Category: Britain
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Walt Disney’s Ancestral Knights at Kingerby
The finest treasures are often found in the most unexpected places.
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The Legend of the Chained Oak
An enormous and infamous oak tree in Staffordshire has been bound in huge chains for over a century.
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She’s got the Eye (and teeth) of the Tiger: Hannah Twynnoy’s Grave
Hannah Twynnoy is best known for being the first person to be killed by a tiger in Britain.
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The Weird World of Mummy Parties
In the 19th century, ‘Mummy Mania’ spread through the western world like a colonial Tamagotchi.
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Flayed Saints, Weeping Graves and Robin Hood at St Bartholomew the Great, London
St Bartholomew was founded in 1123 by Rahere (just the one name, like Beyonce…), a courtier of King Henry I.
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Whitby’s Hidden Horse Steps
Tucked away in Whitby’s residential streets are small sets of steps that go to nowhere.
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A Trip to Bunhill Fields Burial Ground
Bunhill Fields is a relic of London’s overcrowded inner-city burial grounds.
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The Whitby Wishing Chair
On the Western outskirts of Whitby, sits an inconsequential little stone seat.
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The Petrol Station Pet Cemetery
Probably the last place one would expect to find a pretty little pet cemetery is a garage forecourt, but such a site existed in Kent…
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Tea With a Martyr at St Crux
There are few things in life I love more than a good church, a good grave, a cuppa and a slice of cake.
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Henry Trigg and the Coffin in the Rafters
Henry Trigg was an eccentric man. A wealthy and successful man. A real character. And undoubtedly, a pain in the rear to his family. At…
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Grand Tombs at St Peter’s Church, Chillingham
In the shadows of Chillingham Castle sits a tiny, unassuming church, framed by woodland and centuries-old headstones.
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The Roadside Grave of Betsy Smith, Kenilworth
The dead are everywhere. You can’t avoid them. Under city buildings and railway lines, gardens and churches. As centuries pass, memorials are removed, with the…
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A Trip to St Peter’s at Raithby cum Maltby
Raithby cum Maltby is a tiny civil parish in East Lindsey’s Lincolnshire Wolds, just south of the market town of Louth.
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A Day at All Saints, Holton-cum-Beckering
Holton cum Beckering is a tiny village 6 miles south of Market Rasen with a population of 140 at the 2001 census.
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John Higgs, Pig Killer
“Here lies John Higgs A famous man for killing pigs…”
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Peter the Wild Boy
In 1725, a group of hunters were making their way through Hertswold Forest in Hanover, Germany. Fighting through the dense woodland, the party came upon…
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The Last Witch of Scotland
What may seem to be a simple piece of masonry is in fact the memorial to the most brutal and hysterical of executions.
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Two Tone: Funeral for a Fish
He was known as a “marriage wrecker”. People would dedicate every spare moment of their lives trying to catch his eye. He was huge, powerful,…
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The Hellfire Caves: Sex, Drugs and Darkness
The Hellfire Caves of Buckinghamshire are a familiar haunt for many modern ghost hunters and have a sinister history to match.
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Treasures of St Mary’s Church, Barton
I must sound like a broken record, but I truly believe that every church has a fascinating history, or a weird little artefact hidden inside,…
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Hunting for Mary Wollstonecraft’s Grave
Today the Wollstonecraft/Godwin grave survives as an unassuming block of stone beside far grander memorials…
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The Hardy Tree
The Hardy Tree is a centuries-old ash tree surrounded by a radiating circle of densely-packed headstones. But why was it created?
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The Hangman’s Locket
As much as the Victorians revelled in beauty and sentimentality, they really were a bunch of morbid sods at heart.
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The Ghost Clown of Flaybrick Cemetery
‘There’s a clown in my graveyard, what am-ah-gonna-do?’ the people of Birkenhead once yelled in the early 1990s. Or at least they would have done…
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The Ghost Dog of Tingewick
Spectral spaniel or fake Fido? You decide…
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London’s Secret Victorian Pet Cemetery
Hyde Park’s hidden pet cemetery’s once described as ‘the most horrible spectacle in Britain.’
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Ghosts on Film: Hampton Court Palace
See them walking hand in hand across the bridge at midnight…
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90s Pop Necromancy: S Club 7 and the Occult
S Club 7 have always been brazen occultists, hidden in plain sight…
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Whitby’s Hidden Quaker Burial Ground
Whitby’s Quaker burial ground is impressively well hidden. To most passers-by, it looks like a garden extension to some of the more grander Georgian houses…
Burials & Beyond 