Chillingham Castle in Northumberland is widely recognised as Britain's most haunted castle. The castle boasts some of the highest levels of paranormal activity in the country, with a large collection of spectres and apparitions spotted by visitors over the years. Chillingham's resident ghost hunter Richard Craig reports 50 ghosts on the premises. Historical Background: Originally built as a monastery before 1246, it was transformed into a castle and became the home of the Grey family from 1246. The original manor house was destroyed by a Scottish raid in 1296, and by 1298, the new manor house was built, more fortified. King Edward I used the castle as accommodation in 1298 while heading for his fight with William "Braveheart" Wallace. In 1982, the castle was bought by Sir Humphry Wakefield, 2nd Baronet, whose wife, Catherine, is descended from the Greys of Chillingham, and Wakefield set about a painstaking restoration of the castle.
The Dark Legacy of John Sage
John Sage was nicknamed "John Dragfoot" or "The Butcher of the Scots". He was a cold-blooded and ruthless torturer and executioner who tortured more than 50 people each week for three years, probably torturing and killing over a thousand people at the castle. He designed the torture chamber with a sloping floor to allow the blood to drain more easily, and his range of torture devices included the Wheel, the Iron Maiden, the Iron Chair, and the notorious Rack. John Sage killed his lover Elizabeth Charlton, strangling her during a sex game on the rack in Chillingham's torture chamber. Elizabeth's father was the leader of a powerful group of warriors, the Border Reivers, and gave the King an ultimatum: put Sage to death or face an attack from a large army. He was sentenced to hang at Chillingham but was torn apart while he still lived. Elizabeth's father gathered a mob who strung Sage up and mutilated him slowly, cutting off his nose, testicles, and toes as souvenirs. He was left to die from his injuries as the crowd watched on, occasionally taking a piece of him for their own morbid collection. Disembodied voices and full-bodied apparitions have been seen wandering the courtyard, and even the ghost of John Sage is said to haunt the Courtyard.
The Tragic Massacre
At the end of the Scottish-English War, the English needed to get rid of the remaining prisoners. They made a huge fire at the Courtyard and burned all the men, women and older children alive before the eyes of the younger children. After this, the children were taken back into Chillingham Castle where they were hacked to their death in the King Edward's Room.
The Blue Boy (Radiant Boy)
The most famous ghost is that of the ""Radiant Boy,"" a childish wraith seen in the castle's Pink Room, whose heart-wrenching cries of either fear or pain echo through the corridors upon the stroke of midnight. The cries always seemed to emanate from a spot near where a passage is cut through the 10-foot-thick wall. As they faded away, a bright halo of light would appear, and the figure of a young boy dressed in blue would approach those sleeping in the room. During restoration work, excavations between the castle walls revealed the bones of a child wrapped in blue cloth, and this "solved that problem". However, when the room was restored, guests kept reporting "an electric fault which is a flash of blue on the edge of the door," though there's no electricity there at all. The owner joked, "We must have left a toe bone".
Lady Mary Berkeley (The Grey Lady)
Lady Mary Berkeley was the wife of Ford Grey, 1st Earl of Tankerville, who had an affair with her much younger, virginal sister, Henrietta. He ran off with Henrietta and never returned to Chillingham Castle. Lady Mary Berkeley is supposed to haunt the Great Hall, manifesting with a smell of roses and a wafting chill. The rustle of Lady Berkeley's dress is sometimes heard along the passage with cold chilled invisible sweeps as she runs down to look for her husband, leaving a cold chilling aura behind.
The White Pantry Ghost
In what is called 'The Inner Pantry', a frail figure in white still appears. A footman employed to sleep there and guard the silver was accosted by this lady in white. Very pale, she begged him for water. When he returned with the water, the old woman was gone. She was most likely poisoned inside the Still Room and still haunts it, asking for water. A Spanish witch was also killed in the room, and right before she died, she cursed the castle - anyone who would take anything from the castle would experience bad luck.
The Dungeon's Horror
The Dungeon is a very tight space with two cells. One contains a murder pit where injured prisoners were thrown inside and left to die. A door from the gardens gives access to the pit, and the castle's dogs would have indulged the flesh of the dead. If you take a close look, you'll still see human remains inside the pit. Many of the Scottish prisoners who were trapped in the dungeon were so starved that they resorted to eating the dead. The most desperate are even said to have resorted to eating their own flesh. The walls of the dungeon are still covered with marking from prisoners keeping track of the time they spent imprisoned.
Other Paranormal Activity
On Christmas Eve, the staff has reported seeing a candle lift off its mantlepiece and floating by itself. There are disembodied voices heard in the chapel, phantom monks who are occasionally seen, and unseen malevolent presences in dark chambers throughout the castle.
Media Recognition
The castle has been visited by the Most Haunted TV show, and the current owners market it as being the most haunted castle in Britain. Chillingham Castle continues to attract paranormal investigators and brave visitors from around the world who seek encounters with its numerous tormented spirits in what remains one of Britain's most actively haunted and historically dark fortresses, where centuries of warfare, torture, and tragedy have left an overwhelming supernatural presence.