FEATURE: Witches searching for spirits in Louth Conservative Working Men’s Club

Tanya Mitchell, Donna Short, and Nicola Anderson try out the crystal ball.

Witches Shelley Mayes and Tess Lowe teamed up with Christine Daniels of Nirvana Spiritual Events to host a paranormal investigation evening at Louth’s Conservative Working Men’s Club on Thursday (March 28), and I went along to see if there were spirits in the upstairs function room, as well as the bar downstairs.

Established in February 1874, the Working Men’s Club, located on Queen Street, is the second oldest working men’s club in the UK, closely behind Holbeck’s club in Leeds, which was established in 1871.

Steph Vines, manager of the club, said that the building had stood as a working men’s club for all the time of its existence, and that it is thought that a couple of members had passed away within its walls over the years.

From left: Jenny Gill Farris, Paula Hogg, medium Christine Daniels, Bernadette Hogg, and Sandra Gill.

High Priestess Shelley and her second Tessa, who run Horncastle’s witchcraft shop Flange & Prong, started off the evening by explaining how the night would run, with individual investigations using spirit boards (used under the team’s protection), pendulums, EMF readers, table tipping, and a crystal ball.

The evening began with a protective circle of light to prevent any harmful entities from coming forward during the night’s activities, and medium Christine also called on Michael the Archangel for protection.

People had come for the event from all over the Wolds and beyond with Elaine and Darren Hall coming all the way from Chapel St Leonards.

"Not much like this happens in Chapel but there’s so much going on in Louth we had to come over,” they said.

A male presence was felt in this corner of the room.

During the evening, temperature changes were picked up in a corner of the room Christine picked up on the presence of a male spirit, who she said was shy and reluctant to come forward, and was holding a deep sadness.

After a number of individual seances, the group was brought back together for a group seance, where EMF readers and spirit light-up balls were used to encourage any spirits to channel the group’s energies to make the equipment come to life.

Before long, Tessa was receiving the energy of a no-nonsense, matriarchal type lady who was reluctant to do as she was bid, and number of messages came through to Christine from loved ones of those around the table, but any other spirits connected to the working men’s club didn’t make their presence known.

The evening finished with the team offering personal readings, and Shelley said the evening seemed to be a success:

Camille Smith, Claire Dodsworth, and Tara Davis try out pendulums.

"It’s been a really good night and we hope people have enjoyed themselves and got what they wanted to from the night.”

Flange & Prong has just celebrated its seventh anniversary of business in Horncastle. See our special feature on the witches in next week’s Horncastle News.