The Paranormal Database

Reflection

Location: SE17 (Greater London) - Bakerloo line, Elephant & Castle and other stations along the line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: It is reported that occasionally, while travelling northbound, some passengers can see the reflection of someone sitting next to them, even though there is no one in the seat.

Tube Traveller

Location: SE17 (Greater London) - Elephant & Castle Underground Station, Bakerloo line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Woman seen late twentieth century, photograph taken in 1980s
Further Comments: Seen by both staff and commuters, this young woman enters the train's carriages, but is never seen leaving. Some also allocate the blame on the same entity when invisible footfalls create loud echoing around the station after hours.

Bricked Up Train

Location: SE19 (Greater London) - Area below Crystal Palace Park
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A local urban legend states that there is a train bricked up under the park, complete with dead passengers and crew - sometimes the hands of the dead reach up from the ground and try to grab the living. It is said that the story is based on the fact that an experimental railway was constructed here that worked by compressed air but was abandoned after failure.

Rail Worker

Location: SE24 (Greater London) - Tulse Hill Station, platform one
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: Killed as he walked on the tracks, the worker's footfalls are sometimes heard echoing through the station late at night.

Big John

Location: Selside (North Yorkshire) - Railway Line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Sometimes seen on the track by signalmen, this large male figure would suddenly vanish without warning.

Something Behind

Location: Sharpthorne (Sussex) - Tunnel (operational)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1999
Further Comments: A worker on the railway experienced an oppressive feeling, and a sensation as if someone were walking just behind or alongside them. The worker later discovered that other people had experienced the same feelings, and that signalmen working at Kingscote would receive calls from the tunnel's telephone, even though no one would be within.

An old illustration showing the Shipton-on-Cherwell train accident of 1874.

Smoking Train

Location: Shipton-on-Cherwell (Oxfordshire) - Body of water near a railway bridge
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 22 December 2009, 21:30h
Further Comments: While fishing next to a railway bridge, a witness watched a steam train pass by which came from 'out of nowhere'. The train did not make a sound and disappeared further down the track. The witness said that the carriages looked as if they were on fire with black smoke pouring out of the windows. The witness later discovered there was an accident on 24 December 1874; a train derailed on the bridge killing 34 and injuring 69.

Councillor

Location: Shrewsbury (Shropshire) - Railway station, entrance from Castle Street and platform three
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 07 March 2023, between 05:30-06:00h (legs), councillor unknown
Further Comments: While waiting on Platform 4, a witness heard footsteps and looked up to see a pair of legs walking towards the platform, visible from just above the knee to just above the ankle. After six paces, the legs disappeared. The witness said the complete figure should have been visible, illuminated by a streetlight. One story says a local Councillor died after part of the station roof collapsed and landed on him. His ghost has been seen waiting around, either sitting or standing, in the area.

White Figure

Location: Sion Mills (County Tyrone) - Old Railway Bridge, and river underneath
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: No longer in service, this bridge is thought to be haunted by the phantom of a suicide, which has been seen emerging from the waters below. The sounds of a train have also been reported coming along the track.

Crossers

Location: Sittingbourne (Kent) - Railway Level Crossing (no longer part of the railway)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Circa 1893
Further Comments: The crossing here had a spooky reputation after a train driver spotted a white figure run across the line in the early hours of the morning. The driver thought that the figure had been hit by his train, but when the area was searched, nothing could be found. At least one person had died on the crossing and a footbridge erected as a result.

Sound of Steam Engines

Location: Snettisham (Norfolk) - Area around the old Hunstanton/Kings Lynn railway line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2000s
Further Comments: People living near the old railway line have reported hearing a steam whistle and a low grumbling sound, as if the railway had never ceased operating in 1969.

Ammunition Train

Location: Soham (Cambridgeshire) - Approach to the station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 02 June (reoccurring)
Further Comments: Every 2 June an accident that cost the lives of two people is re-enacted. An ammunition train caught fire, the explosion shattering every window in Soham and destroying the old station. The rebuilt tracks no longer follow the scene of the accident.

Boiler Suited Man

Location: Springwell (Tyne and Wear) - Bowes Railway Museum
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Thought to have been killed in an accident, a phantom man wearing a boiler suit and flat cap is said to lurk in the area. Stones are occasionally thrown by unseen hands.

Wailing Man

Location: Strabane (County Tyrone) - Rail station, engine shed (track no longer exists)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1950s?
Further Comments: Four workers at the yard heard wailing, cries and loud bangs in one of the sheds. When the men investigated, they encountered a shadowy figure which glared back at them through the darkness. The ghost continued to create a commotion for two hours before vanishing, though it appeared again the following night to three of the men.

Railway Guard

Location: Straffan (County Kildare) - Former railway track
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1853 onwards
Further Comments: This former rail employee walks along the track carrying a lamp. In 1853 an accident between two trains killed sixteen people; an inquiry blamed the guard who had forgotten to attach a lamp at the rear of the train (which would have prevented the collision). To atone, the guardsman forever walks the rails.

Steam Engine

Location: Stroud (Gloucestershire) - Woodchester Mansion, near the town
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2001, and 14 December 2019
Further Comments: A film crew spending a night in the building in 2001 reported loud disembodied banging that climaxed as if the sounds of a stream train charged through the house. The house is also reported to be haunted by a white lady, and the park surrounding the building is home to a Roman soldier, a figure resembling a monk, two American servicemen in Second World War uniforms, a headless horse and a dwarf which somersaults along the driveway. In 2019, a witness watched a horse and carriage driven by a man wearing a tall Victorian hat pass through a locked gate.

Grey Figure

Location: SW1 (Greater London) - Green Park underground station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Late 1970s
Further Comments: A young track engineer sat at the station waiting for the traction current to be cut off. The engineer felt a slap on the face and turned to see a grey figure vanishing along the platform. Another man present saw nothing, other than the victim flinch and swear.

View from the Jubilee Line window.

Monks

Location: SW1 (Greater London) - Jubilee Line, from Westminster to Stratford
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Early 2000s
Further Comments: Since the construction of the Jubilee Line, reports of phantom monks walking the tracks have begun to emerge. The sightings may be connected to the many graves which were disturbed while work was commencing.

Tall Man

Location: SW1 (Greater London) - Vauxhall Underground Line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1960s
Further Comments: This seven foot tall man was seen underground several times by diggers working on the line - he wore brown overalls and a cap.

Guide

Location: SW18 (Greater London) - Between Wandsworth Common and Victoria Station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1890s
Further Comments: A man taking a shortcut across the common en route to Victoria station became lost. He stumbled across a fellow traveller who said he was also going to Victoria; the stranger then guided the man across the common to the station, where they both entered the same carriage. A conversation then ensured about the stranger who said that he had been robbed and stabbed in a train between London and Brighton; he promptly vanished, leaving a very startled witness behind.

Workman

Location: SW5 (Greater London) - West Brompton tube station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A man dressed in dark, old looking workman's clothing has been spotted early in the morning and late at night. He walks to the end of the platform before disappearing.

The westbound line of South Kensington Station, London.

Worker in a Reefer Jacket

Location: SW7 (Greater London) - South Kensington Station, westbound line
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: December 1928
Further Comments: a spectral locomotive was seen by a person who had just disembarked the last train of the night. A ghostly worker in a reefer coat and flat cap held on to the side of the phantom train. The ghost train gave a whistle and then disappeared into the tunnel.

Workman

Location: SW9 (Greater London) - South Island Place, Northern Line, near Stockwell Station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1984
Further Comments: A trainee manager sent to walk the line by himself as part of his training encountered an old man with a tilly lamp working at South Island Place. They exchanged a couple of words in passing. When the trainee reached Stockwell Station and commented that he had seen someone else along the line, a search party was dispatched to find the worker as no maintenance work was scheduled. No one could be found, and the trainee later discovered that the old man had been seen dozens of times over the years. The ghost was believed to be that of a worker killed on the spot during the 1950s.

Crying Lady

Location: Swanick (Hampshire) - Station
Type: Post-Mortem Manifestation
Date / Time: 1971
Further Comments: Waiting for the last train on a Sunday night, a man sat by a distressed woman who, between sobs, repeated 'I can't go back'. The train pulled up; the man reluctantly left the crying lady and leapt aboard. Arriving at his station, and feeling guilty about leaving her, the witness phoned the police, gave her description and asked if someone could check she was okay. The following morning, the man read a story in the local paper about a woman who had died after being hit by a train near Swanick station on Saturday night - the accompanying photograph was of the upset lady he had encountered twenty-four hours after she had died.

Upset Husband

Location: Tallington (Lincolnshire) - Footbridge over the railway line
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 15 January, 17:50h (reoccurring)
Further Comments: After the death of his wife (see West Deeping, Lincolnshire) this grief-stricken individual jumped from the footbridge over the railway track and was hit by the train from London, which killed him instantly. The incident is re-enacted once a year.