The Paranormal Database

Wild Edric.

Wild Edric

Location: No fixed abode (Shropshire) - Lead Mines
Type: Fairy
Date / Time: 1800s
Further Comments: A county hero, Wild Edric is said to emerge from the lead mines where he lives and charge off towards England's enemies when required. Once flesh and blood, it is thought his fairy wife may have had a hand in making him and his troops immortal.

Miner

Location: Pontypool (Gwent) - Baldwin's Clog & Legging Mine
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: December 1904
Further Comments: Miners refused to work alone after a ghostly figure with a naked light in its forehead was observed tapping the roof and sides of a tunnel. One newspaper claimed the figure could only be seen from one direction.

White Woman

Location: Risca (Gwent) - Miner's graves near campsite in nearby forest
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2000s?
Further Comments: This area is home to a phantom woman in white and a strange shadowy figure, speculated by some to be a former miner.

Mauled Miner

Location: Rotherham (Yorkshire) - Silverwood Colliery
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Mid to late twentieth century
Further Comments: This phantom miner was seen wearing old overalls carrying a lamp - his most distinct feature was the black space that filled the place where his facial features should have been.

Wilfred Hales

Location: Shirebrook (Derbyshire) - Shirebrook Colliery
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1958
Further Comments: Two separate miners reported seeing the glowing form of Wilfred Hales, a worker at the colliery who had died three years previous.

Man Shaped

Location: Shirland (Derbyshire) - Mine (closed 1965)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Late October or Early November, 1867
Further Comments: Two miners fled the pit after one of them claimed to have seen a man-shaped ghost. Word spread through the camp and almost 200 men refused to work that day.

Dorcas

Location: St Agnes (Cornwall) - Old mine, Polbreen
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This woman who committed suicide near the mine was often seen drifting around the site, and once saved the life of a miner by calling his name, preventing him from being buried by a rock fall.

Old Man

Location: Stoney Middleton (Derbyshire) - Sallet Hole Mine
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Wayne Anthony, in Haunted Derbyshire and the Peak District, writes that an elderly gentleman in flat cap and long coat takes his dog for a walk around the mine. The apparitions quickly vanish when seen.

Dead Miners

Location: Swansea (West Glamorgan) - Morfa Colliery
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1890
Further Comments: As if attempting to warn against the incoming disaster that killed 87, the days leading up to the event bore witness to screams and cries coming from the mining tunnels, and visual reports of miners who had previously lost their lives.

Cap Lamp

Location: Teversal (Nottinghamshire) - Silverhill colliery
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: An Inspector travelling underground alone spotted a cap lamp in the distance which remained always just ahead of him. Later, while sawing planks for the gate end team, the man said his job suddenly became easier when it felt like someone was helping him saw by pulling and pushing the other end of his equipment. Startled, he let go of the handle only to see the saw complete another two strokes by itself.

Grime's Graves, Thetford.

The Devil's Holes

Location: Thetford (Norfolk) - Grime's Graves, prehistoric flint mine
Type: Legend - Old Nick
Date / Time: Still present
Further Comments: The name 'Grime's Graves' is thought to have come about in the sixteenth century, Grime being a corruption of Grim, a pagan god that Christians associated with the devil.

Spirits

Location: Towednack (Cornwall) - Old mine known as Wheal Sperris
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The mine had a reputation of being home to spirits, but the finer points of the haunting are not known.

Screaming

Location: Weardale (Durham) - The North of England Lead Mining Museum - formally the killhope lead mine
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2003
Further Comments: Three ghost hunters wanting to raise money for charity tried to spend the night here, only to be scared off by screaming of a ghostly woman from a nearby wood.

Tapping

Location: Wharfedale (Yorkshire) - Greenhow Lead Mines
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The sounds of mining could often be heard here, even when no miners were down the shafts.

Two Miners

Location: Whitehaven (Cumbria) - Unnamed old mine
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A supervisor due to be fired took his replacement deep into the mine where they were both overcome by poisonous gases. Their arguing voices could be heard for many years afterwards.

Glowing Light

Location: Ysbyty Ystwyth (Dyfed) - Llwyn Malees mine
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 14/15 (or 7/8) July 1884
Further Comments: A glowing light which appeared to flit around an office was witnessed by several people after dark. The following night, the light returned even brighter, and this time a woman and two men could be seen moving around the building. Nothing occurred on the third night. It was debated whether the 'ghosts' were paranormal entities or three people playing a joke.