What Does a House Remember?

**SPEAKER_1** (0:07)
The views and opinions expressed by hosts and listeners on The Astonishing Dead Letter Office are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Astonishing Legends Productions, The Astonishing Legends Network, or any affiliated entities or guests.

**Forrest Burgess** (0:37)
When something unexplainable happens to you, it can make you feel isolated or alone. But trust us, you're not. For over a decade, you've been sending your strange stories to Astonishing Legends. And now it's time for our fellow legenders to hear them too.
Join us weekly in Blanket Forteana as we dig through your intriguing messages to the Astonishing Dead Letter Office.

**SPEAKER_1** (1:11)
Tonight's episode, What Does a House Remember?

**Forrest Burgess** (1:17)
Tonight, we're headed across the pond, over the river and through the woods to grandma's house, grand's house, sort of, as you'll hear, into some old border country between England and Wales. Really rich area with a lot of history. But we're going to a house that's been long standing enough to have outlived nearly everyone who ever loved it.
And maybe it's okay with that. The house is okay with that.

**Scott Philbrook** (1:44)
Yeah, this is the Welsh Marches. That's the proper name for this area. Shropshire, pressed right up against the Welsh border. For centuries, this was kind of a rough scene between two countries. You had the marcher lords out here in the medieval period, somewhat independent barons holding a frontier that frequently got raided from both directions, castles every few miles.
It was a lot going on. Then the whole thing just, it went quiet. Things calmed down for a long, long time, probably longer than America has existed. But today, it's some of the most thinly populated old country in England. It's the stiper stones, the long mend, the sever and winding through market towns that were already ancient when the Tudors turned up a little bit later.

**Forrest Burgess** (2:29)
Yeah, and this isn't your typical Hollywood haunted house, haunting style kind of thing either, with the rattling chains and the moaning and this and that. I mean, in a Hollywood sense, the movies, everybody wants to leave. Now, that's certainly the case for a lot of stories we also get, where people are just like, we can't deal with this. But we found over the years, there's a fair number of stories that we've come across where there's actually what sounds like chains rattling.
One of the creepiest ones comes from someone who was a mortuary technician, somebody who was responsible for embalming and treating and preparing the bodies that came through in the basement at night for the night shift, for the day crew to start working on. And they actually heard clanging and chains being dragged. So there's a few other tropes in this, but yeah, for some reason, the chain dragging is one of them, but not for tonight. We have a few others.

**Scott Philbrook** (3:23)
A little Jacob Marley action.

**Forrest Burgess** (3:25)
I see what you mean. It's that there is something about that. And there's another... It's not a trope in that. I believe it's fictitious because it comes up in so many stories of people that we find credible, that there's something about the appearance, let's say, of whatever this thing is.
And that is a recurring theme like so many. So what's going on here? That's what we want to know. But there's also a lovely little story that this is wrapped up in. And when we're talking about these things that are less likely to happen, and the things that are more, the ones that seem to ring more true to us are much more subtle, I'll say.

**Scott Philbrook** (4:03)
I would agree with that.

**Forrest Burgess** (4:04)
But in this story, there is the unexplained, but I love how it's dealt with and how it's experienced, because these all don't have to be horrific, terrible stories. They can be heartwarming and inspiring in many ways.

**Scott Philbrook** (4:16)
I'll only say this, notice how gentle the story is. It's not a story that's necessarily trying to scare you, if anything.
It's a story about being looked after. So, Forrest, I think it is your turn to read this one. So why don't you take us into this house in England?

**Forrest Burgess** (4:38)
I would very much like to tell you a small story about some experiences we had upon first moving into our home in a small village in Shropshire, England, near the Welsh border. It's a beautiful old early Victorian villa, 1840s, in need of renovation, and we, me, my husband, and our two young daughters, were very excited to embark on this new adventure together in 2019
It was empty as we moved in because the previous owner, Betty, had died 18 months previously at the impressive age of 94, having lived in and loved the house since 1961 The house felt a bit sad and unloved being empty so long, but we knew it just needed a bit of life in it, and some fresh paint.