Haunted Castles

Throughout the U.K., you are never more than a stone’s throw away from a castle. According to Wikipedia, there are over 650 castles, the majority of which reside in England and Scotland. Many of these formidable-looking fortresses were built between the 11th and the 14th centuries. Coming from a country whose oldest buildings, with the exception of early Native American dwellings, date to around the mid-1500s, I find myself drawn to the these medieval structures and the intrigue and violence that regularly took place within them.

Last week, Gareth and I drove to Northumberland, an English county just over the Scottish border, to spend the night with our friends Darren and Nikki at Chillingham Castle. http://www.chillingham-castle.com/

When we arrived, Gareth asked an old gent in tweeds who was chatting with the receptionist whether the leg irons hanging on the far wall were for people who don’t pay their bills. “Oh no, we have a blunderbuss* for that!” he replied with a snaggle-toothed smile. Then a young woman escorted us up a steep spiral staircase to our self-catering apartment, which was charming in an old-fashioned, could do with a lick of paint and new carpet, sort of way. Soon our friends arrived and we headed back down for a look around the castle and a tour of the grounds.

I think the best part about visiting Chillingham Castle is that the owner, Sir Humphrey Wakefield, allows guests to literally have the run of it, minus, of course, his own living area and those of the staff. We started in the dungeon and worked our way through myriad dining halls, reception rooms and bedrooms, each filled to the brim with artifacts from all over the world that Sir Humphrey had brought back from his travels. It was as if my Great Aunt Winifred invited me over for tea, then left me to rummage to my heart’s content through the long-forgotten contents of her attic. There were beheaded toys piled around a ramshackle dollhouse; stacks of Mein Kampf magazines from the 1940s atop a snooker table that had seen better days; damaged oil paintings from the 1700s; furniture from various periods in various stages of restoration; rusty suits of armor; mounted antlers of every species imaginable; a pair of life-sized wooden horses; the list goes on.

After we’d spent a couple of hours exploring the interior, we moved to the Italian-style gardens and then on to acres of woodlands surrounding a lake that was the picture of serenity. Watching a mother duck and five ducklings glide past our vantage point on a small dock, I dreamed I was sitting in a lawn chair with my laptop, working away on my second novel. As we continued along the dirt path flanked by thousands of bluebells beneath twisted expanses of yew, I started to seriously consider applying for the next open staff position.

Complaints of hunger from the guys made us end our walk and drive to the singular restaurant/pub in the area, which was beyond busy with hordes of locals, tourists and walkers. Then we returned for the guided ghost tour that makes Chillingham a tourist favorite.

Two couples joined us in the courtyard and then Bob, our tour guide, led us through the castle and grounds while he told us about the castle’s violent past. This included vast amounts of torture and killing of Scots through the centuries. One of the guests claimed a brass plaque in her apartment kept moving while she watched, and Bob recounted myriad sightings of the resident ghosts. Our set of rooms, dubbed the Lookout, was supposed to be regularly visited by a female apparition, but while we spent a few hours supposedly chatting with spirits by way of a makeshift ouija board, we didn’t actually see anything of a supernatural nature during our stay.

* Translation: 18th century shotgun