Adelaide Ghosts and Hauntings - Paranormal Field Investigators

REDRUTH GAOL
Paranormal Investigation

THE GHOSTS

There had been many rumours coming out of Redruth Gaol in particular about hauntings. One story told how witnesses saw a ghostly female figure in the female yard close to the pit. We were told that the reason for this could be that a girl had been found drowned in the pit which had once been a water storage area. On researching the history a little further, we have not been able to verify this story so far so could just be one of those myths that grow and perpertuate by themselves. Although there were deaths in this gaol, none are referred to as having drowned.

Between 1943-1956 the Gaol once again became a private residence, this time for the Todd family. Norm Todd, who was a child whilst living there, stated "The gaol was in some ways a scary place at night and no-one ever ventured out into the yards without someone to accompany him or her..."

We decided the Burra area and in particular Redruth Gaol, was still worth doing and so we proceeded with our first investigation on 11th December 2009. Many more were to follow and we are still investigating this site still. We thank the National Trust in Burra for their kind permission to enter their premises at night and for their representative Neil, who came along to supervise and has remained on our investigations there ever since as a friend.

THE INVESTIGATION

INVESTIGATION #1 - 9th December 2009

The aim of this particular investigation was to cover several of the sites in Burra. Although there has only been one or two stories of 'ghosts' being spoken about, mainly at Redruth Gaol, it was thought to be worth looking into these historical places.

It was proposed that we scout the various locations and spend a short time at each. Places were to include Redruth Gaol, Hampton Village, The Unicorn Brewery and the Dug-outs. With only 4 team members present to cover these areas, any more would have been difficult.


Team One - Anna and Brett

After an initial walk round getting base readings and discussing tactics it was decided to split into two teams with Anna and Brett choosing the female yard to monitor. Temperature taken in the yard at the time was 11.5ºC.

Whilst monitoring, Brett and Anna started to ask questions to see if they could illicit a response. Whilst questioning, Brett brought up a question linked to our St John's Reformatory, Kapunda investigation and asked if anybody missed Rev. Martin. They quickly noticed a drop in temperature and it had suddenly become a lot colder. He took some readings on the meters but according to the thermometer the temperature had actually gone up 2 degrees, even though they were feeling much colder. Temperature reading at this point had increased to 13.5ºC which was unusual due to the night setting in. More questions were asked about Kapunda but without further results.

Anna thought she saw something move in the room towards the men's yard. Anna then saw another shadow moving against the far wall, but Brett admitted that he couldn't see it. She described it as a shadow of somebody actually moving. She then saw more shadows and described them as moving slowly about. Brett and Anna moved towards the area for a closer look but there was nothing there to be seen at that point.

Team Two appeared in the yard shortly after, but Neil stated they had definitely not been there a few moments earlier when Anna was seeing the shadows. Alison did suggest that she had walked through the far room so it was debateable as to whether it was her or not that Anna had seen. However, this wouldn't have explained the black shadows moving against the wall and door near the external pit. Sadly there was only one witness to this and the video camera was pointed away from this area.

TEAM TWO - Spils, Alison, Neil and Anita

This team decided to sit and monitor the room where the sheep were slaughtered and hung on hooks.

Although Anita and Alison had felt uncomfortable in this area earlier in the evening, nothing seemed to happen in this during their vigil.

It did however give us a chance to experiment with something new. For those that have visited our forum, you would have seen our condemnation of the so called 'ghost box' as being a gimmick with no basis to it. You would also have seen we threw down the gauntlet to say we would try it for 6 months and write a report on how we found it, since it wasn't going away. This was one of the places we decided to experiment as there had been nothing else happening at the time. Anna and Brett rejoined us for this experiment. We did get a few 'Alisons' and 'Neils' but apart from this nothing concrete was heard from this device. There was a further session later in the early hours of the morning which revealed some interesting hits, but again nothing that couldn't be put down to simple radio. We will try and put these up later anyway for your own curiosity.

Since this time we have done several investigations at Redruth and plan to return soon. It seems to be the girls yard that yields the most curious happenings. Shadowy figures have been seen again since in this yard, yet never in the mens yard. On our last visit Spils and Brett were listening to their voice recorders live with headphones. They both exclaimed that they had just heard a woman scream loudly, whereas Anna, Alison and Neil who were not wearing headphones heard nothing at all.