I was born in the living room of a 3 bedroom mid terrace house in Brixton. The living and dinning room walls had been knocked down to make one big room. There was a long hallway leading from the front door, to a sliding kitchen door. On the right when you entered the kitchen was another door, leading to what was known as the Scullery. This room had a window which looked back into the living room.

We had a Cooper Hopper boiler which supplied all the hot water and a butler sink in the corner which was next to the backdoor, which lead to an outside toilet and garden. Our heating was a Gas fire in the kitchen, an open coal fire in the living room, and paraffin heaters in the hallway and top landing.

 My bedroom was the first room at the top of the stairs. There were then three further steps along the hall leading up to my sister bedroom, then onto my parent’s bedroom. None of these rooms had any heating. 

I remember waking up one winter’s morning and watching my warm breath in the cold and being able to scrap a thin layer of ice from my bedroom window, and making patterns in the ice with my fingers.  I must have been around 5 or 6 years of age when things started to happen.  After my parents had put me to bed, I would wake up during the night being scared and feeling that someone was in my room, watching me in the dark.

 I used to hide under the covers crying, but at the same time trying not to make a sound just in case who ever it was came over to me. I had this terrible fear that they would pull the covers off me. Sometimes when I was really scared, I would scream out and my mum or dad would come into me. They would switch the light on and I would tell them that some one was in my room, with sobbing breath. Each time they tried to calm me down, telling me not to be silly, that I was only dreaming and to go back to sleep. They would then tuck me in, turn the light back off, close the door and go back to their bed.

 Sometimes I would have the courage to run to my sister bedroom and jump into bed with her. My sister who was only a year older than me didn’t mind me doing that. But I only went into my sister’s room a few times as my dad found out and stopped me. He would smack me and send me back to my own bedroom.

 I never actually saw anything then, but I always sensed that someone was there, in my bedroom at night. I would stay under the covers till the morning, afraid to come out.  About a year later when I was about 7 or 8 years, I was woken up by a feeling that my bed was moving. I opened my eyes and saw a figure standing next to my bed. It then lent forward over me, looking straight into my face. This felt like some kind of eternity. It was only there a few seconds but I was absolutely terrified. This figure then moved over to the window and looked out side; it then turned around and looked back at me, then walked into the cupboard door and vanished.

This became a regular event during the night. When ever I mentioned this to my mum and dad, again they would just say “Don’t be stupid you are just dreaming it’s your imagination.” 

 By the time I reached the age of 10 or 11. I would hear the kitchen door slide open and a creaking on the stairs, as if someone was walking up and down them at night, but I never took any notice of this as I assumed it was my mum or dad getting up in the night.  I didn’t see the figure in my bedroom after the age of about 13 or 14, but I could still sense that some one was there. By then I had the courage to look around the darkened room, deep into the corners. I would lie in bed and pull the covers right up to the top of my nose, peeping over the top of the sheets. On occasions I would call out “Is any one there?” but luckily no one answered back, thank god for that, I would have died on the spot if they had.

 When ever I was alone in the living room watching the television, no matter what time it was, day or evening. I would sit very low down in the armchair so that I didn’t have my head showing above the chair, because I felt as if someone was watching me from the scullery window, the one that looked into the living room.  I am convinced that on some occasions I heard faint tapping sounds on the glass window, as if someone was trying to get my attention. Some times this would get too much for me so I would quickly turn the television off and run up to bed. It would make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

 We had a Black cat called Sooty, who would never go into the scullery, even if we put his food in there. Sooty would go to the door, look around the room, look at his food, and then back off as if he sensed something was in there.

 Even when I reached the age of about 20 years old, I could still sense that some one was in my bedroom at night, and the hairs would still stand up on the back of my neck when ever I had my back to the scullery window. I continued to hear the kitchen door slide open at night on several occasions.

 My dad then got a new job, which came with rent free accommodation, so my parents decided to sell the house. By this time I had recently married Linda and hadn’t found any where to live. The house was empty of furniture but my parents said we could live there until it was sold. We were sort of house sitting for them rather than leaving it empty. We only had a bed and a couple of other bits so we just lived in one room. It was cheaper for us to only have to keep the one room heated, so we lived and slept in the living room.

 On returning home from work one day, Linda said to me “I don’t like this house it gives me the creeps. I feel as if some one is watching me all the time.” Linda never ventured up the stairs; she said she had a strange feeling about going up there. The house was sold about 3 weeks after we moved in, so we the move in with Linda’s parents.

 When I was 26 years of age, I just happen to bring up in a conversation with my parents, the subject of the old house that I was born in. My mum told me that the previous owner had died in that house and my Dad would wake up in the night, go down stairs and find the front door wide open and the kitchen sliding door open.  Mum said he even put a bolt at the top and bottom of the front door and a block of wood against the kitchen sliding door. But there were still occasions when he would come down in the night or early morning to find both doors open still open. Mum told me that they got my dads brother, who was a medium to come in and have a look around, but he never found anything there.

 After joining Kent Paranormal seekers, I wrote a letter to the people living in the Brixton house. Telling them that I was born in their living room in 1959 and that I’d lived there for about 21 years. In the letter I explained all my experiences to them. I wasn’t sure what sort of response I would get back from them if any, but surprisingly I did get a reply back from them about 3 weeks later. They said in their letter that it was them that had brought the house from my parents, that they were still there after 27 or so years and that it was a happy house. They have never experienced any strange paranormal activity, but loved reading my story.

 

© 2009Kent Paranormal Seekers

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