This website accompanies and supplements the ‘Haunted Yorkshire Dales’ as a comprehensive and informative additional resource for the supernatural enthusiast and the ‘armchair traveller’ alike. The richness and variety of ghostly tales and the constraints of paperback publishing meant that I couldn’t include everything in the book, and the inevitable additions I uncovered after going to print are included here on this site hopefully providing the opportunity to enjoy some more haunting tales from the Yorkshire Dales.
I hope that the interactive location map (that is currently being developed) will also prove a useful tool as there are so many locations featured in the book, and the Dales do cover an extensive chunk of the landscape.
In addition, if you’d like to post your own stories and experiences I would be very interested as I continue to collect material and would be very interested to hear from anyone who would like to share a ghostly tale founded in the district – a contact link is available here
As I am not genetically rooted to Yorkshire, I will probably always remain an ‘off cumden’ as my family have not been indigenous residents for at least 150 years! But my existence is none the poorer for that. As I walk or drive along the roads and lanes around my home (I’m lucky enough to live within the boundaries of the Yorkshire Dales National Park) my surroundings never fail to inspire me. The Dales are such a unique area of the British Isles, with a geography that demands respect as well as spawning such famous characters as Hannah Hauxwell and James Alfred Wright, better known as Dales vet James Herriot, to name but two, but also inspiring a wealth of literature and poetry and of course many, many ghost stories…
The subject of ghosts and belief in their existence has proved to be a contentious one – to some tantamount to dabbling in the Occult, while to others the acknowledgement that there is something beyond our plane of existence giving us a momentary glimpse of ‘the other side’. Probably the first question people have asked me in the course of my research is not ‘have you ever seen a ghost?’ but ‘do you believe in ghosts?’ The supernatural can be unsettling because it is the unexplained. Perhaps the unexpected and the mystery is what helps to keep our imaginations alive, although ultimate scientific proof of another dimension has of course yet to be presented. It has been estimated that one in ten people have seen a ghost. It has also been argued that presented with the knowledge that they are occupying an acknowledged ‘haunted hotspot’, and in the right frame of mind then that person would be more likely to experience a haunting phenomenon – yet the absence of concrete proof does not shake the foundation of their existing belief. But in the face of the weight of historical and existing accounts can you ultimately dismiss the possibility out of hand?
Whether sceptic or accepting, or just plain keeping an open mind, I hope you enjoy this website and Haunted Yorkshire Dales if you choose to buy a copy of the book.