CREEPY CHISWICK

For my latest walk I stayed local - and check the supposedly haunted sites around Chiswick. The walk is taken from 'Walking Haunted London' by Richard Jones, and any quotes used to explain the ghostly sightings are taken from that book.

I started at Turnham Green, and The Tabard Inn:

It's said that this pub - built in 1880 - is haunted by "the shade of an old lady, dressed all in black, who sits at tables saying nothing but apparently whistling to herself, although no sound in ever heard".


Wandering through the very pleasant Victorian streets of Bedford Park I came to a very unremarkable row of council houses. But it is here that it is said a poltergeist used to roam.

In July 1956, the poltergeist started throwing coins at the occupants of one of the houses. "Their 13-year old son David was struck in the face. When razor blades began to drift around the house and a spanner thrown by an unseen hand smashed a window pane, the family finally called the police." The officers were also struck by flying coins, in the garden. It was decided that the ghoul was focusing his attention on young David, so he was sent away to stay with relatives. The spooky activity ceased, and didn't start up again on his return.

From there I walked to Chiswick High Road, and Chiswick police station.

It was built on the site of Linden House - an 18th century manor - where, in 1792, Mrs Abercrombie was hacked to death by her son-in-law, Thomas Wainwright. In the 1950s, when the building was occupied by Chiswick Fire Station, firemen would often "hear the sounds of a woman's footsteps walking briskly around the basement during the early hours of the morning. The noise would always stop the moment anyone opened the basement door and switched on the lights". Since becoming the police station, the noises have stopped, but "a spectral lady has been known to put in ghostly appearances on the third floor of the new building".

Not far away - next to the post office - is the Chiswick Warehouse. It's now posh, expensive, apartments - but 20 years ago, the warehouse workers were scared of visiting the second floor. They talked of an icy coldness and "a mysterious, sinister-looking man seen lurking in the shadows and of strange shapes that twisted and writhed across the ceilings". There was also talk of being jabbed in the back by invisible fingers, and of a little old man who walked straight through a locked door.

After an unremarkable walk through a residential area and across the A4, I headed to Chiswick House. But first I came across an interesting memorial to the victims of the first V2 bomb to fall on London during the Second World War. It's not necessarily haunted, or pointed out on the walk, but I thought it was worth noting.

As I entered the grounds of Chiswick House, I'm not kidding when I say the sun - which had been blazing all day - went in, and the temperature definitely dropped a couple of degrees. Not so sure about dark shadows in the undergrowth, but it was certainly a bit creepy.




The house itself was built in 1725, and designed by the Earl of Burlington. Two prime ministers have died here - Charles James Fox in 1806 and George Canning in 1827. It became a lunatic asylum in the late 19th century, and was eventually bought by the Ministry of Works in 1956. "It was during this refurbishment that the inexplicable smell of bacon and eggs would waft around the building. The workmen laughed it off as the ghost of 'one of the mad cooks'. Ever since, though, staff and visitors have constantly been mystified by the distinctive smell of fried bacon that permeates the back gallery. Some visitors claim to sense a female presence in the bedchamber and one lady looking in the mirror there - the only original mirror in the house - was dumbfounded to see the distinctive form of Lady Burlington reflected behind her, but on turning she found the room empty.

The next bit of the walk was around Chiswick Mall - a very villagey area, which you would never think was in London. On reaching St Nicholas Church I was all ready to have a wander round the graveyard - apparently haunted by the white-clad figures of Mary Facounberg and Frances Rich - the daughters of Oliver Cromwell.
"Rumours have long circulated that, following her father's posthumous beheading, Mary bribed a guard to allow her to smuggle her father's headless corpse away from Tyburn, and that she subsequently had it re-interred in the same vault at St Nicholas's where she and her sister would eventually rest. When the church was rebuilt in 1882 the vicar decided to investigate the rumour and he opened the vault. He found the coffins of the two sisters but also a third coffin, which showed signs of rough usage. Fearing the arrival of groups of sightseers to moralise over Cromwell, he had the vault bricked up and left it unmarked. Perhaps the fact that their resting place was desecrated by a vicar, who, by his own admission, disliked everything their father stood for, is why the two spirits return to wander amongst the graves."

However, I didn't get to wander around much - save to see the memorial to the engraver William Hogarth - because a VERY creepy man, dressed all in black, with long jet black hair and dark glasses was walking his cat there, and that was scarier than any ghost!
Opposite the church is Old Burlington.

It used to be a tap room, and is haunted by "a good-humoured, harmless old ghost, who sports a wide-brimmed black hat and billowing cloak. Since he is just content to stare out from the upper windows and cause no inconvenience, he is left to his own devices by residents, who have christened him 'Percy'".

Passing all the gorgeous houses on Chiswick Mall, alongside the Thames, I came to Walpole House.
This is where a former mistress of Charles the Second - the Duchess of Cleveland, Barbara Villiers - spent the last two years of her life. She was arguably one of the most beautiful women of 17th century society. "By the time she came to live here, her royal lover had been dead some twenty year, and worse still, her appearance had begun to change alarmingly. She had swelled 'gradually to a monstrous bulk', which has physician diagnosed as dropsy... Local residents would talk of seeing her bathed in moonlight, standing at the window, her hands clasped to her breast, imploring her maker to restore her beauty." She died on October 9th 1709, aged 67.
Now, when the moon shines on the windows of here old house, it's said Barbara's puffy, bloated face can still sometimes be seen "pressed against the glass, her dark eyes rolling in despair as she implores and begs for the restoration of her lost looks".



The final spooky site on the walk just happens to be one of our favourite pubs - The Black Lion, and rather handily the story of the Hammersmith Ghost is told on a board outside: