Listen to “The Pollock Twins” on Spreaker.
Imagine this: a quiet town in England. It’s the 1950s. Everyone knows everyone. Life moves slowly.
Now picture a man named John Pollock. He runs a small grocery shop, is deeply religious, and believes in life after death—specifically, reincarnation. His wife, Florence, on the other hand, is a bit more skeptical. She’s religious too, but she doesn’t share his strong beliefs in people being reborn.
They live in Hexham, Northumberland. They’re an ordinary couple—until something happens that will make headlines, confuse doctors and priests, and leave paranormal experts arguing for decades.
This is the true story of The Pollock Twins—a story many believe is proof of reincarnation.
The Tragedy
Let’s start with the heartbreak.
John and Florence had two daughters: Joanna, age 11, and Jacqueline, age 6. The girls were inseparable. Joanna was mature, responsible, kind. Jacqueline was feisty, adventurous, and had a birthmark on her forehead and a scar near her eye—something she got from a tricycle accident when she was three.
On May 5, 1957, the girls were walking to church with a friend named Anthony. They were all excited—it was the first Sunday of the month, and the kids liked dressing up.
But they never made it.
A woman named Marjorie Wynne, who was suffering from a mental breakdown and had just lost custody of her own children, got behind the wheel of a car under the influence of drugs and alcohol. She drove straight into the kids at high speed.
All three children were killed instantly.
The town was shattered. The Pollock family was destroyed.
Florence collapsed into deep grief. John was devastated—but something strange happened. He began to believe the girls weren’t really gone. He claimed he felt them around the house. He even told Florence, “They’ll come back to us.”
She was furious. “How could you say something so cruel?” she asked.
But he wasn’t trying to be cruel. He believed—deeply—that Joanna and Jacqueline would return.
The Pregnancy
One year after the accident, Florence became pregnant again. At first, the couple was told they were expecting one child. But as the pregnancy developed, the doctor was stunned: there were two heartbeats.
Florence gave birth to twin girls on October 4, 1958.
They named them Jennifer and Gillian.
Now—this is where the story starts to get…weird.
Even though the twins were identical, they had different birthmarks. Gillian had none. But Jennifer had two markings: a birthmark on her forehead, exactly where Jacqueline’s scar had been, and a dark mark on her waist, identical to one Jacqueline had.
Doctors were puzzled—how could identical twins have different birthmarks?
John immediately believed Jacqueline had returned as Jennifer. Florence was disturbed but tried to ignore it.
Then the memories began.
The Impossible Memories
When the twins were about two years old, the family moved to a new town. They had left Hexham to start fresh, away from the pain of losing their daughters.
But one day, as the family unpacked boxes, the twins—who had never been to Hexham—began pointing at familiar places. Jennifer pointed to a school and said, “That’s where we used to go.”
Gillian said, “And that’s the playground we played at during lunch.”
Florence froze.
How did they know that?
But it didn’t stop there.
The girls started requesting toys that had belonged to Joanna and Jacqueline—toys they had never been told about. One day, Florence opened a box of stored-away toys. Jennifer ran to a doll and said, “That’s my favorite. It’s mine.”
Gillian grabbed another and said, “And this one’s mine!”
They even called the dolls by the same names that Joanna and Jacqueline had used.
There’s no way they could have known.
The Past Returns
The twins also had oddly familiar personalities.
Jennifer, the younger twin, behaved exactly like Jacqueline—bold, a little reckless, and always trying to tag along with her older sister. She also struggled with motor skills, just like Jacqueline had.
Gillian was more mature, more like Joanna—caring, watchful, and protective.
But then something truly chilling happened.
One day, the family was walking past a parked car. Suddenly, Jennifer and Gillian froze. The girls began crying uncontrollably, clinging to their mother. Jennifer shouted, “The car! It’s coming to get us!”
Florence asked, “What are you talking about?”
Gillian whispered, “The car hit us. We died.”
They were four years old.
The Fading Memories
Around the age of five, the strange memories started to fade. The girls no longer remembered the dolls, the school, or the accident.
It was like someone had closed a door in their minds.
Florence never liked talking about it. She didn’t want people thinking they were exploiting their dead children. But John believed it to his dying day: the twins were Joanna and Jacqueline, reborn.
They even reached out to Dr. Ian Stevenson, a respected psychiatrist and reincarnation researcher from the University of Virginia. He studied thousands of supposed reincarnation cases worldwide—but he said The Pollock Twins were one of the most convincing he’d ever seen.
The Theories
So what’s going on here?
Skeptics have some ideas.
They say maybe the twins overheard stories, or saw photographs. Maybe their parents—especially John—subconsciously influenced them.
Or maybe it’s all a coincidence: birthmarks can happen, personalities can resemble, memories can be imagined.
But even skeptics admit—there are parts of this story that are very hard to explain.
How do you explain the exact birthmarks on an identical twin? The toy names? The fear of cars?
And how could two girls who had never been to Hexham describe it in detail?
What Happened Later
As they grew older, the twins led normal lives. They went to school, made friends, and the memories of Joanna and Jacqueline faded completely.
In interviews as adults, both Jennifer and Gillian said they no longer remembered anything from before age five. But they were aware of their unusual childhood—and both believed something strange had happened.
They weren’t sure what to call it. But they didn’t reject it, either.
They said: “We don’t know for sure. But we can’t explain it.”
So… What Do You Think?
To this day, The Pollock Twins case remains one of the most unexplained stories in reincarnation research. It’s been featured in books, documentaries, and podcasts. And whether you believe in the supernatural or not, this story leaves us with one question:
What if some doors never really close… even after death?
If this story gave you chills or made you think twice about what’s possible—you’re not alone. This is one of those rare true stories that seems to whisper: the world is stranger than we think.
