The Grey Lady, the Flying Glass and the Worm of Sexhow

Ask in any Stokesley pub whether the place is haunted and you will very rarely get a straight no. You may get a laugh, or a glance at the person behind the bar, or a story that begins “Well, I’m not saying I believe it, but…”. The Group has gathered these stories from the national collections of ghost lore and from books on the library shelves, and what follows is a tour of them. Let us be clear at the outset: none of this is history in the sense that the rest of this site is history. These are things people have said, and sometimes things people have seen, and that is all we claim for them.

In the town

Begin at the Golden Lion, where the Stokesley Show was founded in 1859. The staff there, the Group was told, have long believed in a Grey Lady, and at times feel someone in the corridors who is not there. Walk west to the site of Stone Hall, now flats, and you are standing at one end of a tunnel that supposedly ran to the church, used, as such tunnels always are, by smugglers. Nobody ever found it. Generations of local children went looking for the Stone Hall ghost too, and, the Group notes, none of them ever saw it.

At the Manor House, in the years when it housed the council offices, the court and the library, staff were convinced they heard footsteps in the corridors when nobody else was in the building. At the Angel Inn a White Lady was said to walk in 1982, long enough for the Evening Gazette to run a piece called “Inn where Angels fear to tread”. The cutting, the Group says, is in the library. There was, they add, no definite proof: only the word of those who had seen her.

The CCTV was checked straight away, which is the only reason anyone believes it.

The Spread Eagle has the most modern ghost in town. One quiet Sunday night in 2023, the pub’s camera caught a glass edging, very slowly, towards the end of a table before tipping itself over a customer. The detail that gives the story its strange persuasiveness is that the footage was checked at once, and that a similar thing happened in another part of the pub the same week. Make of it what you will. And at the far end of the High Street, a customer at the White Swan reported a man who walked through a wall, which may explain why he had already noticed the beer clips flying off the pumps with nobody near them.

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Out of town

The older stories live in the lanes. On the road once called Tweddell’s Stripe, a flaming carriage drawn by six grey hounds is said to carry a headless woman up and down the lane at speeds nobody had seen until the railway engines came. Broughton Bridge had, in the old phrase the Group quotes, always had a bad name: one rider coming from Broughton found a creature like an ass’s foal trotting beside his mare, was pitched over her head, and woke to find it gone.

The Coach Road to Busby Hall has its phantom coach and horses, and the hall itself its Madame Turner, once seen calmly drinking tea in the kitchen. At Sexhow, there was a worm: a dragon, in the old northern sense, which terrorised the district until it was killed and its skin hung in triumph in the church at Hutton Rudby, where, the story goes, it stayed for many years.

The crowing witch and the wise man

Not every legend is a ghost. Stokesley had a witch, too: Mary, or Polly, Marshall, who could reputedly bewitch cows, horses, cats, dogs and people until she was “God struck”, after which she was condemned to crow three times whenever a fowl crossed her path. And it had, for some years at the start of the nineteenth century, a celebrated wise man, John Wrightson, who sold cures and second sight from a cottage at the west end. He was a real person, and has a story of his own.

The grain of truth

Sometimes a legend turns out to have something solid underneath it. The phantom coach on the road to Angrove Hall, near Great Ayton, appears in a book by John Fairfax-Blakeborough, as the Group records. Two Stokesley researchers, Peter Meadows and Geoffrey Stout, went looking for the story behind it, and found that in 1818 a coachman from Angrove had been reported attempting to burgle another house in the area, and had shot himself when he was found out. A murder, a coach, a guilty man: it is not hard to see how the ghost came to be on the road.

That is the best any ghost story can hope for: not proof, but a reason why people might have needed to tell it.

The Group's original text (a selection, unaltered)

There are many collections and even databases of ghosts for the whole country. This small list has used them and books from the library, to identify those local to the Stokesley area.

The Grey Lady of the Golden Lion Hotel. House staff particularly in the Hotel have believed the stories and at times they feel a presence in the corridors.

The Ghost of Stone Hall. It has always been rumoured that an underground passageway went from the Church to Stone Hall and that it was connected with smuggling. Its presence has not been found and the ghost that many youngsters went in search of, was never seen.

The Old Courthouse and Library. The footsteps in the corridors when they were located in the Manor House. Before the Manor House returned to a private residence, it was used by the local authorities and during this time, workers were convinced that someone was walking in the corridors when no one was there.

The White Lady of the Angel Inn. For a short period in 1982 the story circulated the town and a report appeared in the Evening Gazette titled Inn where Angels fear to tread. Needless to say, there was no definite proof just the words of those who had seen the spectre in the Inn. [See paper cutting in library.] Ghost hunters have investigated.

The Flying Glasses of the Spread Eagle. 2023 saw an incident caught on the CCTV in the pub one quiet Sunday night. It records a glass moving imperceptibly towards the edge of the table before it threw itself over one of the customers sat at the table. This might have been forgotten except for the CCTV was checked straight after showing the incident. To make the occurrence more serious a similar incident happened in another part of the pub in the same week.

The White Swan. Seen by a customer was the man who disappeared through a wall at The White Swan in Stokesley. His shock reinforced the feelings he had had seeing beer clips being thrown to the floor on more than one occasion with no-one around.

The Flaming Carriage on the Stripe. Once called Tweddell’s Stripe, a ghostly form appears as a flaming carriage drawn by six grey hounds. The occupant a woman without a head is whisked up and down the lane at speeds unseen until railway engines began appearing.

Troublesome Broughton Bridge. Many are the tales told of this location about those brave enough to pass. One man was riding from Broughton to Stokesley and when he reached the bridge, a thing like an ass’s foal came and trotted alongside. All at once, the man tumbled right over his mare’s head onto the ground. When he came to and got up, the apparition had gone. ‘Broughton Brig awlus had a bad neeam’.

The ‘Crowing Witch’ of Stokesley was reputed to be able to bewitch cows, horses, cats, dogs and humans. Her name was Mary Marshall but sometimes it was recorded as Polly Marshall. Eventually it seems she was ‘God struck’ and ceased her actions except as punishment, she had to loudly crow three times whenever a fowl crossed her path.

Busby Hall. A ghostly coach and horses haunt the Coach Road to Busby Hall. The ghost of Madame Turner was once seen in the kitchen of Busby Hall drinking tea; the phantom was also said to haunt the corridors of her former home and the road leading to the hall.

The Worm of Sexhow. There was a frightful worm at Sexhow, which was a menace and a dread to the local people. When at last the Worm of Sexhow was slain, the happy villagers carried its pelt to the parish church in Hutton Rudby, and hung it in triumph against the wall, where it remained for many long years.

Angrove Hall, near Great Ayton. The coach and horses that haunt the coach road to Angrove Hall is recorded in the book by John Fairfax-Blakeborough. Peter Meadows and Geoffrey Stout of Stokesley tried to investigate this story, and decided that the murder and the ghost story might have had a grain of truth in them because in 1818 it had indeed been reported that a coachman from Angrove had attempted to burgle another house in the area and when his crime was discovered had shot himself.