A Haunting at the Two Wells Hotel.

 

Two Wells Hotel 2021 - Allen Tiller

The Two Wells Hotel opened on 23 April 1860 as the Two Wells Inn. The original hotel was on the Mallala Road. John Cowan, the owner, decided to build a new hotel to better catch passing traffic. In 1867, Cowan applied to transfer his license to the new building, he also changed the name from ‘Inn’ to ‘Hotel’.[1] This new hotel was much larger than the original.
  The new building had 18 rooms – nine up and nine down – and a cellar. The dining room also functioned as a courthouse.  It was realised close to completion that no provision had been made for an internal staircase to the upper floor, so an outside staircase had to be constructed until an extension was built to allow for the internal staircase.[2] It was officially opened in 1868.

Ghosts

It was alleged in The Advertiser newspaper in January 2016 that the ghost of the Two Wells Hotel is a Sea Captain named George.  Publicans, Rodney, and Loretta Wilmshurst who owned the hotel from 1999 claimed that their granddaughter, Krystal Wilmshurst had seen the ghost when she was a child.
  Loretta stated that: “On one occasion she (Krystal) came down the staircase, stood at the doorway and said the monster had gone to bed,’’ Loretta recalled.
 “She took her dad around through the original front bar to the key room and said, ‘he lives in there!’.”
 Krystal referred to the ghosts as a monster, and claimed at times, he would not let her sleep. She witnessed him on one occasion in the shower. He was wearing a hat and a cloak, but he had no feet!

Loretta had not witnessed the apparition but had felt him. She also had an experience; “One Saturday afternoon I was going up the staircase and heard the girls’ soft toys being thrown around the room,’’ she said. “No one was home. I didn’t go up.”

Another witness to the ghostly goings-on was Pam Sisken who was employed as the cleaner. Sisken often worked after hours in the hotel on her own. On one occasion she claimed “strange things” started happening to the alcohol. “I can still see the brandy and whisky bottle in the auto pourer bubbling up, fizzing up with bubbles,’’ she said. “I wasn’t upset. I thought he’s (George) up and about.’’

George has also been heard going up and down the stairs. It was claimed by one witness that George was fond of the downstairs cool room, and this is where he was mostly sensed. A former publican claimed that this was the room that George had lived in while alive, and that George was unhappy as it had been turned into the cool room.

A variation on the identification of George was published by Gordon de L. Marshall in his book Ghosts and Hauntings of South Australia. In this version, George is the son of a former publican who was killed in a war, having half his face blown off.[3]

Further muddying the identification of George is a former publican who claimed the ghost is that of his son. Identified only as a ‘Bruce’ (possibly Bruce Hart, but unconfirmed). This publican claimed that a photo of his son was continually thrown down, and this was the way in which George was trying to communicate with his father.[4]

 It is claimed in this version of the ghosts habits, that George is blamed for an upstairs shower that turns on of its own volition. George is also blamed for mysterious goings-on in the toilet, with Toilet doors opening and closing by themselves, toilet paper being strewn throughout the room and hand dryers operating of their own volition.
  George has been blamed for three front bar fridge doors opening at the same time. On another occasion six people watched a port keg tap turn on by itself, and then port pour all the over the floor; none of the witnesses were close enough to have turned the tap on.[5]

© 2021 Allen Tiller


[1] 'Bench of Magistrates', The Express and Telegraph, (10 September 1867), p. 2. (LATE EDITION.)

[2] Williams, Bet & Williams, Les, & Kranz, David, Two Wells: then and now: a history of the Hundred of Port Gawler, (Mawson Lakes, S. Aust, 1991), p. 30.

[3] Gordon de L. Marshall, Ghosts and Hauntings of South Australia, (Jannali, NSW, 2012), p. 278

[4] Ibid.

[5] Williams, Bet, Two Wells: then and now, p.31.