H
ave you ever wondered about
whom, if anyone, you would
like alongside you to investigate
a haunted house?Throughout the years I have had the pleasure of
visiting some lovely haunted buildings, and worked
alongside such names as Most Haunted, Paranormal
Lockdown, Paranormal Truth, and Ghosts of Britain,
but can you imagine if you did a paranormal
investigation with a champion Olympic wrestler!That’s exactly what happened in Hull in 1908, when
a haunted house on Sykes-street, off Charterhouse-
lane, was undergoing paranormal phenomena.Sykes-street is situated in central Hull and runs from
Charterhouse Lane, to the east, and Caroline Street
to the west. Richardson’s Buildings, which was a
small court off Sykes Street, stood between 44 and
46 on the southern side. It was here in 1908 that
Police Constable O’Kelly, a champion Olympic
wrestler, was called in to assist the family. What
happened next hit the headlines locally, nationally,
and even internationally.The earliest report on the case did not appear in
Hull, as one would expect, but appeared in the
national newspaper, The Daily Mirror, dated
September 5th 1908, and featuring the following,Written by Mike Covell,
Hull’s Haunted HistorianTHE PRESS, THE POLICE,
THE POLTERGEIST &
THE PILEDRIVER
HAUNTED HOUSE IN HULL. Strange Manifestations Cease
on Arrival of Olympic Champion Wrestler. - he last case of
a haunted house was reported yesterday from Hull, where,
on account of alleged supernatural manifestations, Mr. and
Mrs. Gilson, who formerly occupied the house, have moved
out with all their furniture. It is stated that in the small hours
of Saturday morning a comb lew out of a comb box, followed
shortly aterwards by the brush; a pebble came through the
closed kitchen door, and cups and glasses lew from the table
and were smashed. Police-constable Hynes, who, observing the
commotion, arrived on the scene, declares that as he passed
through the kitchen into the inner room a box of blacking lew
past his helmet. On making a thorough search no one could be
found, but later, when other oicers arrived, including Police-
constable O’Kelly, the heavy-weight champion wrestler at the
Olympic Games, the manifestations ceased.