Most Haunted Ghost Tours

 Presents
A Paranormal Investigation
Chillingham Castle

Northumberland

 

If there is any truth in such a contention Chillingham should certainly afford shelter to many wraiths of its departed owners and former dwellers. In this land of ancient dwellings very few houses have been lived in continuously from so early a date. For almost 800 years the long procession stretches of men, women and little children who have lived and loved and suffered therein.

The district is full of romance, and the castle being so close to the Borderland was in old times the scene of many a raid from its Scottish neighbours, and its dungeons were probably seldom without some unfortunate inmate immured therein. We still see on the dungeon walls ancient initials and lines scratched in by them to count the number of the weary days of their imprisonment.

Perhaps our principal and most famous apparition was known as the "Blue Boy" or "Radiant Boy", which used to be seen in what is now knows as The Pink Room (not open to the public). There, when from the clock tower the hour of midnight sounded, was heard the cries and moans of a child in pain and in agony of fear.

Always the noises came from a spot nearest to a passage cut through the 10 feet thick wall into the adjoining tower, and as the blood-curdling cries died slowly away a bright halo of light began to form close to the old four poster bed. Anyone sleeping there saw gently approaching then the figure of a young boy dressed in blue and surrounded by the light. Witnesses say his clothes were like those seen in paintings dating from the restoration period of the 1660's when Charles II was on the throne.

It was in this wall during the 1920's that the bones of a boy of tender years, and some fragments of a blue dress were discovered. It was found alongside the skeleton of a man where the fireplace now is, close to a trap door that opened to the stone arches of the vaults below. These poor remains were reverently removed and decently interred in consecrated ground, since then the figure has never been seen again.

However to this day occasional guests in the Pink Room claim to be awakened by strange blue flashes in the middle of the night. Any explanation of an electrical fault can be counteracted by the fact that there are no electrics of any kind in the wall where the flashes were seen.

Our next best known and authenticated ghost is that of Lady Mary Berkeley, wife of Ford, Lord Grey of Wark and Chillingham and Earl of Tankerville, still looking for her errant husband. That gentleman ran away with her own sister, Lady Henrietta, thus giving rise to a great scandal and a lawsuit before the famous or shall we say infamous Judge Jefferies in the reign of King Charles II.

The end of it all was a heartless desertion. The poor lady was left in her dark and lonely castle with only a fatherless baby girl as her companion. To this day the rustle of her dress is sometimes heard along the corridors and stairs and as the disappointed and anxious wraith passes by, a chill as of cold air seems to sweep through ones very marrow.

There have also been claims of her ghost escaping from her portrait to wander the castle in search of her errant Lord. It was said that the nursery where it hung had been disturbed by its restlessness and children and their nurse declared thats she stepped out of the frame and frightened them by following them about.

In what is called "the inner pantry" there has been seen a frail figure in white. This was where the silver in use was stored and a footman was once employed to sleep there to safeguard it. One night the footman had turned in when he was accosted by a lady in white, very pale who asked for water. Thinking for a moment that it was one of the visitors he turned away to obey her behest, when he suddenly remembered that he was locked in and that no visitor could possibly have entered. On turning round he found the figure had vanished.

This same figure was seen also by a guest who made notes of her psychic experiences in the various rooms of the castle without having been told about the castles claimed hauntings beforehand. It was suprising to see that she alluded to the longing for water of a female ghost who must have been slowly poisoned in olden times.

Not all the ghosts are those we see, some are merely felt 'Impalable impressions on the air" the poet says - "A sense of something moving to and fro' a chill dark thing that creeps or an oppressive atmosphere, as in an upper chamber overlooking the dell where the sensitive cannot remain.

A ladys maid who had been given this room was found next morning on the sofa in the dinning hall. She had quitted her bed in a panic and nothing would induce her to return. It is said that a former chef who occupied the room was driven to commit suicide there and we no longer use it as a bedroom.

In the library underneath the upper chamber the voices of two men are often heard talking but it is not possible to follow what they say and they seem to cease at once if one stops reading or writing to listen to their discussion. It disturbs no one and many have heard it but none had accounted for the fact.

It is not difficult to imagine specters standing in the stone courtyard where surrounded by the strong old towers, the moonlight casts shadows of the battlements accross the worn flagstones.

Many a revel took place there where the hundred horsemen who formed the castle guard caroused in the fitful glare of the flares whose iron brackets are still not rusted away. And if indeed it is as true as Mons Coue tells us that where the imagination and the will comes into conflict imagination always wins the day. Then many an old time scene must have been re-lived before more modern eyes in spite of the will to disbelieve.

All historical events taken from the Chillingham Castle website

 

We invite you to join us on a night to remember on 3rd October 2008

Start time will be 9.30pm

Programme of events during a MHGT investigation

Full introduction to ghost hunting

Refreshments

Tour of building with psychic mediums and teams

Demonstrations of equipment

Group vigils and seance in active areas

Price £60 per person

 

Email chill@mosthaunted-ghosttours.com

 

0151 5103313/07950350810