The Society for the Investigation of Spectral Phenomena
Coroner's Inquest on the Moth-Wick Drownings, Mablethorpe
St Mary's Church, church, Mablethorpe, Lincolnshire
I.Background & History
St Mary's Church is an active Anglican parish church in Mablethorpe, on the Lincolnshire coast. It was built in the early 14th century, renovated with additions in 1714, and designated a grade II listed building in 1966. In 1976 it was extensively rebuilt.
The Society holds no further facts of the fabric. The church stands near a low and exposed shore, where the land runs flat to the North Sea and the winter dark comes early.
II.The Entity
The Wick-Moth
A pale, hovering flame no larger than a man's fist, which in close view resolves into a cluster of tiny folded hands cupped about a light that gives no warmth. It casts no shadow upon anything it illuminates, but those it lights cast two. It approaches any flame kindled in the church or its yard, and is never seen in true darkness.
Assessment of Peril
Class IV: Malignant
It draws the unwary towards the sea-bank by means of their own lamps, and four persons are recorded as lost to the marsh and tide after carrying a light within its reach. It is harmless only to those who sit wholly in the dark.
III.The Account
The matter was brought before the Society in the form of a coroner's inquest held in the winter of 1816, the Regency being then at its height and the church, after its additions of 1714, in sound if shabby repair. The deceased was one Josiah Harrow, a lamplighter's journeyman, found on the sea-bank at first light, his hand still closed about the bail of a horn lantern, the lantern lit. The coroner's clerk records the verdict as 'Found Drowned', and the Society's annotator adds in the margin that the bank lay a full furlong from any water at that hour.
The sexton, called to testify, stated that on the night in question he had set a single candle in the vestry, and that something had come in through the closed door to look at it. 'It stood at the flame as a child stands at a shop-window,' he told the jury. 'And then it turned, and I saw that it had marked me also.' The jury, the clerk notes, asked him to repeat this, and he declined. The Society's annotation observes that the sexton never again kindled a light after dusk, and was found sitting in the dark of his cottage each evening until his death.
There followed, in the three winters after, the deaths of a curate's widow, a pair of wreckers' sons, and a surgeon, Dr. Lathom, who attended the third inquest in a spirit of open contempt and carried a taper into the nave to disprove the sexton. The transcript of his evidence ends mid-sentence. The Society's annotator records that the taper was found alight upon the chancel step, and that it burned, by the verger's reckoning, for eleven hours, and that the flame leaned always towards the sea.
IV.Recorded Manifestations
- ✦A pale flame appearing in the church after any candle or lamp is kindled, however small.
- ✦Persons carrying lights found at the sea-bank with the lamp still burning.
- ✦Objects in the nave casting a second shadow toward the shore.
- ✦Candles that burn for many hours without being consumed, their flames leaning seaward.
- ✦The sound of soft, patient movement in total darkness, as of something searching.
- ✦The sensation among observers of being marked or counted by a light that is not there.
Testimony of Witnesses
“It stood at my candle as a child stands at a shop-window, and then it turned and I saw that it had marked me also.”
“I carried a rushlight over the bank to my sister's, and the little light went on before me, and mine went out, and I knew then whose was the leading.”
“There was a lamp in the church where none should be, and when I looked away it was upon the shore, and it was nearer, and it had hands.”
V.Rite of Expulsion
Difficulty: Perilous
Requisites
- ☐A tin snuffer of the old pattern
- ☐A bowl of sea water
- ☐Three yards of black crape
- ☐A cold stone from the churchyard
- ☐A heavy curtain to cover the windows
The Rite
- I.1. Enter the church at the hour after sunset with no light of any description upon your person, and bar the door.
- II.2. Seal every window with the crape and curtain until no grey remains in the glass.
- III.3. Place the bowl of sea water on the chancel step and sit beside it in silence for one hour by the clock, which must be heard and not seen.
- IV.4. At the end of the hour, speak aloud the names of the four drowned, and lay the cold stone in the water.
- V.5. Without rising, say three times: 'Nothing here is lit; nothing here is yours.'
- VI.6. Remain seated until the first bell of dawn, and do not open your eyes whatever you hear moving near your hands.
Caution. Should the least spark be struck, even by accident, the rite is forfeit and the one who struck it must be led out by others. Mr. Corbin of this Society kept every article of the rite save one, a match forgotten in a waistcoat pocket, and was found in the porch at dawn.
VI.Hauntings of the Surrounding District
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St Peter's Church · Church · 1.2 miles
The Salt-Cap Beadle, spectre. A beadle in a rime-whitened cap is seen leading unseen mourners along the lych-gate path, always one pair of footprints short of the number that walked.
Hagnaby Abbey · Abbey · 2.6 miles
The Hagnaby Cowls, phantom procession. Monks in damp habits cross the abbey fields at low tide, and the last in line always turns his hooded face toward the watcher.
All Saints Church · Church · 3.1 miles
The Bride of the Lychgate, white lady. She stands holding a wedding posy that grows more withered each time she is seen, and no man has been known to look her in the face twice.
St Clement's Church · Church · 2.7 miles
The Pew-Rapper, poltergeist. Knocks sound from inside the locked pews at dusk, each rapping a little nearer to the one who listens too long.
Markby Priory · Abbey · 3.7 miles
Prior Dunnock, revenant. A gaunt cleric walks the ruined cloister each Lent, and those who greet him are found on the following morning with earth beneath their nails.
All Saints Church · Church · 4.5 miles
The Glebe Ram, spectral animal. A great black-fleeced ram stands in the churchyard at night, and its eyes show a second, smaller pupil that blinks out of time with the first.
St Peter's Church · Church · 5.1 miles
The Borrowed Voice, possession. A parishioner of this church will speak in the cadence of someone recently buried, and know things only the grave could tell.
Castle Carlton · Castle · 6.1 miles
The Rampart Sentry, headless apparition. A helmeted figure paces the broken wall at night, his neck ending in a clean dark absence that seems to follow the watcher.
Greenfield Priory · Abbey · 5.8 miles
The Fen-Lurcher, phantom hound. A lean grey hound runs beside travellers on the priory causeway, silent, and keeps pace long after they have stopped.
Carlton Castle · Castle · 6.4 miles
The Moat Clerk, unclassified entity. Something seated at a writing-desk is glimpsed in the castle's dry moat, scratching a ledger in which one's own name is already entered.
St Botolph's Church · Church · 6.5 miles
The Marsh Taper, will-o'-the-wisp. A blue flame bobs above the churchyard drain, and followers report that it hums a hymn of which none can name the tune.
St Wilfrid's Church · Church · 5.9 miles
The Ember-Day Cortege, phantom procession. A funeral train in antique mourning crosses the fields on ember days, bearing a coffin too short for any grown man.
Alford Windmill · Old Mill · 5.6 miles
The Flour-White Miller, spectre. A figure dusted in meal stands at the sails on windless nights, and the stones grind of their own accord while he watches the lane.
