Persons:
Michaela Mindlová - Investigator, Esoteric
Ondřej Bezouška - Investigator, Technician.
Alena Ševčíková - Guide
Miroslav Pribyl - Invited Investigator V.T.P.J.
Milan Pribyl - Invited Investigator V.T.P.J.

Technique:
Ghostmeter
HD Camera
Dictaphone
UV flashlight
Thermal imager
Digital EMF meter

The course of the investigation

It is 6.7.2013 and I am meeting with Michaela Mindlova in Řepč in the Tábor region, where together we are discussing the pre-prepared course of the paranormal investigation in the town of Pacov. Our expectations are not small, although we will not be able to visit all the planned locations due to their reconstruction. Because of this, our investigative activities will be focused only on the selected available sites. Which ones, we will find out after the first inspection.

We'll pack up the EMF meter, ghost meter, flashlights, light, camera and thermal imager and head to our destination. Along the way we pick up our guide, Alena Ševčíková, who leads us to our first stop, a place on the outskirts of Pacov where many people are said to have died due to the typhus epidemic. Today, however, there is a motorbike track near the site and we cut this place due to noise and also difficult accessibility.

On a sunny, warm day we continue hiding in the shade of the coniferous forest. We follow the path up a slight hill, where we can already see a fenced, mowed paling with a few gravestones on it. We follow its perimeter and open a wooden gate leading to the gravelled main path, which ends on the opposite side of the cemetery at a tall cross under which are several stone slabs with the names of deceased prisoners of war. Their bodies are buried in mass graves that have been dug here.

The former place of mourning now looks almost peaceful, contemplative. Two hundred and eighty-four dead bodies have rested here since 1945. How did they die? How did they live, what did they experience? How many families did they leave behind? Questions without answers. They run through our minds among those we will try to answer. Are their souls here? Is it possible to communicate with them? To detect paranormal activity?

We pull out our camera and tripod and shoot the first footage for our short documentary. The weather favours us, even the wind doesn't interfere with our sound equipment, and we take a step-by-step picture of where and when we will investigate after dark and what technique we will use at certain locations.

After a couple of hours of successfully trying out the cameras and recorder, doing interviews and filming exteriors, we go to the last of the planned locations: an abandoned military compound. Finding it is our biggest problem. We have to make our way through tall grasses, dense forest growth, thistles and nettles. The hope of finding it slowly leaves us, when suddenly the forest path widens and a huge, black entrance to a cylindrical room, where entire concerts could be held, opens up like a castle. It is a former military garage. We immediately do our first research, which leads us to the conclusion that filming a documentary here would not be the best idea, as the large space creates a strong echo of the voice, which is then not recorded very well on the equipment. Another disadvantage during the investigation will be the huge amount of dust that will make mischief on the photos and on the equipment.

Michaela Mindlova takes her pendulum, which serves as a supplement for our investigation, and asks if we can pick up anything here at night. The answer immediately is yes. So we walk through the area once more, film a few shots of it and move on. We return to the cemetery, but by a different route than the one we came in. It doesn't even take two minutes and we come across a dilapidated house adjacent to the garage. Formerly a place inhabited by soldiers, now home to a swarm of mosquitoes. Around the house and inside there is a lot of concrete debris from the crumbled wall and the path is covered by several fallen branches and uprooted stumps. We make a note of this spot and move on. Again, we negotiate several slopes, groves, tall grass, mosses and rusty wires and are almost on a comfortable, wide path when I almost fall into an old, concrete-lined cellar.

It's a narrow, old, depressing passageway heading around the corner to a wider room. Again, we note the place carefully for a night visit and take a break of a few hours after we leave. Feelings haven't told us much about the place so far. Still, we are curious and wait to see what the night will reveal.

In the gathering twilight of the setting sun, we return to the cemetery of the German prisoners of war. We set up our equipment and take our first shots of the evening. The ghostmeter is silent, the EMF meter also registers no strange readings. Even the pendulum confirms that it's quiet. Our feelings are as calm as the cemetery we're in.

Loud music begins to pour out of the city, bringing instant surprise and disillusionment to our faces. A beer festival we hadn't counted on has begun in Pacov, and its noise renders the voice recorder unusable for capturing the EVP's voice.

So we turn on the thermal camera, with which we enjoy the heat-rendered landscape, which offers an amazing, unrecognized panorama, but no paranormal phenomena. Still, we remain patient and despite the initial difficulties, we try to press on.

After a couple of hours, when the surroundings are already completely dominated by darkness, an invited visitor arrives, brothers Milan and Miroslav Pribyl. They immediately take their equipment and together we walk towards our distant goal, an abandoned military garage.

Since there are now five of us, we divide our forces and the Pribyl brothers investigate first at the adjacent, dilapidated house, while Michaela, Alena and I are inside the garage trying to get some activity to manifest. We take pictures, record, question the pendulum, monitor the interior with a thermal imaging camera. But even here, there is no manifestation that we can feel at that moment. Later, however, we detect a voice on the tape recorder in one section that none of us have uttered, and it is very likely that it is saying, "Love, come on, we're done."

Then Pribyly and I take turns walking to the house adjacent to the garage. On the way, I feel distinctly nauseous, which I attribute not to paranormal phenomena but to my metabolism, which has been depleted in part because I haven't eaten much due to stomach pains. But Michaela Mindl is getting me together and then we are trying to make possible contact. Unfortunately, again, unsuccessfully. Rather than ghosts, this desolate place is haunted by mosquitoes, which literally form a carpet on the walls.

That leaves the third and final place: the cellar. We wade to it through tall grass, an artificial border and mature trees. After five to ten minutes, we finally find it and enter again in groups. We head to its furthest end, for which we have to cross a section covered by water from rainfall. We stop, Michaela and I unpack the ghostmeter, thermal camera and recorder and start recording.

We ask if anyone is here? We ask for communication. But nothing comes, and even our senses tell us there is no danger. The echo in the room is strong again and we have to consider every step carefully as the ground is covered with concrete rubble and glass. The ghostmeters are silent here as well, and the EMF meter does not register any strange deviations.

We exit the basement a little irritated and return to the cars. It's a little after one in the morning. The good news is that the music from the city has died down. Everywhere is now seemingly quiet. We stop at the barrier where the cars are parked and try to make contact with the man who was shot and whose remains were found there. Later, on a tape recorder, we discuss some interesting phenomena, but they are too weak to be concluded as EVP.

At the end of our investigation, we return to the cemetery. One last, brief visit before we leave. We find ourselves one last time in front of a several meter high cross by massive, apparently granite stones with the names of the deceased.

Michaela, at Miroslav Pribyl's urging, takes the pendulum and asks one of the names if he is here. The subsequent swinging and rotation of the pendulum reveals that at least the spirit in question is here, can communicate but cannot manifest. Later, when the tape recording is analysed, a voice can be clearly heard during this part, which was not recorded by the camera recording Michaela at all. A male voice saying: "Who are you?"

No matter how hard we try to explain the voice rationally, we fail, and so we include it in the evidence, the origin of which is obviously paranormal. We're picking up another interesting EVP at a similar time. Misha, while communicating with Miroslav Pribyl, responds to his words with a question: "Me?". At the same moment, a male, German voice, which does not belong to any of us, is heard: "Ja, Nein, Ja" is spoken in a deeper, distinctive bass. Both of these EVPs are later placed in our short documentary.

During this last part, which at first seems restful and the fatigue of some is already palpable, Michaela tells the Pribyls that there are nine laws that every soul must obey. At this point, the K2 ghostmeter responds, its diodes flashing into a red field. At that moment, I am filming our tired guide Alena Shevchikova, when astonished voices are heard behind me, as a phenomenon has occurred that no one expected. Immediately, I also record the area. Our impressions of the cemetery change. Calmness replaces depression, coldness. A chill at the back of the neck from the feeling of being watched. I record the reactions of the participants, focusing even on the ghostmeter. We try to make it flash again, but without success. I still turn the camera on our guide, but my eyes behind her register a tall figure with a beard in profile watching Pribyl and Michaela. At almost the same moment I see her, she dissolves into the omnipresent darkness.

The time is approaching two o'clock in the morning, and we leave Pacov and his ghosts to the well-deserved rest we ourselves need. Nothing else has happened during the night. We say goodbye and leave.

The investigation was conducted according to our previously proven methods. Even so, the recorded activity was minimal and if it hadn't been for the conclusion, we would have doubted that anything mysterious had taken place at all during our visit. Yes, we did observe something, but we can still say that Pacov, even with the mysterious places we explored, is a location that is mostly quiet. At least in the paranormal sense. Still, manifestations are possible here and there. But they will be perceived mainly by the more sensitive.

author of the article: Ondřej Bezouška

video of the investigation

• in Czech, without English subtitles