Get In The Exorcist! Ghost of Dead Roman Soldier Seen Near Brand New Hospital's Morgue!

Inside the shiny new hospital, a tormented soul stalks the wards and corridors.

Yet this is no ill patient, overworked junior doctor or beleaguered NHS trust executive. 
It is a ghost – or so says a leaked memo from a manager. 

Several workers at the £334million Royal Hospital in Derby have apparently been scared witless by the apparition, which they describe as a man dressed in black and wearing a cloak, who can walk through walls.

Such sightings are not unusual in Derby, which is known as the ghost capital of England, so the matter is being treated with a degree of gravitas.

The memo, written to colleagues by senior manager Debbie Butler, said: ‘I’m not sure how many of you are aware that some members of staff have reported seeing a ghost.

‘I’m taking it seriously as the last thing I want is staff feeling uneasy at work.’

She added: ‘I don’t want to scare anyone any more than necessary, but felt it was best I made you all aware of the situation and what we are doing about it.

‘I’ve spoken to the Trust’s chaplain and she is going to arrange for someone from the cathedral to exorcise the department.’

Yesterday, the talk among workers arriving for their afternoon shifts was that the spirit, if there is one, had emerged from the hospital's Level O - the mortuary.

One, a cleaner who asked not to be named, said: ‘My husband phoned me up as I was on my way in and told me not to go and not to be frightened. He’d just heard about it on the radio.

‘But it hasn’t put me off. In fact, I’d quite like to see a ghost. Perhaps it could help out when we’re understaffed.’

Some believe the visitor is the ghost of a Roman soldier. The site used to be occupied by Derby’s City General Hospital, which was controversially built over one of Ancient Britain’s main Roman roads.

Ian Wilce, co-founder of the Ghost-finder Paranormal Society, said: ‘Generally, spirits we see are those of people who have died suddenly or who frequent a place where they enjoyed being.

‘Wherever this one came from, it doesn’t sound like an evil spirit – if it was, it would be wreaking havoc and throwing things around.  

‘It sounds more like a spirit that has been laying dormant and been disturbed by the building development.’ 

Mr Wilce added: ‘Many sightings can traced back to logical explanations, such as shadows, or psychological factors – if people think there may be something there, they are more likely to imagine they have seen something.’

Benedictine monk Dom Anthony Sutch agreed that the spirit did not sound like a demon, and therefore exorcism was not necessary. The hospital’s PR department said there was ‘absolutely no truth’ in reports that an exorcism will be arranged.  

Derby won its title of most haunted in the Supernatural Britain Report by Lionel Fanthorpe, an expert on the paranormal.

Mr Fanthorpe found there had been 315 reported ghosts, poltergeists, werewolves and vampires in Derby throughout history.

Ghost-Hunting In Devon!

Ghost-hunting's not for wimps, as we find out on hair-raising tour of a haunted Devon manor house!

Kate Wallace's death wasn't peaceful. Legend has it she was shipwrecked off the coast of Ilfracombe, north Devon, when returning to the town in 1695. She was nursed, coincidentally, by her parents, but was so badly bruised that they did not recognise her. Three days later, she died, but only after her father, William – who, as a shipwrecker, had lured her ship to its doom in the first place – relieved the unknown woman of all her valuables. Upon realising who she was, the poor man was so overcome he entombed her body in a room in his house, Chambercombe Manor, where she stayed until 1865 when her dusty skeleton was discovered by some unsuspecting tenants.

So between her and Lady Jane Grey – another former visitor at Chambercombe who met a similarly grisly end – it's not surprising that ghost-hunters here get pelted with stones, pushed into corners by freezing blasts of air and are run out of the house by moaning voices.

"I don't believe in demons," says head ghost-hunter Jayne Hendy. "But I do believe in demonic spirits. They're like people, you just need to know how to handle them." She says this as I clutch two dousing rods, metal apparatus used to locate spirits and other paranormal activity. It is stage one of our paranormal training with Haunted Happenings, which throughout the evening will see us conducting lone ghost vigils in a scullery, having a séance in a spooky bedroom and taking a ghostly tour of the grounds. My rods and I don't communicate well. If there are any currents of unearthly radiation in Chambercombe, I'm the human equivalent of a nuclear bunker. It's not a situation I am keen to remedy. Despite the cheery gingham and bright lights of the Lady Jane's tearooms where we begin our night, there's little getting away from the fact that Chambercombe is creepy.

"Don't worry," says Jayne cheerfully as we skulk into the house behind her. "If you're scared, first look for a logical explanation for the sensations you're feeling, such as a massive spider climbing over your face. Something like that." After some consideration I decide that yes, this is a marginally preferable outcome to meeting a disgruntled member of the undead.

Jayne is a medium and a paranormal investigator with 25 years of spirit experience behind her. Together with Haunted Happenings founder Hazel Ford, who runs similar events up and down the country, she will be chaperoning us through the night. Some of the group are old hands, discussing recent sightings of spirits and whole tables shaking. But most of us are just curious first- or second-timers. One man wears an expression of bored disbelief and carries a very scientific-looking instrument which resembles a Geiger counter. I resolve to stay near him.

We begin our hunting in the main bedroom – a room dominated by an oppressive, intricately carved four-poster bed and a baby's cradle which has been known to rock by itself. Next door is where Kate Wallace's body was bricked up. I can't decide which part of the room scares me least, so I hover uncertainly by the end of the bed. Error. Jayne elects me to feel a certain part of the air near her which is icy cold. The whole room is icy cold. But this bit is definitely colder. According to Jayne, it is also five foot seven. I withdraw my hand and scuttle off to a corner, fearful of having groped Kate Wallace.

Sitting on the floor we begin the séance, and after 10 or so minutes there is a faint knock coming from outside the door. Jayne urges the assumed spirit to come in; I urge it to stay put. More minutes pass, during which time floorboards creak and other members of the group report feeling cold air blowing on their hands. Later on, I return in a smaller group with a spirit board (like a Ouija board) and we try to communicate with whoever was looming around the room earlier. The board spells out "Sofia" who says she is seven. I'm so interested in what Sofia is doing up at 2am talking with us that I forget to be freaked out by the fact that the planchette is moving apparently of its own accord. The guys at Haunted Happenings do this well: there is very little sensationalism in their actions, keen as they are to manage expectations.

Dissatisfied with Sofia, who bade us farewell pretty swiftly, confirming that child attention spans have not changed much over the centuries, we move to the Great Hall and sit quietly around a large, heavy wood table. A glass in the centre of the table begins to move. Whoever is guiding it seems keen to talk to one member of our group. Suddenly some pebbles come skittering across the floor. I jump out of my skin as we clatter around trying to find an explanation. No large spiders are apparent. But the house used to be inhabited by violent smugglers and shipwreckers – tunnels from the beach coming right into the room where I sit. I reckon they must have quite a good throwing arm.

By now it is 4am, and being on edge for eight hours is taking its toll. Yet clearly the spirits are not in the mood for talking or scaring the bejesus out of us tonight, which in many ways adds some authenticity to the proceedings. The part of me which wanted to believe is unsatisfied. The part of me which likes being able to sleep soundly at night most certainly is. And the cheery breakfast back in Lady Jane's tearooms does a lot to make me rationalise events. Pebbles? I muse while I scoff croissants: obviously it was just the wind. Yes, that makes sense. Doesn't it?

Our Haunted Nation

A new book reveals the most chilling ghosts and unexplained stories of paranormal activity from all corners of Britain!

The Tower of London

THE ROYAL SPECTRES

Considering how many people met a grisly end in the Tower of London it’s not surprising it is one of the most haunted places in the world. The ghost of Anne Boleyn, holding her head, has been seen in the White Tower and elsewhere screams thought to belong to Henry Viii’s other executed wife Catherine Howard can be heard.

But it is the ghost of 17-year-old Lady Jane grey, executed on the orders of Henry’s daughter Mary, that really spooks the Yeoman. One reported feeling as if he were being strangled by ghostly hands in the salts Tower where Lady Jane was imprisoned and dogs have an irrational fear of the place. But there are many other spooky goings on in our haunted nation...

GLASGOW ROYAL INFIRMARY

The imposing Victorian building that houses this old hospital certainly looks like the sort of place that could be riddled with the spirits of the dead.

At least three ghosts have been seen haunting its corridors. On ward 27 nurses have observed an  elderly man, known only as Archie, talking to some of the patients who are about to die, while a ghostly ward sister has been seen floating along the corridors at night, she appears normal but has no legs below the knee.

One of the stairwells is said to be haunted by surgeon sir William Macewen, who refused to conduct an operation on a young man who suffered terrible headaches, believing the procedure unnecessary. As the man was leaving he

fell to his death down four flights of stairs.

Sir William, who died shortly afterwards, is thought to be still suffering from the guilt of his decision.

GREAT BED OF WARE

One of the most intriguing objects in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London is the great Bed of Ware. Measuring 11ft long and 10ft 9in wide it was made by a carpenter from Ware in Hertfordshire called Jonas Fosbrooke.

He created it in 1463 for edward iV and specified that it should be used only for royalty. in 1483 the bed was sold to an innkeeper and since then all sorts of common people have slept in it. Many soon regretted the decision, however, and reported being pinched and scratched in the night. Jonas’s ghost, they believed, was punishing them for daring to sleep in a bed fit only for a king.

THE DISCOUNT STORE SPIRIT

While most apparitions haunt gothic mansions, ancient pubs and foreboding castles, one ghost prefers a Poundstretcher store in gloucester. in 2005 CCTV cameras recorded a ghostly figure knocking over a pile of boxes in the cellar.

The shop stands on the site of an old theatre, which was thought to have been haunted by eliza Johnson, an actress who hanged herself there after a doomed love affair.

“You can often feel her presence. sometimes you can feel an icy cold,” deputy manager sue Cooper said. “You can feel a gagging or a choking,  especially down in the cellar.”

HAIRY HANDS OF POSTBRIDGE

Being harassed by a pair of disembodied hairy hands might seem a little comical but those who claim to have encountered the severed hands didn’t find the experience amusing. during the last 100 years several cyclists and motorcyclists riding along the dartmoor stretch of the B3212 between Two Bridges and Postbridge in Devon claim to have been forced off the road after “muscular, hairy hands” suddenly clamped down on top of theirs own on the handlebars.

At least one motorcyclist has been killed in the area after inexplicably veering off the road.

In 1925 a woman staying in a caravan by the side of the road woke in the night to find a dismembered hand clawing at the window. The following day a car was found in a nearby ditch: its driver was dead at the wheel.

BABIES IN THE TOWERS

For hundreds of years people have reported hearing the sound of crying babies around the Reculver towers in Kent: twin towers that are almost all that remain of the Saxon church of St Mary’s near Herne Bay.

In the Sixties archaeologists excavating a Roman fort, which was built on the site before the church was erected, found a number of ancient babies’ skeletons. Nobody knows why so many infants were buried there but some feel that this may have been part of a sacrifice ritual.

THE YORKSHIRE WITCH

In medieval Britain paranoia about witches led to hundreds of women being executed with little more evidence than a forced confession. However one of Yorkshire’s most famous witches, known as Mother Shipton, was somehow spared the death sentence, despite seeming to possess some remarkable powers of prophecy.

Born in a cave by the river Nidd near Knaresborough in 1488 she issued predictions in the form of rhyming couplets, many of which later proved to be spookily accurate.

The following one even seems to have predicted the invention of motor cars and the internet: “Carriages without horses shall go.

And accidents fill the world with woe/Around the world thoughts shall fly/In the twinkling of an eye.”

HANGMAN'S INN

There is an old wooden beam below the stair- case of the Skirrid Mountain Inn pub in Abergavenny, South Wales, that still has the wear marks of its gruesome past.

In 1685 more than 180 people were hanged from the beam after the building served as  a court house for Hanging Judge Jeffreys, who punished members of a rebellion against King James II with ruthless and bloodthirsty efficiency.

Since then investigators have reported plenty of paranormal activity at the pub. Glasses have appeared to fly across the room and patrons have reported feeling suddenly cold or experienced a sensation of being strangled.

Village of spooks According to the Guinness Book Of Records, the apparently charming village of Pluckley  in Kent is officially the most haunted place in Britain.

A ghostly highwayman appears, pinned by a sword to a tree outside the village, while a spectral horse and carriage are seen in the high street.

A poltergeist dwells in one of the two pubs while a Victorian woman haunts the bar of the other. There are three ghosts in the church and a phantom monk wanders the grounds of a house near the railway station.

NIGHTMARE MANSION

When millionaire businessman Anwar Rashid from Dubai bought a 17-bedroom mansion in Clifton, Nottinghamshire, for £3.6million in 2007, he thought he had snapped up a bargain.

But on the first evening after he and his family moved into Clifton Hall they began hearing screams in the corridors, knocking noises on the walls and a man’s voice crying: “Is anyone there?”

The Rashids also noticed ghostly figures moving in the corridors and strange apparitions. “When we found blood spots on the baby’s quilt that was the day my wife said she’d had enough,” Mr Rashid admitted.

“We didn’t even stay that night. It was the last straw. We felt that they had come to attack us. It was really emotional.”

The family moved out and handed the keys to the bank.

l To order a copy of The Most Amazing, Haunted & Mysterious Places I n Britain, published by Readers Digest, at £19.99, send a cheque/PO payable to Express Bookshop to:

Haunted Britain Offer, PO Box 200, Falmouth TR11 4WJ, call the Express Bookshop on  0871 988 8367 or order online at www. expressbookshop.com UK delivery is free. Calls cost 10p per min from BT landlines.