25th September 2010 - North Tower Great Yarmouth

The North Tower is one of the remaining towers and virtually untouched which formed part of the Town Wall,which surrounded the town on three sides, the River Yare forming the forth boundary. Henry III gave his permissionto enclose the town with a wall , and this was built between 1285 and 1396 and was made of flint, brick and beach pebbles. When complete the wall was 23ft high and 2280yds long with 20 towers and 10 gates enclosing an area of 133 acres.The North Tower was built in 1344 mainly for military purposes and also served as a customs barrier, originally it was open topped with a wooden floor, during the 16th century the upper door was added giving access to a new sentry walk along the top of the wall and 1625 a small cannon was placed on the new lead covered roof. During the Civil War Yarmouth sided with Parliament and it was used as a prison for Royalists and the conical roof added, as time went on the walls gradually got demolished and in 1901 this tower became isolated, in its latter time its been used as a stable, hayloft, pigeon loft, photographic studios, a store for the towns Christmas decorations , the Broads Authority, accountants and at the present vacant, waiting for a new venture.

Val collected the keys in the morning from the occupiers , who showed her around the tower. They related the story of how from time to time the main door wont open no matter how hard its tugged , and seems like someone is pushing on the door on the inside to stop entry , there was no reason for this as the occupier is a strong big bloke and the door just doesn't "stick", and hes gone to fetch a locksmithand when they have both come back to the tower the key is put in the lock and the door just opens. Workman at the tower have also reported a "white lady" although the occupiers haven't witnessed anything strange . In the reception there is a large fireplace part of the original one and Val immediately sensed spirit there , and look forward to the great night ahead.

We arrived in the pouring rain about 8pm to started the investigation and to get the equipment set up , we first had a look round to get the feel of the place and to position our cameras and other equipment .Immediately Carl felt that someone was killed when the building was being built and Penny got the feeling of a medieval party going on and that something was wrong , a foreboding feeling.After placing the cctv and putting a static stealth camera in the toilet and store rooms which were located at the base of the tower , Tracey and Val took their positions in front of the cctv monitor located in the main reception whilst Penny and Carl went to the upper floor for a silent vigil.

Carl could see the image of a young woman , she was holding a baby wrapped in a shawl, in her arms .The woman was dressed in a grey grimy dress , that was once white ( could she be our white lady ?) He got her name of Catherine Armitage. He also picked up the presence of a slim man witha goatee beard wearing a tall hat and Penny though his name was Percival . Carl thought the baby was dead and Catherine confirmed she knew her baby was dead and a man (Percival) had taken the baby away. We believed Percival to be a undertaker or a priest or both. Carl then felt very lightheaded and kept repeating she wanted her baby back , Catherine lived in the tower and slept infront of dirty fireplace , her work was cooking on the fire for the soldiers there , supplying for their needs. They both witnessed the image of a woman on the wall( ( see video ) and with the information they were picking it was feasible this was Catherine, a slight change in temperature was noted.

Meanwhile downstairs in the middle office, Tracey and Val were sensing spirit. The entrance doorway was particularly active all evening. Val and Tracey were also noticing movement in the fireplace, they heard, what sounded like, logs being moved around. As the office seemed very active they decided to ask spirit to throw something and, sure enough, they heard the sound of a small stone being dropped on the floor. Although the feelings were strong they could not persuade spirit to do anything else for them.

Tracey went upstairs for a vigil and picked up Catherine , however this time she did have a bundle in her hands, but it wasnt a baby it was food (bread and potatoes) that was wrapped in cloth and was handing it to a man wether this was another time in Catherines life or a difference of opinion we are not sure , but it was confirmed that she cooked for the men and supplied there needs

At 9.45 pm Penny asked spirit to affect Val and Tracey in some way, very soon afterwards, they picked up orb activity on the cctv equipment.

It was at this point that we decided to have a break and reassess our position.

While we were having a break Val noticed poles of light standing by various team members , she checked this was being recorded and alerted the team , who all witnessed these strange lights and also checked it was being recorded.

When we were reviewing the recordings there was a period between 11.15 pm and just after midnight , at the time when we all witnessed the lights , 3 of the cameras had failed to record. we can't explain why or how this happened ( very spooky) because there was no evidence of a camera malfunction on the night. We did manage to capture this one image .We are getting more and more of these strange vertical lights coming up in a lot of our recent investigations, see what you think :

After our much needed break we went back to work and left two of the team watching the monitor , they saw more of these strange vertical lights, nothing was happening upstairs and we were still getting huge orbs and movement by the main door, but as we we cold and tired we decided to call it a night.

Looking back on our findings we came across some interesting video clips (see below). Not only did we capture Catherine's image we also caught a shadow going up the stairs, it was not one of us because we could all be accounted for. A large orb was seen in the main doorway, and several smaller orbs , however nothing was captured. Again, nothing was captured by the stealth camera set up in the downstairs toilet/storeroom area.

For such a small tower we felt we caught quite alot of evidence and everyone had a great night.

Since this investigation the occupiers were still having problems with the main door, the most recent being over the Christmas Holidays, they called in to prepare to vacate the tower and couldnt get in. Returning later, however, they had no problem entering the tower. No explaination could be found for this 'strange' occurace.

.

.

.

.

.