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| The Silent Twins Photo from: http://yattix.com/2013/11/june-and-jennifer-gibbons/ |
June and Jennifer Gibbons were identical twins who grew up in Haverford, Wales. They were childrens of two West Indian immigrants and were born in Barbados.
They were known as The Silent Twins because they only spoke to each other and select members of their intermediate family.
They were the only black children in their community, so they were ostracized at school. This only encouraged their withdrawal from the outside world. So they began using their own idioglossia (a private or secret language developed and used by very few people), thought to be rooted from cryptophasia (the phenomena of a language developed by twins that only the two children could understand).
Eventually, they spoke to nobody other than each other and their younger sister, Rose. When the twins were 14 years old, they were seen by a succession of therapists in an attempted to get them to communicate with others. When this proved unsuccessful, they were separated and sent to different boarding schools where in the separation of their twin became catatonic and entirely withdrawn.
After the twins were reunited, they were given a pair of diaries as a gift. As a result of finding a love for creative writing, the twins wrote genius short stories. The stories they wrote were unusually full of horror and crime. They attempted to get them published and printed in magazines, but were unsuccessful.
In June's story Pepsi-Cola Addict, the high school hero is seduced by a teacher, then sent away to a reformatory school where a homosexual guard makes a pass at him.
In Jennifer's story The Pugilist, a physician is so eager to save hid child's life he kills the family dog to use it's heart as a transplant for his own child. However, the spirit of the dog lives on in the child and seeks revenge on the father.
It was said that they both wrote in a unique personal style and often used unwittingly amusing word choices.
During a brief stint in crime, including arson, they were committed to Broadmoor Hospital, a high security hospital for mental health patients. They were placed on high doses of antipsychotics where they ended up losing their niche for creative writing and eventually their creativity in general. Jennifer even developed tardive dyskinesia, a neurological disorder resulting in involuntary, repetitive movements.
Apparently the girls had a long time agreement that if one of the twins died, the other should go on leading a normal life. During their stay at Broadmoor, the began to develop the notion that it was absolutely necessary for one of the twins to die. They agreed that one twin had to died in order for the other to live a normal life. After long discussions, they both agreed that Jennifer was meant to die.
They were later transferred from the high security hospital Broadmoor to a more open Caswell Clinic in Bridgend, Wales. On arrival, Jennifer experienced some form of heart failure and could not be roused. She died soon after from acute myocarditis, or sudden inflammation of the heart.
There was no evidence of drugs or poisons. It's said that shortly after the passing of Jennifer, June gave a sigh of great relief, as if a burden had been lifted from her body.
After Jennifer's death, June lived quietly and independently near her parents in West Wales. She no longer required psychiatry services, was accepted by her community and has completely put the past behind her.
I've been listening to a lot of podcasts lately and my favorite ones are about strange phenomena and odd stories about people, places or anything paranormal. I thought this one was simple, yet semi-creepy. Enjoy!
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