Experiment

experiment


experiment

Blue Bell Hill - Maidstone

Aim:
To stake out two Neolithic sites during the course of one night to try to record scientifically evidence of the alleged paranormal activity that has been reported over the years.

Background - Kits Coty:
Kit's Coty House or Kit's Coty is the name of the remains of a Neolithic chambered long barrow on Blue Bell Hill near Aylesford in Kent. It is one of the Medway megaliths. Although badly damaged by ploughing and later vandalism the impressive entrance to the tomb still survives. It consists of three sarsen orthostats supporting a horizontal capstone with a total height of almost 3m. This would have been at one end of a 70m earthen long barrow oriented east-west. The mound and ditches are now all but gone and only the stones remain. William Stukeley visited the site in 1772 and was able to sketch the site whilst it was still largely intact.


Stukeley's 1722 prospect of Kit's Coty House with its remnant long barrow still just visible and labelled 'The Grave'

Before this, Samuel Pepys also saw it and wrote:

"Three great stones standing upright and a great round one lying on them, of great bigness, although not so big as those on Salisbury Plain. But certainly it is a thing of great antiquity, and I am mightily glad to see it."

In 1854, it was investigated by Thomas Wright who found 'rude pottery' beneath the stones and further Neolithic shards were recovered from the surrounding field in 1936. Trenching 1956 located the silted-up ditch surrounding the southern side of the monument and further stones which had been pushed into the ditch when the monument was partially demolished. An excavation in advance of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link which runs nearby found the remains of a Neolithic longhouse. In 1885, Kit's Coty was one of the first sites in Britain to become a Scheduled Ancient Monument and the iron railings that surround it were added a few years later. As only the megalithic portion of the barrow was fenced in by the railings, the long earth barrow has been continually ploughed away since, with uncovered stones dumped in woodland nearby by the farmer and the mound itself, still visible in the mid-twentieth century, now gone.

Some call it simply Kit's Coty, because 'coty' means the same as 'house'. The story explaining the name tells us that Kit refers to Catigern, son of King Vortigern, who together with his brother Vortimer fought Hengist and his brother Horsa here around 455. Hengist and Horsa were challenging their father, King Vortigern, at a place called Aegelesthrep. Both Horsa and Catigern were killed. We don't know who won, but Catigern was supposedly buried here. You can imagine a stand-off between two bloodied armies on either side of the river, the ford having been the contested object.

To top things off, I should say that the place is reputedly haunted. Ghostly re-enactments of a battle, may be this battle are said to be heard at one time or another. Another tradition is that at full moon you may place a personal object on the capstone, walk around the dolmen three times, after which the object will have disappeared. No guarantees, though.

Background - The Whitehorse Stone:
The Whitehorse Stone is 2.9m long, 1.65m high and about 0.6m thick and stands just off the Pilgrim's Way. Close by it are nine smaller stones that stretch to the west for about 10m. There is no evidence of a covering barrow and it has been suggested that these much smaller stones were moved from the neighbouring field by local farmers. Its identification as a chambered long barrow like the other Medway megaliths is therefore uncertain although its shape certainly resembles a chamber wall stone. In local tradition it is also the burial place of the Saxon leader Horsa (see above). The standing stone is also considered by some visitors to resemble a horse's head. Both these links have been suggested as the source of the name. A connection with the white horse on Kent's "Invicta" coat of arms has also been invoked.

Kits Coty has been investigated before by other groups who are known to have had remarkable results, but it has never been investigated by Ghost Connections before. We were not aware that the Whitehorse Stone had ever been investigated before and we are also unaware of any reported paranormal activity. With many old stories about the area of Kits Coty and Blue Bell Hill in general we were looking forward to spending the night at these two locations.

Apparatus:
Cameras
Nikon Coolpix 3100
Fuji Finepix 4900
Kodak Easyshare cx7310
Sony DCSV1
Fuji Finepix S5000
Fuji Finepix S5500
Practica Digicam 3

Camcorder
Sony DCR- HC30E
Samsung VP-D351 with night vision (x2)
Sony DCR-HC19
Sony Hi-8

EVP
Sharp PA- VR10E

EMF
Gauss EMF Meter

OTHER
Data Logger EL-USB2
IR Emitter Sony HVL-IRM (x2)
Tripods
Torches
Tapes (VHS/Hi-8/MiniDV)

Co-Investigators:
Ian, Kim, Dave, Sarah, Paddy and Rachel

Method:
This was to be investigation of two venues in one night. First we would be investigating Kits Coty House and the surrounding area including the footpath and the adjacent field before moving on to The Whitehorse Stone. The entire night was to be flexible and we could spend our time between the two sites as and when we wished, but we were to start the night at Kits Coty House. Although there was a lot of noise pollution in the area from the motorways we were to try some EVP, as witnesses have previously told tales of hearing the noise of battle, horses and swords clashing. the rest of our time was to be spent simply being quiet and observing, with possibly a spiritual experiment to see if we could stir up any activity. Then we were to move on to The Whitehorse Stone and do much the same thing. Obviously recording using camcorder and still photography as always.

The Investigation:
After arriving and meeting the others at a local pub we drove up to the Old Chatham Road. We arrived about 10.00pm and walked down the footpath to Kits Coty. This is an unnerving walk because it is so dark and eerie in the tunnel of overhanging trees that line the path. This was even more so when, as we approached the field where the stones are we heard voices. Unfortunately this was not paranormal and came from a group of lads who were hanging around the stones drinking. Our plans scuppered we decided to walk off into the middle of the field and try to soak up a bit of the battlefield atmosphere. We tried to start the investigation but ended up sitting in the field talking and still feeling a little unsettled as we knew others were nearby and they were drinking! Needless to say we had a good discussion about all matters paranormal, kept an eye on our neighbours and tried to create a few more fake pictures using flying torches and interesting camera settings. This was all good fun and sort of constructive but not why we were there. It seemed that the presence of the lads had certainly thrown us a bit. When we did settle a bit more we started seeing a torchlight moving from across another part of the field. We assumed that our "experiments" with flying lights may have caught someone’s attention, needless to say the purpose of us being there had somewhat been lost, and despite the lads having gone, at about 12.30 am we decided to move on to The Whitehorse Stone.

Once at the White Horse Stone we encountered another problem, campers, right next to the stone! This closed of our other avenue of investigation for the night, which was slowly going down hill. Dave's thought was that it was possible that the encampment was set up by the followers of Odin. These people have done a lot of work over the years to preserve and clean up the area of The Whitehorse Stone, although there was nothing on their site to say why they may have been there. They appear to hold a summer camp nearest 21 June each year to celebrate their festival of Balder. Please see the links below for more information.

http://www.odinic-rite.org/ http://www.odinic-rite.org/oryear.htm http://www.odinic-rite.org/Guardians/index.html

However, this was not helping our nights investigation much as it seemed that wherever we went we came up against obstacles, it can happen on outdoor investigations as there is only so much you can plan for, and you need to expect the unexpected. By the time 1.30 am had come around we were all a bit demoralised and although we could have returned to Kits Coty House the majority of us were feeling a bit flat and disappointed so we decided to call it and all head off home for an early night.

We shall be making a return to Blue Bell Hill in the next few months in an attempt to carry out this investigation as planned. Please keep an eye out for our results.

 
  Results - No results recorded

 

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