Our latest spooky tale by Tom Slemen focuses on strange sightings in the sky...
In December 1900, a 14-year-old girl named Rose went to stay with her grandmother Lizzie Brownbill at her crumbling old house on Roscommon Street, Everton.
Around midnight on Thursday, December 20 of that year, Lizzie was unable to sleep because her throat was dry, so she asked Rose to fetch a drink of water.
The girl took a candle and descended the old dark staircase, and as she went downstairs, she could see that something was glowing further down stairs.
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When Rose reached that flight, she saw a woman in long white robes with golden hair, and an intense bright light was radiating from her.
The glowing woman raised a palm, gesturing for Rose to halt. Rose turned on her heels and fled up to her grandmother’s room. The next morning it was discovered that the apparition had been seen where two steps had collapsed – and Rose would have fallen through them if not for the intervention of the mysterious radiant ‘guardian angel’.
That same week, a dazzling cross appeared in the sky over the Toxteth Park Workhouse on Smithdown Road for a few moments, and it was seen by many in Liverpool and beyond.
The steward of the Palatine Club on Bold Street, as well as dozens of Yuletide shoppers, saw the illuminated cross in the snow clouds high over St Luke’s Church, and some believed it was a heavenly sign.
Meanwhile, in the Scotland Road area, there were more encounters with angelic beings. At a draughty old room on Fox Street, a woman named Mrs Byrne was at death’s door due to complications during the birth of her daughter.
The woman’s sister left to fetch a priest to administer the Last Rites, but a woman in white appeared in the room seconds later and delivered the child. Mrs Byrne thanked the ghostlike nurse and saw her vanish into a point of light.
The priest disbelieved the strange tale but Mrs Byrne and her sister were convinced the woman in white was an angel.
On Boxing Day that year, a gang of children chased a spectacular bright light surrounded by a halo of rainbow colours down Gerard Street until it vanished in the evening air near St Stephen’s Church, leaving a sweet scent of flowers in its wake.
The enthralled children ran home to tell disbelieving parents about the spectacle they’d witnessed.
Five days later on New Year’s Eve, there were reports of a similar colourful light being seen in the drawing room of a house belonging to a Mrs Julia Colford on Toxteth’s Granby Street.
Mrs Colford, a servant and a visitor to the house, not only witnessed the appearance of the ‘sparkling globe’ – she also spoke to it.
A disembodied voice came from the globe and told the three witnesses not to be afraid.
The female servant fainted, and the lady of the house told the visitor to depart. ‘God bless you all,’ said the voice and the globe flew to the fireplace and up the chimney.
Tom Slemen's latest book is available on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback. To find out more click here.
