Sam Slide and the Hauntings at Kinwarton

Those who stand in the porch at Great Alne church to ring the bell are very close to the grave of Samuel Slide. Little do they realise what a bright spark he must have been in his youth. 157 years ago he was suspected of being the cause of the hauntings at the old Rectory next to the church at Kinwarton.

In 1930, Miss Sarah Sophia Purton of Alcester (1847 - 1933) copied extracts from the diary of her great grandmother who was the wife of the Revd. Francis Rufford, Rectcr of Kinwarton with Great Alne, 1787 - 1833. In particular, she wrote a few pages entitled ‘Strange happenings in the store room at Kinwarton Rectory, December 17th,1828’.

‘Mrs Rufford was a strong-minded, practical woman and a good housewife. Her store-room at Kinwarton Rectory was at the top of the house, well-furnished with shelves, where, in addition to fruit, groceries and other perishable stores, she also kept spare glass,etc. not in everyday use. She gradually noticed that when she went into the room curious movements and jingling of the glass seemed to occur: articles fell from the shelves and, in spite of her efforts to find a cause, these movements continued. A glass once seemed to move from one shelf to another and on one occasion an oyster barrel that had been filled with apples rolled over. She replaced them, when immediately tne barrel turned a somersault. She became at last quite uncomfortable and told her husband. He pooh-poohed her fancies and only consented to go up into the room to prove her folly. As he went in, he trod heavily first on one foot, then on the other, all about the floor to test it. “There”, he said, “you see there is nothing wrong”. As he spoke, a large earthenware pipkin with ears rolled across the room. He picked it up and firmly placed it back, remarking, “I will undertake to say that it will not come down again”. As he turned, the pipkin again., fell over and rolled against his heels. Our great-grandmother’s own idea about these occurrences was “that an evil spirit had for some purpose taken possession of the room and wished to keep her out but I go there on my own lawful business and shall continue to do so but I never go into the roam without a prayer that I may be protected from evil”. At last she persuaded her husband to hold a prayer service to exorcise the evil spirit. I do not remember an end beyond this to the story but after the Rev.Francis Rufford’s death at the Rectory in 1833 the Revd. Richard Seymour, who succeeded him, called on my grandmother at Great Alne to hear from her all she could tell him about the occurr ences which were spoken of in the neighbourhood. Suspicion had naturally fallen upon the house servants, especially upon Samuel Slide, a general factotum. He went with Mrs.Rufford to Salford for a short time after she left Kinwarton and some pranks that took place there revived the old suspicion. Sam Slide is buried in Great Alne church-yard nearly opposite the west door’.

This seems to me like a poltergeist it does not mean that the old Rectory is haunted, for a poltergeists attaches to a person rather than to a building. And it seems to me to be impossible for Sam Slide to have been responsible for the occurrences as described. Nevertheless, I like to think that for suspicion to have fallen on him at all, he must have been a bright spark in his youth; and what were the pranks at Salford Priors?

(Editor:- Samuel Slide appears in the Alcester census returns in 1861 and 1871. He was the publican at the ‘Three Horseshoes’ in High Street. He was born in 1810 and died 1872)

Winter 1985 Index