March 20, 2025 • 43 mins
When three cryptic 666 omens appear, a family ignores the warning and moves into Heol Fanog. Their decision unleashes six years of supernatural torment that transforms their dream home into a paranormal prison. The home is now referred to as, Hellfire Farm... Some warnings should never be ignored.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:16):
Strange mysteries, unexplained phenomena.
And the shadows in between.
This is The InBetween Official Podcastwith your host,
Carol Ann!
The Brecon Beacon mountains of SouthernWales.
Ancient peaks that overthe millennia, have watched over
(00:38):
ancient people, ancient monumentsand maybe even ancient demons.
Welcome to The InBetween.
I'm Carol Ann, and this episodeis not for the easily spooked.
But if you think you've got what it takes,then hang with me as we follow
one family's descentinto the ultimate nightmare
(01:01):
known as Heol Fanog.
Let's just say you're getting readyto move into a new place
you go to buy supplies,and the total is $66.60.
The car that almost hits youwhen you're getting your new furniture
has a license plate of BST666.
(01:24):
And the stop you make for your last mealbefore moving in
comes to a grand total of $6.66.
Would you take the hint?
I probably wouldn't either,and neither did Bill and Liz Rich.
It's the spring of 1989just outside the southern Welsh city
of Brecon, in the foothills of the Breconbeacon mountain range
(01:47):
in the shadows of Peny Fan, the highest peak in southern Wales.
The Rich family, Bill, Liz,
and Bill's 14-year-oldson, Laurence, from a previous marriage,
pull off of the winding, narrowroad onto the driveway of their new
house–well, rented–known
(02:08):
as Heol Fanog, or "Road to the Peaks".
They get out of the carand start walking toward the house,
which is actually the renovatedbarn of the former manor house that once
stood on the property but was now reducedto crumbling stone outlines.
All three of them can physically feela bubble of peace
(02:31):
envelop them,separating them from the outside world.
This is exactly the fresh start–not
to mention the peaceand quiet–they are looking for.
The road for these threehas not been easy to this point.
Bill, who had spent a number of yearstraveling the world
trying to find himself, finally married
(02:53):
and settled down with his wife,and soon thereafter, Laurence.
But after 16 years of marriage,his wife left him for someone else,
leaving him to figure outhow to be both parents to Laurence.
Liz also had a pretty rebellious
youth, including wandering Mediterraneanfor years
(03:13):
looking for a fix for herdecade-long affliction of anorexia.
Both wayward soulsfound their separate ways back to Wales,
where Billstumbled into Liz's herbalist shop,
looking for a natural treatmentfor his depression.
That was it.
They both found what they were looking forin each other,
(03:35):
and Liz's anorexia disappeared.
So life has taken an upwardturn for both of them,
but they still have their struggles.
Liz moves in with Bill, but
they have a bunch of Karen neighborsthat make life difficult.
Bill is worried about Laurenceadjusting to losing his mom
and Liz moving in, and Bill and Liz decideto get married.
(04:00):
Oh, and Liz gets pregnant.
So everything is kind of a hot mess.
But Bill is an up-and-coming artistwho has a very good business
selling these painted wooden boxes,as well as having some of his paintings
attracting attentionin the international art world.
He even has a few paintings getting readyto be shown in an art exhibition in LA
(04:24):
whose attendees are set to bethe likes of Sylvester Stallone.
Money is good,so they start searching for a new place,
and within just a couple of weeks,they stumble onto Heol Fanog.
It's perfect.
Three acres of land, a big houseand barn, room for a huge studio
(04:45):
for Bill, quiet and no neighbors, done,
and life is good for a while.
The summer is spent getting settledin their new home, Bill and Liz
get married in September, and their babyboy, Ben, is born in October.
But November is when life changed.
(05:08):
Bill and Liz are up latedoing what newlyweds do.
Bill then heads down the stairs from thesecond floor to the bathroom on the first.
As he's in there,he's startled by the banging of what
sounds like someone running downthe upstairs hallway in hobnail boots.
Hobnail boots
are boots that have
thick-headed nailsin the bottom for durability.
(05:31):
So you can imagine how loud that sounded.
Immediately, Bill thinks,
oh, Laurence must have heard
Liz and I, and he's throwing a fit.
He steels himself for the discussionhe is about to have with his son,
when he peeks in his roomto find Laurence fast asleep.
(05:52):
It wasn't Laurence. Then, who was it?
And when he got to the bedroomwhere Liz was up
nursing Ben, he asks her about it.
She hasn't heard a thing,but they will both tell you that from
the instant Bill hearsthose footsteps, everything changes.
The next morning, the house just feelscold and claustrophobic.
(06:15):
Laurence comes thundering down the stairsto Bill and Liz in the kitchen
with a scowl on his face.
Bill asks him, "What's wrong?""Nothing." "Well,
it doesn't look like nothing.""I said, nothing's wrong." Okay, that's
certainly not the happy-go-lucky kidthey had yesterday.
But okay, he's a teenagergoing through a lot of changes, whatever.
(06:38):
Still trying to figure outexactly what he heard the night before,
Bill opens the electric billand can't quite believe what he sees.
The bill for the quarter,so the previous three months,
is 750 pounds.
That's like three grand in today's USdollars.
Holy crap.
(06:59):
That's like pot farm levels.
But Bill and Liz did not have a pot farm.
They didn't even have a regular farm.
They have a pig and a couple of goats,but that hardly qualifies.
They have no idea why the billwould be that high,
and from that momenton, anything that could go wrong did.
(07:20):
Over the next several months,all of those orders Bill had
for his paintedwooden boxes were inexplicably canceled.
Their car battery would go dead overnightfor no reason.
The gallery in LA that was set to showBill's paintings went under,
causing his paintings to be helduntil proper ownership
(07:42):
could be established, a processthat could take years.
And not only are they still hearingthose same invisible boots
running down the hallway,but now they also hear
invisible slipperspatting their way down the stairs.
The temperature in the houseis totally unpredictable.
Some days the house is so hotthat Liz has sweat running down her face.
(08:04):
She tells Bill to turn the heatdown, and Bill says the heat's not on.
Other times, it's just the opposite,where she's so cold she's shivering.
They both experience sudden odors,
either of sulfur or incense,
so strongthat they feel like they're gonna vomit,
and then they seemingly evaporateas fast as they came.
(08:26):
And it feels to everyone that they are
not the only ones living in their house.
One day, Bill is in his studio,and Liz is in the bedroom
with Ben when she hears a door slam.
Was that Bill?
Then she hears the next door slam,and then the next door slam.
The next door is the one to the roomshe is in.
(08:48):
Sure enough, Liz jumpsas she hears the door to her room
slam as well, except
the door was already closedand it had never opened.
Everybody's nerves are wearingthin, and Laurence
is going downhill fast.
He'd been telling Bill for a while
(09:09):
that he wanted to paint his room,you know, make it his own space.
So one day, Bill gives him some moneyand says, "Knock yourself out."
Laurence picks out his paintand paints his room all by himself.
However, Bill and Lizare a little dismayed
to discover that his room is now a bloodred color.
(09:30):
Bill still thinks Laurenceis acting out to the new family changes,
so he buys him a little present,a TV/VCR combo for his bedroom.
Big mistake, because nowBill and Liz are kept up at night
by the screams of horror moviesat full volume all night long,
(09:50):
and any suggestionthat maybe he at least turn down
the volume is metwith the proverbial hand.
The biggest thing that breaks Bill's heart
is seeing the physical changesto his son's face.
Laurence's cheeks are sinking inand his eyes have dark circles under them.
Bill barely recognizesthe face he now sees as his own kid.
(10:13):
Bill'smom comes to stay with them for a weekend,
and after she's been there for a bit,they hear Laurence
coming out of his room,which is a pretty rare affair these days.
He even eats his dinner in theremost nights.
So grandma gets up and wandersover to the stairway to say hi.
Laurence yells, "Get away from me!"Grandma
(10:35):
looks like she's been slapped in the faceand just says "Laurence."
Laurence tells his grandmother to f off,
spits in her face, and startsheading back to his room.
Bill pushes past his motheron the staircase
and shouts at Laurence to apologize,at which point
Laurence tells him to f offand spits in his face too.
(10:57):
Heads back to his room and slams the door.
Bill is shockednot only by his son's behavior
but by the realizationthat that was not his son.
Liz says, "We need help."She contacts the landlord, Phil Holbourne,
and asks him if anything strangehas ever been reported in the house.
(11:19):
He says, "No."She contacts the former tenant
that was there right before them,Bridget Buscombe, who tells Liz, "Well,
I saw a spinning wheelspinning by itself once, but
I didn't really think much of it.
I loved it there."They bring in a Catholic priest
who goes around and blesses every room.
Much to Bill and Liz's relief,the house just feels better,
(11:44):
but only for a couple of days,and one day when Liz is coming back
from taking Ben for a walk,which she does as often as she can
since she figured out
that the further away from the houseshe is, the better she feels – somehow,
their bubble of peacehas become a prison of nightmares.
As she comes up the driveway,she glances up at the windows of the house
(12:06):
and sees an old womanstanding there looking none too happy.
When Liz tells Bill what she saw,
Bill says, "All of thisis because of the ghost of some old lady?"
Liz says, "Nope, she's here,but this isn't her doing."
Not long after that, the Riches starthaving some plumbing issues.
(12:29):
The floor under the toilet is heavingand making the toilet loose.
Bill calls a plumber.
Of course, the floor goes back to normalright before he gets there.
Plumber can't find anything wrong,so he re-seats the toilet and leaves,
but the floor heaves again, so Bill
calls the plumberagain, and the plumber says,
(12:53):
"Ugh,I thought I was done with that place."
Turns out that he'sthe same guy that had installed
the radiator heating systemback in the 60s when the current
landlord'smother, Marion, was living there.
The Plumber finishes the radiator jobbut is called back the next day
by the old ladyyelling at him to come back
because all of the radiatorshave come loose.
(13:15):
He comes back,has no idea how they could even come off,
but dutifully tightens them all back on.
The next day, he gets this same calland goes back again.
This same thing happensfor a number of days in a row,
until the plumber has an idea and decidesto use different screws
to reinstall the radiators.
(13:36):
This time, he uses a cruciform screw,
which was the name for the cross-headscrew,
known today as a Phillips screw, beforeHenry Phillips bought the rights
to the design, and it worked –the radiators never came loose again.
Not long after that, Bill is rearrangingsome stacks of furniture
(13:57):
left in his studioby the landlord for storage
when he finds a faded old pictureof an elderly woman.
He shows the picture to Liz,whose face goes pale.
"That's her.
That's the old woman." It's a pictureof Marion, the landlord's mother.
Bill decides to do an interviewwith the local newspaper.
(14:20):
As soon as it hitsthe stands, he gets a call
from a guy who worked on the houseback in the 50s when it was converted
from a barn to a house, saying itwithout saying it, he implies that
the small family graveyard on the propertyhad maybe been disturbed.
Maybe that was their issue.
And then there's the morningthat Bill wakes up Liz in a total panic.
(14:45):
She says, "What's wrong?"Bill shows her his hands.
Overnight,his fingertips have become swollen.
The skin is cracking and bleeding.
He can't even hold a paintbrush.
He can't paint.
Bill is crushed.
Now it's personal.
(15:05):
He feels like whatever this thingis, it's trying to not only take away
the one thing that has been keeping himsane these past few months
but also taking away his abilityto make his living, as meager as it is.
Meanwhile, a fight withthe electric company is brewing.
After that first hellacious bill,
(15:27):
Bill called the company,saying there must be some kind of mistake,
like there'sno way we use this much electricity.
The response from the electric companyis, "You're right,
that is really high,but there's no mistake,
so you still have to pay it."After a few more lively phone calls,
the electric company sends someone outto check the line to the meter.
(15:52):
Everything checks out fine.
So again, the electric companysays, "Our meter is fine,
so the problem is in your house,which is your responsibility –
pay up." Bill hires energy consultants
to come out and take a lookat all of their appliances.
They all check out fine, butthe outrageously high bills keep coming.
(16:15):
And to all of this,all of their animals start to die.
The pig gets sick and has to be put down.
Laurence'sguinea pig dies, and their goat,
who has two kids, accidentally crushesone of them.
Liz's next call brings in Ray Williams
of the Christian spiritualist churchin Cardiff.
(16:36):
His opinion is that Laurenceneeds to be removed from the house.
Either he's the center of the poltergeistactivity, or if he's not,
this is not a healthy environmentfor a kid to grow up in.
Liz breaks the news to Bill, who's crushedby the idea of sending his son away.
And she adds, "Oh, by the way,
(16:59):
I'm pregnant."Ray Williams comes by to see the house
and has a couple of mediums with him,one by the name of Larry Harry.
I only mention himbecause I think that name is hilarious.
They cleanse the house,which seems to do nothing.
The two mediums come back,and they tell the Riches that they sense
four entities on the farm: the ghosts of two men and an old woman (17:18):
undefined
that are trapped there, andsome other entity that doesn't want to go.
But don't worry, at leastthey set the three trapped spirits free.
That didn't seem to work either.
But one day, Mr.
Harry comes back againwith another medium and tells Bill
(17:41):
they're gonna build a psychicwall of protection around the house.
They walk around the housefor about a half hour and say it's done.
Almost immediately, Bill and Lizcan feel the difference in the house.
It's brighter, feels bigger.
The next few days are a dream, with Bill's
(18:01):
fingershealing overnight and their neighbor
commissions Bill to paint a portraitof their prize horse, Echo.
Fantastic!
The only hard part was saying goodbyeto Laurence.
The boarding school they found for himwas right there in Brecon,
so they could visitwhenever they wanted to.
But that didn't really make it any easier,but to keep his mind off
(18:25):
of all of that, Bill dove into the horsepainting project.
The neighbors had given hima picture of the horse,
but Bill went out one daylooking over the neighbor's
fields, looking for the perfect backgroundto put behind him.
He finds the perfect spot
with the mountains in the backand sits down to sketch it out.
As he's sitting there, another neighborcomes by, starts chatting.
(18:49):
Turns out all of the farms in the area
are all suffering from a blanket of badluck.
All the livestock that's been born lately
were either all deformedor blind or deaf or dead.
Bill asked him, "Whendid all of this start?"
Turns out the first deformed calf was bornthe day after Larry Harry
(19:14):
and his friend had erected the protectivepsychic wall around Bill's house. Huh.
So it's like the negativity and bad mojo
they had been experiencinghad now been pushed out to everyone else.
Bill keeps working on the horse paintingand is more than satisfied at
how it's coming along, with the exceptionof the horse's right rear leg.
(19:38):
No matter how many timesBill starts it over,
it keeps coming out looking deformed.
He finally gives up, making it
look as good as he can,and delivers the painting.
The neighbors are thrilled.
Not long after,Liz gets a call from the neighbor's wife.
Now keep in mindthat the neighbors are aware
(20:00):
of some funky thingsthat are going down at Heol Fanog,
maybe not the full extent,but they know something's going on.
So the neighbor's wife callsto let them know that their horse
had contracted an infection of its right
rear leg,making it look exactly as deformed
as it looked in the painting,and they had to put it down.
(20:24):
They buried the horse right where it fell,which happened to be
in the exact same spotin which Bill had painted it.
Barely able to hide her insinuationthat the curse of Heol Fanog,
and by extensionBill, had killed their horse,
she let Liz know that they burned Bill'spainting.
(20:45):
Several weeks of peace later,so around August of 1990,
a brutal storm seems to wash awaytheir wall of protection.
The house goes from completely peacefulto 100% ominous.
The thing is back.
What follows is a string
(21:07):
of people, religious and secular,
all trying to help the Richesrid their home of this dark energy.
Sometimes nothing changes, but sometimesthings would be better for a while.
One man, David Holmwood,even managed to exercise the evil presence
for almost two years.
(21:28):
And as awesomeas that felt for the Riches,
they still knew deep insidethat it wasn't really gone.
They could feelwhatever this thing is simmering
in the dark recesses, waiting.
Just so you know,their power bill is still off the charts.
(21:48):
And as usual, the peace does not last.
And as time plods on,
the electricity in the houseis not the only thing draining away.
So is Bill's creativity and inspirationto paint.
Seeing the proverbial writing on the wall,he knows he has to make a choice
(22:08):
between putting his time and energyinto his life's passion
or into standing with his wifeto protect their family.
You can't do both.
The choice really isn't all that hard,but like the loss of any good friend,
Bill grieves the loss of this hugechunk of who he is,
(22:30):
and is angry for having to make the choiceto begin with.
In his anger and frustration,he grabs one of his older paintings
and starts covering over itin a frenzy of sadness and frustration.
After 20 minutes of blind emotionguiding the paintbrush,
covering the canvas in dark, vibrantcolors,
(22:54):
Bill is finished, both emotionally as wellas with the painting.
He sits back to see what the result is,
only to be shocked at what he sees.
In a sea of dark hues in turmoil,
a bright whitecross dominates the color storm,
(23:14):
and for the first time in a longtime, Bill sees
just a flicker of lightat the end of his tunnel.
He names the painting "Testimony."Throughout this entire ordeal,
Bill and Liz just kept talking to people,going to the library, and collecting
any information they could findabout the history of the property.
(23:36):
One interesting thing they dug upis that in
1898, there was a murder.
23-year-oldThomas Edwards was hanged for taking an ax
to the back of the head of 18-year-oldJames Griffith.
James's body was found buried in a muckheap, a stone's
throw away at the farm at Cwmgwdi,where they both worked as farm hands.
(24:01):
But some say the actual murderhappened at Heol Fanog.
There are suggestionsthat it was a fight over
money or a beef over a farmer's daughter.
There's a surprise,but there is also the persistent legend
that James was taken outbecause he witnessed some kind
of ceremony of the dark arts variety.
(24:23):
And supposedly, Thomas was toldby someone in said dark arts
ring that if he committed this murder,he would be taken care of.
And that Thomas believed,until the very moment
the noose was tightened around his neck,that someone was gonna step forward
with an alibi or somethingto stop this whole execution thing.
(24:46):
But no one did.
Maybe Thomas misunderstoodwhat was meant by him
being “taken care of.” Another interestingtidbit that comes to light
comes from the local vet slash animalcontrol officer called the Dog Warden.
The Riches had decided to try their luckwith animals one more time
(25:07):
and get a Doberman puppy named Beau, both
for the kids, of which they now had two,
and the third one was due soon,and for protection.
At first the puppy was your regular puppy,
but soon it was reduced to shakingand crying
in its spot in the corner,obviously terrified of something.
(25:30):
So the Riches called Liz Jones,the Dog Warden, to come and take a look
at Beau just to make sure that nothing'swrong with him.
After pronouncing Beau fit as a fiddle
and admitting she has no ideawhat's causing his behavior,
she confesses to the Richesthat she almost didn't come –
she never wanted to set footon this property again.
(25:54):
Turns out she's friends with BridgetBuscombe, the previous tenant of Heol
Fanog, the girl who really didn't thinkanything of her spinning spinning wheel.
Well, Bridget has to go out of town,
so she asks Liz Jones to take care of heranimals for her.
Liz says, "No problem,"
and starts going to Heol Fanog every dayto feed the animals.
(26:17):
Guess what?
She heard the clomping boots running
down the hallway too, more than once.
She doesn't find anything wrong with Beau,so Bill takes him
to the local vet,who also can't find anything wrong.
But as soon as they get home,Beau takes his regular spot,
crying, shaking, and whimpering.
(26:40):
Now, I know we have a lot of animal lovers
watchingwhose hearts are breaking for poor Beau,
but I have to digress for just a momentand talk about
one of the actual good thingsto come out of this whole ordeal.
Bill and Lizhad both been spiritual people
before 1989, but their faith was just not
(27:00):
really in the foregroundof their day-to-day lives.
However, as the months and years of mentaland physical torture tick by,
not only do they figure out thatthey are stronger together than alone,
but they discover that they are strongerwith God than without him,
and are eventually baptizedinto the Baptist faith.
(27:24):
So here's Bill laying on the floorwith his face next to Beau's
trying to comfort the poorterrified puppy,
when inspiration strikes.
He lays his hand on Beau's head and says,
"Jesus, whatever is bothering this dog,
take his fear away."And with that, Beau stops
(27:47):
shaking and whimpering and fallsinto a deep sleep
he hasn't had in days, maybe even weeks,
and is bothered no more.
By now, the Riches had been given
the name of another personwho might be able to help them.
David Holmwood has done a good jobhelping them keep the monsters at bay
(28:09):
for a long time, but the Riches needed
someone to get rid of it once and for all.
Enter one Eddie Burke.
Eddie had come to prominencein the paranormal world recently
when word got outthat he cleared a haunted bank.
Now he wants to help the Riches, but
(28:31):
he also wants to bring a documentary crew,
so the Riches tell him, "We'regonna have to think about that one."
They really weren't sure that they wantedto invite that kind of publicity.
And Eddie was not a Christian.
All of their Christian friendstell the Riches to stay away from him,
(28:53):
but one friend steps up and tells them,"Give Eddie a shot.
Why not?
No one else has been ableto get rid of this thing."
The Riches certainly are in full-ondesperation mode at this point.
The activity is more pervasivethan it has ever been
with something unusual happeningalmost every day,
(29:15):
and it comes in waves, ramping uplike someone turning up the voltage.
When it's at its worst,it even affects their children,
who become much grumpier and harderto put to bed at night.
But then something usually happens,like seeing the old woman
in the children's roomsthat drains that pent-up charge,
(29:37):
dissipating the oppressive atmospherefor a while, but only for a while.
Whatever it is, it's angry.
The Riches decide to accept Eddie Burke'soffer of help,
but getting everythingcoordinated takes some time.
The waiting is especially hard for Bill.
(29:58):
He is about as low as he can go right now.
His physical energy is draining away.
Bills are piling upwith no income in sight.
He no longer has his painting as a refuge,
and their third child has just been born,
bringing with itall kinds of new pressures of taking care
(30:19):
of the other two,so Liz can concentrate on the new one.
And just like they didwhen their second child was born,
they had both of their motherscome to stay for help and support.
But this house has a wayof pulling out the worst in people.
Just like the first time,perfectly cordial in-laws devolved
(30:42):
into arguing unhelpful distractions,
so the Riches sent them home.
One night, as Billsits alone at the kitchen table,
trying to comprehend
how they'd even gotten to this place,he looks up to notice
one of their big, sharp kitchen knivessitting next to his arm on the table.
(31:04):
Immediately, he's ticked off.
He and Liz are always careful to make surethey put it back in the drawer
so the little ones can'tget their little fingers on it.
Obviously, Liz must have left it out.
How irresponsible can you get?
He gets up, grabsthe knife to put it back in the drawer,
(31:25):
and a sudden thought rushes into his head:
what would it feellike to run that blade over his wrist?
He shoves the knife in the drawer, closeshis eyes, and tries to shove
the thoughts of death out of his head,
but the thoughts don't want to go away.
(31:46):
"Think of how easy it would be,no more pressure, no more problems,
just peace."He tries to flood his head with positive
images of Liz and his children,but the dark thoughts keep winning.
He opens his eyes again,and there's the knife,
the one he hadjust put away in the drawer.
(32:09):
"Come on, it'll be over in an instant.
You won't feel a thing." Bill lashes out,knocking the knife to the floor.
When Liz comes through the doorto see what happened,
she finds Bill on his knees on the floorwith tears in his eyes.
Bill says, "This house wants us,and if we don't do something soon,
(32:30):
I'm afraid it's gonna get us."By the time Eddie
arrives, it's March of 1993 now.
He's not reallyyour typical ghost hunter or medium.
An experience as a childgot him to thinking that maybe there's
more to this life than we know,but he spent his adult life
as a Principal Science Officerfor the civil service, pretty no-nonsense.
(32:54):
But then in 1970 his wife dies
of a heart attackand appears to him, causing him
to look more towardwhat we can feel than what we can see.
As he sits down with friendsto discuss the happenings at Heol Fanog,
Eddie suddenly feels informationcoming through to him,
telling himthere is much confusion at this place,
(33:18):
many layers of influence,
some of which are unpleasant,
and that he needs to keep his mind openand his senses sharp.
When Eddie, with the help of his friend,Captain Ferguson Cunningham,
gets to the house, Eddiefollows the instructions
coming to himby the guides who promised to help him.
(33:40):
He lays down a barrier of lightaround the property's
perimeter and another around the houseitself.
Eddie tells Bill thatthere is a concentration of energy here,
and it's not friendly, but he can see that
the house is filling with light.
He can sense the presence of Christ
(34:02):
and hears the words, "Andthere will be nowhere left for them to go.
The light shall prevail."
Eddie asks Billif there's some cross of significance
nearby, as he's also hearing, "Andso I shall leave my mark and my protection
upon this place." Bill stops for a momentand smiles knowingly
(34:25):
and leads the man into the housewhere his last painting
"Testimony" hangs on the living room wall.
Bill's mind is blown –
all this timehe saw the cross in his painting
as the hope of Christswimming in a sea of evil,
(34:46):
but instead, this whole time, it's
been the image of God's defeat of evil.
The day after Eddie's visit,the ever-spinning
electric meter starts to slow down.
Something's working.
Eddie warns them that the activityand cleansing that has taken place at Heol
(35:08):
Fanog is now going to become a beacon
for other souls looking for the light.
So don't be surprisedif you start seeing more apparitions,
and they do, but none of them give off anyill intent vibes.
Instead,it's like they're all just passing
through the houseon their way to somewhere else.
(35:29):
Not exactly the result they werelooking for but better than evil.
The house is bright and happy again,and Bill's son, Laurence,
who pretty much did a 180after getting out of that house,
comes over to play with his brothersand sister on a regular basis,
(35:49):
and laughter fills every space.
But Bill and Liz can feelthat things are not quite right.
Somewherein the flurry of vicars and mediums,
someone had managed to release Marion'sspirit, and Eddie
says he was able to release the spiritsof both the murderer
(36:11):
and his victim,the two male spirits that were there.
Whatever that last dark forceis, it's not quite gone,
and the electric meter startsto spin faster.
Now, before you come to any conclusionsabout this
last entity being an actual demon,
(36:31):
there are a couple more avenuesto consider.
Way backwhen Bill and Liz had just become an item,
young Laurence was fascinated with Egypt,
so the three took a bonding vacation
to Egypt,including a tour of the Pyramid of Cheops,
the largest of the three pyramids of Giza.
They all got up really early to beatnot only the heat of the day
(36:55):
but the other tourists as well.
And it worked.
They were the only ones aroundwhen they started up the dark
passagewaysthat led to the burial chamber.
Once they get in the chamber,Liz can see these flashes of light
within the rocks like laser lights.
And she asked the boys, "You see that?"
Both boys say, "See what?"
(37:18):
But then they all feel a presence
enter the room with them.
Totally creeped out and feelinglike they're all in danger,
they all take off
and don't stop until they are outsidein the sunshine again.
Liz would later report seeing those same
(37:40):
flashing lights again in their barn.
But the Egypt ties don't stop there,
as the encounters in their housewere at their highest levels.
Both Bill and Liz saw an entitythat they both describe
as being about seven feet tall,all black with the head of a bird,
(38:00):
closely resembling picturesand statues of the Egyptian god Horus.
And Liz's mother, whomthe Riches would stay
with occasionally when they neededa few days away from the farm,
found a pendant on her living room floorthat looked strangely Egyptian.
Wasn't hers.
Knowing they had been to Egypt,she assumed it was a souvenir of Liz's.
(38:23):
"Handed it to her, here,I found your pendant,"
but neither Liz nor Bill had ever seen itbefore.
Liz hands it to Bill, who immediatelydrops it on the carpet after getting hit
with what felt like an electrical surgethrough his arm.
Bill takes the pendant outsideand smashes it with a hammer.
(38:45):
So maybe the familyaccidentally brought back
some kind of spiritfrom the ancient tomb of Cheops.
But there is still one more avenueto explore: ley lines.
During the parade of interested partiesthat waltz through Heol Fanog
over the six-year ordeal,many were searching for ley lines.
(39:07):
A ley line is a theoretical line of energythat flows through the earth.
And if you check out a ley line map,you'll see that many churches
and ancient monumentshave been erected on these lines.
What I didn't knowis that these lines are said to either
followor are created by underground rivers,
(39:30):
and the energy emittedcan either be positive or negative.
So dowsers, people who are skilled atdetecting underground water and minerals,
can also detect these energy channels,and according to them,
Heol Fanog is sitting on more thanone negative energy river.
(39:53):
“How much
negative energyit must have taken to generate a flow
this size?” And they all said,
"I wouldn't live here."So do the negative entities
come from the energyof those negative energy ley lines?
Or are they just attracted to the negativeenergy signatures they radiate?
Very good question, but I gotta say,
(40:16):
I have a hard time with the whole leyline idea.
Every time I try to compare maps,
nobody's map is the same.
Not helpful.
But no matter where the dark energy camefrom originally,
it's pretty evidentthat it's now entrenched in Heol Fanog.
Eddie pays the farm another visit,and as he's getting in touch
(40:41):
with the dark presence,which he describes as something
without form, without personality,something very ancient,
the oppression in the room ramps up.
He describes the force as somethingprimitive, possibly a force summoned
by early pagans who did not understandthe power they were messing with.
(41:05):
As Eddie is dealing with that entity,the tape recorder that had been set up
and turned on in the cornersuddenly lets out this loud crack
like it's been struck by lightningor something, and stops.
The oppression that filledthe room is gone.
Since Eddie's second visit to Heol Fanog,
(41:27):
there has been no reportsof any strange phenomena at the farm,
and the electricity bill is now belowthe average for a house that size.
I wish I could say, "And
they all lived happily ever after,"but I can't.
In the aftermath, it seems asif the dark force had just taken
(41:50):
too much from Bill, who turned to alcoholto try and erase the memories.
After leaving Heol Fanog, now nicknamed
"Hellfire Farm" or "The Welsh Amityville,"
Bill and Liz divorced,and Bill passed away in 2016.
One of Bill's biggest fearsis that the house would get them.
(42:14):
Looks like in the end, it did.
Big thanks
to Marc Chadborne and his book"Testimony,"
which is where I got the majorityof the information for this episode.
If you would like a deeper dive into Bill
and Liz's experience,I recommend reading this book.
(42:37):
It's kind of knownas the book on the subject,
so we will have a link to itin the description below.
Now if you're brave enough to tackle more
haunted weirdness,this is the video for you.
Just click it. I dare you.
Be careful out there,
and I will see youhere again on The InBetween.
(43:03):
Thanks for tuning into The InBetween Podcast.
Enjoy the full visual experiencewith me over on YouTube.
Just search for @TheInBetweentales.
I'm Carol Ann,and until next time, be careful
out there.
Strange mysteries, unexplained phenomena.
And the shadows in between.
This is The InBetween Official Podcastwith your host,
Carol Ann!
The Brecon Beacon mountains of SouthernWales.
Ancient peaks that overthe millennia, have watched over
(00:38):
ancient people, ancient monumentsand maybe even ancient demons.
Welcome to The InBetween.
I'm Carol Ann, and this episodeis not for the easily spooked.
But if you think you've got what it takes,then hang with me as we follow
one family's descentinto the ultimate nightmare
(01:01):
known as Heol Fanog.
Let's just say you're getting readyto move into a new place
you go to buy supplies,and the total is $66.60.
The car that almost hits youwhen you're getting your new furniture
has a license plate of BST666.
(01:24):
And the stop you make for your last mealbefore moving in
comes to a grand total of $6.66.
Would you take the hint?
I probably wouldn't either,and neither did Bill and Liz Rich.
It's the spring of 1989just outside the southern Welsh city
of Brecon, in the foothills of the Breconbeacon mountain range
(01:47):
in the shadows of Peny Fan, the highest peak in southern Wales.
The Rich family, Bill, Liz,
and Bill's 14-year-oldson, Laurence, from a previous marriage,
pull off of the winding, narrowroad onto the driveway of their new
house–well, rented–known
(02:08):
as Heol Fanog, or "Road to the Peaks".
They get out of the carand start walking toward the house,
which is actually the renovatedbarn of the former manor house that once
stood on the property but was now reducedto crumbling stone outlines.
All three of them can physically feela bubble of peace
(02:31):
envelop them,separating them from the outside world.
This is exactly the fresh start–not
to mention the peaceand quiet–they are looking for.
The road for these threehas not been easy to this point.
Bill, who had spent a number of yearstraveling the world
trying to find himself, finally married
(02:53):
and settled down with his wife,and soon thereafter, Laurence.
But after 16 years of marriage,his wife left him for someone else,
leaving him to figure outhow to be both parents to Laurence.
Liz also had a pretty rebellious
youth, including wandering Mediterraneanfor years
(03:13):
looking for a fix for herdecade-long affliction of anorexia.
Both wayward soulsfound their separate ways back to Wales,
where Billstumbled into Liz's herbalist shop,
looking for a natural treatmentfor his depression.
That was it.
They both found what they were looking forin each other,
(03:35):
and Liz's anorexia disappeared.
So life has taken an upwardturn for both of them,
but they still have their struggles.
Liz moves in with Bill, but
they have a bunch of Karen neighborsthat make life difficult.
Bill is worried about Laurenceadjusting to losing his mom
and Liz moving in, and Bill and Liz decideto get married.
(04:00):
Oh, and Liz gets pregnant.
So everything is kind of a hot mess.
But Bill is an up-and-coming artistwho has a very good business
selling these painted wooden boxes,as well as having some of his paintings
attracting attentionin the international art world.
He even has a few paintings getting readyto be shown in an art exhibition in LA
(04:24):
whose attendees are set to bethe likes of Sylvester Stallone.
Money is good,so they start searching for a new place,
and within just a couple of weeks,they stumble onto Heol Fanog.
It's perfect.
Three acres of land, a big houseand barn, room for a huge studio
(04:45):
for Bill, quiet and no neighbors, done,
and life is good for a while.
The summer is spent getting settledin their new home, Bill and Liz
get married in September, and their babyboy, Ben, is born in October.
But November is when life changed.
(05:08):
Bill and Liz are up latedoing what newlyweds do.
Bill then heads down the stairs from thesecond floor to the bathroom on the first.
As he's in there,he's startled by the banging of what
sounds like someone running downthe upstairs hallway in hobnail boots.
Hobnail boots
are boots that have
thick-headed nailsin the bottom for durability.
(05:31):
So you can imagine how loud that sounded.
Immediately, Bill thinks,
oh, Laurence must have heard
Liz and I, and he's throwing a fit.
He steels himself for the discussionhe is about to have with his son,
when he peeks in his roomto find Laurence fast asleep.
(05:52):
It wasn't Laurence. Then, who was it?
And when he got to the bedroomwhere Liz was up
nursing Ben, he asks her about it.
She hasn't heard a thing,but they will both tell you that from
the instant Bill hearsthose footsteps, everything changes.
The next morning, the house just feelscold and claustrophobic.
(06:15):
Laurence comes thundering down the stairsto Bill and Liz in the kitchen
with a scowl on his face.
Bill asks him, "What's wrong?""Nothing." "Well,
it doesn't look like nothing.""I said, nothing's wrong." Okay, that's
certainly not the happy-go-lucky kidthey had yesterday.
But okay, he's a teenagergoing through a lot of changes, whatever.
(06:38):
Still trying to figure outexactly what he heard the night before,
Bill opens the electric billand can't quite believe what he sees.
The bill for the quarter,so the previous three months,
is 750 pounds.
That's like three grand in today's USdollars.
Holy crap.
(06:59):
That's like pot farm levels.
But Bill and Liz did not have a pot farm.
They didn't even have a regular farm.
They have a pig and a couple of goats,but that hardly qualifies.
They have no idea why the billwould be that high,
and from that momenton, anything that could go wrong did.
(07:20):
Over the next several months,all of those orders Bill had
for his paintedwooden boxes were inexplicably canceled.
Their car battery would go dead overnightfor no reason.
The gallery in LA that was set to showBill's paintings went under,
causing his paintings to be helduntil proper ownership
(07:42):
could be established, a processthat could take years.
And not only are they still hearingthose same invisible boots
running down the hallway,but now they also hear
invisible slipperspatting their way down the stairs.
The temperature in the houseis totally unpredictable.
Some days the house is so hotthat Liz has sweat running down her face.
(08:04):
She tells Bill to turn the heatdown, and Bill says the heat's not on.
Other times, it's just the opposite,where she's so cold she's shivering.
They both experience sudden odors,
either of sulfur or incense,
so strongthat they feel like they're gonna vomit,
and then they seemingly evaporateas fast as they came.
(08:26):
And it feels to everyone that they are
not the only ones living in their house.
One day, Bill is in his studio,and Liz is in the bedroom
with Ben when she hears a door slam.
Was that Bill?
Then she hears the next door slam,and then the next door slam.
The next door is the one to the roomshe is in.
(08:48):
Sure enough, Liz jumpsas she hears the door to her room
slam as well, except
the door was already closedand it had never opened.
Everybody's nerves are wearingthin, and Laurence
is going downhill fast.
He'd been telling Bill for a while
(09:09):
that he wanted to paint his room,you know, make it his own space.
So one day, Bill gives him some moneyand says, "Knock yourself out."
Laurence picks out his paintand paints his room all by himself.
However, Bill and Lizare a little dismayed
to discover that his room is now a bloodred color.
(09:30):
Bill still thinks Laurenceis acting out to the new family changes,
so he buys him a little present,a TV/VCR combo for his bedroom.
Big mistake, because nowBill and Liz are kept up at night
by the screams of horror moviesat full volume all night long,
(09:50):
and any suggestionthat maybe he at least turn down
the volume is metwith the proverbial hand.
The biggest thing that breaks Bill's heart
is seeing the physical changesto his son's face.
Laurence's cheeks are sinking inand his eyes have dark circles under them.
Bill barely recognizesthe face he now sees as his own kid.
(10:13):
Bill'smom comes to stay with them for a weekend,
and after she's been there for a bit,they hear Laurence
coming out of his room,which is a pretty rare affair these days.
He even eats his dinner in theremost nights.
So grandma gets up and wandersover to the stairway to say hi.
Laurence yells, "Get away from me!"Grandma
(10:35):
looks like she's been slapped in the faceand just says "Laurence."
Laurence tells his grandmother to f off,
spits in her face, and startsheading back to his room.
Bill pushes past his motheron the staircase
and shouts at Laurence to apologize,at which point
Laurence tells him to f offand spits in his face too.
(10:57):
Heads back to his room and slams the door.
Bill is shockednot only by his son's behavior
but by the realizationthat that was not his son.
Liz says, "We need help."She contacts the landlord, Phil Holbourne,
and asks him if anything strangehas ever been reported in the house.
(11:19):
He says, "No."She contacts the former tenant
that was there right before them,Bridget Buscombe, who tells Liz, "Well,
I saw a spinning wheelspinning by itself once, but
I didn't really think much of it.
I loved it there."They bring in a Catholic priest
who goes around and blesses every room.
Much to Bill and Liz's relief,the house just feels better,
(11:44):
but only for a couple of days,and one day when Liz is coming back
from taking Ben for a walk,which she does as often as she can
since she figured out
that the further away from the houseshe is, the better she feels – somehow,
their bubble of peacehas become a prison of nightmares.
As she comes up the driveway,she glances up at the windows of the house
(12:06):
and sees an old womanstanding there looking none too happy.
When Liz tells Bill what she saw,
Bill says, "All of thisis because of the ghost of some old lady?"
Liz says, "Nope, she's here,but this isn't her doing."
Not long after that, the Riches starthaving some plumbing issues.
(12:29):
The floor under the toilet is heavingand making the toilet loose.
Bill calls a plumber.
Of course, the floor goes back to normalright before he gets there.
Plumber can't find anything wrong,so he re-seats the toilet and leaves,
but the floor heaves again, so Bill
calls the plumberagain, and the plumber says,
(12:53):
"Ugh,I thought I was done with that place."
Turns out that he'sthe same guy that had installed
the radiator heating systemback in the 60s when the current
landlord'smother, Marion, was living there.
The Plumber finishes the radiator jobbut is called back the next day
by the old ladyyelling at him to come back
because all of the radiatorshave come loose.
(13:15):
He comes back,has no idea how they could even come off,
but dutifully tightens them all back on.
The next day, he gets this same calland goes back again.
This same thing happensfor a number of days in a row,
until the plumber has an idea and decidesto use different screws
to reinstall the radiators.
(13:36):
This time, he uses a cruciform screw,
which was the name for the cross-headscrew,
known today as a Phillips screw, beforeHenry Phillips bought the rights
to the design, and it worked –the radiators never came loose again.
Not long after that, Bill is rearrangingsome stacks of furniture
(13:57):
left in his studioby the landlord for storage
when he finds a faded old pictureof an elderly woman.
He shows the picture to Liz,whose face goes pale.
"That's her.
That's the old woman." It's a pictureof Marion, the landlord's mother.
Bill decides to do an interviewwith the local newspaper.
(14:20):
As soon as it hitsthe stands, he gets a call
from a guy who worked on the houseback in the 50s when it was converted
from a barn to a house, saying itwithout saying it, he implies that
the small family graveyard on the propertyhad maybe been disturbed.
Maybe that was their issue.
And then there's the morningthat Bill wakes up Liz in a total panic.
(14:45):
She says, "What's wrong?"Bill shows her his hands.
Overnight,his fingertips have become swollen.
The skin is cracking and bleeding.
He can't even hold a paintbrush.
He can't paint.
Bill is crushed.
Now it's personal.
(15:05):
He feels like whatever this thingis, it's trying to not only take away
the one thing that has been keeping himsane these past few months
but also taking away his abilityto make his living, as meager as it is.
Meanwhile, a fight withthe electric company is brewing.
After that first hellacious bill,
(15:27):
Bill called the company,saying there must be some kind of mistake,
like there'sno way we use this much electricity.
The response from the electric companyis, "You're right,
that is really high,but there's no mistake,
so you still have to pay it."After a few more lively phone calls,
the electric company sends someone outto check the line to the meter.
(15:52):
Everything checks out fine.
So again, the electric companysays, "Our meter is fine,
so the problem is in your house,which is your responsibility –
pay up." Bill hires energy consultants
to come out and take a lookat all of their appliances.
They all check out fine, butthe outrageously high bills keep coming.
(16:15):
And to all of this,all of their animals start to die.
The pig gets sick and has to be put down.
Laurence'sguinea pig dies, and their goat,
who has two kids, accidentally crushesone of them.
Liz's next call brings in Ray Williams
of the Christian spiritualist churchin Cardiff.
(16:36):
His opinion is that Laurenceneeds to be removed from the house.
Either he's the center of the poltergeistactivity, or if he's not,
this is not a healthy environmentfor a kid to grow up in.
Liz breaks the news to Bill, who's crushedby the idea of sending his son away.
And she adds, "Oh, by the way,
(16:59):
I'm pregnant."Ray Williams comes by to see the house
and has a couple of mediums with him,one by the name of Larry Harry.
I only mention himbecause I think that name is hilarious.
They cleanse the house,which seems to do nothing.
The two mediums come back,and they tell the Riches that they sense
four entities on the farm: the ghosts of two men and an old woman (17:18):
undefined
that are trapped there, andsome other entity that doesn't want to go.
But don't worry, at leastthey set the three trapped spirits free.
That didn't seem to work either.
But one day, Mr.
Harry comes back againwith another medium and tells Bill
(17:41):
they're gonna build a psychicwall of protection around the house.
They walk around the housefor about a half hour and say it's done.
Almost immediately, Bill and Lizcan feel the difference in the house.
It's brighter, feels bigger.
The next few days are a dream, with Bill's
(18:01):
fingershealing overnight and their neighbor
commissions Bill to paint a portraitof their prize horse, Echo.
Fantastic!
The only hard part was saying goodbyeto Laurence.
The boarding school they found for himwas right there in Brecon,
so they could visitwhenever they wanted to.
But that didn't really make it any easier,but to keep his mind off
(18:25):
of all of that, Bill dove into the horsepainting project.
The neighbors had given hima picture of the horse,
but Bill went out one daylooking over the neighbor's
fields, looking for the perfect backgroundto put behind him.
He finds the perfect spot
with the mountains in the backand sits down to sketch it out.
As he's sitting there, another neighborcomes by, starts chatting.
(18:49):
Turns out all of the farms in the area
are all suffering from a blanket of badluck.
All the livestock that's been born lately
were either all deformedor blind or deaf or dead.
Bill asked him, "Whendid all of this start?"
Turns out the first deformed calf was bornthe day after Larry Harry
(19:14):
and his friend had erected the protectivepsychic wall around Bill's house. Huh.
So it's like the negativity and bad mojo
they had been experiencinghad now been pushed out to everyone else.
Bill keeps working on the horse paintingand is more than satisfied at
how it's coming along, with the exceptionof the horse's right rear leg.
(19:38):
No matter how many timesBill starts it over,
it keeps coming out looking deformed.
He finally gives up, making it
look as good as he can,and delivers the painting.
The neighbors are thrilled.
Not long after,Liz gets a call from the neighbor's wife.
Now keep in mindthat the neighbors are aware
(20:00):
of some funky thingsthat are going down at Heol Fanog,
maybe not the full extent,but they know something's going on.
So the neighbor's wife callsto let them know that their horse
had contracted an infection of its right
rear leg,making it look exactly as deformed
as it looked in the painting,and they had to put it down.
(20:24):
They buried the horse right where it fell,which happened to be
in the exact same spotin which Bill had painted it.
Barely able to hide her insinuationthat the curse of Heol Fanog,
and by extensionBill, had killed their horse,
she let Liz know that they burned Bill'spainting.
(20:45):
Several weeks of peace later,so around August of 1990,
a brutal storm seems to wash awaytheir wall of protection.
The house goes from completely peacefulto 100% ominous.
The thing is back.
What follows is a string
(21:07):
of people, religious and secular,
all trying to help the Richesrid their home of this dark energy.
Sometimes nothing changes, but sometimesthings would be better for a while.
One man, David Holmwood,even managed to exercise the evil presence
for almost two years.
(21:28):
And as awesomeas that felt for the Riches,
they still knew deep insidethat it wasn't really gone.
They could feelwhatever this thing is simmering
in the dark recesses, waiting.
Just so you know,their power bill is still off the charts.
(21:48):
And as usual, the peace does not last.
And as time plods on,
the electricity in the houseis not the only thing draining away.
So is Bill's creativity and inspirationto paint.
Seeing the proverbial writing on the wall,he knows he has to make a choice
(22:08):
between putting his time and energyinto his life's passion
or into standing with his wifeto protect their family.
You can't do both.
The choice really isn't all that hard,but like the loss of any good friend,
Bill grieves the loss of this hugechunk of who he is,
(22:30):
and is angry for having to make the choiceto begin with.
In his anger and frustration,he grabs one of his older paintings
and starts covering over itin a frenzy of sadness and frustration.
After 20 minutes of blind emotionguiding the paintbrush,
covering the canvas in dark, vibrantcolors,
(22:54):
Bill is finished, both emotionally as wellas with the painting.
He sits back to see what the result is,
only to be shocked at what he sees.
In a sea of dark hues in turmoil,
a bright whitecross dominates the color storm,
(23:14):
and for the first time in a longtime, Bill sees
just a flicker of lightat the end of his tunnel.
He names the painting "Testimony."Throughout this entire ordeal,
Bill and Liz just kept talking to people,going to the library, and collecting
any information they could findabout the history of the property.
(23:36):
One interesting thing they dug upis that in
1898, there was a murder.
23-year-oldThomas Edwards was hanged for taking an ax
to the back of the head of 18-year-oldJames Griffith.
James's body was found buried in a muckheap, a stone's
throw away at the farm at Cwmgwdi,where they both worked as farm hands.
(24:01):
But some say the actual murderhappened at Heol Fanog.
There are suggestionsthat it was a fight over
money or a beef over a farmer's daughter.
There's a surprise,but there is also the persistent legend
that James was taken outbecause he witnessed some kind
of ceremony of the dark arts variety.
(24:23):
And supposedly, Thomas was toldby someone in said dark arts
ring that if he committed this murder,he would be taken care of.
And that Thomas believed,until the very moment
the noose was tightened around his neck,that someone was gonna step forward
with an alibi or somethingto stop this whole execution thing.
(24:46):
But no one did.
Maybe Thomas misunderstoodwhat was meant by him
being “taken care of.” Another interestingtidbit that comes to light
comes from the local vet slash animalcontrol officer called the Dog Warden.
The Riches had decided to try their luckwith animals one more time
(25:07):
and get a Doberman puppy named Beau, both
for the kids, of which they now had two,
and the third one was due soon,and for protection.
At first the puppy was your regular puppy,
but soon it was reduced to shakingand crying
in its spot in the corner,obviously terrified of something.
(25:30):
So the Riches called Liz Jones,the Dog Warden, to come and take a look
at Beau just to make sure that nothing'swrong with him.
After pronouncing Beau fit as a fiddle
and admitting she has no ideawhat's causing his behavior,
she confesses to the Richesthat she almost didn't come –
she never wanted to set footon this property again.
(25:54):
Turns out she's friends with BridgetBuscombe, the previous tenant of Heol
Fanog, the girl who really didn't thinkanything of her spinning spinning wheel.
Well, Bridget has to go out of town,
so she asks Liz Jones to take care of heranimals for her.
Liz says, "No problem,"
and starts going to Heol Fanog every dayto feed the animals.
(26:17):
Guess what?
She heard the clomping boots running
down the hallway too, more than once.
She doesn't find anything wrong with Beau,so Bill takes him
to the local vet,who also can't find anything wrong.
But as soon as they get home,Beau takes his regular spot,
crying, shaking, and whimpering.
(26:40):
Now, I know we have a lot of animal lovers
watchingwhose hearts are breaking for poor Beau,
but I have to digress for just a momentand talk about
one of the actual good thingsto come out of this whole ordeal.
Bill and Lizhad both been spiritual people
before 1989, but their faith was just not
(27:00):
really in the foregroundof their day-to-day lives.
However, as the months and years of mentaland physical torture tick by,
not only do they figure out thatthey are stronger together than alone,
but they discover that they are strongerwith God than without him,
and are eventually baptizedinto the Baptist faith.
(27:24):
So here's Bill laying on the floorwith his face next to Beau's
trying to comfort the poorterrified puppy,
when inspiration strikes.
He lays his hand on Beau's head and says,
"Jesus, whatever is bothering this dog,
take his fear away."And with that, Beau stops
(27:47):
shaking and whimpering and fallsinto a deep sleep
he hasn't had in days, maybe even weeks,
and is bothered no more.
By now, the Riches had been given
the name of another personwho might be able to help them.
David Holmwood has done a good jobhelping them keep the monsters at bay
(28:09):
for a long time, but the Riches needed
someone to get rid of it once and for all.
Enter one Eddie Burke.
Eddie had come to prominencein the paranormal world recently
when word got outthat he cleared a haunted bank.
Now he wants to help the Riches, but
(28:31):
he also wants to bring a documentary crew,
so the Riches tell him, "We'regonna have to think about that one."
They really weren't sure that they wantedto invite that kind of publicity.
And Eddie was not a Christian.
All of their Christian friendstell the Riches to stay away from him,
(28:53):
but one friend steps up and tells them,"Give Eddie a shot.
Why not?
No one else has been ableto get rid of this thing."
The Riches certainly are in full-ondesperation mode at this point.
The activity is more pervasivethan it has ever been
with something unusual happeningalmost every day,
(29:15):
and it comes in waves, ramping uplike someone turning up the voltage.
When it's at its worst,it even affects their children,
who become much grumpier and harderto put to bed at night.
But then something usually happens,like seeing the old woman
in the children's roomsthat drains that pent-up charge,
(29:37):
dissipating the oppressive atmospherefor a while, but only for a while.
Whatever it is, it's angry.
The Riches decide to accept Eddie Burke'soffer of help,
but getting everythingcoordinated takes some time.
The waiting is especially hard for Bill.
(29:58):
He is about as low as he can go right now.
His physical energy is draining away.
Bills are piling upwith no income in sight.
He no longer has his painting as a refuge,
and their third child has just been born,
bringing with itall kinds of new pressures of taking care
(30:19):
of the other two,so Liz can concentrate on the new one.
And just like they didwhen their second child was born,
they had both of their motherscome to stay for help and support.
But this house has a wayof pulling out the worst in people.
Just like the first time,perfectly cordial in-laws devolved
(30:42):
into arguing unhelpful distractions,
so the Riches sent them home.
One night, as Billsits alone at the kitchen table,
trying to comprehend
how they'd even gotten to this place,he looks up to notice
one of their big, sharp kitchen knivessitting next to his arm on the table.
(31:04):
Immediately, he's ticked off.
He and Liz are always careful to make surethey put it back in the drawer
so the little ones can'tget their little fingers on it.
Obviously, Liz must have left it out.
How irresponsible can you get?
He gets up, grabsthe knife to put it back in the drawer,
(31:25):
and a sudden thought rushes into his head:
what would it feellike to run that blade over his wrist?
He shoves the knife in the drawer, closeshis eyes, and tries to shove
the thoughts of death out of his head,
but the thoughts don't want to go away.
(31:46):
"Think of how easy it would be,no more pressure, no more problems,
just peace."He tries to flood his head with positive
images of Liz and his children,but the dark thoughts keep winning.
He opens his eyes again,and there's the knife,
the one he hadjust put away in the drawer.
(32:09):
"Come on, it'll be over in an instant.
You won't feel a thing." Bill lashes out,knocking the knife to the floor.
When Liz comes through the doorto see what happened,
she finds Bill on his knees on the floorwith tears in his eyes.
Bill says, "This house wants us,and if we don't do something soon,
(32:30):
I'm afraid it's gonna get us."By the time Eddie
arrives, it's March of 1993 now.
He's not reallyyour typical ghost hunter or medium.
An experience as a childgot him to thinking that maybe there's
more to this life than we know,but he spent his adult life
as a Principal Science Officerfor the civil service, pretty no-nonsense.
(32:54):
But then in 1970 his wife dies
of a heart attackand appears to him, causing him
to look more towardwhat we can feel than what we can see.
As he sits down with friendsto discuss the happenings at Heol Fanog,
Eddie suddenly feels informationcoming through to him,
telling himthere is much confusion at this place,
(33:18):
many layers of influence,
some of which are unpleasant,
and that he needs to keep his mind openand his senses sharp.
When Eddie, with the help of his friend,Captain Ferguson Cunningham,
gets to the house, Eddiefollows the instructions
coming to himby the guides who promised to help him.
(33:40):
He lays down a barrier of lightaround the property's
perimeter and another around the houseitself.
Eddie tells Bill thatthere is a concentration of energy here,
and it's not friendly, but he can see that
the house is filling with light.
He can sense the presence of Christ
(34:02):
and hears the words, "Andthere will be nowhere left for them to go.
The light shall prevail."
Eddie asks Billif there's some cross of significance
nearby, as he's also hearing, "Andso I shall leave my mark and my protection
upon this place." Bill stops for a momentand smiles knowingly
(34:25):
and leads the man into the housewhere his last painting
"Testimony" hangs on the living room wall.
Bill's mind is blown –
all this timehe saw the cross in his painting
as the hope of Christswimming in a sea of evil,
(34:46):
but instead, this whole time, it's
been the image of God's defeat of evil.
The day after Eddie's visit,the ever-spinning
electric meter starts to slow down.
Something's working.
Eddie warns them that the activityand cleansing that has taken place at Heol
(35:08):
Fanog is now going to become a beacon
for other souls looking for the light.
So don't be surprisedif you start seeing more apparitions,
and they do, but none of them give off anyill intent vibes.
Instead,it's like they're all just passing
through the houseon their way to somewhere else.
(35:29):
Not exactly the result they werelooking for but better than evil.
The house is bright and happy again,and Bill's son, Laurence,
who pretty much did a 180after getting out of that house,
comes over to play with his brothersand sister on a regular basis,
(35:49):
and laughter fills every space.
But Bill and Liz can feelthat things are not quite right.
Somewherein the flurry of vicars and mediums,
someone had managed to release Marion'sspirit, and Eddie
says he was able to release the spiritsof both the murderer
(36:11):
and his victim,the two male spirits that were there.
Whatever that last dark forceis, it's not quite gone,
and the electric meter startsto spin faster.
Now, before you come to any conclusionsabout this
last entity being an actual demon,
(36:31):
there are a couple more avenuesto consider.
Way backwhen Bill and Liz had just become an item,
young Laurence was fascinated with Egypt,
so the three took a bonding vacation
to Egypt,including a tour of the Pyramid of Cheops,
the largest of the three pyramids of Giza.
They all got up really early to beatnot only the heat of the day
(36:55):
but the other tourists as well.
And it worked.
They were the only ones aroundwhen they started up the dark
passagewaysthat led to the burial chamber.
Once they get in the chamber,Liz can see these flashes of light
within the rocks like laser lights.
And she asked the boys, "You see that?"
Both boys say, "See what?"
(37:18):
But then they all feel a presence
enter the room with them.
Totally creeped out and feelinglike they're all in danger,
they all take off
and don't stop until they are outsidein the sunshine again.
Liz would later report seeing those same
(37:40):
flashing lights again in their barn.
But the Egypt ties don't stop there,
as the encounters in their housewere at their highest levels.
Both Bill and Liz saw an entitythat they both describe
as being about seven feet tall,all black with the head of a bird,
(38:00):
closely resembling picturesand statues of the Egyptian god Horus.
And Liz's mother, whomthe Riches would stay
with occasionally when they neededa few days away from the farm,
found a pendant on her living room floorthat looked strangely Egyptian.
Wasn't hers.
Knowing they had been to Egypt,she assumed it was a souvenir of Liz's.
(38:23):
"Handed it to her, here,I found your pendant,"
but neither Liz nor Bill had ever seen itbefore.
Liz hands it to Bill, who immediatelydrops it on the carpet after getting hit
with what felt like an electrical surgethrough his arm.
Bill takes the pendant outsideand smashes it with a hammer.
(38:45):
So maybe the familyaccidentally brought back
some kind of spiritfrom the ancient tomb of Cheops.
But there is still one more avenueto explore: ley lines.
During the parade of interested partiesthat waltz through Heol Fanog
over the six-year ordeal,many were searching for ley lines.
(39:07):
A ley line is a theoretical line of energythat flows through the earth.
And if you check out a ley line map,you'll see that many churches
and ancient monumentshave been erected on these lines.
What I didn't knowis that these lines are said to either
followor are created by underground rivers,
(39:30):
and the energy emittedcan either be positive or negative.
So dowsers, people who are skilled atdetecting underground water and minerals,
can also detect these energy channels,and according to them,
Heol Fanog is sitting on more thanone negative energy river.
(39:53):
“How much
negative energyit must have taken to generate a flow
this size?” And they all said,
"I wouldn't live here."So do the negative entities
come from the energyof those negative energy ley lines?
Or are they just attracted to the negativeenergy signatures they radiate?
Very good question, but I gotta say,
(40:16):
I have a hard time with the whole leyline idea.
Every time I try to compare maps,
nobody's map is the same.
Not helpful.
But no matter where the dark energy camefrom originally,
it's pretty evidentthat it's now entrenched in Heol Fanog.
Eddie pays the farm another visit,and as he's getting in touch
(40:41):
with the dark presence,which he describes as something
without form, without personality,something very ancient,
the oppression in the room ramps up.
He describes the force as somethingprimitive, possibly a force summoned
by early pagans who did not understandthe power they were messing with.
(41:05):
As Eddie is dealing with that entity,the tape recorder that had been set up
and turned on in the cornersuddenly lets out this loud crack
like it's been struck by lightningor something, and stops.
The oppression that filledthe room is gone.
Since Eddie's second visit to Heol Fanog,
(41:27):
there has been no reportsof any strange phenomena at the farm,
and the electricity bill is now belowthe average for a house that size.
I wish I could say, "And
they all lived happily ever after,"but I can't.
In the aftermath, it seems asif the dark force had just taken
(41:50):
too much from Bill, who turned to alcoholto try and erase the memories.
After leaving Heol Fanog, now nicknamed
"Hellfire Farm" or "The Welsh Amityville,"
Bill and Liz divorced,and Bill passed away in 2016.
One of Bill's biggest fearsis that the house would get them.
(42:14):
Looks like in the end, it did.
Big thanks
to Marc Chadborne and his book"Testimony,"
which is where I got the majorityof the information for this episode.
If you would like a deeper dive into Bill
and Liz's experience,I recommend reading this book.
(42:37):
It's kind of knownas the book on the subject,
so we will have a link to itin the description below.
Now if you're brave enough to tackle more
haunted weirdness,this is the video for you.
Just click it. I dare you.
Be careful out there,
and I will see youhere again on The InBetween.
(43:03):
Thanks for tuning into The InBetween Podcast.
Enjoy the full visual experiencewith me over on YouTube.
Just search for @TheInBetweentales.
I'm Carol Ann,and until next time, be careful
out there.
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