Post by Spooky on Sept 22, 2004 15:06:32 GMT
By Eddie McIlwaine
emcilwaine@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
21 September 2004
Spirit medium Derek Acorah, who will be intriguing a packed audience at the Waterfront Hall tomorrow night, has agreed to investigate Carrie the restless ghost of the Tullyglass Hotel in Ballymena.
She's the little girl who is said to haunt an old bell tower at the hostelry who has been seen by owner Chris McConville and several members of his staff.
"I will send Sam my spiritual guide down to Ballymena to do some detective work," promised Acorah, the former Liverpool soccer player, who claims to talk regularly to his former manager Bill Shankly who died 22 years ago.
"Sam is from the other side himself - a friend of mine from years and years ago in a previous life. I communicate with Sam and he gives me good advice.
"I will be talking to him about the Tullyglass affair and he will be finding out for me what is going on in that tower.
"It may take some time, but Sam has never failed."
Carrie, who is believed to have died in the tower some 200 years ago when the Tullyglass was a mansion house, could end up a subject on the Acorah Antiques Ghost Show which is essential viewing on the Living TV satellite television channel.
So popular is this ghost-hunter that there is a long waiting list for the Waterfront show and already the management are negotiating for a return visit before the end of the year, next time for several days.
Down at the Tullyglass, Carrie has made only fleeting appearances since the announcement by Mr McConville of a £1.7m refurbishment at the hotel.
"I didn't believe in ghosts until Carrie happened," he said today.
"My theory is that after unfounded rumours that the Tullyglass was to be knocked down to make way for a housing development, she thought her abode was about to disappear.
" She seemed to settle down again after my plans for an extension were revealed.
"I'm happy for this spirit guide Acorah to investigate, although I don't know much about Sam."
Acorah (53), has already this year identified a sailor who owned a watch picked up from the wreckage of the Titanic.
"There are ghosts out there - they are the restless spirits who haven't yet entered the light of God's kingdom.
"I don't go to church, but I believe in God and the hereafter. I am the receiver of messages from the spirit world and I pass the messages on. The dead have only gone on a journey through a doorway."