Now is the time to admit to the ghosts in your cupboards - all for a good cause of course. Child protection group Bravehearts wants to hear about your supernatural sightings and will sell The Ghost Files to raise money to help abused children
Ghost file #1
Our pubs are alive with spectres
From the ghost that haunts the bar of the Barron River Hotel at Stratford to the Chinese poltergeist furious at being burned in the 1930s on Granite Creek, the Far North appears to be a hot spot for the paranormal.
It is hoped this week's formal launch of Braveheart's ghost investigations by the soon to be appointed Cairns president of the association "Sheriff" Dales Whyte will unearth scores of such stories.
One still making his presence felt is the Barron River's spectre who is believed to have committed suicide by plunging to his death out of the pub after being jilted by his girlfriend.
The shadowy Stratford bar fly, known as Henry, has been lurking in the main bar ever since.
In the late 1990s, he terrified one staff member so badly she could not move until the sun rose.
Another staff member fled after the dead ex-patron ran amok in the piano bar.
To this day, patrons say Henry is there but has mainly retired upstairs to where he spent the last minutes of his tormented life.
There are many other pub ghost stories such as the one where a spectre sleeps in people's beds at the Peeramon Pub on the Tableland.
Its ghost is also said to follow visitors around in the night.
The poltergeist may be that of the pub's dead chef, who is said to have eerily turned up in a photograph taken years after he passed away.
Or it could be that of a man staying at the hotel who murdered his adulterous wife in the 1920s before turning a gun on himself.
The old Garradunga pub, near the spooky croc-infested Eubenangee swamp north of Innisfail, is also said to have a resident ghost who crashes around in the room where he died.
Ghost file #2
Flaming Chinese miner on murderous rampage
Henry's frightening escapades pale into insignificance compared to that of a Chinese miner who burned to death in the 1930s, along with his camp, at the wish of the local police.
The enraged ghoul went looking for blood at the neighbouring campsite of the miner who carried out the deed for the constabulary.
Two other miners, Joe Jones and Dick Clarke, asked the man, Ah Quay, why he was so spooked.
Ah Quay took them back to the camp and showed them why.
In a sign of things to come, the men dismounted and their horses bolted across the dangerously swollen creek.
For several hours, the men witnessed plates and bottles hurled across the shack, detonator cords writhing on the floor and fires spontaneously erupting where there was nothing to burn.
Ah Quay's companion Willie was smothered by a blanket at the hands of the furious spectre and was saved only when the others tore it off.
The shack burst into flames and as the shaken victims escaped, Mr Jones said that Ah Quay murmured "I burn him, he burn me".
Ghost file #3
Dead lady terrorises Far North
While our two previous cases feature men who have suffered horrid ends, women are also involved in Far Northern hauntings.
Take the example of an abandoned northern suburbs house, owned by a wealthy racehorse owner and grazier who spent much of his time overseas.
In a bid to show the house was not haunted, his agent offered it to anybody rent-free for three months.
A man called George, who was down on his luck, accepted the challenge.
When he saw visions of a ghostly woman in the garden and footsteps on the deck, the sceptical renter began to have his doubts.
During an electrical storm he was shocked to see the woman's twisted features reflected in the window panes of the dining room.
"On another occasion, I swear I heard a strange gurgling noise like somebody getting their throat cut," George reportedly said.
Framed pictures suddenly falling off the walls, including one which struck him on the head, could have been the final straw.
But a stoic George stayed another three months and then declined to pay rent after a second rent-free period had expired.
The house was eventually torn down.
