Who is the Grey Lady?

I was ten years old when it happened. Looking back I am sure it was her ghost that I saw that autumn evening from my bedroom window.

The town of Dudley, West Midlands is steeped in history. Its Norman Castle stands out from the highest point of this time honoured Black Country town like an old decaying tooth.

Although reputedly the home to more than one ghost, the wraith of the Grey Lady has returned through the centuries and haunted us mortals who care to link the past with the present, and who dare to be foolish enough to seek out the unknown.

As a child my home overlooked Dudley Castle, a mile distant to the west. One evening, I have no idea exactly how long ago, but it would have been in the mid sixties when I was a little boy, I was in my room, grounded by a throat infection. My bedroom window directly overlooked the Castle ruins. On this occasion, probably through boredom, I spent some time gazing out through the window as the sun went down behind the Castle. I could see, quite clearly, up there, on the battlements a human figure. The Castle grounds, which are also home to Dudley zoo, were closed for the day.

Being so far away, I could not make out whether it was a man or woman, but this very upright, slender figure slowly moved around the keep in a soft and un-deliberate flowing motion, sometimes pausing for a while before moving on.

After about ten minutes or so, and for no apparent reason it was no longer visible. By that, I mean that it was there one second, quite clearly, and then, nothing at all. I can recall the whole episode as if it was yesterday, and I remember still vividly that I was left with a sort of feeling of despair or ‘what’s the point’ as the experience unfolded before me.

The event puzzled me at the time, but I soon forgot all about it, until quite a few years later, when my mother mentioned that she had seen from the kitchen window, a shadowy figure that moved slowly around the Castle keep with a steady flowing motion and wondered if was the ghost of the Grey Lady.

My appetite for more knowledge on the Grey Lady and the haunted castle on my doorstep was honed.

During the English civil war, Dudley Castle was laid siege on two separate occasions. The second assault on the Castle took place in 1646, by a force of Parliamentarian troops led by General Sir William Brereton. The siege lasted for three weeks, and during this time, one Dorothy Beaumont, wife of the Garrison’s Second in Command, died within the Castle walls probably of natural causes connected with childbirth.

This left quite a predicament for the Royalist Commander Colonel Leveson. As there was no means of burial inside the Castle grounds, Mistress Beaumont’s body would have to be ‘committed to the ground’ in the usual way, by burial in the local churchyard, obviously before too much decomposition and the acompanying unpleasantness of putrefaction set in.

The problem was that the church nearest to Dudley Castle, St Edmunds, known locally today as ‘Lower Church’, had been pulled down by the Royalists as it was considered too close to the Castle and a possible place of concealment for the opposing Roundheads.

This meant the funeral would have to be held at St Thomas’s Church or ‘Top Church’, at the other end of what is now Dudley High Street and Market Place, and the other side of enemy lines.

Negotiations were hastily put in place and a brief ceasefire was observed as the funeral party, minus Dorothy’s husband passed through the Parliamentarians lines for a speedy burial in St Thomass churchyard.

Today, a fundraising event macabrely known as ‘The Coffin Race’, where two teams carrying coffins compete in a race from the Castle to St Thomas’s church, is held annually to raise cash for local charities.

The ghost of the Grey Lady still makes occasional appearances around Dudley Castle, often to the surprise of visitors. According to Staff at the Castle, on one occasion a group of visitors were being treated to a ghost talk. When an actress playing the part of the Grey Lady, dressed in period costume, joined the proceedings from the darkened end of the room, the audience became confused after seeing a second female figure also dressed in Grey waiting in the shadows near where the actress had made her entrance.

Organized Ghost Walks around Dudley which include the Castle grounds, the ruins of Dudley’s haunted Priory, and parts of the Town centre can be booked by visiting the Dudley Ghost Walk website. Keep watching The Hidden realm of Britain, I will be covering the Ghost walk in a future posting. JCA

Gunpowder, Treason and Plot !

The main contenders in the Gunpowder Plot

In a small rural enclave of old Staffordshire sits a dark and brooding area of woodland. Once part of the extensive Pensnett Chase, Himley Wood is one of the last remnants of this once vast forest, long lost to the Scythe and the plough.

The wood is a popular place for dog-walkers who meander with their pets daily along the pathways which once formed ancient byways and bridle paths.

In summer the place is dark and can be eerie. At this time of year, the English Autumn, you can feel, suddenly, very alone beneath the branches of it's English Oaks and Beech trees as the delicate leaves, like golden snowflakes flutter to the soft earth to be swallowed up in the mud of a dozen centuries.

Himley Wood bears a terrible and mostly forgotten secret.

After the failed Gunpowder Plot of 5th November 1605, and following the apprehension of Guido Fawkes, the remaining plotters, Ambrose Rookwood, John (Jack) Wright, Christopher (Kit) Wright, Thomas Percy, Robert Catesby, and the Winter Brothers, in the company of others, and now desperate men, made their way north from London, seeking refuge where ever they could find a sympathetic roof. They finally came to rest at Holbeache House near Kingswinford, the home of Stephen Lyttleton, where, on 8 November 1605, Robert Walsh, the Sherriff of Worcester and his men caught up with them and laid siege to the house. The conspirators were trying to dry out their powder barrels which had either become wet from the ensuing autumn rains or else from fording the river Stour.

Gunpowder and fire do not mix and the black powder exploded blinding one of the party and injuring others. Chaos ensued and the Sheriff’s men went in mob-handed.

In the confusion of fighting, flames, and the rattle of musket fire, Lyttleton’s Groom, a young lad by the name of Gideon Grove, managed to mount a horse and escape westwards towards the village of Wombourne, pursued vigorously by a contingent of the Sheriff's Men-at-Arms.

Already suffering a serious throat injury, Gideon Grove entered Himley Wood which lies less than half a mile from Holbeache House. Riding at break-neck speed his mount lurched into a swamp and horse and rider began to sink. The pursuers were upon the scene in seconds, and as Grove called pitifully for help from his tormentors, his young life was cut brutally short by a volley of musket balls, whereupon the Sheriff's men returned to to the melee at Holbeache, leaving him to sink forever into the rancid bog. The morbid event, in its entirety was witnessed by an old charcoal burner, too fearful for his own life to make his presence known.

The route of Gideon Grove's last journey.

The swamp where he met his death is on the left of the photograph.

Yesterday, as I once again trod the same path along that deserted old trackway that had mapped the last journey of Gideon Grove and his steed, I thought back to all the reports of sightings of the Spectre of the young groom which have had a habit of resurfacing time and again over the last four decades. It seems that the Shade of Gideon Grove still rides the lanes and paths around Himley, Wombourne and neighbouring Swindon. Speak to any old local in the surrounding pubs and Inns and you will hear tell of a dark rider on a moonlit night, or the stampeding thunder of a miriad unseen hooves which stop as suddenly as they begin, leaving an uncanny and frightening silence so terrifying that those who have experienced the phenomenon are left jibbering.

Staring into that dark and fetid swamp almost four hundred and one years to the day after the murderous event, I felt suddenly very alone, as if in a sinister time warp. A sudden squall raced through the Sycamores behind me, a sprinkling of leaves came to rest on the surface of the dark waters; somewhere, there was the remote sound of traffic in a distant lane. I came to my senses, gathered my thoughts and headed away from that watery grave.