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

In this latest tale, a terrifying encounter of the extra-terrestrial kind ...

ON the night of Tuesday 17 July 1962 at 11:25pm, a full moon hung over Birkenhead.

A 70-year-old man named Terry was looking at it from the bedroom window of his home on Argyle Street South through a pair of 10x50 Hartmann binoculars that he’d bought out of Curry & Paxton over in Liverpool for £37 and 13 shillings (paid over eight monthly payments).

Wife Mary, lying in bed, reading an Agatha Christie book, said: "I hope you're not ogling any girls, Terry."

"Just Diana, love," Terry replied, smirking to himself.

When Mary asked who the hell Diana was, Terry said: "The Moon, love; that's what the Romans used to call her - the goddess Diana, like."

"Not funny, Terry," said Mary, glaring at him over the rim of her reading glasses.

"Mary, you're not going to believe this" said Terry. He turned to his wife and said, "come and have a look!"

"Oh just tell me," grumbled Mary, 2I’m trying to read this."

"Mary, will you get over here now you lazy cow?" shouted Terry.

Mary tossed the book aside and asked: "What did you just call me?"

"It's a bloody flying saucer! Have a look!" said Terry, full of excitement.

Mary saw the moon go in and thought a cloud had passed in front of it - but the lunar disc had been eclipsed by a huge dark circular craft that was gliding silently through the sky.

"What is it?" asked Mary, and Terry, focussing the binoculars on the unidentified craft, muttered: "I don't know but it's big!"

Meanwhile, over on Tranmere’s Hollybank Road, Brian and Sheila, a couple in their 30s, were sitting beside one another on a sofa, watching the crime drama series Interpol Calling, when something outside, beyond the net curtains, caught Sheila’s attention out the corner of her right eye.

She turned and saw it was a large glowing blue disc-shaped object travelling north across the sky. "Brian - what's that?" she asked her husband, pointing at the window.

He turned to see what she was referring to and when he saw the object through the nets he got up and pushed them aside.

He and Sheila watched the UFO suddenly halt and estimated it was somewhere over the Hamilton Square area.

"Ha! A real flying saucer," quipped Brian with a smile, but Sheila thought there was something ominous and sinister about the craft.

A few minutes later there was a heavy knocking at the front door of the couple.

It was the neighbour, Clive. "Did you see that thing in the sky just now?" he asked, excitedly.

Sheila nodded and Clive said his sister had telephoned him from her home on Hampden Road to tell him she had seen it pass overhead, and that it had come from the direction of Rock Ferry.

"Are we being invaded?" a worried Sheila asked Clive, who smiled and shrugged: "I hope not, I've just booked a holiday for me and the wife in St Tudy down in Cornwall!"

Brian invited Clive in and they all went to the upstairs bedroom window to see if the flying saucer was still visible but it was gone.

From other reports, the craft was still there, but it had turned off its lights to blend in with the night sky.

Meanwhile on Grange Road, a beautiful blonde 21-year-old bus conductress named Barbara was walking hand in hand with a 24-year-old TV repairman named Rob of Tees Street.

They'd been on a pub crawl and although the couple had only been seeing one another for two months, Rob had proposed to Barbara at the Glass Barrel Hotel on Market Street – and Barbara had said "yes".

The couple were therefore walking on air on this warm July night, and both had designs on visiting a chippy; all that walking between pubs and drinking had built up the lovers' appetites.

And then, when the couple had had their fish and chips, Rob would escort Barbara to her home in Priory Buildings.

On their way to the chippy, the couple met three old vagrants.

One of the down and outs took off his trilby and said to Rob: "Excuse me young man, but my friends and I have not eaten for three days.

"Could you possible spare a few bob?"

"Yeah, I can," said a beaming Rob, proudly clutching his fiancée’s hand, and he delved into his trouser pocket and took out a ten-bob note and some pennies.

"Thee-yar mate," he said.

The old rosy cheeked tramp gave a toothy grin and said: "Ah, thank you young man – you'll have luck for doing that.

"Goodnight sir! Goodnight miss!"

And then the three tramps went off down Grange Road.

Just before Rob and Barbara reached the chippy, the TV repairman noticed something moving across the sky.

He stopped Barbara and pointed up at the object, which was blotting out the brighter stars which had not been lost in the glare of the full moon.

Barbara, who was a little tipsy, said: "It's lovely, just us and the old moon."

"Can't you see it? Look!" said Rob, continuing to point at the elliptical black object.

Barbara smiled and went to cross the road to go to the chippy - when suddenly, that object lit up in the sky with a steady blue glow, and now Barbara couldn't fail to see it.

She gasped, looked at the gigantic UFO, which Rob estimated to be at least 500 feet in diameter, and then she screamed when she saw a beam of light shine down onto Grange Road.

The blinding spotlight fell on the three tramps, and Rob and Barbara thought they heard distant cries from the trio.

Then the beam was gone - and so were the vagrants.

People stopped and gazed up in awe at the enormous heavenly visitor and watched its lights fade.

It then rose steadily into the sky and vanished.

When I mentioned this incident on a local radio programme I was inundated with calls, but I never discovered who the three tramps were or if they were ever seen again...

*All Tom Slemen's books and audiobooks are on Amazon.