Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire. According to Richard Morris, in his recent biography Harry Price:
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.  The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.  The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."  Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.  Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
What is the Borley Rectory?
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.