It never entered my mind that I might be frightened.
The evening, organised by ghost hunting experts Fright Nights, began in the brightly lit café at Oxford Castle, where the group gathered to fortify themselves with hot tea and coffee.
Our Fright Nights host was Alison Rooke, and she took us on an introductory tour before the start of the ghost-hunt proper.
The castle is a peculiar place, with buildings from different historical eras jumbled together. The oldest part is the castle itself, an ancient Saxon tower built in 1071. A church and crypt were built next to it a few years later.
In the 18th century, the church was knocked down and a prison wing built in its place – but in a sinister twist, the crypt remained underneath as it was useful for storing the bodies of criminals who were hung in the courtyard. One notorious criminal executed in this way was Mary Blandy, who allegedly poisoned her father with arsenic. Her ghost has been seen walking the castle mound.
The castle continued to be used as a prison right up until 1996. It was only in 2006 that it opened its doors to the public.
Alison began her tour in the prison wing – a long corridor with open cells, empty except for the odd cabinet or antique metal bedframe. It has frequently been used as a film set.
Museums and ancient buildings have a strange aura at night. By day, the energy from the exhibits is pressed back by a flow of visitors, but at night it surges out. The lights were off and as we stood there in the gloom I began to feel distinctly unusual.
Alison did not help by telling us that a member of a film crew had once fled the prison wing after hearing a loud screaming from one of the cells. Poltergeist activity has also been reported by film crews, who have found clapperboards and other film equipment inexplicably damaged.
Next, she took us to the crypt, a low stone room with thick columns holding up arches, cool to the touch. Alison told us that after bodies were taken down from the gallows and brought to the crypt they were stored alongside food and wine. “Corpses and vittles!” she observed brightly.
Finally, came the Saxon tower. As we went up its spiral stone staircase by torchlight, I realised I was loving the evening.
How many times have had I trooped dutifully around a historical site, reading the tiny squares of writing, screwing up my face with the effort of remaining interested? The Fright Night approach bypasses all of that and gets straight through to your gut. You don’t just think about the past – you feel it.
We took a short break and the Spirit and Destiny photographer showed us some of his digital photos - he had captured some strange columns of light and patches of mist in the prison wing and crypt.
It put us in a receptive mood for phase two of the evening and the real action, with Elaine Dayton, the medium. She took us down to the crypt for the second time, and told us to turn off our torches. It was that rare thing - total pitch black. I felt my eyeballs couldn’t quite believe it and were stretching into the darkness to find something to see.
Elaine, when I last saw her, had been pacing in the middle of the crypt, and now she begun to speak. “I feel an energy.. it’s stronger down that end,” she said. “I think his name is…. John…yes, John.”
We pondered this, then she gulped: “It’s not a very…. welcoming energy. He’s walking around, he’s looking at you.”
We waited in silence. At this point it became very real. Then it got worse.
“Please John, make yourself known,” said Elaine. “Go to the most sensitive person in the room and give them a sign. Touch them or make a sound.”
She was talking about being psychic, but I consider myself sensitive in the ordinary sense. I was seized by a visceral terror that normally only strikes if I think I’m about to be mugged on a dark night, flashed at in the park, trampled by cows in a remote pasture, or knocked off my bike by an oblivious lorry.
I considered lunging for the photographer – also called John, spookily enough – and clinging to his legs for comfort. But I’d met him for the first time only about an hour ago, and made a split-second decision that I might feel embarrassed about this later. I settled for wrapping my coat as tightly as possible around my body. It felt pathetic: you’re not getting me, ghost, you’ve got to get through my coat first!
At this point, John came to me. A stirring in the air in front of me, and an absolute total horror in the pit of my stomach. In complete anguish, all inhibitions gone, I let out a cracked wail: “If anyone touches me I’ll scream!”
Someone else said they were going to faint, and the torches went back on.
When I looked around, the group seemed delighted. This was what we had come for, after all.
Personally, I felt like I’d stepped off a fairground ride after glugging down a bottle of wine at top speed. This might explain what happened next. We did a vigil in the tower, and I found myself unable to look away from a guy in a white cap whose head kept disappearing – blinking on and off like a flickering light. Alison asked him how he felt, and he responded in an unintelligible, Spanish-sounding mumble. When the torches came on, I was surprised to see the guy was a girl, with long dark hair and no cap. I never got to the bottom of that one, and probably never will.
Some seasoned ghost-hunters in the group had hoped for more from the evening, and there are Fright Nights all-nighters which might suit them better. But when the mini ghost hunt ended at midnight, I was ready.
I felt pretty strange as I went back to the ordinary environment of the café to collect my bag, but good – I was on a buzz from this totally new experience.
In the cold light of day, I don’t know if I really encountered a ghost. Readers can make up their own minds. What I do know is that you may laugh, but you won't be bored, on a ghost-hunt!
For more information visit www.frightnights.co.uk or call 0114 251 3232.