The Paranormal Database

Shadow

Location: Outer London: Havering (Greater London) - Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Twenty-first century
Further Comments: One manager claimed to have witnessed the shadow of someone move past a light when alone in the staff room, while another heard a piano coming from the empty stage.

Children Playing

Location: Outer London: Havering (Greater London) - Site of RAF Hornchurch (no longer operational)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s
Further Comments: One witness reported hearing schoolchildren playing on the site, although it was late at night, and seeing pilots walking around the area.

Young Woman

Location: Outer London: Hillingdon (Greater London) - Private house off Church Hill, Harefield
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Winter 2006
Further Comments: A witness spotted a faint, translucent young woman, between 20-24 years old, standing by the front of a bed. The blonde haired ghost appeared to be wearing a pleated lilac skirt and a pink tank top, and held a pink handbag and a lipstick. The woman turned and looked at the witness before disappearing.

A photograph of a raven.

Raven

Location: Outer London: Hillingdon (Greater London) - West Drayton church
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1883 (another version says circa 1749)
Further Comments: For many years, this large black bird haunted the church and its grounds - it would tap and peck at coffins, sit on the pews, and generally create a nuisance.

An old woodcut of a skeleton carrying a fiddle, grabbing a woman.

Seeking Skeleton

Location: Outer London: Redbridge (Greater London) - St Mary's Church and graveyard, Overton Drive
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This skeletal ghost has been seen pushing a cart designed for corpses, looking for the body of his dead wife that was stolen by grave robbers. The grey female form seen around the graveyard is a poor widow who lost her husband only hours after they were married - she still searches for him today.

Alexander Pope (detail), by Godfrey Kneller.

Alexander Pope

Location: Outer London: Richmond upon Thames (Greater London) - St Mary's Church, Twickenham
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1830 onwards
Further Comments: The ghost of Pope returned to earth once his skull was stolen from his grave in 1830 - his form has been observed limping around the churchyard, chatting and mumbling to himself.

Sir Walter Raleigh

Location: Outer London: Sutton (Greater London) - St Mary the Virgin churchyard, Wallington
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Raleigh's headless body was returned to his wife's family in Beddington; his ghost said to walk along a path in the churchyard.

Dropped by Old Nick

Location: Over (Cheshire) - Church
Type: Legend - Old Nick
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The church once stood in the middle of the village, but the Devil tried to run off with it. He dropped the building where it currently stands when he heard the ringing of the bells at a nearby abbey.

Hunchback

Location: Oxenden Magma (Leicestershire) - St Helen's Church
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A ghostly person with a hunch back has been reported around the church area.

An old postcard showing Christ Church College in Oxford.

Charles I

Location: Oxford (Oxfordshire) - Christ Church College
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The former king has been observed around the college grounds both with and without his head. A shade belonging to a former royalist commander also lurks here - he was shot for treason on the site.

Grey Lady

Location: Oxford (Oxfordshire) - St Giles' Churchyard
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This unnamed woman willed her money to charity, but her greedy family accessed her wealth first and hid it away.

White Horse Upright

Location: Oxwich (West Glamorgan) - Churchyard
Type: Other
Date / Time: Early nineteenth century
Further Comments: This ghostly creature walks around on hind legs, ending the jaunt as it vanishes down an ancient well.

Animated Statues

Location: Padstow (Cornwall) - Church
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Stone statues of a lion, unicorn, and knight became animated and chased a young girl after she chanted the rhyme, 'Reefy, reefy rum, without teeth or tongue; if you'll have me, now I am a-come'.

Ninety Nine Yews

Location: Painswick (Gloucestershire) - Churchyard
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Still present
Further Comments: Ninety nine yew trees stand in this churchyard. It is said that it is impossible to grow another yew tree in the churchyard, as the devil always comes and removes it. . .

Banging

Location: Pakenham (Suffolk) - St Mary's Church
Type: Other
Date / Time: 12 September 2025
Further Comments: After walking around the churchyard recording with an old Dictaphone, a witness reported hearing voices and banging when playing back the tape.

Haunted Margaret

Location: Panteg (Gwent) - Church (plus a footbridge and other locations in the area)
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Marget yr Yspryd gained her nickname 'Haunted Margaret' after being jilted at the altar - she fell to her knees in the church and prayed that the man who betrayed her would never find rest. The man died shortly after, and his ghost took to following Margaret. One of Margaret's friends suggested talking to the ghost and forgiving him. Soon after, Margaret met the ghost at a footbridge - she absolved him, and the ghost disappeared forever.

Alan A' Dale's Marriage

Location: Papplewick (Nottinghamshire) - St James' Church
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Alan A' Dale, one of Hood's loyal men, is said to have been married in this church.

Bobby Bannister the Bastard Landlord

Location: Passenham (Northamptonshire) - Churchyard, & Millstream
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Being dragged by a ghostly horse, this tragic figure bounces around the roads, his neck broken whilst hunting. One report says that the ghost was laid by a team of holy men who banished it to the bottom of the millstream. Screaming sometimes comes from the millstream, the sounds belonging to a girl who fell and was crushed by the wheel.

A wild man of the woods.

Woodwose

Location: Peasenhall (Suffolk) - Peasenhall church
Type: Other
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: While the woodwose, or wild hairy man, carved into the church porch has not been seen for centuries, the creatures were once said to be 'plentiful' in the region.

Anne West

Location: Pembury (Kent) - Great Bayhall Manor house, and churchyard (no longer standing)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1803
Further Comments: Anne feared being buried alive, so she requested a bell be placed in her crypt when her time came. When she was buried, the bell rang for several nights, and her corpse was seen walking down the road towards her former home. She continued to haunt the area for many years afterwards.

Corpse Candles

Location: Penistone (South Yorkshire) - St John's Church
Type: Crisis Manifestation
Date / Time: July 1793
Further Comments: A local curate watched two lights dance around a particular grave in the village, before disappearing. The following day, the grave was opened to allow the burial of a young boy who had died at the time the glowing balls had been seen.

Woman in White

Location: Penn (Buckinghamshire) - Church
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1980s
Further Comments: A female phantom is said to have left the church via the east gate and walked down the hill. Author Eddie Brazil speculated that the phantom was Ruth Ellis, the last woman to have been executed in England.

Giant's Grave

Location: Penrith (Cumbria) - St Andrew's Church
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Still present
Further Comments: Large stones mark the place where a giant is buried - he is thought to be Sir Ewen (or Sir Ewain), a great boar hunter.

Captain Martin

Location: Penryn (Cornwall) - Church of St Gluvias
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Drowned at sea, the former bell ringer of St Gluvias who became a captain returned from his watery grave and now silently stands in the church. On occasion, he has been heard ringing the bells in the early hours of the morning.

A fairy funeral, from James Bowker's Goblin Tales of Lancashire.

Fairy Funerals

Location: Penwortham (Lancashire) - Church Avenue
Type: Fairy
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Fairy funeral processions were said to once have occurred here, always by the soft light of the moon. It is reportedly unlucky for mortals to gaze upon them.