Spooky Cork stories to give you a fright on Halloween night!

It was back in the autumn of 1958 that I was bundled out into the working world at 14 years of age. This was to help rear my five younger siblings so that eight people weren’t depending on one wage.

Delivering telegrams was the job got for me - six full days every week - even late in the dark evenings. It was OK around town with the street lights, but cycling out the country on dark winter evenings was dreary and sometimes frightening.

The light attached to the front wheel was pointing more up into the air than along the ground where it was wanted. Some guesswork had to be used to stay between the ditches.

Ballynatray House - where Horace Holroyd Smyth lived - on the Cork/Waterford border got a lot of telegrams in those days because it had no telephone. Being a long avenue from the public road meant there would be a prohibitive cost to installing one as it was expensive per telephone pole. At the time, Horace was able to manage without it. The house had no electricity either.

I cycled firstly over a loose timber bridge with rattling planks that had no sides to it. Then, in along that long, dark, haunting drive with hundreds of tall trees sheltering the shrieking cranes up high as the wayward light of the bike upset them. I was pedalling fast and furious until the frightening shape of the huge Ballynatray House threw a shadow over the front lawn.

I dismounted from the bike and pulled the chain to ring the bell away down in the bowels of the house. While standing there at the huge front doorway, the outline of two cannon guns could be spotted nearby as if on guard.

After what seemed an age, the faint light of a single candle came to the glass front door - held by a very old lady. This was Nell McCarthy, a long established housemaid at Ballynatray. Of very small stature with a bun of grey hair - she could have been a ghost to me. Her wrinkled face outlined the shadows given from the candle-light like lines drawn with a pen.

She invited me to stand in the huge reception room while she brought the telegram down into the kitchen to Horace. He then had to pay two shillings porterage to me to bring back to the post office. Being a very decent man, he always gave me a sixpence (tanner) for myself.

It seemed like an age before Nell returned from the kitchen. Meanwhile, the big oil paintings and portraits on the high walls of that large room looked down on me in the darkness. And the mounted heads of the stags - with their exceptionally large antlers - loomed out over all. If ever anyone believed in ghosts - then this was the place to see them.

Nell slowly appeared again with the candle and gave me the money to release me from this ghostly, haunting room. With a quick “Thank- you”, I jumped on my bike and pedalled like fair hell out along that tree-covered drive. The big, loud crane birds were screeching again as my crooked bicycle light shone up into the trees. After crossing the timber bridge with the loose rattling planks, I reached the double white lodges on the main public tar road.

Heading for town brought relief that such a frightening ghostly experience was once again behind me, and the tanner in my pocket for myself was great. It would pay the fourpence to the Sunday matinee at the Regal Cinema with tuppence worth of slab toffee at Bridgie Quirke’s.

Happy days.

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As we encounter the darker nights, it brings us nearer to the other-world of the ghosts and spirits. Here are a few unexplained happenings - plus some entertaining ones - to keep you awake tonight!

Bill Pomphrett was a sober, sensible type of man in Youghal who was not prone to telling yarns.

Coming home one night after the late shift at the carpet factory in Youghal, he was passing the gate of the gas works near his home. At the gate, standing under a street light, was Michael (Muggs) Norris - whom Bill knew very well, so he wished Muggs “Good Night”. He got no reply and was wondering what was troubling Muggs as he was usually chatty.

The next morning, Bill was told that Muggs had died at exactly the very time that he had been at the gas works gate the night before. Bill was certain that it had been Muggs at the gate and he never accepted anything else.

Staying with the Pomphrett family at Gallagher Terrace, Simon told a story about when his mother, Mary-Anne, was getting old and staying in bed most days.

Bringing up her breakfast one morning, she spoke of a visit that she had during the night from her eldest son Batty, who was living in England. Simon passed it off as a dream - but she was adamant he had stood at the foot of the bed for a short time.

The event was forgotten until a telegram arrived that day to say that Batty had died at the time during the night that he had appeared to his mother, on his way as he passed through out of this world.

Those two Pomphrett stories impressed the late Youghal author and RTÉ broadcaster Colm Keane so much that he included them in one of his books.

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Malachy O’Connell told me an amusing happening that frightened him the most during his many years as an ambulance driver and helper at the local Cottage Hospital in Youghal.

He was locking up the little chapel and mortuary one dark night in winter. A woman had died in the hospital during that day and the body was laid out on the stone slab ready for the undertaker in the morning.

Malachy turned on the light to check the place and got the fright of his life. The woman on the slab was staring at him with eyes wide open. He nearly died of shock. Then, as he moved away in different directions - the eyes followed him.

He ran over to Sr Gonzales (Matron) and told her the woman could be still alive. The Matron led Malachy back into the mortuary to explain to him that the eyes of the corpse had not been closed and she was very much dead.

Before we leave Malachy - he told me how he was selected from a big panel of applicants to be an ambulance driver. The examiner asked him to drive the ambulance for a mile out along the road. While doing so, Malachy thought that the engine was not sounding well. The examiner asked him if that happened with a patient on board, what would the driver do?

Malachy stopped the vehicle and opened the bonnet to find one of the plug leads disconnected. He quickly connected it back and drove away perfectly. It had been a ruse to test him - he passed the test and got the job.

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For decades in Youghal, there was an outstanding sacristan named Liam Ryan. He had a very demanding job. With all the Masses, funerals, Angelus bells, wedding bells, christenings and devotions, there was no end to it.

He had a great assistant in his wife Eileen to share the ties over the 60 years.

Liam told of getting a terrible fright one night while locking up the mortuary, a large, independent building standing in a corner of the quarry where the Parish Church is built. It is a dark place - even in daylight.

Having locked up the church one night, Liam was locking the mortuary where there was a coffined body lying. He extinguished the six big candles around the coffin and (now in complete darkness) was about to put the big key in the door when he got a tap on the shoulder.

Knowing that he was alone could only mean one thing - it was somebody from the spirit world!

Running out, Liam locked the door behind him - but then came a terrible banging. Somebody was locked in. Slowly unlocking and opening the door, Liam discovered Tommy Hannon from Mill Road trapped inside. He had arrived late to say a prayer for the deceased. But it was Liam who said the prayers that night, and they cannot be repeated as I cannot spell some of them!

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When the old Youghal metal bridge - with the barrels and planks - was negotiable, the folk from Ardsallagh found it very handy when walking into town.

Johnny O’Keeffe was one such man, who walked into John Kennedy’s pub every Sunday night for his few pints of porter. He had a few one night and later was walking home in pitch dark on the straight road to the bridge. Suddenly he heard a chain rattling behind him.

Scared that it was the devil, he moved faster - but the chain rattling got louder and seemed to be nearer.

Johnny was thinking about what the missioner had said about giving up your bad habits. He promised to be good evermore and began to trot. Then he started to run. The chains were still just behind him.

Then, on reaching the Waterford side of the bridge, Frankie Coughlan - under the public light - opened the gate to let this breathless, sweaty man through. And Johnny was followed by a large billy goat pulling a chain behind him. That fright was better than any missioner!

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Ghosts, graveyards and spirits are popular topics as we approach the dark November nights of the Holy Souls - and most cemeteries have their own tales to tell. Seemingly, the most haunted, eerie burial place of all is very near us here.

Templemichael Graveyard has been visited by ghost investigators and was said to be the best place to encounter spirits in all of Ireland.

One author - having visited graveyards everywhere - declared it to be very eerie and ahead of all the rest. On your next visit, pause a while, then feel the chill - and say a prayer for the spirits there.

Agus anois - (and now) - codladh sámh duit - (peaceful sleep to you).