WWYD - creepy box in attic

[LittleSausageFingers]

DH and I bought our first home, which is 100 or so years old, last year. It has a partially boarded attic, and in the attic is a fairly big metal box addressed to someone in New York. It looks really old, old fashioned handwriting on the address label, super dusty like it's been there a long time.

We're not particularly "woo", but we've seen our fair share of horror movies, including those involving boxes in attics (Sinister, anyone?) and we weren't really keen to open it. Plus, I was 9 months pregnant when we moved in and we had other things to do, like build a million boxes of Ikea furniture.

Our friends (mostly) think we're mad for not opening it. One of them researched the name on the box and came up with an old newspaper clipping saying that the person died in an asylum from a religious furvour! Obviously it's probably a coincidence, but date wise it would fit with when the house was first built.

I must admit that my main reason for not wanting to open it is that it's dirty as fuck and i don't want to have to clean up all the mess involved in getting it down! My DH doesn't want to open it because he is actually scared of ghosts (has been known to scare himself while telling a made up ghost story ).

The house doesn't feel haunted or anything like that, but it has a couple of weird quirks that freak us out a bit, e.g. the spare bedroom door (loft hatch is in this room) sticks for no obvious reason and you can get stuck in there. We've also both seen a shadow move under a door looking out into the hallway from the nursery.

So WWYD about the box? Open or leave it?

For goodness sake! Is it any wonder Mumsnet is known as a nest of vipers, trying to freak the poor op out! 😡

Don't worry OP, it's obvious what happened. They wanted some poor unfortunate murdered soul to be gotten rid off buried near her/his original home and realised it would be too suspicious expensive to ship a body, so they just posted her/him instead. They've since removed the body and that pattern is just the imprint of their face pressed against the box. See, nothing whatsoever to be frightened of. 😇

Even though the box was empty, I still feel freaked out.

To be honest, I wouldn't open it, I'd probably have burned my house down and run away screaming after the creepy shadow thing...but I'm
A wimp.

OPEN IT!!!!

I'd have to move out after that, oldugg that would give me the creeps.

I found a suicide note stuffed in a bedroom cupboard when we moved in. I can't remember exactly what it said but it was something to do with track marks on arms and other pretty desperate stuff. The room it was in had a bolt on the outside and the people we bought it from had no children, had lived there for years and seemed very nice. At the time I just chucked the note away and thought no more of it but I was young and carefree.

Agreed, OP, you should probably just cancel the check.

It just looks like it's the kind of metal trunk that has been shipped over when someone has emigrated. Writing looks fairly modern script to me.

At a guess I think that someone has moved to the USA for a while, then moved back and thought the box may come in useful. It was probably brought back in a bigger crate with the other 2 hence the reason it isn't a UK address - the UK address would have been put in the outside of the bigger crate. Owner of the box, having moved back to the UK, decided they wouldn't ever need 3 of the same size box, so got rid of the other 2 and put this one in the attic just in case it might ever come in handy.

Which it has, to provide mumsnetters with some spooky entertainment.

But now Sherlock Curly has cracked the case, you can all have a peaceful night's sleep.

We found 2 crucifixes in a cupboard in one of our bedrooms when we were renovating. It's a lovely house and I'm not at all woo, but those crucifixes went straight back in the back of the cupboard and that's where they can stay!

We've got a similar thing in our loft. I won't post what exactly as it will out me but friends have said before we are mad not to open it. I've thought about it a few times but it's dark up there!

Well I can see letters and numbers carved inside the box? So that's kinda creepy.

Odduggboot. My Aunt and Uncle found something similar. They had been living in their large cottage for years and decided to get the rendering re-done.
They saw a bricked up window and checked the internal dimensions.
They found a hidden room. They thought the big long wall upstairs was just because it was an old cottage.
Two old China dolls,books,newspapers.
My sister and I were desperate to see the dolls but for a few months we weren't allowed to visit.
About 15 years ago my cousin(their son) revealed during a drunken night that all sorts of crazy shit went on after they'd opened the room.
They had the deliverance person in to settle things down.
My aunt and uncle refuse to talk about it and the house is a lovely calm place but my cousin refuses to sleep in the hidden room that is now the spare room there still.

Ok, so nothing creepy in the box but that "doll" thing a couple of pictures above it has freaked me out, don't think I'll be sleeping tonight

dayswithaY

That's what happened at ours. The last owner killed himself about 20 years or so before we'd bought it. They never found his suicide note but we did. It was very sad, we just passed it onto the police in case he had any family left that wanted closure. All the bedrooms had bolts on the outside of the doors which was always weird to me but I try not to think too much about it.

I'm way too nosey not to open it. Used to live in a big old Edwardian house, and one of the first things that I did was check out the dusty, cobwebby old attic 👻

13 pages of comments. Spooky

In our old house all the doors had bolts on the outside, what is with that? I also found out a woman hung herself in there and her teenage son found her! There was always a weird feeling in the house and the dog used to sometimes growl and bark at thin air with her heckles raised.

OP, who lived in the house before you? If you don't know much about them, any neighbours might know? May give some clues to the box.

I'm feeling well spooked now. The threads about houses with locks on doors give me the creeps!

I sometimes dream that I find hidden rooms in my house, occasionally an entire wing with many rooms. I'm always gripped by overwhelming physical fear when I walk through these rooms!

What reason would anybody have for putting bolts on the outside of doors in a house

Open It

Exactly - why would anyone put bolts on outside of door? As far as I know no one died there and I've never had a spooky feeling in my house but there was definitely something off about the couple we bought it from. Nice and friendly but when I saw them again after the move they both completely blanked me and couldn't get away from me quick enough. Weird.

I've known of people who have put bolts on the outside of doors because their children have a habit of getting up in the night......
These are not friends I hasten to add.

Shall we run a book on how many pages this thread will get to with someone still saying that the op should open the box?