Lost souls
Unexplained physical encounters are often the most unsettling for those who experience them, as they challenge the senses and all rationality.
Many Trail readers have been spooked by apparitions in the hills, it seems…
“About 18 years ago, a friend and I went for a walk out in the Peak District,” says Paul Lewis. “It was a midweek walk, and the weather was lousy (mist and rain), so there was no-one else around. After a drink and a snack at the Chequers Inn, we walked up through the trees to Froggatt Edge. As we came out onto the path below Froggatt Pinnacle, we saw a climber standing looking up at the Pinnacle. He was wearing an orange fibreglass helmet, a Whillans sit harness and EB climbing boots; in other words, straight from the 1970s. I said to him, “Rough weather for climbing!” – at which point he turned and stared at us without saying a word. Although he looked pale, he didn’t look ghostly; but my friend and I both suddenly felt a cold shiver. The man then turned and walked around the side of the Pinnacle, away from us. We looked at each other, and decided to follow him; but when we got around the side, he was nowhere to be seen. There was nowhere he could have gone in the time it took us to walk around to where he went...!”
Bleaklow too, also in the Peak District, has converted many a sceptic’s mind when it comes to the supernatural. This desolate moor has a dark history, with Roman soldiers disappearing and planes crashing.
Trail reader Paul Bridge says: “I was coming back down from the B-29 Superfortress plane wreck on Gathering Hill, Bleaklow, on an early morning run. I saw a man stood in the peat just off the track wearing a long overcoat and hat. I shouted ‘Good morning!’, with no response. As I got closer to the figure, I looked at him, but his face was not there – it was just blank space, with no facial features. I got a record time back to my car that day!
“I know of a few other sightings over the years, the most famous being the mountain leader who was taking a group to the same crash site. It was misty and raining, when something caught his eye in the wet soil by the wreckage. When he bent down to pick it up, the rest of the party all fled in panic. The object in the mud was a golden ring, inscribed with the initials LPT. When he caught up with the rest of the party, they told him that a ghostly figure wearing a trench coat had appeared right behind him.
“Having researched the history of Bleaklow after my own experience, I believe the figure I saw was a Captain Langdon P Tanner, the pilot of the crashed Superfortress. It has made me want to experience more of Bleaklow; I always felt a brooding presence there, which intrigues me.”
Lisa Bartholomew also recalls: “We were walking over Bleaklow when we saw a man behind us dressed like a Quaker. We lost sight of him, but as we carried along the path to the edge, he suddenly appeared in front of us. He sat there, silent, just looking out into the distance. We passed him on the edge, but then coming down into Crowden we again could see him, but this time in front of us in the distance... weird.”