done in the village than make a noise!â
Don Quixote , Miguel de Cervantes (Spanish writer, 1547â1616)
In the autumn of 1921 the town of Guyra in northern New South Wales found itself in the international spotlight. For a period of about six weeks the world watched with morbid curiosity as a workerâs cottage about a kilometre from the town centre was assaulted by a destructive, invisible force, the occupants were driven to despair and the rest of the community tottered on the brink of mass hysteria.
It all began one morning when Bill Bowen, a gang foreman who worked for the Guyra Shire Council, walked into the townâs police station and complained to Sergeant Ridge that during the night someone had placed a heavy wooden railway sleeper up against a window of the cottage he and his family rented. Putty, he said, had also been removed from around the pane of glass in the window.
The sergeant sent his two constables out to investigate. One, Roy Stennett, recalled fifty years later that when they got to the Bowensâ house they inspected the window and removed the railway sleeper, leaving it fifty metres from the house. As the previous day had been April Foolâs Day, the police concluded that the whole incident had been either a prank played on the Bowens by someone else or played on them by Bill Bowen. Mild amusement turned toannoyance when Bowen turned up at the police station the next morning complaining that the sleeper was back and more putty gone. Sergeant Ridge was now convinced that Bowen was pulling his leg. He told his constables to go back and shift the sleeper then return, secretly, after dark, to keep watch on the house.
Stennett and his colleague arrived at the Bowensâ for the second time that day at dusk and settled down behind some bushes to watch â confidently expecting to catch Bill Bowen setting them up again. Less than an hour later they heard the crack of a .22-calibre rifle close by and the sound of a bullet ricocheting off the house. They ran towards where the shot had come from but could find no one. They returned to the house, where Bowen, his wife and three children were huddled in the kitchen, clearly frightened.
The next day the police and most of the townspeople were distracted by another problem. An eighty-year-old Irish woman, Mrs Doran, had been seen wandering around a paddock the day before with a potato in each hand. She had not returned home that night, so a full-scale search was undertaken. No trace of the old lady was found and the search was called off when darkness fell.
The two constables returned to the Bowensâ home for another night vigil, this time inside the house. Soon after their arrival loud thumping was heard on the walls near the window where the railway sleeper had been placed and in one bedroom. From inside it sounded as though the thumping was coming from outside, but nothing could be seen through the windows. When the police went outside to investigate, the sound seemed to be coming from the inside. These unexplained noises continued for another two nights, then stones ranging in diameter from three to eight centimetres began to raindown on the corrugated iron roof of the house â singly and in deafening showers.
By then everyone in town and the surrounding district had heard what was going on. Crowds gathered around the Bowensâ house each night to witness the strange to-do. Sergeant Ridge recruited volunteers to stand guard in each of the four rooms in the house and around the outside. Motorcars were lined up in a cordon with their headlights trained on the house, ready to flood the area with light as soon as anything happened. And happen it did, just after dark. The thumping began, rocks crashed into the walls and roof of the house and window panes were smashed. No one could have broken through the cordon without being caught, which meant that either someone within the house was responsible for the thumping and someone
Don Quixote , Miguel de Cervantes (Spanish writer, 1547â1616)
In the autumn of 1921 the town of Guyra in northern New South Wales found itself in the international spotlight. For a period of about six weeks the world watched with morbid curiosity as a workerâs cottage about a kilometre from the town centre was assaulted by a destructive, invisible force, the occupants were driven to despair and the rest of the community tottered on the brink of mass hysteria.
It all began one morning when Bill Bowen, a gang foreman who worked for the Guyra Shire Council, walked into the townâs police station and complained to Sergeant Ridge that during the night someone had placed a heavy wooden railway sleeper up against a window of the cottage he and his family rented. Putty, he said, had also been removed from around the pane of glass in the window.
The sergeant sent his two constables out to investigate. One, Roy Stennett, recalled fifty years later that when they got to the Bowensâ house they inspected the window and removed the railway sleeper, leaving it fifty metres from the house. As the previous day had been April Foolâs Day, the police concluded that the whole incident had been either a prank played on the Bowens by someone else or played on them by Bill Bowen. Mild amusement turned toannoyance when Bowen turned up at the police station the next morning complaining that the sleeper was back and more putty gone. Sergeant Ridge was now convinced that Bowen was pulling his leg. He told his constables to go back and shift the sleeper then return, secretly, after dark, to keep watch on the house.
Stennett and his colleague arrived at the Bowensâ for the second time that day at dusk and settled down behind some bushes to watch â confidently expecting to catch Bill Bowen setting them up again. Less than an hour later they heard the crack of a .22-calibre rifle close by and the sound of a bullet ricocheting off the house. They ran towards where the shot had come from but could find no one. They returned to the house, where Bowen, his wife and three children were huddled in the kitchen, clearly frightened.
The next day the police and most of the townspeople were distracted by another problem. An eighty-year-old Irish woman, Mrs Doran, had been seen wandering around a paddock the day before with a potato in each hand. She had not returned home that night, so a full-scale search was undertaken. No trace of the old lady was found and the search was called off when darkness fell.
The two constables returned to the Bowensâ home for another night vigil, this time inside the house. Soon after their arrival loud thumping was heard on the walls near the window where the railway sleeper had been placed and in one bedroom. From inside it sounded as though the thumping was coming from outside, but nothing could be seen through the windows. When the police went outside to investigate, the sound seemed to be coming from the inside. These unexplained noises continued for another two nights, then stones ranging in diameter from three to eight centimetres began to raindown on the corrugated iron roof of the house â singly and in deafening showers.
By then everyone in town and the surrounding district had heard what was going on. Crowds gathered around the Bowensâ house each night to witness the strange to-do. Sergeant Ridge recruited volunteers to stand guard in each of the four rooms in the house and around the outside. Motorcars were lined up in a cordon with their headlights trained on the house, ready to flood the area with light as soon as anything happened. And happen it did, just after dark. The thumping began, rocks crashed into the walls and roof of the house and window panes were smashed. No one could have broken through the cordon without being caught, which meant that either someone within the house was responsible for the thumping and someone
Similar Books
