Halloween Sheffield: Ghost hunter reveals spooky encounters - from strange noises at a former hospital to White Lady who had throat slit

Brenda Diskin is a paranormal investigator and is the co-owner of a company called Sheffield Paranormal Investigations.

It was founded in 2002 to research historical buildings, places of interest, and reports of anomalies, in a bid to find out if ghosts and paranormal activity exists.

The team conduct professionally organised psychic investigations in various 'reportedly haunted' places using a wide range of scientific and spiritual equipment.

They have visited Sheffield buildings with spooky stories behind them, including the Abbeydale Picture House, Middlewood Mental Hospital, Mosborough Hall, the National Emergency Services Museum and many others.

Brenda has had paranormal interests since childhood and has been investigating spiritual activities across the UK for over 40 years.

She has now shared some of her personal paranormal and ghostly encounters in Sheffield with The Star.

Former Middlewood Hospital

Brenda said: “I think the most active place I’ve been to was Middlewood.

“We've been called back there a few times from residents living on the site of the old hospital saying that they've got disturbances in their apartment. We did go to one apartment, spent quite a bit of time there and went back about four or five times. We experienced some activity and strange noises and voices, but when you are living in a block where there are other people, you can't be 100 per cent sure if any of that is due to the other residents making noises or actually ghostly going-ons.

“One thing that was interesting was we set up one of those window alarms where you have to open the window, and then it goes off. During the course of the evening, it suddenly went off for no apparent reason, and there was nobody anywhere near it.”

During this investigation, Brenda and the team experienced a lot of physical contact, including the feeling of one particular spirit passing through their bodies.

She added: “We have had times when we've been a little bit shocked by certain things that we have felt and experienced.

“This one time we felt like something went straight through us, it was a strange feeling, you kind of caught your breath, and it suddenly felt very cold.”

Mosborough Hall

According to legend, this hotel has a friendly ghost called the White Lady.

The woman is believed to have been working as a governess at the hall in the late 1600s when she was seduced by a local squire and fell pregnant.

Despite pledging to provide enough money to help her care for the child and buy a small cottage, the squire went back on his promise, and when she threatened to tell his wife about the affair, he allegedly slit her throat.

Speaking about Mosborough Hall, Brenda said: “I don't recall it being very active apart from fluctuations in the temperature.

“There was a strange incident when it looked like somebody was sitting on the bed next to us. That again could have probably been explained, but it did look like somebody was sitting there. It looked like a dent in the covers.”

To read full reports from past investigations, visit www.sheffieldparanormal.co.uk/