The Poltergeist of Cambridge Castle

Cambridge Castle, 1730

Simon Ockley was Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge from 1711 until his death in 1720.  In 1718, he was briefly imprisoned in Cambridge Castle for debt, where his enforced stay was enlivened by the company of what we would today call a poltergeist.   Our sole source for Ockley’s brush with The Weird are from a series of letters he wrote to a “Dr. Keith” about the experience:

CAMBRIDGE, MAY 6th, 1718.

Sir,

I do not remember myself to have been worse in my whole lifetime than I was on Sunday last when to mend the matter I was plagued all night with a Caccodæmon that infests our castle after a very strange manner. He did not suffer me to get one wink of rest till after broad daylight, and not much then, for he is verily as troublesome in the day as the night at certain times.

I know these things are exploded as mere Chimeras in this (si Dus placet) discerning age; but they must give me leave to trust to my own experience rather than to their Cui bonos.

I felt him moving under the bed and heaving it up. I waited the event, whilst he entertained me with variety of sounds and capricious troublesome motions in different parts of the room. At last he gave such an explosion under the bed as seem'd to sound in my ears as loud as the largest cannon, and rais'd both me and the bed with the force of it.

I soon after heard him tapping at the top of my bed's head. I asked him what we were to have next? Immediately he flew through the boards that separate my bed chamber from the next room, and returned again with such violence that you would have imagined that he had shivered them all to pieces. Then giving a slight tap in the midst of a great boarded wooden chair that stands close by my bed's head, he seem'd to make such a noise as when a great cat leaps down upon the boards, but withall so hollow as if all his body except his feet had been made of copper. I look'd for him instantly, the moon shining very bright, but there was no appearance; then moving a little while at a distance he returned to his old tricks again.

Once he was whisking about in the corner of the room and made such a noise suppose as a cat would do playing with a piece of paper. I snatched the curtain immediately to see him, which he took so ill that I thought my great wooden chair had been coming directly at me; such a suddain terrible jarring noise did he make with it.

So civil he is that tho' the parlour where I live all the daytime is a good bow's shot distance from the chamber where I lodge, yet he now and then makes me a visit here; and not long since I was talking to an honest man about him, who is not over credulous in such cases, he made a proselyte of him at once by giving such a bounce as seem’d to shake the whole room and almost to blow me and my chair quite away, tho’ I could never perceive anything stir.

Yesterday about one o'clock he entertain'd us with a multitude of hollow thumps exactly resembling the fire of cannon at a distance. In the afternoon it was more like thunder.

The last night I design'd to entertain him by candle light, but perceiving that some people in the street had got a notion that I was going to conjure down a spirit, and besides that he was not so active as in the dark; to humour him in his own way I put out my candle and put myself in a posture for his reception. The first I heard of him was a leap from the windows like a cat; then the noise of two able threshers upon a boarded floor. Afterwards he twisted a long line making the same noise that the ropemakers do. He whistles admirably well and drives a cart or a gang of packhorses. I have heard the sound of the bells as distinctly as ever I did in my life. After he had entertained me thus for a while, I having rebuked him after such a manner as I thought most proper, I was resolved to endeavour to compose myself to sleep in spite of him which I did, but he would not let me rest long.

I fancy there is a gang of them, or else he is like the Old Man in Scarron's comical Romance, that used to act three parts at once viz.: the King. the Queen and the ambasadour.

But, after all it is no laughing matter. I am sure I do not find it so. It is exceedingly troublesome and terrible. There is something in the nature of those separated beings so different from flesh and blood as make their too near approach almost insupportable. God preserve us all from the Malignant influences of infernal powers for the sake of our blessed Lord the Saviour Jesus Christ.

Yesterday my daughter was here, and having confess'd that there were unaccountable sounds, she wished they were louder. The spirit did not stay a great while before he gratified her request, and gave us a peal like thunder.

If anyone doubts the truth of this I am ready to resign my chamber to him with all my heart.

S. OCKLEY.

Ockley wrote to Keith again on May 23rd: 

Dear Sir,

I perceive you are under a mistake. You are not aware how much I converse in my thoughts with the invisible world. I never make any ostentation of it, for if I ever mention anything that goes any farther than Mathematical demonstration our people know just as much of it as I do about the situation of the cities in the moon. But you are a Gentleman to whom I have such obligations that it is not, nor ought to be, in my power to refuse you anything; but notwithstanding all those obligations were they ten times greater, they should not induce me to communicate anything of this kind, unless I had that same assurance that I have of your being thoroughly qualified to judge of things of this nature.

Whether or no the spirit haunts the castle I am not certain. I believ'd so at first, but this I am fully assured of, that his last visit was a particular Dispensation of Providence to me.

I have heard him make noises at a distance some months ago. I am not so acquainted with things of that nature as not to be able to distinguish those sounds from any other. I oftentimes said there was a spirit and was of course as often laughed at.

But once (I believe about 3 weeks ago) I had sent the keeper on an errand, it was about 9 o'clock at night, and my candle stood burning by my bedside, I heard upon the wall distinct rappings as if they had been upon wainscot; I anticipated your good advice. I recollected my spirits and resigned myself into the hands of the Father of Spirits under the protection of his blessed Son our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

I knew very well that that was but the beginning, and lived in constant expectation to hear more of it, which I did frequently; and the reason why I gave you a particular account of Sunday night was because it was the most remarkable.

I was indeed of your opinion first. I took it to be an uneasy departed spirit, and thought it an act of charity to assist it; but all my labour was lost; I had no remedy left but fervent prayer, in which I spent the greater part of the night.

Not that I was scared, for I defye anyone to convict me of anything that ever looked like cowardice,* if I have any fault with relation to such matters it lyes in the other extreme.

N. B. So far as the asterisk was written as soon as I received your letter, since which time I have been under such a feaverish indisposition as has made me incapable of anything and perfectly listless. I slept well for two or three nights and began to recover my strength and spirits but they must of necessity decay again unless my troublesome guest, as you very properly call him, either leave this habitation, or I be removed to another. He is come back again as it were with double force; for these two last nights he has exercised me incessantly from ten till after four in the morning. Last night he gave near I believe an hundred strokes in the next room to me as loud as men make when they are rendering timber or breaking down wainscot! besides variety of rappings, hideous, hollow, inarticulate voices, besides several other inimitable sounds. This morning between three and four a'clock he was very busy in rubbing down a long table that stands in my room, and as he was whisking about, he now and then stumpt like one that has a wooden leg. You seem, Sir, to think that he is a ludicrous spirit, and that therefore he is never to be entertain'd or subdued in that way. I never did entertain him in that way, nor did he ever give me any reason.

I cannot yet be persuaded that he is a ludicrous spirit, nor the Soul of any person deceased. At present I take him to be a malignant evil Genius, of the same sort that I met with in Hand Alley, for the sounds and his manner are very much the same.

Nobody heard him but myself last night, and let me have been in never so great distress, I could neither have awakened any of them, nor have been able to gone out of my room.

I believe he would speak but cannot. I have thought sometimes to lay hold of some of his hollow tones but never could to any certainty. Whatsoever he is I do not desire to be farther informed by such conversation. If he is in any distress, nobody more ready than myself to serve him; but I do not desire he should distress me, which he do's exceedingly by robbing me of my rest, and exercising and debilitating my spirits. I have spoken to him several times, but he never returned a syllable of answer--a week's more such exercise would reduce me to a very bad condition.

S. OCKLEY.

Soon after this letter was written, Ockley was released and returned to his home at Swavesey.  However his supernatural troubles were not over.  On July 6th, he wrote to Keith from Swavesey:

Dear Sir,

You ask me, Sir, whether my spirit has left me or not. I cannot say that he has. About an hour ago my second daughter and I sitting in the kitchen, I heard a very great noise above stairs. Now you are to understand that I am a man the most impatient of noise of any man breathing. I took it for granted that the maid had been cleaning the rooms or making a bed, and had flung something about by accident, but having occasion to go upstairs I found the coast clear, and upon enquiry was inform'd that the maid was sent on an errand; all the rooms were immediately search'd, no cat, no dog, nothing visible.

I cannot close my letter before I acquaint you with one memoir relating to the spirit in Cambridge Castle. One night when all the prisoners were lock'd up in their rooms except two or three innocents, I had occasion to go to the house of office. As soon as I sat down and placed my candle on my left hand, the spirit came down with such force as you would have imagined would have dashed the whole partition to pieces. Such things are so far from diminishing my courage that they encrease it, for immediately I summon up all my spirits, and make the most regular Christian opposition that I am able, but as I have told you before I am not able to bear the influence of their vehicles, and I owe my present indisposition to that malignant power (so much by way of parenthesis). I immediately snatch'd up my candle in one hand, and opened the door with the other, but nothing appeared.

I knew very well that there was none of the prisoners could or would impose on me, for tho' I do not design to make going to Jayl a habit, yet common sense taught me to secure the friendship of the most impudent fellow in the crew. I hate mortally to have a piss-pot emptied upon my head, and then be answered that nobody did it. He would not I'm sure play any tricks with me because I was his best friend; besides if he would he could not, for I defye all mortal powers to impose upon me in such a case.

The sounds that those spirits make are inimitable, and their accursed Influence is supportable. However, I went up and ask'd him why he made such a noise (tho' I knew it was not he, but I was resolved to be thoroughly satisfied). The poor man was asleep, but upon my awaking him he answered that he had made no noise but had been composing himself to rest ever since he came to bed. I then took more particular notice of the building and observed that it was impossible for any of the prisoners (considering the situation of their lodgings) to have made any such noise in that place. I wrapt myself up in my gown and went thither again on purpose to see whether he would return. As soon as I was sat down he came with the same force, and gave such a jar to the door as if a man had kick'd at it with the utmost force. I saw the door jarr, as I did the first time, and opened it as quick as I could, but finding nothing went to bed. S. OCKLEY.

Dr. Keith replied on July 12th:

Rev. and Dear Sir,

I received your very acceptable letter of the 6th and rejoyced to see it dated from Swavesey. I am sorry first of all to hear of your indisposition and listlessness and especially of the weakness and tremor of your nerves. I shall set down a prescription or two at the end of this, which I desire you would use for about ten days or a fortnight. You may send for the powders mentioned in the first in two little vials, and weigh out 15 grains of each in the morning and evening when you take them. They will be the more effectual if you will add 5 grains of the Sal Succini to them, and therefore you may get one dram of this in a vial too. When you have weighed out of the powders mix them in a little conserve of Rosemary flowers, and take it by way of Bolus, drinking a cupfull of sage or sassafras tea after it. Tho' you don't mention any disorder in your stomach yet I think it fit to order a general litter for you in order to help your digestion, which I reckon to be one-half of the cure. If you hav't an honest Apothecary that's your friend your daughter may get the ingredients and boil them at home, and also the two waters to add to the liquor when it is strained out and cold. I pray God to give his blessing that they may be a means of your recovery. When you are in any tolerable condition to use it, I would recommend to you gentle exercise, and especially riding on horse-back.

In the next place I cannot but lament the negligence and imprudence of your friends both at Oxford and Cambridge, and indeed am at a loss how to account for either. In the meantime, you must take a good heart and do the best you can. And I hope you will especially since now you will be easier at home than ever. For I reckon the noise and disturbance that may come from the other spirit will be in all respects less sensible. cribed the whole of your three letters on the subject of the spirit in Cambridge Castle, and have here enclos'd them to be communicated to his Lordship at your leisure. I have not heard the least syllable of that of Hand Alley a great while. I often pass by the house and see it is still inhabited.

I remain very heartily, 

 Rev. Sir, 

Your sincere humble servant, JAMES KEΙΤΗ. 

We know nothing more about Ockley’s spectral visitor.  The professor died at Swavesey on August 9th, 1720.