Tag Archives: football

The Phantom Fan of Bescot Stadium

Posted on by
Reply

With the new season kicking off this weekend it seems somewhat synchronous to have found a story of a spectre wandering around the stands of Walsall FC. Back in 1996, staff at the Bescot Stadium reported seeing a boy wearing old fashioned clothes more in keeping with the styles of the early twentieth century than the approaching millennium. No comments about the sartorial elegance of Saddlers fans, or lack of, please. I share a house with two of them.

Accompanying the apparition of the lad was a series of strange events which included lights being turned on, doors being opened and things being pushed off shelves in an empty building. The commercial director at the time, Roy Whalley, had his own experience when he was sorting through post in the office and heard a crackling sound accompanied by disembodied voices, as if a radio had been switched on.

Bescot Stadium 2007
By John M, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12948600

After the story on the apparition appeared in the Walsall Observer, a pensioner from the Birchills area of the town made contact with the paper to say he didn’t believe in ghosts but did remember a tragic incident near the club’s original ground at Fellows Park, about half a mile away from Bescot, involving a group of lads loitering near ground to try and get in for free. His recollection was correct. In March 1933, an inquest was held on the body of a boy who was hit by a train and thrown against a wall at Wallows Lane Bridge.

Fellows Park 1982 by Steve Daniels, CC BY-SA 2.0,

Whoever the phantom fan was, he seems to have been sent off by the prayers of the club chaplain, as there have been no sightings of him since. It has made me wonder which other local stadiums might have supernatural stories to tell. Do any spirits wander Wolverhampton’s ground or is The Hawthorns haunted? Are there any fans at Villa Park lingering long after the final whistle has blown? I’d love to hear any tales you might have to tell about the boo-tiful game.

Sources

Walsall Observer, Friday, 18 October 1996

Staffordshire Advertiser, Saturday, 11 March 1933

Death Match

Posted on by
Reply

Here in Lichfield, Shrove Tuesday is celebrated with people dressed up as princesses, pirates or, um, slices of pizza racing along Bore Street as they flip pancakes. Visitors to the city tomorrow may see the old Price of Wales/Chameleon Bar/Feria and think its been boarded up as a precautionary measure in case the shrovetide shenanigans get out of hand but it’s actually just been left derelict for about twenty years.

A flipping disgrace

Somewhere they really do have to take such steps to protect their premises is up the A5 at Atherstone, where instead of pancake racing they play a truly hardcore game of football and have been doing so since 1199. Apparently, once the giant leather ball has been tossed into the crowds onto Long Street there are only two rules. One is that the ball must stay on Long Street. The other is that you can’t kill anyone. I told you it was hardcore (by comparison, the rules of the Lichfield Shrovetide Festivities include mandatory non-slip footwear and that at some point during the festivities the Mayor of Lichfield must be photographed in a spinning teacup on the Market Square).

Pandemonium (Lichfield style)

With this in mind, I am inclined to believe the following anecdote about the good folks of Atherstone. In February 1800, John Massey was executed for murder and his body was gibbeted at Bilstone, near the site where he committed his heinous crime. Eighteen years later, his rotting remains remained on display, and became quite the local tourist attraction for Atherstonians who would pop there for a picnic. Once they’d finished their food, they’d partake in that quaint old pastime of throwing stones at the murderer’s skeleton. Eventually, a grocer called Mr Peach knocked the skull from its boney shoulders and so the group of day-trippers took it back home to Atherstone with them. It seems Peach then presented this sinister souvenir as a gift to his local pub.

My grocer went Bilstone and all I got was this skull of a lousy murderer

I’ve read the skull was lined with silver and turned into a punchbowl. Other versions claim the cranium became a candle holder. Some say it was eventually stolen, others say it’s still kept in a secret safe in one of Atherstone’s ancient inns. If you know anything more, please give me a heads up. Finally, please do accept my apologies if I’ve put you off your pancakes.

Sources:

Coalville Times – Friday 30 November 1956

Loughborough Echo – Friday 25 January 1952