Most Haunted Ghost Tours

 Presents

A Paranormal Investigation Of

Bolling Hall

Bradford

8th October 2008

One of the bedrooms at Bolling Hall is generally known as "The Ghost Room". Nobody within living memory has actually seen a ghost there but there is a story that one appeared there once, long ago.

The civil war raged up and down the country during 1642, 1643 and 1644. Bradfords first real brush with the war was in December 1642. The town was very Puritan, the local people valuing their right to read and discuss the bible as they chose, to worship as they liked and to listen to their own choice of preachers. The town therefore was generally sympathetic to Oliver Cromwell and his idea that parliament, not the king alone should have the final say in all matters of law.

Bolling Hall then stood outside the town with a commanding view over the whole of it towards the parish church and the main streets of Ivegate and Kirkgate. The owner Sir Richard Tempest, belonged to the old school who believed that the king alone had the right received directly from godm to rule as he saw fit and that Parliament should be lower. Sir Richard was therefore a royalist.

The town of Bradford was beseiged by the royalist army under the Earl of Newcastle, in December 1642. The Earl of Newcastle stayed with Sir Richard Tempest and looked down on this small town from the hill above it. Bradford held out strongly in spite of having no army and no fortifications, the earls temper was naturally not improved by this.

We do not know which room the Earl occupied here but it may have been the small chamber over the parlour with its large bay window and fine painted plaster ceiling. The story tells that he was very cross one Sunday evening at Bradfords continued resistance and as he went to bed declared that the following morning he would slaughter every man, woman and child in the place in spite of this being against the general code of conduct for war. He then went to sleep.

During the night the Earl was awakened by feeling the bedclothes being pulled off him. By his bed stood a ghost wringing its hands and saying "pity poor Bradford". The Earl was suitably shaken and the following morning said that he had changed his mind. He would still attack Bradford but would now only slaughter those who offered real armed resistance. Bradford was duly attacked and taken by the royalists, There were very few casualties, probably less than 10 who died of wounds received in the skirmishing.

The story of the ghost appears in a small booklet called "An Historical Narrative of the life of Joseph Lister". Lister was a local man, born in Bradford and spending his later life at Kipping, now part of Thornton. He began to work as a servant but spent most of his adult life as an independant dissenting preacher although he was never ordained. He would certainly have been able to write such an autobiography but the earliest record that we have of it is in a publication dated 1842. At that time there was a fashion for family history and the publisher proudly states his own connection with the Lister family. We shall probably never know for certain whether it was written in the 1640's or the 1840's or at anytime between. It would be nice to find a reference to the ghost nearer the time that "she " is actually supposed to have appeared!

Start time will be 9:30pm

Programme Of Events During MHGT Investigations

Full introduction to Most Haunted Ghost Tours

Refreshments

Tour of building with psychic mediums and team

Dowsing workshop

Demonstration of equipment

Group vigils and seance in active areas

£50 per person

 

Email bolling@mosthaunted-ghosttours.com