Customer Reviews

Haunted castles

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I wish that we'd owned a copy of "Haunted Castles" when we toured Great Britain. It would have been either the high-point or low-point of our trip if we'd actually caught sight of a long-departed Lord or Lady. It bothers me to realize that we visited Glamis Castle (the most haunted of all royal residences) and the Tower of London without a clue as to what we really might have seen.

However, your trip doesn't need to be spoiled by that same oversight, because Marc Alexander has published the ultimate tour guide to the haunted castles of Great Britain. His book was published back in 1974, but I don't imagine that it has gone out-of-date. What do the Grey Ladies, Phantom Pipers, and assorted ghostly prisoners in their dungeons care about the passage of time? According to the author, some of them have been haunting the same spot for several hundred years.

Of course, the phantoms may have been exorcised if they frightened too many tourists, so you are still advised to call in advance of your visit.

The author himself tried to visit many of the haunted castles, and he writes very atmospheric stories about the not-so-departed departed. He also narrates a brief, painless history of each site mentioned in this book. A sampling:

Rochester Castle, Kent - "A girl, her body transfixed by an arrow and an expression of terror beneath her wildly flowing hair, is the spectre of Rochester Castle which is still seen after seven centuries"

Roslin Castle, Midlothian - Sir Walter Scott wrote a poem about the ghostly portent that precedes the death of a lord of Roslin Castle (now a ruin): "...Blazed battlement and pinnet high,/ Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair;/ So still they blaze, when fate is nigh/ The lordly line of Hugh St Clair."

If you enjoyed these stories about burning death portents and ghostly, arrowed brides, Marc Anderson has also published "Haunted Inns", "Haunted Churches & Abbeys of Britain ", and "Phantom Britain".