“A customer stood by the till and said they felt someone, or something, touching their shoulder...” Has a shop in Brandon caught evidence of a ghost on CCTV?
The stockroom at Ozzie's Metaphysical in Brandon. Highlighted are the box the bags were stored in and the spot the bags ended up. Picture: Gary Osbourne (Image: Gary Osbourne)
Is this CCTV footage proof that a shop in Brandon is haunted? Look carefully at the video taken by a shopkeeper in the Suffolk town and you will see something very strange: from a lipped plastic box in a tiny stockroom, a packet of plastic bags launches itself into the air and on to a shelf below. Behind the box is a solid wall, in front of it is a small space which could not conceal a person: shopkeeper Gary is perplexed by the footage, which is the second time his CCTV camera has picked up something inexplicable on tape.
The other video shows a string of bells swaying in a room which was completely still before appearing to be pulled and falling to the ground. Posted on sister site Weird Norfolk's Facebook page, the two videos support Gary's belief that the shop, Ozzies Metaphysical on the High Street, is haunted. "I was quite dubious about posting the videos, but after watching them over and over again, I am convinced that they show that something strange happened," said Gary, of the videos which were caught in March and earlier this month by CCTV cameras.
Gary Osbourne of Ozzies Metaphysical in Brandon where they experience supernatural occurrences on a regular basis. in Byline: Sonya Duncan Copyright: Archant 2019 (Image: Archant 2019)
"The bells had been hanging up since September. We'd just had a delivery about 20 minutes earlier and I was unpacking - there was no breeze and the delivery had been gone long enough for any disturbance to have stopped. I hadn't noticed they were moving, but I certainly noticed when they fell! "To me, it looks as if they are being tugged from below. The nail was still on the wall and one bell was still hanging there. Obviously, this is easier to explain than the other video - you could just say that it broke, although it was very light. The other video, though…"
The 41-year-old, who runs the shop with his wife Eve, was born in London and has previously worked in Norwich. "There's not a lot of space in the room where the boxes are stored - there's basically standing room and no more," said Gary, of the video which shows the plastic bags seemingly 'thrown' from a box. "I couldn't believe it when I saw the footage because it looks as if the little package of bags is being thrown out of the box it was stored in - it's not fallen out, it's been launched out. It's very strange.
"I have felt that there is something odd in the shop for a while, but most of the time it doesn't bother me: there was one occasion when I'd locked up for the evening but then realised that I'd left the back lights on, so I went back in," he said. "As I walked out again, I felt a lump in my throat and tears come to my eyes. I was suddenly overwhelmed with sadness - I nearly started crying. As soon as I got outside, it totally stopped. It was so strange. "When we first opened the shop, we had a lot of Halloween stock and there was one particular costume that kept falling off the rail, even when we made sure it was secured properly. "Several people who have come into the shop have said they have felt something is there - a customer stood by the till and said they felt someone, or something, touching their shoulder.
Other people have been walking around the back of the shop - at the place not far away from where the bags fell - and said it suddenly felt really cold. "No one has ever said they have felt that anything bad is there, just that they feel there is something there that they can't explain. This is the first time we've captured anything on camera."
Brandon, on the Suffolk/Norfolk border, has been a settlement since prehistoric times when the area was mined for flint, and in medieval time, the town was renowned for its rabbit fur while more recently it was a major centre for the production of gunflints. It was once a stop-off for pilgrims on their way to Walsingham in Norfolk and the current High Street was once known as Ferry Street, reflecting the town's role as an inland port receiving goods on the Fenland Waterway. Another ghostly presence has been reported at a pub on Brandon's High Street - a different kind of spirit behind the bar.
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