THIS IS FINDON VILLAGE — www.findonvillage.com  created by Valerie Martin, contains scenes from her home village of Findon, West Sussex, U.K.

THE GHOST OF BROADWATER HALL

If you live in Findon, have you come across the name Broadwater Hall?  

Do not go looking for the property known as Broadwater Hall just to the south of Findon and only a few minutes away —because it has long since gone.    Just the name remains.

A gentleman named George Orme built Broadwater Hall in Victorian times.   He had died by 1882 but I do not know if his family (if he had one) continued to live on at the Hall or not.   From c.1908 the farmland around Broadwater Hall was increasingly sold up and built upon.   By 1952, the property had been sold and divided into flats and was finally demolished in 1972.    Three years later it was remembered only by the cul-de-sac bearing the name of Broadwater Hall which was built on the site.  

I will leave the ghost story to Andrew Miles who now lives in Guelph in Ontario —

When I was very young my family lived on Northcourt Road, in central Worthing. Growing from a toddler to a young boy I made friends with a few other local children of my own age. Together we developed a pastime of exploring the many alleyways and secret nooks and crannies of our neighbourhood - something I think all of us did when we were young scallywags.

Around the age of eight I made friends with Susan, the girl next door. Susan was also about eight and.  I was impressed by her cat-like eyes, which were always looking for a way to have fun and get into trouble. We both had older and somewhat bullying brothers who looked down at us and teased us endlessly. Consequently Susan and I loved to escape to the streets where we were free to do whatever we wanted. Going to the sweet shop, looking for tennis balls at the nearby courts, climbing walls and sneaking into strange gardens - these were just a few of the great adventures we had - just the two of us. We had a very special friendship.

Northcourt Road joined onto nearby South Farm Road, which was, even back in 1970, a very busy thoroughfare. Susan and I rarely crossed the main road to venture further, yet we had always been aware of a strange overgrown laneway that existed just on the other side, slightly south of Northcourt Road.

The entrance to this mysterious lane said a lot about what one could expect further in - all kinds of weeds, overgrown bushes, stinging nettles and choking ivy indicated a path into a veritable jungle. My brother had told me that an empty mansion, full of giant bloodsucking bats, stood at the far end of the laneway and no-one ever walked there because the place was haunted by two hideous ghosts. Despite being very frightening to me, this bizarre claim stimulated Susan and she suggested that we both ask our mums and dads whether it was true.

We were both very sternly told that the old building was strictly out of bounds because the Worthing Fire Brigade used it for practice and filled it with toxic smoke so they could test their breathing equipment. But no mention of giant bats or ghosts were made. After all, we thought, all that toxic smoke would have surely gotten rid of such things and both Susan and I considered my brother to be a fibber.

One sunny day in the spring of 1970 Susan and I, being the very bold eight year olds we were, decided to cross South Farm Road and enter the strange lane. The bushes and tangled vines bracketing the grassy and weedy path, which we had seen many times from across the road, now seemed even more unwelcoming when we stood under their leaves. Before us a grassy and weedy path seemed to thread into a different world and we both felt very reluctant to begin our mission. But Susan suddenly went tentatively forwards and I followed, admiring her courage. I remember wishing that I had the same cat eyes she had

As we entered the shadows of the laneway the sound of the traffic behind us quickly faded from our ears. Too quickly, I thought to myself. I looked at Susan and she was walking much more slowly, as if she had also sensed something wrong. This gave me a chance to catch up with her and I felt a secret wish to hold her hand. She must have sensed my need, or she had a similar one, because our hands met and it was a very special moment for both of us. Pigeons cooed mournfully somewhere nearby and the sun was suddenly obscured by clouds. Everything became very gloomy. We were still only a short run from South Farm Road behind us - but it seemed a mile away.

We carried on, a few steps at a time, both feeling that maybe there was something to my brother's words after all. Maybe the place really was haunted.

The lane was deathly quiet and still - not a leaf moved, yet the day had been breezy earlier. After a while the pigeons stopped cooing and flew off, leaving us completely alone.

Then suddenly, as the path straightened to the right, we heard a strange "click", like someone clicking their fingers. The sound broke the silence like a whip. Susan let go of my palm and with both hands nervously ruffled her mop of blonde hair. She was staring intensely at something to the side of the path. I followed her cat eyes and to my astonishment realised that she was looking at an old lamp post.

The lamp post was set back a few feet to the right of the path.   It looked somehow ancient, almost gothic and otherworldly. Foliage was partially wrapped around it and the four glass panes at the top were missing. It was in fact and old rusty cast iron relic from Victorian times, very similar to the one pictured here (photo attached).

For some reason the lamp post looked incredibly spooky and both Susan and I were already quite scared by that weird "click" sound we had just heard - as if the lamp post was going to suddenly come to life. We looked at each other blankly. There was no possibility of us going any further along this strange lane. We nervously turned our backs to the lamp post and hastily retreated in silence. The familiar noise of the cars on South Farm Road comforted us and we quickly skipped across to the safety of the other side, then ran home.

Little had we known that we had just walked along a path that once was well used and well tended. Had we looked closer we would have probably found one or two other forgotten lamp posts, hiding in the overgrown branches and vines.

Susan and I felt rather silly for being so easily spooked by a mere rusty old lamp post, and we both agreed that the weird click we had heard was probably just a twig breaking underfoot. Susan was no sissy and she often suggested to me that we should go back to that forbidden lane and explore further. With a certain reluctance I agreed but it was months before we actually decided to give it another try.

When the blackberries came out Susan and I cultivated a joint hobby of picking the ripe berries where ever we could find them. Along the back of alley walls, behind Mrs Piercy's garden shed - and where ever else we could find them. Punters Timber yard was a good place to look but there was often a great bearded man who yelled at us and threatened to let his Alsatian off his chain.

The blackberries soon became slim pickings and so one afternoon Susan suggested that we should give "Lamp Post Lane" (as she called it) another try. There surely would be lots of blackberries there, and if what my brother said was true, that no-one ever went there, then there would theoretically be millions of blackberries - all sweetly ripe and waiting to be discovered and devoured by only us.

Just minutes after telling our parents that we were going to look for tennis balls we crossed South Farm Road and entered the lane. The strange and ominous atmosphere that kept normal people away had no effect on us and we disappeared in the shadows. Susan and I weren't normal - we were adventurers, bold explorers and fearless plunderers of blackberries and other juicy edibles.

We soon got to the lamp post and because we knew what to expect we had somehow neutralised its spell. The tall and gothic looking object had little power over us and we calmly walked past it, and thankfully there was no weird click. I still felt, however, a little shiver as I felt that the lamp post was eyeing me. Susan was indifferent to it and she talked about where the best blackberries would likely be found.

As we progressed along the lane - further than we had ever been before - we looked anxiously for the sight of the legendary old mansion, which we had heard so much about but had never ever seen with our own eyes. It soon appeared - a gloomy and quite pitiful relic of abandoned architecture. It was huge and grey and the sills of the glassless windows were smudged with black soot, left by the fireman's' smoke tests. The roof was half gone and black starlings chattered and whirled about the crumbling chimneys.

It was indeed the shell of what must have been once a great place. In fact it was once known as Broadwater Hall, but Susan and I had no idea of that fact. It had been built around 1860 on an estate adjoining South Farm. In the 1920's it had been used as a school but after the Second World War the Hall fell into disrepair and eventually became derelict. The grounds must have once had tidy hedges, neat beds of flowers, shrubs and shapely lawns. Gardeners once potted about, keeping everything just right and elegant gas lamp posts kept the path lit for visitors.

But to Susan and I what was once Broadwater Hall was merely a wasteland of brambles, rubble and old mattresses. And blackberries. Susan saw them first, dangling in great bunches from arch-shaped limbs that criss-crossed each other, forming an almost impenetrable web of thorns. They were to the right of our path - a boy's stone throw from the weedy edges of the Hall (a girl's stone throw is much less). The sky became very dark with blackish clouds that made it feel like twilight.

The old building loomed on our immediate horizon like a stoney monster, the empty black windows eyeing us like a spider watching prey approach its web. I felt leery about picking the blackberries. They seemed like forbidden fruit, too big and luscious - too good to be true. Susan and I were not used to finding such an undisturbed bounty of delectable berries, awaiting our eager fingers and hungry mouths. I hesitated and glanced across at the black windows and a thought went through my head. There were a lot of black things about. Blackberries, black windows, black clouds and black starlings. Maybe the birds were actually giant bloodsucking bats, I thought.

But Susan was already deep in the thorny bushes, her hands in the air as if she was wading through water. I followed her path, where the growth had been partially crushed under her shoes. We both started picking the numerous blackberries which were within reach and we soon forgot all other concerns. Our fingers, faces and sleeves became purple with the juice of berries so sweet and delicious that we thought we were in heaven.

Deeper we ventured into the thickest bushes, slowly and carefully moving our bodies to avoid the sharp thorns that snagged our clothes and nicked our skin. A dot of blood appeared on one of my fingertips - I was relieved it was red and not black. Despite the lovely feast I still felt a bit uneasy.

Perhaps twenty minutes or half an hour went by, as we stood there only feet apart. Susan kept comparing the biggest berries and then cheerfully gobbled them up. I was starting to get bored and felt I could hardly eat any more. We were surrounded on all sides by a sea of brambles, rising like waves from our knees to our waists. Fortunately we had a kind of rough path behind us, where some of the bushes had been crushed underfoot.

Susan and I were facing the same direction, plucking yet more berries, when suddenly we both stopped and froze. We had just heard another weird click. We then slowly looked at each other with expressions of fear because we both felt someone or something looking at us from behind.

We both turned around and to our complete terror an old lady, all white and dressed in Victorian costume, was standing there just several yards away. Her face was completely white and her white lips moved angrily as if she was shouting at us. But there was no sound. Her eyes were slightly pinkish and unbelievably frightening. They stared coldly at us and we were paralysed with horror.

The figure had a rolled up parasol or umbrella, also completely white. A wide and elaborate white hat was on her head, filled with white flowers. Her dress seemed embedded with brambles, yet untouched by them. And then it became clear why this was so. The white figure was actually translucent. We could both see the background of bushes right through her. It was as if she was made of mist, yet so distinctly shaped to every detail.

The white lady raised her parasol like a truncheon and waved it at us. Her mouth shouted angry words yet we heard nothing. And then the apparition started to move towards us, the white dress flowing smoothly and unaffected by the dense brambles. All this happened in well under a minute while Susan and I were frozen on the spot with terror. When we finally realised we had to quickly get out of there there was a terrible problem The translucent apparition blocked the path of our retreat. So we had to literally jump and scramble in the opposite direction through a dense wasteland of choking blackberries. By now Susan was screaming hysterically and I too started wailing and crying.

By the time we reached a clearing so we could run back towards the lane as fast as we could, we were both bleeding in numerous places and our clothes were in shreds. The thorns had almost ripped us apart. Still crying and with legs like jelly, I had a chance to look sideways back towards the blackberry thicket from where we had emerged. There was no sign of any elderly white lady.

We ran and ran and ran, our hands, arms, legs and ankles covered in numerous bloody scratches. We ran so fast that South Farm Road loomed up quickly and we didn't pause to wait for a gap in traffic. We just kept running - north, then west, then north, then east, then north. Finally we were out of breath and we sat on the curb of some street far from home. We were still so intensely frightened and shaking like leaves that we couldn't talk. What had just happened flashed through our brains like lightning. I glanced up and down the street, half expecting to see the horrible white spectre gliding towards us, waving it's parasol. I put my hand around Susan's shoulder and she leaned into me. We must have looked quite wretched because a man came running across the street, asking what had happened. Susan remained quiet as I stood up and explained, with a stroke of spontaneous invention, that we had been chased by a dog into a pile of brambles and that we were okay and on our way home. I didn't like the look of the man because he had huge yellow teeth, almost like fangs.

Susan and I got up and with renewed energy ran home. The day had seemed to turn into a nightmare and we both craved the safety of our families. When we got home our mums and dads couldn't believe the state we were in. But we were home and we were safe.

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Just yesterday I asked my mother what she remembered about this event. She told me that she had never seen me so frightened as that day. She had thought that I looked so terrified it made a unusual change - because it was usually me that terrorised the neighbourhood. She also told me that when Susan grew up she got married and eventually moved to Australia.

I believe that what Susan and I saw that day in 1970 at the old location of Broadwater Hall was a ghost. I have never forgotten it and I'm sure Susan hasn't either.

Thank you, Andrew.

Let us try to unravel this story of the spectral of Broadwater Hall.   I will leave you to decide for Andrew if the apparition in white was a past owner of the mansion described as  Broadwater Hall?   I cannot help but ponder on her demise and why she continued to haunt the property as a shadowy nebulous image?   Could it have been Mrs George Orme the wife of the original owner?

I thought it would be a relatively easy project to find a photograph of the original Broadwater Hall to illustrate Andrew's story but I have drawn a complete blank.   I wonder why we are destined to not know what it looked like?

Perhaps you live (or work) in the road known as Broadwater Hall today and have a similar spooky experience to relate?  Surely this lady in white angrily waving her parasol cannot have vanished forever — unless the demolition and bulldozers frightened her away?

What happened to Susan?   I can answer that one for you at least at least.   When she grew up she got married and moved to Australia.

I do not believe in ghosts but I am open to being converted.   I think canines chase off any possibility of spirits coming near me.

Let us unravel this ghost story.    I will leave you to decide for Andrew if the apparition in white was once the owner of the mansion described as  Broadwater Hall?   I cannot help but ponder on her demise and why she haunted the property?   Could it have been Mrs George Orme the wife of the original owner?

I thought it would be a relatively easy project to find a photograph of the original Broadwater Hall to illustrate Andrew's story but I have drawn a complete blank.   I wonder why we are destined to not know what it looked like?

Perhaps you live in Findon (or work) in the road known as Broadwater Hall today and have a similar spooky experience to relate?  Surely this lady in white angrily waving her parasol cannot have vanished forever — unless the demolition and bulldozers frightened her away?

What happened to Susan?   I can answer that one for you at least at least.   When she grew up she got married and moved to Australia.
 

Continue if you would like to read about 1983 and All That Went on in Findon.

THIS IS FINDON VILLAGE — www.findonvillage.com is a continually growing record created by Valerie Martin exclusively for documenting life in Findon.