Tragedy Replayed
The most profound ‘seeing‘ experience happened when I was 18 years old and studying for my A Levels at Friends School in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, which has been in existence for a few hundred years. It was mid-October and my final school exams were starting in a few days. I was a boarder at the school and it was well after 1am when I called it a night and closed my books.
I left my bedroom which was on the third floor of the boarding department, to visit the girls‘ communal bathroom. It was extremely cold and eerily quiet and as I rounded the corner, I saw a young woman standing about half-way down the long corridor, just past the bathroom‘s door.
She was dressed in a soft grey long dress that looked like it was made of some warm material, with a bodice that was laced up the front and a white blouse of sorts. She had a pretty face and long blond hair that was neatly pinned back. I was so startled I said ‗What are you doing?‘ (I was a senior Prefect, so checking on naughty girls up to no good was 2nd nature!) Then I realised she was a few years older than me and she looked so sad. My heart was pounding and I still remember the hot, prickly feeling that shot through my entire body when I realised I was seeing something that was paranormal.A few moments went by and she just stood there, looking at me. I felt that nothing was going to happen unless I made some move, so I took a deep breath and started walking towards her. She watched me for a bit and as I got close to the bathroom door, she turned and calmly walked/glided further away, down the corridor.
At the end of the corridor was a door into a small TV room. I watched her go through this door towards the building‘s outside wall, where there was a large floor to ceiling window. She stopped, turned and looked at me and then turned back, paused for a second and then seemed to take a big step – and disappeared. Needless to say, my visit to the bathroom was the fastest ever!
A few days later, I plucked up the courage to tell one of the other senior girls, who told the Matron.She called me into her study that night and explained to me that I had seen ‗The Lady in Grey‘. She said that this lady was a teacher at the school in the 16/17/18th century (can‘t recall which one), when Northern Ireland was at war.
I can‘t recall what the fighting was about but apparently, the winning side had taken to chopping off the heads of those opposing soldiers they killed, marching through the town of Lisburn with these gruesome heads impaled on pikes.
The Matron‘s story was that the Lady in Grey was engaged to a man who was on ‗the other side‘. Her family were completely against her engagement so she and her fiancé had decided to elope. The day this was supposed to happen, this lady had looked out from her classroom and had seen her beloved‘s head impaled on a pike of a soldier marching past the school. She was so grief-stricken that she had taken her life, by jumping out of the floor-to-ceiling window that I had seen her disappear through.She apparently has been seen through the centuries many times, but always on that night in mid-October – the anniversary of her and her fiancé‘s death. The school records these appearances and the Matron offered to show me the archives, but with exams upon me – and then the celebrations of leaving school forever, I never took her up on her offer.
The most profound ‘seeing‘ experience happened when I was 18 years old and studying for my A Levels at Friends School in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, which has been in existence for a few hundred years. It was mid-October and my final school exams were starting in a few days. I was a boarder at the school and it was well after 1am when I called it a night and closed my books.
I left my bedroom which was on the third floor of the boarding department, to visit the girls‘ communal bathroom. It was extremely cold and eerily quiet and as I rounded the corner, I saw a young woman standing about half-way down the long corridor, just past the bathroom‘s door.
She was dressed in a soft grey long dress that looked like it was made of some warm material, with a bodice that was laced up the front and a white blouse of sorts. She had a pretty face and long blond hair that was neatly pinned back. I was so startled I said ‗What are you doing?‘ (I was a senior Prefect, so checking on naughty girls up to no good was 2nd nature!) Then I realised she was a few years older than me and she looked so sad. My heart was pounding and I still remember the hot, prickly feeling that shot through my entire body when I realised I was seeing something that was paranormal.A few moments went by and she just stood there, looking at me. I felt that nothing was going to happen unless I made some move, so I took a deep breath and started walking towards her. She watched me for a bit and as I got close to the bathroom door, she turned and calmly walked/glided further away, down the corridor.
At the end of the corridor was a door into a small TV room. I watched her go through this door towards the building‘s outside wall, where there was a large floor to ceiling window. She stopped, turned and looked at me and then turned back, paused for a second and then seemed to take a big step – and disappeared. Needless to say, my visit to the bathroom was the fastest ever!
A few days later, I plucked up the courage to tell one of the other senior girls, who told the Matron.She called me into her study that night and explained to me that I had seen ‗The Lady in Grey‘. She said that this lady was a teacher at the school in the 16/17/18th century (can‘t recall which one), when Northern Ireland was at war.
I can‘t recall what the fighting was about but apparently, the winning side had taken to chopping off the heads of those opposing soldiers they killed, marching through the town of Lisburn with these gruesome heads impaled on pikes.
The Matron‘s story was that the Lady in Grey was engaged to a man who was on ‗the other side‘. Her family were completely against her engagement so she and her fiancé had decided to elope. The day this was supposed to happen, this lady had looked out from her classroom and had seen her beloved‘s head impaled on a pike of a soldier marching past the school. She was so grief-stricken that she had taken her life, by jumping out of the floor-to-ceiling window that I had seen her disappear through.She apparently has been seen through the centuries many times, but always on that night in mid-October – the anniversary of her and her fiancé‘s death. The school records these appearances and the Matron offered to show me the archives, but with exams upon me – and then the celebrations of leaving school forever, I never took her up on her offer.
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