How The Battersea And Enfield Cases Are Similar And Different

The BBC ran a series of podcasts on the Battersea Poltergeist earlier this year. It's gotten millions of streams and downloads and has been widely discussed, and a television series is under development. Comparisons between Battersea and Enfield came up periodically during the podcast series and have often been brought up elsewhere. I want to discuss how the two cases relate.

I've been studying Enfield extensively for a few years now, but I know much less about Battersea. I've read Shirley Hitchings and James Clark's The Poltergeist Prince Of London (Great Britain: The History Press, 2013) and some recent articles on the case, I've listened to the BBC series mentioned above, and I've watched some videos on the subject. Clark's book is good and is the best resource I'm aware of on the case. It had to have taken a lot of time and effort to sort through all of the material involved in such a large and complicated case and to present it so well. I recommend starting with Clark's book, then listening to the BBC series. The podcasts will be easier to follow if you have the background knowledge the book provides, and some of the material covered in the podcast series happened later than the timeframe the book covers.

Unless I indicate otherwise, references related to the Battersea case below will be to the approximate location in the Kindle version of Clark's book. I'll be citing some of Maurice Grosse and Guy Playfair's Enfield tapes. I'll designate Grosse's tapes with "MG" and Playfair's with "GP", so that MG23B is Grosse's tape 23B, GP90A is Playfair's tape 90A, and so on.

I'll briefly discuss what I think of the authenticity of the Battersea case, then address how Battersea and Enfield relate and make some miscellaneous comments about the BBC series on Battersea and other issues. To keep this post from being longer, much of what I'll be saying will be summaries of my conclusions. I can expand on the points I'll be making if anybody wants me to.