HGB Ep. 487 - Haunted New South Wales

Moment in Oddity - Beatle Wigs

If you've never heard of a band called the Beatles, you must be living under a rock somewhere on a remote island. In 1963, the United Kingdom embraced the Beatles with rave reviews. When the band's first single released stateside, "Please Please Me" it was a resounding flop initially. While Beatlemania was well on its way in the UK, even the drop of the bands third and fourth singles still had an almost non existent fan base in the US. The manner in which the band overcame America's lack-luster response is intriguing. In December of 1963 the single, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" debuted with a more favorable reaction than the prior singles. The Beatles were set to begin their first American tour in February, 1964. In a tactical campaign move to increase their popularity, the Beatles went all out. An onslaught of band merchandise consisting of buttons, bumper stickers and even Beatle styled wigs arrived in America. By the time of their tour, more than 1,000 pounds of wigs had been shipped into the United States. On February 9th, 1964, the Beatles performed on The Ed Sullivan Show with over 70 million viewers tuning in. As the British Invasion swept the United States the band contributed countless chart topping hits. It's tough now, to imagine a time in America when the Beatles were not popular, however, the fact that over 1,000 pounds of bowl-cut wigs contributed to turning the tide of popular opinion, certainly is odd. 

This Month in History - Transcontinental Railroad

In the month of May, on the 10th, in 1869, the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railways were first linked at Promontory Point, Utah. This made transcontinental railroad travel possible for the first time in the history of the United States. On the celebrated date, the presidents of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads drove a gold ceremonial spike joining the two railroad tracks. As far back as 1832, both Eastern government and frontier statesmen knew that the two sides of the nation needed to be connected. Although Congress allocated funding for the inspection of possible routes for the transcontinental railroad in 1853, the building would need to wait much longer. One of the reasons for this was the mounting tensions between the North and the South, preventing an agreement regarding the railroad's starting point. In 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railroad Act, giving public land grants and loans to the two railroads chosen to undertake the task. Interestingly, in the rush to complete the transcontinental connection, the Union Pacific and Central Pacific built their two separate lines right past each other. This caused the final connection point to be renegotiated. In 1869, the transcontinental railroad was completed ahead of schedule after laying almost 2,000 miles of track and coming in under budget. The rapid growth of the United States was greatly improved due to the speed and convenience of travel that the railroad delivered.

Haunted New South Wales 

New South Wales in Australia seems to be the most haunted state in the country and for good reason. This was the first place colonized in Australia. Not only is there a long history here that features a country built by convicts, but there is the displacement of the indigenous people who had been here for thousands of years. We've covered some of the more well known haunted locations in New South Wales on previous episodes, so on this one we are going to explore the lesser known haunts. Join us as we explore the history and hauntings of New South Wales!

New South Wales is the oldest state in Australia and was the site of the landing by the First Fleet from Britain. This fleet included eleven ships arrived in 1788. Captain James Cook took possession of New South Wales in 1770 and named it for King George III. Of course, in saying that, we all realize that the land was already being lived upon by indigenous people. The group of convicts and jailers that arrived on the First Fleet set up a small settlement on the foreshores of Sydney Harbor. There were about 1,000 of them, but this number would grow extensively over the next five decades. And to be fair, the definition of a criminal back then is different then our modern era. Some of these people were political prisoners and some had committed lesser offenses. As New South Wales grew, it would break apart into the different states that now make up Australia. We covered the haunted Quarantine Station in Manly on Ep. 17, the Monte Cristo Homestead on Ep. 51 and Maitland Gaol on Ep. 68, all locations in New South Wales. These are some of the bigger, more well known places. Now let's look at some of the lesser known places.

Old Helensburgh Railway Tunnel

Old Helensburgh Railway Tunnel in Helensburgh, New South Wales is surrounded by a beautiful green landscape. Many people who visit this location claim that it is scary as hell. The legend here is that a miner named Robert Hales was walking through the tunnel on his way home when a steam train came down the line, into the tunnel and hit and killed him. His body was severed in two. People feel as though they are being followed in the tunnel and worse, they see only half of an apparition. Sometimes the top and sometimes the bottom.

Wakehurst Parkway

Wakehurst Parkway has a hitchhiking ghost. This is a road running from North Narrabeen through to Seaforth in New South Wales. The story goes that on a section of road near Oxford Falls a young girl - or nun in some stories - appears and accepts rides. One story we read claims the girl's name is Kelly. Drivers then tell stories of being tormented by the woman's piercing green eyes when they look at her in the rear view mirror. The drivers then crash their cars as the woman disappears. And there really are a lot of crashes on this stretch of raod. People are encouraged to not drive on it at night. Car headlights randomly fail or cars break down for no reason. There is no cell service in the area making it even more dangerous. 

Redbank Range Railway Tunnel

Redbank Range Railway Tunnel is located in Picton, New South Wales and is also sometimes called The Mushroom Tunnel because it was used for a time to grow mushrooms. Picton is said to be one of Australia's most haunted towns. The tunnel runs 592 feet in length and was used between 1867-1919 as a  corridor to and from Melbourne. The tunnel was used during World War II to store weapons and mustard gas spray tanks. A woman named Emily Bollard was struck by a train in the tunnels in 1916 and her spirit is said to haunt the tunnel. She may be at unrest because no one is sure if it was an accident or if she jumped in front of the train on purpose. The spirit of Emily usually appears without her face. Stories claim that a young girl was assaulted and killed in the tunnel and that she too haunts the place. Visitors report lights floating above people's heads, seeing shadow figures, sudden drops in temperature and the apparitions of children.

Mrs Me wrote in 2015, "I was there in 2009 and i filmed a female face in the tunnel on my phone i did send it to people, but i think its been lost now.The female seemed young with dark hair it was towards the end of the tunnel the face would appear on my phone, and this happened in broad daylights." And Tracey said, "I have investigated that tunnel numerous times in the past ( not in a tour) & with fellow investigators, using scientific equipment. It was common to see the coloured lights & hear rocks being thrown around you when no other person was in there. We even captured that on IR video which we still have. We also witnessed one of those lights becoming large and forming into a whitish figure that was floating off the ground and looked like a holagram. I have numerous EVP taken on a voice recorder and also on a ghostbox."

Gladesville Mental Hospital (Suggested by: Kathy Bergin) 

Gladesville Mental Hospital is one of those asylums that started with a cruel history that lends itself to hauntings later. This began as the Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum in 1838 just outside of Sydney, Australia. Care of the mentally ill would change and get better through the decades. And yet, a creepy essence has been left behind. The keepers in asylums were once called wardens, which reflects the early treatment of the mentally ill. The ill were referred to as lunatics and inmates and they were considered dangerous and needed to be locked away from society. On previous asylum episodes, we have mentioned Bedlam, the first asylum opened in London, England back in 1247. This was the model that many institutions followed, so patients weren't treated for their ailments and they weren't cared for either. Many were left in their own waste and vomit and were chained to beds and walls. Wealthy people with mental illness were usually kept at home and locked in rooms or separate wings, or they would be moved to private homes set up for their care. Doctors who cared for them were called alienists. This term started to be used in the mid-nineteenth century. Most people probably haven't heard of this term, but it was resurrected by a television series that launched in 2018. The mentally ill were thought to have mental alienation and alienists were tasked with studying, understanding and caring for the afflicted.

Now let's flip to the 19th century in Sydney, Australia. When the First Fleet arrived in Australia in 1788, many of the first 750 convicts brought here were mentally ill. Anybody that was a risk to the community was locked up and criminals, the mentally disabled and the mentally ill were all imprisoned at the Town Gaol in Parramatta. The first mental asylum was built in 1811 at Castle Hill in New South Wales. The first purpose built psychiatric hospital would be Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum, which opened in 1838 in Sydney. Twelve more asylums would be built in New South Wales in the 1800s. Treatment was horrendous until The Lunacy Act was introduced in 1843, but improvements really wouldn't be made until 1852 when the government started investigating violence, corruption, mistreatment and mismanagement. Moral treatment began along with work schemes as asylums became more like farms. Treatment would improve even more over the decades with medication. Deinstitutionalization began in Australia in 1992.

Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum was built on the banks of the Parramatta River in a town named Gladesville. Before the convicts made their way to this area, the Wallumettagal people of the Eora nation lived here. They left behind their rock carvings. Gladesville was named for John Glade who bought the land here in 1836. And it's a good thing they changed the name because before that it was called Doody's Bay. Okay, so we'll put aside our thirteen-year-old boy senses of humor and reveal that it was named for the guy who got the first land grant, John Doody. Construction on the asylum began in 1836 under the design of Colonial Architect, Mortimer Lewis. That construction was completed in 1838. This initial design consisted of two wards, one for each gender, and could accommodate sixty patients in separate cells. There was also a central Keeper's House.

John Thomas Digby was the first supervisor and his wife Susannah served as matron. Patients were brought in from Liverpool and the Female Factory at Parramatta. In 1848, Dr. Francis Campbell became the Medical Supervisor, but Digby would remain until 1850 when he was dismissed. Frederick Norton Manning was the next supervisor and he came on board in 1867. He had just returned from a trip overseas to study methods of patient care. Upon his first inspection of the asylum, he was disturbed to see the isolation of the patients and how gloomy and prison-like the asylum was with a monotonuous and deficient diet. The name of the asylum was changed in 1869 to the Hospital for the Insane, Gladesville. This change was made to indicate that people would be cared for and no longer locked away. Manning ordered that restraints be used at a minimum. The hospital was expanded and modernized and new workshops and workrooms were constructed.

One of the older buildings on the grounds was made from stone, brick and timber and was dubbed "The Priory." This was built in the late 1840s by Thomas Stubbs as designed by William Weaver and Henry Hardie Kemp in the Georgian style and had a west face with a gable and painted sundial. This sundial was considered a relic and was the only vertical sundial in Australia. This portion of The Priory was later demolished and the sundial lost. There is a Catholic religious organization in Australia known as the Society of Mary and members are called the Marist Fathers, who model their lives after the Virgin Mary. They used The Priory in the early days and then it was acquired by the hospital in 1888 as part of its expansion. This land had already been set up as a farm and vineyard, so the patients just continued that work, harvesting the crops for use at the hospital. They did this farming for more than 60 years.

Colonial Architect James Barnet designed additional buildings in the hospital grounds precinct. One of these buildings was a two-story plus basement stone and slate building with verandah, timber framed awning and corrugated iron verandah roof with a stone chimney. This was completed in 1878 and served as the Medical Superintendent's residence. Other buildings added to the property included the wash house, the dead house and gate keeper's quarters. A cemetery was also added to the property at a distance from buildings and consecrated. Eric Sinclair headed up the asylum from 1882 to 1925. He oversaw gas lighting being added to the property and water issues that had continued for decades would finally be rectified. Gladesville would be the only mental hospital with industrial workshops in New South Wales. The name was changed to Gladesville Mental Hospital in 1915.

Horace Henry Nowland became supervisor in 1926 and he stayed on until 1950. He laid the foundation at the hospital for an enlightened approach to the treatment of the mentally ill. Despite his efforts, the 1930s to 1950s were considered a period of decline in mental health treatment. Gladesville Mental Hospital was used as an air raid shelter during World War II. The main shelter was cut into the terrace alongside the Weaver wing's main front. In the 1960s, the headstones were removed from the cemetery and taken to the Field of Mars Cemetery. There was no indication that bodies were moved as well. The number of patients at the the hospital declined greatly by the 1970s when services were decentralized. Gladesville Hospital was combined with Macquarie Hospital to form the Gladesville Macquarie Hospital in 1993. The last inpatient services were closed down in 1997.

As we know, the kind of care and numbers of deaths at these facilities lends itself to haunting activity. Patients were abused and restrained for hours at a time. Female patients were assaulted by fellow male patients and staff. Staff were also assaulted by patients, one of them dying 1884 after being kicked in the stomach by a patient. Even with modern advances, it was reported in a newspaper in 1954 that a female patient's head was left burnt after she received electric shock treatments. Mass graves are believed to be on the property, possibly holding up to 1200 people. Because of all of this, the hospital is said to be the most haunted place in New South Wales. Now we could believe that, but there aren't many stories to back that up because this is an abandoned property left to neglect and vandalism. A picture taken by Yvette Worboys in 2011 seemed to reveal a presence standing in a doorway. Psychics claim there are spirits here and several people have written in blogs that walking the property gives them the creeps. A writer on leftrightcreative.org wrote, "I can attest to the eerie and unsettling feeling that cloaks you as you make your way through Gladesville Mental Hospital." 

King George V Avenue

King George V Avenue in Tamworth was created as a tribute to King George V. This is an avenue of English Oaks planted in 1936 at the Paradise Tourist Park. The trees form an interlocking cathedral like effect that is today a protected site. There are many reports of a phantom set of headlights appearing to people driving toward the city on the Avenue. Cars have random electrical problems like fuses blowing. A ghost car is also seen.

Jenolan Caves

The Jenolan Caves are located in the World Heritage Blue Mountains and are the largest cave system in Australia. The Gundungurra People have been the traditional custodians of the caves with the Burra Burra being the main clan here. Each clan has its own special totem animal and they are not allowed to injure, kill or eat this animal. The totem for the Burra Burra is the Gunyunggalong Biggiewan. We think this is a lizard. The totems come down from the Dreamtime, which is an explanation of how the Earth and everything in it was created. This is a religious belief system. The Jenolan Caves receive more than a quarter million visitors every year. There are many creepy tales connected to the caves, which is not surprising based on what we have shared about caves in Kentucky. Staff and visitors claim to see phantom figures, lights turn on and off b y themselves and security gates rattle. One of the spirits here is believed to belong to James Wiburd, who was Jenolan’s third caretaker around 1903. He loved the place so much, they think he never left. One visitor claimed to have seen someone in the shadows watching the tour group and that this appeared to be an old man in a suit. The Jenolan Caves embrace their spirits and share these stories on their website:

"The Orient Scream

One evening, cave guide, Geoff Melbourne, was taking a small family through the Orient Cave.  It was very quiet. They were in a chamber known as ‘The Well’, looking up at the natural dome far above them.  Geoff was describing their surroundings, when he heard a loud, piercing scream, that made him jump. It came from the chamber that they had just left. The man said, “What was that noise?”  Geoff said, “What did you hear?”  “Sounded like a woman screaming,” the man said. Geoff said, ‘Yep, that’s what it sounded like to me.” The children started to cry, and they all decided to leave the cave without finishing the tour.

Why didn’t he check it out?  He said that he was absolutely certain there was no one else in the cave. They had just been in the chamber from which the sound had come. It’s impossible for visitors to get into a cave unaccompanied, and there was no reason for any staff to be there at night.  Could it have been a Sooty Owl?  Although it is quite uncommon to see or hear one, there are Sooty Owls at Jenolan. They have only ever been seen in the Nettle Cave, where they have roosted for literally thousands of years.  Sooty Owls make a short, descending screech, which is often called the ‘falling bomb whistle’.  Did they hear a Sooty Owl that night?  Geoff doesn’t believe so, as there is no way that an owl could have got into the Orient Cave, because of the solid doors, and in the Orient, it is impossible to hear any external noises, no matter how loud, even if a real bomb fell!

The Laughing Children

The Jubilee Cave is currently closed for tours, but a few years ago, cave guide, Geoff Melbourne, was showing a group of adults through.  The big chamber called the ‘Water Cavern’ marked the furthest reaches of the Jubilee, where tour groups always turn around to go back. The group had stopped to photograph the unusual chocolate-coloured stalactites and gaze into the enormous Water Cavern, before turning around to return the way they came.  Out of the darkness of the cavern, Geoff clearly heard the noise of a group of small children giggling and laughing.  He asked his group, “Did you hear that?  They all heard it too.  There was no explanation.  They could not leave quickly enough.

The Shoulder Tap

Some cave guides, while underground, have been tapped on their shoulder. They look around, but no one is there. It seems to happen to the female guides more often.  Some guides speculate it is the ‘ghost’ of James Wiburd, who worked at Jenolan for nearly 50 years, from 1885 to 1932, and was devoted to the place.  He and his colleagues explored the cave system thoroughly, discovering several of Jenolan’s most spectacular caves.  It is even rumoured that his ashes are hidden in the caves.

Visitors have sometimes told stories of seeing a tall, thin old man on their tour, sporting a big moustache and dark suit, but when they looked again he was gone. The description matches Wiburd.  He was a gentleman.  Maybe when he taps female guides on the shoulder, he’s really trying to say, “Young lady, you are doing a better job than I ever did.” We hope that’s it, anyway.

The Children in the Hallway

Caves House staff have repeatedly reported that at night they hear children loudly running up and down the hallway in the Vernon Wing, which was the first section of Caves House to be built, in 1897. (The Vernon Wing is currently staff accommodation.) The noise is loud enough to keep staff awake at night, but no children are ever seen.

The Lady’s Arm

In March 2014, cave guide, Geoff Molesworth, was conducting the ‘Legends, Mysteries & Ghost’ tour, in the Mud Tunnels near the River Cave. The discussion of belief came up. One of the visitors asked whether he believed the caves really are haunted, or if it was just made up. A lady decided to share her story of what had happened in Caves House just the night before, when she was staying in room 211. To her horror, she saw a ghostly arm coming through the door of her room - no body - just an arm, wearing a lace cuff.

The Shared Dream

A family came to visit Jenolan when their 2 daughters were young.  They stayed on the 2nd floor of Caves House. The girls pestered their mother to go up to the 3rd floor, but the mother insisted that there was nothing to see there, as it was just the same as the 2nd floor, so they never went. 15 years later they visited Jenolan again, and reminisced about their previous visit. One of the girls told her sister and mother that 15 years before, after they had not been allowed to visit the 3rd floor, she dreamed she went to the 3rd floor anyway, and she and her sister were floating around the room. In the dream, their mother came upstairs, and saw the girls, as well as an older lady in a rocking chair. The mother beckoned the girls to come down, and the lady in the rocking chair calmly told the mother that the girls were only playing. The mother and the sister both said, “No, that was my dream”. All three had the same dream, but none of them spoke about it until their return to Jenolan Caves 15 years later."

Hill End Pub

Hill End Pub is also known as The Royal Hotel and is located in the village of Hill End. Hill End started in the Tambaroora area and was named Bald Hills, which changed to Forbes and then Hill End. The hotel was built in 1872 as one of over two dozen hotels built during the gold rush era between the 1850s and 1870s. The gold take in 1872 alone equals out to $40 million today. The boom brought thousands of people to the area, but after everything went bust, the place was practically deserted. As a matter of fact, The Royal Hotel is the only hotel still standing in Hill End. People claim that the hotel is haunted. A paranormal investigator stayed for  two nights in room 6 and had his camcorder recording in the hallway as well as having a digital voice recorder going both nights. He managed to capture some EVPs, one of which is a female voice saying "Help me," and he got what looked like the reflection of a woman and little boy in the museum, which had once served as a hospital. There was also a shadow figure captured on video.

Jo wrote in 2016, "We just spent New Years at the Royal Hotel, Hill End. Brilliant old place! We were in Room 12. During the first night (undisturbed) my husband’s cigarette lighter which he had placed in his packet of tobacco went missing. The next night (again undisturbed) I had put the room key in my handbag and locked the door behind us when we turned in. In the morning, the room key was sitting on the bedside table and the door wide open. The locals said that this room is reputedly haunted by a lady but no-one seems to know the story behind the haunting, only that it was probably back in the gold-rush heyday. It was a brave ghost to go into my handbag (known in our household as ‘The Bermuda Triangle’) and get the key out! The cigarette lighter never showed up. Does anyone know anything behind this particular story?"

Meg McLennan wrote in 2018 about Hill End, "Several years ago I stayed in what was known as the old post office. It was a privately owned cottage that was extremely haunted. During the night I heard people talking and laughing and actually thought there was a party going on up the road. The sounds were on the roof. I heard someone chopping and cutting up vegetables in the little old kitchen and there was a very strong smell of onions in the morning. I had a very restless night but my partner slept through everything. We went back in 2016 and the house was no longer available to rent/ stay in."

Brae Lossie

Jo also wrote about this in 2016, "Another place to def’ check out is a holiday cottage near Oberon, called Brae Lossie. We went there several times with no incidents then one weekend, the weird business started at full volume. We were informed by a very well respected psychic that in the late 1890s an itinerant had asked for a bed for the night from the then-owner, an aboriginal man. The itinerant murdered him and buried him on the property but since the place was so isolated then (still is) and people moved around a lot usually in search of gold then, no one really noticed that the property had changed hands. So the itinerant was still trying to protect his secret. Apparently because we had kept going back, it decided to try and scare us off. Most people don’t return for a holiday or weekend there but they aren’t sure why. There have been other incidents there due to this haunting: fights, quarrels, at least two stabbings, one of them fatal. If you do go, get yourself plenty of psychic protection."

It appeared that this property had fallen into disrepair and was going to be demolished, so we're not sure if it still stands.

Sydney University

The University of Sydney was founded in 1850 and has been ranked in the top 10 of the world's most beautiful universities. The Anderson Stuart Building is the Medical Sciences building and is one of the most well known buildings on campus. It's gorgeous and was built in the Gothic and Tudor Revival style of architecture.  

Eelboy wrote in 2015, "The Anderson Stuart Building @ Sydney University is supposedly haunted. My mother worked there for 25 years; she used to type student essays after hours in the old days before laptops. I would pick her up & take her to Redfern station for the trip home often well after sundown when the building was locked up & all was in darkness (I had a side door key). One night she asked a PhD student whose thesis she was finishing off to make her a cup of tea.The student returned minutes later absolutely terror-struck. When she regained a degree of composure, she claimed she had been groped by an unseen assailant & absolutely refused to leave my mother’s office by herself. The story goes that this was the ghost of a randy old professor. My mother had several such stories. The place was certainly pretty creepy. It contained an anatomy museum with prosecuted bodies in glass tanks of formaldehyde. The long high central hall had a marble floor and busts of famous medical people placed at regular intervals on rails along both walls. One winter night c1976 about 8pm, I entered through the caretakers side door & was walking down this corridor in darkness with only the dim outlines of the busts visible. My footsteps echoed on the stone floor. All of a sudden I got the feeling that I wasn’t alone & so I stopped. The sound of footsteps trailed off down the corridor for about another 8 or 9 paces. My mother was seated at her typewriter as usual & asked me to get her a cuppa when I entered her office. No she hadn’t left her office for any reason since telling the caretaker she would lock up as she hadn’t finished – @ 7.00pm when he’d finished work & left for the night. The student for whom she was typing she had just phoned to clarify the spelling of a couple of words. We were alone in the building."

Zac's Story

"Hi I’m Zac, I am a twelve year old boy and here is my story from Vintage Lakes, South Tweed, NSW, Australia. The weather was beautiful as it always is in Australia. It was a sunny day, the large colorful variety of wonderful birds were chirping and the sky was cloudless. That’s when everything went terribly wrong, I turned my little bike into the dark forest grove where the large and menacing trees blotted out the sky and the only exits were the two small openings at the front and back as the sides were covered by large wooden fences. I rode to the middle and stopped realizng the birds were silent and the wind was unusually strong. That’s when I saw it, a large non-human humanoid figure which was only red, my heart started pounding and I felt only fear for what it might be. It walked forward taking no notice of me. Suddenly, being the headstrong 10-year-old I was, I rushed at it . I neared it as it turned a bend in the path but, by the time I was there, it had disappeared. This figure had somehow managed to escape a place with no reachable exits and disappear without a trace. As I biked out of that dark grove, the small passageway the length of a house felt like a mile of land that was inescapable and would trap me there forever. I was always a believer in other beings, whether you call them spirits, energy beings or ghosts, I believed in them. But now, my perspective had become something more. I had a face-to-face encounter with something that was not a living being. I never forgot that day and I never will feel such fright as I did."

Carolyn's Story

Carolyn Palmer wrote in January of 2023 about a location in Glen Innes in NSW, "I was attending a dinner at a radio station at Glen Innes with my husband and children when I felt a hand touch me on the shoulder. I looked up expecting to see someone, but there was nobody there. Then I noticed my give year old daughter looking behind me and saying “Oh mummy! I thought there was someone standing beside you!” I told the people at the station but they did not seem to be interested. Almost as though it was a bit of sensitive issue. I never mentioned it again and we never went back. I think the station is in an old church and the dinner was being held in what used to be the reception hall. I was pregnant at the time and the whole thing gave me a very bad feeling."

New South Wales has a rich history, particularly since this is where Australia got its start. Are these locations we shared haunted? That is for you to decide!