HAUNTED INNS

Why is it that haunted inns are so scarce and difficult to find? We have sought for them far and wide. During thirty years of wanderings among the old inns, we have retired for the night full oft into blackened oak-lined chambers with secret sliding panels in the walls, or traps in the ceiling, that offered golden opportunities for any ghost of enterprise; rooms where heavy tie-beams and dark recesses cast eerie shadows in the moonlight; vast churchlike dormitories with springy floors which if one jumped out of bed caused the door incontinently to unlatch and open in a distinctly ghostlike manner. But no supernatural visitor has ever favoured us. In vain we have tried the experiment of sleeping in bedchambers which the great ones of the earth have made memorable, from Queen Elizabeth to Dick Turpin. No cavalier knight has ever tried to unburden his conscience to us, no spectral dame has come to moan and wring her hands with grief, no clanking chains on the stairs, merely the peaceful dreamless sleep of the proverbial top.

The learned in occult lore tell us that the astral body must follow the habits of the departed to whom it once belonged. It would therefore prefer private dwellings to the inns which it merely occupied for a night or two. Ghosts with a grievance would find more congenial occupation in annoying surviving relatives rather than the passing traveller who is not interested in their concerns. Well-informed and intelligent spectres, of course (unless they had some private end in view), steer clear of inns altogether. At the baronial hall, the ghost is a cherished petted heirloom; the innkeeper regards him as a nuisance, driving away the more timid class of customers, and in case of trouble might call in the parson to exorcise him with bell, book and candle. Then, again, in the halcyon days for the spooks, say a hundred years ago, the traveller generally drank deeply to the good of the house. The spectral vision fell flat when tested on an individual well inoculated with spirit of a more material nature. In face of all these discouragements, the ghosts, as a rule, left hotels and taverns unmolested.One exception is to be found at the Ostrich at Colnbrook, a beautiful old Elizabethan coaching inn, retaining near the middle of its long half-timbered and gabled front, above the yard gate, the platform by which “the quality” embarked on the coach. It is an ideal place for a ghost to take sanctuary, with many corridors and low-ceilinged chambers, all lined through with carved chestnut panelling and twisted pilasters. There is a Queen’s room, said to have been used by Queen Elizabeth while awaiting the repair of her coach which had lost a wheel crossing the ford. Over the mantelpiece is her coat of arms. But chiefest of all is the Blue Chamber, sacred to the memory of Dick Turpin. This ubiquitous villain, so tradition states, once leaped from the first floor window and escaped into the street when pressed by the authorities.[15]

The ghost is also associated with the Blue Chamber. His name in the flesh was Thomas Cole, and his story is told in a very rare work of Jacobean date, published by Thowe, of Reading.Once upon a time in the reign of Henry I, the Ostrich was already a flourishing inn kept by a man and his wife who were secretly robbers and murderers. When a guest of substance came along and was considered a suitable victim, the husband would remark aloud: “Wife, I know of a fat pig if you want one!” and she would answer, “Well, put him into the pigsty till to-morrow.” Then the visitor was put into the Blue Chamber above the kitchen. Underneath the bed there was a trap-door, so arranged that by pulling out two iron pins in the kitchen below the whole fell down, and plunged the unfortunate man into an immense iron brewing-vat filled with boiling water. The dead body was then thrown into the Colne which flows just behind the house. If other travellers asked for the murdered man in the morning, they were told that he had saddled his horse and ridden away before dawn. As a matter of fact, the horse had been saddled and taken away to a barn, some distance off, where the innkeeper cropped and branded it in such a manner that recognition was impossible.

Thomas Cole was a Reading clothier, rich and thrifty. He was in the habit of riding to London, and sleeping at the Ostrich on his return journey, when he usually carried a considerable sum of money, the proceeds of his sales. For a long time Cole had been marked out for the cauldron as he usually travelled alone. After the manner of most sixteenth-century legends—Arden of Faversham, for example—the murderers were on several occasions balked of their prey at the last moment when the guest had been shown into the Blue Chamber. Once it was his friends, Gray of Gloucester and William of Worcester, who also traded with cloth in London, and arrived unexpectedly late at night. Another time a tavern dispute kept the house in commotion; a third time a rumour came that his friend Thomas À Beckett’s house in Chepe was on fire, and he returned to town. On another visit he was so ill that a nurse must needs watch by his bedside.

The “Clothiers’ Arms,” Stroud

But at last the opportunity came. Poor Thomas was full of forebodings of some impending calamity all the evening. He dictated his will to the landlord, disposing of his wealth, half to his only daughter, half to his wife. His goodness failed to move the hearts of the greedy couple, and that night the bolts were withdrawn and he was scalded to death.When the innkeeper had disposed of the body in the river, he found that the merchant’s horse had broken loose and wandered out into the street, where he was lost for the time being.

Next day, Cole’s family, who were expecting his return, were alarmed at his non-appearance. They sent his servants to make inquiries at the inn. The horse was found on the road. The servants were not satisfied with the explanations given them, and appealed to the authorities. On hearing this, the innkeeper lost courage and fled secretly away; but his wife was apprehended and confessed the truth. It appeared that sixty persons had been done away with by means of the falling floor. Both the murderers eventually suffered the extreme penalties of the law of that period.

On the credit of the above story the ghost of Thomas Cole enjoyed for centuries a magnificent notoriety, strutting proudly at midnight along the corridors and terrifying any unfortunate occupant of the Blue Chamber out of his wits. But the historical critic has found him out. There was no cloth trade either in Reading, Gloucester, or Worcester, when Henry I was king, nor was Thomas À Beckett a friend of his, nor did the Blue Chamber itself exist, indeed there were no beds invented for ages afterwards. Colnbrook is not so called because “Cole was in the Brook” as was pretended, nor did the river Colne receive that name because Cole was in it. If the shade of Mr. Cole has not fled away altogether, it takes care to hide its diminished head in some dark corner or cupboard. For at least ten years this detected impostor has not shown himself in the Blue Chamber. As a matter of fact, the Ostrich was a hospice founded by Milo Crispin about 1130, and given in trust to the Benedictines at Abingdon.

About two hundred years ago the owners of the Hind’s Head at Bracknell tried to emulate the exploits of their rivals at Colnbrook. One winter’s night a stout-hearted farmer was benighted there and spent a merry evening round the fire with some jovial companions. At last a serving-maid showed him up to his chamber. In a scared whisper she warned him that he had taken refuge with a band of villains. By the side of the bedstead was a trap-door leading into a deep well. He threw the bed down the trap-door and escaped by the window. Then he roused the neighbourhood. The gang of ruffians were captured and all executed at Reading. In the well were found the bones of all their victims.The Hind’s Head is a pleasant little inn, with a fine old garden, and we have slept in the haunted room—slept the sleep of the just undisturbed by visitors of any kind. But we have hopes of the Hind’s Head, for the present occupier is a man of taste, who believes that behind the modern wainscot ingle-nooks and other treasures of the old time are waiting to be unveiled. The trap-door and the well are to be seen in situ, and perhaps when the old-fashioned appearance of the interior is restored, the ghosts may be induced to return.

On the western end of Exmoor there is an old inn, the Acland Arms, which supernatural visitants have rendered uninhabitable. It lies deserted and melancholy, with its ruined porch and the broken walls of its weed-choked garden. The wraith of Farmer Mole haunts its precincts. He was returning from South Molton market one dark night on a horse laden with sacks of lime. Many years afterwards horse and man were dug out of the bog close by, into which they must have wandered in the mist and become engulfed.

For the tale of the “Hand of Glory” we are indebted to Mrs. Katherine Macquoid, and will let it be told in her own words, with only a few abbreviations.[16]

The Spital Inn on Stanmore in Yorkshire, was, in the year 1797, a long narrow building kept by one George Alderson. Its lower storey was used as stabling, for the stage-coaches changed horses at the inn; the upper part was reached by a flight of ten or twelve steps leading up from the road to a stout oaken door, and the windows, deeply recessed in the thick walls, were strongly barred with iron.

One stormy October night, while the rain swept pitilessly against the windows and the fierce gusts made the casements rattle, George Alderson and his son sat over the crackling log fire and talked of their gains at Broughton Hill Fair; these gains, representing a large sum of money, being safely stowed away in a cupboard in the landlord’s bedroom. A knock at the door interrupted them.

“Open t’ door, lass,” said Alderson. “Ah wadna keep a dog out sik a neet as this.”

“Eh! best slacken t’ chain, lass,” said the more cautious landlady.

The girl went to the door, but when she saw that the visitor was an old woman, she bade her come in. There entered a bent figure dressed in a long cloak and hood; this last was drawn over her face and, as she walked feebly to the armchair which Alderson pushed forward, the rain streamed from her clothing and made a pool on the oaken floor. She shivered violently but refused to take off her cloak and have it dried. She also refused the offer of food or a bed. She said she was on her way to the south, and must start as soon as there was daylight. All she needed was a rest beside the fire.

The innkeeper and his wife were well used to wayfarers; they soon said “Good-night,” and went to bed; so did their son. Bella, the maid, was left alone with the shivering old woman, who gave but surly answers to her advances, and the girl fancied that the voice, though low, was not a woman’s. Presently the wayfarer stretched out her feet to warm them, and Bella’s quick eyes saw under the hem of the skirt that the stranger wore horseman’s gaiters. The girl felt uneasy, and instead of going to bed, she resolved to stay up and watch.

The “Greyhound” Inn, Stroud

Presently Bella lay down on a long settle beyond the range of the firelight and watched the stranger while she pretended to fall asleep. All at once the figure in the chair stirred, raised its head and listened; then it rose slowly to its feet, no longer bent but tall and powerful looking; it stood listening for some time. There was no sound but Bella’s heavy breathing, and the wind and rain beating on the windows. Then the woman took from the folds of her cloak a brown withered human hand; next she produced a candle, lit it from the fire, and placed it in the hand. Bella’s heart beat so fast that she could hardly keep up the regular deep breathing of pretended sleep; but now she saw the stranger coming towards her with this ghastly chandelier, and she closed her lids tightly. She felt that the woman was bending over her, and that the light was passed slowly before her eyes, while these words were muttered in the strong masculine voice that had first roused her suspicions:

“Let those who rest more deeply sleep;
Let those awake their vigils keep.”