chillingham castle ghost hunt

UK Ghost Hunt specialises in paranormal evenings and Halloween Ghost Hunts in the UK and Europe. We work very hard to ensure all our members and guests have the best Halloween experience possible.

UK Ghost hunts are currently searching the whole of the UK to find some of the most active and scary venues available. If you are aware of any haunted or paranormal locations, please feel free to let us know and we will make the relevant requires to see if it maybe an option for future Halloween event.

Our Halloween Ghost hunts are made up of highly experienced Mediums, Investigators and Historians to add that extra professional approach in the paranormal field. We welcome you on any of our Ghost hunts for a Halloween night you will truly never forget.

 In the 12th century Chillingham Castle was a stronghold and a home for Sir Humphry Wakefield and his family. The other added benefit was that Chillingham Castle is located only 20 minutes from the sea. This Castle also became 'base-camp' for the 1298 conquering attack on William Wallace by “Hammer of the Scots”, King Edward 1st.  Wallace had raided the previous year, burning the women and children to death in the local abbey.  The Castle was given permission to add battlements by King Edward III in 1344 (See the actual License in the Castle).  The Elizabethans added 'Long Galleries' and Capability Brown designed the park in 1752.  The glorious Italian garden was laid out in the 19th century by Sir Jeffrey Wyatville, fresh from his royal triumphs at Windsor Castle.  Royal visits from 1200s to this century, and winner of many architectural awards.
 
Chillingham Castle is now open to the public and also available for Ghost Hunts and Ghost Tours and has self catering apartments. located 10 miles from the coast and around 70 miles from both Newcastle and Edinburgh, it is the ideal choice for anyone in the North looking for a paranormal evening.

Enjoy an exclusive opportunity to walk inside the gates of Chillingham Castle - reputed to be the most haunted Castle in England. Your guided tour will take you through the most haunted rooms in the Castle - the Edward 1st Room, onto the candlelit Great Hall and Chapel, continuing through the Torture Chamber and Dungeon for those who are brave enough! You will also explore the atmospheric Monk's Trail outside in the grounds. Join the Blue Boy, Lady Mary Berkeley, John Sage the Torturer and others on this fascinating historical tour of Chillingham Castle's residents, past and present .....
 
Ghost Tours take place at Chillingham Castle most weeks, days vary according to demand. They cost £20pp and start at 8pm - over 16s.
 
All bookings must be made in advance: please contact the Estate Office on 01668 215 359.
 
Forthcoming dates with vacancies are: 6th and 27th March. Extra dates can be scheduled, if required.

Lady Tankerville's Encounters

LEONORA, Lady Tankerville, (Tankerville is an old 1400s Grey family title) lived at Chillingham Castle in the 1920's.  She tells many haunted tales of her life at Chillingham Castle:
 
A “Precognition”

“The first time I ever saw Chillingham Castle was actually in the company of a ghost!

“I was abroad in France one early morning, asleep.  Suddenly, I dreamed I was walking through what I now know is the Chillingham West Lodge entrance, and then proceeding along the avenue towards the Castle.  I had never even heard of Chillingham at that time. 
 
“In fact, I had made the acquaintance of my future husband some months before, but had no expectation of ever seeing him again.  I knew nothing of his home and no one had described it to me, nor had I seen photographs elsewhere. 

Finding myself there I was full of interest and curiosity, especially wondering why the Castle, if it was to be a Castle, was not visible from the end of the avenue.  I later found this to be the case.  Although asleep, I remember asking myself what this meant, and wondering if I should ever see this Castle in the flesh.  Then, suddenly, a young man came forward, introducing himself as my recent friend’s brother.  He said, “I have come to walk with you until my brother George is ready.”  We turned and walked towards the park and then my future husband joined us.  The brother then disappeared.
 
“In fact this brother had sadly died in Afghanistan fully two years before, but I had no difficulty in recognising him later from a photograph. Maybe he was dissatisfied to leave his old home without the fulfilment of seeing his surviving brother married and settled.  I never saw him again, but I felt his mind was now at rest.”
  
The Dying Officer

 
“Those who have just left their bodies are so often seen by their friends that the recital of such an occurrence becomes a mere commonplace today.
 
“Only last spring such a ghost visited me. – He was a young officer who we knew to be seriously ill but never thought of his being at death's door.  It was after midnight and I stood at the dressing-table brushing my hair, with most of my clothes lying on the sofa near at hand.  Suddenly, I became acutely conscious of this young officer’s presence, and of being curiously scrutinised, and it was as if he were about to speak.  Before listening or even looking, my first impulse was to seize my dressing-gown and throw it over me. Then, turning back, ready to hear what he had to say, he was suddenly gone.  The room was empty and I stood alone.

 
“I told my husband that our young friend must be dead, and we heard next day that he had died at that very hour. 

Ghosts of War

“The third type of ghost, where the figures moved as on films, appeared to me just before the Great War, when there was much occult disturbance of every kind in all countries.

 
“One morning, after an exceptionally busy time, I sat down for a few moments rest in a handsome room in the Castle overlooking the Cheviot Hills.  The wind made sounds in the wide old chimney just like the distant boom of cannon.  As I looked out on the restful formal garden, suddenly the waving branches and heavily drifting clouds assumed a menacing and warlike aspect.
 
“As I looked out at this wild scene, the form of a woman seemed to take shape before me, walking on the parapet of a tower apparently as solid as the one I sat in.  She was in the garb of a Dominican Abbess.  After looking eagerly towards the hills of Scotland, she knelt beside the battlements as if in prayer.  A man stood beside her proudly upright, handsome and-richly dressed.  He too was scanning the horizon toward the enemy country of Scotland.

“A few paces behind were two men in velvet court dress of the time of King Henry VIII. They were talking in subdued tones. In the background, on the further parapet, a halberdier paced up and down on sentry duty. I got up to watch the scene from the window, thinking I was about to witness some tragedy of former times.
 
“Presently I called to my son in the next room, but he was out.  Then a housemaid came in to close the shutters and asked a couple of questions.  I thought surely the vision would have disappeared.  But no!  Another woman brought the Abbess an ermine cape, and now the man's rich dress was covered by a surcoat.  The atmosphere was tense with a feeling and sense of impending danger!

“I spoke to them twice, and asked if I could be of any service.  When the man, who was now pacing back and forth, stopped and looked at me, it was the face of my husband.  But he was in the garb of France four centuries ago!  Then who was the Abbess?  Was that myself?  And why the anxiety?  What was about to happen?  If it was I, what was I praying God to avert?  It was not long before we knew, and the din of battle sounded in our twentieth century ears.  Shortly official directions were sent to us for action in the case of an invasion!
 
“I believe I had, quite inadvertently, 'tuned in' to a similar moment from long ago.
 
Blessed Skeletons

Just below the floor boards of my writing room, estate workers discovered two grinning skeletons!  They were lying against great, gothic carved stones, hidden to us till then.  The real mystery to me is that I always sense the occult, a strong gift I have, which is why I have been ‘sent’ to Chillingham.  Yet, I sense nothing here.  Nothing, all these years with my writing bureau scarcely two feet above these puzzling bones.  Nothing!  Not even as I gazed at those solemn restful features.   

NOTE:  It was nearly a century later that we discovered that these bones lay in the ancient Chapel.  So they would have received the traditional burial encouraging the heavenwards journey!
 
Conclusion

 Why we do not all of us see these invisible things?  I believe there is no inherent reason, as we all possess the same senses.  We just need some understanding of those senses, and of the discipline to put it all to use.  The ghosts of Chillingham, as with a radio set, have helped to show me we have the choice, for instance, as to whether we tune in to deep depression -- to the horror against which we are powerless to fight-- or rise up to the fairest heights of which man is capable and join and fight?
Chillingham Castle

 
LEONORA TANKERVILLE (1925)

Castle Hauntings

The poet Longfellow begins an apt description of Chillingham with the following verse:
 
”All houses in which men have lived and died
Are haunted houses:  Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sounds upon the floors.”
  
Chillingham certainly hosts memories of the happiness and drama of a colourful and drama packed past.  In our land of ancient dwellings few houses have been lived in so continuously and from so early a date, let alone have they been lived in constantly by the very same family line.  No house has Chillingham’s true breadth of glamour, from basking in royal visits to suffering with horrifying military assault. For eight hundred years the family, their friends, with their royal friends and masters have visited the Castle, and lived, loved, fought, and faced triumph and disaster right there .

The entire region is romance packed, the Castle evocatively described by Sir Walter Scott as having “the true rust of the Baron’s wars”. . The Castle was the scene of many an attack from Scottish neighbours, its dungeons seldom without some unfortunate inmate. Safe behind a seven inch thick oak door, the dungeon walls have old initials, and lines scratched, to count out the weary days of imprisonment.  
 
The White Pantry Ghost
In what is called 'The inner Pantry' a frail figure in white still appears.  The silver was stored here and a footman employed to sleep here and guard it.

 Historically, one night, when the footman had turned in to sleep, he was accosted by this lady in white  Very pale, she begged him for water. Thinking it was one of the Castle guests he turned to obey.  Suddenly he remembered he was locked in and no visitor could have possibly entered. 
This same pale figure is seen today, and it is thought the longing for water suggests poisoning.
 
The Ghost in the Chamber
Not all the ghosts are those we see.  Some are merely felt as 'Impalpable impressions on the air,' as the poet Tennyson says.  There is this sense of something unseen yet distinctly moving, it can be a chill dark creeping sensation, or maybe just an oppressive atmosphere.

Voices in the Chapel
In the Chapel, beside the Great Hall, the voices of two men are often heard talking.  It is never possible to follow their words, and they stop talking if one makes serious efforts to trace them.
 
Ghosts in the Courtyard
The moonlight casts the shadows of the battlements across the worn flagstones, and it is positively hard not to see the shades and shadows come to life.
 
Extracts from recent visitors in Chillingham’s Haunted rooms..

“I felt this hand on my arm.  It was a most friendly feeling, and I believe someone was trying to guide me to see something”.  “My camera just would not take a picture of the orbs and lighting I actually saw.  Yet, when I developed my film, there were just those same orbs, but in different places and rooms, literally all over the place”. “The guide told me not to be frightened, and funnily I was quite happy even with the distinct whispering I heard in the King Eward Room”.  “I did not expect to find anything of interest, but was completely charmed rather than frightened”.  “It was at midnight when Ralph woke me.  I saw nothing but he…”.  “It must have been the very early morning.  I thought it was my wife, and suddenly realised that I had come along alone…”And so on!

Ghosts

The Blue boy, poor, wandering, Lady Mary, a tortured child, the Royal procession and so many other famous stories.  Chillingham retains them all because the Castle stays calm and unaltered ever since ancient battling days.  With all its beauty and calm, Chillingham has many ghosts….  Of course it has.  Quite apart from Lady Mary and her friends, the Castle family lived exciting and romantic lives, they served Kings, but then, as William Shakespeare notes, they rebelled, too.  With a record eighteen Knights of the Garter, the family also had no less that eight famous, well recorded, executions.  Some were hanged, drawn and quartered.  While alive, they were cut down from the Gallows, to have their entrails removed.  Still living, the failing body was cut into quarters.  The head was displayed on city gates, as a warning. Other members of the family, more fortunate, simply had their heads chopped off.
 
Haunted DVDs
Chillingham Castle has its own DVD, featuring Richard Felix from TV's “Most Haunted”.  Cost £15.00, plus £2.50 postage. Please call 01668 215359, or email enquiries@chillingham-castle.com to purchase your copy.
 
A tour of the haunted areas of the Castle and grounds.
 
Tours all year round, by arrangement.

Price: £20.00 per person

Start: 8.00p.m.

Tours last approx 2 hours, depending on psychic activity.