Credit goes to Helen Prime & Shane Lee for this article. - Posted 14/10/05

In her lifetime, Lady Anne Grimstone denied the Resurrection and doubted the very existence of God. Her argument continued onto her death-bed in November, 1716, when she said, "if there is any truth in the Word of God, may seven trees grow on my grave".

Lady Grimstone’s grave is in the eastern part of Tewin Graveyard. A multi-trunked sycamore and several ash trees have forced open the stonework of the tomb and have almost completely engulfed the original railings.

Hatfield House, regularly visited during her lifetime by Elizabeth I, is haunted by a coach and four, which has been witnessed many times careering up the long drive to the front of the house, passing through the great door and continuing up the stairs.

Hatfield House is also haunted by the ghost of a veiled woman, who is thought to have died at the house whilst in the act of trying to pass a message to Charles II.

Pieman Glibbon was a regular visitor to Hertfordshire fairs and markets. This friendly character showed interest in the local farmers and learned much of their movements as he sold his pies. It was just coincidental that they would talk with him at the sales and then be robbed by a masked highwayman on their way home, or so it was thought until the masked highwayman was eventually caught and identified as the friendly Pieman.

So outraged were the farmers at Glibbon’s trickery, befriending them by day and robbing them by night, that he was severely beaten before being tied to a horse and dragged some distance, before he finally died.

Travellers in the area have seen the vague shape of a horse pulling a "writhing body" along Bramfield Road and Whitehorse Lane, and Pieman Glibbon’s moans have been heard pleading for mercy. The sound of horses’ hooves has also been heard.

When novelist Barbara Cartland moved into Camfield Place in 1950, she was already aware of the psychic phenomena that occurred there and she had the house blessed. However, it was not the ghost of some previous occupier from Victorian or Tudor times that haunts Camfield, it is the ghost of a cocker spaniel who died there in 1955.

Barbara Cartland’s son, Glen, had a brown and white cocker spaniel called Jimmy, which in 1955 developed glandular trouble in his throat, and as a result had to be put down by a vet.

Soon after Jimmy’s death, it was noticed that the other dogs of the household became very jumpy at feeding time. They would appear to notice something standing by the food dishes, and after growling would back away. One particular dog, a black and white cocker spaniel called Murray, was particularly affected and would often scream as if being attacked. Squeals of pain would come from the dogs as they battled with an invisible dog for their food.

Then Jimmy started to be seen around the house, both by Miss Cartland and her maid. He was usually seen curled up just inside the door of the dining room, in the same spot that he used to lie before he was put down. One day, Miss Cartland was arranging some flowers on a hall table when she saw Jimmy. Thinking that the dog was Murray, she tried to gently edge him away with her foot. At that Jimmy just disappeared.

Miss Rose Purcell, the family maid, who often used to take Jimmy for a walk during his earthly days, entered the dining room one day in 1961, and found Jimmy lying on the floor in his favourite spot. Thinking no more of it, she walked across and actually went to step over the sleeping dog when it disappeared.

The King’s Arms was certainly in existence in the 16th century, a fact borne out by the patronage of Henry VIII, in the days when he was courting Anne Boleyn, and later when the inn was visited several times by Edward VI, the son of Henry’s third wife, Jane Seymour.

The inn is haunted by the occasional visit of a Lady in White, and a tall fat man, who laughs. Perhaps the couple are Henry and Anne, revisiting the place they knew in their romantic courting days.

Many customers of this delightful pub, which dates back in parts to 1530, have experienced a feeling of sheer terror when approaching the stairs, and more than one member of the staff has actually refused to go near the stairs at all.

In the 18th century, recruits for the Army and Navy were usually press-ganged into service. Any young man, who was apparently alone, could be literally grabbed and dragged off to the nearest camp to be compulsorily pressed into service.

One of these victims was a rather tall, good-looking young lad who was quietly sipping his ale one night in the bar of the White Hart, when he was confronted by a bunch of drunken soldiers, who had decided to "press him. In the ensuing fight, the lad, fighting for his freedom, put up a good struggle but died at the foot of the stairs. The feeling of sheer terror in the young lad’s heart at the time has echoed down through the years, and the same feeling of terror is still often experienced in the modern day.

The figure of the lad has been seen several times, standing at the foot of the staircase, still showing the intense feeling of terror in his face, as he relives the last few moments of his earthly life.

The ancestral home of the Lytton Family, Knebworth House was said to have had a haunted room in the East Wing, until it’s demolition in 1811.

It was in this room that a girl, called Jenny Spinner, was imprisoned in the 18th century. During her time of imprisonment she devoted her time to spinning. She had finally turned insane and died.

Shortly following her death, the sound of spinning came from this room on irregular occasions, and this was thought to have been a warning of the impending death of one of the Lytton Family.

In 1946, thuds and footsteps were regularly heard at 10.30 in the evening, coming from an empty room, which the family’s collie dog flatly refused to enter.

It is thought that the sounds, which lasted for a period of about 12 months, were caused by the return of a former owner of the property.

Early one Sunday morning in the Summer of 1970, a taxi driver was travelling between Dunstable and Markyate when suddenly, just past the Pack Horse Inn, he noticed the tall figure of a cricketer standing in the middle of the road. The driver braked to avoid the figure but the car was travelling too fast. However, instead of knocking the figure down, the taxi went straight through him. So sure was the driver that he had knocked the pedestrian down, that he stopped and went to render assistance where possible. There was no sign of the strange figure in white, and there was no mark or dent on the car.

What the taxi driver had experienced was an encounter with a ghostly cricketer, one of a team that had been involved in an accident in 1958, whilst returning to Surrey after playing a match at Milton Bryan, near Woburn Abbey. At the spot where he had encountered the strange figure, their vehicle had swerved whilst overtaking a car and two men, Jerry Rycham and Sidney Moulder, had been killed in the ensuing accident. Three others had been injured.

The taxi driver was not alone in his experience. Several motorists have reported that when passing the site, they have noticed a cricketer standing on the side of the road, apparently a hitch-hiker, hitching a lift after a call at the local pub.

The story of the Wicked Lady, and her exploits, was told in two films of the same name, the first film being made in the late 1940’s, with Margaret Lockwood playing the leading role.

Lady Katherine Ferrers married the teenage son of the Fanshaw Family when she was a mere 13 years of age, and as can be expected of a marriage between two young people of such tender ages, it was a complete disaster. So bored was she with marriage that, at the age of 21, she began leading a double life, by day enjoying the social life that befitted her title, by night donning the clothes of a highwayman, robbing late-night travellers, dropping on her unsuspecting victims from trees overhanging the road. She often selected her victims from the social meetings she had attended the same day.

Often on her forays along Watling Street she would be accompanied by a male highwayman. She always acted in a very genteel way with her male victims, but she was known to be quite vicious with members of her own sex. She was known to kill, without the slightest hesitation, and life around the area of Markyate Cell at that time, in the 18th century, was far from safe at night.

She used a concealed room at the Cell, which she entered by means of a secret stairway in the kitchen chimney, and it was from this room that she used to emerge into the night. It was also this room to which she returned carrying her loot.

One night, whilst attempting to rob a coach that she had held up on the highway near Markyate, she was shot and mortally wounded by the coach guard. Somehow she managed to climb back onto her jet-black horse and was carried home, but she died at the foot of the stairs leading to her concealed room. Her body was found the following morning, still dressed in highwayman’s garb, and her secret was out. Immediately after her funeral the doorway was bricked up.

Shortly after her funeral, stories began to circulate throughout the neighbourhood that her ghost had been seen riding through the grounds of Markyate Cell, and along the surrounding roads at a fast gallop, and other stories told of how she was seen on several occasions sitting on the branch of an oak tree, under which it was rumoured that she had buried her ill-gotten gains. She was also seen several times near the kitchen chimney. She is said to have completely demoralised one parish tea party in the early part of the 20th century by her sudden appearance.

In the 19th century, it was decided to open up the bricked-up doorway. Local workmen, who knew the story of Lady Ferrers and the hauntings only too well, refused to have anything to do with the work and the owner was forced to recruit men in London to carry out the job. When they finally opened the doorway, they discovered a stairway which led to the secret room, with an oak door. Inside the room they found nothing. The workmen claimed that whilst in the secret room they had heard sighs and groans which they could not account for, and they also complained that whilst they were passing the oak tree, on their way back to their lodgings at night, they saw the figure of Lady Ferrers swinging her legs on the branch of the tree.

A local pub, called The Wicked Lady, which was certainly used by Lady Ferrers as an illicit meeting place with her companions of the night, is also said to be haunted. From one of the upper rooms comes the sound of a woman weeping, although whether the weeping ghost is connected with Lady Ferrers is not known.

One night, in December, 1970, a man was walking his dog across nearby Normansland Common, when he heard the sound of a horse galloping at high speed across the scrubland. It came so close to him that he claimed that, if he could have seen it, he could have possibly touched it. However, nothing was visible and the sound died down as it galloped away into the distance. The dog was frantic with fright and it took a lot of soothing to quieten the poor animal down again.

The fortune and treasure that Lady Ferrers accumulated has still to be discovered, but there is a clue in a local rhyme which goes:-

"Near the Cell, there is a well; near the well, there is a tree; and neath the tree, the treasure be".

There have been people living on the site of Salisbury Hall for well over 1,000 years. It is known that in the 9th century the land was held by a Saxon, Asgar the Staller, and after the Conquest, William gave the land to his friend, Geoffrey de Mandeville. The house received it’s name from Sir John Montague, the Earl of Salisbury, who moved in to the Hall in 1380, when he married into the Mandeville Family. The last family to live there, before the Hall’s decline, was the Nevilles, the most famous of them being Warwick the Kingmaker, who died a short distance away at Barnet, with his brother, the Earl of Northumberland, during the Battle of Barnet in the Wars of the Roses. It was after his death that the Hall fell into decay.

During the reign of Henry VIII, the Hall was rebuilt by Sir John Cutte, Treasurer to the King. He built it into a fine Tudor mansion and it was ready for occupation in 1507. Salisbury Hall was used by Charles I as an armoury and headquarters during the Civil War, and in the Second World War the house achieved further fame when it was taken over by Sir Geoffrey de Haviland, where he developed and built the first Mosquito bomber, an aircraft that was to play a large part in the decimation of the Nazi war machine.

Two people, although they lived in completely different times and in completely different ways, were to emerge from Salisbury Hall to become household names. The woman was Nell Gwynne. The man was Winston Churchill.

It was early in the 20th century that the Hall began a revival of it’s greater days. Jenny Churchill, mother of Britain’s future Prime Minister, remarried and together with her new husband, George Cornwallis-West, bought the house. Every weekend the house was lively with distinguished guests, including Edward VII, but the liveliest guest to enter the Hall was Winston. He never got on well with his step-father, mainly because George Cornwallis-West was only a few years older than himself and far younger than Jenny. Winston’s stays were well-remembered by the locals, especially the one occasion when he set about ridding the moat of a giant pike that had been terrorising the other occupants of the moat for a long time. All attempts at catching the pike had failed, until one day Winston arrived at the spot with a high-powered rifle and shot the pike from close range; a most unorthodox way in which to catch a fish.

The ghost of Nell Gwynne was seen by George Cornwallis-West on at least one occasion at Salisbury Hall. He recorded the incident in his book "Edwardian Hey Days", which he wrote in 1930. In the book he described how one evening, when he had descended the stairs at dusk, he had entered the oak-panelled dining room, when, standing in a corner of the room he saw the figure of a beautiful young woman, wearing a blue fichu around her shoulders. The figure had looked intently at Cornwallis-West and had then turned round and walked through the doorway into the hall. George had followed but could see nothing of the beautiful young woman.

Thinking that the figure looked very much like Ellen Bryan, a former nursemaid, who was at that time in his mother’s employ, and thinking that the apparition meant that Ellen had died, he telephoned his mother. She told him that Ellen was perfectly well and was about to marry an artilleryman. A few weeks later he was discussing the puzzling incident with his sister, Daisy, when she remarked upon the striking resemblance between Ellen Bryan and the portrait of Nell Gwynne that hung in the entrance hall.

George Cornwallis-West consulted a London medium, who said that he had also seen an apparition of Mistress Nell and she had warned him of an impending disaster. Six months later, a solicitor, to whom Cornwallis-West had entrusted £10,000, absconded with the money.

In 1956, the house, which was by then in a drab and dilapidated state, was taken over by Mr Walter Goldsmith and his family, and they set about the mammoth task of restoring the Hall to it’s former Tudor splendour, and also a suitable place for the ghost of Nell Gwynne, who has also been seen in the Crown Chamber and the Green Bedroom.

Unmistakable footsteps have been heard in the passageway which leads from the bedrooms. The steps have been heard walking down towards the bathroom at the far end, and out into the direction of the old Tudor Wing, which was demolished in 1818. The footsteps are believed to have been made by the ghost of a Cavalier who was killed at Salisbury Hall during the time of the Civil War. His ghost, complete with sword sticking through his chest, was also seen many times during the 18th and 19th centuries.

On the bridge over the moat there is also a definite presence of a woman, although she has only been detected by persons with mediumistic gifts.

Battlefield House, in Chequers Street, an Elizabethan half-timbered building, has foundations of a much earlier time, when the original building belonged to the nearby Abbey.

It was on the ground surrounding Battlefield House that two major battles were fought in the Wars of the Roses. In the first battle, in 1455, the Yorkists won a resounding victory, but in the second battle, in 1461, the tide turned in favour of the Lancastrians.

Two separate sounds are heard on the site of Battlefield House. The sound of galloping horses and the clash of steel and shouting of men, remain as a reminder of the two battles fought on the spot. The sound of chanting is a reminder of the earlier days when the original house was used by monks from the nearby Abbey.

Now a girls’ school, Hyde Hall was once owned by Sir Strange Jocelyn, a Non-Conformist in an area that was strongly Quaker in the 17th and 18th centuries. His unorthodox views on religion got him into lively arguments, especially his strong desire to be buried in the local churchyard, after his death, with his favourite horse. Naturally his rather unusual request was turned down by the church authorities and when he eventually died, he was buried with his horse in the grounds of Hyde Hall itself.

From time to time, Sir Strange’s ghost is seen, riding his spectral favourite along the drive leading to his old house.

The ruins of 14th century Minsden Abbey, which fell into decay in the 17th century, have long been reputed to be haunted by the ghost of a monk, who is said to appear each year on 1st November, after the strains of sweet music and the tolling of bells have been heard.

The monk is said to appear under an ivy-covered archway, and walking with head bowed, always ascends a stairway which is no longer there, before finally disappearing, accompanied by a few melancholy chords.

In 1907, a world-wide sensation was caused when the monk was actually photographed by W.T. Latchmore.