26:44

himself while she even with with mosquito

26:46

bite that he had on his cheek, and that

26:48

led to blood poisoning, and

26:50

he he died shortly

26:52

afterwards, and Carol, but there's also

26:54

been other people connected with the tomb who

26:56

supposedly have died supposedly

26:59

again because of the Connect with the tomb

27:01

of Tootenkamun. It's important to note that

27:03

the ancient Egyptians did have curses, and

27:06

they would often ascribe inscriptions

27:08

onto the entrances of their tombs

27:11

warning people to stay

27:11

out. As we've said before, whether we believe

27:14

curse is a real or not the impact of

27:16

believing that you are cursed can

27:18

be huge. Did Bill believing this

27:20

about his grandmother feed into that mix of

27:22

things that were swirling around in his

27:24

head. We will throw the Egyptian

27:27

theory into the mix. It sits in there.

27:29

Ken, thank you so

27:29

much. Big round of applause, please, for Ken

27:32

Griffin.

27:42

I think it is high time that we bring

27:44

in some people at the very heart of

27:46

this case. We are gonna meet

27:49

Liz. Her daughter

27:52

Becca, and this is a

27:54

huge moment 4 the very

27:56

first time We are also gonna

27:58

meet Liz'

27:58

son, Ben. Backroom,

28:03

Ben, please join us on stage in the big round

28:05

of applause.

28:16

Now Liz

28:17

was meant to be with us too, and we

28:19

are so gutted because

28:21

she is ill.

28:23

So we

28:23

have her by Zoom instead. But

28:26

Liz, can you hear us? I

28:28

can hear

28:28

you. Yes.

28:29

Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. The

28:35

technology has worked. I feel like this is still a bit like

28:38

Eurovision. This is Cardiff calling

28:40

Brecon. Liz.

28:43

Even on Zoom, it must be weird though,

28:45

knowing that you are here with hundreds

28:47

of people discussing your

28:48

story, your life.

28:50

Yeah. The word bizarre, I don't

28:52

think really covers it. It's

28:54

mind blowing. The people

28:56

are so interested but

28:58

people seem to be fascinated with

28:59

it. People are so fascinated.

29:02

People have traveled from all over

29:04

the country to be here tonight.

29:06

Becca, How has it felt watching

29:09

the interest grow around the series? You know

29:11

what? It's been so surreal,

29:13

but also really humbling just to

29:15

see the amount of people

29:18

shown interest in my family's

29:19

experience. Ben,

29:21

it's amazing to have you here. You

29:23

were the baby that your mom

29:25

was feeding on that very first night when your dad

29:27

heard the

29:28

footsteps. How

29:29

did you feel listening to

29:30

that? It just blew me away because

29:33

it was it was something that I went through.

29:35

And I was there, and it was surreal

29:37

to hear people

29:39

of interest in

29:40

that. And I'm thinking, hang on. That was me.

29:42

Know we're going have We're going to take questions from

29:44

the audience, but we've also got questions that have

29:46

been sent in on social media as

29:48

well. Great. When the mic comes to you, just

29:51

tell us your name and then ask us your

29:53

question.

29:53

My name is Beth. I've got a question

29:55

for Liz. Before 4 Van

29:58

Hook, did you have any paranormal or spiritual

30:00

experiences? And have you had anything afterwards

30:03

or since? No. Hi,

30:06

Beth. No. I mean, there was the pyramid

30:08

experience, but never

30:10

anything before. Simply

30:12

because I went to see the abscesses when

30:14

I was fifteen at you

30:16

know, I shouldn't have, but I did. But then that

30:18

that's the movie, the exhibition. It's non naturals.

30:20

Yeah.

30:20

Yeah. Okay. And it terrified

30:21

the hell into me. And

30:24

so I have an aversion to

30:26

anything like this, and I still have an

30:28

aversion to anything like

30:29

this. And since we left Helvanov,

30:32

I

30:32

have not

30:32

seen a ghost. No.

30:34

That's great. I've got a question here from social

30:36

media. This comes from Katherine Orton.

30:38

And I'll throw this to Ben and Becker.

30:41

She says, Could you tell us more about the

30:43

apparitions that the kids saw?

30:45

Were there any occasions when you saw the old woman

30:47

or the figure in the whole way of

30:49

stairs? So she's wondering, about the geography? Was she always in

30:51

the bedroom or did you see her in other parts

30:53

of the house? No.

30:55

Always in the armchair in the corner

30:57

of the playroom. That's the only place we

31:00

well, anybody's I ever saw where did you

31:01

Yeah. It

31:02

was mainly that room. There's a

31:03

few hotspots in the house, you know, the barn

31:05

with the lights we've seen, the corridor,

31:08

where the beaked figure was seen and

31:10

then upstairs in the long corridor.

31:12

That's where the doors were slamming and

31:14

of course the large staircase were

31:17

footsteps. Were heard going down

31:19

steps, but never quite completing their journey to the

31:21

bottom always stopping two

31:23

steps shy of the full length

31:25

of the

31:26

stairs. And, of course, my father's studio.

31:28

You both saw the old woman in the

31:30

house. Yeah. What

31:31

what are your

31:31

memories of having?

31:33

It was it was like I was I'm seeing you

31:36

today, but just like fainter and

31:38

very still. And I've

31:40

only memories of her being in

31:42

that room nowhere the room.

31:44

But I always saw her as a

31:46

protective energy because

31:48

there was so much in that house, which was

31:50

quite the opposite of protective. It's

31:52

so it's amazing w. I'm so glad

31:54

you

31:54

came. Thank

31:55

you. Let's take another question for Liz. She's at

31:58

home on Zoom. Let's let's

32:00

give her a question. There's some hands grip at the back

32:01

there. Tell me now. My

32:04

name

32:04

is Bethon.

32:05

Are you aware of the folklore of the

32:07

area? No.

32:09

I had no knowledge.

32:11

I still have no knowledge of

32:13

these things. I don't actually want

32:15

any knowledge of these things.

32:17

Because you have lived it, Liz. I mean, you you want to

32:19

Yeah.

32:19

Yeah. You like to live live. Why

32:22

and the truth is I've never even

32:24

read the book testimony because I

32:26

don't want So if you've

32:28

met this stuff head on in

32:30

real life, I'll

32:32

tell you what your opinion change is

32:35

very sharpish. You move away from

32:37

that and you move to the positive. If you don't

32:39

want anything to do with

32:41

it on any level at

32:43

all because it is very

32:45

It's horrible. I remember you saying

32:48

to me once that you'd never watch horror

32:50

movies because you've you've lived one.

32:52

Let's get a question for

32:53

Becca. Anyone got a question for Becca. Okay?

32:55

Yep. Gone? Some kids, they would make

32:57

up stories like my house is haunted.

33:00

Would you ever talk about

33:02

that with your

33:02

friends, and they would think you were lying, or were you too scared

33:05

to talk about it? And what's

33:06

your name? My name's Riley. And did

33:08

you listen to all of the series writing?

33:11

Yeah.

33:11

Most of it. Oh, wow. I've got I've got a ten year

33:14

old son who is too scared. He won't necessarily

33:16

trade at all. This is a really interesting

33:18

point because We are often

33:20

inclined to disbelieve children to think that

33:22

children are making things up, and when

33:24

children do make things up, they have incredible

33:26

imagination. Have you ever had moments where

33:28

you wondered if this was your imagination?

33:30

And what's the thing that grounds it for

33:32

you in reality? This this

33:34

idea of seeing the lady and hearing these

33:35

things. Well, it's it's your body's

33:38

reaction to the situation, not just

33:40

your mind's reaction. So

33:42

you start to shake because

33:44

you don't know how to handle the situation that's put in front

33:46

of you whereas an adult has got experience that they

33:48

can draw from. A child has none of that. They've

33:50

only got raw emotions. So

33:52

when you face with something as

33:55

unbelievable and as

33:57

terrifying as what we went through, you

33:59

get terror and you just

34:01

freeze because you have no

34:03

experience to draw

34:03

from. But we were also cushioned a lot. Won't

34:06

we? Like, ma'am would make us feel

34:08

like everything's fine. You know, there's nothing going

34:09

on. Yeah. But going on

34:10

in later life, when I did become a teenager,

34:12

I wouldn't talk about it

34:16

at all. I found people would be very

34:18

judgmental and look at me

34:20

in a negative light almost, so I

34:22

didn't really speak about it at

34:24

all. Riley,

34:26

I'm intrigued to know what you've made of this.

34:29

Are you team believer

34:31

or team's getting ready?

34:33

Well, I believe that

34:36

there are answers for everything,

34:38

but there are some things like the race is

34:40

coming off the wall that I literally

34:42

can't

34:43

think finance for. So I'm in the middle

34:45

of the minute. Okay. That's a

34:47

very appropriate and and totally

34:49

okay place to be. I mean,

34:51

Ben and Becca just I think

34:54

to just say how much

34:56

they respect your bravery,

34:58

your honesty coming out and

35:01

sharing your story. Liz, we are so sad you went with

35:03

us, but thank you so much for being

35:06

here as a disembodied voice,

35:08

being in

35:10

from record huge round of applause, please, for Liz Bell

35:12

and Becca. Thank

35:29

you so much to

35:32

them. I want to talk

35:34

about somebody else who has played a big

35:36

role in this story, but right at the end of

35:38

the series. Eddie Birx, do we remember him? He

35:40

was the ghost hunter who came after

35:42

everybody else had tried to exercise

35:44

Hale Valoc. He

35:46

claimed to channel the ghosts of the murder victim, Thomas

35:48

Edwards, and his murder, James Griffiths.

35:51

After his intervention, the electricity

35:53

usage in the property did drop

35:56

dramatically. So did Eddie,

35:58

to some degree succeed where others failed,

36:00

judging by your messages, you

36:02

seem to be divided fifty fifty on

36:05

this. Kieran, you were not convinced

36:07

by

36:07

Eddie? No. No. I

36:10

wasn't. No. I wasn't. I think I even

36:12

said at the time when we were chatting about

36:14

it that there's the possibility he could have done research beforehand.

36:16

And actually, as a renowned ghost

36:18

hunter, I would have been disappointed, had

36:20

he not done research beforehand? You'd

36:22

expect

36:23

that of him. But then it was put across as though he

36:25

was getting it from the information from Spirit. So, no, I wasn't

36:28

impressed. I would go as far as saying that you pretty

36:30

extensively dissed

36:32

him. Actually. And there was somebody listening at home who

36:34

did not like that at

36:35

all. And I'm gonna

36:37

let her tell you why.

36:40

So she is called Joanne Jordan, and Eddie helped her

36:42

with her own haunted

36:43

house. And I spoke to her just

36:46

before we came

36:48

to

36:48

Wales. I had a seriously haunted house back

36:50

in the nineteen eighties, and I

36:52

don't know what I would have done without

36:54

a study. I really don't I've

36:58

left my house with my two babies in my

37:00

arms. I've left the house and I

37:02

didn't wanna live there. It was that

37:04

bad, dummy, that I

37:06

would stay awake with coffee. Most of the night, I

37:07

said, gone on for some years, and I was

37:10

very close to a breakdown. It

37:12

was finding

37:12

the right person. So,

37:15

Joe, the first time that you

37:17

met

37:18

Eddie, did he talk you through what he was gonna do? Yes. He described

37:21

it as counseling for

37:25

the spirit and that he shares the death story. He

37:27

walked around the house. He was

37:29

liking an

37:31

altered state and in his

37:34

breathing

37:34

altered. And he connected and he listened

37:36

to the spirit after he'd

37:38

finished counseling with my spirit.

37:42

There was no return from him, and the house felt

37:44

lighter and brighter, and it

37:46

felt like that impressive dark bulb that

37:49

had been on it that I felt

37:51

but

37:51

lifted. Joe, you heard

37:53

the episode when we talked about the witch

37:56

farm and we

37:58

featured Eddie. You contact me after hearing

37:59

that. And you would

38:00

move to write to me, I think, by

38:02

something that Kieran O'Keefe said.

38:05

So Kieran O'Keefe,

38:07

described Eddie as a

38:10

liar. Yes.

38:10

He did. I'm not happy that

38:13

Eddie was called a liar,

38:15

I Karen. Not happy at all. How does it make you feel when you

38:18

heard that? I felt

38:20

like I because Eddie is not

38:22

here to defend himself that

38:24

someone

38:25

had to be voice. And I just

38:27

know him to be such an honest,

38:29

an earnest, and of one

38:31

hundred percent

38:33

integrity. And

38:34

I

38:35

just I really can't have Kieran saying that about

38:37

him. We're we're dealing with something that's

38:39

unprovable here, aren't we? We

38:41

we can't prove that

38:44

Eddie did research about

38:46

these stories as Kieran suggests,

38:48

and we can't prove that he

38:50

was channeling the spirits as you

38:53

believe. But what makes

38:55

you think that Kieran is wrong? What

38:57

makes you think that Eddie was genuinely in

38:59

touch with his

39:00

spirits? The proof is in the pudding.

39:03

If you are then no longer

39:05

afraid to sleep, to use your

39:07

whole house

39:07

again, to not flee the house in the middle

39:10

of the night

39:11

as I did,

39:12

then I think that's evident.

39:14

One crucial question. Did you ever pay

39:16

Eddie? Did any money change hands? Never.

39:20

Never. The

39:22

only thing that I ever gave him was a piece of cake. He

39:24

was a bit partial to

39:26

cake, and that was his payment of a

39:28

cup of tea and a piece of cake.

39:31

Karen, Karen,

39:36

Karen.

39:36

Joanne is not happy. I'm

39:39

gonna give you the right of reply here. Does Joanne's testimony in any

39:41

way change your view on

39:42

Eddie? No.

39:44

And think very

39:46

carefully It

39:48

doesn't, but here we've got a witness. And

39:50

she's right. You know, I'm saying this, and

39:52

Eddy doesn't have that, you know, right to

39:54

respond. He's not being able to respond.

39:57

So I can't take anything away from her perspective.

40:00

She's got a lot more

40:02

knowledge about Eddie than I

40:04

do. It's more kind of raising that

40:06

skeptical viewpoint. About the fact

40:08

that you've got somebody who's an

40:10

expert on ghost hunting, who

40:12

presents himself as an expert

40:14

medium effectively And there's that

40:16

potential for him to be able to do

40:18

research. So, yeah, I'm I'm not

40:20

convinced, but also I don't wanna take

40:22

anything away from her

40:22

experience. It feels as though Eddie was

40:25

a genuine help for her. Evan were talking about

40:27

Eddie because he still has one

40:30

pretty huge role to perform in the story of

40:32

Hel Van Hook. We are

40:34

not quite done

40:34

here, are we? No. So we need to

40:37

go back to the summer of nineteen ninety

40:39

five and it's after Eddie has

40:41

supposedly channeled the murdered ghosts. And after Liz and Bill

40:43

saw all of those apparitions and

40:45

lots of them,

40:48

That period was after Eddie's first accessism. So it feels

40:50

like things have finally turned the corner, but

40:52

then that feeling of the

40:54

presence returns to the 4. And

40:57

the electricity bill start going back up. Bill

40:59

is unraveling, certain that it's all his

41:01

fault, and Liz is utterly

41:04

utterly desperate.

41:06

So She calls

41:10

Eddie.

41:15

Eddie Mucks. Eddie. It's Liz. His

41:18

back. Oh,

41:21

that's happened.

41:23

Oh, his so sure. But

41:26

it's not

41:26

stripping paint, isn't it? You take

41:29

off

41:29

the layers, you saw

41:31

them, all those poor souls, but the bottom

41:33

layers always the hardest.

41:36

It's the

41:37

oldest, most

41:40

stubborn.

41:41

And it's

41:41

where you can do the most damage.

41:43

We can't go up anymore. I

41:46

didn't.

41:46

Bill, unless we do something,

41:49

I so so

41:51

we're to bow him.

41:51

I know

41:52

what to do.

41:54

One last exercise

41:57

that will emerge I hope

42:00

so, but by god,

42:02

it'll be dangerous. We

42:05

fed

42:07

this house seen more accessisms than any other in

42:09

British history, but there is one more

42:11

to come. The final

42:13

accessism, it takes place.

42:15

On eighth June nineteen ninety five,

42:18

Eddie returns to Hale VanOG and he's

42:20

not

42:21

alone. Here

42:23

we are again.

42:24

This is Montague King,

42:27

Ralph noise, and

42:30

Morris Gross. Please

42:33

just just

42:34

help us. We can't take it anymore.

42:36

It has to stop.

42:38

All the monitoring

42:39

equipment is set up, Eddie.

42:41

Thank you, Morris. Sorry. We'll

42:43

put the cat on.

42:45

Hey, Liz. Liz?

42:48

Feel it. It's freezing. Temperature

42:50

really has dropped. Bell,

42:56

as you in

42:56

this room now. Kieran,

42:59

it

42:59

is all kicking off

43:01

and

43:01

Eddie's taking no chances this time. He's

43:04

brought a a team of experts

43:06

with him. Yeah. And he's brought a team of

43:08

experts from the Society for Psyche

43:10

Research. You've got

43:12

Montague Keane. Who's known for his research into sales room phenomena

43:14

and crop circles, but also

43:16

he was a parliamentary reporter for twenty

43:18

five 4, Ralph

43:20

noise. Known for his research into

43:22

UFOs. He was based at MOD. And then lastly, but

43:24

no means least Morris Gross.

43:28

A renowned investigator who

43:30

was the lead investigator on the Enfield Poltergeist

43:32

of

43:32

course, which is one of the most famous

43:35

pultugized and ghostly cases, I would argue. It is

43:38

like this paranormal dream team. It is a

43:40

paranormal dream team. Yeah. For

43:42

Eddie and Andy's experts set up in Liz and Bill's kitchen.

43:44

Bill pacing nervously as a

43:46

light fades outside. Eddie

43:48

sits quietly

43:51

focusing preparing for what he

43:53

believes will be his greatest ever

43:55

challenge. The sense of presence

43:57

is intense and overwhelming. And

44:00

as night falls,

44:01

Things start to

44:03

happen. Just watching

44:06

us. Oh, god.

44:10

Yes, she I knew it. It doesn't want to leave. Oh,

44:13

my

44:14

chest. Oh, my

44:17

chest. My feet

44:19

a tightness. Morris. Yep.

44:22

And further temperature drop.

44:25

4 circle. Hold

44:27

on hand help each

44:29

other. My head hurts so

44:32

much is it. It's like someone's crushing

44:34

it. How

44:34

do you breathe? It feels it has

44:36

to be not a fight.

44:40

Are

44:40

you here because of me?

44:46

It was like a sort of horrible tension wrapped

44:49

around his stomach. It

44:51

was very intense

44:53

This

44:54

thing did

44:54

not want to leave. Eddie, do

44:56

something. Can you see the light

44:58

change, Eddie? It's got suddenly very

45:00

dark. I'm trying to think Morris.

45:03

Keep the

45:03

circle. The room

45:06

got incredibly dark, almost

45:08

as if a storm was coming

45:10

through. In everything dimmed

45:13

down. It was like the energy was being

45:16

sucked out

45:17

of it again. What was that?

45:20

Stop it. Stop it.

45:22

Stop it. I'm getting

45:25

new. Personality. Normally, I get that straight

45:28

off. Right, Morris? Yep.

45:30

But this

45:35

isn't a person. Well,

45:37

Evelyn, what does that

45:39

mean when he says this

45:41

isn't a person? So as he

45:43

believes that what we are dealing with is a Telpa. What is a Telpa? So

45:46

a Telpa is basically a paranormal

45:48

entity that is brought to life by a

45:50

collective will.

45:52

And it's this belief that something non capurial, something that

45:54

exists purely in thought can be made

45:57

real if enough people believe it and

45:59

speak it into existence. What

46:01

does Eddie actually believe that this tauper

46:04

is? So he essentially believes that it's some

46:06

source of entity that might have been invoked by

46:08

the ancient

46:10

chaotic tribes that lived on the land where the house is. So I think

46:12

what's really interesting is that we were talking

46:14

about that bird headed sort

46:16

of shadowy figure presence

46:18

earlier. And one interpretation

46:20

of that is that it was horace like if

46:22

we look at the Egyptian explanations. But another

46:24

version is that there is archaeological evidence of ancient

46:27

Celtic warriors wearing bird shaped

46:29

helmets. This tribe is a warrior tribe

46:31

and those were the helmets

46:33

that they wore. Eddie feels that this is a presence that links

46:35

right back to those ancient Celtic

46:38

times. It's so interesting.

46:40

It seems so fantastical,

46:42

but what feels like a battle is

46:44

now raging in that remote

46:46

farmhouse back in nineteen ninety

46:48

five. Everybody in that room believes that they

46:50

can feel the physical impact of

46:52

this presence, as Eddie

46:53

explains, his theory at the top of a

46:56

television bill.

46:57

Is that possible?

47:00

Listen, it's what every

47:02

single religion is

47:04

based on. Somebody, a very long time

47:06

ago, through prayer or

47:08

ritual, brought this thing to life with

47:10

one

47:11

purpose. To bring

47:14

terrible harm.

47:17

There's something there. I

47:21

can smell it. Some god.

47:25

It's coming towards

47:27

us. Oh god.

47:30

It's testing each of us. Oh

47:34

god. I recognize

47:37

it. What is

47:39

god, shit. It's too

47:41

dark. There's

47:43

the shadow.

47:46

This every shot of one. This is

47:48

my

47:49

fault, Courtney. Take

47:51

it out

47:51

of me. Take it out

47:54

of me.

47:58

Leave us alone. Get

48:00

out

48:01

of my house. It's

48:04

been here all

48:07

this time doing what it

48:09

was brought into this world

48:11

for to cause hate unfear.

48:13

And we must now meet it

48:15

with the one thing

48:17

at least

48:18

expects. Compassion.

48:21

You can walk

48:22

back into the forest now.

48:26

Go. Leave

48:31

this piece. I

48:33

love you. I

48:35

love you.

48:37

I love you. After

48:42

that exercise, there really was this huge

48:44

optimism that hail banner was finally

48:47

at peace. We know, that things did not work out that

48:49

way, but do we come any closer here,

48:51

Evelyn, to understanding what this thing in

48:53

Hale Vanadad was? It's

48:56

router potentially in this ancient wealth

48:58

landscape and the ancient people who lived

49:00

on it. I mean, it's mad and it's

49:02

thrilling, but it's literally like no other case

49:04

we've ever come across. Over the course

49:06

of this series, we've debated so

49:08

many theories together. We've had some

49:10

brilliant, ingenious ones from

49:12

the audience. I think now as we

49:14

come to the end of this final

49:16

chapter, everybody here and

49:18

everybody listening would love

49:20

to know what you think really

49:21

happened, Evelyn first.

49:24

The crux of this case for me

49:26

is the house. So I kept asking

49:28

myself, you know, why hail Van Ogh.

49:30

It can't be the rich family because the predates them and

49:32

we've talked about this. Marry and Hoborn

49:35

lived there before them 4

49:38

she experienced dream disturbances,

49:40

including readings being ripped off of

49:42

walls. But there was a person

49:44

between Marion and the richest living

49:46

in the house, which is Bridget Booskin.

49:48

And she had only a small amount of phenomena. Now if memory

49:50

serves, it was simply a spinning wheel that was going by itself at

49:53

night. So why is

49:55

that? Because what Demarion and

49:58

the rich family have in common. Well, we know from researching

50:00

Marion's backstory that she lived in

50:03

a famously haunted house before retired

50:05

to Wales. And she has a lengthy

50:08

history of strange happenings and

50:10

paranormal experiences. And as we

50:12

know, Bill and Liz had that, you know,

50:14

strong experience us that were in

50:16

Egypt, and the bill was involved with one of the most

50:18

famous witch ovens in modern

50:20

history. So it's kind of chicken and egg for

50:22

me. Is it the house

50:24

that's paranormal? And is drawing certain people to it or is it that the

50:26

people themselves are susceptible to the

50:28

paranormal and that when in this house or on

50:30

the land,

50:32

The peering does something that creates the chaos we've just witnessed. So

50:34

I started thinking, perhaps it's not the

50:36

host that's haunted by the people

50:39

themselves. I love that idea of people and the house

50:42

pairing, like some sort of paranormal

50:44

equivalent of

50:46

Bluetooth. Kieran,

50:48

I imagine that you agree with all

50:51

of that.

50:53

No. No. I think we've got go think

50:55

Liz and what you earlier you earlier said

50:58

about them being ingredients

51:00

in this

51:02

amazing cocktail. This amazing

51:04

cocktail is made up of psychology

51:06

and the environment. But I think there

51:08

is this other ingredient that I mentioned before,

51:10

and I think that's Lawrence. And I think Lawrence

51:12

is the trigger. He's the starting

51:14

point of this. Not that

51:16

he's responsible for the phenomena.

51:19

But the bill might be

51:21

misinterpreting perfectly natural things that are happening

51:23

to Lawrence. And then that's the

51:26

starting point

51:28

believing that all the phenomenon that's being

51:30

possessed, his mood, maybe the

51:32

footsteps as well. He's using

51:34

that as a starting point to think what is

51:36

going on

51:38

here. And then all of this trauma or all of this history

51:40

comes up, this belief in curses,

51:42

etcetera, and he starts attributing it

51:45

to the paranormal. Almost though as though

51:47

he's avoiding an aspect, which is the

51:49

psychology of his relationship with Lawrence, which

51:51

is an amazing relationship. But he

51:53

even expresses at times guilt about

51:56

the situation, about the divorce and all

51:58

of that. So it's an incredibly

52:00

complex cocktail I wish there

52:02

was one thing that could

52:04

explain it all. And

52:06

and ghosts could explain it

52:08

all. That would be a lovely simple explanation.

52:11

But there just isn't a singles

52:14

natural explanation that can explain it

52:16

all. Thank you both. I've enjoyed just borrowing

52:19

It is almost the end. There's

52:21

just one final question I want to

52:23

deal with. One that has been almost

52:25

as popular as why didn't

52:28

they leave. Hundreds upon hundreds of you have written to

52:30

ask, what do the

52:32

people who live in Hale Van Aag now make

52:34

of all of this? I

52:36

told you that we contact them and ask them if they

52:38

want to take part in the program, and they were very

52:40

clear they didn't, so we respected their

52:42

privacy. We have never

52:44

known if they've had experiences in

52:46

the house

52:47

or not. But

52:50

then, just

52:52

before Christmas,

52:52

I received an

52:53

email. The senders asked

52:54

me to keep their name private, but

52:58

it reads. Deer

53:00

Danny. Congratulations on the

53:03

witch farm. I'm contacting you

53:05

as Hale Van Ogg has been

53:07

home for my

53:08

4. For the last twenty

53:10

five

53:11

years. If

53:12

there is anything mysterious

53:14

going on here

53:16

today, It is the gentle mystery of nature.

53:18

For a quarter of a century,

53:20

the land around the converted

53:22

barn has been managed for

53:26

wildlife. For family get togethers and as productive organic

53:28

gardens if a visitor encounters

53:30

a cloud of flies at the

53:34

gate now. It's part of the web

53:36

of insect life that also includes butterflies, moths, and bees, thronging

53:38

the garden and the walls of the manor

53:42

house ruin. And there are birds, even owls

53:44

roost inhaled analogue oaks,

53:46

where they and their chicks are hopefully

53:49

protected. For the dangers of

53:52

collisions with speeding

53:53

Exorcists. In contrast to some of

53:55

the windsweb passes

53:58

around Brecon, Hail VanNog is

54:00

a calm, oasis, a biodiversity protected from the elements

54:02

by the trees which line its boundary.

54:04

The humans who live

54:08

there also value their private quiet

54:09

enjoyment. Thank you for

54:11

encouraging your listeners to be kind and

54:14

give us

54:16

privacy. We don't want to be drawn

54:18

into discussion of what may or may not have happened prior to this residency.

54:20

However, I can confirm

54:24

that the infamous electricity meter has behaved itself for

54:26

the whole of the twenty first

54:29

century. As a symbol

54:32

perhaps, of what Hale Van Ogg has become. A few years

54:34

back, a pair of swallows built

54:36

and nest in the barn, perched on

54:39

a tiny ledge. From

54:41

there, their brood flew to sunny

54:44

Africa and back in a cycle

54:46

which repeats itself across

54:48

the years. Can you

54:50

guess where they nested

54:52

and peacefully raised their

54:53

young? On

54:56

top, of the electricity

54:59

meter. There is your

55:02

answer. Whatever walked inhaled

55:04

van og for so many years.

55:07

Walks no more. Did it

55:09

finally leave? Or is it

55:11

just dormant waiting for the right people to

55:13

move in sometime in the future?

55:15

People who for whatever reason can

55:18

tune into its frequency,

55:20

people who are the right ingredients.

55:23

Who knows? But I hope that we will

55:26

all respect the wishes of these new

55:28

owners and leave them

55:30

in

55:30

peace.

55:30

You have been listening to the witch farm. This

55:33

really is the final episode. Thank

55:35

you to our amazing cast who brought

55:37

the drama to life

55:40

to our experts, Kieran Evelyn, to the formidable and

55:42

inspirational Liz, to Becca,

55:44

to Ben, to egyptologist Ken

55:46

Griffin, and to all our other witnesses

55:49

and most of all, to you, the other

55:52

half of this conversation.

55:54

I will be back with a new season of

55:56

uncanny until

55:59

then, sleep well and

56:01

don't have nightmares. The

56:18

witch farm is written and presented by me,

56:20

Danny Robbins,

56:22

sound design is by Charlie Brandon King and Richard Fox.

56:24

Our theme song is by

56:25

Gwenno, and other music is by

56:28

Evan Sykes. It's co produced

56:30

by me and Simon Barnard, and it's a

56:32

baffle gab and uncanny media

56:34

production for BBC

56:36

Radio four.

56:46

Hello. I'm Professor Hannah

56:47

Fry. And I'm Dr. Adam Rutherford.

56:48

And together, we're investigating listener

56:51

led mysteries. Some people have levitated

56:53

in frog. Yeah. Yeah.

56:55

In happen, has anyone ever levitated

56:56

a human? In this new series, you'll

56:58

discover the secretive levitation and what

57:01

really fueled the construction

57:03

of the pyramid. All the burgers you can eat, lots of beer,

57:05

and one of the groups. Paul's themselves,

57:08

and I'm not picking this

57:09

up, the clunkers of men

57:12

carve off. All

57:12

this and daredevil experiments too. Now here is the crystal.

57:14

Am I allowed

57:15

to touch it? You

57:15

certainly are.

57:16

Yeah. Oh, hang on. It's a sleep time.

57:19

The new series of the curious cases of

57:21

Rutherford and Fry Available now

57:23

on BBC sounds.