One of the most famous modern bizarre cases occurred in 1977 in Enfield, north London.

Events unfolded in the Harper family, consisting of four children and a mother who broke up with her husband. It all started on August 30 when the children's beds began to shake. The next night, both the children and their mother heard as if someone was shuffling their feet in slippers on the carpet. Then there was a loud knock four times, and the heavy chest of drawers began to move. The family's neighbor searched the entire premises and, when another knock was heard, called the police. But the police couldn't do anything.

The next evening, marble sculptures and pebbles from the hostess's collection moved under the influence of some invisible force. It turned out that one of the sculptures was very hot. The Daily Mirror and the Society for Psychical Research were involved in this case. The investigation was led by Maurice Gross and Guy Lyon Play Fair.

Many could observe the movement of objects, furniture and the appearance of visions. At one stage of the investigation, "under suspicion" was the disturbed spirit of a little girl who was strangled by her father in a neighboring house. Some furniture from that place was moved to the Harper house, but when mysterious events began, they decided to get rid of it.

The invited medium made contact on several occasions with the beings allegedly responsible for this persecution. The medium said that the beings absorbed the negative energy emanating from one of the children - eleven-year-old Jeannette - and her mother, who admitted that she had only the worst feelings for her ex-husband.

Psychiatrist Maurice Gross in a fight with the riddles of the house in Enfield. According to him, the girl is suffering from a poltergeist attack. Unsolved forces used all means, even lifting the girl into the air. Observers have linked this incident to the preserved energy of the deceased old man.

The strange occurrences stopped for a few weeks and then resumed in October. The researchers recorded four hundred incidents, among them the appearance on the kitchen floor of a large puddle of water with the outlines of a man.

As is usually the case with poltergeists, they can be very dangerous. One day, an iron grinder suddenly fell next to one of the children, another time, a gas water heater was suddenly torn off the wall. As soon as the poltergeist began its activity, visions appeared, notes remained on sheets of paper and on the walls.

The most mysterious events took place around Jeannette. She often convulsed, and once was even thrown out of bed. The girl went into a trance and behaved as if her throat was bleeding heavily. Then she wrote the name "Watson". The Watson family used to live in this house, and Mrs. Watson died of throat cancer. In December, a very strange voice started talking, introducing himself as Joe Watson. It was indeed a male voice. It sounded like electronic, with difficulty pronouncing every word. Later, he introduced himself as other people, as well as an old man buried in a cemetery next door.

Some members of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) were convinced that it was all a hoax and that the children were playing the show. Yet the two investigators who worked on the Enfield case disagree. It is impossible to imagine that a family could arrange so many different misadventures. The pursuit of the Harpers died down in the summer of 1978.

In 2016, James Wan released The Conjuring 2. The creators claim that the film is based on real events, based on reliable facts, video recordings, interviews with eyewitnesses, and so on. The background was the so-called Endfield poltergeist that occurred in 1977 in England. The case excited the public, it was discussed on radio and television. So how accurately did The Conjuring 2 reconstruct the events that happened, and were those events really paranormal activity, or is it just another overblown hoax?

This article will not review the film, although I liked it, there will be an analysis of dry facts, because the topic is very extensive and there is a lot of information.

How it all started

In the film, paranormal events are preceded by the personal torment of the Warren family, a mysterious demon who has taken the form of a nun, and a sense of the imminent death of her husband Lorraine Warren. The nun, by the way, is really scary, catches up with some kind of unnatural horror, but these scenes have nothing to do with real events. Also in reality, the Warrens were never associated with the church, they founded the "Warren Occult Museum", and also led a group of researchers of paranormal activity. That is, in this film and reality diverge quite significantly. Here is a photo of the Warren family, above is real life, below is a film adaptation. By the way, in reality, the Warrens never encountered the Endfield poltergeist. I think they were included in the film because they are quite famous personalities.

The similarities begin when a police squad was called to the house on August 30, 1977 in Enfield, hence the name of the poltergeist. This episode is also played out in the film adaptation. The house was rented by mother-of-four Peggy Hodgson. Two of her children, Janet and Margaret, claimed that the furniture in the house moved by itself, extraneous sounds were heard at night, someone's shuffling feet and objects fell. Later, a policewoman who arrived at the exit claimed that she saw a chair that had passed around the room, which no one had touched at that moment. Well, it boiled.

Peggy and her four children

The essence of the phenomenon

One of Peggy's daughters, Janet, was possessed by an old man's spirit, presumably Bill Wilkins. His old voice, coming out of the mouth of an eleven-year-old girl, claimed that he had died of a hemorrhage in the corner of the living room. The girl entered into a terrible state, her face was twisted from the pain she experienced when the ghost took possession of her body. Most of the paranormal activity took place around this child. "Spell 2" reveals the essence of this phenomenon in sufficient detail, there are flying objects, and frightened children, and strange sounds throughout the house.

The public became interested in the Endfield poltergeist when there were too many witnesses of the events taking place there, according to some reports, there were about thirty of them. Researchers who came to this house report one and a half thousand unexplained phenomena:

• furniture, including a heavy chest of drawers, moved by itself, sometimes it was impossible to return it to its place or simply move it
• small objects flying in the air
• in the small rooms of the English house, the inhabitants heard shuffling steps, an old man's cough
• doors opened and closed
• Janet repeatedly levitated, while experiencing an incredible sense of fear
• the ghost used physical violence on children, strangled Janet and threw her in different parts of the room
• the children's beds vibrated and bounced, sometimes the blankets fell to the floor on their own, as if someone had pulled them

One night, when a ghost threw the children out of bed, the Hodgsons asked for help from their nearest neighbors - Nottingham. Vic Nottingham, the father of the family, went alone to a creepy house and immediately heard mysterious sounds that seemed to come straight from the walls. He was seriously scared, just like the police, who only shrugged. This case was clearly out of their jurisdiction.

Researchers of all

When things got really frightening, paranormal investigators Morris Gross and Guy Lyon Playfair were invited to the house. By the way, they are also present in the film adaptation and the actors are very similar. It was these people who recorded the audio recording with the voice of a creepy old man, and also took many photographs.

Janet was placed in a psychiatric hospital in London, but the doctors did not find any pathologies in the child. She speaks of this incident as a severe mental trauma. They called her and her brother names at school, threw stones at them and, of course, were afraid.

However, when Janet returned home, terrible events continued to occur. It was at that time that the story hit the British newspapers - the Daily Mail and the Dayli Mirror.

In "The Conjuring 2," Janet was rigged, bending spoons and throwing objects in the kitchen on camera. In reality, this incident also happened, but Morris Gross was sure that most of the cases were genuine.

Photo - confirmation or refutation

In fact, I have not been able to examine the evidence enough to say whether the Endfield poltergeist was true or fake. If the latter, then everything was done very well, but a large number of witnesses do not speak in favor of this version. I suggest that you familiarize yourself with the photographs that paranormal researchers provide as evidence.

In the photo above, you can see how the towel is gradually being placed on the child's bed.

It off lived me, off my energy. Call me mad if you like. Those events did happen. The poltergeist was with me and I feel that in a sense he will always be.-Janet Hodgson, Daily Mail Online

Questioning the Story:

When did the Enfield haunting begin?

The Conjuring 2 true story reveals that according to the mother, Peggy Hodgson, the haunting of her Enfield home began on the evening of August 30, 1977. It was on that night that her daughter Janet told her that her brothers" beds were wobbling. The next evening , Mrs. Hodgson heard a loud noise from upstairs. She entered her children's bedroom and saw a chest of drawers moving. She tried to stop the heavy oak chest as it moved towards the door, concluding that an invisible force was trying to trap them in the room.

"It started in a back bedroom, the chest of drawers moved, and you could hear shuffling," recalled the real Janet Hodgson many years later in a Channel 4 Enfield Poltergeist documentary. Thinking that it was Janet and her siblings making the noise, she said that her mother told them to go to sleep. "We told her what was going on, and she came to see it for herself. She saw the chest of drawers moving. When she tried to push it back, she couldn't." -Daily Mail Online

The real Janet Hodgson (left) and actress Madison Wolfe (right) as Janet in The Conjuring 2 movie.

Did they hear a strange knocking coming from the walls? Yes. The knocking would fade in and out as it ran down the wall, supposedly frightening the family so much that they all slept in the same room with the light on. Vic Nottingham, a neighbor, claims that when he went into the home to investigate at the family's request, he heard a knocking on the wall and on the ceiling, leaving him somewhat frightened. The knocking can be heard during this that was conducted in the home. -Daily Mail Online

Did dozens of crosses turn upside down?

no. In fact-checking The Conjuring 2 by comparing it to the real Enfield Poltergeist case, we found no evidence that crosses turned upside down on the walls of the Hodgson home. In fact, the upside down cross has not traditionally been a symbol of evil. It is the Cross of St. Peter, who was crucified upside down because he felt that he was not worthy to be crucified in the same way as Jesus.

Unlike the movie, crosses did not turn upside down in real life, nor is it traditionally a symbol of evil.

Did the mother, Peggy, go to the neighbor's house for help?

Yes. While exploring The Conjuring 2 true story, we learned that single mother Peggy Hodgson took the family next door and pleaded for help. The neighbors, Vic and Peggy Nottingham, offered to go into the home to investigate. "I went in there and I couldn't make out these noises—there was a knocking on the wall, in the bedroom, on the ceiling," said Vic. "I was beginning to get a bit frightened." -Daily Mail Online

Did Janet Hodgson really levitate? In The Conjuring 2 movie, Peggy's daughter Janet (Madison Wolfe) rises high in the air and finds herself pinned against the ceiling. This is a complete exaggeration of what allegedly happened in real life during the Enfield haunting. Photographs of the real Janet Hodgson "levitating" only show her a short distance above her bed (see below). Daily Mirror photographer Graham Morris after the family contacted the press (it should be noted that the Daily Mirror is a UK tabloid newspaper whose stories have often proven less than credible). "The levitation was scary," recalled Janet, "because you didn't know where you were going to land."

Supporting the family's claims were two witnesses, a baker and a lollipop lady, who were passing by outside and claimed to have seen Janet hovering above her bed as they looked through an upstairs window. "The lady saw me spinning around and banging against the window," recalls Janet. "I thought I might actually break the window and go through it." -Daily Mail Online

These combined photographs appear to show the real Janet jumping from the bed on two separate occasions. The 1st and 3rd photographs appear to be one instance, while the 2nd and 4th are another. Photos by Graham Morris.

Did demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren really investigate the Enfield Poltergeist case?

Yes, but to a far lesser degree than portrayed in the movie, which is somewhat misleadingly billed as being "based on the true case files of the Warrens." Paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren briefly investigated the Enfield Poltergeist in the summer of 1978 and were just two of the many investigators to visit the Hodgson's North London home on Green Street. Most articles about the Enfield Poltergeist case don't even mention the Warrens, leading one to conclude that their role in the case was significantly dramatized for The Conjuring 2. In fact, Guy Lyon Playfair, one of the original paranormal investigators on the Enfield Poltergeist case, came forward prior to the movie's release and said that the Warrens had shown up "uninvited" and only stayed for a day. He also said that Ed Warren told him he could make him a lot of money off the case ( Darkness Radio).

Ed Warren touched on the case and its skeptics in Gerald Brittle's book , stating, "...inhuman spirit phenomena were in progress. Now, you couldn't record the dangerous, threatening atmosphere inside that little house. But you could film the levitations, teleportations, and dematerialisations of people and objects that were happening there - not to mention the many hundreds of hours of tape recordings made of these spirit voices speaking out loud in the rooms." As the case was widely viewed as a hoax, some saw it as proof that the Warrens themselves were frauds.

Unlike the movie, the Warrens (pictured) were not heavily involved in the Enfield Poltergeist case.

Was 11-year-old Janet Hodgson really possessed by a dead man named Bill Wilkins? While fact-checking The Conjuring 2, we discovered that this part of the movie was to some degree inspired by . In the recordings, she can be heard conveying a message via an eerie voice, which is supposedly that of Bill Wilkins, a man who had died in the living room of the house several years earlier. "Just before I died, I went blind," said the voice, "and then I had a hemorrhage and I fell asleep and I died in the chair in the corner downstairs."

An at the time suggests that the idea of ​​talking in a possessed voice may have been encouraged and planted in Janet"s mind by paranormal investigator Maurice Grosse. When asked when the voices started, Janet said that one night Maurice Grosse told them, "All we need now is the voices to talk." Almost immediately following this suggestion, they did (the voices had mainly grownled, barked and made similar noises prior to this).

"I felt used by a force that nobody understands," the real Janet Hodgson told the UK"s Channel 4 years later. "I really don't like to think about it too much. I"m not sure the poltergeist was truly " evil". It was almost as if it wanted to be part of our family. It didn't want to hurt us. It had died there and wanted to be at rest. The only way it could communicate was through me and my sister." -Daily Mail Online

Did the man who allegedly possessed Janet die in the downstairs living room years earlier?

Yes. In exploring the Enfield haunting, we learned that Bill Wilkins" son Terry confirmed that he had died in a manner similar to what Janet described when she was possessed (Wilkins had passed away in an armchair downstairs after suffering a brain hemorrhage). -Daily Mail Online

Like in The Conjuring 2 movie (pictured), the real Bill Wilkins (who allegedly possessed Janet) went blind as he died of a brain hemorrhage in his armchair.

Did the paranormal activity begin after they played with a Ouija board? Yes, at least according to the real Janet Hodgson, who says that she and her sister Margaret played with a Ouija board just prior to the start of the supernatural activity. -Daily Mail Online

How many children did the real Peggy Hodgson have?

In researching the Enfield Poltergeist true story, we learned that, like in The Conjuring 2 movie(), the real Peggy Hodgson was a single mother with four children: Margaret, 12, Janet, 11, Johnny, 10, and Billy, 7.

Siblings Johnny, Janet and Margaret attempt to convey their fear while posing for photographer Graham Morris.

Were Janet and her siblings bullied at school?

Yes, and according to Janet, the other kids called her "Ghost Girl" and put crane flies down her back. Her brother was tormented in similar ways. -Daily Mail Online

Did furniture really move?

Perhaps the most credible claim of furniture moving in the Hodgson home at 284 Green Street involved a policewoman, (pictured below), who signed an affidavit to the effect that she had witnessed an armchair levitate approximately half an inch and move close to four feet across the floor. In all, there were more than 30 witnesses to similar strange incidents in the home. In addition to furniture moving, they had supposedly witnessed objects flying around, cold breezes, physical assaults, pools of water appearing on the floor, graffiti, and perhaps most improbably, matches spontaneously igniting. -Daily Mail Online

Police constable Carolyn Heeps (right) said that she saw an armchair appear to levitate slightly and move three to four feet across the floor.

Did the police do anything to help? no. During our investigation into the real story behind the Enfield Poltergeist haunting, we learned that despite a female police officer witnessing a chair move, the police left after determining that it wasn't a police matter since no one was breaking the law. -Daily Mail Online

What caused the Enfield Poltergeist events to quiet down?

The real Janet Hodgson believes that it was a priest "s 1978 visit to the family" s Enfield home in North London that caused the haunting to calm down (not the Warrens), though the occurrences did not end completely. Peggy still heard noises in the house from time to time, and Janet's younger brother Billy, who lived there until his mother passed, remarked that you always felt like you were being watched. -Daily Mail Online

Janet Hodgson is supposedly photographed while possessed (left). Actress Madison Wolfe (right) takes things to another level in The Conjuring 2 movie.

Is it possible that the whole thing was a hoax?

Yes. Two experts from the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) caught the children bending spoons themselves. They also found it strange why no one was allowed in the room when Janet was talking in her possessed voice, which was supposedly that of Bill Wilkins (among others). Janet herself admitted that some of the Enfield haunting events were fabricated. In 1980, she told ITV News, "Oh yeah, once or twice (we faked things), just to see if Mr. Grosse and Mr. Playfair would catch us. They always did." In an article that was published in the year before the release of The Conjuring 2, Janet said that roughly two percent of the paranormal activity in their Green Street home had been faked. -Daily Mail Online

During a that aired as part of a TV special in 1980, Janet is asked how it feels to be haunted by a poltergeist. "It"s not haunted," Janet replies smiling. Her sister smiles in astonishment, as if Janet just gave up a secret, and whispers, "Shut up!" through muted giggles. Janet later said she didn't feel that the poltergeist was evil, meaning that the house wasn"t necessarily "haunted."

Like the Enfield Poltergeist story, a slew of similar accounts emerged in the years following the 1973 release of The Exorcist. Some argue that the film gave birth to a culture of paranormal hoaxes carried out by those seeking money and fame. Others believe that the William Friedkin film allowed impressionable minds to become easily influenced by its demonic plot. In any case, similar alleged true stories emerged, such as the ones chronicled in

The people in the room simply froze in fear. A gruff male voice details the moment of his death: “Before I died, I went blind, had a hemorrhage, passed out and died in a corner on the bottom floor.” The eerie voice belongs to the deceased Bill Wilkins, but the scariest part is that it comes from an 11-year-old girl named Janet Hodgson.

In the 70s in Enfield, north London, there was probably one of the most famous cases of poltergeist manifestation, which attracted the attention of the whole country. Witnesses of paranormal activity were not only residents of the house in which everything happened, but also journalists, specialists in the occult, psychics and even policemen.

It all started in August 1977, when the Hodgson family (a single mother with four children) moved into a low-rise apartment building at 284 Green Street.

On the evening of August 30, 77, Mrs. Hodgson put her children to bed. As she left, she heard Janet's daughter complaining that the beds in the room were vibrating on their own. The woman paid no attention to this, but the next day something more strange happened in the house. In the evening, Mrs. Hodgson heard a noise upstairs, which greatly alarmed her. When she entered Janet's bedroom, she saw that the chest of drawers was moving without anyone's help. Not understanding what was happening, she tried to put the dresser back in place, but some invisible force kept pushing it towards the door.

Many years later, Margaret, Janet's sister, will tell that every day the poltergeist manifested itself more and more actively, so the Hodgsons decided to turn to neighbor Vic Nottingham for help. “I went into the house and heard sounds coming from the walls and ceiling. I was a little scared,” says Vic. Then the family called the police, but they also could not help them, saying that such cases were not within their competence.

Daily Mirror photographer Graham Morris, who also visited the house, claimed that chaos was happening there - everyone was screaming, and things just flew around the room, as if someone simply moved them with the power of thought.

A BBC film crew set up their cameras in the house, but a few days later it turned out that some components of the equipment were deformed and all the records were erased.

The family later applied to the Society for the Study of Psychic Phenomena. They sent researchers Maurice Grosse and Guy Lyon Playfair, who would later write a book about the incident called This House is Possessed.

Grosse said that when he arrived at the place, he immediately realized that something was wrong there. But at first everything was calm, and only then did he see how LEGO elements and a piece of marble began to fly around the house. According to Grosse, the objects exposed to the poltergeist were hot, which surprised him very much.

All family members were already at the limit, but the otherworldly force did not even think of stopping. Everything only got worse: the sofa levitated, the furniture was constantly moving, and at night someone pushed all family members out of bed. Maurice saw something invisible holding the child by the leg, while he and his neighbor Hodgson with difficulty freed him. Also worth noting is the knocking that didn't stop and was one of the most unnerving aspects of the case.

The poltergeist paid the most attention to 11-year-old Janet. The girl constantly went into trances and behaved like a possessed. “I felt like I was being used by a force that no one could understand. But I don't want to think too much about it. I'm not sure if the poltergeist was real "evil. It seems that he wanted to become part of our family, ”Janet says years later.

At the same time, researchers once caught children bending spoons. Janet herself later confirmed that a couple of times the children faked some incidents, but only to see if Grosse and Playfair could distinguish their antics from the real activity of the poltergeist. Janet also claims that before it all started, she played with a board to summon spirits.

According to Janet, she did not know that she was falling into trances until she was shown pictures. She also tells that one day a curtain wrapped around her neck and Mrs. Hodgson could hardly tear it. Janet believes that the man who possessed her - Bill - was angry because they lived in his house.

Some time after the incident, Janet had to spend in a psychiatric hospital in London, while there she was recognized as sane. At 16, she left home and soon got married. Her younger brother Johnny died at the age of 14 from cancer. In 2003, her mother died, also of cancer. Janet herself lost her son - at the age of 18 he died in his sleep. Janet still assures that the story is completely true. “I don’t care if people believe or not. I've lived it all and I know it's true." Janet says that something still lives in the house, although it has calmed down a bit.

After her mother died, Claire Bennett moved into the house with her four sons. “I didn’t see anything, but I felt strange. There was clearly a presence in the house, it always seemed to me that someone was following me, ”says Claire. Her children said that at night someone was talking in the house, but when she found out what had happened in this house before, she immediately understood what was the matter. The family left this house 2 months after the move.

Now another family lives in the house, but how the Enfield poltergeist reacted to their move is unknown.

In the 70s of the last century in Enfield (Enfield), located in one of the northern districts of London, there was probably one of the most famous cases of poltergeist manifestations, which attracted the attention of the whole country, and later became world famous. Witnesses of paranormal activity then were not only residents of the house in which everything happened, but also journalists, specialists in the occult, psychics and even policemen. The real events of this story later formed the basis of the horror film The Conjuring 2.

It all started in August 1977, when the Hodgson family moved into a low-rise apartment building at 284 Green Street. The family consisted of a single mother Peggy Hodgson and her four children - Johnny, Janet, Billy and Margaret.

On the evening of August 30, Mrs. Hodgson put the children to bed. As she left, she heard Janet's daughter complaining that the beds in the room were vibrating on their own. The woman did not attach any importance to this, but the next day something more strange happened in the house. In the evening, Mrs. Hodgson heard some noise upstairs, which greatly alarmed her. When she entered Janet's bedroom, she saw that the chest of drawers was moving without anyone's help. Not understanding what was happening, she tried to put the dresser back in place, but some invisible force kept pushing it towards the door. Janet later mentioned this evening in her notes and added that at the moment the chest of drawers moved, she distinctly heard the shuffling of someone's feet.

After that, paranormal phenomena did not stop: the children heard terrible sounds that they were not allowed to sleep, objects flew around the room. One evening, the family had to put on slippers and dressing gowns and go out of the house to the street. The Hodgsons turned to their neighbors for help, and they decided to look into what was happening.

Commentary of the head of the family, Vic Nottingham, after he entered the terrible monastery: “When I entered the house, I immediately heard these sounds - they were heard from the walls and from the ceiling. When I heard them, I got a little scared.” Margaret, Janet's sister, recalls: “He said to me: I don't know what's going on there. For the first time in my life I saw a healthy man so frightened.

Many years later, Margaret, Janet's sister, will tell that every day the poltergeist manifested itself more and more actively, so the Hodgsons decided to turn to neighbor Vic Nottingham for help. Then the family called the police, but they also could not help them, saying that such cases were not within their competence.

The poltergeist manifested himself in different ways. With numerous eyewitnesses (there were about 30 people), things and furniture flew around the room, danced in the air. A drop in temperature was felt, inscriptions appeared on the walls, water on the floor, matches ignited spontaneously. The attack also took place on a physical level.

Daily Mirror photographer Graham Morris, who also visited the house, claimed that there was chaos there - everyone was screaming, and things just flew around the room, as if someone simply moved them with the power of thought.

The BBC film crew set up their cameras in the house. A few days later, it turned out that some components of the equipment were deformed, and all records were erased.

The poor family almost gave up, but still decided to turn to their last hope - the Society for the Study of Psychic Phenomena, which studied human psychic and paranormal abilities. They sent investigators Maurice Grosse and Guy Lyon Playfair, who stayed at the Hodgson home for two years and subsequently wrote a book about the incident called "This house is hounted" ).

Maurice's comments on the paranormal activity in the house:

As soon as I crossed the threshold of the house, I immediately realized this was not a hoax, but a real case, the whole family was in a terrible state. Everyone was in terrible anxiety. On my first visit, nothing happened for a while. Then I saw how Lego pieces and pieces of marble began to fly around the room. When I picked them up they were hot.

Then it got worse and worse: large objects began to fly around the house: sofas, armchairs, chairs, tables, the Hodgsons seemed to be thrown out of their beds on purpose. And once a completely unthinkable story happened: two specialists heard Billy cry for help: “I can’t move! It's holding my leg!" The men barely managed to free the child from captivity.

Also worth noting is the knocking that didn't stop and was one of the most unnerving aspects of the case.

The researchers tried their best: they recorded everything on voice recorders and cameras. Bottom line: they witnessed 1,500 paranormal events that took place in the Hodgson house.

The poltergeist pursued all family members, police officers who came to visit family, neighbors and journalists from time to time. But 11-year-old Janet Hodgson got the worst of it: she could enter a terrible trance, somehow scatter objects that even an adult would not pick up, and also soar in the air.

We can say that all this looks like a fiction, a rigged trick, as skeptics claimed, only some of the eyewitnesses managed to take a few pictures of what was happening. One of them shows how the poltergeist lifted Janet and threw her with such force that the girl flew off to the other side of the room. In the photograph, the distorted face clearly shows that she is in great pain. It is unlikely that a child would intentionally hurt himself.

Once the girl even spoke in the gruff male voice of an Enfield poltergeist, whose real name was Bill Wilkins (Bill Wilkins): "Before I died, I was blind from a cerebral hemorrhage, I fainted and died in a corner."

The police after this incident met with the son of the deceased old man to check the truth of the words that came from the girl and exclude the possibility of a simple hoax. However, the son confirmed all the details of the story.

The original audio recording of conversations with Bill Wilkins while Janet Hodgson was in a trance became available on the Internet:

Years later, she spoke about it:

I felt that I was controlled by a force that no one understands. I really don't want to think about it too much. You know, I'm not entirely sure that this something was genuine "evil". Rather, he wanted to be part of our family. It didn't want to offend us. He died in this house and now wanted peace. The only way he could communicate was through me and my sister.

Despite such a variety of manifestations of the phenomenon, many researchers believed that the phenomena in Enfield were nothing more than a protracted children's prank organized by Janet Hodgson and her older sister Margaret. Skeptics claimed that the girls surreptitiously moved and broke objects, jumped on the bed and made "demonic" voices. Indeed, on several occasions researchers caught girls bending spoons. In 1980, Janet admitted that she and her sister simulated some incidents, but only in order to test the researchers themselves.

Janet also claims that before it all started, she played with a board to summon spirits.

According to Janet, she did not know that she was falling into a trance until the pictures were shown to her. And about her "flights in the air" she spoke like this:

Levitation was scary because you don't know where you're going to land. In one of the cases of levitation, a curtain wrapped around my neck, I screamed and thought that I would die. Mom had to make a lot of effort to break it. And Bill, who spoke through me, was furious that we moved into his house.

Some time after the incident, Janet had to spend in a psychiatric hospital in London, where she was recognized as sane. She later recalled:

This was hard. I spent some time in London, in a psychiatric hospital, where they braided my head with electrodes, but everything was normal.

The girl herself made it to the title page of the Daily Star with the glib title "Devil Possessed." Janet's school was also "not sweet." Childish cruelty was shown to her in full:

I was teased at school. Nicknamed "ghost girl". Calling names, they threw various things at my back. After school, I was afraid to go home. Doors opened and closed, different people came and went, and I was very worried about my mother. As a result, she had a nervous breakdown.

At 16, she left home and soon got married. Her younger brother, Johnny, nicknamed "The Ghost House Freak" at school, died at the age of 14 from cancer. In 2003, her mother also died of cancer. Janet herself lost her son - at the age of 18 he died in his sleep.

Janet (Hodgson) Winter

Janet still assures that the story is completely true. She claims that something still lives in the house, but over time it calmed down a bit.

I did not want to experience it again while my mother was alive, and now I want to tell everything. I don't care if people believe it or not - it happened to me, it was all real and true.

After Janet's mother died, Claire Bennett moved into the house with her four sons. “I didn’t see anything, but I felt strange. Someone's presence was clearly felt in the house, it constantly seemed to me that someone was following me, ”said Claire. Her children said that at night someone was talking in the house, but when she found out what had happened in this house before, she immediately understood what was happening. The family left this house 2 months after the move.

Claire's 15-year-old son named Shaka recounted this:

The night before I left, I woke up and saw a man entering the room. Running into my mother’s bedroom, I told her about what I saw and said: “We need to leave,” which we did the next day.

Now another family lives in the house, but how the Enfield poltergeist reacted to their move is not yet known. The mother of the family did not want to introduce herself and said briefly: “My children do not know anything about this. I don't want to scare them."

A video has been preserved where you can look at all the main participants in this unusual story. By time:

• 00:00 Opinion of Maurice Grosse (researcher of the paranormal)
• 04:27 Janet and Margaret as children (recorded by BBC)
• 11:27 Margaret and her mother Peggy Hodgson
• 13.06 Interviews with the police
• 13.34 Interview with Janet in 2014 (recorded by itv1 channel)

In 2015, the series "The Enfield Haunting" / "The Enfield Haunting" was released, based on the events described above.

In 2016, the movie "The Conjuring 2" / "The Conjuring 2" was released, which refers to this particular case. The directors very accurately showed all the real events that happened to the Hodgson family.

In preparing the article, materials from