As you will see on the signs heralding your crossover onto Staffordshire soil, it is officially known as the Creative County. I would say a more appropriate description is the Creepy County. Admittedly, its sinister side does reveal itself in a more subtle way than that of other counties perhaps (although we do now have a Ghost Museum in Stoke and Cannock Chase is, well, Cannock Chase). Many of its most intriguing stories take a bit of digging and on these dark winter nights, I like nothing more than taking a metaphorical spade to the archives to see what unearthly tales I can uncover. There are those who mock my endeavours and are all too quick to point out that ghosts and monsters don’t exist. Perhaps not, but tales about them certainly do and I believe it’s impossible to get a sense of a place without its stories.

There is nothing more satisfying to me than an unexpected tale of the unexpected, leaping out from the landscape and that is what happened as I was driving home from Deadman’s Green in Uttoxeter recently. Ironically, my story doesn’t relate to the necro-named place, as one might imagine but to a nearby derelict mill turned dairy I spotted down a country lane. Too much of a scaredy Kate for urban exploring but always attracted by a bit of rural decay, I pulled over to have a nose from a safe distance. There were two stone plaques embedded into the red brick, which piqued my interest immediately. One read ‘H C 1771’ and the other ‘Destroyed by Fire WV Rebuilt 1897’. However, even I, as someone who is always writing about weird stuff, wasn’t prepared for what I found out.

I’ve just realised that I’m trying to build up the suspense when I’ve already given part of the game away in the title so I’ll fast forward to the story, taking us back in time to Victorian Staffordshire.

When staying with the Vernon family at Fole, sceptic turned spiritualist Dr George Sexton was enjoying a varied and lengthy conversation with his hosts, which lasted well into the early hours of the morning. Inevitably, the talk turned to Spiritualism and specifically, a séance which members of the household had taken part in at Fole Mill on the night of 17th November 1872. The medium was a young man named Manley, an assistant at the mill owned by the Vernons, and another recent convert to Spiritualism. As the participants (William Vernon, Jane Cooper, AC Manley, Thomas Atkins and E A Vernon) gathered around the table, Manley soon claimed he was in contact with a spirit, who spoke as follows,

“This is a very funny country. My name I will tell you. I am an old miller. I like a drop of beer when here. I was killed in a mill; I was doubled up, twisted round the shaft; it was something awful. My name is S_____ C______, and the name of the place Coddington Mill, Cheshire”.

Those present hadn’t heard of Coddington, never mind its mill, and signed a declaration to this effect. The following day however, they found details of it in a directory and so Mr Vernon decided to write a letter to ‘the Proprietor’.

“Dear Sir,

Would you oblige me whether a miller used to work at your mill by the name of S_____ C_______, and if killed in the mill and how, and kindly oblige me with the date of his death?”

On 29th November 1872, Albert Lowe of Coddington Mill replied,

“Dear Sir

S______ C______ was killed at Coddington, on September 6th 1860 in the fifty-third year of his age, and was buried in Coddington Churchyard. He was killed whilst in the act of putting a strap on a pulley to drive a grindstone, his coat having got entangle between the pulley and strap.

Your truly, Albert Lowe

I’ve checked back in the newspaper archive and there was indeed a fatal accident at Coddington involving the man named, on the date given and I am absolutely convinced there is more to this mill’s tale than meets the eye. Why did the Vernon family hold a seance there in the first place, unless it was just wealthy Victorians indulging in the ultimate parlour game? Were they motivated by something more than a mere desire to be entertained on a dark winter’s night in the Staffordshire countryside? After all, they didn’t have an excellent blog written by a woman from Lichfield to amuse them. Or a Channel Five documentary on Britain’s Favourite Cheese at Christmas (starts at 6.05pm folks). If we assume that young Manley was making it all up, how did he come by the information about the accident?

Even I, here on Team Believer, concede it highly unlikely that the spirit of the poor chap from Cheshire chose to make a fifty mile trip down the A500 to have a chat with a group of Staffordshire strangers twelve years after his death. Anyway, if I was him, I’d have stayed at Coddington Mill. It looks absolutely heavenly. If anyone wants to hire me to come and carry out a paranormal investigation there, just let me know…

Sources

Wrexham and Denbighshire Weekly Advertiser September 8 1860

The Spiritualist, May 8^th 1874