Welcome to Haunted Wirral, a feature series written by world famous psychic researcher Tom Slemen, for the Globe.

In this latest story, Tom investigates the strange timeslip on Park Road North, Birkenhead...

For legal reasons I’ve changed a few names in the following strange and intriguing stories, but the rest is alleged to be true.

One muggy evening around 7.20pm in the summer of 1964, a 40-year-old constable we shall call Terry (not his real name) based at Birkenhead Police Station on Chester Street, was on his beat on Conway Street when a scruffily-dressed lad of about 13 walked alongside of him.

The boy asked, “Excuse me sir, but I’m thinking of being a policeman but what’s the pay like?”

Terry came to a halt, and said, “Well, for a constable, it’s around six hundred and thirty-odd quid, and after nine years it can go up to nine hundred and sixty-odd.

"When can I join?" asked the lad, all eager with pound signs in his eyes.

“Once you hit sixteen you can apply to become a Cadet, sonny, and you’ll need an O level.”

The policeman walked along with the boy, who said he wanted to be a detective after watching Z Cars, and after Terry and the ambitious youth crossed Vittoria Street onto Park Road North, the boy ran to his home on Aberdeen Street.

“Constable!” cried a female voice. Terry saw a corpulent woman of about fifty years of age trying to run towards him from the corner of Livingstone Street.

She met him all out of breath and she seized his hands and gasped, “A man exposed himself to me and a friend about twenty minutes ago.”

“Where was this?” Terry asked, and the woman – who said her name was Annie – told him: “Aspinall Street, down an entry.”

She led Terry to the street and took him to the first alleyway on the left, which ran behind 11 terraced houses of Park Road North.

“I was taking a short cut down here with our Nelly – my sister in law – and he was looking at us through this big hole in the wall of a yard, and then he came through it and said “Hello” and then he pulled his trousers down – oh! I’m still in shock.” Annie burst into tears.

“It’s alright, Annie, calm down,” said Terry, “just wait here love in case he’s still there. Which wall was it?”

Annie stopped sobbing and said, “I’m not sure – one of them on the left."

Terry looked for a hole in a backyard wall, and could find none, and he returned to Annie and asked: “You sure it was one of those walls, love? I can’t see any hole you see.”

“It was definitely here officer, I’m not lying,” said Annie.

“I’ll go and get our Nelly if you want; she’s in the Crown, having a drink to steady her nerves.”

“What did he look like – this flasher?” Terry asked, “Was he old or young?”

“Oh he was young, no older than twenty-five, officer, and he had a shaved head,” Annie recalled, “and what was strange was that he was dressed like a clown.”

“A clown?” Terry muttered, and he immediately linked this bizarre description with the non-existent hole in the wall, and he naturally started to doubt the saneness of this woman.

“On the Seven Sacraments officer,” said Annie in a solemn voice, “he had on a sort of white windcheater and it had green and blue and red patterns on it, and the trousers were white, and they had red stripes on, and he had big white pumps on and they had like golden stripes on as well.”

The logical question had to be asked by Terry. “Annie, listen; don’t take this the wrong way love, but had you been drinking when you saw this fellah?”

Annie’s mouth formed an O-shape, and then her face reddened, “Are you saying I’m drunk and that I imagined all this?” she fumed.

“Annie, I’m only asking you a standard question a detective will ask you if this goes further,” said Terry.

“Come on! Let’s go and see our Nelly in the Crown!” Annie said, walking away.

“Hold your horses Annie,” the PC was saying when a voice behind shouted, “Excuse me constable!”

It was a man of about forty in a string vest and pyjama bottoms.

He was standing in the backyard doorway of one of the houses.

He said his name was Vince and that he worked nights.

He’d overheard Terry and Annie and he said he too had seen the flasher.

Vince invited Terry and Annie into his backyard and pointed to the wall.

“You’ve heard of haunted houses haven’t you?” said Vince, “Well this here’s a haunted wall.”

“A haunted wall,” said Terry, “must be all the sun causing this.”

“I’m serious,” said Vince, “every now and then a hole opens in this wall and you can see all kinds through it; weird-looking people, all dressed funny, and the cars are like something out of Dan Dare, honest.”   

Annie stormed off, threatening to make a complaint about Terry, and Vince said no one would believe her story.

About a week after this, Terry was on his beat on Park Road North, and Vince came out of his house and almost dragged the startled policeman in.

“Quick! It’s there again!” Vince said, pushing Terry down the hallway.

He led him into the backyard, and there was a strange shimmering hole in the wall, and Terry looked through it.

He saw a young woman with purple and green hair, her face caked in white make up, and a lady next to her covered with tattoos, and she had blue hair and was speaking into what looked like a walkie-talkie – and then the hole closed.

Forty years later, Terry realised that somehow, back in 1964, he had glimpsed two young ladies of the 21st century through what must have been some ‘hole’ in time – but how this was so remains a mystery.

Haunted Liverpool 29 is available from Amazon.