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Faringdon

The ghost of Hampden Pye haunts the Churchyard. It was seen by his mother as she entered her coach. He had married beneath his station, to a beautiful peasant girl from the village. This was undertaken without his mother’s consent, a ‘woman of inexorable severity’ and she most certainly did not approve. He left England to go to the Spanish Wars upon her insistence. His expedition was led by Sir George Rooke in 1702, but Hampden’s head was carried off by a shot. His spectre carried his head under his arm, but was finally laid to rest by an eminent vicar with bell, book an candle at a point on the Radcot Road. Read the full story.

The Bell Inn has a resident ghost. A monk-like apparition, regularly sighted by guests, probably dates from the time when the building was a hostelry for the monks of Beaulieu Abbey. They had a monastic grange on the outskirts of the town. 

In the early 1960s, Oriel Cottage, on the Wicklesham Road, was the scene of many disturbing ghostly noises. Rumblings and bangings kept the Wheeler family awake at night and the children refused to sleep upstairs. A mysterious shadow was sometimes seen and an inexplicable cold draught felt around the feet. The phenomena were thought to be caused by a former tenant who had committed suicide in the house. Fortunately, they ceased after a service of exorcism undertaken by Canon Christopher Harman.

Finchampstead

A poltergeist played tricks in a cottage called ‘The Forge’ at Finchampstead in 1926 and experts, who travelled down from London to observe the furniture and books being hurled about, went away little the wiser. The locals refused to believe this was caused by a dear old lady, who once lived there, as it seemed so very unlike her. Read the full story.

A little old lady frequents the lounge bar at the Queen’s Oak, often sitting in her favourite seat by the bar. A séance undertaken some years ago indicated that she was the grandmother of a small boy who had lived somewhere in the local area.