The Paranormal Database

Examining folkloric, paranormal & cryptozoological locations in the UK and beyond

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Hampshire Ghosts, Folklore and Forteana

Young Girl

Location: Fareham - Saltern Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1999
Further Comments: The misty figure of a young girl crossing the road was seen by three occupants of a vehicle which had to break hard to avoid her. The figure disappeared into a verge on the side of the road.

Figure in Large Hat

Location: Farnborough - Farnborough Place
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Mid twentieth century
Further Comments: Night workers at this former R&D building would sometimes hear footsteps around quieter areas. A former housekeeper reported seeing a figure with a large hat and dressed in brown move silently past her before vanishing.

James Martin

Location: Fawley - Jolly Sailor public house
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2020s
Further Comments: One employee told the local press that she would hear whispering and spot fleeting shadows when locking up at night. Snacks would occasionally fly off the wall and other items tipped over. Some people named James Martin, a nineteenth century landlord, as the responsible party.

White Lady

Location: Fleet - Bagwell Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A ghostly white lady haunts this country lane - she is also said to cross a field and vanish into a pond.

Old Lady

Location: Fordingbridge - Hourglass Restaurant, formerly fourteenth century farmhouse
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This shade of an old lady warms herself by sitting by one of the original fireplaces.

Cavalier

Location: Fordingbridge - Tutor Rose Inn
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: As well as a phantom Cavalier, this inn is also said to be the home of a ghostly woman who ascends the staircase. The female apparition may also be responsible for the footsteps heard on the same staircase.

Jack the Painter

Location: Gosport - Blockhouse Point
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Hanged for setting fire to the ropeworks in Portsmouth, Jack's body remained in a gibbet for many years and the squeaking of the rusted chains can be heard today.

Whistler

Location: Gosport - Fort Brockhurst
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The phantom whistling and occasional footsteps are thought to belong to a sergeant major that still patrols the grounds of this fortified building.


A French officer, only one of several entities to haunt this site.

Attempted Murder

Location: Gosport - Forton Barracks (no longer operational)
Type: Other
Date / Time: January 1899 (shooting)
Further Comments: After a 'ghost scare' at this barracks, a marine was found guilty of unlawfully shooting another man. The marine claimed to have been 'unnerved' by the ghost stories and accidently opened fire at his relief. The 'ghost' incident which preceded the shooting had been reported by another guard who had watched a dog leap over a wall. When the guard tried to follow the dog, he discovered that the dog's footprints turned into human prints which led into a creek. The site had been a PoW camp for Napoleonic troops, and another ghost story said that a French officer's spirit remained earthbound.

Black Hooded Figure

Location: Gosport - Green Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 7 November 1999
Further Comments: A taxi driver had to sharply brake to avoid hitting this faceless entity, which slowly dissolved before his eyes.

Vanishing Musicians

Location: Gosport - HMS St Vincent
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: A local piece of folklore says that, in the early twentieth century, a bugler and a drummer were so bad they were both sent behind the barracks so they could practice out of earshot of other trainees. A fog descended and the musicians were heard screaming; when the fog lifted, no-one could be found, and only a smashed drum and broken bugle remained. A phantom drummer was said to occasionally appear in the area.

Woman with Dark Hair

Location: Gosport - Hotel (name withheld)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Circa 2003
Further Comments: A witness awoke in the middle of the night and spotted a woman with long dark hair sitting in a chair. After the witness rubbed their eyes for a few seconds, they then watched the woman walked out of the room through a closed door. The witness later discovered that staff reported hearing people in the room even when it was empty.

Young Woman

Location: Gosport - Hotel (name withheld)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: August 2010
Further Comments: A guest awoke in the middle of the night to see, standing over her sleeping husband, a young woman with brown hair. The guest covered her eyes out of fear. The following morning the guest mentioned the sighting to staff and was told other people had seen the girl.

Gentle Pete

Location: Gosport - Lane running past The Hermitage
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Late 1970s, around 22:00h
Further Comments: A woman walking her dog along this lane encountered a dark figure wearing Elizabethan clothing. The man tipped his hat at the woman before walking though the wall and a closed door. A few years later, the story of Gentle Pete featured in a magazine; a Dutchman who fled to England to escape persecution in the Elizabethan age.

Electrical Dead Zone

Location: Gosport - Percy Road
Type: Other
Date / Time: Summer 2006
Further Comments: Car immobilisers and electric starters on vehicles persistently failed to work for many residents along this street, with no one able to offer any explanation why.

Footsteps

Location: Gosport - Private residence (no longer standing, replaced with masonic hall), King Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Early twentieth century
Further Comments: Occupants would be awoken by heavy footsteps walking up and down the staircase and would occasionally feel a presence brush past. One Christmas, gifts were found crushed, as if someone in boots had repeatedly stamped on the presents.

White Lady

Location: Gosport - Royal Hospital Haslar
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2004, and 1998
Further Comments: A phantom white lady is said to haunt the building. In 2004, an employee sitting in an office spotted a head pass the window in the door. Knowing he was alone in that part of the hospital, the man tried to follow the person - all possible exits were locked, but no one could be found. Six years previous, two people working on reception heard an internal door squeak open and footsteps walk towards the front desk, although no one could be seen and a walkaround found no one.

Charlie Pearce

Location: Havant - Havant Forest, Gypsies' Clump
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Charlie died whilst drinking gin on horseback - he hit an overhanging branch while his mare galloped along a darkened path, crushing his windpipe and killing him almost instantly. Those wounds are immediately apparent on his phantom.

Alice

Location: Havant - Private residence, North Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1981
Further Comments: Alice froze to death while in front of her empty fireplace at the start of the twentieth century. Eighty years later, a hypnotherapist working on the site reported Alice's ghost walked the house and would make herself known to his patients by chilling them during their sessions.

Exorcism

Location: Havant - Private residence, Purbrook Way
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: January 1978
Further Comments: The events that drove a family to move from this property are not clear; the occupants were convinced the house was haunted and tried to have the site exorcised, although neighbours were a little more cynical.

Pooling Water

Location: Hawley - Old Malt House, Chapel Lane
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: A ghostly form here is blamed for the puddles of water that once formed on the staircase every night - no natural source of the liquid could be found.

Sailor

Location: Hayling Island - Church, Northney
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A phantom sailor is said to walk this area.

Man in a Fading Uniform

Location: Hayling Island - Disused railway station
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Mid 1960s onwards
Further Comments: Believed to have been a guard at the station, this figure has been seen several times since the station closed in the early sixties.

Roadkill

Location: Hayling Island - Exact location not known
Type: ABC
Date / Time: July 1988
Further Comments: A jungle cat was knocked over and killed along a road on the island, though sightings of other large cats continued for a while afterwards.


Folklore says sunken church bells still ring.

Submerged Bells

Location: Hayling Island - Off the south coast
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The sound of sunken church bells is said still to be heard coming from the sea.

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