Ghost Story For Sublime Sunday

My contribution for #sublimesunday organized by @c0ff33a.

Today is a miserable rainy day. If your Sunday is the same, please pull up a chair around this wood fire and I will recall a ghost story called Phantom Bell Ringers.

Here’s the cosy fire Hubby started to take the dampness out of the air.

Gather around folks and I will tell you the true story of the disappearing ghostly bell ringers.

In my youth, my grandmother entertained me and the rest of her grandchildren with ghost stories.

A most precious memory, this time with Nanny, spent gathered around the large wood stove in her living room.

Sometimes the room would get so hot from the fire, we had to go to another room. She had such great scary stories we would all be terrified, laughing and screaming at the same time.

Someone would knock on the wall and we would be hysterically frightened again thinking the ghost was coming to get one of us.

Her ghost stories were true supernatural events that happened to people in the local area.

I had a short distance to walk home, in the dark, after an evening of hearing one of Nanny’s ‘scare the crap out of you stories.’

Running home, as if chased by the last apparition I heard about, my feet barely touched the ground. I was afraid something ghostly would jump out of the ditch at me.

My dearly loved grandmother has been gone many years but the love for true ghost stories has stayed with me.

And now for the ghost story I promised...

In a previous post I wrote about the Phanton Fiery Ghost Ship. The Ghost Ship was commemorated on a Canada Post stamp.

In 2016 Canada Post issued this final stamp in the series on Haunted Canada.

The following stamp, Phantom Bell Ringers of the Kirk of St. James, is commemorating another famous ghost story of Prince Edward Island.

Phantom Bell Ringers

source

The stamp shows three women. One is holding the rope from the bell of the Kirk of St. James Church in Charlottetown. A glow of white light eerily shines from the church tower.

This ghost story has it’s beginnings in the early morning, Friday, October 7, 1859, when a bell could be heard ringing all over Charlottetown.

A local Sea Captain thought the bell was from a ship at the harbour. He goes there to find the steamer ship , Fairy Queen ready to depart for Pictou, Nova Scotia.

While at the harbour, the Captain realizes the bell sound is coming from the direction of the Kirk Of St. James Church.

By the time the Captain gets to the church, the Church Sexton arrives to check out why the bell was ringing.

As the two stand outside, the bell rings eight times. Suddenly three women appear dressed in white and open the door to the belfry, while another women looks down from the tower. As they enter, the door closes behind the three ghostly apparitions.

In order to enter, the Church Sexton has to open the shut door with his keys. He and the Captain search the tower that contains the bell. Much to their surprise, no sign of the women can be found!

As the story goes...

The steamer Fairy Queen never arrived at Pictou, Nova Scotia that day. The ship sank killing eight passengers.

Among the passengers killed were three women who belonged to the Kirk of St. James congregation. The fourth women lost at sea on the same ship did not belong to the church.

My interpretation of the supernatural happenings:

The bell ringing eight times corresponds to the foretelling of the eight passengers killed on the Fairy Queen.

At the time, this church’s congregation would be of Scottish/Gaelic descent and most probably carry the bloodline the Banshee Woman follows. The women dressed in white could have been their family’s Banshee announcing the coming deaths of the women. The women in the tower- another banshee, but not connected to the others.

I’ve written about the Banshee Woman forerunner in precious posts. She appears dressed in light or white clothing. She is known for wailing and weeping to let the families of Irish/ Scottish descent know of an approaching death. The sound of a bell is also know as a forerunner of death.

For an example, I have a friend here on the Island who hears a bell sound in her ear when a family member or close friend is about to die. She even knows the direction they live in by which ear the sound is heard.

I happened to stop at the Kirk of St, James Church in Charlottetown a few years ago and took this photo of part of the church.

This is one of the old trees in front of the Kirk of St. James Church. The bump looks like a wrinkled up face.