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Ghostly Encounters

If you enjoy a chill down the spine, are sensitive to unseen spirits, or just love a good old ghost story, you'll find plenty to intrigue you all over the Heart of Kent.

Around Ashford

Pluckley

Believed to be the most haunted village in England with sightings of at least 14 different ghosts, not to mention others which have been heard but not seen. The ghosts include the Red Lady, the White Lady, a monk and his unrequited love, a couple and a dog, a gypsy watercress seller, a highwayman, a cavalier, a Tudor maid, a teacher, a prankster and even a coach and horses.

Elvey Farm, Pluckley
The place where Living TV's 'Most Haunted' presenters stayed when filming about the village, Elvey Farm is a highly rated 7-room B&B. The owners organise occasional events and weekends including a special Haunted Weekend - 31 October to 2 November 2008 - with village ghost tour, paranormal investigations and guest psychic.

Eastwell Manor Hotel, Boughton Lees, Ashford
A White Lady has been seen and strange noises have been heard. A housekeeper is said to have left for good after a frightening experience in one of the rooms.

Around Maidstone

Leeds Castle, near Maidstone
Beware if you see a large black dog wandering the castle - it's a phantom beast that is said to bring bad luck to visitors!

Nettlestead on the River Medway
On a small island, once a year each November, a linking bridge appears, from which a monk throws a bound and gagged woman into the water... nothing is known about this ghostly occurrence.

The Museum of Kent Life, Maidstone
Petts Farmhouse was dismantled from Burham village and rebuilt at the museum. After the rebuild, furniture was moved around in the night. Then a puppy got excited every time he entered the farmhouse, although his lively response suggests the ghost is friendly. It is said to be Rebecca Alexander, a farmer's wife who, in 1912, boarded a pony trap holding her newborn baby in her arms. The pony reared up, throwing mother and child to the ground - the baby was unharmed, but Rebecca died. Since then she haunts the farmhouse looking for her baby.

Bluebell Hill, Maidstone
A notorious stretch of road with less benevolent ghostly tales. There have been numerous reports of drivers hitting people who have vanished before emergency services reach the scene. Be careful when you drive along here in the dark...

Around Royal Tunbridge Wells

Ruins of Bayhall, Pembury, near Royal Tunbridge Wells
This ruin was once home to the great Kentish Culpeper family and also to the Duke of Buckingham. It is now haunted by an unfortunate lady by the name of Anne West.

Rusthall, near Royal Tunbridge Wells
During the Civil War, the western hamlet of Rusthall was occupied by the Cromwellian forces while the Royalists preferred Southborough as a temporary centre. It is this fact which may well account for an unusual incident which occurred in Hurst Wood, just north of Rusthall, in 1966.
One evening a man walking home along the narrow, now overgrown path from Broomhill Road heard the sound of horses' hooves and on turning round was astonished to see the headless figure of a rider bearing down on him. Up to that moment he had dismissed all tales of ghostly happenings as figments of imagination or the results of excessive drink. But, faced with a horseman wearing the apparel thought at the time to be of a medieval knight, his ideas vanished and he fled.

On examination of the description of the phantom later, one finds that the figure could well have been that of a cuirassier, a member of Cromwell's troops, wearing the normal three-quarter armour of laminated plates. As to the reason why the horseman was headless, the answer can only be conjectural. Perhaps the soldier had been killed in a skirmish with a group of Royalists or, as has been suggested, his head was knocked off by an overhanging branch as he sped through the forest.

Some years ago and only a few yards away from that haunted spot, on the Broomhill Road itself, a couple from Tonbridge visiting some friends on Christmas Eve saw the figure of a man standing in a hollow at the side of the road. They were travelling too fast to stop the car in time and drove so close to the silent spectre that they felt they must have hit it. Shocked and abashed by the experience, they searched the area for some time before being forced to accept that they had hurt and damaged nothing other than their own credulity. Derision from friends hearing of the incident turned to puzzlement when a Rusthall resident named Joe recalled that some 70 years earlier a large house and a cottage had existed at the exact bend in the road where the phantom had been. The buildings had lain empty and derelict for many years before being demolished because "potential buyers were scared away by the ghost of a man who haunted the place". Joe claimed that his mother knew the people who lived in the house and they frequently stated that the "cottage is haunted by a man in a grey suit". The figure seen by the couple was on the exact spot where the cottage had been.

The Pantiles, Royal Tunbridge Wells
Royal Tunbridge Wells has an abundance of apparitions from the spooks of the Pantiles to the ghostly children of Rusthall's Beacon Tea Garden, but there are more than 20 ghosts lurking around the Pantiles and on the Common. Local expert, Geoff Butler, leads occasional ghost walks which can be booked through his gemstone shop in The Pantiles.

Around Tonbridge

Ightham Mote, Ightham
The tower of Ightham Mote is said to be haunted, perhaps by the ghost of the woman whose skeleton was discovered behind a sealed panel by workmen undertaking renovations in 1872. Although the old belief that this haunting was something to do with the Gunpowder Plot can be discounted, it is said that an unearthly chill still hangs about the tower, and has proved resistant even to exorcism.

Old Soar Manor, Plaxtol
The manor is the remains of a medieval knight's hall with a 13th-century solar (family quarters). The manor (now owned by the National Trust) was once owned by the Culpepper family, which looms large in Kentish history and whose menfolk were rumoured to have founded their fortunes as the biggest landowners in Kent and Sussex by marrying all the available heiresses of the day. It is said that the house is haunted by the ghost of a young servant girl called Jenny. When Jenny was 17 in 1775 she was called in to help prepare food for a great Christmas feast. While she was busy in the dairy, the family priest, who had been getting himself into the Christmas spirit, took it upon himself to initiate a nativity of his own. When Jenny's personal advent made itself known as a result, she asked the parson what she should do about it and he told her she should marry her boyfriend - a solution that left poor Jenny so unreassured that she fainted, hit her head on the font and drowned in it. When she was found, it was assumed that she had committed suicide and was buried in unconsecrated ground, from which she returns from time to time to haunt the old house.

Diamond's Cottage, West Peckham
According to locals, the village is home of a ghostly highwayman, Jack Diamond. It was here, one Friday 13th that he burnt to death in the cottage that always bore his name. His ghost has been reputedly seen here on numerous occasions, but only on that supposedly unluckiest of days, Friday 13th.

Steeles Lane, Meopham
The ghost of a young Parisienne is said to visit Steeles Lane. In the aftermath of the defeat of the French Emperor Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, the British army was sent to occupy Paris. Its task was to keep order while the re-established regime of King Louis XVIII was installed. In the event, the French caused little trouble and the British army did not have much to do. One soldier was a private in the Buffs, Kent's premier regiment. With time on his hands, the young man dallied with a Mademoiselle Pinard, promising to marry her in due course. As a result, the pretty young girl surrendered to the soldier rather more of her virtue than was normal in those days. The regiment eventually left Paris and was sent home to Kent. Believing her lover's promises, Mlle Pinard scraped together enough money to buy a wedding dress and to pay for her fare to Kent. Arriving in Meopham at the soldier's home, the girl found herself cold-shouldered by the man who no longer had any need for her charms. Distraught and penniless, Mlle Pinard dressed herself in what was supposed to be her wedding dress and hanged herself in Steeles Lane. Her ghost lurks there still, standing quietly by the side of the road on the spot where she died.

Her sad death served as a warning. In the 19th century many mothers would point to the phantom and admonish their daughters to get their man up the aisle before surrendering to him.

Tonbridge Castle
Here's a tale of a ghost, seen only once, that isn't seen at the castle itself, but the castle led to her death. In 1892, an unpopular grocer who always wore a large hat, Elizabeth Lewis went looking for her collie dog which had wandered off. The dog was her only friend. Elizabeth asked everywhere about her dog, but no-one responded because they didn't like her. Eventually she heard her dog whimpering and found it had fallen down a deep hole in the castle which was undergoing repair at the time. Trying to rescue it, Elizabeth fell in herself. No-one heard her screams and eventually both she and her dog died. Two years later, a boat maker swore he had seen Elizabeth, in her large hat, and her dog walking home where they both sat happily under a tree...

Around Sevenoaks

Hever Castle, near Edenbridge
The ghost of Anne Boleyn is said to cross the bridge over the River Eden at the castle every Christmas Eve. She is also said to walk the castle on Boxing Day and her doleful love songs, sung in a minor key, can be heard from the room where Henry VIII wooed her.

Another ghost has made itself felt, in the north-west corner of the castle. Viscount Astor's housemaids were afraid of the corner and of using the spiral staircase. Others too have felt this fear and complained of a feeling of chill and unease when passing the end of the Long Gallery, as though something unpleasant had happened there.
In the Queens' Chamber visitors occasionally say, "There are too many people sewing in the room." The room is empty apart from portraits on the wall.

In Henry VIII's room children don't like the horrible looking man sitting on the chair... but adults don't see him.

In 2006 two members of staff saw what they thought was a housekeeper in the doorway along the corridor of the Tudor Village; one member of staff particularly liked the crossover 1940s style dress. They realised there were no housekeepers at work at that time and went to investigate, but no-one was there.

Timberden, near Shoreham
A horrifying ghost has been seen at Mr. Howard's house at Timberden near Shoreham. The owner awoke one night to see a lady in a black dress. There suddenly appeared the ghostly head of an old man, his face blood red. It gently rocked backwards and forwards until it reached the window. Another night he awoke to see a headless body dressed in a red coat with a ruff. This also drifted slowly to the window where it remained for several minutes. The ghost is that of a previous owner, a 17th -century clown who went mad and hanged himself from the window with piano wire - hence the ghost's severed head. The 'black lady' who appears with him is believed to be his mourning widow.

Knole, Sevenoaks
The famous ghost of the Duchess of Cumberland, Lady Anne Clifford, the unfortunate wife of Richard Sackville, is said to walk the dark avenue of chestnut and oak trees to the north of Knole Gate House. The area she walks was named Duchess Walk after her ghost was seen there several times, always on windy moonless nights. Lady Anne married the 'black sheep' of the family, the third Earl, who plunged into the splendour and vanity of court life and subsequently bankrupted himself.

The ghost of a 'Black Knight' is said to roam the older quarters at Knole whenever a misfortune is about to befall Knole. The Knight may also be seen riding silently on horseback among the leafy shadows.

Combe Bank, Sundridge
Combe Bank School is situated within 350 acres of parkland. It was here that Lady Ferres petitioned her husband for divorce and the steward of the estate was asked to give evidence in the petition. The Countess was seen to be distraught, however when her husband, the Earl of Ferres, was subsequently arrested for the murder of the steward. He was hanged at Tyburn. Before he died, however, he cursed his wife and wished that she should experience a death more painful than his own. She subsequently married Lord Frederick Campbell and eventually died a very torturous death being burned in a fire in the tower of Combe Bank. All that was found of her in the ruins was the bone of one thumb which was buried at Combe Bank. The ghost of Lady Frederick Campbell is said to still haunt the ground of the estate.

Ramhurst, Leigh
Ramhurst, previously a manor and later a farm, was long reported to boast a headless woman dressed in a grey robe who walked about the estate. The property was owned by the influential Culpepper family. In 1857 it passed into the hands of a retired Indian Army officer. He and his wife were repeatedly disturbed by mysterious voices, phantom footsteps, the sound of rustling silk and other sounds of someone being present, but there was never any explanation for the strange noises. Once the brother of the mistress of the house and the cook both heard the mysterious voices at the same time. Thinking it must be his sister calling for help, although it was the middle of the night, the startled man hurriedly grabbed a gun and rushed upstairs, only to find his sister sleeping peacefully. At the bedroom door he met the cook who had also heard voices and had come to see whether she could help her mistress... there was no one else in the house at the time.

The Chequers, Kemsing
The ghost of an English Civil War Cavalier named William is said to haunt the Chequers in Watery Lane, Kemsing. He was hung from a beam in the barn, now part of the pub, after overhearing two Roundhead Officers discussing battle plans.

Biggin Hill
A ghostly airman in full WW2 flying gear has been seen at the crossroads by the Spinning Wheel restaurant in Biggin Hill, trying to thumb a lift back to the Battle of Britain airfield. Local folklore says he crashed his plane over the ridge at Tatsfield and sometimes, early in the mornings, the sound of his Merlin engine can be heard, even though the sky is clear.

The Bottle House, Smarts Hill, Penshurst
www.thebottlehouseinnpenshurst.co.uk
At one time parts of the Bottle House were a shop, a farrier's and a shoemender's, and to the rear of the pub was originally a skittle alley which, in November 1865, was given to the church. A small chapel was built and to this day there are two graves in the grounds. A ghost, a lady supposedly called Elisabeth, often makes her presence felt rather than seen.