The Paranormal Database

Cyclist

Location: Blackpool - Promenade
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 15 August 2014
Further Comments: While walking along the promenade, a witness watched as a cyclist slowly approached him. The witness looked away for a moment, and when looking back ready to move out of the way, the cyclist had vanished, with no visible exits for them to have taken. After the sighting, the witness realised that the cyclist and his bike had been a single colour, either dark blue or grey.

Drowned Nun

Location: Blackpool - Raikes Hall (currently a public house)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Once a convent, one of its former inhabitants who drowned herself nearby would once come back to visit from beyond the grave.

Sister

Location: Blackpool - Residence in the FY2 0 area
Type: Other
Date / Time: Circa 2016
Further Comments: Local press reported on a case in which a tenant requested the council rehouse him after he encountered his neighbour's dead sister in the property. The tenant provided photographs of the entity, although it was reported the council were able to reproduce the images using a 'ghost app'.

Woman in Black

Location: Blackpool - Ripley's Odditorium
Type: Curse
Date / Time: 1970s
Further Comments: When the skull of a local girl was displayed here, several people reported seeing a spectral female figure standing by it. The skull's owner was convinced the item was cursed and died a week after finally giving it away.

Coach Driver

Location: Blackpool - Royal Pavilion Cinema
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1971
Further Comments: This shade claimed to be a 1920s coach driver when contacted by a medium, which was called in after evening workers reported flickering lights and cold spots in the building.

Tram

Location: Blackpool - Sea front
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: After all the regular trams have stopped running for the night, a phantom tram is reported to travel slowly and silently down along the rails.

Pincher

Location: Blackpool - The Lobster Pot public house, Market Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: This phantom is said to grab female members of staff so hard it leaves red blemishes on the skin.

Shirley

Location: Blackpool - The Old Coach House
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The phantom female Shirley is said to haunt the dining room. A male figure has also been reported here, wearing a cap and black cloak.

Vaseline Projectile

Location: Blackpool - Unidentified villa, South Shore
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: August 1938
Further Comments: This poltergeist outbreak began with a jar of Vaseline, a sewing box, and a hairbrush all striking one of the owners on the back of the head. A policeman and a plumber both reported items moving on their own accord, with the latter refusing to return to the site.

Woman on the Stairs

Location: Blackpool - Unknown hotel
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2000s?
Further Comments: The sounds of heavy furniture being dragged across wooden floors has been reported here, even though all the floors are carpeted. Doors are heard to open and close themselves, and an apparition of a woman has been spotted on the staircase.

Wardrobe Pusher

Location: Blackpool - Unnamed house on the outskirts of town
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: Late July - August 1951
Further Comments: One of the residents of this property was knocked to the floor unconscious after a wardrobe fell on her. Books floated from shelves and photographs fell and smashed. One visitor managed to catch a vase as it flew through the air. The residents, a newly married couple, moved out.

Tug

Location: Blackpool - Victoria Hospital
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Tugging in 2004, white coated man in 2018
Further Comments: While walking a particular ward, a worker felt a tug at her tunic, as if a small child were trying to attract her attention. She turned around but no-one was there. Several staff have shared the same experience at the hospital, including a cleaner who was so unnerved they ran off, leaving their floor polisher running. In a basement storage area, two staff independently witnessed a man in a white coat who vanished shortly after being briefly spotted.

Moving Head

Location: Bleak Rivington - Road near the vicarage
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The head of a man is said to move rapidly at ground level - they say that it belongs to a ghostly rider, but his mount and body can no longer be seen as the road has been built up over the years.

Stomping Horse

Location: Blundellsands - Round House
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The building was once haunted by the sounds of a horse stamping its feet and whinnying loudly. When an equine skeleton was found under the house during extension work, it was reburied in a nice area of the grounds; the ghost no longer troubled the household.

A phantom lurks on the canal.

Grey Lady

Location: Bolton le Sands - Canal bank
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This woman drowned in the cold waters of the canal, and now tries to lure men into the water to join her for the rest of time.

Starving Girl

Location: Borwick - Borwick Hall
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 29 March 2009, July 2015, 20 October 2018
Further Comments: This young woman fought against her parents who had arranged her wedding - as punishment she was locked in the tower and forgotten about. She soon starved to death, but her ghost still protests. A visitor to the site in 2009 felt something touch their back and briefly spotted a dark human shape which quickly disappeared, while a similar experience was reported in 2015 and 2018.

Footfalls

Location: Bradshaw - Old Timberbottom Farm
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Loud footsteps can be heard traversing empty parts of the building - it may be the last remnants of the haunted skulls that once were on display here, since relocated to Turton Tower.

Lady with Dog

Location: Bretherton - Bank Hall
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: April / May 2011
Further Comments: A male witness at the gate of this building spotted a lady in a white dress, walking her dog in the distance. The witness turned momentarily and when he looked back, the figure and dog had vanished - there was nowhere for them to have disappeared to. The same witness reported that several years previous he had heard someone whisper his name at the hall, even though the nearest person was some one hundred metres away.

Blood Stained Steps

Location: Brindely Bank - Trent and Mersey Canal
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The body of Christina Collins, murdered by three boatmen, was pulled up these steps - they occasionally still reveal the blood stains her body left while being dragged.

Footprint

Location: Brindle - Church of St James
Type: Legend - Old Nick
Date / Time: Still present, now wall mounted
Further Comments: The footprint in a slab of stone is now on display within the church. It is said to belong to a Catholic who, after arguing with a Protestant, declared 'if my doctrine be untrue, may my foot sink in stone' - upon which it did. Another version of the story says it was the Devil who left his footprint in the stone.

Old Scrat

Location: Brindle - General area
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This boggart would leap on passing carts, causing them to stop dead. He once climbed on a hearse taking a dead man to the church, and the local priest banished the entity forever.

Nun

Location: Bromborough - Bridge along Dibbinsdale Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The phantom nun that flits around this area was said to have been encountered by a man who drove straight through her.

George

Location: Broughton - Fire Station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s
Further Comments: George the ghost would lurk around the engine bay, opening and closing lockers.

Cursed Skull

Location: Browsholme - Browsholme Hall
Type: Curse
Date / Time: 1850s
Further Comments: When the skull was last removed from the hall (as a joke), it was blamed for spontaneous fires and family deaths. The skull was quickly returned and has not left since.

Peg O'Nell

Location: Bungerley - River Ribble
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The ghost of Peg O'Nell is said to haunt the River Ribble, wanting an animal sacrificed to it once every seven years. It was in this village that a man once tried to cross the river before the sacrifice was made - and promptly drowned.