An Emergency Call.

So a few weeks or so ago, I get a message from Charm around 8 o’clock at night. A family has contacted us in dire need. They just witnessed a full apparition of a man in their house, and hey are very scared and want us to come right away. They said they had a feeling before that something was in their home, but now they were sure. So, we grabbed up our gear and drove to a small town about 30 minutes away. To be honest, this was my first “emergency call” in this field so my thoughts were kinda everywhere, I mostly thought to all the movies I’d seen in my life… What’s considered an emergency in this field? Should I expect to see things flying off the walls or someone coming down the stairs backwards on their hands? I’ll admit I was kind of nervous!

            In attendance on this trip were myself, Charmian, and two mediums that are in our group. It was a small house with two separate apartments. When we arrived there were about 6 people in the kitchen all sitting around the kitchen table. You could tell the air was tense from whatever had happened before we arrived. Luckily it was nothing like I had expected to see. You could see the young girl there was shaken. We did a walkthrough, and had a man there explain what he had seen. I carried the K2 around the house while he was telling his story. I noticed an aquarium tank in the living room, and I had to check it out to see what it was. It was a small snake, and the man asked me if I was afraid of snakes. I told him no I was checking to make sure it wasn’t something like a tarantula or something. (I HATE spiders!!) Afterwards, the mediums were explaining to the family that the man they had saw, was hesitant about crossing over, which is why he still remained there. Also that they had communicated with him and assured him that, ya know, it was okay to cross over. That his family was in fact waiting for him on the other side and he could let go of being here.  After not getting any hits on the K2, myself and Charm decided to do an EVP session in the girls room, where it was quieter, while the two mediums spoke with the family. After about a ten to fifteen minute session, we continued out into the house with the rest of them.
            When we came out of the room, with again no K2 hits and kind of convinced the activity had ended, one of the mediums was standing with the young man there and the young girl with a picture in her hand, face down. When I asked who the picture was of, she had explained it was the boys deceased father, but she had not yet looked at the picture. The deceased mans wife was also present. I had never actually seen a medium at work in person before, so when she started telling stories with such detail, I was floored. Not only was I amazed, you could tell these people were as well. I will admit I’ve never experienced any huge losses in my life, in the sense of significant other or parent, so I can only imagined how these people felt hearing these messages from a passed loved one. Overwhelming I’m sure. I won’t lie I had honestly thought in my head that we had gone there for.. nothing. But once I started seeing this unfold in front of me, well by the end of it I was almost in tears for these people! She just kept telling stories that this man was “showing” to her and telling her to tell. And they were laughing but crying at the same time just amazed by what she was saying. At one point she said, “You know I can see him standing there like, ‘Hey don’t be sad that I’m gone, grab a beer and have a party!” They laughed with tears in their eyes and said “Yep that’s SO him.” And she STILL hadn’t looked at the picture. When she did she just laughed like she had seen a picture of an old friend and said “YEP that’s the guy I’ve been talking to!”
            We then proceeded down the stairs to the other apartment to see if the mediums felt anything. And the family asked a few questions. One thing that stuck out in my mind was one of the mediums said “You used to live in a house, with an old clock that used to chime off-time, right?” And the woman replied with “Yes.” And she said “Well, he wants you to know, that was him, letting you know he was there.”..You could tell this touched the woman, she was laughing and crying all at once. After a little more storytelling, we decided it was getting late and we had to leave, but assured them they could contact us. As we were leaving, the young girl ran outside and hugged one of the mediums, crying and thanking us so much for coming.
            This trip reminded me of another aspect of this field that is so appealing to me. And that’s helping people, giving people peace & closure. My hope is that someday I can know that we helped someone sleep better at night, or changed their life in a positive way. That people can trust our group to help them understand the things that go bump in the night. I’m also hoping I eventually can get back into a night owl habit so I’m not always napping on the way home :) Until next time!
Don't forget to check out GMPS on Facebook and anyone can join the page and share their stories with us :)

Greater Moncton Paranormal Society

The First Investigations.

After I joined GMPS, I figured it would be a little bit before we would gain some good credit from investigating public areas before we would get any residential calls. But I was wrong! We had a few contact us right away. Before we had done our first residential investigation, we had done a history/ghost tour with the Albert County Museum, which is said to have its share of odd happenings. A very controversial trial went on there in 1905. It was the trial of Tom Collins. It is said a judge has been seen in the courthouse (possibly one who was involved in one of the three trials), and knocking sounds have been heard in the gaol (jail). It is also said that when Tom’s body was buried on the property, grass never grew on the spot where he laid, but after his body was moved to a cemetery the grass began to grow there again. (Weird!!) It was a great spot to explore. In the gaol they have the walls in one cell preserved behind clear glass. And behind it is drawings, poems, etc, written on the walls by people who served time there over 100 years ago. So crazy to see! There’s dates drawn on as well, one drawn on the wall saying 1905, another one carved into the door, if I remember correctly, saying 1871. Also in one of the cells they have the actual axe that was used as the murder weapon in the Tom Collins case. With it they also have a door that was smashed open with the axe during the murder. So while everyone else was finishing up the tour, just for fun the founder of the group (Charmian Douthwright) set up an audio recorder in one cell, and took a K2 meter into the cell with the door and the axe in it. She asked a number of questions,  but when she asked the question “Did you kill Mary?” the K2 went off and flew into the red. We didn’t catch anything on the audio so we aren’t sure if the reaction was a ‘yes’ or a frustrated ‘NO’.(The case went to trial three times, with two guilty verdicts and one hung jury, raising speculation on whether he really did it or not.) But nonetheless, because of that we asked if we could come back some night and do a formal investigation, and they said yes! So now we have that coming up with Global News attending as well to do a little piece on us (: I’ll admit I’m kinda nervous but at the same time really excited.
                GMPS had actually gotten quite a bit of publicity for such a small group. So far, we’ve had two or three newspaper articles, a couple radio stations contacted us, different commercial buildings have been wanting investigations, and even a few residential investigations. Also, this thing with Global News coming up.  We’ve already done one residential investigation, which went fairly smoothly for it being all first timers, with the exception of Nick Leblanc. Nick is the lead investigator for GMPS and also the founder of Atlantic Canada Paranormal. He has done 25+ investigations.
                I was so excited/nervous that I could barely sleep the night before (which resulted in the biggest energy drink I’ve ever had being purchased.) & couldn’t eat the day of cause my stomach was just doing flips. On the drive there, I can’t explain the feeling, it was just kinda like ‘wow, I’m really doing this, it’s actually happening.’ It felt like a huge accomplishment already and I wasn’t even there yet. The family was very nice and welcoming, and had a very friendly dog, whom I was later shown can give high five and LOVES attention. We had a medium do a walkthrough and share with us her feelings and visions and such, which were pretty spot on! Then the video equipment was set up and we split into two groups, and went into various rooms of the house where activity was reported. My group wasn’t seeming to have much luck at the time, so I had make a joke about the other group getting all the attention. Well about ten seconds later, the K2 began to go off, then it stopped. I had checked to see if it was the audio recorder or the flashlight that set it off. It wasn’t. So I thought hmm maybe that was the spirits response to my joke! The wife was in my group, and she had said before she never had any experiences, so this was her first. It was kind of a cool feeling to know I had given the first experience for her.  We also had a spirit box session, and got what we thought was a response a few times. For someone who’s not used to staying up past 11 most nights by the time we left around 1 o’clock, I was pretty tired but I still couldn’t even sleep that night cause the excitement was still there even after I had gotten home.
                I have been informed by Nick that we have a few possible EVPs (Electronic Voice Phenomena) to listen to. So here’s hoping they are something solid! And I cannot wait to do this again! I’ll be sure to keep updating on what we find!

Links:
GMPS Facebook Page

Tom Francis Collins

K2 or EMF detector

                                           The beautiful view from the front of The Albert County Museum.

The inside of the courthouse from upstairs.

The judges chair where a spirit of a judge has been seen.

The gaol(pronounced jail) where knocking sounds have been heard.

Some of the drawings on the walls inside one of the cells.

No that's not the real noose that Tom Collins was hung with, but that would be kinda neat!

The axe used in the murder and the door that was damaged. This is where Charmian got the K2 hit when she asked the question "Did you kill Mary?"

The end with the shackle on it is not the original. But the rusted ring attached to the floor and part of the chain attached to it is the original, that means it's over 100 years old!

A new beginning..

So I’m not really sure how people start these things off. I guess I could start with my name is Lindsay, I’m 23 years old, & I run a bottle exchange warehouse. In my free time, I like to work online, read educational books, watch documentaries, travel (even if it’s only to go home for the weekend), draw, and I recently started chasing ghosts. Yes, you read that last part correctly. I recently have gotten into the field of paranormal investigating. I guess I could start this with that story, since I get asked that a lot. How did I get into this?
                My interest in the things unknown started when I was around 12 years old. There was a show on TV about spontaneous human combustion that had caught my attention. Once it was over, I needed to know more. Was it really possible that people just burst into flames suddenly with seemingly no cause? So I jumped on the internet and found there were actually a number of cases of deaths that were linked to such a thing. Being 12 years old, that was a scary thought. It was scary to think that out in the world there were people just burning to death, from fires that had apparently started from within them.
                I spent the next few years then finding out and learning about other things people had no answers for, and for the unexplained and puzzling in general. It ranged from the loch ness monster, to Bigfoot, to aliens and ufos, to ghosts, to cults, to even unexplained cold case murders. Anything that didn’t have an answer intrigued me. I had found myself always wanting to know about ghosts and beyond death more than any other topic though. I had eventually gained an interest for forensic science and wanting to be a crime scene specialist. I wanted to be the person who found answers where no one else could, and to give people peace from these answers. That, and I had a genuine interest in science in general (minus physics) and the human anatomy. I eventually slacked off a little and didn't get the marks required for such a field.

Then when I was 17 I was flicking through the channels one night, and I fell across the show “Paranormal State”. After watching an episode, I was shocked. I couldn't believe the possibility that there were people out there who shared this same huge interest with me, so much so they had dedicated their life to it. As soon as the notion was in my head, I remember thinking ‘That’s it, that’s what I am going to do someday’. So I basically spent most of my free time for the next few years doing my research. I learned about equipment used, different scientific theories, & haunted places & stories all over the world. Any show on the paranormal that held any validity I watched episode after episode to learn techniques. I had never started making my own group back then because I knew I would eventually move on from my hometown.

About three months ago, opportunity knocked. My mother had just moved to Moncton, and life in my hometown had reached a breaking point. I needed a change. So with about a days notice I quit my job (which they were very understand about.) and I packed up my car with what I could fit in it, and away I went. A few weeks after arriving and getting myself a job, I was in shoppers with my mother when something caught my eye on the front page of the newspaper. A local paranormal group was getting together. Well if there was ever a time I believed in fate, this was it. So I attended the first meeting. I was surprised how many people shared the same interest in such a controversial topic. After all was said and done, I introduced myself in hopes of making a good impression, because after all this could be the start of a dream come true for me. You can imagine now how excited I was when they messaged me to meet with them early before the next meeting! After an interview, I was accepted. I am now a paranormal investigator with the Greater Moncton Paranormal Society :) (GMPS for short). So far people have shown quite the interest in the group, with a few newspaper articles, a couple radio shows have contacted us, and a few public places and a few residential places have already contacted us for investigations. I don’t think I’ll be climbing on a plane anytime soon to travel the world to visit haunted castles, but every great adventure has to start somewhere!