Thursday 8 September 2016

Investigation Report - Grendon Hall, Northamptonshire

MVPI Case Ref: MVP/1624/16
Entry Dated: 02/04/2016
By: Rob Dennis


Brief Summary:
The Hall, formerly the manor-house, is on the north side of the village, near Nether End, on the road to Wollaston. It is a 17th-century two-story house greatly altered in the 18th century, when the principal or east front, which has slightly projecting end wings, was rebuilt in Corby and Ketton stone. It is a simple but very pleasing design, with square-headed windows, drafted quoins, wooden modillion cornice, and slated hipped roofs. The windows have architraves and heavily barred sashes painted white, and the squareheaded doorway has a circular hood supported on brackets. The 18th-century facing is continued along the shorter south front, but the longer north front remains substantially unaltered and retains its mullioned windows. There is a partly panelled open staircase and two of the bedrooms contain tapestry. To the northeast of the house are the stables and dovecote, the latter a rectangular limestone structure with gables east and west, and square wooden cupola, apparently of 17th century date.
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/northants/vol4/pp249-252#h3-0002

Grendon Hall – 20 room manor house with converted stable, dovecote and walled gardens.  Site now in use as an outdoor activities centre.  MVPI set up equipment all focussed on the first floor.  CCTV was later set up covering a connecting walkway between the rear staircase and the front staircase where earlier activity was detected.

Report:
Of all the incidents of note Andy, Paul and I were mainly working together for the whole evening.  We began in Room 1 on the first floor.  Andy used the Ovulus, Paul was using the spirit box and I arranged a few EMF devices and a trigger object.  I felt that I was being drawn to a year in time along with a reference to cavalry.  The was one incident where floor boards on the first floor could be heard but after going to find the source no plausible explanation could be offered.  I went into adjoning rooms as well as up the front staircase but no one in room 1 reported on my return any sort of noise that would explain what we had heard.  After a few further attempts at communication  we felt that we had spent sufficient time in that Room and moved on to Room 2 next door.

Room 2 was not very interesting and I felt personally nothing was of interest in this room.  After a few minutes in here we decided to move on.  We made our way off the first floor at 2120 hours via the front staircase, as we opened the door onto the staircase Andy, Paul and I all heard a clear female voice say “WOO HOO”, all three of us confirmed we heard this independently and I called over the radio to see if any team member had made that noise.  No one other than Grahame Young was on the first floor and the other teams all confirmed no one had made that noise.  Andy identified that there was a ladies shower room on that floor so we went in there.  I left Andy alone in the room while I set off and got a Full Spectrum Camera and EMF device.  When I returned Andy reported feeling that he was not alone in the room and described a definite cold spot he experienced in the shower room.  I set up the F/S in the window pointing down and to the right towards the shower cubicles and aiming at an EMF device on the floor. (Sasha revealed later in the evening the same type of sensation in this room, there had been no prior discussion about this experience)

During this period also we spoke with Grahame and his group who reported that prior to our radio message about the female voice they heard footsteps along the first floor connecting walkway and were in the process of trying to debunk this by walking along that area in various different way (heavy footed, sneaking, with and without footwear).

Andy, Paul and I decided to make our way from the first floor down to the ground floor via the front staircase when at 2140 hours all three of us stopped as we heard a male voice say “WOAH”, again I called over the radio for any team member who called out this word but no one responded that they were responsible.  On both occasions with the location as it was and the fact that all members had been accounted for and only one member of staff was on premises in a disconnected building to the investigation site we could not find any plausible explanation at the time for these two occurences.

ROOM 8C

Andy, Paul and I after coffee set up in Room 8C on the second floor.  Room 8B was occupied by Sadie and her team.  Both rooms were separated by a stud wall forming bedrooms.  The floor boards connect between both rooms without any break at the foot of the stud wall.  There is a wall mounted light on the wall along with a Central Heating Radiator.  There was no heating on in this part of the building.  The room was cold but it had no carpet (which 8B did have) as well as a single pane lead window which looked out onto the gardens.

In this room I used a pendulum and a glass in order to attempt communication and invited any energies to use this as a means of doing so.  I invited a single tap on the glass as YES and two for NO.  I ascertained from this experiment a male energy, deceased during WWI as a result of a single gunshot wound to the chest.  Andy using the Ovulus came up with a name 'PAUL', the pendulum gave a confirmatory YES.  There were several questions then around this persons existence in the physical plane, he was unmarried, had no children, had received award and was happy for us to be here.  The Ovulus warned of DISASTER, GRAY and WATER.  Upon research the next day I found the following:

On 29 August 1876, a battle took place between local farmers and their men over water rights. The scene was commemorated in a poem by a local poet.

There was also elevated EMF readings found on two of the K2 meters one was on a shelf above a radiator and one on the bed opposite.  No physical source of EMF could be found to account for the activity on the bed, however we found that a cable running through the stud wall may have accounted for some of the activity from the radiator one.  It should be noted that this K2 meter for ¾ of the time in Room 8C was dormant and presented no readings whatsoever, but we cannot rule out possible man made sources at this time.  The  K2 on the bed cannot be as readily explained away.  There were also footsteps outside the room coming from directly outside 8C near the door but when Andy opened the door there was no one standing anywhere on that landing and after further investigation I found that the team next door were in no position to stand where the noises were coming from due to there being a bed in that area.  That team were using equipment linked to an XBOX Kinect and they reported not long before I came into the room that the device had detected someone sat on the bed.

Conclusion:

Based on the investigation, experiences, the experiences fed back on the the night and some early research without reviewing the physical evidence as yet, this site has to be regarded as being of Significant Paranormal Interest.  If nothing else happened on the whole event other than those two witnessed voices this would warrant further investigation at a later date and on that one we would also be able to involve better coverage and experimentation around this venue.

For further info on Grendon Hall see HERE.http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/northants/vol4/pp249-252#h3-0002

0 comments:

Post a Comment