Littlecote House

 Two miles west of Hungerford, between Ramsbury and Chilton Foliat, stands Littlecote House in Wiltshire (formerly Bergshire), near the River Kennet. This large, old Elizabethan house is among the five most haunted houses in Britain. More than twenty ghosts are said to roam the present-day hotel.

This house was built between the 13th and 14th centuries by the Calstone family, who had occupied it since 1290. William Darrel married Elizabeth de Calstone, and they moved into the house in 1415. Meanwhile, it was expanded until the early 16th century. In 1560, the last William Darrel took over the complex.

This also caused one of the greatest scandals of the Elizabethan years. Wild William, as he was also known, was known for his successes. In the middle of the night, he ordered the midwife Barnes to be brought from the nearby village of Great Shefford.

A sister of St. Mary's convent was brought blindfolded to Littlecote and taken to the upper floors. Only there could she remove the blindfold. In the room stood a nobleman next to the bed where a woman was lying in labor. Immediately after the child was born, the nobleman snatched it from Sister Barnes's arms and threw it alive into the fireplace. In the terrible pain, the fire consumed the child.

Later, the midwife was given a purse full of gold and ordered to blindfold herself again. Despite the shock of this crime, she grabbed some of the bedclothes and hid them under her gown. As she was led downstairs, she counted the steps.

The next morning, the sister took this incident and its evidence of her being in Littlecote's house to the judge. Darrell was imprisoned for his crime until his trial. However, later, by the judge's judgment, Darrell was released and left free.

Williams's financial problems forced him to sell Littlecote House in 1575 and move to London. Fourteen years later, he visited Littlecote again. During this visit, he died from a horse kick—as the saying goes, the horse was frightened by the ghost of a burned child who had perished horribly in the fireplace years earlier.

John Aubrey described this event a century later in Brief Lives, a collection of short biographies of important figures from the Elizabethan era. In this work, Aubrey assumed that the child's mother was Darrell's wife.

However, in the village, Darrell's sister was considered the child's mother, which would also explain the cause of such a terrible crime. This led to a veritable flood of ghost stories.

Darrell is said to still appear at the site of his death today, either on foot or on horseback, usually accompanied by a group of dog spirits. Sometimes with a cart if the owner of Littlecote lies dying. The room where the murder took place is visited by a distraught woman holding a child.

Another noteworthy event is the appearance of a female ghost in the garden, an event linked to another child murder.

Peter de Savary bought Littlecote in 1985 and shortly thereafter organized a sort of sale of the previous owners' belongings while he was clearing out the property. On the morning of the sale, Savary decided to wander around the property. While stretching his legs, he encountered a young woman.

"She was wearing a sweater and a tweed skirt. Just like those women who come shopping in Hungerford," Savary told Hello magazine in 1993.

When the woman approached, he greeted her and began to go on his way. The woman stopped him and accused him of being a bad man who, along with his family, would pay for his misdeeds. Irritated beyond measure, he asked the young woman what he had done. She said he had taken her child's belongings. De Savary protested his innocence but promised to return the items if any of the servants had misappropriated them.

The woman explained that she couldn't take the items, but she told him where they were and where they should be returned. Savary assured her that the items described would be returned.

The woman began to laugh and told him that he and his family were forever blessed at Littlecote House. Then the woman vanished as if she had vanished into thin air.

Upon his return home, he sorted out the items and searched the locations described. Sure enough, he found everything there.

Among the items of clothing was a board with a drawing of a child's face on it, which read:

"Early morning, July 21, 1861. Calm and cold—oh so beautiful"

 

The next piece, which is still kept at home, has holes for flowers to be placed in.

It reads:

 

"Planted on a Child's Grave, July 23, 1861"

All these items were taken to the place where the woman's ghost had spoken. In Littlecote Chapel lay a scrap that the mother had ordered made as a memento of her child—peaceful, quiet, and beautiful.

At a tournament in 1993, a woman encountered a dark figure, blacker than black, who gave her a sign. This figure had no face, wore a hood and long, billowing clothing. Sometimes a legion of Roman soldier ghosts marches through the park.

Within its walls, Littlecote is a small Roman villa that served as a military base 50 years after Christ. Furthermore, the ghost of Gerald Lee Bevin haunts the place. Bevin owned the villa in the 1820s and was involved in a major scandal in the city at one time.

Before moving out, Savary and his family announced that there were places and rooms in the house that should be avoided at night and in the dark, as a form of mutual respect between human and spirit.

Since 1996, it has been part of the Warnerbrekas hotel chain and is now a country hotel and holiday resort. Guests continually report strange occurrences.

On March 17, 2007, Warnerbrekas left frequently reported rooms to the renowned British ghost-hunting group PSI (Paranormal Site Investigators) for a search for paranormal activity. The 10-member group included Malcolm Gould, Steve Willis, and Nicky Sewell.

Deborah Wood, a hotel spokeswoman, led the group to the rooms where paranormal activity was most frequently reported, either by guests or staff.

Among other things, they also searched the room where Henry VIII stayed, where he met Janie Seymoure (whose ghost is still seen at Hampton Court Palace today) and married her on May 30, 1536.

Guests report that their covers were removed and pinched while they slept.

The next rooms were a large hall, where guests reported seeing a small child caressing their hands, a chapel built in 1250 and thus the oldest part of the house, and, of course, a bedroom, where a newborn was murdered in 1575.

The investigation revealed numerous inexplicable phenomena and paranormal activity in each room.

Terrible movements and a restless shadow were recorded in the bedroom.

While searching the Great Hall, another strange incident was reported. Two people were running through the hall, and only one member of the group definitely saw three people. The group followed them, but there were only two of them. Visual illusions, or a visitor from the past walking through the hall?

During the investigation, the group had to contend with equipment problems.