With a history dating back to the twelfth century, its walls could tell tales of many a bloody deed committed on its fortified premises. In 1298, Edward I (the 'Hammer of the Scots' was based here, as he prepared do battle with William Wallace ('Braveheart') who, far from being that nice Mel Gibson with the blue face, was in fact a mass murderer, burning the local women and children to death. Since then, it has been the site of many a battle, and numerous unfortunate souls were tortured and murdered here in cruel and imaginative ways I will not go into here!
The castle has been owned by members of the Grey family since 1246 and the present owner - Sir Humphry Wakefield Bt.- has been renovating it for over thirty years. It is a curious place, much of it still derelict, and the atmosphere is one of quiet expectancy. But what of the ghosts?
Poor Lady Mary Grey was deserted by her faithless husband, Ford, Lord Grey of Wark and Chillingham, during the reign of Charles II (17th century). She can still be heard wandering the corridors in an endless search for him. Her dress rustles as she passes.
The radiant Blue Boy was frequently reported in one of the bedrooms. At the stroke of midnight, the agonising cries and moans of a child in pain were heard and, as these died down, a bright halo of light would form close to the old four-poster bed. If anyone was sleeping there at the time, they would see a young boy, dressed in blue, surrounded by the light, approaching them. Curiously, in the wall of that room were found the bones of a young boy, along with some fragments of a dress. A blue dress.
Lady
Leonora Tankerville, who documented the castle's ghosts in 1925, recalled
having strange experiences of her own, including a manifestation of a nun
praying on the battlements, accompanied, a few paces behind, by two young men
dressed in clothes from the time of King Henry VIII. She also experienced a
visitation by the ghost of a young officer who, so far as she knew, was
actually alive at that time. Only later did she discover that he had died at
the very time she had seen him appear in her room. Lady Leonora was also
responsible for the discovery of the skeletons of a man and a boy who had been
walled up in her bedroom. Indeed, there seems to have been a fair amount of
walling up of people in this castle!
If you
are brave enough, you can actually stay at the castle, and many who have done so
have reported strange events. Some have even left before morning, too scared to
sleep!
But if
you do stay, think twice before taking the complimentary shower gel or shower
cap home. In one of the rooms, letters and returned items are displayed
(including a door knob removed 'by accident'). Reading these letters, you will
see that the guests returned the items because no good came to them while they
possessed them. Above the display is a portrait of a woman, reputedly a witch,
who is said to take a pretty dim view of such thieves. She has a tendency to
haunt them... and not in a friendly way.
Take it from me, once you visit Chillingham Castle, you will never frget it. There's something in the atmosphere...
There's more than a hint of something in the atmosphere at Chanterlands too, as you will see:
“You don’t belong here. None of you do. None but us...”
1940. Fourteen-year-old Pamela Courtney is evacuated to Chanterlands where she will live with her two spinster aunts: Jilly, the eccentric one, who dreams of her days as a star of the silver screen, and Bunny, ever practical and down-to-earth.
But Chanterlands is home to more than just the living and some of them do not rest in peace. There’s the long-dead lonely boy whose room she sleeps in - and that’s only the start.
Pamela discovers the long-neglected attic and, as she sorts through the assorted detritus accumulated over generations of her forebears, more ghosts stir, and an ancient feud reveals just one of the sinister secrets of this once-great house.
But, in the grounds, there is much more danger awaiting Pamela during that summer long ago when war waged all over Europe and the safety her mother had wished for her took a dark and fatal turn.
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