There is a story in Sciennes about a ghost who haunts the attic. Many children claim to have heard the awful rattling of milk crates behind the attic’s locked doors.
The awful truth about this locked door [was] revealed in the school’s 100th year.
One morning in the late 1960’s, Mr. Melrose the janitor was stacking milk crates with the help of some senior boys. They were working outside the North East attic when the janitor was called away. Six curious boys took their chance and entered the attic – only five came out.
The headmaster Mr. Robertson was immediately called to the scene. ‘Where has that boy gone?’ he demanded.
‘Just disappeared!’ claimed the others.
‘Rubbish, boys don’t just disappear,’ he shouted angrily.
One further step inside the attic revealed the awful truth.
A shaft of light shone up through a round gaping hole where ‘Ricky’ had fallen through the plaster ceiling to the classroom below.
Room 16 was in chaos. In the middle of their arithmetic test Ricky had dropped out of the sky and landed softly on a girl in the second front row.
Ricky escaped almost unscathed (apart from his row), but the girl ended up in the Sick Kids with a broken collar bone and a lung full of plaster dust. The teller of this true tale – although wishing to remain anonymous – admits to being one of Mr. Melrose’s helpers on that fateful day.
All that’s left in the way of evidence is a strange lumpy circle in [Room 16’s] ceiling where there hole was hurriedly repaired.
From the Sciennes School Centenary book – 1992. Published by and copyright of the Sciennes Pri- mary School Parent Teachers Association. Reproduced in 2003 by kind permission of Lindsey Robert- son, Headteacher of Sciennes.
(see Sciennes traditions on page 23)