The Museum Store, Clarence Road,
Berkhamsted, Herts HP4 3YL
Telephone 01442 879525
Email info@dacorumheritage.org.uk
Berkhamsted, Herts HP4 3YL
Telephone 01442 879525
Email info@dacorumheritage.org.uk
Source: Hemel Hempstead Gazette dated 31st October 2001. The Gazette archive, part of the Dacorum Heritage collection, cared for at The Museum Store, Berkhamsted.
Ghost, vortexes and portals are all in the realms of fantasy but this picture from the Olde Kings Arms in Hemel Hempstead may hold the evidence that there is a link between the living and the dead.
Image: The Olde Kings Arms, High Street, Hemel Hempstead. From the Berkhamsted Local History & Museum Society collection, cared for by Dacorum Heritage at The Museum Store, Berkhamsted.The pub in the High Street is at the top of the ghost hunters’ map after production company Nomad Rush Productions spent a spooky evening searching for ghostly happenings.
The company’s Ross Hemsworth and photographer Graham Matthews heard about the eerie happenings in the 400-year-old building and decided to check it out for themselves.
Image: Engraving of the buildings in the yard behind the Olde Kings Arms public house, known as Kings Arms Yard, Hemel Hempstead. This beautiful 19th century hand coloured print is part of Dacorum Heritage’s own collection, cared for at The Museum Store, Berkhamsted.Stories from the pub’s former licensee Maurice Eason and regular drinkers said a figure often circled the cellar late at night. And an elderly man and his woman companion dressed in 17th century clothes were regular in the pub’s back bar.
There are also tales of tables being knocked over and doors being opened and closed by themselves, with some of the stories going as far back as 200 years.
Image: A black and white postcard image of the Kings Arms Yard, showing the spire of St. Mary’s Church from behind the buildings that face the High Street, Hemel Hempstead. This image was taken not long before the First World War, with an estimated date of 1913. This postcard is part of the Dacorum Heritage collection, cared for at The Museum Store, Berkhamsted.The results from the production company’s research are breath taking but most of their successful pictures come from a disused room in the first floor where a ghost had never been sighted.
Graham managed to capture photographs of orbs from the room after a medium had pointed out that a spirit was standing there.
They also found evidence of a vortex in the pub and when people stand on the site they feel travel sick or a violent spinning motion.
Graham and Ross are unsure whether the presence of an orb is directly related to ghosts but neither can deny the strong physical and emotional feelings they had at the same time as photographing the orb.
Graham said: At the time we took the pictures you have all types of strange feelings. At the Olde Kings Arms Ross and I felt it at the same time. Your body starts shaking and your hair stands on end. It was not a draft because we tested for that beforehand.
“Ross and I both felt intimidated by the place”. But new landlord of the pub David Thompson said he is not worried about the ghosts. David, 56, only moved into the pub on Thursday, and already the regulars have been testing his bravery with tales of the three residents from the other side.
Image: New landlord of the Olde Kings Arms, David Thompson is keeping a careful eye open for his pub’s eerie occupants.But he said he will not be scared by the stories and he has never had a supernatural experience: “The customers keep saying beware of the ghost in the cellar and the back room. I do not particularly believe in ghost stories. It is the live ones you have to watch.
“They have seen a couple of old gentlemen and an old woman. They are from the 17th or 18th century. They just appear and disappear and one walks around the cellar.
“But I am always down the cellar every morning and last thing at night and I have not seen anything”.
What do you think about these orbs? Are they real and what do they explain?
The dictionary defines an orb as a sphere or heavenly body but Graham and Ross believe that it is something more than that. One theory is that it is the soul taking on a different appearance after it leaves the body behind in death.
If the soul was a ball of energy driving the body then when it leaves that body it may take on the form of an orb, a self-illuminating, moving entity, they say. Genuine orb pictures must not be taken with the sun or any other strong white light source nearby.
Image: Orbs pictured at the Olde Kings Arms were undetectable to the naked eye but were picked up on the ghost hunters’ cameras. Image by Graham Matthews.Reflective surfaces must not be in the picture. Orb photographers say they often experience feelings of energy or a Buzz as someone once described, or sudden strong emotions or fear or anxiety.
A sudden and unexpected change in temperature can also occur at the time of taking the picture.
Original newspaper article by Gayle Tomlinson.
Transcribed by Pam Gasking
Newsletter Editor, Collections & Research Volunteer, Dacorum Heritage
Dacorum has some beautiful and atmospheric old inns that date back hundreds of years, many of which serve some excellent local beverages. Maybe a way to celebrate All Hallow’s Eve would be to go on a different kind of spirit hunt to grab yourself a treat. At this time of the year when the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest you may even experience a trick or two from some previous occupants!
