This story a part of the True Ghost Stories page on Obiwan's UFO-Free Paranormal Page. Please do not copy or distribute without permission from Obiwan and/or the original author!
Date: Tue, 25 Nov 1997 18:15:55 -0800
From: James (dashaman@pacbell.net)
To: ghost-discuss@aurora.cdb.com
Subject: German Ghosts (long)
Here goes:
Like many here, I have experienced many an odd occurrence in my life. (Why is that, do you suppose? I have heard it conjectured that those of us 'gifted' with a sixth sense act as magnets. I have also heard theories that such things go on around us all the time, but most people fail to notice, or pass such events off in an effort to save their view of reality. Any thoughts?)
In the spirit of shared wonder and shivers, I'd like to pass on a few of my favorite experiences..
Whilst in the service of Uncle Sam, I was stationed in a rather beautiful place known as Bamberg, Germany. Being (a)married, and (b)not an officer or non-com, I lived off post (I won't go off on my rant about the only people unable to get base housing being the people who most needed it, I swear)
In my three years there, I lived in three different places. All were haunted (or perhaps were only haunted while we were there, hmmmm, food for thought)
For tonight, I will share my experiences at the second place. An earlier posting asked if anyone thought ghosts could follow a person. Yes, I do. This one did, for instance. (At least we think it was the same one. It felt like it)
The town we were living in was Stegaruach (Probably misspelled terribly, its been a while. For anyone interested, it is about 18K outside of Bamberg. If you find it on a map, please let me know the correct spelling)
We (my wife, months old son, and I) were living in a converted bakery. Being a former commercial building (it still had large glass storefront windows and all... most annoying), it's front door was of the type that had no door knob. Just a handle and a deadbolt. The only other door was to the bathroom, through the kitchen (I did mention that the layout was a bit annoying, didn't I?). In keeping with most other German buildings, the bathroom door had a lock on it that used a skeleton key. (Bear with me a bit longer, good readers. I do tend to ramble, don't I?)
We had been living there for only a month or so when we started noticing strange things occurring. At first it was minor things. magazines left open that we remembered closing, small articles gone, or turning up in unlikely places, etc.
At first, we ignored the events. We chalked them up to faulty memory, or dismissed them as trivial. Gradually, however, the events escalated to the point where we could no longer ignore them.
Our first real clue that the ghost was less than Casper like came one evening shortly after we had returned home from the Post. I was on the couch, getting my uniform ready for the next day. My wife went into the bathroom (to do what most people go into the bathroom to do). She had been in there for a minute or so when I heard the sound of the bathroom lock being turned, followed by the sound of something metallic hitting the floor. I didn't think anything of it at the time. I assumed my wife wanted some privacy, and had locked the door in case I tried to come in and join her for a shower.
After a while (and the requisite shower sounds), I heard the bathroom door rattling, followed by my wife calling for me to "quit fooling around and unlock the damn door!"
I went in the kitchen to ask her what she meant, and found the key lying about six feet away on the kitchen floor. Puzzled, I unlocked the door to find myself face to face with a slightly miffed wife.
She had heard the door lock while she was getting ready for her shower, and thought it was me pulling a prank on her. She said that she had told what she thought was me to unlock it then, but figured I would unlock it before she was finished.
My first thought was that my wife was pulling my leg. She swore she was not, and kept with her original belief that I was the culprit. What followed was a spirited (pardon the pun) session in which we alternately denied responsibility, and tried to convince the other to 'come clean'. Eventually, I convinced my wife of my innocence, and she convinced me of hers.
At this point we became slightly concerned, but not overly frightened. Both my wife and I were relatively used to ghostly events, so the idea of living in yet another haunted house (or bakery, as the case may be) didn't really scare us. We were more concerned for our son's sake than anything else. Even so, it wasn't enough to scare us into finding a new place to live. Our son seemed safe enough, and had already had his first experience with ghosts, in any event (another story, another time).
We did start taking precautions, though. From that point on, we kept the bathroom key in a jar on the living room table, so it couldn't be lost, or left on the wrong side of the door. We would take it with us when we went into the bathroom, and put it back when we came out (especially if we were alone in the house).
Being denied that outlet apparently angered the ghost. From that point on, things got worse. We would be woken up in the middle of the night by the sound of banging pots, or find our son's crib moved several feet. My boots, which I always left next to the couch, would find their way to the doorway of our bedroom.
We would come home to find the place boiling hot, the heater on full blast.
We repeatedly found ourselves locked in or out of the house, even when we knew the door should have been unlocked.
We tried to reason with the spirit. My wife, being a bit of a natural medium, tried to talk to it, and find out what it wanted. It would never respond, instead getting more agitated.
We did something I had always sworn we would not do. We moved. We did our best to 'ward' ourselves, and especially our son, in the interim.
It took us a month, but we found a place back in the same town we had just moved from.
Neither of us felt good about leaving whatever it was behind, though. True, it hadn't succeeded in actually harming us yet, but what about the next family to move in?
I spent one last night there, with my family safely tucked away in our new home, trying to rid the place of the unwelcome inhabitant. I had not, at this point, had any real training in how to deal with these situations. I was still running on instinct. I spent the night alternately trying to reason with the thing, and threatening it. I erected the typical new age 'white light' in an attempt to force it out. At one point, the landlady walked in on me (she thought we were gone and was coming to check the place for cleaning and such). I remember us staring dumbly at each other, neither of us quite sure what to say. (We hadn't told her exactly why we were moving. I did not want word of this to reach my unit, since they would not have been very accepting. Likely any other former enlisted out there can relate to my reluctance)
Apparently, I was successful to a degree. It did apparently leave that place, and followed us to our new home.
But that's another story...
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