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Original poster

How do you know if a previous occupant in your home died whilst living there?

58 replies

SundaySimmons · 30/12/2013 20:37

An unemployed mother has demanded to be given a new council house after she discovered that a man died in her current home.

Lisa Bowden insists that her traveller beliefs mean that she cannot live anywhere where someone has died.

And the mother of four says her local council has a duty to provide her with a new taxpayer-funded home.

Former heroin addict Ms Bowden, 40, moved in to the two-bedroom flat in Dartford, Kent in October with her nine-year-old son.

But she was soon horrified to learn that the previous tenant, a 64-year-old man, had died in the property, and called in a priest to bless the first-floor flat.

However, she says that she still believes she can sense the man's spirit moving around her home, and has applied to be moved by Dartford Borough Council.

According to traveller tradition, when someone dies at home their caravan should be burned in order release the spirit of the dead person.

'It is forbidden for us to enter somewhere where someone's died,' said Ms Bowden, who has not worked since 1998 because of ill health. 'It's not good for us.

'I can feel the man's spirit and it gives me the shivers. I can't live here. I always sleep with the light on and would never stay here at night on my own.

'The council need to give me a new home - one with a garden and three bedrooms so my daughter can visit.'

.............................

I'm not going to debate Gypsy tradition, being on benefits or whether she has the right to insist on being moved or not.

I am wondering how you would know who has previously died in situ in your home?

Especially in old properties where someone could have died in their sleep forty years ago?

OP posts:
ReluctantBeing · 30/12/2013 20:39

I'd assume that, unless a house is new, someone has probably died in any house.

edamsavestheday · 30/12/2013 23:02

Agree with reluctant, every house will have seen its fair share of deaths.

Love this quote: 'The council need to give me a new home - one with a garden and three bedrooms so my daughter can visit.' No-one's told her about the bedroom tax, clearly...

Gileswithachainsaw · 30/12/2013 23:04

Every house probably had some one die Confused

Even if you built your own someone probably died on the very land in which it was built

MuttonCadet · 30/12/2013 23:07

Someone must have died in our house because of it's age, it doesn't bother me in the slightest.
(But then I'm not from a background that believes in ghosts)

CogitoErgoSometimes · 31/12/2013 07:15

"According to traveller tradition, when someone dies at home their caravan should be burned in order release the spirit of the dead person."

Could be sheer ignorance on my part but I live not far from a large permanent traveller site and, to the best of my knowledge, there have never been any 'spirit-releasing' caravan burnings.... Hmm Perhaps Mrs Bowden is a tad overplaying the culture card?

vvviola · 31/12/2013 07:33

Cogito, it certainly is (Irish) traveller custom, but I wonder whether practicality comes into it a bit more these days, particularly in a permanent site?

HoleyGhost · 31/12/2013 07:47

Did the custom apply to women and children, or was it just the men?

CuttedUpPear · 31/12/2013 07:55

The custom applies to women and men, it dates back to horse drawn travelling times.
Some of you may have read 'The Diddakoi' by Rumer Godden where the grandmother's wagon is burnt on her death, rendering Kezia homeless.
I am from a travelling background and I have never known modern day caravans to be burned for this reason.

However the article you quoted is unpleasantly written with its mentions of drug use.

OP I should prepare yourself for an onslaught of benefit/traveller bashing. Sad

ShotgunNotDoingThePans · 31/12/2013 08:00

How would you know? Well, you could be chatting to a neighbour who maybe says, 'nice chap, Mr So and So - shame he died of x . . .' And it leads on from there I suppose.
People talk.

ShirtySocks · 31/12/2013 08:02

Sundaysimmons - yes I wonder that too but suspect that as others say, most older houses will have had someone die in them. We bought our house from the owner's son as the owner had died. I have deliberately not made any effort to find out if she died here. Having said that, dh and I have slept in the room his dad died in at his mum's house and it was fine.

That article smacks of daily mail to me.

curlew · 31/12/2013 08:11

"I'm not going to debate Gypsy tradition, being on benefits or whether she has the right to insist on being moved or not.

I am wondering how you would know who has previously died in situ in your home?"

Why didn't you just ask that then, without posting the article in full?

KepekCrumbs · 31/12/2013 08:12

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Norudeshitrequired · 31/12/2013 08:16

I have heard of the tradition of burning the caravan when a person dies but I'm not sure if all travellers still follow the tradition. There was a programme on the tv early in the year which showed the practise of caravan burning being followed after a traveller died.
I do however think that 'beggars cant be choosers' and if you want a council home then you can't afford to be fussy given that we have a huge shortage of local authority housing.
The only way the lady in the article could be certain of getting a home where nobody has died is to go and buy a new mobile home and be a proper traveller. Traditional travellers don't like being in static brick homes, so she isn't following all the traditions anyway.

TheOldestCat · 31/12/2013 08:18

The lady who owned our house died here - probably in our tiny office room, which she used as a bedroom when she couldn't manage the stairs. Thought it would freak me out when I work from home in there, but it doesn't worry me at all. The house is 130 years old so I expect a few people have shuffled off down the years.

DH reckons that DS being born in the front room has driven out any ghosts Hmm

thegreenheartofmanyroundabouts · 31/12/2013 08:22

Even if you live in a newbuild there is no guarantee that the land the house is built on wasn't used as a gravesite as many an excavation on Time Team has shown. If you live in the UK then you live in a very crowded island that has been inhabited by people for thousands of years so the chances of your property and the land it is built on being death and tragedy free is quite low.

FunkyBoldRibena · 31/12/2013 08:23

I used to live in the house that Edwin Starr lived and died in (house before his one, 8 years ago).

His bedroom was our chill out room.

I'd often be talking to my OH and hear him walking up the stairs and later find out he was still at work.

Edwin was and presumably still is, a lovely friendly spirit.

I'm sure people have died in this house but no spirits seem to be present here.

thegreenheartofmanyroundabouts · 31/12/2013 08:25

Yes it is the Daily Mail

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2531067/Gypsy-mother-demands-new-council-house-beliefs-not-allow-live-home-died.html

CuttedUpPear · 31/12/2013 08:52

And every DM link you click on brings revenue to them, don't forget Hmm

scaevola · 31/12/2013 09:07

I doubt you could know, unless the house was very modern (ie within the last 10-15 years and with same neighbours there throughout).

Posters have confimed that travellers (used to) burn caravans after a death (but custom not universally followed). What tradition is there for deaths not in caravans?

The solution for this person is to observe tradition more closely, and move fully to a caravan; or if that is not immediately possible, to one of those mobile home static sites (not traveller sites, the regular ones, suitable here as she doesn't seem to mind being in a general community).

Clawdius · 31/12/2013 15:51

I wonder if the tradition of burning the old wooden caravans originated to protect others because the deceased may have died of infectious diseases (tb, typhoid etc.).

I was brought in a building which had been a monastery in one of it's previous uses. They say (I don't know who, just they..) a monk had hanged himself in what had been the coach house (it was our shed). There was also a room which had been used as an oratory. I guess people were laid out there.

One day there was banging on our kitchen door (internal door). We were a bit startled especially when it started creaking open. All feelings of foreboding gave way to extreme pride when we discovered our collie boy was able to jump up and pull down doorhandles in order to open the door. All our ducks were swans!

Pixel · 31/12/2013 15:57

Perhaps Mrs Bowden is a tad overplaying the culture card?

Well it's hard not to be suspicious when she lives in a two bed flat and wants to be moved to a three bed house with garden (don't we all?). If she was that worried about the 'spirits' she'd take anything surely.

Optimist1 · 31/12/2013 16:49

If it's forbidden for them to enter where someone has died, what happens when they need to attend a hospital?

Morloth · 03/01/2014 01:41

I quite liked the thought that my terrace in London had probably seen many births and deaths over the years.

Was comforting for some reason.

I live in a new build now, it does have a good feel about it, but doesn't have that 'depth', IYSWIM.

scattergun · 04/01/2014 21:25

A family member died in my house a few years back and we all take comfort from being closer to them because we can be in that place. Our next buyers may find out and we'd hope they wouldn't be creeped out by it because it doesn't creep us out. The next generation would never know but we've lived there for some years and would like to think that if there was any chance the spirit remained, we'd have had a sign by now.

shinook123 · 07/01/2014 11:43

I used to live in a house that was a converted chapel of rest.
We had some wood panelling in the lounge that was made from original church pews as was the built in shelving.
The fireplace was very gothic with faces carved into it.
It sounds really spooky but we loved that house.
Everyone who visited was fascinated by the features and it's history.
I never felt any ghostly presence though.
It didn't bother me that it was used to lay out hundreds of dead people.
I had a home birth there and the Midwives thought it was lovely for the old building to be the setting of such a joyous event.
It had seen so many people leave this world and then welcomed a new life into it.
Sadly we moved when we needed a larger home but I've never loved any home like that one.