FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - The Ghost by the Gretna Green

Some time ago I wrote a series of articles (which I later turned in to a podcast) on the assorted ghost stories associated with Aycliffe Village in County Durham where I spend a good portion of my childhood. One of these local ghosts was an example of a very common sort of spectre, the Phantom Hitcher. In the Aycliffe version, a young woman dressed in white is seen by the side of the road and hitches a ride, only to later vanish from the back of the vehicle. 

Now the interesting thing I uncovered was that while the version I heard in the mid 1970s usually placed the lady in white near the village church and travelling in the direction of Darlington, the story actually dated back to the days of coaches and horses. Back then the A167 which runs through the village was the old Great North Road, and in the days when the coaches ran, the ghostly lady would hitching a ride north and vanish before reaching the nearby village of Rushyford a few miles up the road.

The village is also home to another well-known phantom, the Grey Lady. And over the years, aside from the oft-repeated creepy tales told about both these local ghosts, sightings of a white female figure have been reported in the Aycliffe village area. And recently a reader got in touch to relate his sighting of this strange white figure. It was seen a little to the north of the village, near what was once the Gretna Green pub, and is now back in business as the Gretna Hotel. His account is as follows - 

I was with my friend Chris at the time, and both of us were about 9 year old. Both of us were living near to Neville Parade in Newton Aycliffe. Strangely we were out 'ghost hunting' and rode our bikes over to the Gretna pub which was derelict at the time. We spent a bit of time looking around before heading back over the road (A167). There is a path leading through a small field and then some woods back to the houses. Halfway up this path we stopped to look at a rag which was caught on some barbed wire on the fence that ran along the path (still in ghost hunting mode). After a few seconds I looked ahead into the field and saw a white figure kind of floating towards us. I shouted at Chris to look but he took this as an attempt to trick him or something and promptly rode off on his bike, so I don't think he saw it which was very frustrating at the time! I remember looking up again at this thing and it was a bit closer. I pretty much got straight on my bike and rode off as fast as I could.

So the thing is basically similar to what the other people have described. It was about 30 years ago so my memory is a bit blurry but I remember it being all white, wearing flowing, kind of raggy clothes but no distinctive marks. And the main thing was it had a white face with no facial features at all, which was really weird. Could a veil possibly explain this? It was kind of moving its arms slowly, and moving slowly towards me with very awkward movements from what I remember. Just really weird. It wasn't too far away either, maybe 30/40 feet away. Oddly, at the time I didn't think it was a ghost because it didn't strike me as what a ghost should look like. It didn't look very human, but rather humanoid - if that makes any sense - mainly due to having no distinctive features and the white face area. So I just told people I saw a kind of weird creature/alien/ghost thing.

Now people have obviously said I was 'ghost hunting' so my childish active imagination got the better of me. and I too have thought this could be what happened. That is, until recently listening to you podcast and reading the comments about other people's similar experiences in that specific area. So maybe I did really see something after all? I wonder now that maybe because I was ghost hunting I was more perceptive than I usually would have been. But maybe it was coincidence. I've had a lot of weird stuff happen to me over the years so maybe I'm just more tuned in to these things than some other people. Maybe this thing appeared to me because I was kind of asking for it and it somehow knew. And I just happened to be in a spot where something was hanging around and was able to pick up on that? Or maybe something there is causing people to hallucinate? Or maybe someone dressing up to scare people? Who knows! But at least now know I'm not the only one who's seen weird stuff there!

Very intriguing, I am sure you will agree. Now what struck me as particularly interesting is the detail that the figure lacked a face, for this would appear to be a common feature in most of the reports of the white ghost. Andrew Green in Ghosts of Today lists several encounters with a seemingly female figure dressed in a long garment and a hood but with no face visible within, and often described as moving oddly or even floating. It would seem a similar figure has been seen in the south end of the village near the church, in the surrounding fields, on the road heading north of the village, and even a good way up The Great North Road.

For those who may wish to investigate further, we should note that the area described in the above account has now been built on, and where there was once a field where a young boy saw a strange figure in white are streets of houses. One wonders if any of these residences have reports of unwelcome guests in white...

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FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - Tales from the Playground Part IV - The Grey Lady

Over the last few entries in Folklore on Friday, we've been exploring tales I heard in a childhood spent in the little village of Aycliffe, in County Durham in the 1970s. We've identified some tales as urban legends, and traced others to actual reports of hauntings in the village. However if you mention the subject of ghosts and hauntings to anyone who has ever lived in Aycliffe Village, there is one name that will be mentioned more than any others - the Grey Lady. 

But despite being easily the most talked about phantom in the village, there seems to be very little written about the Grey Lady in gazetteers of ghosts or collections of local folklore. Indeed the only definite reference to her I have ever found was printed just a few years ago. In an interview with Mr Richard Matthews, a leading vet based in Barnard Castle, published in Newshopper (Wednesday 27th August 2014),  he recalled a call out to Aycliffe - 

I was once called out to lamb a ewe at night on a smallholding near the old church in Aycliffe village and told by the farmer that the place was haunted and he had recently seen the ghost of a grey lady. He then hid behind a tree and jumped out at me!

That said however, some collections of ghostly reports from the North East, do reference several sightings which are usually conflated with the hitch-hiking lady in white we discussed last time (see here). The first is taken from Ghosts of Today by Andrew Green (Kaye and Ward 1980) - 

Having escorted a lady friend home he was walking through Aycliffe Village when he saw 'a white shape about five yards away, walking in a field'. The figure clearly resembled a young woman in a wedding dress and a veil.

And over the years there have been other reports of a female apparition in vintage dress too. For example, a father out walking with his brother and son spotted a female phantom wearing Victorian dress. The figure did not appear to have any feet, and was in fact floating just off the ground. The spectre turned to look at her three observers and then sped away, reportedly 'faster than a greyhound'. 

Now to my mind, this female figure in period costume is undoubtedly the Grey Lady. For although the tale of the lady in white that haunts the road out of the village has been doing the rounds for more than a century, stories of encounters with this hitch-hiking spirit always describe her as appearing in contemporary dress. Plus she only ever appears on the roadside. Whereas the Grey Lady is always described as wearing "olden times" clothes and appears in several places around the village.

Most commonly the Grey Lady is seen in the vicinity of St Andrews Church. For accordingly to stories I heard, she is the shade of a noble lady who died while praying in the church - in one version she tripped on the altar steps and bled to death, while another story claimed she had been killed by round-heads while at prayer. However given that our year was studying the English Civil War when I heard this second variant, I rather suspect that what was going on in the classroom had shaped the spooky tales being told in the schoolyard. Once again, if you dear reader have heard a different origin tale for the Grey Lady I would love to hear it. 

However certainly the Grey Lady has close links to the old church. Generations of kids in Aycliffe Village have heard of the local rite associated with her, a classic example of what folklorists call legend tripping. It is said that if you go to St Andrews Church after dark, and walk (or run) around it seven times, and then stick a pin into the church doors, the Grey Lady will appear. Naturally I have heard of many who claimed they would attempt this, but no reports of anyone who actually did the deed in the end. Typically the whims of weather and parents, and in general the sort of catastrophes that prevent children from doing their homework, somehow always got in the way and the bold soul had to shelve their ghost raising plans.

But the Grey Lady does not appear to be bound to one particular location. And unlike the roadside lady in white or the red-eyed spectre that allegedly can be seen outside one of the village pubs (see here), the Grey Lady does not seem to trapped re-enacting the circumstances of her death. Rather she appears to be a phantom with a certain degree of freedom to appear where ever she chooses. However
it was also said that she appeared most often in the last quarter of the year, and in particular in the run-up to Christmas. And when I canvassed some locals about the village's famous spectre, one chap
recalled - 

I know a guy who saw her twice. He saw her near South Grove, off the village green when he was a kid. I was told that she appears around this time of year checking that people spend their money to help the needy rather than wasting it.

I don't recall ever hearing any specific tales she had appeared to chastise a wrong-doer, but she was always talked about in terrifying terms. I'm quite sure that more than a few children over the years have been persuaded into behaving as otherwise the Grey Lady would come and get them. However she was never portrayed as an evil presence, but from the way the the Grey Lady was talked about, there was a sense she was always watching over the village. And although I cannot remember any tales that envisioned her as some kind of supernatural guardian, she has been a part of the village for many many years, and so perhaps we can say that the Grey Lady is simply the spirit of Aycliffe in more ways than one... 

FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - Tales from the Playground Part III - Ghosts of Aycliffe

Over the last couple of weeks, I've been recounting and discussing assorted strange tales I heard as a child at a village school in the North-east of England in the 1970s. And among the usual urban legends and oft-recycled campfire tales, a good chunk of local folklore entered the mix, in particular accounts of various ghosts alleged to haunt the village. 

Now such tales of spectres on my own doorstep were a particular favourite of mine, and this was partly because it always deliciously terrifying to learn of ghosts roaming so near to my home. However it was also because these tales passed around in corners of the playground, filled an important gap. Now there have been many guides and gazetteers of strange lands and haunted locations published over the years, but I was always somewhat annoyed that such tomes generally never mentioned anything interesting in my local area. Oh yes, there was always reams written about the big hitters such as Avebury, Pluckley, Hampton Court or Glamis Castle, but often these books gave the North of England somewhat short shrift, and in particular there was rarely anything reported at all for the County of Durham. So then I naturally relished these pieces of local ghostly lore, for they made the immediate world around me a more exciting and magical place. Although given the lurid and generally dubious nature of these tales passed around the schoolyard, even as a child,  I was somewhat sceptical about their veracity. 

However I never forgot them, and in later years a little research would prove that several of these local phantoms were more than the imaginings of school kids. Probably best known to the wider world is a figure that haunts the road through Aycliffe Village. As we mentioned last week, in the old days, the Great North Road used to run through the village, and this particular phantom is believed to date back over two hundred years, first reported in the days when coaching inns thrived. This particular spectre is actually a familiar species of folkloric haunting, the road ghost. And as the name implies, these spirits haunt the sides of roads and highways, and usually they have a Phantom Hitchhiker style story attached to them. And this Aycliffe road ghost is no exception. 

What used to be the Great North Road is the A167 these days, and where it once used to travel through the centre, now it passes through just the North-west edge of the village. At the southern end you pass by an old church, St Andrews which dates back to Saxon times, and on the road leading into the village is where a former coaching inn stood, now a pub the North Briton. Now according to the tales I heard, it was said that the ghost of a young woman haunted this particular stretch of the road. On dark nights, it was said that drivers heading south towards Darlington reported seeing the figure of a young lady, usually described as wearing a white raincoat, standing by the side of the road, seemingly looking to hitch a ride. 

Now over the years, several drivers took pity on her, for as you'd expect it was nearly always a wet and rainy night, and offered the young lady a ride. Our mystery woman in white apparently always wanted to get to Darlington, but much to our gallant drivers' shock and horror, long before they reached the town, the young lady would always vanish from the car. However if your passenger melting away into the rain-streaked darkness wasn't frightening enough, in some versions it was claimed that our unfortunate drivers would look around and see the lady was now suddenly covered in streaming blood just before she dematerialised before their eyes! 

Of course, as is typical in this kind of folk tale, there is an eerie little coda. Our troubled driver would then later discover that the young lady he had picked up born an uncanny resemblance to a woman killed a few months earlier. And the driver would then discover a story that would tell of how she was looking to get home late one night, but unfortunately the vehicle she hitched a ride with met a horrific road accident that killed all involved. Naturally the tale usually concluded with the story-teller pronouncing solemnly that on dark, rainy nights you can still see her trying to get home... 

Apparently just a year after my family moved away from the village, in 1978 a Mr Dennis Fisher reported to the Birmingham Society of Ghost Hunters that the mystery lady had hitched a ride and done her unsettling vanishing turn again. Interestingly in this case she was travelling north and disappeared when they reached Rushyford some four miles up the road. However according to research into this spectre's history by Andrew Green, one of our leading parapsychologists, this is in fact the traditional direction she travels in - 

Ron Watson writing in the Newtonian mentions an earlier report in the Aycliffe Chronicle, of a phantom 'White Lady' haunting the Great North Road. The story is associated with the finding of the body of young woman in 1698 in the nearby River Skerne. She has been witnessed fairly recently, however, over 250 years later, dressed in white and wearing a veil. Originally it seems she was collected by stage coaches travelling between the 'North Briton' and what is now the 'Eden Arms' in Rushyford. 

from Ghosts of Today by Andrew Green (Kaye and Ward 1980)

It is interesting to note these variations in the tales of Aycliffe's vanishing hiker. The versions I heard as a child had clearly been updated to move with the times - her death involved a car accident, had occurred relatively recently, and reflected the fact that most folks were then travelling south into Darlington (where most of our parents were employed) rather than going north between two small villages. But also, as we see from Mr Fisher's report, the traditional version of the haunting was still occurring after I had heard the new variants. Once again, I would be interested to learn which version any of you good folks at home have heard.

As I mentioned earlier, this hitchhiking road ghost is the one you will most commonly find listed in books of ghostly lore that take the trouble to mention hauntings in the North-east. And often appended to the tale are reports of various sightings of a white female figure in the village itself. However I rather suspect these reports relate to the ghost that is most well-known to the locals - the Grey Lady. And shall learn more of this infamous spectre next time... 

FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY: The Brawny Beasts of County Durham Part III

Over the past two articles in this series, we have detailed the peculiar case of a small area of County Durham being home to three overlapping legends. In the Part I we discovered a muddled legend of the Pollards  in Bishop Auckland, which variously claimed that this aristocratic family's lands were granted as a reward for slaying either a dragon or a monstrous wild boar, noting that the legend and a ritual with a falchion were suspiciously similar to the tale of the Sockburn Worm, another dragon legend from a miles away in Croft.   Meanwhile in Part II, the waters grew even muddier when we discovered the neighboring town of Ferryhill also had a legend of a knight slaying a boar too. 

So then, at last its time to get to the bottom of the mystery. Last time we drew the cautious conclusion that Ferryhill's cherished legend of a medieval knight slaying a huge boar was most likely based on fact, and our earlier article traced the long history of the Sockburn Worm. Therefore it is the Pollards tale is looking most suspect, indeed as we remarked in Part I, it was curious that different accounts seem uncertain whether the beast slain was a wyrm or a brawn. So then, what evidence is there for the Pollard tale?

Well, the earliest version of the legend comes from the Parliamentary Survey of church lands undertaken in 1649, which mentions the tradition of presenting a new Bishop of Durham with the falchion that slew the beast, and that it was for this deed that the Pollard family had been given their lands around Bishop Auckland. However this wasn't the first such record of which family held which lands and the basis for their claims, and there are several earlier mentions of the Pollard family having a falchion as the title deed for their estates, with its image becoming part of the family heraldry from the 14th century onwards. But interestingly there is no mention made of slaying a monster in any of these accounts...

Hence it appears that this story of slaying a beast seems to have only been told by the Pollards themselves. Furthermore it is considerably later that the tale gets its additional details added of the cunning Sir Richard riding around lands to claim them as a reward. Furthermore unlike the similar story of Sir Roger of Ferryhill, there is a distinct absence of any supporting evidence for the story of monster slaying in the historical record prior to the mid 17th century. Indeed the date of that first mention of the legend is significant in itself for that Parliamentary survey was taken while the English Civil War was raging.

Now to sum up briefly, this era saw the country tearing itself apart over who had the right to rule, a battle between the emerging ideas of democracy and the old feudal system which placed political power by birthright in the hands of the Crown and the nobility. Hence in this period the aristocracy were asserting their traditional rights and stressing their long histories and ancient links to their lands. Furthermore after the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, there was a considerable amount of romanticizing the past - after the upheavals of the Civil War, there was a strong cultural push to reclaim the ancient traditions that had been disrupted and threatened by the conflict. Hence in this period, archetypes of 'Merry England' - an idyllic view of rural Britain and its local customs and folk traditions - become common in literature and other texts, as the new King  repealed the acts of the Puritan Parliaments that that outlawed the likes of May Day celebrations, harvest festivals and Christmas feasts. Naturally the surviving nobility romanticized their histories too and there are a great many alleged ancient traditions and tales, that were claimed to date from medieval times, were actually fabricated in this period.

Now the Pollard family itself did not survive the Civil War, and hence in the 1660s the current Bishop of Durham, John Cosin decreed that the freeholders of their former lands were to continue the tradition of the presenting of the Pollard Falchion to the Bishops of Durham. Cosin was very active in healing the rifts caused by the civil war, reinstating old liturgies, restoring the fineries stripped out of the churches by the Roundheads, and spent a great deal of the bishopric's revenues in strengthening the Church's charities and schools. In setting up a continuation of the Pollard falchion tradition, Cosin was effectively pulling the local community together - on one hand it was asserting the ancient ties between the Church and the nobility, but in transferring the upholding of the tradition to the local people it was also neatly embracing the political changes whereby the aristocracy had conceded a large degree of power to the new emerging Parliamentary democracy.

And certainly it seems that the legend of Pollard and the monster brawn appears to have really taken root in this period, a time when England was attempting to unite a recent bloody rift. In romanticising stories of medieval times essentially the feudal system was quietly being cemented into history. Hence originally the Pollard falchion, like other ancient weapons held by other noble families, was a symbol of their right to rule through their martial power and oaths to deploy that might in the service of  the crown, it now became a relic wrapped up in folklore, a left-over from days when knights were bold and monsters still lived in Merry Old England.

And in this transition from history to folklore, the tale of Pollard and the boar has clearly borrowed from the neighboring legends of Sir Roger and the Brawn of Brancepeth and the slaying of the Sockburn Worm by Sir John Conyer, with details added as the years passed. And while it is possible there might be lost earlier sources that would show the Pollard story to be a genuine medieval legend, the only other piece of supporting evidence appears to point at it being a later fabrication. For in St. Andrews Church in Bishop Auckland, that ancient residence of the Bishops of Durham, there is a 13th century wooden effigy of a knight. It is the usual sleeping figure atop a tomb and local tradition alleges it is the resting place of Sir Richard Pollard who slew the boar.

Now there are no inscriptions or mentions in ancient records to back up this claim, and the story is based upon the fact that at the feet of the sleeping knight is the carved likeness of a boar - much like how the tomb of Sir John Conyers has a dragon at his feet. However experts believe that this carven beast was most likely originally a lion, and at some later date the creature's face was recarved to resemble a pig's snout. This in itself is certainly suspect, hinting at a later revision of local history. However what make it a smoking gun for our investigation into the brawny beasts of County Durham is the fact that Bishop Cosin, who recreated and remodelled the Pollard falchion tradition was famous for redecorating and restoring old churches whose features and ornaments had been destroyed or defaced by the Puritans. And indeed most tellingly, a whole branch of church decorations in Durham now bear his name - Cosin Woodwork...

FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - The Pickled Parson of Sedgefield

Among the hills and forests of County Durham in the north east of England, lies the little village of Sedgefield. It's a small place with a population of less than five thousand, and is most likely known for either being the former constituency of British Prime Minster Tony Blair, or the birthplace of Mark Gatiss. However while it may not be a huge place, its history is prodigious. 

The village dates back to Roman times, and is recorded in the Domesday Book. Its church, St. Edmunds was built in the 1300s, and in the 19th century, among the aristocracy it was a popular place to hunt. And there is a reminder of its bygone popularity with the great and good, in the shape of Ceddesfeld Hall, a manor house built just by the village green. This wonderful old building was built by two notable sons of Sedgefield, Samuel and Shute Barrington, one an Admiral and the other a Bishop of Durham. However the hall was not constructed for their benefit - rather it was built for their nephew, George Barrington, who was the rector in the village in the 1790s, as a lavish replacement for the old rectory which had burnt down. 

Of course, such a long established village has more than a few ghosts haunting its history, and indeed its most famous spectre is said to haunt the site of the old rectory. This alleged phantom is known as the Pickled Parson, and was reputedly to be responsible for a very spirited haunting. The story dates back to the 1730s, when a fellow called  Rev. John Garnage, A.M., was the rector of Sedgefield. He was responsible for the parish of St. Edmunds and lived just a short way away in the old rectory, where he dwelt with his family. 

However in the second week of December in 1747, the good Reverend passed away suddenly and this left his family in something of a pickle. For back in those days, the church collected an annual tithe from its parishioners, and every year by law, whatever was due was to be paid to the parson on the 20th of December. These tithes provided an income for the clergyman and maintained the church buildings, but in a case like this, should a parish be without a clergyman to collect the tithes on the 20th of December, all the money would go instead to the bishopric of Durham. Hence Garnage's family were suddenly facing the dire threat of poverty; indeed in that era, deceased clergymen's families had starved to death when the tithe money ran out.

However the parson's wife thought fast and came up with a cunning plan. According to an early written version of the story found in Legends and Superstitions of the County of Durham (1886) by William Brockie, the parson's wife preserved his body with salt until the crucial December day - which surely should make him the Cured Clergyman. Anyhow, the day after the tithes had all been paid, she summoned the local doctor, who suspected no chicanery and pronounced the parson dead and recently deceased. However his ghost's name seems to derive from another version of the legend, for some tellings of the tale hold that she actually kept her husband's body fresh by soaking him in brandy. What's more, these alternate versions go on to claim that she embroidered the deception further by propping up the preserved parson in the window of the old rectory so that the tithe payers could see he was up and about his business!

But whether by salt or brandy, with the death certificate signed and dated, all was legal and above board. And so, the parson's wife and her family were spared the horrors of a winter in poverty. However there was one person who was apparently displeased - the spirit of the parson himself. According to the old stories, because his body had been delayed in receiving a proper Christian burial, the parson's soul could not enter Heaven, and therefore the earth-bound spirit returned to vex the village. Apparently the rectory became haunted with all manner of disturbances and eerie events "making the night hideous". 

And apparently there was no placating the restless shade either. For the Pickled Parson continued to haunt the rectory for many years afterwards. Indeed, it is said that the violent haunting only ceased when the rectory building caught fire and burnt to the ground in 1792. However you can't keep a good ghost down, or at least, let a good ghost story come to an end. For it is said that the Pickled Parson is still haunting Sedgefield. Local legends say that there was a special tunnel that connected the old rectory with St Edmunds, and as the last surviving remnant of his old home, the unquiet spirit of the clergyman still haunts the gloomy passage. For course, the exact location of both the tunnel and its entrance in St. Edmunds is now long forgotten and lost in the mists of time, so who is to say that the Pickled Parson is not still walking abroad down there in the damp and dark...

Ceddesfeld Hall with St. Edmunds' tower in the background