'The Case of The Disappearing Wife' Irish Story, Co. Clare, Ireland 1970

The tale of Jack Dinan from County Clare whose wife was replaced by a fairy.

An elderly storyteller known as a seanchaí, tells the story of Jack Dinan from Fahy’s Hill in County Clare whose young wife mysteriously disappeared.

She went to bed as he thought and when he went to bed there was nothing but a little small little collough in the bed, screaming and cross and if he went near her she’d kick him.

Jack Dinan spent the next seven years with this fairy or collough-na-luha in his bed.

One May evening Jack Dinan was up late with a foaling mare when his wife appeared. He asked her to come home but she replied she could not

While you have that thing in the bed that you have and when she leave the bed I’ll go back home.

Jack Dinan asked how he could remove the interloper from his bed. His wife told him to light a large fire and threaten to burn the fairy alive.

Jack did as he was told and when the fairy refused to go, he said he would burn her alive. Only when he lit the fire did the fairy leave the house. She went out through the door with a breeze of wind and Jack’s wife came in.

Jack Dinan and his wife lived together a further forty years and were never parted again.

This episode of Newsbeat was broadcast on 14 January 1970.