Kings & screams
QUEEN VICTORIA: In 1936 King Edward VIII attempted to have some spruce trees moved at Windsor Castle that had been planted by Queen Victoria and her husband Prince Albert. But the alterations were never carried out as workmen claimed to have seen Victoria’s ghost waving her arms and moaning.
GEORGE III: After coming to the throne in 1760 the king, played by Nigel Hawthorne in The Madness Of King George, suffered a serious mental illness. His ghost has been seen peering from the window of the room at Windsor where he was detained for his own safety.
HENRY VIII: Some apparitions of the Tudor king have been seen on the battlements of Windsor before passing through a wall. Witnesses have also described him “pacing furiously and shout- ing loudly” in the corridors.
ANNE BOLEYN: Henry’s second wife was beheaded at the Tower of London in 1536. Her headless body has since been seen floating around the grounds and also glimpsed at her alleged birthplace, Blickling Hall, Norfolk. She’s said to arrive holding her own head in a carriage pulled by headless horses.
JANE SEYMOUR: Henry’s third wife, who died after giving birth in 1537 aged 29, is reckoned to haunt Hampton Court Palace. A pale figure is seen on Silverstick Stairs, which leads to the room where Jane’s son Edward was born, on the anniversary of the prince’s birthday.
CATHERINE HOWARD: Henry’s fifth wife was beheaded in 1542. Her ghost is said to run down the hallway of Hampton Court screaming, repeating the moment she was arrested for adultery.
PRINCES IN THE TOWER: Richard III had the deposed 12-year-old Edward V and his nine-year-old brother Richard, Duke of York, thrown in the Tower of London – where it’s believed he had them murdered in 1483. The ghosts of two boys wearing nightgowns and holding hands have been spotted in its Bloody Tower.
EDWARD II: Murdered in 1327 at Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire – supposedly with a red-hot poker up his bottom – the king’s screams are still heard echoing around its walls. The ghost of his wife, Queen Isabella, who deposed him, may have been photographed with her pet wolf at Castle Rising in Norfolk.
MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS: Stirling Castle, where she was crowned, is reputedly haunted by a “pink lady” believed to be Mary while her ghost has also been seen at the Talbot Hotel in Oundle, Northants, built with stone taken from nearby Fotheringhay Castle where Mary was executed in 1587.
KING ARTHUR: There have been sightings of ghostly armoured cavalry at Cadbury Castle, Somerset – a hill associated with Camelot. It’s believed the legendary king leads his knights down its slopes every midsummer.
Marilyn spooked me: Pages 20-21