Final photo of exorcist before he died emerges – and scary detail creeps everyone out – The Mirror
An ancient evil in a Scottish churchyard seems to be echoing down the centuries – and has been blamed for the death of the exorcist who tried to put an end to it
A photograph that appears to show the evil ghost of a man responsible for hundreds of deaths defies any explanation – almost a quarter of a century after it was taken.
Many visitors to the eerie Greyfriars Kirkyard in Edinburgh have reported being attacked by an spooky presence in the graveyard, but spiritualist medium Colin Grant actually seems to have met his death at the spectral hands of George ‘Bloody’ Mackenzie.
Mackenzie’s evil reputation was born in the wake of 1679’s Battle of Bothwell Bridge, when some 6,000 Presbyterian Covenanters were routed by government forces led by the Duke of Monmouth. Around 1,200 Covenanters were captured and imprisoned in a field not far form the churchyard. Many were executed, and hundreds more died of maltreatment – notorious judge Mackenzie was a fierce advocate of the use of torture in Scotland.
The bodies of the Covenanters were thrown into a mass grave on the site is what is now Greyfriars Kirkyard. By chilling coincidence, on his death in 1691, George Mackenzie was interred in the so-called Black Mausoleum in that very cemetery.
The cemetery soon acquired a sinister reputation, centred around the Black Mausoleum. There are hundreds of reports of unexplained scratches and bruises appearing on the faces of visitors to the cemetery, and one woman claimed to have been knocked off her feet by an “icy blast” of wind that came from within the eerie structure.
Some even claimed an evil presence had followed them home from the cemetery, lighting fires in their homes and causing other unexplained phenomena.
There was an apparent increase in this poltergeist activity in the late 1990s, after a homeless man, seeking shelter for the night, broke into the mausoleum and feel through the floor into a pit of ancient skeletons. Some say this accident reawakened the cruel spirit of ‘Bloody’ Mackenzie.
Podcaster Mr Ballen explains: “A story began to circulate around town that maybe when that guy fell through the floor in the mausoleum that that had released George McKenzie's evil spirit and his spirit was responsible for all these attacks.
“It went on like this for about a year until finally this young woman was found outside of the black mausoleum unconscious, looking like she'd been strangled and when she came to she had no memory of what happened and so people assumed this had to be another attack by the spirit of George McKenzie."
Mr Ballen says that minister and medium Colin Grant had been "begged" by city officials to perform an exorcism in the graveyard, and banish Mackenzie’s restless spirit: “If he didn't do this exorcism there was a good chance more people were going to get hurt."
On that chilly November night, Colin at least had some company: “There were two people with him – there was a journalist and a photographer from a local newspaper who were basically tagging along to document this exorcism.”
Colin told the reporter that he was finding the exorcism ritual unusually hard, and had given up on confronting the ghost of Mackenzie and was instead trying to free the trapped souls of 200 or so Covenanters who had been buried there. An exhausted Colin said that the exorcism would "be the death of him".
It was at around two in the morning that the ritual reached its peak, and even the two sceptical journalist began to feel that something “weird” was happening. Photographer Susan Burrell lifted her camera and took one last photo of Colin.
Over his shoulder, apparently peering from a window of the locked and empty church, a mysterious dark figure can be seen. Susan told colleagues afterwards that, whatever this strange apparition was, it had been moving at the moment she snapped the photo.
“After the flash goes away,” Mr Ballen says, “it was like the light went out of Colin and he just crumpled to the ground. The journalist immediately ran over to o see if he was OK and Colin, who was barely conscious at this point, just kept repeating ‘This is going to kill me, this is going to kill me …’”
Colin’s words proved prophetic, the podcaster adds: “Not long after this failed exorcism, Colin would die inexplicably. His death would come as a total shock to his friends and family.”
No convincing explanation has ever been found for Susan’s photo, which appears to show the heartless judge reaching out from beyond the grave to claim one more victim.
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