A Christmas Ghost Hunt

John Stoker shares a few ghost stories for Christmas

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You might be surprised to learn that there are more ghost sightings on Christmas Eve than there are at Halloween, so what better time for a ghost hunt? The festive season has always been favoured by literature ever since Charles Dickens penned A Christmas Carol back in 1843. The writer was buried, against his wishes, in Westminster Abbey. His chosen resting place would have been Rochester and that's where his ghost can be seen strolling between the tombstones on Christmas Eve. He makes another appearance just before midnight outside the Corn Exchange as he checks his watch.

Rupert Brooke was a writer who knew much about folklore and even left a reference to a seasonal event in his poem Grantchester: "And things are done you'd not believe At Madingley on Christmas Eve."

Brooke never explained this reference but it does in fact concern Madingley Hall in Cambridgeshire, which Sir John Hynde had begun building in 1543. His son, Francis, completed the construction with the use of wood and stone from St Ethelreda's Church in nearby Histon. He also stripped the roof of lead and sold it together with the bells. His mother, Lady Ursula, was so shocked by this desecration that her ghost appears on Christmas Eve wringing her hands as she walks from the hall to the church.

Many bells are rung on this night but not for as long as those at Dewsbury Minster in West Yorkshire. One of the bells, "Black Tom", is named after Sir Thomas de Soothill who had led a far from blameless life. In order to atone for his sins, he donated the bell, and it now has to be rung on Christmas Eve for the number of years since Christ's birth to protect parishioners from the devil. But the ringing must finish before midnight.