The Horror of Briarwych Church by Amy Cross

Author:Amy Cross [Cross, Amy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-12-03T06:00:00+00:00

***

“Her name was, I mean is, I mean... Whatever. She's Judith Prendergast. She's a woman who died in that church in 1940. Her body was discovered two years later, in 1942, when Father Lionel Loveford arrived to open the place and get it up and running again.”

We're back up in his room now, and he's taking some documents from a bag. There are photos and scans, although I can't really make much out, even when I crane my neck to get a better look.

“How did she die?” I ask.

“It seems that she had a run-in with Father Loveford's predecessor, a man by the name of David Perkins. For reasons that are rather unclear, Father Perkins locked Judith Prendergast in the church when he left to fight in the war. I'm sure he expected her to find her way out soon enough, but it would appear that she instead went up into the church's bell-tower. Then, somehow, she fell at the top of the stairs and hit her head, and she was subsequently found by her daughter Elizabeth once the church had reopened. Although, again, there is some question as to when the body was found, and whether Elizabeth had previously broken into the church and found her mother before Father Loveford's arrival.”

He pauses, before sliding a copy of an old, black-and-white photo over to me.

“Back row, on the left,” he says as I pick the photo up. “We're not certain, but we think that's Judith Prendergast in 1939, about a year before her death.”

As soon as I see the woman's face, I flinch. She's staring intently at the camera. I know it's crazy, but I swear I feel the same way I felt back in the church when I thought I was being watched.

“By all accounts, she was an unpopular lady around these parts,” he continues. “Why she was hated is a bit of a mystery. My theory is that she was disliked, but that the hatred came later. The locals sensed something about her, even if they couldn't explain what was wrong. They sensed the evil in her soul, right at the end and also after she was locked in the church. We're not certain about some aspects of her story. What happened to her husband, for example, is unclear, or even whether she had one. She had a daughter, so we assume there was a husband, but records for that period are incomplete when it comes to this area. What we do know is that the locals weren't particularly keen to retrieve her from the church. So much so, in fact, that nobody went to check on her.”

“For how long?”

When he doesn't immediately reply, I turn to him.

“How long did they leave her in there?” I ask.

“Until Father Loveford arrived,” he explains. “They collectively assumed that she'd found her way out and that, for whatever reason, she'd decided to leave Briarwych overnight. A somewhat odd assumption, I'm sure you'll agree, but you have to understand that she was really, truly reviled.

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