A Dark Past
How squeamish are you? Would you, like my friends Antonia and Martin, buy a house where someone had blown himself up in the bedroom – the poor man had been smoking while attached to an oxygen tank.
Being a pragmatic pair, they decided that the appeal of the vast garden (and the dramatic price reduction) far outweighed its tragic past. Besides, most houses come with a back story.
Deadly poisons on show in the museum
Rock House can boast at least one memorable death within its walls. In 1910, having lived here since the spring of 1879, Elizabeth Blackwell, the first-ever female doctor on the British Medical Register, died in bed. Her demise hastened by a plunge down the stone basement steps. I can’t claim that I feel her ‘presence’ but I do tend to grasp the banister on the way down.
Alastair Hendy’s Tudor House on All Saints Street, however, was home to the town’s mortuary for centuries and on the one (and only) occasion I slept in his guest room, I was so disturbed I kept the bedside light on until morning. Visitors on his open days tend to leave with hairs raised.
Last week, Joel Griggs opened The True Crime Museum in a 3,000 sq ft cave on the seafront. Visitors will be offered the chance to identify celebrities and their crimes from their police line-up shots, view a lethal injection death bed close up and stare at recreated crime scenes. Among the other exhibits there will also be a grim reminder of how dark some house secrets are.
In 1980, John Childs, a notorious contract killer, was convicted of murdering six people in the bath at his flat in Dolphin House, in London’s Poplar. Joel’s uncle Arthur happened to be the council contractor who refitted the bathroom. Instead of dumping the bath, he took it back to the depot and planted it with flowers. Then, when he retired, Arthur took the bath with him to his allotment. Still in bloom, its place at the museum will serve as a lasting memorial to Childs’s victims and a chance to conquer our demons.
Next week: RNLI
Being a pragmatic pair, they decided that the appeal of the vast garden (and the dramatic price reduction) far outweighed its tragic past. Besides, most houses come with a back story.
Deadly poisons on show in the museum Rock House can boast at least one memorable death within its walls. In 1910, having lived here since the spring of 1879, Elizabeth Blackwell, the first-ever female doctor on the British Medical Register, died in bed. Her demise hastened by a plunge down the stone basement steps. I can’t claim that I feel her ‘presence’ but I do tend to grasp the banister on the way down.
Alastair Hendy’s Tudor House on All Saints Street, however, was home to the town’s mortuary for centuries and on the one (and only) occasion I slept in his guest room, I was so disturbed I kept the bedside light on until morning. Visitors on his open days tend to leave with hairs raised.
Last week, Joel Griggs opened The True Crime Museum in a 3,000 sq ft cave on the seafront. Visitors will be offered the chance to identify celebrities and their crimes from their police line-up shots, view a lethal injection death bed close up and stare at recreated crime scenes. Among the other exhibits there will also be a grim reminder of how dark some house secrets are.
In 1980, John Childs, a notorious contract killer, was convicted of murdering six people in the bath at his flat in Dolphin House, in London’s Poplar. Joel’s uncle Arthur happened to be the council contractor who refitted the bathroom. Instead of dumping the bath, he took it back to the depot and planted it with flowers. Then, when he retired, Arthur took the bath with him to his allotment. Still in bloom, its place at the museum will serve as a lasting memorial to Childs’s victims and a chance to conquer our demons.
Next week: RNLI