BORLEY, ENGLAND — On Feb. 27, 1939, an infamous house in England was destroyed by fire. It was Borley Rectory, reputedly the “Most Haunted House in England.”
Borley is a small village near Sudbury, Essex, England. Borley Rectory was built in 1863 for the Rev. Henry Bull on the site of an ancient monastery. The ghost of a sorrowful nun who strolled along the so called “Nun’s Walk” was already well-known to the villagers at that time. An old legend claimed that she was a wayward sister from the nearby nunnery in Bures who had fallen in love with a monk from the Borley Monastery. The two had tried to elope together but had been quickly tracked down. The monk was executed and the nun was bricked up in the cellars of the monastic buildings!
The Rev. Bull had a summer-house put up overlooking Nun’s Walk so he could observe any ghostly happenings. However, the lady soon became something of a nuisance, often startling guests by peering at them through the windows of the new rectory. Servants rarely stayed long. The Reverend’s four daughters even saw the lady gliding across the lawn in broad daylight. The hauntings increased during the incumbency of Henry Bull’s son Harry. Apparitions now included a ghostly horse-drawn coach seen racing up the rectory drive.
In 1927, the last of the surviving Bulls died and the Rev. Eric Smith and his wife moved into the rectory. They had been warned of the building’s reputation and took the precaution of inviting the famous psychic researcher Harry Price to visit. Price’s arrival appears to have set in motion an outburst of inexplicable poltergeist activity. Objects were smashed and stones hurled at the investigator by unseen forces. It proved all too much for the Smiths and after two years they moved out.
The next occupants of the rectory were the Rev. Lionel Foyster and his family. The ghostly phenomena immediately took a turn for the worse. The phantom in residence appeared to give special attention to the rector’s young wife, Marianne. She often had objects thrown at her, but even more strange were the messages addressed to Marianne which began to appear scrawled on the walls of the house — even while witnesses watched! However, despite attempts at communication, most remained unintelligible. Though one certainly read, “Marianne, please get help” and another, “Please for help and prayers.”
Taking the bull by the horns, the Rev. Foyster had Borley Rectory exorcised. The result was positive at first and the manifestations stopped. However, it was not long before they reappeared in a new form. Strange music would be heard from the nearby church, communion wine would unaccountably turn into ink, the servants call bells in the house rang of their own accord and the Foyster’s child was attacked by “something horrible.” This did it for the rector. The Foyster family left and all successive incumbents refused to live in the house.
Intrigued by further reports of the ghostly activities at Borley, Harry Price returned in 1937 and rented the building himself. He advertised in The Times for trustworthy assistants and, in a prolonged psychic investigation, attempted to get to the bottom of the hauntings. With a team of 48 observers he logged an extraordinary number of psychic phenomena. The most bizarre was perhaps the results of a seance held on March 27, 1938. A ghostly communication from beyond the grave claimed that the rectory would catch fire in the hallway that night and burn down. A nun’s body would be discovered among the ruins. An extraordinary assertion — but nothing happened.
When Harry Price’s lease ran out in 1938, the building was taken over by Captain Gregson. He too was subjected to continuing mysterious happenings, including the disappearance of his two dogs. Then exactly 11 months to the day after the curious ghostly warning, an oil lamp unaccountably fell over in the hall and Borley Rectory burned to the ground. Witnesses claimed to have seen ghostly figures roaming around and through the flames, while a nun’s face peered down from an upper window.
Harry Price returned to the ruins in 1943. Digging in the cellars, he discovered the jawbone of a young woman. Convinced it was part of the body of the spectral nun, he attempted to end the hauntings by giving the bone a Christian burial.
It does not seem to have worked. Supernatural happenings are still reported from the site of the rectory and the nearby churchyard. And Borley has an eerie air about the place that visitors cannot help but feel.
© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2008
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