This is the first investigation ever carried out at the secret bunker.

With thanks to James Mitchell.

History. The bunker was built in the 50's to serve as a command and control centre for the Northern Defence of Great Britain. It served in this role and later as an Emergency Regional Seat of Government until being decommissioned in 1993 at which time it was declassified and sold. The bunker has been open to the public since 1994 and during this time some visitors have noticed orbs in photographs and in one case, a figure on a stairwell.

Investigation. The Alba Paranormal team consisted of Steven Douglas, Ralph Kelly, Heather Kelly, Bill Black, Tracey Black, Neil Cameron, Allan Watson and John Burns. The team were accompanied by the owner James Mitchell, his wife and 5 guests.

Most investigations begin with a walk-round. This allows team members to familiarise themselves with the building under investigation and allows the psychic team members to get a general feeling and sometimes to point the technical crew towards the best places to set up cameras and recorders later in the investigation.

To go to the individual parts of the investigation, click on the links below.

The Walk Round

The Stairwell   R.A.F. Operations Room  Russian Motorcycle Display   Cinema 1   The Armoury 

  Switchboard Room   Telex Room   Plant Room   Regional Commissioners Room

The Chapel   Room 14   Cinema 2   Dormitory

The Vigils

The Vigils   Second Vigil. The Chapel   Third Vigil. The Cinema.

Conclusion

Bill sensed a presence and came up with the name of 'Podge Graham'. He was an RAF serviceman and was linked to an RAF cap which is kept on a rack in the stairwell. Bill said that he had not served in the bunker but was solely linked to the cap. The EMF meters were going wild in this area. The Gauss meter was reading full scale and the digital meter was also on full deflection. A check of temperatures produced nothing unusual. We moved into the BT services room to further investigate the unusual EMF readings. We discovered that there is a high voltage distribution unit mounted on the wall which divides the room from the stairwell. The EMF meters were both reading full scale several feet from this unit and we concluded that this was the source of the readings.

Temperature variations of several degrees were recorded in the room. No unusual EMF readings were recorded during this visit. Bill contacted a spirit but was unable to get a name. He said that this was the spirit that has been seen in the stairwell but that it was not 'Podge Graham'. The spirit was proud of the fact that he had been seen on several occasions although the manifestation has been reported only once as far as we were led to believe. There have however been instances of orbs in photographs taken in the area. No further information was obtained from this area during the rest of the investigation.

This room appeared unremarkable except for one rather strange piece of information Bill came up with. He sensed the presence of two small dogs! They were Spaniels and he said that they worked in the installation. James told me that there were originally kennels in the grounds and that there were certainly dogs employed for security. The presence of Spaniels however, gave us something to think about. The only explanation I can come up with is that Spaniels are sometimes used as sniffer dogs to detect drugs and explosives and may have been part of the original security measures for the bunker.

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When we entered the armoury, Bill was immediately drawn to one weapon on display. An American M3 machine gun known as a Grease gun hangs on the wall of the room. Bill tried some psychometry on it and said that he felt it had been used in combat. He said it wasn't a nice feeling and that he also got the name of a place in France, a small village which he pronounced as 'Geersy'. He said that he felt it had been used there during the war.

The following day, Bill called me and asked me who would have used this weapon and when. I told him that the M3 had been issued to American Airborne forces around D-Day and that these had been used extensively in the retaking of Europe. Bill called me back the next day and told me that he had been doing some digging on the internet and had found that American and Free French Airborne forces were dropped near a village called Guercy in France around D-Day. Their task had been to attack the German forces from behind and catch them in a pincer movement.  A vicious battle had apparently been fought around Geurcy resulting in many dead on both sides.

Nothing was found in this room although several team members noticed a strange smell here.

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We entered the plant room and Bill immediately said that he was seeing the room as it had been during the years of its use. He said he saw and heard men running around, throwing switches. He got the feeling that the men were frightened and that they thought they were locking the bunker down for a war. He then felt that there was a mixture of relief and anger and that this had been a drill. Before we had gone to the bunker, Bill had told me he could see a room with two levels and lots of pipes and switches. He said that he was sure this was the room he had seen previously. Bill has done this before on several occasions in that he has described a room to me that we’ve later walked into. We moved up onto the upper level which is accessed by a set of ladders. Bill said he saw something forming at the door of a vent shaft but nothing was caught on camera. Nothing further was noted here.

Bill said he felt this room was quite calm. He got the name of a woman and said he thought that she was in charge at some time in the past. The name Bill was getting was Fiona Cuthbertson. At the moment, we have been unable to confirm this name. There was a temperature difference noted here and the adjoining room of 6 degrees centigrade.

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Almost all of us felt that the chapel was quite an oppressive place. Bill said that he felt that there had been a lot of carrying on at the back of the room. He likened it to schoolboy type carry on. He said that he heard a voice say that what went on in here was ‘a load of rubbish.’ He felt that services were maybe not held ‘all that often’ and that they weren’t very popular when they did occur. Bill said that he was being told to hold a vigil in here. This was an area where we were going to setup a locked of camera but on this information, we decided to hold a vigil later in the evening. Alex felt a very cold spot halfway towards the back of the room and this was confirmed by laser thermometer as being 2 to 3 degrees colder than the rest of the room. However, there is a large air-conditioning duct in this area and cognisance must be taken of this while considering our report.

Bill then asked Alex where room 14 was. He said that there had been a fight here between two young men. Alex said he wasn’t sure where room 14 was but that we could go and look for it.

This turned out to be the small store at the rear of the coffee shop! Bill said that it wasn’t always a store but was in fact some accommodation and that two young men had once had a real fight here over a woman. He said that he saw them, ‘kicking hell out of each other.’ Bill then saw the two of them laughing and said that they had realised that they had been behaving like idiots and had decided to end their feud. Alex confirmed that this room had originally been part of the accommodation for the station.

A lot of the group felt that this room was originally larger than it now appears. Bill said he saw it larger and much grander. He told us that Mackay was still following us around. He said he felt it was an officers’ mess and that Mackay was making him feel that we shouldn’t be in here. Bill saw a female spirit and got a feeling of real sadness from her that she was missing, ‘the good times’ she had once experienced here. Bill also said that he was still thinking of the two young men fighting and that he was laughing at their antics.

Mackay appeared to Bill here. He said that he wasn’t an officer and that he had slept in a particular bed in this room.  Bill got the date August 19^th 1954 and felt that something important had happened here on this date and that it involved him and another man. So far, we’ve been unable to find any link to the bunker on this date.

Nothing else was noted in this room and we decided to end the walk-round and move to the base for coffee.

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Vigils

The second part of an investigation involves setting up vigils in various parts of the building. The team may split up into groups and hold vigils in various parts of the building. In the case of the bunker however, we decided to keep the team together.  In a vigil, we sit quietly and try to open up to anything that may be in the atmosphere. The psychics in the team will often pick up more during a vigil than they can while doing the walk-round.

The first vigil was held at the bottom of the stairwell. Previous visitors to the bunker have taken pictures here that have contained orbs and one visitor claims to have seen the figure of a man on the stairs.

One of the female guests claimed to be seeing lights under the staircase. She described them as small, twinkling blue lights. Several photos were taken of this area but, unfortunately, nothing conclusive was observed. Nothing was seen on any of the video footage taken in the area at the time.

While filming using night mode on the camera I caught light anomalies near Bill. Further examination of the footage leads me to believe that this is the reflection of infra-red illuminators on other cameras being used by the team. The I.R. is reflecting from a clear plastic sheet which is covering the notice board in the stairwell.

Bill said he saw a light mist in the area around the bottom of the stairs. Again nothing conclusive captured on film or still photos. As before, the EMF meters were giving very high readings but this was previously explained as nearby high voltage equipment. 

Bill then said he was getting a spirit by the name of Adam Robertson. He was a civilian contractor working during the construction of the bunker who fell and was killed around Christmas 1952. At the time of his death, he was married to Elizabeth and she was carrying his unborn child. The child, a girl, was born on 6^th January 1953. Again, I have searched what records I could find but so far have had no confirmation of these names and dates. Adam was a steel worker employed by a company with a name similar to Forresters Construction. He is not grounded in the bunker but comes in visitation. Bill said that he died as a result of a broken back sustained in a fall. Bill then tried to get the spirit to confirm it’s presence by making a noise or moving an object. A faint bang was heard by several people present. No further noises were heard despite a repeated request for more.

During the vigil, no orbs or unexplained light anomalies were recorded on the two video cameras present. Some orbs were captured on digital cameras although I must stress that this area of the bunker has sandbags and the floor was quite gritty underfoot. As a result of this I can’t say that any of the pictures taken show a true orb. Temperature readings were fluctuating and the trend was for the temperature to drop markedly during the vigil with a sudden drop as Bill contacted the spirit of Adam Robertson.

The vigil ended after around 50 minutes and the team returned to base to prepare for the next.

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We settled ourselves in the chapel to begin the second vigil. Some of the team felt the urge to laugh. The team were all feeling very light hearted and considering it was around midnight, everyone felt very well. Alex and Bill both reported seeing small blue lights near the centre of the room. Nothing caught on camera.

Bill said that someone was standing at the door which joins the chapel and the cinema. He said it was a vague shape and couldn’t give a description. He wasn’t picking any information up regarding any spiritual entities as so he asked for any present to contact us, by making a noise or by touching a team member. At this point, I felt a severe pain in my lower back and said I had to sit down. Bill, who was standing beside me at the time, also felt a lower back pain.

Bill then asked if we knew if Ian Fleming, the writer of the James Bond novels, had any link with the bunker. Unfortunately no-one knew if there was any such link. Bill insisted that he was getting some sort of link regarding Ian Fleming and that he could feel someone standing behind him. Stevie checked the area with the EMF meter but nothing conclusive was recorded.

We had set up a trigger object at the back of the room using a plate of flour. Unfortunately no movement was recorded in this. However, one interesting thing was noted. A church hymnal was found lying open, on top of the organ keyboard. On checking through photos taken during our visits to the chapel, I can confirm that this book was originally closed and no team member or guest admits to opening it.

We ended the vigil after 35 minutes and returned to the base.

Bill asked if we could return to the cinema even though we had picked up on nothing during the walk-through.

At first, nothing was being picked up. As the time wore on, Bill noticed lights around various team members. These lights were also noticed by other team members. Photos taken during this time show several ‘orbs’ in the room.

Bill picked up the name of a female, Anne Lawson, who worked in the bunker but could not get anything more. At the start of the vigil, everyone had felt fine. However, as the vigil progressed, more and more of us began to feel unwell and very, very drained of energy. Bill explained that this was sometimes an effect experienced before an apparition occurred, so we decided to wait and see what happened. Bill asked any spirit present to let us know they were there but nothing was heard. Team members were, by this time, beginning to feel very unwell. In some cases the members felt close to fainting. We decided that for the safety of the team we would stop the vigil and return to the base. When we returned to the base, most of us began to recover but after some discussion, we decided to end the investigation at this point due to tiredness, the time (02:30) and the distance that we all had to travel to get home.

Conclusion

While the psychic team members had picked up on several different spirits and some team members had felt very uneasy and drained in some areas of the bunker, very little solid evidence was gathered during this investigation.

Video footage shows nothing of a spiritual nature although some photographs do have ‘orbs’. Temperature fluctuations were noted and while not normally evidence in themselves, I would point out that the bunker air circulation system was inactive and the installation remains at a fairly constant temperature all day.

Our team psychic, Bill Black, contacted several astral entities and managed to get some names which we may sometime be able to research and prove the information received.

Perhaps the most unusual phenomenon on the night was the fact that all the team members and guests in the cinema began to feel drained  at the same time, albeit in the early hours of the morning but the fact that everyone present felt the same at the same time is worthy of note.

After analysis of the available evidence and after personal experience of the investigation, I have to say that, in my opinion, there remains much to be found out about the history of any spirits present in the bunker and that this alone would warrant further investigation.

Finally, Alba Paranormal would once more like to thank James Mitchell, his wife and staff for their hospitality and for putting up with our team as we went about our investigation.

Ralph Kelly September 2005.             

For further information on Scotland's Secret Bunker, go to http://www.secretbunker.co.uk        

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Due to a mix up on my original notes, I originally reported the name of the spirit in the dormitory as Podge Graham. This was due to me misunderstanding Bill as I took notes. I have corrected the mistake and updated the report.

Ralph Kelly Sept. 2005.