Elsewhere in these memoires you will have read of an apparent case of Demonic possession: this tale came to us from an old friend: Richard! You should know that Richard and I were at Grammar School together, back in the halcyon days of the 1960's.
We shared our hopes and dreams, double-dated together and played guitar in a variety of bands!

In 1969 we spent a last holiday together in our beloved France, before I joined the Royal Navy and Richard departed for University….

While lying on a beautiful sandy beach in Southern Brittany, Richard remarked that it would be good for the two friends and their female partners (who had been left back in the United Kingdom!) to reunite thirty years hence to witness together the 1999 total solar eclipse…..

We two devoted friends laughed at the thought of  ourselves at the age of 50, and debated the likelihood of mankind avoiding the seeming inevitability of a nuclear holocaust before the appointed time.

Thirty years passed…. Richard became a successful computer systems modeller, while I managed to find my way in and out of over fifty careers and two marriages before arriving at the point we know now….

In the Spring of 1999, sitting in the garden with my wife, I suddenly thought of that long lost Summer, and the promise Richard & I had made to each other. I picked up the phone, and, having obtained Richard's number from directory enquiries, dialed my old chum: not without some trepidation!

Frustratingly, Richard's phone was engaged, so I hung up, resolving to try later….Immediately the phone rang! YES! It was Richard!
He had suddenly felt the need to contact his old friend about the coming eclipse!  I stammered out the details of how I too had felt the sudden impulse to talk to my oldest school friend.
The  computer scientist then astounded me by reminding me that it was his birthday!!!

Sadly, it was not possible for us to witness the 1999 eclipse together: and in any event, poor weather precluded either of us from experiencing totality…..

Nonetheless: we were re-united and were already making plans for the next accessible eclipse when Richard disappeared once again!

Elsewhere in these memoires you will have read of how I encountered the spirit of a Nurse in an old house in South Devon.
Although by no means the most outre of my experiences, this story was not without its features of interest, and I was asked to retell it on a live television programme.

As visual aids, I took along a photograph of a group of nurses and a uniform, both of which had been found in the attic of the old house and which had been loaned to me by a local museum. During the show, a psychometrist was able to confirm that the uniform had indeed belonged to the Nurse whose shade I had encountered on a dark landing some months before!

The preceeding item on the programme had featured a very gifted clairvoyant: she performed some astonishingly accurate readings on audience members, several of whom were very moved by their experiences.

Then came my account. At some point in the item, the 90 year-old photograph of the nurses was projected onto a screen. Although I was very focused on telling my story, I was aware of a slight commotion from the audience.

During an interval, it transpired that a female guest had recognised her own grandmother in the photograph! Later, she confirmed that her relative had nursed in the region during the First World War!