Category: Community (Warminster)

From the Wylye Valley Life magazine, Issue No.41, Friday 13th December 1985:

A reader who lives in the Wylye Valley sent us this ghostly tale of spectral happenings in his village and wondered if we would like to share it with WVL readers. Yes, of course, we would. We would suggest though, that it you are venturing out on a dark December evening, not to read it before leaving home. Wait ’til you get back and make sure you’re not alone in the house!

Do you believe in ghosts? Well, I do, even though I have never seen one but have experienced a sense of unease.

In our local churchyard there is a vault dating back to the late 1800s and it is these inhabitants that are said to roam the village. I have always been reluctant to enter the church alone, sometimes more than others, when that feeling of not being alone has been stronger. Now, I like going around churches and have visited several in my time but with the exception of two others I have never experienced that feeling of unease more stronger than the one in our very own village.

To relate, early one morning, about 1945, I left home to walk to work; at that time I was with the “railway’ and my way led past the church. When passing I had the feeling of being watched and on turning I saw and heard a window above the vault close. Nothing odd about that you may say but the church was closed and no light was to be seen!

On another occasion, on returning late from work, as I approached the church I saw the vault lid lift. Needless to say, I did not wait to see more but turned round and took the long way around the village to get home.

Now to go back a few years, in fact to the time when this nation was under the threat of invasion, my father was in the Home Guard and every night they would be out on the Downs. One particular night a dog was heard to howl and the men came down to investigate. They found nothing, not even a dog, and again I will leave readers to form their own opinion of this.

On another occasion, about 1954, my wife, who hails from Aberdeen and knew nothing of these happenings, chanced to meet a lady dressed in black (and believed to be the wife of the incumbent of the vault I mentioned earlier) in the lane by the church. My wife wished her “Goodnight,” and getting no reply, turned around to find there was no one to be seen.

The last incident that I wish to relate to here is a report in the local paper about the same time of a visitor to the village who described the inhabitants as “zombies’ because they all stood around and did not say a word. Did we experience a “time warp’?

On joining the RAF in 1951 I spent very little time at home since, so my experiences are only based around the 40’s and 50’s. I expect some readers will recognise the village I live in by my own account above, probably because it will echo their own experiences.

Good hunting. Moonraker.