Bob Hoskins’ Luck

Bob Hoskins

The deceased English actor Bob Hoskins believed a ghost he encountered as a teen brought him good luck in his life.

At the age of 15 Hoskins left school—where beatings were the norm—his teachers tied his left hand to a chair to try and force him to write with his right hand.

He worked at Covent Garden as a porter in the late 1950s. This area, located in central London, was used up until the late 1960s as a thriving fruit and vegetable market. With traffic congestion this market was moved in 1974 to an area 3 miles southwest of Covent Garden.

Porter in Covent Garden

Hoskins worked in a shop where the fuses often blew. He would go down in the basement to fix them.

On two occasions he encountered what he describes as a beautiful female ghost.

The first time he encountered her, he was frightened but he could not help but notice her lovely face and hands.

The second time he encountered her she was a mere two feet away from him. He rushed upstairs to tell the owner of the shop what he had seen. His boss, an older man, was not surprised.

He told the excited teen, “Oh, you’ve seen one of the nuns.” He went on to explain that where the shop stood was once a convent.

Starting in 1200 part of Covent Garden was walled off for Westminster Abby. At that time it was known as “the Garden of the Abby and Convent.”

His boss then told Hoskins he was in luck for according to a local superstition everyone who saw one of these nuns had “a lucky life.”

Later, Hoskins became famous in America for playing opposite animated characters in the film, Who Framed Roger Rabbit? He told a reporter for Spin magazine in 1989 that his life had indeed been lucky.