Marilyn Michau stands outside her haunted Bathurst Settler house with a painting of an angel that mysteriously had a rope added around the angel’s neck after the artwork was put up in her home. Picture: DAVID MACGREGOR

In South Africa, another strange news report of a supposed haunted home. One in which the owner tells of the ghosts communicating in strange ways. Doors opening and closing by themselves, kitchen noises and paintings altered. Sounds crazy? read more…

GHOST busters have failed to drive out the souls who drift in and out of an 1820s Settler house in Bathurst. The house was bought on a whim by Johannesburg businesswoman Marilyn Michau in December 2005 – she had not even set foot inside the boarded up St John’s Church rectory at the time she decided to purchase the building.

The building has since been exorcised several times by some of the best ghost busters in South Africa. The story is insane yet a few are convinced that this is really happening. So the next time you want your kitchen cupboard replacement, look around the house and you just might get some free advice. Professionals are honestly the best option though.

“When I brought my son to see the place for the first time, he overheard in the pub about a crazy Joburg woman who had bought the haunted house … he was so frightened, he told me to cancel the sale immediately,” Michau told the Daily Dispatch this week.

Reputedly haunted for the past 140 years by the ghost of a pregnant nun who committed suicide in the house soon after her illicit relationship with a slave or soldier was discovered, the history of the place did not spook Michau off.

An avid ghost buster herself, Michau called in the best Catholic exorcist in South Africa, Father Larry Kaufman , in February 2006 to clear the house of unhappy spirits.

“He arrived with his incense and robes and we prayed up a storm in all the rooms,” Michau said. “Upstairs, a lot of entities presented themselves.

“There were bad smells and winds. When we got to my son’s room there was a smell that would not go away, it just got worse.”

According to Michau, Kaufman explained that the room had once contained the bodies of dead, “legless” soldiers.

“When we renovated the room, we found pentagrams and other satanic emblems made from copper under the wooden floors. I removed them and threw them in the ocean.”

Although Kaufman ridded the house of most of the entities, Michau also called renowned white sangoma Bokka du Toit to help cleanse the house.

“I fell in love with the place … the house chose me – there was no way I was going to just run away.”

Strange events in the house include lights switching on and off, doors being flung open by winds, mystery shadows, chopping sounds from the kitchen, foul odours, bed covers being ripped off and the occasional sighting of the “nun” ghost.

Another unexplained incident occurred when an American artist friend, Nancy Noel, painted her a picture of an angel and posted it to South Africa.

A day after hanging the artwork, a friend arrived at the house and asked why she had a painting of the dead nun on the wall.

“The angel had a rope painted around her neck that was not there when I opened the parcel.

“I phoned Nancy and she said she never painted a rope around the angel’s neck.”

With most of the ghosts now gone, Michau said the nun was the only entity left.

Soon after buying the house, Michau dropped her daughter, Michaela , at a medium’s house in KwaZulu-Natal for a consultation.

“When I went to drop her off the medium came running out and asked if I was coming to see her as she had some messages for me from a nun.

“I was overwhelmed by this bit of news and sat down immediately to hear what my nun had to say.”

According to Michau, the nun had told the medium to “thank me for listening to her and buying the house”.

“She had waited for over 100 years for someone to come along that could love the house as much as she had, and she had chosen me.

“She described the house exactly and asked me to renovate and restore it to its former glory particularly by making the upstairs windows into doors again.”

Michau followed the nun’s instructions “to the letter” and restored the house.

“This is my home, I never want to leave,” she said. “I have grown quite attached to my ghost.” – BY DAVID MACGREGOR

Full source: Dispatch Online