Drop me an email at inklepiskie@yahoo.co.uk

The Shadowman/woman of Spittal-on-Rule Okay, so I live in a cool crazy cottage with an ancient and simultaneously 17th Century Graveyard as its back garden (more on that on another page).  One night when I was younger, about nine years old, my friend and I had made a camp/den in my bedroom.  As it was dark I was looking for the torch as I'd misplaced it, and as I felt on the ground outside the camp/den I looked up to see a Shadow Figure standing about two metres away from me, looking down towards my chest of drawers which were on my right (two metres away).  This person was dressed like Zorro, long cloak and wide flat-brimmed hat, but completely silhouette/black shadow.  I shot back into the camp and just about had a fit with fright, and my friend looked out and said she saw something but coudn't be sure what it was.

The Shadow Person - Part Two  Now some thirteen years later.  Every summer we have a party to celebrate lots of things.  On this particular party (July 2005) my two friends were driving up from Newcastle and were a bit late - it was dark when they arrived.  Before I go on let me explain a couple of points:   - I did not get to hear this story until the next day, from the guy that saw the Shadowperson, because he didn't want to scare the other person in the car as she wouldn't sleep that night.  He had never heard the story of the Shadowperson before.  - To get to my house you turn down a driveway with a "Lucky" Toll House with painted windows(currently used as storage and will talk about that elsewhere), and you have a driveways of, I don't know, 500 metres? or so, before you reach my house. Back to the story, recounted to me by my friend the next day:  They were just turning down into the top of the driveway and had passed the Lucky House when he saw a figure all in black, like a shadow, finish crossing the road in front of the car and walk behind a tree.  The figure was wearing a wide brimmed flat hat and long cloak.

The Lucky House/Toll Cottage  The Lucky House was last inhabited by a couple I can only estimate about thirty or more years ago.  I've heard they were very pleasant and would wave to passers by when they were in the garden.  And let me set the scene:  Toll Cottage is at the top of the driveway to the farm and also the top of the "Boatroad"  that leads down to the river at a spot people used to cross at in the older days (and still do today but thats besides the point).  The river bank is quite flat and I'm always walking down there with my dog, and because I know the land so well I avoid using a torch as you see more wildlife that way.  So, when you're down at the river you look up a hill to see the Toll Cottage, okay?  So the story:  (hear the owl hoot outside you're window at this eerie point).  I was walking my dog (she's great) down at the river and the night had caught up with dusk when I was down there, so I decided to make my way home.  I was going to go up the boatroad, so I looked up there, to see an orange glowing light emitting from the painted window that would have been the sitting room of Toll Cottage.  I walked for a good ten minutes with my eyes fixed on this light and can swear it was not a car, and was definately coming from the window.  Needless to say I took a different route home and wonder what would have happened had I went up the boatroad that night . . .