House In Port Adelaide

It was the first home I had owned in Australia. After being offered a regular contract with the Australian Government to do tests on sites for future Oil Rigs, I signed a contract where I would have to spend at least six months on and off in Australia. It sounded like a good opportunity at the time as I had just got divorced from my wife of 11 years and was looking for a bit of a change and a fresh start.

I started living in Adelaide in July of 2001 renting a room in a mens' boarding house on South Terrace at the East Terrace end of the city. I was pretty much only there to sleep. In my time off after about 3 months of living there and getting bored of having no real privacy, I started house hunting. As the boarding house was only to be temporary. And just a month later I found a nice smallish older style home in a suburban part of old and historic Port Adelaide (I've seen enough ghosts in the actual part of the town and in Adelaide to write a lot about too. And will when I get the chance). The home was what they called a Working Man's Cottage from around the 1890's. It was Slate, Bluestone and Sandstone built with walls nearly 2 foot thick. It had been fantastically restored to brilliant condition and had a new kitchen, 2nd bathroom and a huge Lounge/Dining room built onto the back. It was perfect. So I paid for it with a little help from the bank and moved in on the 14th December, 2001. And soon filled it with things I cared about and some wonderful furniture. I was very comfortable.

Sadly the peace and quiet of the house didn't last very long, just a few days later I started noticing some really odd things going on.

To describe the home for you it is like this. When you go in the front door, your straight into a LONG hallway that goes right down to the kitchen and original dining room. Along the hall are doors for certain rooms for people to reside in. On the left there is 3 doors, 1st My bedroom, 2nd My home office and the third the original bathroom that's also been done up. On the right is 1st my Son Jason's Room, 2nd my son Shane's room and 3rd a Guest bedroom. Then you walk into an open area still going in with the hall doors running through each end is the original Lounge/tv room where we generally sit and relax. Then through the doors it opens up to the Kitchen on the left and the original dining on the right which we used then mainly as a breakfast nook. Then the Laundry and Bathroom just at the bottom of the kitchen going on through to the build on which had a new formal dining room and our larger lounge room we used when we had guests and it also had a Pool Table and a TV with a playstation 2 (at the time), Dvd player and Video. Then you had double doors that opened to a patio and a fairly large sized backyard, as older homes in the area had larger yards. The house also had a wine cellar you had to enter through a trap door like contraption in the kitchen and a Large Garage on the side of the house. The garden was well looked after by the previous owners and looked great. And my boys loved it.

Now to the strange goings on. After living there a month and getting used to all the noises the house makes, I started feeling that something was a bit off. Not much to start with, just the odd feeling like someone was watching me on and off when I was in the Kitchen. Not anywhere else with that feeling. It heated up when I got my dog Louie (a Jack Russell X Fox Terrier) as a rescue from the R.S.P.C.A. He was about 2yrs old when I got him and not a little pup. I started noticing Louie staring at the wall next to where we had the Refrigerator/Freezer combo. Once in a while he'd either whine or bark or would wag his tail and dog grin at something I couldn't see. Other times he would be out in the backyard running around and he'd suddenly stop and start dancing around in a circle and go up on his hind legs look like he was trying to get someone to give him attention. As he used to do this to me when he wanted mine. He would also roll over like someone was trying to belly rub him and lay there for a minute or two like they were. He would also bark happily and paw the air (giving his foot for his shake trick) like he was playing with someone I couldn't see. At first I thought Louie was just being silly. Then I thought he might have something wrong so I took him to the vet. Nothing was wrong with him. So I just thought that maybe Louie had found a friend, someone maybe to play with and keep him company when I was at work. Which as he wasn't getting hurt or upset by this spirit friend I let it be. And for the rest of the time I lived there and had Louie, he would play with this friendly to him spirit.

Another thing that happened was in the bedroom where I slept. It had an old open fireplace as did all the original rooms except the bathroom and kitchen. Above the fire place was a shelf and a built in mirror, it was large and had a decorated frame. I liked it as I could make sure I was neat and tidy before going off to meetings, etc. I woke up one night from a deep sleep to see a elderly lady dressed in clothing that looked like she was from around very early 1900's. She was tall and thin and had her hair up in a kind of bun like roll on her head. She was looking into the mirror and pinning her hair with clips she was carrying in what looked like a tin in the other hand. She payed no attention to me and after a couple of minutes disappeared into thin air. I was so startled to see her I yelled out a less than kind word and sat in shock upright in bed as she went on doing her hair and ignoring me completely. I don't know who she was or why she was haunting my room, but I would see her two or three times a week. Always in the same spot and doing the same thing. And never noticing me no matter what I tried to get her to pay attention to me. I think maybe she was a imprint of a person who was living in the house during that time. As she never was seen anywhere else or trying to communicate with anyone who was in the home.

Another thing was this ginger cat that I'd see around the house in different places. Most often walking up and down the hall between my office room and the bedroom. When he got to my door he would scratch at the door like he wanted in and then disappear. Both my sons and I saw the cat do this on several occasions. Other times we would see him in the back garden sitting or laying curled up under the Magnolia tree. The tree was probably 60-70 years old and it gave a lot of shade. I got curious one day and tried to pay it attention soon as I got close enough it quickly got up and ran around and disappeared as it rounded the tree. Curiosity got the better of me and I got down and had a look around the tree. Wondering why the cat had vanished before he got around the tree. So I felt around and saw something leaning against the back of the tree. Again got more curious and went to get my torch to find out what was going on. And after getting back to the tree and looking around it, I found something that shocked me a little bit. A home made cross grave marker with one word painted on it that was badly faded and could hardly be read. The marker said "FREDDIE" nothing more. As I didn't want to go digging around, I just carefully put back the cross marker where it was and offered Freddie an apology for disturbing it. I'm guessing Freddie was the cat I saw that someone who cared about him in life cared enough to make a special marker for him where they obviously buried him when he died. Either way it was so nice I think. And the cat who it was for still was there making sure he still has a place in the house where he was clearly so loved in life. Like the lady, I continued to see Freddie the rest of the time I lived there. And I'd always say "Hey Freddie" when I did. Not that he ever reacted to me. It was just to good to see him strutting around the house like he owned the place all the time as cats do.

Other minor things happened around the house too while I was there:

1/ I had someone I couldn't see kiss me on the cheek at night once or twice a week for sometime until I asked them to please stop. It wasn't some crazy wild kiss. Just the kind of kiss a mother would give a child as they tucked them into bed at night.

2/ I constantly had things moved, mainly my keys, mobile phone and wallet. I would put them on the lamp table next to my bed and every morning I'd wake up and they would be put up on the shelf in front of the mirror above the fireplace... Lined up neatly like they had been carefully placed there. At first it bugged me, but then I decided that they were probably better off up there and starting leaving them there myself every night before I turned in for the night. Never had anymore trouble with that stuff being moved after that.

3/ Footsteps up and down the hall from the front door to the guest Bedroom and then on to the lounge then kitchen, they would stop near the stove and then after a minute or two they went back to the guest room. This would happen twice a night most nights. Harmless spirit who just made footsteps, this never bothered me and it did cause any grief so I let it be.

There were a few others that were here and there mostly the odd unattached voice calling out to another unattached voice, I couldn't work out anything they were saying, it just made me wonder a bit with what was going on. Other than that the house was quite ok and I enjoyed living there. But I just grew bored as I do and after living there until 2005 I sold the place to a married couple with 5 children who needed all the room.

And I moved to a House in Parkside in August 2005. But that is a story for another time as that place had some ghosts of its own.

Thanks for reading and I hope to put up some more stories for you all to enjoy very soon.

SebastianRaynes73.