Jamaica Inn is a legendary coaching house located on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall. The building was erected in 1750 to give shelter to travellers as they passed over the wind-swept moors. The inn and its shadowy past were both immortalised in Daphne du Mauriers novel, "Jamaica Inn" published in 1936. Its isolated location made it a popular stop for smugglers and today, the Jamaica Inn is also home to a Smugglers' Museum, which comprises many artefacts from these unsavoury characters. Reports of a strange man dressed in a tricorne hat and cloak, apparently appears in the DuMaurier restaurant and then seems to walk through solid doors. Many people have also spotted the figure of a man sitting motionless on the wall outside of the Inn, apparently linked to a story about a stranger who when drinking in the inn was summoned outside only for his body was found on the moor the next day.

This was my second investigation of Jamaica Inn, so I was more than comfortable in familiar surroundings as we embarked upon the night's events. It was also not long before activity was recorded by one of our guests who had been sitting in the bar waiting for the nights activities to commence. They described to me that they were walking towards the restaurant area through the bar when one of the menus placed downwards on one of the tables appeared to just fly off and land on the floor nearby. Nobody was sitting at the table in question, and neither of the ladies could explain what they had experienced.

After a walk around with Jannine, our medium for the evening, we began the opening vigil as I took a team to the bar area to attempt some automatic writing using the Planchette. While using the Planchette one of the team members felt that had contacted an energy called "Jella" who they felt was a young boy of around 9 years of age. He appeared to communicate information about a medium sized black dog that he loved to play with and that he would have worked at the Inn as a chimney sweep. It is known that an apparition of a black dog has been seen on numerous occasions at the Inn. Later in the vigil one of the team suggesting hearing what sounded like a whispering voice coming from the back of the bar area calling the name ‘Jella’. Shortly after this episode all efforts to contact Jella were unsuccessful although a Camcorder battery belonging to one of the investigators which had 36 minutes remaining, was completely drained. Of most interest was the activity recorded by the teams investigating Rooms 3 and 4, where a motion sensor placed between the 2 bedrooms facing towards the main corridor. The sensor appeared to be triggered a number of times at the beginning of the first vigil, while this was also experienced a little after we had originally set up the experiment earlier in the night. This could simply have been the sensitivity of the sensor picking up those people who were entering the room, resetting the device and then re-entering the room again.

My next 3 vigils of the night took various teams to the upstairs bedrooms of the Inn, where for the most part activity was scarce and the investigation was relatively quiet. Other teams did have experiences in the bar and restaurant area, suggesting links with Jack Travellis, believed to have been a notorious smuggler whose apparition is often seen as a dark figure in a tricorn hat. Glass divination in the restaurant brought extreme movements for some team, especially on one occasion where the glass flew off the table and smashed on the carpeted floor. Other teams heard what sounded like laughter and coughing from the restaurant and bar area, while Abigail believed that at one point she had seen a black dog just wandering around briefly before losing sight of it.

Of the various experiments we setup during only the Motion Sensor appeared to bring any results. We had setup a number of Trigger Objects taken from the Inn (mainly brass ornaments) in most of the bedrooms, dusted with flour, and no movement was recorded on any of these. We had also earlier locked off a video camera at the end of the main bedroom corridor outside rooms 5 and 6 facing down towards the stairwell, and this video is still to be analyzed. Further trigger objects together with the Negative Ion Detector were also placed on a wooden chest outside of Bedroom 2, and although the NID did occasionally trigger the alarm sensor this only appeared to be when individuals walked near to it, so this is not likely to represent paranormal activity. The night on a personal level was a disappointment as all remained still and quiet during the majority of my time on the vigils, although the experiences shared by many of the other teams seemed to enhance the possible notoriety of Jamaica Inn as a haunted location.