West Yorkshire

The Three Nuns Hotel is well within bow-shot of Kirklees Priory where Robin Hood is said to have died, and although it is unconnected with the outlaw, during the summer of 1985 it was the focus of a supernatural visitation when renovation uncovered a strange carving of a horned ram's head. Almost immediately strange things began to happen. Site manager Ian Thompson witnessed unusual phenomena when he was alone in the pub waiting for a colleague. He heard doors slamming and footsteps going down into the cellar. In an attempt to rationalise this experience he shouted down into the cellar, certain another workman must have been there, but received no reply. Shortly afterwards he heard footsteps ascending the steps and doors once again banged open and shut. Finally, he went to investigate: 'I went into the cellar. It's always cool down there, but on that occasion there was a strange sort of chill about the place.'

The crossroads where the A58 trunk road bisects the A641 near Brighouse has been known as Hell Fire Corner for many years. The name is often thought to be connected with the numerous serious road accidents which have occurred there, but it was actually known by that name before motor transport in the area was commonplace.

'Devil' names such as Hell Fire Corner often occur at locations which have a history of odd happenings and this spot is no exception, with its spectral headless horseman and tales of ghost cars appearing immediately prior to accidents.

Judy Woods, behind the crossroads, is also plagued by hauntings. Earth mysteries researcher Paul Bennett was confronted by some children in the woods in 1981, who told him of hideous white shapes floating between the trees. Later the same year, during a wave of UFO sightings, mysterious balls of light were seen flying over and rising from the woods together with strange craft entering and taking off from the trees. Towards the end of the spate of UFO sightings, a bus crashed at Hell Fire Corner and the driver later blamed the accident on a hovering UFO which momentarily distracted his concentration before the bus skidded out of control.

High Fernley Hall at Wyke has a long tradition of strange phenomena, which began during the eighteenth century when it was occupied by the Bevers brothers, both of whom were besotted by the same girl. After witnessing her marriage to his brother at Kirkheaton church on 5 May 1742, the rejected suitor rode to High Fernley and told the servants that some misfortune was going to befall him, but that he would 'come again' without his head. He then deliberately, but by means unrecorded, beheaded himself and true to his final words began to appear every night in the form of a headless horseman. His family left the hall in terror and it stood empty for many years, with few even daring to pass it at night, until that portion of the hall where the suicide took place was demolished, reducing the building to its present size.

The Brown Cow pub at Denholme was the scene of a very disturbing haunting in early 1990, when landlord Barry Ditmer and his family became the playthings of a powerful poltergeist-like ghost shortly after taking over the pub.

In a litany of ghostly happenings the Ditmers all experienced room temperatures dropping to freezing-point, smells of rotten eggs, tobacco smoke drifting through the rooms, and objects being moved by unseen hands in the beer cellar. Most frightening of all was when Barry Ditmer was thrown through the air by an invisible assailant. One attack was observed by barman Don Clancy who saw the landlord pinned to the floor as if being strangled. In a newspaper interview Don recalled how he attempted to help his employer: 'I tried to pull him up, but couldn't. His face was turning blue and he had indentation marks on his neck.'

Events became so bad that at one stage the entire family moved out and the brewery replaced them with a relief landlady. But she too was visited by the poltergeist and left in terror. The brewery took the haunting seriously enough to comment: 'Obviously the family is very upset by events and the brewery has tried contacting various institutes and universities for help, but to no avail.'