JOHN: My Early Psychic Experiences.

I believe that each and every individual on earth has hidden abilities that can be loosely termed as Psychic Powers. As children many people do encounter the paranormal that is for them, at that time in their development, normal. It is only as we become socialised, programmed if you like, into this increasingly material world that we deny our supernatural self.There may be those among you reading this that remember their early paranormal encounters. Many children do demonstrate some degree of supernatural awareness. Here, as an example, are some of my own personal psychic experiences. These demonstrate that, deny it or not, there exists an obscured doorway between this world and the next. On occasions that door opens and we, in our innocence, walk through.
 THE GHOST IN THE CELLAR
 Born in the shadow of Lancashire’s Pendle hill, infamous for its witches, I was brought up to believe that the supernatural was evil and to be avoided. Perhaps there remained in the little village of Foulridge, where I lived, a kind of collective folk memory concerning the practice of witchcraft. I can clearly recall hearing my grandmother ‘Eva Walsh’ warn me that if I misbehaved then ‘Old mother Demdyke’ would appear and take me away. Demdyke being one of the Lancashire witches. My father, Francis Sutton, was by faith Roman Catholic and rather strict. The very last thing welcome in our family was a psychic encounter. But the spirit world had plans that extended beyond the belief systems and paternal rules that structured my young life.My grandparents lived in a 17th century stone cottage in the village of Foulridge, where I was raised. The house had, in the distant past, been the home of weavers who wove cloth on the premises. The cottage had a cellar the full length of the house and it was there that the hand-operated loom would have been sited. The cottage industry of weaving vanished with the factory system at the start of the industrial revolution. When I was a child the cellar contained only an old wooden workbench and various unwanted household goods. To me it was a wonderful place, full of cobwebs and mystery. Whenever we visited my mother’s parents, Eva and Billy Walsh, I would head straight for that dark cellar to play.As a child of five years it seemed to me that there was nothing strange about the atmosphere in the dark corners of my friendly cellar. I was happy down there and would sit for hours playing. Then one day I noticed that someone had moved my toys, I had a tin train and some building blocks that were my favourite playthings. I recall searching for these and seeing a shadow moving  in a corner. ‘I’m Sammy’ a voice said that seemed to come from within the darkness. Then a blast of cold air rushed by me. I wasn’t afraid, just curious. When I looked again into the corner of the cellar there was nobody there. But in the shadows I saw my little tin train and other toys.From that day onwards I often saw the strange shadow in that dark corner of the cellar. It wasn’t scary, I had heard the shadows name it was Sammy and we were friends. Sammy said he lived in the house and was happy here. I never told anyone about him because I somehow knew they wouldn’t let me play down the cellar again if I did. I saw Sammy  the shadow regularly until we moved away from the area. Then one day when I returned, he wasn’t there anymore. I whispered his name into the cold corner where I used to play, but now there was only dusty cobwebs  and a long abandoned broken tin train.

Many years passed before I told my mother about the shadow man that I used to see in her parent’s cellar. I was amazed when she admitted that my grandmother had always thought that a ghost called Sammy haunted the house. It seems she too had heard and seen him. Whilst researching this book I checked the local records and there was a man by the name of Sammy Tummy who once lived in my grandparents old house. Perhaps he still does.
 
 

BUILDING PYRAMIDS

The year was 1955 and I was a six-year-old boy full of the joys of life. The family had moved to Prestwich on the smart side of north Manchester. My father had entered the Lancashire Constabulary and was serving as a Police Officer. There were by now five of us; mother and father, myself John the eldest, my brother Martin and baby sister Frances Lesley. I was the wild one, the dreamer. I was the one that saw things that were not there. And I quickly learnt not to repeat that which I saw and heard.

The rules within our house were rigid and enforced. At a certain time, around 6 p.m., the children were dispatched to bed and the doors of the bedroom locked behind us. From then until next morning we did not leave the room into which we had been secured. During the summer months this was quite distressing as the nights were light and outside looked like so much fun. It was pointless complaining, as this brought unexpected and entirely unwelcome results.

My bedroom was separate from my siblings and I would lay in bed alone, staring at the wallpaper, wishing I were free. Night after night I lay aimlessly counting the pink paper roses on my bedside wall. Suddenly I was no longer in a tiny back bedroom locked in against my will, I was in a strange land where a river ran before me. The sun beat down from a clear blue sky and I sensed the heat and saw about me men dressed in unfamiliar clothes, leather belts and sandals. I seemed to be standing on a raised wooden platform bound together by what seemed to be ropes. Below me were countless hundreds of dark skinned men heaving and pulling huge stones along across a pathway of tree trunks. Fantastic as it may seem I saw these stones being heaved and dragged towards what I now know to be an unfinished pyramid. At the time I had absolutely no knowledge of Egypt and not a clue about the pyramids. But in the vision I was there, in some kind of position of authority, directing the work taking place. The strength and the joy of it all flooded through me. Then slowly the vision faded and I was back in Prestwich, a little lonely boy locked in my bedroom.

The next morning, when mother unlocked the door, I ran straight downstairs to tell her and my father all about that which I had seen. The reception I received shocked me. It frightened me a great deal to know that my parents considered that I was either inventing the visions or was in some way wicked. There was, as far as I knew, nothing evil about what I had experienced. However, I was left in no doubt that I must not talk of this again. I clearly recall wondering why I was thought to be so bad. To me the sights I had seen were both mysterious and wonderful. Like any child I just wanted to tell everyone about them. But the matter was, as my father so sternly said, closed. I was never to speak of it again.

That night I voluntarily went to my bedroom early and closed the door. Staring at the pale pink paper flowers that I had counted so many times I waited for the visions I had seen to return. Outside the early evening summer light faded and day became night. Still I stared at the wall waiting to be transported out of my lonely room and away to that strange land beyond the capacity of my imagination. It must have been midnight before I saw once more the sights of that far away and long ago kingdom. There again I stood watching the creation of something outside my childish comprehension. But the joy of being there was enough, I was there as a man, not as a boy. The experience was intense, thrilling, overwhelming. I was not viewing this vision, I was a real live living part of it. The sun, the river, the many dark skinned men all heaving and shoving and dragging and pushing huge stone blocks towards some distant place were happening now. I was there, in the midst of all this excitement and action.

The next morning I awoke exhausted. I felt dizzy, weak and unable to control myself. Staggering out of my bedroom across the first floor landing I fell from the top of the wooden staircase to the bottom. I vaguely recall trying to stop myself but could not do so. My parents were standing over me when I awoke. I was physically uninjured. Of the mysterious land beyond my bedroom I said nothing.

For months after the first visions came to me I would infrequently be transported into that world far away from my locked little room where I lay counting paper roses. But the intensity of my experiences had an effect upon my health. I would often waken feeling dizzy and fall down, as the room seemed to spin around me. My parents took me to the medical practitioners who said I was a perfectly healthy boy who was just growing up. I wonder what they would have said if I had told them about my nights spent building pyramids?

MEETING THE ANGEL OF DEATH

The year was 1968 and I was a young man serving as a soldier with the Royal Artillery in barracks at the small town of Sennelager, near Padderborn in Germany. The month was December and I caught a cold. The infection got rapidly worse and I had to report sick to the military Doctor. He diagnosed influenza and suggested I be admitted into the hospital, as my temperature was very high. Being a foolhardy youth I thought I would be better off in my barrack room with some medication. Reluctantly the Dr agreed and, carrying my supply of medicine, I was driven back to my barracks and confined to bed. It was a near fatal mistake.

The influenza overtook my ability to move and no sooner had I got into bed than I became almost comatose. The other soldiers in the barrack room, being young men, thought I was just enjoying a few days in bed. In truth I was very near to death and too ill to even take my medication. How long I was in this condition I do not know, perhaps two days.

Suddenly I was free from that lump of heavy body that was lying there in the bed. Looking down I could see it wrapped in untidy sheets and I felt nothing for it at all. In fact I was delighted to be out of it. Indeed I was out of my body and able to fly anywhere I wanted to. The feeling was almost indescribable. The joy of having no restrictions was fantastic. Then I heard a voice say to me ‘Where do you want to go?’ For some unknown reason I thought of Paris and the Eiffel tower, instantly I was there. Amidst the other tourists I walked around admiring the structure, I mingled with the crowds and it was real, I was there.

Having seen the Eiffel tower I thought I might visit the Taj Mahal and no sooner had the thought crossed my mind than I was transported there. Once again I looked around the grounds and the exterior of this magnificent building. But that wasn’t where I really wanted to be. I was a young soldier, far away from my native land, my thoughts were now of home. I wanted to see and be with my beloved grandparents, in that little stone cottage where I had always been welcome.

Instantly I felt myself uplifted and flying through the atmosphere, soaring above the clouds and below me the blue seas of the wide world sparkled and shimmered in the heavenly light from above. It was an absolutely incredible and unforgettable experience. Suddenly I began to feel heavy and I could no longer fly. I felt myself falling, floating slowly to the ground. When I next looked I saw that I was standing on the long familiar road that leads from the town of Colne, in Lancashire, into the little village of Foulridge where I was raised as a child. But I couldn’t walk another step. My feet felt as though they weighed a hundred pounds each. I was stationary, stuck on the final few hundred yards home to my village. Then I saw the most gloriously glowing beautiful lady I have ever seen in my life. Her shining hair fell in long dark tresses about her shoulders and she wore a brilliant white dress that seemed lit from within.

“I must ask you to make a choice” she said to me in a voice that was as calm and cool as a summer breeze. “You may continue on your journey to your village or return now to your body, which will you do?” she asked. For a brief moment I thought and made a decision “I’ll go back to my body” I replied. As soon as I had spoken she reached out her hand and took mine. In that very instant I opened my eyes to see the grubby barrack room wall, next the untidy bed where I lay in my young soldiers body. The fever had passed and I was alive.

Since that day I have often thought to myself just what would have happened had I made the other choice? Perhaps then the angel of death would have taken me on to another home, in another world. One day I will know.
 

MATERIALISATION

On the 15th May 1973, at the young age of 44 years, my father Francis Sutton passed away. He had contracted leukaemia and died in hospital. His death was expected but it still came as a terrible shock. The man who had been the unquestioned head of the family was no longer with us. It seemed hard to believe at first. My father had been a Detective Inspector in the police serving in the town of Leigh in Lancashire where I now lived with my wife Mary. To me my father was the indestructible strong arm of the law. His death changed many things, including the dynamics of our extended family. No more would we be able to turn to him for advice and guidance. The rock upon which we had so often relied for support was gone.

It was early evening late in the month of August of the same year. I had just completed a days work and returned home to the ground floor flat that I shared with my wife Mary. She was in the kitchen preparing dinner and my mother, Sheila Sutton, was helping her. I stood in the main lounge area quietly watching the two of them fussing about with the setting of the table. It was a perfectly ordinary domestic scene not dissimilar from countless thousands of others in households throughout the U.K. That is before my father returned in his spirit body.

As I stood watching my wife and my mother, only half interested in what they were doing, I saw something move from the corner of my right eye. Turning quickly towards the centre of the lounge I saw, sitting in a chair, my late father Francis Sutton. For a very brief instant I was unable to speak. He looked directly at me and smiled one of his sardonic smiles as if to say ‘I’m watching you boy’. He was dressed in his usual formal suit with a waistcoat, white shirt and dark tie. He was absolutely as alive as I was and this astounded me. Grasping for something to say I blurted out “What are you doing here dad?” Then as suddenly as he had appeared, he disappeared.

I felt faint, my pulse raced and for a moment I thought I would collapse. In my mind I questioned what I had just seen. It was impossible, yet it had happened, I had seen my father whom I knew to be dead. Searching for an explanation I thought that I had imagined it. But I did not imagine it. He had never entered our flat in life so it was not a memory of a former visit. The light was natural and the room well lit. No matter how I struggled to find an answer there was, to me, only one, my father’s spirit had materialised and I had seen it.

From the kitchen my wife called “John, the dinner’s ready” I sat at the table, half dazed, looking disinterestedly at my food. I was still in shock. “What’s the matter John?” my mother said, “you look a bit pale” Little did she know, I had just seen a ghost!

A NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCE

In the year 1986 I was in hospital recovering from the removal of an embolism from my right leg when the site turned gangrenous. Despite desperate efforts by the medical team the infection quickly became life threatening and amputation was the only safe option. It was whilst I was sedated, following the removal of my right leg, that I underwent what I now know to be a near death experience.

The amputation procedure had been successfully completed and I remained unconscious. However, unbeknownst to me, my body had reacted to the drugs I had received and a minute form of fungi had begun to grow in my blood. So on top of the trauma of amputation I was now faced with a further serious infection. According to my brother Martin, who dared to ask, the odds against my survival were put at 20/1.

I can clearly recall stepping out of my body and seeing it motionless on the bed. There were tubes and wires protruding from it and I felt nothing but a desire to move onwards. Before me the walls of the intensive care unit opened and I stepped through them into an airport departure lounge.

There were many people in this airport lounge and I knew none of them. The seats were set in long rows and were filled with others who were just sitting there. Looking out through a series of windows I saw an aircraft standing on a runway. Then a lady dressed like a stewardess came to me and said I must follow her. Together we went to the rear of the seating area in the lounge to a door set into a white painted wall. “You’re next” she told me “when they call you, go through that door”.

I wasn’t afraid in this situation. It seemed perfectly natural and, whilst I was curious, I was not overly concerned. Then someone called my name “Mr Sutton please”. I stood and walked through the door that had been indicated. Within I saw three middle aged men seated behind a long wooden table. They were dressed in business suits and the eldest of the three, sitting in the centre position, had grey hair. They looked rather like senior civil servants ready to interview me for an official position. “Please take a seat” one of the three said and I duly sat down wondering what was next.

“You do know you are not in your body?” the man in centre said. ” I know” I replied, though in truth it had not occurred to me. There followed a kind of benevolent examination of my life. Each of these three gentlemen questioned me in detail about why I had done this and how I felt about that aspect of my life. There was no indication that I was being judged, but a sense that I could have done better. “I’m not ready to die yet!” I said in defence of my lack of positive achievement. “Really” said the man on the right of the three “so tell us, why we should let you return?”

It was then that I knew that I was within the antechamber of eternity. These three men had the absolute unquestionable authority to send me to my destination in the next world. “I have a daughter, a wife, they need me” I said thinking as quickly as I could. That statement made no impression at all. “Everyone who comes in here tells us that kind of story, what are you going to do that will make it worthwhile letting you return?” My mind was spinning, this was it, wrong answer and I was out of the game.

The man in the centre with grey hair spoke to me very kindly “You do realise that if you return you will be an amputee” he said. The thought had never crossed my mind, but it did now. “Yes, but I can do many things despite that” I said. “I can help the mentally handicapped, I was a nurse once” I ventured. “Now you are telling us something” the man on the left said “but there is more that you can do isn’t there?”

For a moment I thought, then it came to me like a flash of inspiration, though why I will probably never know. “Yes” I replied “I will resurrect the pop singer P.J. Proby” (Proby had been my favourite singer from the 1960’s when I was a teenager). The three men looked at me for a while and spoke quietly to each other. “Right Mr Sutton, just wait outside whilst we consider sending you back on a mission” the man with grey hair said. I stood and walked out of the room taking a seat directly next to the door. Time passed and I was not called back in.

As I sat in that airport lounge I heard the intercom announce that it was now time to board the aircraft. I remained seated, watching as all the others, every single one, stood, formed a long queue and boarded the plane. I had no doubt that they were en-route to the next world. I didn’t move. “Will Mr Sutton, will Mr JOHN SUTTON! please take his seat on the plane, we are waiting to depart” a voice from the intercom was calling me. But I would not go, I was being considered for a mission and not until I knew what it was would I go anywhere.

I awoke in a hospital bed on the very edge of death. I was dreadfully ill, my kidneys had failed and I was on dialysis, if they did not start working soon I would certainly die. But they did. Much to the amazement of the medical staff I recovered. The odds might have been 20/1 against, but I made it.

In the year 1990 I was working as a Day Centre Officer caring for and teaching adults with learning disabilities. One evening I received a telephone call from a friend who told me that P.J. Proby was living just a few miles from my home, in the town of Bolton. I went to see the man who had once been voted the world’s best male vocalist in the New Musical Express poll of 1964. He was in desperate straits, a washed up alcoholic mess. Somehow I managed to persuade Jim Proby to sing and wrote a song for him called ‘Stage of Fools’. Within just a few months I had P.J. Proby on Radio and TV with a new album on international distribution.

JOHN on Granada TV September 1990 with P.J. Proby

 I had resurrected him just as I said I would. Granada TV even made a documentary about this and I was featured alongside P.J. Proby. However, that was not the reason I had returned from the borderland between this world and the next. I still did not know what that was though I knew it must be important and linked to spirit.  Then from out of the blue a man called at my house, he said he was a Spiritualist medium. The man explained that he had been sent to see me by his spirit guides who had told him that I was to be instrumental in bringing the truth of spirit communication to the publics attention. This was to become my mission and it has been so since that day many years ago.