The Paranormal Database

Examining folkloric, paranormal & cryptozoological locations in the UK and beyond

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London (NW1 - NW11) Ghosts, Folklore and Forteana

Floating Candles

Location: NW1 - 33 Harewood Square (no longer standing)
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: May 1851
Further Comments: Watched by a couple as they lay in bed, two 'candle flames' hovered over them. When the male witness grabbed the flames, they turned to liquid, running over the bed and fading to nothing.

Trotting

Location: NW1 - Camden Market (Stables Market section)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Traders have reported the sounds of horses trotting on the cobbles, and occasionally cries for help from long forgotten accidents.


Platform 10 of King's Cross Station, London.

Boudica's Grave

Location: NW1 - King's Cross Station, Platform 10
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Still present?
Further Comments: The final resting ground of the warrior queen is reported to be under this busy platform.

Blonde Women

Location: NW1 - Kings Cross Tube Station, escalator from Victoria to the Circle Line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: August 2001, late one Tuesday night
Further Comments: A late night passenger, one of the last from the tube, was travelling up an escalator when he heard shrill female voices behind and below. The witness turned around, and even though nothing could be seen, the escalator shuddered as if people were running up it. Then two women appeared, brushed past the witness, then suddenly vanished and the shuddering ceased. The two women were described as both blonde, young and in jeans, with one in a bright yellow puffer gilet jacket.

Distressed Woman

Location: NW1 - King's Cross underground station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: May 1998
Further Comments: A witness spotted a woman in her twenties with long brown hair, wearing jeans and t-shirt. The figure was kneeling at the side of the corridor with her arms outstretched, and appeared distressed and crying. Someone walking in the opposite direction then walked through the woman. The witness said that upon reflection, it was like watching a repeating piece of film.


Inside London Zoo.

The Whistler

Location: NW1 - London Zoo, particularly the aquarium area
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Circa 2002
Further Comments: The phantom whistling that unnerves employees is thought to belong to a tuneful engineer from the early nineteenth century.


The wax Hitler in Madame Tussaud's Waxworks.

Chamber of Horrors

Location: NW1 - Madame Tussaud's Waxworks, Marylebone Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This area is reportedly haunted by the ghosts of a few of the wax models. Other bizarre stories come from the waxworks, including a tale about how the hair on Adolph Hitler's wax head started to grow.

Jogger

Location: NW1 - Outer Circle, Regent Park
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 18 November 2007
Further Comments: Even though rain had cleared all the evening joggers from the area, two friends standing on the Outer Circle heard the distinct sounds of someone jog by them, the runner remaining invisible.

Lion

Location: NW1 - Regent's Park
Type: Crisis Manifestation
Date / Time: 1930s (glowing lion), August 2010 (glowing figure)
Further Comments: A zookeeper and his granddaughter came across the glowing apparition of a lion while out walking in the park at evening. The creature faded away as they approached it. The keeper knew that one of the lions at his zoo was ill, and when he went into work the following day, was told the sick lion had died the previous evening - at the time of the sighting. More recently, a glowing green figure was observed by a witness in the park after midnight and had actually caused the witness to flee; another person with the witness was unable to see anything. The witness returned to the scene the following day to try to understand what they had seen and realised the figure first manifested in a bush and had moved at a very fast pace.

Moving Chairs

Location: NW1 - St Pancras Railway Station
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: July 2013
Further Comments: Several workers at the Eurostar terminal have reported poltergeist activity in the corridors that run parallel with Pancras Road. Doors have been opened and closed and chairs refuse to budge when people try to push them.

Alarm

Location: NW1 - The New Diorama Theatre, Camden
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2021
Further Comments: Duty managers at the theatre have reported the door of the disability-access toilet locking itself, and the alarm being triggered, when the facility is unoccupied.

Robert Neville

Location: NW1 - Volunteer public house, Baker Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Dressed in the clothes he wore four hundred years previous, Neville now lurks in the cellar of this public house, occasionally materialising so that he is not forgotten.

Bruno Hauptmann

Location: NW1 (possible) - Bakerloo Line
Type: Other
Date / Time: 1983
Further Comments: A photograph of a ghostly figure taken by Karen Collett while travelling on the Bakerloo Line later transpired to be the waxwork figure of Bruno Hauptmann, although it is still unclear how Hauptmann's form (with added bolts of lightning) managed to manifest on the photograph.

Fat Monk

Location: NW10 - St Mary's Church, Neasden
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: This jovial looking monk has been seen standing on the site of an old well in the garden of the vicarage. He sometimes pops across to the church, which is also haunted by a priest that plays with the doors.

Will Writer

Location: NW11 - Golders Lodge (now demolished), Golders Green Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Golders Lodge was bequeathed (c1810) to a certain person on the condition that the author of the will's body 'remained above ground'. The new tenant is said to have kept the body of the former owner hidden away in the loft for a considerable period. Since the Lodge was demolished, the ghost of that first occupier has haunted the area.

Banana

Location: NW2 - Above Wembley Stadium
Type: UFO
Date / Time: 15 and 17 March 1985
Further Comments: A flying banana shaped object was seen in the sky over the stadium a couple of times. It was described as bright and made up of several different colours.

Scareship

Location: NW2 - Dollis Hill
Type: UFO
Date / Time: February 1932
Further Comments: A possible early ufo encounter. A married couple spotted two men wearing caps working on a cylinder-shaped craft perched on the ground. As the married couple approached for a better look, the men disappeared, and the craft took off.

Hovering Furniture

Location: NW2 - House in Westcroft Way
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: 1963 - 1964
Further Comments: Two exorcisms failed to remove this polt which caused furniture to hover and tossed around marbles and milk bottles. Despite the damage, occupier Mrs Wright told journalists she considered the entity more mischievous than harmful.

Boudica's Grave

Location: NW3 - Barrow known as Boadicea's Grave, Hampstead Heath
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Still present
Further Comments: Local folklore says that the barrow is Boudica's final resting site, although it could just be a Bronze Age burial mound belonging to someone else entirely.

Red Head

Location: NW3 - Church Row, Hampstead
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown, early morning
Further Comments: The shade of a servant girl carrying a carpet bag has been seen walking down this street, heading towards the church. Contained within the bag are the remains of a child's body, which the maid had killed, and she is en route to dispose of the pieces in the churchyard. The entity was also said to haunt an unnamed building along the road.

Sighing

Location: NW3 - Church Walk, Hampstead
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: Loud sighing could be heard throughout the house, believed to be the site where a mother murdered a young child.

Woman in White

Location: NW3 - Close to the corner of Finchley Road and Frognal
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Early nineteenth century
Further Comments: Local folklore once placed a ghostly woman in white here, although the finer points of the entity are not forthcoming.

Old Man in Brown

Location: NW3 - East Heath Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This smiling old man, dressed in a brown overcoat, follows witnesses along the road, quickly fading into the air if challenged.

Victorian Woman

Location: NW3 - Fitzroy Park near junction with Millfield Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Spring 1975, around 22:00h
Further Comments: Four people in a parked car spotted a woman wearing a Victorian style dress glide past. Although dark outside, the woman was illuminated, and made no sound on the gravel track. The witnesses quickly drove away.

Stress Inducing Shade

Location: NW3 - Gatehouse public house, Hampstead Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1947
Further Comments: The landlord of this pub apparently collapsed after seeing the spectre and retired soon after. The ghost is thought to be an old white-haired smuggler murdered on site.

Records 1 - 25 of 55

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