THIS HAUNTING AT AN ENLISH COUNTRY HOUSE IN 1662 WAS THE FIRST POLTERGEIST TO BE RECORDED IN DETAIL. AT THE TIME IT WAS BLAMED ON WITCHCRAFT, BUT IT BEARS A REMARKABLE SIMILARITY TO MANY MODERN POLTERGEISTS,
For many centuries, most people in Europe and America believed in witchcraft. It was a crime for which both men and women could be tired by law. So when Jogn Mompesson, a respected magistrate, became the victim of a spooky haunting, everyone assumed a witch or wizard must be to blame.
NOISE NUISANCE
The trouble began one day in 1662. Mompesson was at work at the courthouse when he was bothered by a drumming noise outside. It turned out to be coming from a wandering musician named William Drury, who had been hanging around the town for several days, banging a drum and making a nuisance of himself.
Mompesson immediately had Drury brought into the courthouse and ordered him to explain himself. The drummer claimed to have a permit allowing him to perform in the street, but Mompesson investigated and found the permit was a fake. He had Drury arrested and thrown into prison, and confiscated his drum.
STRANGE SOUNDS
Drury was released later that day, but his drum was not returned. Instead, Mompesson took it home to his house in tedworth, and left it there while he went to London for two weeks on business.
When he got back he found his family in turmoil. His pregnant wife, young children and servants had been kept awake at night by banging and knocking noises. They were sure someone was trying to break in - but whenever they looked, no one was there.
BEAT OF A DRUM
The trouble continued, and Mompesson and his family noticed a pattern. Most evenings, the noises began at around bedtime with a strange wirring sound. This would change to a banging and thumping, and finally to the sound of a drum being played. Each night, after two hours, the noise stopped. This would change to banging and thumping, and finally to the sound of a drum being played. Each night, after two hours, the nouse stopped. This would happen for five nights in a row. After a few nights' break, it would start again.
The haunting seemed to stop completely when Mrs Mompesson had her baby. it seemed as if the ghost meant the newborn child no harm. But a few weeks later it was back - with a brand new bag of tricks.
HAUNTED DAUGHTERS
The disturbance now seemed to "focus" on Mompesson's two daughters, aged 11 and 7. It moved to the room where the two girls slept - and it was no longer just a nouse. The girls' beds bagan to shake violently, and sometimes even floated into the air. Mompesson decided to move the girls to an attic room, but the ghost just followed.
MORE WITNESSES
The family thought a priest might be able to help - but when he arrived, things got even worse. Chairs walked around, shoes jumped into the air, and the priest was hit on the leg by a flying plank.
news of the ghost, whuch was now known as the "Tedworth Drummer", spread far and wide. Soon dozens of tourists arrived, hoping to see the spooky events for themselves - the King even sent a servant to Tedworth to report on the ghost. One of the visitors, a young clergyman named Joseph Glanvill, wanted to make a written description of the haunting, and was invited to stay overnight.
NIGHT OF FEAR
Glanvill witnessed the banging noises and moving objects in the girls' room. He tried to track down the source of the nouse, making sure the girls kept their hands still on the counterpane so it could not be them. But every time he got close, the noise moved to another part of the room.
The ghost didn't seem to welcome Glanvill's investigation, as it soon began to persecute him as well. During the night, he was woken up by a loud knock on his bedroom door - but no one was there. When he went to fetch his horse in the morning, he found it sweating and exhausted - as if it had been ridden all night. It managed to carry him home, but died mysteriously just a couple of days later.
DRURY'S BOAST
The family suspected that William Drury, the musician whose drum Mompesson had taken, had something to do with the haunting. Then news came that Drury had been put in prison again, this time for stealing pigs. He was said to have boasted to a fellow prisoner that he had bewitched Mompesson, to pay him back for confiscating the drum. So when Drury was sentenced to be deported to America, the Mompessons were sure the touble would stop. But Drury escaped, and the haunting began again. Now, they were sure he was to blame.
PHANTOM FIGURE
The ghost at the Mompessons' house now seemed to develop a more physical presence. First it began to speak: a loud voice could often be heard shoting "A witch! A witch!" in the girls' bedroom. Jogn Mompesson also glimpsed a shadowy figure on the stairs, and one of the servants woke in the night to see a human shape, with glowing red eyes, looming over his bed.
On another occasion, Mompesson was sitting in a downstairs room when he noticed some logs in the fireplace seeming to move by themselves. He immediately drew his postol and fired in the direction of the logs. Not long afterwards, he found drops of fresh blood on the hearth.
GONE AT LAST
The way the troubles ended suggested William Drury had indeed been behind them. Following his mysterious claims, he was arrested on charges of witchcraft. Although he was let off - perhaps because there was not enough hard evidence to convict him - he was still sentenced to be deported for his earlier crime.
In 1663 he left for America - and the haunting stopped. This made the Mompessons more convinced than ever that he had been using witchcraft to frighten them - a view which was considered quite normal for the time. However, most modern experts on the paranormal say that the spoky events at Tedworth were mroe likely to have been caused by a poltergeist.
Because the case took place so long ago, no one can find out what really caused it. But there were so many witnesses that the case of the Tedworth Drummer remains one of the most convincing haunting stories.