With a long history of hauntings, superstition and folklore, the UK is rich with spooky tales to chill the blood and necessitate a change of underwear, and nowhere more so than the small market town of Holbeach in South Lincolnshire. From Old Shuck to the Black Lady of Bradley Woods, this ostensibly quiet, unassuming borough is home to some of the most horrifying supernatural encounters ever reported. To this end, WordJam took a train down there armed with nothing more than a tape recorder and a shitload of bribe money in the hope of hearing some of these tales of terror first-hand. In honour of Halloween, we proudly present four hitherto untold real-life ghost stories straight from the mouths of the people who experienced them. Prepare to be scared...
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The King of Cowling Bakery
"I come from a long line of bakers," proprietor Nick Cowling explains over a cup of tea and a jam roly-poly. "It all started with my great-great grandfather, who set up the business as a front for the brothel he was running upstairs. That was shut down when the Mayor's wife got more than she bargained for after nipping in for a sponge finger. After that, the only buns you could get your hands on round here were strictly the hot cross kind."
I ask Nick when he first discovered the bakery was haunted.
"That's the weird thing," he says with bemusement; "it only started up a couple of months ago. I was in bed with the wife one morning when we woke up to the smell of bacon and eggs coming from downstairs. I knew Helen hadn't got up in the middle of the night to cook herself a crafty fry-up because the doctor told her to lay off pork after her eleventh heart attack, and it definitely wasn't me as I'd just converted to Judaism the day before. Anyway, when I went to the kitchen to investigate I discovered pots and pans lying all over the floor and a bearded fat man with grey skin and olden days clothes sat at the table patting his stomach. I recognised him straight away as Henry VIII off the telly. It was a surprise, I can tell you."
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| Henry VIII off the telly. |
Soon Henry started to make his presence felt outside the bakery, causing distress to other householders and businesses.
"After a hard day stuffing his face he'd drift over the road to the Horse and Groom of an evening and chat up the barmaids," Nick elaborates. "Come chucking out time he'd be out in the street, pissed off his head, bellowing the tune to "Greensleeves." Before you know it, her next door would be shouting out the window at him, telling him to keep it down. The police even came out a couple of times. I tell you, me and the wife were at our wit's end. What I couldn't get my head 'round is what he was doing haunting a bakery in a small market town instead of Hampton Court or somewhere like that. I mean, this place is a fucking shithole."
But despite these initial difficulties, Nick says he was able to reach an arrangement with the spectral sovereign that made life much easier for the Cowlings.
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| A fucking shithole, yesterday. |
"It dawned on us that, as a king, he was used to being waited on hand and foot, so we started leaving out three 14'' meat feast takeaway pizzas, two tubes of barbeque-flavoured Pringles, 200 Rothmans, four six-packs of Carling and copies of Escort, Razzle and Men Only every night. That seems to have done the trick. Occasionally you can hear the crack of a ring pull or him muttering to himself about the tits on the centrefold, but other than that he's quiet as a mouse. It costs a small fortune, but it's worth it for a bit of peace and quiet. Besides, it's every Englishman's duty to serve the needs of his monarch. Even if he is a fat bastard who can't keep it in his pants."
The Post Office Poltergeist
"People think being a postman's a piece of piss," ventures Bob Cundey as he kicks a parcel marked 'FRAGILE' into the back of his van. "And they're right. I've been doing this job for eight years now, and as long as you don't get caught with your fingers in the envelopes and slip the 'Sorry We Missed You' card through the letterbox before the home owner gets to the door it's a fucking doddle."
But it isn't all fun and capers working for the Holbeach postal service. Behind its cosy, modest exterior, the local depot hides a bloodcurdling secret.
"Well, when I started I heard these stories about stuff going missing and people saying they felt like they were being watched, but I just thought that was the other posties' way of telling me to watch my back. Not that anyone checks up on you, mind. Andy Dawson's been lifting Mrs Lee's diabetes medication for months now. He cuts it with icing sugar and sells it down the Horse and Groom. But like I say I didn't think much of it. That all changed when I got stuck working a double shift to make up for the sickie I pulled the day before. It was about five o'clock in the morning and I was just sorting the mail ready for my round, helping myself to some cash that'd somehow fallen out of several of the envelopes, when I heard this woman's voice behind me calling me a wicked boy. I turned round, but there was no one there. Then I heard it again. 'Snips and snails and puppy dog's tails,' it said. It was a horrible, croaky voice, a bit like that bird in The Exorcist. I wasn't shitting bricks or anything, but it freaked me out all the same."
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| Bob, helping himself. |
Unknown to Bob, the voice belonged to Old Mother Buckley: a 17th century spinster whose cottage once stood on the site now occupied by the postal depot. In 1648, the townsfolk burned her house to the ground with Buckley inside after it was discovered she'd abducted and murdered several local children. According to local legend, her restless spirit stalks the grounds to this day, looking for fresh victims.
"One of the other lads reckons she tried to lure him into the bushes with some breadcrumbs," Bob says with a pensive look, "but I dunno; I once caught him eating a slice of pizza he found on the pavement, so I'm taking that with a pinch of salt. All I know is I've seen things. Things you wouldn't credit. This one time I found all the post bags had upside down crosses cut into them. At first I thought it was just Andy pissing around, but I soon worked out who really did it when he woke up after dozing off in the sorting room with the word 'Buckling' carved into his forehead. Then there was that effigy of me made out of hair and fingernails she hid in my van. I'd dropped my vape skidding onto Fishpond Lane, so you can imagine my reaction when I went feeling around under the seat and found that. I tore straight through a zebra crossing, nearly knocking down some kids as I went. Mind you, that's normal for me."
I ask Bob if these nightmarish experiences have ever made him think about finding another job.
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| Old Mother Buckley. |
"Are you kidding?" he laughs, folding up a cardboard-backed envelope that says 'DO NOT BEND' and ramming it into his sack. "I fucking love it! I mean, all right, so you've got some 400-year old bint stirring it up, but what other job are you finished and down the pub by lunchtime? Then you've got the bunce. It's a piece of piss, mate, I'm telling you."
The Haunted Highway
"If you told me five years ago all that supernatural bollocks was true I'd have spat in your face and given you a good hiding," admits motor dealership owner John Wright. "But now I'd probably just spit on your shoe and tell you to fuck off. An experience like the one I had changes you. It really does."
John's story begins unremarkably enough with a visit to a family member in the nearby fenland village of Holbeach St. Marks. It was a journey he'd made many times before, but on this occasion in April 2019 there was a surprise waiting for him as he drove back home down the seemingly deserted country lanes he knew so well.
"I'd just been to see my sister-in-law Rebecca about a deal I could get for her on a Katsura Orange Nissan GT-R 3.8 litre twin-turbo with 20'' Y-spoke forged alloy wheels and a sports leather interior - and not, as that stupid old cow next door makes out, for any other reason - so I was feeling pretty chill. Well, you do afterwards, don't you? Helping someone find the right car, I mean. Anyway, it was dark outside and pissing it down. I couldn't wait to get home to the wife, who I love more than anything else in the world, no matter what anyone says. I was just turning past Roman Bank when I saw someone standing by the side of the road desperately trying to flag me down. I wasn't going to stop, but then I realised it was a young brunette and thought maybe she's up for it like Rebecca. Help, I mean. 'Cos, you know, I'm just that sort of bloke.
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| John's sister-in-law. |
What John didn't bank on, of course, was the nightmare he was about to visit upon himself.
"When she got in I noticed she was wearing this ratty old dress that looked like it'd been made out of a sack. I asked her if she'd had some car trouble, but she didn't answer. She just sat there looking at me, sniffing and rubbing her neck. I thought she might be getting a cold, poor thing, so I turned up the heating and put on a bit of Marvin Gaye to help her relax. I told her my name and how much I was making from the car dealership. I said she looked pretty fine - you know, just to be polite - and that it would be nice to get to know her a little better. She smiled at me sexily and started stroking my leg. Don't get me wrong, I was just playing along with her. I mean, I love my wife, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted. Then I asked if there was somewhere we can go... to get her home, obviously. She leaned over, her hand now cupping my groin, and whispered 'Yonder'. After about half a mile she motioned to turn off down a narrow lane. It was pitch black outside so it was hard to see anything, but I could just make out this huge oak up ahead. I stopped the car, switched off the stereo and turned to face her. Suddenly she started to laugh and pointed at the tree. I looked over and saw this figure hanging from one of the branches by a rope. The nose had been cut off and the face was covered in blood, but I knew straight away it was her. When I turned back to the passenger seat she'd disappeared, but that horrible, mocking laugh of hers continued until I floored it and drove right out of there."
From John's description and historical research into the Holbeach St. Marks area, I was able to ascertain that the figure John saw was most likely a young woman from the early medieval period who'd been put to death for adultery, indicated by the severed nose - a common form of public humiliation at that time. When I share this information with John he looks stunned.
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| A hanging tree. Obviously. |
"It just goes to show the trick is don't get caught," he says, lighting another Marlboro Gold. "Not that that's ever going to happen to me, I'm careful. I mean, not to get involved. But I'll tell you one thing, though, it's stuff like this - slags with no noses - that makes you appreciate the wife a bit more. Not much, but enough."
'Blood Cottage'
Built in 1736, The Willows has passed into legend as perhaps the most haunted house in Britain. Even the very grounds on which the house stands have a dark and disturbing past, variously playing host to a Neolithic sacrificial site; the supposed last resting place of a lost Roman legion; Viking and Saxon raids; a plague pit; minor but bloody skirmishes in both the War of the Roses and the English Civil War; witch burnings and public executions. As for the house itself, records indicate 94 murders, 63 suicides and at least 127 fatal accidents have taken place there over the last 200 years. I ask Stephen if he was aware of The Willows' bloodcurdling history before moving in.
"Not really," he replies, "but, then you expect most places to have had the odd unpleasantness happen at some time or other. When Uncle Barty was a boy a stricken Lancaster bomber crashed into the grounds right in the middle of his ninth-birthday party. Killed most of his schoolmates and crippled him for life. It's just one of those things, I guess."
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| Just one of those things. |
"I remember that first evening here as though it was yesterday," he says, pouring himself another drink as his hands visibly shake. "It was last October. I'd just been out in the garden throwing some not particularly important documents on a bonfire when I heard this noise coming from the attic. It was this weird creaking sound, like wood on wood or whatever. I'm not a naturally suspicious person like those arseholes at the tax office, so I didn't think anything of it at first. Besides, after a bottle of Bells your senses are going to play tricks on you, aren't they? After a while it was really starting to get on my tits, so I decided to investigate. I went up to the attic where I suddenly became aware of something moving in the corner. I went over for a closer look, brushing past cobwebs and tripping over cardboard boxes, when I saw this old wooden rocking horse bumping up against the wall. And there was this cold, uneasy aura, all around the house. Like when you fall asleep at the fridge door after an all-night session."
I ask Stephen if he would've vacated the house there and then had he known what was to happen next.
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| The rocking horse. Stephen's tits not pictured. |
"Well, I didn't know, did I?" he belches, wiping a fleck of spittle from his top lip. "It's like I told that flash git from the HMRC, if it's not there in front of you, you can't do anything about it. Didn't stop the bastard, though, did it? I just wish Sarah was still here, that's all. I mean, it wasn't perfect, but she didn't want for anything. Even that villa in the Algarve was in her name. I bet she's there with him now, the bitch. But anyway, no, I probably wouldn't have cleared out if I'd known. A haunted house is better than no house at all. You try getting a good night's kip in a Vauxhall Corsa."
Within days of moving in, Stephen started experiencing even more mysterious phenomena.
"It started off with the sound of footsteps on the stairs and doors suddenly slamming by themselves. I'd wake up to find blankets lying all over the place in the front room and a fire blazing away in the hearth. Then came the shadowy figures. They'd stand around the bed in the middle of the night, groaning as if in agony. I couldn't make out their faces, but their clothes all seemed to come from different historical periods: Tudor, Regency, the Victorian era, plus one or two who looked fairly modern. I don't mind telling you it scared the living shit out of me. Literally. Or maybe that was the booze, I don't know. But no matter what was going on, you could always hear that rocking horse creaking away in the attic. I got the feeling they were trying to tell me something, but at the time I couldn't make out what."
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| Artist's impression of the shadowy figures who made Stephen shit himself. |
After weeks of torment, Stephen made a terrifying discovery when he ventured downstairs one morning after a particularly troubled night .
"That was the worst," he says, setting down his glass in favour of the bottle. "Screams coming from every room, furniture crashing around everywhere; I tell you, it was like hell on earth. I don't think I got a wink of sleep. I just barricaded myself in my room with my head under the covers. Anyway, it got to about six o'clock when it suddenly stopped. I put on my dressing gown, picked up an empty bottle to defend myself with and went down to the living room. I opened the door to find all the tables and chairs had been smashed up and shoved onto the fire. And there, carved into the wall above the mantelpiece, was the message: 'SORT OUT THE INSULATION, YOU LAZY BASTARD'. Well, I got onto the contractors that morning. I figured if I'm going to be sharing a house with a bunch of pissed off spirits the least I can do is keep them on-side."
