Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Wales, for my money, is home to some of the best folklore tales and ghost stories. For example, here is this account of a very disgruntled spirit. ("Driffield Times," April 19, 1879):

A strange ghost story (says the Birmingham Gazette) comes from the Principality. There is a friendly society at Pontardawe, in the Swansea Valley, among whose rules is one that the funeral allowance on account of a deceased member shall not be paid in cases of suicide. One of the members recently died by his own hand, and the club accordingly refused to pay the death money. For this reasonable and just refusal the members are now complaining that they are subjected to serious persecution from an unseen and presumably a ghostly agent.

The manifestations began on a recent Sunday, when one of the officers, returning home over a lonely road, was assailed, as he asserts, by the spirit of the late member, who, failing to obtain a satisfactory reply to his demand for the money, in a somewhat unspiritlike manner assailed the unfortunate man. and actually "tore his clothes to ribbons." Such, at least, was the account he gave in tones of horror at the first public-house he came to after this terrific encounter.

But the ghost does not appear to have been satisfied with this demonstration. On the following Tuesday evening, whilst the members were assembled in the lodge room, the usual knocks were heard at the door as of a brother seeking admittance. The door was opened, but no one was to be seen. The members, however, are all very certain that they beard the voice of the deceased utter the words, "Pay my widow my funeral money, and then I shall rest." The meeting precipitately broke up, and the members are now puzzled to know what do with such a determined deceased brother.

I couldn't find any sequel to this story, but if I know my disgruntled ghosts, the members would have been wise to just pay up.