The Paranormal Database

Highwayman

Location: Godmanchester - Black Bull public house
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Circa 1980s
Further Comments: A ghostly highwayman is said to haunt this site, which also contains occasional poltergeist activity.

Tall Man

Location: Gorefield - Small farmhouse (?), Isle of Ely.
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: 1923
Further Comments: For a brief period, a small house owned by Mr Scrimshaw became plagued by poltergeist activity. Pictures fell from their hooks, furniture rearranged, and stands pushed over. After a visit from spiritualists, who claimed the outbreak to have been caused by a tall dark man who fell off a horse, things returned to normal.

Lord Byron Swimming

Location: Grantchester - Byron's Pool
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Lord Byron once enjoyed swimming in this pool, and it is reported that he still does.

Rupert Brookes walking towards Sitting Room

Location: Grantchester - Old Vicarage
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Once occupied by the poet Robert Brookes, the footsteps which walk around the outside of the house and towards the sitting room are believed to be his. His shade has also been reported in the garden. Poltergeist-like activity has been reported in the top floor of the Vicarage, often moving literature from the bookshelves.

Blue Lady

Location: Great Abington - Field next to the churchyard, and the river
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A phantom blue lady is said to cross this field. Her journey starts at Great Abington church, where she floats straight over the river, and ends at Little Abington church where she is said to vanish.

Girl

Location: Great Abington - Private residence
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A young girl who drowned in a well reputedly still haunts the area. The well has since been covered over.

The Infidel's Bible

Location: Great Gransden - Gransden Post Mill
Type: Legend - Old Nick
Date / Time: 1860s
Further Comments: A copy of The Infidel's Bible, a black magic book, was accidentally left in the mill and forgotten about. Within days the mill stopped working, and for three years no-one could figure out why. After that time, the book was rediscovered in the mill and burnt - almost immediately, the mill started turning once more.

Old Pork-and-Lard

Location: Great Staughton - Crown Inn
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s
Further Comments: 'Old Pork-and-Lard' was the nickname given to the ghost that haunted this building, in the belief that the entity was a former landlord who also worked as the local butcher. The landlord died just before the birth of his first child; because of this, some say his ghost remained earthbound, and his footsteps have been heard in empty rooms.

No Locks

Location: Great Staughton - Unnamed farm on the moors
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Owners of a farmhouse here were said to have once removed all the locks and bars from their doors, as a white lady would open all the doors at night, no matter how securely they were left closed. A workman called in to mend the roof encountered the ghost and refused to finish the job - another builder had to complete the repairs.

Coach

Location: Great Wilbraham - Mutlow Hill
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A golden coach was thought to be buried under the hill.

Phantom Footsteps on Upstairs Corridor

Location: Great Wilbraham - The Carpenter's Arms public house, High Street
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: 1980s
Further Comments: Footsteps are often heard on the upper floor of the public house, always stopping at the same place. Any investigation to find an intruder has failed.

White Lady

Location: Harston - Area between the Queens Head public house and Mill Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This phantom woman is likely to be the same suicidal figure that haunts elsewhere in the village.

Suicidal Leap

Location: Harston - Road bridge en route to Haslingfield
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Here a white lady has been seen throwing herself off the bridge, but like so many other ghost stories, the reason behind it is unclear.

Choir

Location: Helpston (formally Helpstone) - Area close to the Exeter Arms Inn (no longer open)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Circa 1950
Further Comments: A ghostly choir could be heard somewhere in this area, close to the spot where a quartered skeleton had been discovered a few years previous.

Fiddling

Location: Helpston (formally Helpstone) - Langley Bush Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The sounds of a wildly played fiddle haunted this area after dark, the road becoming off limits to travellers. Along the same road, the gibbet had stood before being moved closer to the inn.

Romans

Location: Helpston (formally Helpstone) - Swaddywell Pit
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Unseen Roman soldiers could be heard fighting an unknown enemy in this area.

Giant Saxon Warriors

Location: Heydon - Heydon Ditch. Five foot high at its highest point, runs from Heydon to Fowlmere (3.5 miles in length)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Accounts of warrior ghosts seen at this sight date back hundreds of years, and during the 1950s (or 1920s, according to other sources) several Saxon graves were found around the area.

Man with Children

Location: Holcot - A43, Holcot / Sywell junction
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: October 2003, 18:00h
Further Comments: A driver spotted a man with two children, wearing 1970s clothing, standing in the brambles at this roundabout. The driver circled around for another look, but the figures had vanished.

Money collecting in the bottom of a well.

The Holy Well

Location: Holywell - Churchyard
Type: Other
Date / Time: Still present
Further Comments: The waters of the well were said to cure sore eyes, and teenage girls would throw money into the pool in the hope the face of the man they would marry would appear to them.

The ghostly Juliet appears once a year.

Juliet Tewsley, Her Love Unrequited

Location: Holywell - Ye Olde Ferryboat Inn, gravestone in bar
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 17 March (Reoccurring)
Further Comments: Juliet took her own life after being jilted by a lover. The pub was later built over her grave, and she is now seen in the form of a white lady, appearing near the Ferry Boat Inn and walking towards the banks of the river on the date of her death.

A Voice Asks for a Spade

Location: Horseheath - Money Lane
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Nights of a full moon
Further Comments: Supposed to house hidden gold, the street is haunted by a voice that, on nights of a full moon, tells any listeners to 'pick up your spade and follow me'. To date, nobody has accepted the challenge.

Passing Through

Location: Huntingdon - Falcon public house
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1960s (door opening)
Further Comments: Oliver Cromwell is said to have used the building as a temporary base, which may explain the Civil War era troops seen here. During the 1960s, one witness watched a door on one side of the room open and close, and after a few seconds, the door on the opposite side of the room did likewise, as if something invisible had walked through the room. Another piece of folklore says a tunnel ran from the building to the site of the old castle (since demolished).

Nun

Location: Huntingdon - Hinchingbrooke House
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Thought to be the same entity which haunts the nearby bridge, a legend says the nun tried to run off with a monk, resulting in the execution of them both. The nun was said to haunt the cloister garth and the grounds. A cavalier was also reported to haunt a room in which he was killed, while a phantom woman floats six inches (fifteen centimetres) above the staircase.

Nun and Nurse

Location: Huntingdon - Nun's Bridge over Alconbury Brook
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1965
Further Comments: It is unknown where the nurse's ghost came from, but the nun is thought to have had an affair with a monk during her lifetime. After the affair was discovered, the nun was killed for her 'crime'.

Sounds of a Motorbike

Location: Ickleton - Mill Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Mid twentieth century
Further Comments: For six months, a family were haunted by the sound of machinery, reminiscent of a motorbike engine, which came from a solid wall in a bedroom.