History & Haunting of: Lochmaben Castle, Lochmaben ,Dumfries and Galloway Scotland Spine-chilling story..... Tom Robertson investigated the woods after hearing stories that animals had been found drained of their blood. He encountered a tall figure dressed in sacking with a hood over its head, which black eyes and grey face. The creature leapt into a tree and swung away. ....... Lochmaben Castle is a ruined castle in the town of Lochmaben, the feudal Lordship of Annandale, and the united county of Dumfries and Galloway. It was built by Edward I in the 13th and 14th centuries, and later rebuilt during the reign of James IV of Scotland. An earlier motte-and-bailey castle was built south of the current castle in c.1160 by the Bruce family, Lords of Annandale. King Edward replaced the castle with a much sturdier structure at the south end of Castle Loch around 1300 and its remains still show the massive strength of its defences. Archibald Douglas, Lord of Galloway, with the assistance of the Earls of March and Douglas, after a siege of nine days, took Lochmaben Castle from the English and razed it to the ground on 4 February 1384/5. The castle and barony became a possession of the Earls of March, but when the 10th Earl was forfeited and then reinstated, in 1409, it is noted that it was with the exception of the castle of Lochmaben and the Lordship of Annandale which by July 1455 was in the possession of Alexander Stewart, Duke of Albany, etc.,(d.1485). Following his death both the Lordship and the castle were annexed to the Crown by Act of Parliament dated October 1, 1487. On 16 January 1508/9, at Edinburgh, Sir Robert Lauder of The Bass (d.1517/8), knight, was appointed Captain and Keeper of the Kings castle and fort of Lochmaben, with all pertinentes and other privileges etc., for three years. In 1605 the Depute Lieutenant of the Borders, Sir William Cranstoun of that Ilk (later 1st Lord Cranstoun), was Keeper of Lochmaben Castle. The area around Lochmaben Castle is also the haunt of a vampire. The following article by Craig Robertson entitled Ghosthunter claims he saw a vampire in Lochmaben was published in the Dumfries Standard on 29 October 2010. TOM Robertson insists it was a vampire he saw in Lochmaben. Yes, the sleepy village is home to a bloodthirsty ghoul straight out a horror movie he says. And it lives in the woods next to the ruins of Lochmaben Castle. Tom – the Indiana Jones of the afterlife – tells the story of his unbelievable but frightening encounter in a new book. Ghosthunter: Adventures in the Afterlife was co-written with journalist Murray Scougall and features a string of similar tales of his ghosthunting exploits from across Scotland. But it is the incident in Lochmaben from 1991 which is the most fascinating – and it even has a link to the late King of Pop, Michael Jackson. Bizzare, weird? Not half. Lanarkshire-based Tom explains how he had been approached in 1991 from locals who were worried about animal carcasses being found in the woods at the castle. He decided to spend the night there in his car and visited with wife Margaret - who wisely stayed in the car as Tom went walking in the woods where he saw his “vampire”. He said: “Just 15ft or so away stood the most hideous sight - a walking, decomposing corpse. “Its face was as grey as granite, its eyes as black as coal. The skin seemed transparent except for the purple veins protruding from the creature’s dead, withered tissue. It was tall but round-shouldered and a hood was pulled over its head, dressed in sacking. “Vampire. The word popped into my head. “The creature suddenly took flight, springing up on to a branch and gliding from tree to tree like Tarzan on steroids. “I was worried about Margaret sitting alone in the car, so I forced myself to move faster. “I unlocked the door, started the engine and put my foot down on the pedal to get away.” Tom’s wife would then go on to suffer from a series of strokes which forced Tom to give us his ghost hunting to care for her. But when she died eight years later, he returned to Lochmaben. He said: “I camped out in the woods. It was nearing dawn. I had seen nothing. I walked some distance. Then I noticed a shadow. “It was the vampire - stooped over like a hunchback. “It stopped and turned its head towards me. It glared at me with evil intensity. This grotesque beast looked like it had crawled out of the grave.” Tom said a journalist friend printed a story about his experience but then a letter arrived in the post with a New Orleans postmark – it was woman called Mary Grant who had read the article and was asking if Tom could catch it alive. Then in November 2002, he said the phone rang and a American accent was on the other end. The voice said: “This is your little friend. I hope you can help me. You’ll have got the letters from Mary. I really need help – please.’ Tom went on: “The voice was effeminate, almost child-like - familiar to me – but I couldn’t place it. “I asked who it was, then the line went dead. I knew I had recognised the voice. It was Wacko Jacko. “Had a team of crackpots been hired by Jackson to help give him the gift of eternal life? “Jackson and his team must have thought that by taking blood from the vampire, a creature that had lived for hundreds of years, they’d transfer the regenerative cells to Michael to make an attempt at granting eternal life.” Tom added: “I never went back to Lochmaben. Nor should you. There is a creature slinking around in those woods, baying for blood.” Though Mr Robertson said in the article above that he would not return to Lochmaben, that changed in 2012. Sandy Kilpatrick updates the story in a 24 February 2012 Dumfries Standard article entitled Ghost Hunters sink teeth into vampire investigation. mysteriousbritain.co.uk/ Newspaper article here >> dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/encounter-with-a-borders-vampire-brought-me-into-contact-1071369 Visit this page for more info > mostlyghostly.org/ghostly-walk-at-castle-loch/ paranormaldatabase/ en.wikipedia Photo 1 & 2 by mostlyghostly.org- Photo 3 by scottish-castles.de- Photo 4 by tootlepedal.wordpress
Posted on: Sun, 21 Sep 2014 14:53:08 +0000
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