Episode 5. The Casebook of Dr Miller- Case 3, pt1. The Borley Drowning.

Back in London and stumped for a course of action, a letter opens up possibilities- while also bringing uncomfortable links to Devon and recent experinces.

Written, narrated and produced by Charles Walker.

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Transcript

Dr Miller- The Drowned Man of Borley

Since my return from Topsham some two weeks previous, I had been at somewhat of a loss. Recovering from my experiences my mind was at the same time both exhausted and filled with incessant repeating thoughts.

Rather than answering my questions or putting my thoughts of John to rest, it had rather opened up so many thoughts and possibilities that my mind was in truth a mess. Add to that my realisation that John rather than being dead may well be somewhere else, somewhere beyond our understanding, alive and yet not alive, weighed even heavier on my mind.

I had not returned to my occupation as I had taken at least a year’s sabbatical and I now, rather than having little to no leads had more possibilities than was probable or indeed able to be processed.

Topsham had opened up so many possibilities that I was spoilt for choice while also being confused as where to start.

Firstly, there were these beings. Beings of no recognisable form or origin, that seemed if the beliefs of the locals were right, to be both here and somewhere else at once (where the somewhere else was I dreaded to think), They it would seem were unable due to an interrupted ritual to fully inhabit this space. What they were or where they came from was a total mystery, as was what was their intent.

Then there was the fact that witches, or cunning folk were real. That covens existed. Now witches and the such like have lived long in folk law, but to find that out that they were real and beyond those playing at being witches, was mind opening to say the least. They, the coven, had performed some kind of ritual that had brought something partially through.

There were the sigils, Wards that provided it would seem, protection, and now I knew of them they were everywhere I looked- on the facades of buildings, in books of the more esoteric nature, in graveyards, on churches- the list was endless.

Between the cunning folk’s circles and the sigils of protection this also meant that ‘magic’ was real!

Magic is the only term that I can use, and I would presume that throughout history anything that could not be explained has been termed magic. Once how something works becomes known though meticulous investigation and scientific proof then it is deemed to be ‘science’, however until then it is magic. I am sure that if we were to show people from a mere hundred years ago some of the inventions of the present age, they would call it magic. It may well be, that what I now call magic in another hundred or so years would be understood and then accepted as science, and we may be ridiculed as being uneducated and backward for seeing it as magic.

I now understood that people before me have made a stand, acting as watchers of such events that I was as a supposedly education man unaware. Ordinary and possibly common folk as would have perceived them- yet more worldly wise, knowledgeable and far, far, braver than I. This is much to my shame.

The brave folk of Topsham had stood for decades, watching, protecting their population from forces that could snatch people out of thin air and apparently change the passage of time or at the very least the perception of it.

Finally, there was the book. I had no description beyond it was a book that was brought and introduced by a stranger into a coven of witches, and in being used cause consternation to many of the coven members opening a gateway to somewhere or something I cannot understand at this time in my investigation.

I have no idea what the book looked like, or where it and its owner went after that fateful night. I am sure, that it holds answers though, and that although the locals believe it would be better if it has been lost to history, I believe that it would be better found and studied. Maybe, John, could be brought back?

It was the search for the book, or least the beginning of the search that brought me into the most danger I believe I have been in so far.

The book seemed as improbable as it may sound, my best lead. The creatures had been watched for many decades and nothing had been learned of them by folk seemingly far wiser than me in these  matters. The book however had been lost to time and disregarded. Now it has to be said that although I have proposed that it was my best possible lead, it was also a lead that had no trail to take me to it. I, as I have said had no idea what it looked like, or who the woman was that had possessed and wielded it. I also had no idea from whence she came or to where she had gone when she ‘disappeared’. So, in effect, my best lead was one of no leads.

I did however have a couple of ideas, threads that I could follow. Firstly, I now knew of cunning folk and covens. Secondly, I knew of the sigils that marked some of the craft of these folk, and lastly, I after some research had found one or two so called esoteric bookshops within the greater London area. My hope was that either one of these bookshops may have heard of such books, for I presumed there may be more than the one book, and also with the nature of the books they sold, they may have contacts to practitioners of the craft. My second hope was in effect the opposite, that by following the sigils and wards around London, I may find one of the folk I sought, and in doing so that I may be introduced to a coven that may then be able to provide me with the history of the book or of the person who wielded it. The only decision was, of to which route of investigation should I put my efforts.

It was on this morning early in March 1896, that I decided that I would follow the path of the esoteric bookshops. I knew where they were- with the preoccupation of the age for séance and Ouija boards these dealers in the arcane arts actually advertised in the pages of the London newspapers. I had always thought of them as peddling so much bunkum to susceptible folk, and although I was sure that most of it was pure bunkum, I was also now sure that indeed some of it was not.

As a last resort as I had no one to introduce me to a coven I had considered that I could get into contact with the Society for Psychical research.  I had no one to vouch for me or to introduce me to the society either, so for the time being I had put that idea on the shelf, so to speak.

And so it was, that after two weeks of indecision, that in a handful of moments I had formed my plan of action, how far or as to where it would take me, I could not have possibly imagined as I sat there tracing the lines of the recently etched apotropaic marks on the case of my pocket watch.

The plans of men however, oft go awry and so it was to be so with the course of action I had settled on, although looking back now, all was inextricably linked.

A letter arrived on this morning of my having finally formed a plan of action. It was from Edward Brown, with whom I had studied at Oxford. He was now a coroner such as myself, having taken up practice in Ipswich in Sussex, his home county.

Many of us that had studied together kept in occasional communication, I was the worst at this, having never been much of one for letter writing. And so, many of the letters that sat in the bottom drawer of my desk were opened and read but to my detriment not replied to.

He had apparently written to more of our old classmates in the hope at least one of us could provide some though or shed some light, asking if we could provide any opinion on something that he himself could not explain.

He has been called to investigate a corpse found very near to the rectory at Borley. Now with my current preoccupation with the inexplicable, and even before continuing with the rest of the contents of the letter, my interest was piqued. Borley by now was quite famous and not for any good reason.

The rectory at Borley had gained a somewhat marred history since its erection 1862, a history of hauntings and inexplicable happenings- a very short time to have built such a reputation. There were also, I am sure of great distress to the church, stories of a Monastery having existed in the area and of- well I shall not detail here, but the hanging of a monk and the bricking up of a nun in the walls of the monastery! It had been quite the sensation in the papers and was quite extraordinary for such a modern and recent building as the rectory (the previous rectory having burned down some years earlier).

Edwards communication went on to say that he had been called out to examine and recover a body that had been found in the grounds of the rectory. A body in itself being found in the grounds of this place being enough to cause a local stir and word had passed quickly through the local community.

He had attended as quickly as he could (having to travel some twenty mile or so) and he had found a man who to all intents and purposes would have seemed to have been sleeping, such was the almost perfect preservation of the body, or at the very least recently deceased.

Neither the Rector nor the locals recognised the fellow –The locals, of which when he arrived- there were a good few milling around, the local constable being pressed to preserve the scene and the deceased dignity in not being gawped at, were all hinting at the less than reputable history of the rectory- conspiracy was rife in their minds. It was a far more public affair than Edward would have liked and at times he was jostled as the onlookers pressed in. Finding absolutely nothing of note in the vicinity (which was strange in and of itself) and with the man seemingly not to be a local or visitor to the area (no one had seen him before), he had the body moved back to Ipswich where he could properly examine it. It was there that he discovered two things that gave rise to thought. The man himself was not extraordinary- being a male of some 30 years old, in good health, of a manual trade (by his hands and clothes), however this man had drowned, and in salt water, not fresh, so ruling out any nearby rivers. The coastline here was some 30 miles away- the nearest port towns being Claxton or Felixstowe.

Other than that, there was nothing further to note from the examination of the body, no injuries to be found either to point at accident or foul play.

The second thing that stood out as strange and out of place was to be found in the man’s jacket pocket, a pawn slip. Now it was quite commonplace for the services of pawnbrokers to be sought out, indeed they oft proved to be as numerous as public houses, however this pawn slip was dated 1855 from a broker in Exmouth. The slip bore none of the signs of aging that one would expect in a piece of paper some forty years old, it also bore no sign of having been in contact with water. And that was the other thing- the man’s clothes were completely dry, yet if pressed to give a time of death Henry would have estimated within the last 24 hours. The weather was cold and damp, it being early March and there had been a light rain all throughout the previous night, so anyone who had had cause to find themselves in a river or the sea (as improbable as that was), or indeed if they had been just out in the elements the previous night would not have been bone dry.

As may be imagined, my blood ran cold at the mention of the date and of Exmouth. I stood from my desk and paced the study my heart fair jumping out of chest., in both excitement and the cold remembered horror of my own experiences on the path from Topsham to Exmouth only two weeks previous.

I knew at once that I must go to Ipswich to see the site of the discovery of the body and the body itself, even if that meant exhuming it from a recent grave.

My sleep was fitful that night, and when, I finally drifted off, I found myself walking in cold mists, unresolved forms around me. When they came closer, I saw the horror stuck and pleading face of John the farmer from Devon- his dog circled him, its hackles up and its teeth bared incessantly growling and barking. A woman also there came to haunt my dreams. A young woman (although I could discern no solid feature to recognise her by), she held a closed book that the mist seemed to emanate from, to billow around us. Walking just out of reach, she looked back to beckon me forward, taunting my inability to gain any ground on her. Shapes, holding no one form for longer than a moment emanated from that book, always at the edge of vision, never full forming into anything recognisable or that could be remembered and described.

I woke in a cold sweat, as the last breath was leaving my body, my eyes now unfocused, staring from the depths of dark, cold waters to the dwindling light of the sky far above.

 Some few hours later, I found myself stepping onto the platform at Ipswich railway station at the very beginning of my second case- my night terrors still fresh in my mind.