The Haunting of Miss X

By Jonathan Williams

In the second part of our feature on Llanelli Ghosts (first part Halfway Hotel), I was contacted by young lady who wanted to tell me about her experiences. To protect her and her family’s identity, I’ve given her the alias ‘Miss X’. I’ve also not included the names of the buildings mentioned due to the fact that they are still being lived in today and we don’t want to cause any unnecessary anguish.

Let me tell you about Miss X. She is level headed 23 year old clerical assistant, who has attended Trinity College in Carmarthen where she studied English. She likes music, books and socialising, just like any other 23 year old. Everything is going well for Miss X in her life apart from one aspect.

She tells me that she is being plagued by supernatural activity!

How old were you when you had your first supernatural encounter?

I don’t really know how old I was, it’s not until recently that I realised what some of my childhood fears actually meant. I’d been staying with my grandmother over weekends since before I could remember. Since I was so little in fact that she used to sleep in the same bed as me as she didn’t have cot. I hated the hallway. My grandmother would have to switch the light on before I could go upstairs. Not because I was scared of the dark, but because the man was in the hallway!

He didn’t seem nasty man, except when I misbehaved, because then he’d lean against the doorway and glare at me with his arms folded. I now know that the man is my grandmother’s brother, my great uncle. He passed away before I was born in 1985. He’s often been in touch, and he’s always been around. He refuses to speak English and my father has since told me that he couldn’t speak the language very well.

My first supernatural encounter that I knew was ghost was in Ferryside. I was eight and we’d not long moved to local pub there. It was the middle of the night when I needed the loo. The pub was quite large, and I had to traverse narrow windowless hall to get there. On my way back to my bedroom, there was what looked like black cloud hovering near the lightshade. I screamed and ran to my parent’s room.”

“My father rushed out to the hall but there was nothing there. It’s something that stumped us, as there wasn’t anything in the hall to create shadow – and besides, how could shadow be caused alongside the light?

couple of years later we had medium stay at the pub and she told us that it was haunted by ghost named Hannah, and the black cloud that I’d seen was her attempt to materialise in front of me!

Hannah used to walk out of the bar vidoor (that no longer existed) in the corner of the bar and would walk along the cliff path in Ferryside wearing long, brown coat. If customers sat in that corner, they would often say that they experienced cold shivers and it felt like something was walking past.

My grandmother once saw lady in long brown coat on the cliff path. She called out to her and asked if she had dog with her. My gran was walking our two dogs, and one of them didn’t like other dogs. As the lady didn’t answer her, my grandmother went back along the path and into someone’s drive out of the way. She waited there awhile but as no-one went past she went back to the path and no-one was there anymore!

No-one else had ever seen Hannah, but my father had seen man stood at the bar in one of the mirrors when the pub was supposed to be closed. He turned the corner into the bar to look for who it was but it was empty!

There are also numerous occasions when people had heard voices from empty rooms.

What else has happened?

After Ferryside, we moved to pub in Trimsaran. That’s where I’ve had some very disturbing experiences.

I often felt like something was watching me, something malevolent and I would often experience being actually “scared stiff” i.e. I was incapable of moving from fear that something I could not see was watching me. On daily basis, I would feel this presence in our flat above the pub in which we lived. It would happen numerous times throughout the day. You could not pay me to set foot in that flat again!

My father also experienced this presence in the “lounge” part of the bar. He describes it as battle of wills. The spirit was trying to force him out of the room, but my father was determined to stay in it to finish cleaning it. Most disturbingly, on one occasion when my eldest nephew had stayed over, he woke us all in the middle of the night screaming as there was man in his bed. This ghostly man has also been seen by others, one of our friends and man who had been cleaning the pub for the owners after us.

Apart from when you were younger, has anything frightened you?

The only frightening experience I’ve had was in the pub in Trimsaran. It seems to be something that affects my emotions very much. The spirit seemed to exude feeling of malevolence, if I was in my bedroom I would be able to sense him in the hallway and the feeling would increase or decrease as he walked around the flat, like bad smell.

How does it make you feel?

I think it was about three years ago that I really started to experience things. My father dislikes it all very much, and has asked me not to meddle with things I don’t know and ‘chase after ghosts.He knows number of people who have gone crazy, which is something I can understand. I’ve never been able to see outright or hear anything, but it’s more an imprint in my mind and voice in my head.”

For long time I thought I was hearing voices and that I had an overactive imagination, but when I started telling people what I was able to see and hear complete strangers corroborated my stories.As result of this, I started to feel more confident. I’ve never attempted to contact any spirits; it’s just case that they’re around, going about their business and sometimes I can feel their presence.

Anything further to add?

The majority of my experiences are good. For example, I’ve come to know an elderly lady living in Raby Street in Llanelli. She had returned to the areafter finding her childhood sweetheart had passed away and was desperate to find his grave.

She said that number of strange occurrences had happened in her home, and she told me she had visited spiritualist church where mediums would often tell her that the spirit of her childhood sweetheart was with her.

When I visited her home, I could see him stood in the doorway. When I described him to her she confirmed that it was her childhood sweetheart, and she showed me picture of him – it was the very tall gentleman I could see.

It seems to be something that comes and goes with phases. I don’t know if it’s because I now have so much on my plate that I don’t have time to notice things anymore, or if it’s something else altogether. It’s been quite while since anything has really brought itself to my attention.

Afterthoughts

Personally I find Miss X’s story very interesting and quite chilling when you read about her experiences as child. As parent myself, you want to do everything possible to protect your children, but what do you do when your child’s would be assailant is ghost?

I can fully understand her decision for anonymity as the more I look into the subject and talk to people, I find that everyone has story to tell but few wish to speak in public. ‘Things that go bump in the night’ are seldom spoken of in modern 21^st century conversation. With society’s interest and attention so fixed on technology, are we just too distracted to notice the supernatural? Some might think so, but, type ghost into Google and your search will reveal about 18 million articles. I think this shows that at we’re all interested to know more!

Have you experienced anything similar? If you have, we would be interested to know.