1. Edinburgh Castle – Edinburgh, Scotland
Edinburgh Castle is reputed to be one of the most haunted spots in Scotland. And Edinburgh itself has been called the most haunted city in all of Europe. On various occasions, visitors to the castle have reported a phantom piper, a headless drummer, the spirits of French prisoners from the Seven Years War and colonial prisoners from the American Revolutionary War – even the ghost of a dog wandering in the grounds’ dog cemetery.
As with all castles, Edinburgh’s fortress has been a centre of military activity. As an ancient fortress Edinburgh Castle is one of the few that still has a military garrison, albeit for largely ceremonial and administrative purposes. The New Barrack Block is now home to the official headquarters of the Royal Regiment of Scotland and 52 Infantry Brigade, as well as home to the regimental museum of the Royal Scots and Royal Scots Dragoon Guards. The Governor of Edinburgh Castle is Major General David McDowall, GOC of the British Army’s 2nd Division. The Governor of the Castle has always been the head of the Army in Scotland. Direct administration of the castle by the War Office only came to an end in 1923 when the army formally moved to the city’s new Redford Barracks. Nevertheless, the Castle continues to have a strong connection with the Army. Sentries still stand watch at the castle gatehouse after opening hours, with responsibility for guarding the Honours of Scotland.
2. The Whaley House – San Diego, California,US
Located in San Diego, California, the Whaley House has earned the title of “the most haunted house in the U.S.” Built in 1857 by Thomas Whaley on land that was partially once a cemetery, the house has since been the locus of dozens of ghost sightings.
Author deTraci Regula relates her experiences with the house: “Over the years, while dining across the street at the Old Town Mexican Cafe, I became accustomed to noticing that the shutters of the second-story windows [of the Whaley House] would sometimes open while we ate dinner, long after the house was closed for the day. On a recent visit, I could feel the energy in several spots in the house, particularly in the courtroom, where I also smelled the faint scent of a cigar, supposedly Whaley’s calling-card. In the hallway, I smelled perfume, initially attributing that to the young woman acting as docent, but some later surreptitious sniffing in her direction as I talked to her about the house revealed her to be scent-free.”
3. The Borley Rectory – Borley, England
Borley Rectory was constructed near Borley Church by the Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull in 1862, and he moved in a year after being named rector of the parish. The large brick building was built in a style influenced by Pugin, that replaced the rather earlier Georgian house built for a Reverend Herringham, which Henry Bull demolished. The rectory would eventually be enlarged to house a family of 14 children.
The church dates from the 12th century and serves a rather scattered rural community making up the parish. There are several substantial farmhouses, and the fragmentary remains of Borley Hall, once the seat of the Waldegrave family. Ghost-hunters like to quote the legend of a Benedictine monastery supposedly built in this area about 1362, according to which a monk from the monastery carried on a relationship with a nun from a nearby convent. After their affair was discovered, the monk was executed and the nun bricked up alive in the convent walls. It was confirmed in 1938[citation needed] that this legend had no historical basis and seems to have been invented by the rector’s children to romanticise their red-brick rectory. The story of the walling up of the nun was probably taken from a novel by Rider Haggard.
4. The Bell Farm – Adams, Tennessee, US
The Bell Farm has been made notorious through books, TV specials and movies. Most recently the events at this small Tennessee farm were dramatized in the 2005 movie An American Haunting. The story behind the Bell Farm haunting is so notable and recognized because it is said to be the only documented account in paranormal history when a ghost caused the death of a living person. Between the years of 1817 and 1821, the Bell Family was terrorized by some sort of entity, mostly said to be a woman, who became known as the Bell Witch or, more personally, “Kate.” She is said to have perturbed and tortured John Bell (the father of the family and victim of a nervous system disorder) so much that it lead to his inevitable death.
He was unable to sleep or recuperate and the ghost’s antics worsened his condition. It is also said that a vile with a strange black liquid was found at John Bell’s deathbed and that Kate herself claimed she gave it to him. Supposedly, in order to test the liquids validity, a drop was placed on the family cat’s tongue and it immediately killed the animal. Though the haunting of the Bell Farm has been sensationalized many times over, it is still inarguable that something happened there during those three years. A family and a community were terrorized by an entity of some kind, and residents still believe Kate is up to no good. For an extensive history of everything that went on at the Bell Farm, click here.
5. Raynham Hall – Norfolk, England
Raynham Hall in Norfolk, England, is most famous for the ghost of “the Brown Lady,” which was captured on film in 1936 in what is considered one of the most authentic ghost pictures ever taken.
The Unexplained Site describes one of the first encounters with the spirit: “The first known sighting happened during the 1835 Christmas season. Colonel Loftus, who happened to be visiting for the holidays, was walking to his room late one night when he saw a strange figure ahead of him. As he tried to gain a better look, the figure promptly disappeared. The next week, the Colonel was again came upon the woman. He described her as a noble woman who wore a brown satin dress. Her face seemed to glow, which highlighted her empty eye sockets.”
6. The Queen Mary – Long Beach, California, US
This grand old ship is quite haunted, according to the many people who have worked on and visited the craft. Once a celebrated luxury ocean liner, when it ended its sailing days the Queen Mary was purchased by the city of Long Beach, California in 1967 and transformed into a hotel.The most haunted area of the ship is the engine room where a 17-year-old sailor was crushed to death trying to escape a fire. Knocking and banging on the pipes around the door has been heard and recorded by numerous people. In what is now the front desk area of the hotel, visitors have seen the ghost of a “lady in white.”
Ghosts of children are said to haunt the ship’s pool. The spirit of a young girl, who allegedly broke her neck in an accident at the pool, has been heard asking for her mother or her doll. In the hallway of the pool’s changing rooms is an area of unexplained activity. Furniture moves about by itself, people feel the touch of unseen hands and unknown spirits appear. In the front hull of the ship, a specter can sometimes be heard screaming – the pained voice, some believe, of a sailor who was killed when the Queen Mary collided with a smaller ship.
7. The White House – Washington D.C., US
That’s right, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. is not only home to the current President of the United States, it also is home of several former presidents who occasionally decide to make their presences known there, despite the fact that they are dead.President Harrison is said to be heard rummaging around in the attic of the White House, looking for who knows what. President Andrew Jackson is thought to haunt his White House bedroom. And the ghost of First Lady Abigail Adams was seen floating through one of the White House hallways, as if carrying something.
The most frequently sighted presidential ghost has been that of Abraham Lincoln. Eleanor Roosevelt once stated she believed she felt the presence of Lincoln watching her as she worked in the Lincoln bedroom. Also during the Roosevelt administration, a young clerk claimed to have actually seen the ghost of Lincoln sitting on a bed pulling off his boots. On another occasion, while spending a night at the White House during the Roosevelt presidency, Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands was awakened by a knock on the bedroom door. Answering it, she was confronted with the ghost of Abe Lincoln staring at her from the hallway. Calvin Coolidge’s wife reported seeing on several occasions the ghost of Lincoln standing with his hands clasped behind his back, at a window in the Oval Office, staring out in deep contemplation toward the bloody battlefields across the Potomac.
8. The Tower of London – London, England
The Tower of London, one of the most famous and well-preserved historical buildings in the world, may also be one of the most haunted. This is due, no doubt, to the scores of executions, murders and tortures that have taken place within its walls over the last 1,000 years. Dozens upon dozens of ghost sightings have been reported in and around the Tower. On one winter day in 1957 at 3 a.m., a guard was disturbed by something striking the top of his guardhouse. When he stepped outside to investigate, he saw a shapeless white figure on top of the tower. It was then realized that on that very same date, February 12, Lady Jane Grey was beheaded in 1554.
Perhaps the most well-known ghostly resident of the Tower is the spirit of Ann Boleyn, one of the wives of Henry VIII, who was also beheaded in the Tower in 1536. Her ghost has been spotted on many occasions, sometimes carrying her head, on Tower Green and in the Tower Chapel Royal.
Other ghosts of the Tower include those of Henry VI, Thomas a Becket and Sir Walter Raleigh. One of the most gruesome ghost stories connected with the Tower of London describes death of the Countess of Salisbury. According to one account, “the Countess was sentenced to death in 1541 following her alleged involvement in criminal activities (although it is now widely believed that she was probably innocent). After being sent struggling to the scaffold, she ran from the block and was pursued until she was hacked to death by the axe man.” Her execution ceremony has been seen re-enacted by spirits on Tower Green.
9. Ballygally Castle – Ballygally Bay, Ireland
Ballygally Castle is a castle in the village of Ballygally, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, located approximately three miles north of Larne. The castle overlooks the sea at the head of Ballygally Bay. The castle is the only 17th century building still used as a residence in Northern Ireland, and is reputed to be one of the most haunted places in the province.The castle was built in 1625 by James Shaw, of Scotland, who had come to the area and rented the land from the Earl of Antrim for £24 a year. It was built in the style of a French chateau with high walls, steep roof, dormer windows and corner turrets. The walls are five feet thick with loopholes for muskets. An open stream ran through the outer hall to provide water in case of siege. The castle did come under attack, from the Irish garrison at Glenarm, several times during the rebellion of 1641 but each assault was unsuccessful. The castle was owned by the Shaw family until it passed into the hands of William Shaw in 1799.
He sold the estate for £15,400. In the 1950s the castle was bought by the carpet tycoon Cyril Lord and was extended and renovated. It is now owned and run by the Hastings Hotels Group.The castle is reputed to host a number of ghosts, the most active of which is the former resident, Lady Isobel Shaw, who amuses herself by knocking at the doors of different rooms and then suddenly disappearing. When she was alive, Isobel was locked in her room and starved by her husband. She leapt to her death from a window. Madame Nixon is another ghost who lived in the hotel in the 19th century. She can be heard walking around the hotel in her silk dress.
10.The Rose Hall Great House – Montego Bay, Jamaica
Rose Hall great house, the most famous in Jamaica. It is a Georgian Mansion with a stone base and a plastered upper storey, high on the hillside, with a fantastic panorama over the coast. Built in the 1770s, Rose Hall was restored in the 1960s to its former splendour, with mahogany floors, interior windows and doorways, panelling and wooden ceilings. It is decorated with silk wallpaper printed with palms and birds, ornamented with chandeliers and furnished with mostly European antiques. There’s a bar downstairs and a restaurant.
Rose Hall is most famous for the story of its mistress Annie Palmer, who came here in 1820, and the fanciful legends of underground tunnels, bloodstains and hauntings. A renowned beauty, Annie Palmer was widely feared as a black magician, and she is also supposed to have dispatched three husbands (by poison, by stabbing and then pouring boiling oil into his ears, and by strangling) and innumerable lovers, including slaves, whom she simply killed when she was bored of them. She was 4ft 11ins high and was murdered in her bed. There is little evidence to support the legend, an amusing version of which was written up by H. G. de Lisser in his “White Witch of Rose Hall”, though maybe you’ll be convinced by the ghostly faces that appear in photographs taken by tourists.
Some of the credits to http://inventorspot.com
www.wikipedia.org/
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Check out Rolling Hills in East Bethany NY. That place is full of ghosts.
What a bunch of crapola. A guy hears a raccoon climbing around on the rooftop at 3 a.m., goes outside and sees a puff of smoke (a shapeless white figure), and of course this is the ghost of Ann Boleyn.
The Queen Mary is a building made entirely of steel, that is exposed to the California sun and the California current. It is exposed to huge temperature swings over the course of a day, and the steel expands, flexes, and contracts as a result, sometimes doing so with a loud banging noise. In addition, it is floating in the ocean, with wave action that is capable of moving deck chairs around (every other piece of furniture is either bolted down or simply heavier).
John Bell was obviously mentally ill and was seeing visions, and died from drinking from a vial of poison that he placed next to his bed, after he drank it and before he died. (That is how the poison ended up next to his bed, DUH!!!)
This whole article is a sad commentary on the state of American education and the degree of gullibility that still exists even to this day in ordinary people.
This all may be crap, however, I do not believe that it has anything to do with “the state of American education” or the “degree of gullibility” in these people. What do you care if people want to believe that ghosts exist? Have you no sense of romanticism? What is wrong with believing in ghosts or UFO’s or gods? Are you so arrogant as to believe that there is nothing bigger than yourself in this world/galaxy/universe?
We don’t have raccoons in England…
What I find the funniest is people who “don’t believe” explaining everything away to “prove” their point. If you don’t believe, is it necessary to try to prove it wrong? If believers are so stupid, how urgent is it to explain things to them? Why does anyone who doesn’t believe even care??
To the poster above. Why is it that idiots like you have to have a ilogical explanation for everything. There have been hudnreds of millions of people that have either witnessed, seen, or experienced some type of unexplainable event. How are you going to discount that? You are going to sit here and say it was the wind, and a racoon every single time? Get some sense and understand that just because we are human, everything does not need to make scientific sense.
I’ve seen something at the Whaley house, i totally believe its haunted.
Thanks for this. I kinda want to visit all of them. You know, I think it’ll be a novel idea for a travel agency to offer a haunted vacation package of some sort.
Savannah, GA is known as one of the most haunted cities in america. Not only that but it is a great city to visit. They have a really fun haunted pub tour where your guide walks you around the city at night to different bars and pubs telling you ghost stories along the way and about the bars and pubs. Check out http://www.savannahgavacations.com or http://www.savannahvisit.com
What bothers me about your statement ‘bullocks’ is that you are quite obviously very biased and closed-minded. There are so many cases out there where several witnesses report the same occurrances over several hundred years without knowing each others’ stories. It’s what is known as historical evidence. While you are somewhat correct in thinking that most experiences are created by matrixing or some other function of the brain, there are some genuine cases that cannot be explained by normal means.
Of course, anyone who’s done research on the paranormal would have a basic understanding of this, which leads me to believe you are just spewing your ignorance of the subject.
Honestly, don’t you think that if there was nothing to it, the idea would have been dismissed around the same time we discovered the world was not flat or that lightning strikes did not mean the gods were angry with us?
In after troll.
Hey “bullocks”,
Your commentary just shows the sad state of your education. Most of the haunted sites in this article are in Europe, backed up by Europeans but obviously your America bashing isn’t predisposed to actual facts I am sure. Much easier to bash us with baseless stereotypes with no imagination. Hey, why don’t you go invent an atomic bomb (even with the help of defecting Germans), or a mass form of communication of some type……
Oh by the way, unless you meant your name to represent international furniture wholesalers then the anglo saxon word for testicles is BOLLOCKS
What about Bachelor’s Grove Cemetary in suburban Chicago?
Ahhh, obviously you have never stayed in a haunted house. I grew up in a House in Reseda California. And it was haunted, but before you dismiss me as a loon first understand why I thought it was haunted.
- Several times myself as well as guests would see a Black cat (whom my mother thought was a deceased cat of hers) walking through the house, but was never found. You’d see it go into a closet, open the closet, and its empty, or it would walk into a bedroom, and not be there when you looked (we had a light tan cat at the time, who hated other cats)
- Many many many times the kitchen light would turn off and on, more specifically the switch would go up and down (my brother and I were both too young to reach the switch that was placed far above the standard [i might be off a bit] 4 feet) This switch was very tight and made a loud snap (metal on metal) when switched.
-There was a 2 foot crawl space under most of the house, there were several times that people in my family would see a person walking around, on the actual ground (you’d see them from about knee cap up) There was someone dressed almost like a cowboy (I later found out there were cattle farms in the area some 75-100 years earlier), and the more common, ‘old lady with a gray shall’.
- Now there were many other occasions where other things happened, but they are a bit less compelling, ie. exploding light bulbs (3 occasions), framed pictures flying off the walls, landing several feet away. There was even one time (yep just once) that it sounded like there was a mouse in a box of (we’ll just call it) rice krispies, I pured it out, there was no prize (mouse).
- The real one that made me believe (also around the height of the haunting) I saw someone standing outside of the sliding glass door, and I ran to my mom (who was watching TV thus didn’t see it) not 1 minute after I got up, the ceiling caved in (though it probably wouldn’t have killed me, it would have been quite painful)
All of this ended a few days after my grandpa died of a heart attack on the front lawn. however he had a ritual morning shower, and the bathroom mirror would steam up every morning, and you could smell his cologne for several years after.
After I moved I learned the people who live there now have similar experiences.
Oh, don’t be such a spoil sport. Whether it’s true or not, it’s a fun thing to muse about- or is fun beyond your capacity?
Whilst not bullocks, if there were any real proof of a haunting, ghost or any paranormal activity, then it would be the amazing discovery in human history and would change our lives for ever.
The James Randi Educational Foundation offers a one million dollar prize to anyone who can give, under controlled conditions, evidence of the paranormal.
If you think your house is haunted you should try to go for this prize. If it’s haunted, you’ll be famous and a million bucks richer. I wonder why the prize has never been claimed?
I’m open to the possibility of ghosts, but I wonder why they seem to hang out only in places well-known to the public, usually with historical significance. What do ghosts have against three-bedroom ranch houses in Dubuque?
Dear Moron,
It’s morons like you that make ghosts seem like they don’t really even want to
be bothered to come up and share the evidence that has been gathered
over the past several hundreds (or thousands) of years that they might even want to talk
to someone because other people like you are so full of self-effacing
nothingness that no ghost every possibly could if they couldn’t they would but they can’t if no one gives them a chance to get a chance to get a way to get over the
ridge into the new dimensions of reality that some people have been talking over and over.
I know there are doubters out there about paranormal activity,and yeah it hasn’t been proved by science that there is a god..BUT there is too much historical evidence to dismiss the idea of ghosts. even if you’re not a believer, you cant tell me that you’ve never pondered the idea of ghosts.
I dont think anyone can become a true believer of the unknown until they have experienced something unexplainable. those who are closed minded never will.
and most people i know, who are in fact open minded to this subject, have experienced something..
Greyfriars Kirkyard + cemetary is way more haunted. The Covenanters Prison is one of the only places in the world where supernatural activity has been recorded and accepted as scientific fact. It is regularly closed due to the sheer number of attacks that take place there with multiple reliable witnesses.
All ’round good feature though. Nice to see the Castle at No. 1, deserved or not….
Most of the buildings that people experience these issues in have semi-metalic or crystalline embed rock structures that causes magnetic induction over a period of time. This causes the human brain to experience hallucinations. There is a medical treatment for this that requires injecting fluid under the skin to change or desensitize the person to the magnetic waves. Modern building also suffer from these problems when wired incorrectly and again inducing magnetic fields into the human brain. Numerous experiments have been done on this topic and every case of a “haunted house” or “haunted castle” has been verified to be caused by either artificial or natural forms of magnetic induction.
The Whaley House in San Diego is not haunted.
I live in SD and I know for a fact that there is an
old lady who takes care of the place after dark who goes
around perpetuating the myth that it is haunted.
She always wears black and doesn’t talk to any one…
Try the Old town cemetery, it’s a few blocks from the
above mentioned house… that place is haunted!
I was interested until I got to 3…..
PS your email field is too small for my address
I don’t believe in ghosts, but I do find stories about them to be rather interesting.
You use “in the world” in your title yet never mention New Orleans or anywhere in Canada. Toronto, Guelph and Kitchener in Ontario, Canada are recorded as amongst the most haunted places in North America. I’ve collected stories for these cities for 25 years, sometimes from multiple people who’ve lived in the same house.
i love stories like this
but always gives me chills
I actually know of one place that not many people speak of and it is haunted, Deer park castle in howth, co, Dublin, Ireland, where im from. About 5 friends and i witness’s a white figure emerge from a solid stone wall in the private grounds of the castle, it moved slowly across the dirt road and vanished in the hedges, on a later(Daylight) tour of the grounds we discovered deep in the bushes directly in line with the area the figure disappeared is a small cottage completely destroyed and covered in ivy and plants. My sisters friend when in school lived in the castle, and the story goes as follows: In 1656 a young girl a descendant of my sisters friend was kidnapped while returning from a trip abroad, her body was never returned but the family to this very day set a place for her at the dinner table in the great hall, and i am not the first to see this ghost, the entire family see it regularily and everyone who has lived there has….. If you are visiting the nearby hotel stop by the castle at dusk, but be careful the gates close after dark, the hounds released and the white lady wakes. True story guys 100% what ive seen and been told from the source. And the girls kidnap checks out historically, also its taboo in the family to speak of it.
isn’t this boring
How’s your pork?
I’m upset. Why did they not mention anything about Eastern State Pen in Philadelphia? It’s crap that they named the Whailey House the most haunted place in the U.S. Eastern State is actually the most haunted place in America. Numerous organizations have claimed this. (Ghost Hunters and MTV’s Fear to name just a few.) It’s even had quite a few specials specifically dedicated to it. I can count 3 that I’ve seen myself.
Good Stuff…
Hi YoU ghost fAnss !! JuSt THOUGHT I WOULD TELL YOU MY STORY !!
wEll i was going to edinburgh with my class and wee went to the castle !! It didnt look scary at all but beneath the walls it was dead sspooky because there is said to be a piper ghost on the fort bit and it felt quite cold – especially in the gun room and in the main hall and also a room overlookin the side of the castle which we ate in !! it was soo scary man wee al felt a wind and all the windows and doors where shut !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT WAS VERY SOPPKY BE HERE AT YOUR OWN RISK !!!
i enjoyed your websight so much, it really helped me with my project!!
ghost were people to like you and me and someday we all will be ghost.
[...] budget travel guide by HoboTraveler will give you some great ideas for saving money on travel. 24. Top Ten Most Haunted: If the idea of bumping into a ghost excites you, a tour of the World’s Top Ten Most Haunted [...]
I know this sounds bad but shouldn’t #1 be auschwitz?
If their was such a thing as ghosts the place should be full of them
Hey! It’s not that there is no such things as ghost.I am just saying that people just enjoy making a fuss about some thing so little and ignorable..
Ok, each one of you has your opinion, each one of you wants to make sure that everyone else knows it, and every one of you wants to win here. Let’s not try to be right or make your point stronger. Some people just don’t believe in it. If you think about it, everyone has their own opinion about everything in life so why harp over this one thing when each of you are so used to having your own opinion anyways. On one hand I do believe that ghosts are real because some things you can’t explain.. yet at the same time, just because you can’t explain it doesn’t mean it has to be a ghost. Another topic that has a lot of debates is UFOs. What exactly is a UFO? Is it an alien, a ghost or is it just someone planning each occurence of it? Guess what, each of you will have your own opinion on that too so how about each of us just don’t worry about it. In the end of the day it isn’t going to matter if we told everyone that we believed in ghosts or not. It only causes for these types of debates and really, no one wins.. I hope that each of you keep with your opinions and don’t let people change your mind. If you don’t believe in ghosts you have your reasons. Same goes for if you do believe in them. So… with all that being said… how about we worry about the more important things in life like the economy or our children’s schooling or the justice that is being served, etc.. I’m sure we can find something else to focus on.. at least for now.
wish you all would stay in CHILLINGHAM CASTLE FOR 3 DAYS and never come out
Chillingham Castle is known to be one of the scariest places on earth. It was built in England in 1334 as a torcher chamber. people from Scotland Would be thrown in there and be torchered. The most famous Torcher Was Jhon Sage.
Jhon’s favorite torcher was the cage. you would be placed in a metal cage and under you would be a burning fire. Except he wouldn’t put you really close. No he would hang you up about 10 feet above the fire so you would slowly cook. They also had spike beds and spike chairs and a type of handcuff that your head would be stuck in and then they would slowly ware down your finger nails and your forehead. Inside the castle walls was a boy that was buried in the hard stone brick concrete walls. His body was found. His fingers were acually worn down and his teeth were broken because the little boy was trying to escape. :
the headless drummer sounds freaky
Andrea, . . . grow up a little okay? It’s spelled “Torture,” ~ Sheesh!
Hey Bullocks the Queen Mary is not a Metal building you Dick it a Bloody Boat that was the fastest passenger liner during WW2 in the Atlantic Ocean