LITTLE DEAN JAIL – July 2007

Investigation Site

Little Dean Jail
Forest Of Dean
Glocester

History of the Site

Known as the "ALCATRAZ OF THE FOREST", Little Dean jail was built to be a House of Correction, but has since also been used as a Police Station and a Court house. The building was designed and built by the leading prison architect of his day, William Blackburn and also by the prison reform Sir George Onesiphorous Paul. The building was completed in 1791, but due to the sudden untimely death of William Blackburn, the project was finally completed by his Brother-In-Law, architect William Hobson.
The revolutionary design was considered to be ahead of its time, and was seen to be used as the role model for London’s Pentonville Prison. There is also speculation that it was used to form the basic design of the world famous Philadelphian Cherry hill Penitentiary System in America.
On approach to the prison it is easy to feel uncomfortable as the large austere gatehouse looms above with its formidable sandstone facade remaining much as it did when it was first build 216 years ago. As you walk around the jail, it is difficult to imagine the amount of craftsmanship and hard labour that was needed to build this architecturally impressive jailhouse.

Investigating Team

The members of the team present for this investigation:
Marlene
Sandra
Gill
Sue
Pete

Paranormal Activity Eyewitness Reports

As the jail has stood for the past 216 years, and was used as a "house Of Correction", it is not unusual to imagine that the walls contain masses of stories of torture and unhappiness, as well as paranormal activity. Due to this the jail is a very common hunting ground for paranormal investigators.
There have been many reported sightings of various activities. Many people reported that they feel sick, and also the feeling of being touched. There are also reports of children being seen up on the top corridor.

Investigation Report

The team arrived at the jail at around 5pm and as they went through the gatehouse, were met by the sight of a lovely building. Nicola (The owner) was waiting for the team on arrival and gave them a brief overview of the buildings history, before taking them on a tour through the jail.

After having a tour, the team were left alone to conduct the investigation, but were advised that they would only have 4 hours due to Nicola and her husband having small children.

The team started by performing some baseline tests around the jail with the EMF meter and the temperature sensor.

The investigation started at 11pm by performing the standard baseline tests of checking the temperatures in various locations around the pub, as well as using the EMFS. The results are listed below:

Cell #1
TEMP: 15 degrees
EMFS: 0

Upstairs Landing
TEMP: 15 degrees
EMFS: 0

Downstairs Hallway
TEMP: 15 degrees
EMFS: 0

Cell #2
TEMP: 15 degrees
EMFS: 0

After all the readings had been completed, the team noticed that the temperatures were quite consistent throughout.

The team then decided to split into two groups as time was against them. Marline, Gill and Sandra started their investigations up stairs, whilst Pete and Sue started down stairs. The first team where walking around the old cells and Marline was shut into a cell on her own, but after 5 minutes, needed to come back out due to her starting to feel ill. Gill and Sandra decided to enter the same cell and also found that they had a feeling of unease whilst in there.

The members from the first team then had the opportunity to sit in the electric chair, but found that whilst it was a very strange and moving experience nothing of a paranormal nature happened.

The second team found that their investigation of the ground floor produced no activity what so ever, and so they rejoined the rest of the team to perform a seance. The team decided that they would perform this in one of the cells on the ground floor, and were really hoping to pick up some activity from the energies that are meant to be moving through the jail, but to their disappointment they had nothing to report.

Conclusion

The team all thought that the prison was a very remarkable place and that the owners have work extremely hard to produce a lovely example.

Due to it being day light and also the team having a very limited amount of time to complete their investigation, they were not too disappointed not to have had any real paranormal activity. The experience in the cell where 3 members felt uncomfortable would have been interesting to investigate further.

Although the team used camera's during the investigation, they have found that there were no orbs or light anomalies captured.

The team all agreed that the trip was well worth it, even just to visit the jail, and would love to make the trip again, but maybe this time on a dark evening as then maybe there would be more to report!!!!!

***We would like to thank Nicola and her husband for allowing us to perform the investigation at the Jail***

© Copyright - South Gloucestershire Paranormal Investigation Team