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Savernake forest?

25 replies

caroline161 · 20/01/2019 09:14

I have spent ages looking for this story!! Somebody posted a link to the thread but couldn't find the story within the thread. Would anyone be able to copy and paste it for me ? Curiosity is getting the better of me 😆

OP posts:
OldGrinch · 20/01/2019 09:15

Was that the creepy story about Savernake Forest OP?

HowlsMovingBungalow · 20/01/2019 09:17

its on page 20 of the link.

HowlsMovingBungalow · 20/01/2019 09:18

Here it is :

Have name changed for this as it will totally out me!
This is on the theme of the PPs, having had a near miss with the likes of Levi Bellfield and Fred West.
In the Spring of 1987 I was heart sick of the job I trained for and decided to have a summer off and do something different. Through a contact, I got a job as a labourer for a well known local thatcher near my home village in Wiltshire. It was great. Very physical, the old gent I was working for was a lot of fun and he enjoyed winding up the American tourists when they came to photograph us. Giving silly names to the tools and lying about what they were used for (measuring smoke) etc.
I had a dog and took her for a walk in my lunch break in Savernake Forest which was at the top of the hill on which the house we were working on was situated.
The following day, I was sat on the roof with one leg either side of the ridge and my back to the chimney putting points on spars and throwing them at the thatcher who banged them into place. From the forest, I heard automatic gunfire and told the thatcher this. He was nonplussed and then adamant it came from the car radio which was on but on the other side of the roof. I denied this so he suggested it came from Salisbury Plain (military training ground) . The wind was in the wrong direction for this though.
As I drove home, I heard on the car radio about the Hungerford massacre but I knew we were 10 plus miles from Hungerford. On the TV that evening they reported that the gunman killed his first victim in Savernake Forest in the exact spot I had been with my dog and at the exact time, but the day before! I was also aware that had he chosen to drive into Marlborough for his murderous spree instead of Hungerford, the thatcher and I would have been the first two people he would have likely seen and as he was apparently shooting at random it's a scary thought. He had his reasons for driving to Hungerford that day but I'm glad I missed him in the forest by a day!*

caroline161 · 20/01/2019 09:22

Thankyou for posting. That's actually terrifying 😨

OP posts:
recently · 20/01/2019 09:25

There was another very creepy one about Savernake. It was about going into the forest with the dogs at night. Can't find it though.

recently · 20/01/2019 09:26

Although this one is pretty terrifying, the other one was more supernatural.

Laiste · 20/01/2019 09:29

Oh i was thinking about the dogs one too. Running back to the house with something at her heels whispering ... It's repeated on most of the creepy threads. I'll have a go at finding it.

Alicejacks · 20/01/2019 09:31

Yes, I have been looking for the other one before. Chasing a dog into the forest at night... Really spooky

Bezalelle · 20/01/2019 09:32

There's the one where a lady was walking dogs and came across a demon or the devil in the forest... Terrifying!

SueGeneris · 20/01/2019 09:36

Crikey. I live quite near there. I often hear the distant rumbling and booming of artillery training on Salisbury Plain. We are far enough from there that it's sort of spooky as it's not quite clear what the sound is.

ToeToToe · 20/01/2019 09:40

This is it - I don't think this is the OP, I think they copied it onto another thread:

"Found it. Warning: it's very long (sorry) and very freaky, and if anyone can come up with a rational explanation I'd be extremely grateful because I'm generally a pretty rational non-woo where's-the-evidence person, but I've never been able to explain this and it still makes my heart beat faster and the hair stand up on my arms when I think about it, years later.

I was pet sitting for my friend several years ago. She had moved into a sort of small holding right on the edge of a village in the SW, with a huge garden that backed onto trees. At the time she had a right menagerie - chickens, ducks, a couple of Shetlands, cats and four black retrievers, three fully grown and one a half grown puppy. Originally DH had been going to come with me as a little holiday but the dates she ended up having to go away for work clashed with a couple of his medical appointments so he stayed at home with our dog and I went to petsit alone.

It was about halfway through my stay, a couple of nights to go. Late evening, already dark when I heard a massive commotion from the chicken shed, banging and thumping. I assumed a fox or something had got in so went out to check. As I was halfway across the garden the noise stopped instantly as if it had been shut off; by the time I got to the shed all was calm and the chickens were all settled, mostly asleep. No sign of any intruder or disturbance at all, nothing to explain the noise or any indication that the chickens had made a noise. Bit freaky but I didn't (and still don't) know much about The Way of Chicken so I locked up again and left them to it.

As I went back in the house a small black shape ran past me out of the back door and I realised the puppy must have got out. It streaked across the garden and off towards the woods. Cue much cursing, then calling her name in vain. More cursing when she didn't come back. I grabbed a torch and put one of the other dogs on the lead, partly for protection, partly because I thought the pup was more likely to come back if I had one of her canine companions with me and partly because I didn't fancy my chances of finding my way back to the house on my own even though there were a couple of vague paths that I'd followed when walking the dogs throughout the week.

Off we trudged into the wood along one of these paths, me calling pup's name at intervals and trying not to imagine murderers and rapists behind every tree trunk. We got to a point where it felt like the trees were starting to thin out and I remember thinking that I didn't remember a clearing on this path and we must have gone wrong somewhere when the dog with me slowed right down and started to resist going forward. I tried to jolly her along - while my stomach suddenly dropped like a stone - and she started growling, a really low serious rumbling growl. By this time I was practically shitting myself. I tried shining the torch ahead but the beam just sort of bounced back off the darkness if that makes sense? I got the sense of something - or somethings - moving but just sinuous deeper black shapes against the blackness and always on the periphery of vision. (The hairs on my arms are standing up again just remembering how completely and utterly terrified I was. I have honestly never known a feeling like it.)

At this point the dog sank right down, still growling, hackles up and refused to budge. I muttered something like "Jesus, you have got to be kidding me" and this ugly gurgling inhuman sort of voice hissed, right up close as if someone was right next to me "don't say that name". At the same time there was a horrible snickering sort of laugh. I cant express how utterly petrified I was. I can't remember having any coherent thoughts apart from the word "evil". That's the only clear thing I can remember. Me and the dog were frozen to the spot with pure fear. Then a different voice, really commanding, said "GO. BACK." That sounded more in my head but echoey, where the others had sounded out in the air IYSWIM?

Wherever it came from it did the trick. Me & the dog turned and belted back through the woods. She basically towed me, I just clung onto her lead stumbling to keep up and sobbing with fear. I lost the torch somewhere on that wild run but there was no way I was stopping to find it. How I didn't run blindly into a tree I'll never know, she guided me I guess. I can remember thinking desperately that I mustn't let go of her lead or "they" would get me.

When we got back to the garden she suddenly stopped - I did fall over her this time, onto my hands and knees - turned around and started snarling, proper teeth bared, rabid-looking snarls, back at the trees and the darkness. I thought I heard the snickering again but the blood was pounding in my ears so hard I can't be sure. I scrambled up and ran to the back door and she followed me but backing and snarling all the way as if holding something at bay. Oh, and the chicken shed was banging and thumping again. I got the back door open, me and her belted in, I slammed home every bolt behind us. The other dogs left behind were staring at the door and growling too with their hackles up and when I saw all three of them, puppy included, acting like that I started to cry properly because I honestly thought I was trapped in some horror film nightmare and was going to die. I don't know - I still don't know - what the black shape was that ran past me out of the house and triggered all of this because the puppy was right there in the kitchen.

Anyway I made sure every door and window was locked and bolted, I turned on every light in the house, I wandered round mumbling all sorts of weird half-religious half-spiritual shit to ward off evil spirits. Gradually the dogs settled down and stopped growling, and eventually stopped glancing at the door. Funnily enough I didn't sleep for one second that night and I rang my DH and begged him to come over the last couple of days. I know I didn't dream it because I was covered in scratches from running through the woods and had grazed hands from where I fell over the dog in the garden.

Nothing like that has happened before or since and I hope it never, ever does. It was the single most horrible, terrifying experience of my entire life."

anunseemlylovefordustin · 20/01/2019 09:46

Whoah! That's terrifying.

Laiste · 20/01/2019 10:05

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/2264465-To-ask-what-is-the-strangest-creepiest-thing-that-has-ever-happened-to-you

I've just been scanning through this thread to find the dog story. Couldn't find it but glad to see someone else has :)

I did find myself on the above thread a few times under my old name. It's an amazing thread.

Redpriestandmozart · 20/01/2019 10:50

Tip for future use. If a poster says the story is in a thread of many pages what I do on the computer is

a. Select show all messages (so not broken down into pages)
b. Hold down 'ctl' and 'f' keys at the same time
c. A box appears below and to the right of your address bar
d. Type in the word you wish to find on page
e. You will find the post straight away.

This is the easiest way I have found to find a message within a long post. I don't know how to do this on the phone.

BrexitBingoGenerator · 08/10/2019 21:52

Well that was utterly terrifying!!!!

Smashtastick · 19/12/2019 20:28

Jesus Christ almighty! I'm so glad I'm not in my own in the house!

EspressoPatronumm · 24/09/2022 06:01

I know this is old but that second story is absolutely terrifying

TheChippendenSpook · 24/09/2022 07:07

The second story is definitely the one that gets mentioned a lot and copied and pasted a lot too.

WeAreTheHeroes · 24/09/2022 07:15

My god that is terrifying. I've read a lot of that Savernake Forest thread before, but never that post. I think I'd be inclined to go back in daylight with company, ostensibly to look for the torch, just like the idiot who gets killed/disappears in horror films.

GorgeousLadyofWrestling · 24/09/2022 08:58

I have so many questions about this.

So was the black thing in the house with her the whole time?
Why did it run out?
What was happening in the chicken house?
Had her friend ever experienced anything?
Did she tell her friend about it?

RunAwayTurnAwayRunAwayTurnAway · 24/09/2022 10:36

GorgeousLadyofWrestling · 24/09/2022 08:58

I have so many questions about this.

So was the black thing in the house with her the whole time?
Why did it run out?
What was happening in the chicken house?
Had her friend ever experienced anything?
Did she tell her friend about it?

Yep. I want to interrogate these plot holes too!

Handsnotwands · 24/09/2022 11:40

I walk in savernake pretty much every singe day. Have played in the forest since I was a child. Lived on the edge for 15 years. It’s just a nice forest 🤷🏼‍♀️

OpenToSpaces · 30/01/2024 01:17

This thread hasn't had a contribution for 16 months, but I had to add a thought or two. I'm from Savernake, born at Savernake Hospital when it had a maternity unit. We lived in four villages close to the forest - Little Bedwyn, Great Bedwyn, Crofton, and, a little farther away, Upper Chute. I'd agree with Handsnotwands, that Savernake is a lovely area, the forest is beautiful, and St Katharine's Church is peace-on-earth.
What I think is possible is that this was not a supernatural entity per se, but one or two misguided/stupid/evil humans. Dogs can and do sense evil in people. There may well have been a supernatural element to the events, especially the phenomena, but that could've been stoked, wittingly or unwittingly, by whoever was doing bad things that night. Foolish and dangerous attempts to summon entities, or just play around with the occult, happen quite often, and some people see woods and forests as fair game for larking around, maliciously or otherwise, with unknown forces. What I mean is that the area may not be haunted - whatever was abroad that night (don't you love that expression?) would not be there now. I hope! The story itself is very well-told, and the victim who got frightened was blameless and did everything sensible under the conditions. The dogs were there for her as well, which is lovely.
The very picturesque and atmospheric Tottenham House, between Durley and Crofton, which used to be the school I attended, has lots of paranormal activity, both inside and in the woods / deer park, but none of that was sinister or unpleasant. I'd like to think the same is true of the forest itself.

tuvamoodyson · 30/01/2024 05:59

I think it was a load of old tosh…

AnglepoisePond · 30/01/2024 06:53

tuvamoodyson · 30/01/2024 05:59

I think it was a load of old tosh…

I always imagine the ‘banging and thumping’ from the shed being the chickens having a rave.

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