A pencilled message appears on a vicarage wall in Essex, addressed to the rector's wife, and stops mid-sentence.
Adam, Oz and Frank take on Borley Rectory: the bricked-up nun nobody can find a record of, the Foysters and the writing on the walls, Harry Price renting the whole house and advertising in The Times for observers, the fire of 1939, and the 1956 book that accused Price of faking most of it. Marianne Foyster later admitted she faked some of it, though her story changed depending on who was asking.
Everyone who set foot in that house came out with a different story, and every one of them was sure.
The Grave Shift is a Ghost Haunt UK production. Hosted by Adam, Oz and Frank.
Full transcript
AdamSomebody wrote 'help' on a vicarage wall, in pencil. And never finished the sentence.
AdamThis is The Grave Shift.
AdamAnd we're now on every major podcast platform, so if you found us on Spotify or Apple, the link's in the bio for the rest.
OzLovely. Doing the advert before he's even said hello.
AdamIt's called efficiency, Oz.
FrankMorning, lads. I've been up since Tuesday, so if I say anything strange, that's why.
OzSo that's who's holding the recorder at three in the morning.
AdamRight. Borley Rectory. Essex, on the Suffolk border. Big red-brick Victorian house, built in eighteen sixty-two for the Reverend Henry Bull.
AdamBy the nineteen twenties it's being called the most haunted house in England.
OzCalled that by who?
AdamMostly one man, with a very good publicity machine. He's coming.
FrankLocal story was a nun who fell for a monk, tried to run off with him, and got bricked up alive. Plus a phantom coach on the lane.
OzBricked up nun. Every haunted house has one. They must do a bulk deal.
AdamAnd you're right, that's the bit that never held up. Nobody has ever found a record of it. It's legend.
AdamNineteen twenty-nine. The Daily Mirror runs a story about strange goings on at the rectory, and a man called Harry Price reads it and drives straight up.
FrankThere he is. The publicity machine.
AdamPrice was a showman and a proper investigator, and to this day nobody agrees where one stops and the other starts.
AdamNineteen thirty. A new rector moves in, Reverend Lionel Foyster, and his wife Marianne, who's about twenty years younger than him.
AdamAnd it kicks off. Bells ringing with the wires cut. Stones and bottles flying about. Keys shooting out of locks.
OzWires cut. That's a person with a pair of pliers, Adam.
FrankHe's on the pliers again.
AdamThen the writing starts. Pencilled on the walls and along the corridors. Little scrawled messages, all for her.
AdamSomething like, 'Marianne, please help get' -- and then it just stops. Like whoever wrote it was dragged off mid sentence.
FrankSee, that's what does it for me. The stopping.
OzOr someone in the house had a pencil and a flair for drama.
AdamAnd here's the twist that lives in the footnotes. Years later, Marianne herself said some of it was her.
FrankHang on. She admitted it?
AdamPartly. She told researchers she'd faked some of it. But her story shifted over the years, depending on who was asking.
OzThere we go, then. Case closed. Pack the van, Frank.
AdamSit down, Oz. Plenty happened in that house before she got there, and after she left.
FrankOther rectors reported things. Servants. Visitors. That's what they all said, anyway.
OzIn a house the whole county already knew was haunted. That's the bit I keep coming back to.
AdamWhich is the real problem with Borley. By the time anyone looks properly, the story's already in the room.
AdamNineteen thirty-seven. Price rents the whole house for a year, and puts an advert in The Times for volunteers. Sensible, honest people, willing to sit in a freezing house at night and write down what happens.
OzRight. Fair play. That's actually a decent method. Independent observers, written notes.
FrankHold on. Oz just approved of something.
OzDon't get used to it.
AdamDozens turned up. Students, doctors, retired officers. Some saw nothing at all. Some heard knocks, some felt cold spots, some claimed a lot more.
OzSo a year of people sitting in the cold, disagreeing with each other.
FrankSame as our Tuesday nights.
AdamThen, twenty-seventh of February, nineteen thirty-nine. The rectory burns down.
FrankNew owner was unpacking boxes. A lamp got knocked over. That's the dull, documented version.
OzA lamp. Not a nun. A lamp.
AdamAnd yet people said they saw a figure in an upstairs window, watching it burn. With nobody inside.
OzFlames reflecting in glass, Frank.
FrankCould be. Doesn't sound like it when someone tells it right.
AdamPrice writes it all up. The Most Haunted House in England, nineteen forty. It sells brilliantly and makes Borley famous worldwide.
AdamThen Price dies, in nineteen forty-eight. And a few years on, the knives come out.
AdamNineteen fifty-six. Three researchers, Eric Dingwall, Kate Goldney and Trevor Hall, publish a book saying Price faked a lot of it.
OzOh, now we're talking.
AdamTheir case was that things were staged, stories were dressed up, and Price had every reason to keep the legend going, because it sold his books.
FrankThey did find real problems. Even his fans admit the book isn't spotless.
OzSo Price is a fraud. Simple.
AdamThat's where people get impatient, Oz. Because the other side says his critics had their own agenda, and picked what suited them, too.
FrankAnd some of it was reported by people with nothing to gain from Price.
OzReported years later. About a house that was already famous.
AdamWhich is the honest answer nobody puts on the poster. Borley's a haunted house nobody can quite look at straight.
FrankHere's where I land. And I'll stand on it.
FrankWhoever wrote that word on the wall, a real person in a real house wrote 'help' and left it for someone to find.
AdamGhost, or a young wife in a hard marriage. Either way, that's the bit that's still sad.
OzYeah. I'll give you that one straight. Somebody in that house needed help.
AdamThat's the unsettling bit for me. Not the bells. Not the nun.
AdamJust somebody, in the dark, starting a message and never finishing it.
FrankRight. Who'd last longest alone in that house overnight?
OzMe. I'd have the meter and a clear head.
AdamYou jumped when my phone buzzed last week.
OzThat was a loud buzz.
FrankIt was a vibrate, Oz.
AdamFull case files, the Times advert, and the wall writing line by line, all at the link in the bio.
AdamThis has been The Grave Shift. I'm Adam.
FrankFrank. Still awake. Technically.
OzOz. The one who'd last until ten.
AdamA house burned to the ground, and the argument about it never did.
AdamEveryone who set foot in that house came out with a different story, and every one of them was sure.
AdamRead the wall. Decide who wrote it.
AdamYou can listen to this episode and every other episode of The Grave Shift on all major podcast providers -- link's in the bio below.
New episodes, first
Get the next case in your inbox.
One email when a new Grave Shift episode lands. Nothing else, and you can leave any time.