Ghost Stories & Paranormal Encounters

Have you read the previous parts of this story? Growing up Haunted in Sydney Part 1

While we had many little anecdotes and stories growing up in a haunted house in Liverpool, Australia – we knew it was my grandfather and while it was a little odd we had become used to him being around.

There was only one time we truly felt terrorized and to the best of our knowledge what ever happened, was nothing to do with my grandfather.

The late 70′s were busy – I was now a teenager, my older married sisters had ‘ run home to mother ‘ fleeing bad marriages bringing grand children and pets with them. We suddenly had a full house….again.

The night it started I had a fight with my mother and stormed down the back yard to hide in the dark. I picked up dirt from my step-father’s garden beds and threw it at the fence in the typical rage of a teenage girl. But soon the mosquitoes and the stillness of the dark night air got a bit pressing and I decided I’d had enough.

Our house was built up and had two back doors. The dining room ended in huge floor to ceiling French glass windows, one of which was a door which had steps leading down into the back yard. At the other end of the house there was a laundry door with cement steps. I could see my elder sister and mother deep in conversation at the dining room table through the French windows and decided I would sneak in the laundry door quietly as I was still angry and not talking to them!

I got into bed pretty much immediately and hopped into bed and turned off the light. I hadn’t been inside very long and only in my bed moments when I heard my sister open my bedroom door and hiss to my mother, “she’s here in bed” ( this would be relevant to the later timings of events ). But at the time I thought they had been concerned and thought I was lost and hadn’t known where I was – which given my teenage rationale was wonderful! ha ha! I thought, ‘you couldn’t find me.’ I laughed and fell asleep, feeling justified by my small victory. But soon I would be laughing on the other side of my face!

My sister and mum were discussing ‘life’ and drinking whiskey, when they heard a bang on the glass of the French windows. My mum assured my sister it was me trying to get attention because of our earlier argument and to ignore me, when there was a second bang. By the time there was a fourth bang – mum opened the door in the French windows and admonished me. Surprised by my lack of response, that was when they went looking for me… and my sister found me in bed.

Now realizing it wasn’t me – the banging kept going on the glass. “Its kids,” mum assured my sister, “shut the curtains,” she suggested. But that made no difference and the banging continued. My sister demanded our mother call our step-father to come home. ‘Yeah and we’ve been sitting here drinking whiskey – he’ll think we’re drunk’ she snapped and refused. Suddenly the banging stopped and they became aware of “noises” in the driveway that ran down that side of the dining room. My mother said there was a “whoosh” similar to when you swish a cane through the air very fast and then a bang on the brick base to the house supports. It was so hard both women felt the floor move with each impact – slowly the whoosh and bang moved down the driveway towards the back of the house where they both knew a huge locked 6′ gate hinged on the corner of the house. The “kids” were going to have to stop to climb the gate.

My mum was astounded when the sound didn’t miss a beat and continued around the corner, along the brickwork under the French windows and now along the back of the house. Intrigued, mum climbed in the kitchen sink to see if she could look down from the kitchen windows and see what was going on below but it was too dark. Being on a 6 lane highway meant most of the backyard was lit up by huge highway lights – but the immediate proximity to the back of the house was in shadow. The whoosh and bang made its way along the back of the house even changing tone as it hit the concrete steps of the laundry – as it reached the far end of the house – mum got this idea in her head ‘I can’t let it encircle the house’ so she bolted out the front door and across the pickle infested lawn (not feeling a thing) and waited at the front corner for “it” to appear. Instead my sister started screaming – so my mum had to run back inside where she found my sister cowering in the loungeroom on the opposite side of the house. “As soon as you left it doubled back,” she blurted out. The banging continued at the window for a few hours finally slowing and stopping before my step-father got home.

The next Friday night I was enjoying being alone in the house which was a rarity and had just gotten out of the shower and was walking up the hallway towards the loungeroom to watch TV when I heard the first bang on the French window glass! We had since had a look in daylight and found that dirt was hitting the windows. It hit the house so hard in places it was caked against the brickwork. I went to pieces immediately at the sound and started to cry. I prayed and cried.

When suddenly the phone rang – it was my middle sister. “Are you ok? ” she asked. “No – the ghost is here – get home,” I sobbed. As I hung up and still had my hand on the receiver the phone was already ringing again! It was my mother. “What’s wrong?” she demanded. “Its here! come home,” I told her. Later they would both tell me they just “knew” I was in trouble – which is something we have an uncanny knack for in my family sometimes.

My sister arrived first and ordered me to bed. I was almost hysterical by this time. I was immediately aware of something scratching at my bedroom window behind my head, as if it was trying to get in! My sister stood at my bedroom door and argued with me I was hysterical and to cut it out. It would take her years to admit she could see a shadow figure outside my window but she knew making me aware of that at that point would only add to my hysteria so she told me I was imagining things and to calm down.

My mum pulled in the driveway at this point and my sister later claimed the dark shadow appeared to dissolve in the headlights of the car. My sister went out on the back laundry step and yelled very loudly in profane language for it to leave us alone. I found out much later my sisters and mother used a Ouija board and were advised there was an angry 15 year old girl wanting “in” to the house but our resident spirits (my grandfather?) were having none of it – so there was a bit of a battle of wills going on. But she had tapped into my rage and emotion on the night of my argument with my mother and was now manipulating it.

The third Friday night it was a full house when the dirt started and a bit like the ‘Witches of Eastwick’ – we’re formidable together. We weren’t scared at all. We opened the doors – searched our yard and even the neighbours yards but never found any evidence of “kids.” As soon as we came inside the dirt would start again. Everyone got bored and went back to watching TV. My middle sister and I stared as the dirt flew perfectly straight from “nowhere” – illuminated by the huge highway lights meant we could see our yard and nothing in the area where the dirt was coming from. It would just “appear” and hit the glass.

As we the house was built up – the dirt came in a straight line – so it seemed to appear in mid air! The dirt as usual built in intensity until the glass panels even began to bend, mum made us close the curtains in case the glass broke. Then slowly as if a spent force it slowed, became less and after about three hours the final blow fell on the glass around 11:30 pm. And that was that… and it never came back. But to this day – I do wonder what I stirred up as an angry teenager, throwing dirt at my fence!

Written by Jennifer Mills-Young, Copyright 2009

Have you read the previous parts of this story? Growing up Haunted in Sydney Part 1 ~~ Growing up Haunted in Sydney Part 5