The Paranormal Database

Running Boy

Location: A37? - Heading towards Glastonbury
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Summer 2001 (?)
Further Comments: While driving fast along a straight stretch of road, a driver, his wife and child spotted a young boy holding a goldfish bowl running up an embankment at superhuman speed and into the road. The driver hit the brakes as the boy passed in front of the car, thinking it was too late to avoid collision, but there was nothing. The boy had gone.

Illustration of the Old Leigh Courthouse ghost from the book The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century.

Suicide

Location: Abbots Leigh - Old Leigh Courthouse (no longer standing)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Eighteenth century
Further Comments: The courthouse was supposed to be haunted by a woman who cut her own throat. The bangs and crashes which her spirit created were so alarming that parts of the building were locked up at night. The courthouse was later demolished. The creative image of the ghost is from 'The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century' (1825).

A dragon being slain.

Dragon Slayer

Location: Aller, Curry Rivel - Exact area unknown
Type: Dragon
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The village is named after a local hero who slew a dragon but died as the beast released a final breath of flame. In another version of the tale, the hero survives and finds a brood of hatchlings in the dragon's cave, which is subsequently blocked up.

Elizabeth Maronne

Location: Almondsbury - Bowl Inn and other areas in the village
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s?
Further Comments: Elizabeth was said to have been abused by her father and died young. Her phantom voice has been heard singing nursery rhymes or otherwise sobbing gently. The inn also claims two other female ghosts, though little is known about them.

Cobbler

Location: Axbridge - General area
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown, but said to walk at 05:00h (reoccurring)
Further Comments: A cobber who died in the late nineteenth century was said to take a daily walk through the town every morning.

Redcoat

Location: Axbridge - George House
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This property was once thought to be haunted by the ghost of a soldier in a redcoat carrying a musket. A neighbouring shop reported hearing pacing footsteps, as if someone were guarding the site.

Tabby Cat

Location: Axbridge - King John's Hunting Lodge
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s
Further Comments: This feline apparition has been observed padding around on the first floor, vanishing when it sits down. A white Elizabethan lady is also reported to haunt the same floor, seen sitting in a chair.

Trio

Location: Axbridge - Shute Shelve Hill, Hanging Field
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The three ghosts lurking here, two men and a woman, were all hanged for murdering the lady's husband.

Gowned Figure

Location: Axbridge - Unnamed private residences, High Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A ghostly figure in a nightgown reportedly passed through a group of visitors, while at another nearby property, two female phantoms possessed an aura of happiness.

Sight and Sound

Location: Backwell - New Inn (no longer open)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Pre-2015
Further Comments: Patrons at this inn would report seeing apparitions, hearing noises and footsteps, and having objects moved around rooms by unseen hands.

Cloaked Figures

Location: Banwell - Abbey
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1960s onwards
Further Comments: One witness recalled, as a child, a figure who led him across his bedroom at night and helped him throw up (he was suffering from an illness at the time). There are also reports of phantom footfalls in the hallways and of cloaked figures being seen moving about the abbey.

Beast of Banwell

Location: Banwell - Banwell Hill
Type: ABC
Date / Time: September 2007
Further Comments: While walking her dog, Helen Stokes encountered a large black creature that she described as 'very fast'. Both owner and pet ran away from the creature.

Blown Cross

Location: Banwell - Hillfort
Type: Legend - Old Nick
Date / Time: Still present?
Further Comments: It was believed that the villagers tried to erect a massive cross on the hill, though the Devil visited every night and blew it down. Exasperated, the villagers carved the cross into stone, preventing further destruction. It is now thought the cross was the base of a Roman hillfort.

Stubborn Bell

Location: Barlinch - Barlinch priory (now ruins)
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: When the priory bells were removed from the site, the Great Bell did not want to leave its location. Eventually the bell was dragged away (after a single unhappy peal) by man and ox to its new home in Exeter Cathedral, where it promptly cracked once mounted.

Blacksmith

Location: Batcombe - Burn Hill
Type: Legend
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: A giant blacksmith is said to appear if you call out his name while standing on this hill.

Chained Hound

Location: Batcombe - Gold Hill
Type: Shuck
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Buried in nearby woodland by an owner, this phantom hound is now reputed to roam the area, a large chain around its neck.

Royal Crescent, Bath.

Eloping Elizabeth

Location: Bath - Royal Crescent
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The phantom coach and horses reputed to haunt this area contain Elizabeth Linley and Richard Brinsley Sheridan as they elope time after time.

The Salamander pub, Bath.

Flying Glasses

Location: Bath - Salamander public house, John Street
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: 2000s
Further Comments: This noisy spirit is said to throw glasses around, create disembodied footfalls, and generate cold spots.

Old Fashioned Lady

Location: Bath - Second floor flat at Grosvenor Place
Type: Unknown Ghost Type
Date / Time: Twentieth century
Further Comments: Seen by a husband and wife couple, this monochromic figure silently drifted through their living room, terrifying the pet cat. More recently, she has been observed on the staircase.

Voices

Location: Bath - St Catherine's Court
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Late 1996
Further Comments: Radiohead stayed in this recording studio while producing OK Computer. Singer Thom Yorke would later state to the press that ghosts would talk to him while asleep.

Stone Lions at entrance to Royal Victoria Park, Bath.

Playing Ball

Location: Bath - Stone Lions at entrance to Royal Victoria Park
Type: Legend
Date / Time: When the clock strikes thirteen
Further Comments: Two lions stand on the gate posts here, each cat with a paw on a ball. Locals say when the clock strikes thirteen, the lions kick the balls at each other.

George

Location: Bath - The Raven public house
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: George is said to take a female form and haunt the cellar, close to a well which was once thought to be bottomless.

Theatre Royal, Bath.

Grey Lady

Location: Bath - Theatre Royal & Garrick's Head Hotel
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 25 December (butterfly) (reoccurring), Grey Lady last seen 1975
Further Comments: An actress killed herself in the hotel in the 1880s after discovering her husband had murdered her secret lover. The actress's last performance at the theatre occurred a few hours before her death, a role which required her to wear a grey feather dress - the same clothing her ghost still wears as it patrols the theatre and hotel. Her phantom may have last been seen in 1975. A dainty butterfly is also reported to haunt the theatre, manifesting briefly once a year on Christmas Day.

Old Servant

Location: Bath - York Villa
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: This faithful servant now refuses to leave the house, suffering guilt for allowing two children to starve to death. One of the children is said to still be around, as is his mother who manifests as a Grey Lady.

Henrietta Street, Bath.

Robinson

Location: Bath - 20 Henrietta Street
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The disembodied footsteps occasionally heard on site are attributed to Admiral Robinson.