The Ghosts of Sudbury Hall

Queen Adelaide was certainly at Sudbury Hall during her lifetime. There are countless historical documents to prove it.

Records from the house recall how many servants accompanied her; and how suddenly more grand everything became. Everything from etiquette to the quality of the meals steps up a gear, when royalty is in residence.

Dowager Queen Adelaide arrived in 1840, three years after the death of her husband, William IV.

Her niece Queen Victoria was on the throne. In the movie, The Young Victoria, it's Adelaide we see privately giving advice to the teenager, before quietly retreating. London could not cope with two Queens!

So it was to Sudbury Hall that Adelaide went. It was here where she wrote her will, then quietly mourned her husband. She was gone again by the end of 1842 to take up residence in Worcestershire instead.

The only question hangs over whether she later came back to Sudbury.  Countless members of staff and visitors to the hall think that Adelaide might have done just that.

In the Queen's Room, several people have reported a feeling of being watched.

Occasionally people approaching the small dining room will catch a glimpse of green from the corner of their eyes. Others have seen more clearly the woman in the green, velvet dress. She walks into the room and disappears.

No reenactment staff even dress like that, let alone are on duty during the sightings. But it's obvious who she is. Too many portraits of Queen Adelaide exist not to match her visage with the ghostly apparition answering a long gone dining call.

In contrast to Dowager Queen Adelaide, nobody knows the identity behind a far more frequent haunting at the house.

The grand staircase is beautiful to behold. Visitors to the property tend to spend a long time gazing up its height, taking in its sweeping elegance and the portraits lining its walls.

It's even appeared in movies. This was the staircase used in the classic BBC miniseries of Pride & Prejudice. Housekeeper Mrs Reynolds stood on it to show miniatures to Elizabeth Bennet and Mr and Mrs Gardiner.

Fortunately for them, the only people in shot that day were actors and actresses. Others looking up the great staircase have seen much, much more; and it's terrified them all.

A woman in black descends from the top floor. She appears to be in distress.  All of the color has drained from her face.  She reaches the bottom step and pauses. She's grief-stricken and doesn't know what to do.

Then she disappears. 

Who she is, or what has upset her quite so much, remains a mystery. The annals of history are silent.

Since Elizabethan times, stately homes in Britain have included a long gallery. Sudbury Hall is no exception. 

Stretching the length of the house, lined with windows and artwork, this room would have been used for exercise. High born inhabitants would pace up and down, collecting their thoughts and contemplating the scenery.

One of them apparently still does.

There have been many sleepless nights for Sudbury Hall's National Trust Property Managers. The flat which comes with the job is situated directly beneath the Long Gallery.  During the night, when all is otherwise quiet, footsteps can be heard walking up and down, up and down, in the room above.

Sometimes it even triggers an alarm. Responsible for security, the manager has to leap from his or her bed and rush up the grand staircase to check for intruders. There is never anybody there. The Long Gallery remains empty.

However, a clue to the nocturnal walker may come in the blue lady seen by some visitors to the house.

When the Mayor of Derby visited, in an official capacity, his chauffeur remained with the car outside. Sudbury Hall staff, eager to extend their hospitality, kept nipping out to invite him to come inside. There were refreshments being served in the Long Gallery. 

The chauffeur said no, but everyone got the sense that it wasn't just professionalism keeping him out. He looked decidedly uncomfortable.

Eventually he was outright asked why; and then he shared a story dating sixteen years before. He had been just an ordinary visitor then, touring the house with his family.  They'd wandered into the Long Gallery and immediately spotted the lady in a long, blue gown, sitting on a chair at the far end.

The assumption, of course, was that she was a tour guide, dressed in period costume as part of a living history day.  But that was strange, because no-one else was doing that.

As the family neared her seat, she suddenly stood and, without a word, walked into the adjoining Talbot Room.  They followed her inside, then started with shock.  The book-lined room was completely devoid of a single soul, but themselves.

By now very rattled, the chauffeur and his family rushed out to find the nearest actual tour guide. They were reliably informed that no-one was dressed up that day; and no-one had been overseeing the Long Gallery.

A warren of broad rooms lie under Sudbury Hall. There is the vast kitchen, filled with daylight from windows up near the ceiling. There is the large billiard room. There are workshops too. And then there is the boiler room.

The boiler room appears to be a hive of supernatural activity, surpassing any other area in the whole estate. 

A previous National Trust curator was once following a guided tour into the area. As she did so, the torch in her hand started to flash on and off. She was not touching the switch!

The present administrator of the house is also employed by the National Trust. His job includes everything from keeping the books to ensuring the maintenance of the property.  He lives on site and claims never to have seen a single ghost.

But that doesn't mean that he's not encountered something weird in the boiler room.

One day, he needed to go down there, so went to walk through the cellar to get to it. The door would not budge. This was a little perturbing, as it was never locked and it was his job to make sure all worked well!

He tugged on it, wriggled the handle and peered into the keyhole. There was nothing to see, but the cellar door held fast. Eventually he gave up and fetched a crowbar to lever the lock, in case it had jammed. Even with that tool in hand, he could not force the door open.

Naturally calling a tea break at this point, he walked away to consider his options. It turned out that they were not needed.  As soon as he left the point, the door sprang open on its own.

On another occasion, an electrician was in the boiler room fixing a light fitting. He realized that he'd picked up the wrong screwdriver, so asked his assistant to pass the correct one to him. While the electrician held the fitting, the tool was placed into his hand.  He muttered his thanks.

But then was stunned a moment later, when said assistant hurried into the room to ask what he wanted. The boiler room had been otherwise empty, when the screwdriver had been passed up.

Tour guides tell of a fire, which once roared through a bedroom on the top floor. A young maid was trapped inside and she was burnt to death.

It should have been a tragic footnote of history, but for one small fact.  She is still trying to get out.

At the rear of Sudbury Hall is a wonderful landscaped expanse leading down to the river. Every so often, a visitor strolling between the topiary will glance back at the house. What they see sends them running back inside. 

A child peers back from a top floor window, apparently desperate to summon help. Of course, she's never there, when staff run to check.

Also on the subject of children, one of the National Trust's staff members was living in a self-contained flat within the house. She had recently had a baby, which was sleeping in its cot. She went into the room to check on her to find that someone was already doing the same thing.

A ghostly maidservant could be made out watching over the infant.

Finally, a psychic visiting Sudbury Hall encountered the ghost of a young woman named Mary, in the entrance to the kitchen. The spirit informed her that she'd been murdered there in 1715 and her body buried in the grounds. The house had since been extended over her grave, which now was right beneath their feet.

All that she wanted was the floor taken up and her bones exhumed, so that she could be given a Christian burial.