# Share your saddest story



## jerm IX

Houses that tell stories that evoke emotional responses are my favourite aspect of exploring. I would love to hear the saddest story that you have ever uncovered while exploring abandoned houses. Please share.

Here is my sad story...

http://jermalism.blogspot.ca/2013/08/abandonment-issues-house-on-hill.html


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## mookster

Discovering what later became known more widely as the Beekeeper's Bungalow.

It took me two trips to piece together enough information on the owners and the house. To cut a long complicated story short it was owned by a family including a woman working as a teacher who had moved from Turkey to the UK in the late 1940s, she married and had some children one of which died of Leukaemia at the tragically young age of just six in 1970. The second trip I went with the specific intention of digging out all the paperwork I had seen piled on the bottom of some shelves in the kitchen, and in amongst it was this lot...which absolutely floored me.

























I've never been so affected by a location before, especially as I was the initial discoverer of it...

I took loads of photos documenting it before it inevitably got out through the usual channels and is now a shadow of it's former self.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mookie427/sets/72157630302832252/


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## djrich

Got something in my eye..


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## UrbanX

I guess the saddest time I can relate to it was in Chernobyl when I visited one of the more in tact nursery's; there were 29 bed spaces laid out, all numbered. On the blackboard by the door were 29 names, all with a photograph of a smiling toddlers face next to them. I looked at the kids faces faces smiling innocently to the camera and guessed they must have been 3-4 years old - about the age I would have been when Pripyat was evacuated. 
They must all be the same age as me now. I wondered what they all done with their lives, did they get married? Did they become architects? builders? carers for their loved ones? 

Then the sinking realisation fell upon me that non of these kids were alive. 

It's unlikely any of them saw their 5th birthday. 

Their parents dont have these photos, yet here I am, a stranger, just looking at their child, weeping.


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## UrbanX

My most emotional experience through exploring has to be this one: 
http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/showthread.php?t=22097#.UiEjQ9I3u8A

Video: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnyYmF_7qfk[/ame]


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## Dirus_Strictus

UrbanX said:


> My most emotional experience through exploring has to be this one:
> http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/showthread.php?t=22097#.UiEjQ9I3u8A
> 
> Over the last fifty years I have built up a vast collection of original items based around my interest in photo-journalism - I took the easy way out and went into technical photography! The above report by UrbanX is outstanding and easily bears comparison with many of the articles in my collection produced by renown journalists over the last half century! It certainly puts our endless fascination with images of the common detritus of past family life in this country into perspective - though I somehow doubt many will agree with me on that one.


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## UrbanX

Dirus_Strictus said:


> UrbanX said:
> 
> 
> 
> My most emotional experience through exploring has to be this one:
> http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/showthread.php?t=22097#.UiEjQ9I3u8A
> 
> Over the last fifty years I have built up a vast collection of original items based around my interest in photo-journalism - I took the easy way out and went into technical photography! The above report by UrbanX is outstanding and easily bears comparison with many of the articles in my collection produced by renown journalists over the last half century! It certainly puts our endless fascination with images of the common detritus of past family life in this country into perspective - though I somehow doubt many will agree with me on that one.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Thanks dude, that means so much especially coming from you. In by no means a journalist, I'm pretty clumsy when it comes to wording things! I still love this 3 mins tho, I watch it more than I'd ever look through a folder of photos! Cheers dude!
Click to expand...


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## skankypants

mookster said:


> Discovering what later became known more widely as the Beekeeper's Bungalow.



I agree with you on this post,,,i also have been to bee keepers,and totally understand what you mean,me and the rest of the crew I was with first went into the "house",thinking it would be a waste of time,due to the state it was in,but after a closer look,it unveiled a very sad history....such a shame that these items were left to rot....prized posessions........I also found bucket house a little moving.


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## Derelict-UK

I don't think I have a sad 'story' but a have a sad picture...

From St Edwards Boys home


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## ianitter

How sad! I am really moved..proper heartbreaker..


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## AllyB

While I was exploring an asylum I got a phone call to say my dog had died.


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## smiler

djrich said:


> Got something in my eye..


Yeah, me to, bloody dust gets everywhere.


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## RichardH

There was a report on here a few years ago (can't remember by whom), where the explorer had been wandering around a grand old house that had sadly drifted into dereliction. He opened a door and came face to face with the old man who still lived there. It turned out that the old man was the last of his family, and didn't have enough money to maintain any more of the house than the couple of rooms in which he lived. So he sat there year after year, as his home fell down around him.


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## Derelictspaces

RichardH said:


> There was a report on here a few years ago (can't remember by whom), where the explorer had been wandering around a grand old house that had sadly drifted into dereliction. He opened a door and came face to face with the old man who still lived there. It turned out that the old man was the last of his family, and didn't have enough money to maintain any more of the house than the couple of rooms in which he lived. So he sat there year after year, as his home fell down around him.



You sir just broke my heart. That is one of the most touching things I've ever heard. Poor guy.


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## NakedEye

RichardH said:


> There was a report on here a few years ago (can't remember by whom), where the explorer had been wandering around a grand old house that had sadly drifted into dereliction. He opened a door and came face to face with the old man who still lived there. It turned out that the old man was the last of his family, and didn't have enough money to maintain any more of the house than the couple of rooms in which he lived. So he sat there year after year, as his home fell down around him.



Bloody Hell I just dropped my fork eating my Chinese...how heart breaking...does anyone know the original report??? would love to see it [I think]


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## corij

Walking my dog one lunchtime on Parham Airfield (WW2 USAAF ).It was about the year 2000 ,as we had done many times before, we wandered thru the woods adjacent to the runways,all was quiet and the air was still.
Suddenly under a Hawthorn tree i came across a mans lower jawbone with very good teeth. Just laying there on the surface .I could see it was very old but i didnt know what to do . So i heaved up a large slab of broken concrete and laid the bone under it and gently relaid the slab for safekeeping . Something about it told me it had belonged to a Young Airman from back in the War .
Anyway,,,months went by and then one day i decided to go take another look at it. Back in the woods nothing had changed and ah yes theres the concrete slab.
.Lifted up the slab and guess what - it had gone .


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## Mr Sam

had an uncomfortable feeling in an ROC post once like someone else was there

later found out someone hung themselves in the shaft


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## chazman

on a site at the mo where we have all seen a locker door open (same locker) and theres 9 in our secca team.the old gym has an atmos and we all know who it is,but im the only one who chats to him when i check the old changing rooms and do patrol 3 (the area where he is) im not scared like the rest are because i say someone is only dead when nobody talks about you anymore.the story is sad but its a fact.i like to think he knows i respect him as he gave his life to us all and for us all.


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## Richard Davies

RichardH said:


> There was a report on here a few years ago (can't remember by whom), where the explorer had been wandering around a grand old house that had sadly drifted into dereliction. He opened a door and came face to face with the old man who still lived there. It turned out that the old man was the last of his family, and didn't have enough money to maintain any more of the house than the couple of rooms in which he lived. So he sat there year after year, as his home fell down around him.



This sounds like something out of one of John Harris's books, when he was sneaking round big houses after the war, & many a landowner was suffering from having the house used in the war & not getting any compensation.

It also reminds me of a programme a few years ago about an old rich family who had money problems for 2-3 generations.

Even after pulling half the house down, they were struggling to make ends meet. They considered turning the land into a residential riding school, but didn't want to rent out the better bedrooms, which were still full of things from the children who had grown up & moved out.


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## krela

Richard Davies said:


> This sounds like something out of one of John Harris's books, when he was sneaking round big houses after the war, & many a landowner was suffering from having the house used in the war & not getting any compensation.
> 
> It also reminds me of a programme a few years ago about an old rich family who had money problems for 2-3 generations.
> 
> Even after pulling half the house down, they were struggling to make ends meet. They considered turning the land into a residential riding school, but didn't want to rent out the better bedrooms, which were still full of things from the children who had grown up & moved out.



That's the story of 90% of manors and estates up and down the country over the past 200 years.


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## rinaric15

One thing useful in sad stories is getting courage to express anxiety in some way. Ive found a way to care less about the double edged sword of "everyone will know how anxious i am." in my desperate need to avoid certain situations. So in cases of rading an essay id let my Deer In Headlights look show or just mouth that i cant, at least (because I might not be able to talk xD). 

I actually think this is a pretty important skill. If you skip it and focus on trying to feel less anxious doing the tasks themselves only, what if that doesnt work in time? You at least have something to fall back on - flaunting your weakness. Showing them how sadistic theyd be if they made you do the task at hand. So, try your hardest to stare frozen as an ice sculpture in front of the teacher staring at your desk and gripping it until your knuckles are white - or at least power walking out of the door! ;D (PS - i havent seen if i can apply any of these yet. I might end up mouthing like a fish out of fear of giving such a silent display.)


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## krela

I'm sorry rinaric15, I have no idea what you're talking about, or what it has to do with this thread?!


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## Paulytwotanks

What an interesting thread! Good idea of the initiator.


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## Paulytwotanks

corij said:


> .Lifted up the slab and guess what - it had gone .



Absolutely surreal.


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## Infraredd

I managed 3 flats in West Hampstead for a while and had to get them furnished to let, so the estate agent I was working for let me go to another building to take whatever furniture I needed. When we got there he told me an old woman had died in the house the night before and all her possessions were still there and were not part of the deal. Ok fine, so me and another guy went through the house and took anything half decent. After a couple of hours I had worked my way to the very top of the house where there was an attic door. Having forgotten all about the old lady I pushed it until it opened about 6 inches. It was dark in there but within reach was a really nice silver teapot. So I reached in to get it. Then I noticed the feeling of utter sadness coming out of that room and remembered what I had agreed. I left it and shut the door. I felt so shitty after that experience and that's why I don't do shots of dead people's personal possessions...........................


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## Avengerius

That paperwork about Kingsley is really powerful. I can imagine how finding that stuff would be emotive. I wonder if the family would have appreciated that documentation being returned? 
I don't know anything about the history to the beekeepers cottage though, am really new here.


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## TeeJF

I dunno about a sad exploration but I do remember seeing some rather ancient graffiti once which graphically brought it home to me that people are much the same irrespective of the era in which they live, their circumstances, surroundings etc.

This is cut into the stone of a door lintel within a particularly ancient structure in Egypt.







For those of you not familiar with Latin it says:

*"B. Mure is really stupid"... *​
I rather suspect it may also be interpreted in a somewhat courser fashion if you chose to use "the vernacular"!


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## ZeaJane

UrbanX said:


> My most emotional experience through exploring has to be this one:
> http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/showthread.php?t=22097#.UiEjQ9I3u8A
> 
> Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnyYmF_7qfk



The thread is closed now but I still feel the need to let you know that it had such a huge effect on me! The way you wrote about his reaction to you drinking his wine, it felt so raw that I may have cried a little..
Thank you.


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