3 True Stories from Creepy British Villages | Podcast Horror Stories

British Horror Stories. Prepare to be spooked with 3 true horror stories from creepy British villages. These chilling tales will leave you on the edge of your seat! 3 True British Horror Stories from British Villages. Witches, Ghosts and haunted abandoned places. 
Story 1: The Pluckley Paradox
Story 2: The Reflection in Kilgrave
Story 3: The Hollow Beneath Pendle Hill 

Transcript

There are villages across Britain where 
time seems frozen where cozy cottages 
and quiet lanes hide secrets that locals 
refuse to talk about but beneath the 
surface of postcard beauty something is 
wrong very wrong these are three true 
stories from British villages that may 
make you question whether evil prefers 
the quietest places of all i was never 
the type to believe in ghost stories not 
really not until the summer of 2019 when 
I agreed to housesit for my cousin in a 
small village somewhere in Kent i won't 
name the village directly but if you've 
heard of the place often called 
England's most haunted you'll know 
exactly where I'm talking about it was 
the kind of place people visit for 
Halloween ghost tours and newspaper 
specials the kind of village that locals 
never really talk about unless they're 
warning you or testing you my cousin and 
his wife had inherited this place from 
an uncle a red brricked ivycovered 
cottage at the edge of the village 
backing right up to a patch of dense 
woodland they were off to Spain for 2 
weeks and asked if I was willing to look 
after the house and their dog Alfie it 
sounded like a perfect getaway from my 
cramped London flat quiet fresh air 
nature trails maybe even work on a book 
I kept promising myself I'd write they 
picked me up from the train station and 
drove me the last few miles in that old 
defender the road narrowed quickly after 
the turnoff a single strip flanked by 
hedge and farmland eventually giving way 
to thicket of forest when we reached the 
village it looked exactly like you would 
imagine postcard pretty with a crumbling 
church tuda pubs and houses that had 
clearly been standing for centuries but 
there was something off i noticed it 
before we even reached the cottage the 
locals every person we passed on the 
lane they didn't wave they stared not 
angrily not even suspiciously just this 
quiet unreadable stillness like they 
knew something I didn't or like they 
were waiting for something to happen my 
cousin noticed me glancing and laughed 
it off don't mind the locals he said 
they're used to tourists and ghost 
hunters poking around this place has a 
reputation but most of it's nonsense 
i nodded didn't say anything but 
something about that ride and the way we 
passed the crossroad with a handpainted 
sign that simply read "Turn back." Stuck 
with me alfie was sweet a sleepy 
retriever who barely left the rug by the 
fireplace i spent the day settling in 
unpacked explored the house and took a 
walk around the village the people 
weren't rude but they weren't exactly 
chatty either i got a few polite nods 
and one old man who muttered something 
as I passed i turned to ask him to 
repeat it but he just kept walking all I 
caught was the word woods and something 
about screaming i remembered reading 
once that the woods here had a nickname 
dearing wood but most called it 
something else the screaming woods that 
night I cooked dinner read by the 
fireplace and went to bed around 11 the 
bed creaked in a way all furniture does 
the kind of creek that doesn't feel 
quite mechanical more like someone 
breathing slowly just beneath you i 
chalked it up to the age of the house at 
3:17 a.m i woke up not from a noise but 
from a lack of one you ever wake up in 
such a deep silence that it feels 
unnatural like the whole world has 
paused i lay I lay there for a moment 
just staring at the ceiling and then 
faint but unmistakable I heard it 
knocking three slow knocks 
not at the front door not at the bedroom 
door but from the window the second 
floor window i sat up my heart kicking 
hard there were no trees near the house 
tall enough to reach that window i crept 
across the room and pulled back the 
curtains just a few inches nothing there 
just a sliver of moonlight and the top 
of the hedges 
i must have stood there for a full 
minute just watching then I heard it 
again but this time from the back of the 
house the 
kitchen another three knocks not on the 
door on the glass like fingernails 
tapping in a slow patient rhythm i 
didn't sleep much after that by the 
fourth day I was trying to brush it all 
off old house country air maybe my mind 
was too used to the city's hum i took 
Alfie for a walk around the village 
keeping to the main past as we passed 
the churchyard he stopped completely 
froze tail tucked ears flat then he 
started growling low quiet and constant 
i followed his gaze expecting a fox or 
maybe a stray cat there was a woman 
standing at the far edge of the 
churchyard just beyond the mossy 
gravestones pale gray dress long black 
hair face partially turned away she 
wasn't moving just standing like she's 
being placed there i stared at her for a 
moment and then no exaggeration she was 
gone i blinked literally blinked and she 
was just just wasn't there anymore i 
felt a jolt of static crawl down my 
spine i tugged Alfie's leash and turned 
back we went home and I didn't leave 
that cottage for the rest of the day the 
next night just after midnight I heard 
something else not knocking this time 
hoof beats i thought I was imagining it 
but they were loud crisp like iron 
striking stone then I heard the wheels 
wooden ones creaking underway like an 
old wagon i looked out the upstairs 
window the lane in front of the cottage 
was empty but I heard it i heard the 
carriage pass right by the house it was 
as if something invisible rolled down 
that lane pulled by unseen horses and I 
swear just as I passed the gate Alfie 
who hadn't moved in hours sat up and 
started growling at the door not barking 
growling day six i was looking around 
the house i didn't even know the cottage 
had a basement i found the door behind a 
tall bookshelf that leans slightly as if 
it didn't want to be moved there was no 
reason for me to open it but the door 
was open just a jar and from below I 
swear I heard movement like someone 
dragging something across the stone 
floor i shut the door hard and shoved 
the bookcase back over it i didn't sleep 
at all that night i stayed by the fire 
with every light on in the house and on 
the seventh day I decided I'd had enough 
my cousin wasn't back for another 6 days 
but I couldn't stay there anymore i 
packed my things loaded up the car and 
got ready to leave i walked Alfie one 
last time and when I came back the front 
door was open and on the kitchen table 
was a sheet of yellowed paper looked 
like it had been torn from a ledger the 
handwriting was cramped jagged and it 
simply said "You weren't supposed to see 
her." There was no signature no sign of 
forced entry just that note i left i 
didn't care if it meant abandoning the 
house i drove to the next town over and 
got a room above the pub a month after 
returning to London I started doing some 
digging that woman in the churchyard she 
matched multiple descriptions of local 
legends the red lady often seen near the 
graveyard people say she's looking for 
her lost baby some say she was buried 
alive the horse carriage same locals 
have reported hearing it for over a 
hundred years always at midnight always 
unseen and the screaming woods i 
listened to an old interview from the 
80s a retired police officer describing 
cases of people going missing in that 
very stretch of trees he said the 
screams were so regular at one point the 
village just stopped reacting to them 
but the part that froze me cold was a 
photograph I found in a local history 
book a black and white image of the 
village celebration from the 
1920s people in suits and dresses 
children with balloons and right there 
behind the mall her fading and out of 
place was the same pale woman in a gray 
dress same long black hair same posture 
staring straight at the camera i still 
have that photo saved but I never look 
at it at night and sometimes only 
sometimes I hear three knocks on the 
bedroom window even though I live on the 
fifth floor 
now they say there's a place in the 
 
Highlands where the fog never fully 
clears a village that isn't on most maps 
hidden deep beyond the pine stretches of 
Invet past loc locals don't talk about 
it even most satellite images blur at 
the edge like the mist seeps into the 
data 
itself i was traveling through Scotland 
in the fall of 
2021 working on video series where I 
documented remote abandoned places 
across Europe urban exploration with a 
folklore twist my channel had just hit 
200 subscribers and I wanted something 
special something eerie that's when I 
stumbled upon an old post in a forgotten 
forum thread just four words post 
anonymously don't film in kill grave 
there were no replies no context just 
that i searched for kill grave on Google 
Maps nothing i thought it was a hoax or 
some arg marketing then I found it in a 
19th century railway survey kill grave 
Argal County population 47 listed as 
abandoned unsuitable terrain no photos 
no coordinates but in the comments of an 
old YouTube video about Scotland's 
vanishing villages someone casually 
mentioned that if you take the Glen 
Stray single track road and veer off 
into the forestry trail behind a closed 
gate you'll eventually hit it if the 
road hasn't changed again 
so of course I went it was colder than I 
expected that morning fog hugged the 
hills like a blanket thick and unmoving 
i left my rental car near a locked 
forestry gate and hiked 2 hours with a 
GoPro and my drone gear in my pack no 
cell signal just me and the soft 
cruncher boots on old moss the trail 
wasn't on any modern GPS i'd copied it 
by hand from a printed audience map 
eventually I reached it kill grave a row 
of five crumbling stone cottages a small 
church blackened with time a dried up 
well the fog rolled in and out like 
breath sometimes thick enough that I 
could barely see the stone steps in 
front of me it didn't feel abandoned it 
felt forgotten the cottages still had 
intact chimneys mosscovered doors hung 
slightly a jar one even had lace 
curtains still dangling in the broken 
window like it was waiting for someone 
to come back i started filming the 
footage starts normal scenic quiet my 
commentary light and 
observational but when I played it back 
later I swear to you there was something 
wrong in the first 30 seconds of the 
footage as I panned the GoPro across the 
cottages there's a figure standing in 
the window of the third house i didn't 
see it at the time a long coat facing 
shadow hands pressed against the glass 
but when I returned to the house just 
minutes later the window was completely 
shattered and the inside empty silent i 
told myself it was the trick of the 
light the fog my imagination that 
afternoon I set up the drone for an 
aerial shot I got some beautiful eerie 
footage of the entire hamlet from above 
except and this is what still gets me 
every time I flew over and reviewed the 
footage the number of cottages changed 
one time it showed six another time four 
never the same layout twice one clip 
even shows a narrow alley between the 
third and fourth cottage but when I 
walked it on foot there was no alley 
only a solid wall i hadn't planned to 
stay overnight but the sun went fast 
behind the clouds by 300 p.m and pitch 
black by 5 i had a backup battery some 
food and a sleeping bag i figured one 
night in a ruined village would make 
great content clickbait gold i chose the 
cottage with the least damage roof 
mostly intact fireplace crumbled but dry 
at 2:13 a.m I woke up to footsteps not 
outside inside the cottage i froze in my 
sleeping bag the steps were slow 
deliberate moving through the empty room 
behind me the one with the collapsed 
floor there was no way in from the back 
i checked the sound stopped right next 
to my head then the softest sound I've 
ever heard click my GoPro i left it on 
the window still turned off something 
had turned it on at dawn shaken but too 
stubborn to admit I was scared i decided 
to explore the other buildings again 
before leaving that's when I saw it a 
cottage I hadn't noticed before standing 
opposite the church down a sloping path 
I could swear hadn't existed yesterday 
it looked newer windows intact doors 
closed roof fetched instead of tiled i 
entered 
cautiously inside it was identical to 
the one I slept in exactly identical 
same collapsed fireplace same dusty 
shelf with an iron kettle same corner 
where I dropped my bag but my bag wasn't 
there and in the corner where I slept 
last night someone else's sleeping bag 
red old torn open at the side i opened 
it inside was a Polaroid photo of me 
standing in front of the church only I 
never posed for a photo i turned the 
photo over in faded handwriting it read 
"Don't film in kill 
grave." By now I was shaking i grabbed 
my things or what I thought were mine 
and ran the forest was on the way back 
the trail fought more times than I 
remembered and the fog it never lifted 
not even once i made it back to the car 
just before sunset collapsed into the 
seat and drove until I hit a main road i 
didn't upload the footage right away 
someone told me to review it in full 
first when I finally did 2 days later 
back in Edinburgh I noticed something in 
every video clip every single frame 
where I'm holding the camera in selfie 
mode my reflection is wrong my mouth 
doesn't move when I talk in one frame I 
blink but the reflection doesn't and in 
the last clip the one just before I left 
I freeze frame and enhance it there's a 
figure behind me but not behind me in 
the real world behind me in the 
reflection only standing just inside the 
ruined church wearing a long coat with 
the hands against the glass i never 
posted the footage i left it on a hard 
drive that I eventually smashed 
sometimes when I shoot a new video I 
swear I see things in the corner of my 
reflection outlines movements that don't 
match mine and once just once I woke up 
to find a Polaroid on my window still 
same red sleeping bag same ruined 
cottage same fog only this time the 
photo wasn't of me it was someone else 
holding a camera 
 
i never intended to write about witches 
i'm a historian by trade university 
lecturer mostly focused on 16th and 17th 
century social structures my research 
has always leaned towards dry datadriven 
content but in 2020 when I received a 
grant to investigate local justice 
systems during the English witch trial 
period my academic curiosity drew me to 
a name I haven't paid much attention to 
before pendle the Pendle witch trials of 
1612 were among the most infamous in 
British history 12 accused 10 hanged 
mostly women from two poor families 
there were whispers of curses rivalries 
and strange sightings on the hill ever 
since I figured it would make a solid 
final chapter for my book what I didn't 
expect was to leave that place changed 
uncertain of my own memories and afraid 
to be alone at night ever again i rented 
a cottage in New Church a village tucked 
along the spine of Pendle Hill it looked 
quaint rolling farmland a single pub and 
a tiny church with a stone tower so old 
it leaned slightly in the wind the 
cottage itself had been unoccupied for 
decades but a preservation society had 
cleaned it up recently the owner a 
retired farman named Mr cleivero handed 
me the keys with a dry warning "if the 
wind comes from the hill," he said "bolt 
your door and don't open it no matter 
who knocks." He laughed after like it 
was just a joke but I noticed he didn't 
follow me past the stone gate the first 
few days were calm i documented court 
transcripts at the local archive 
visiting Malin's Towers remains and even 
interviewed a folklore tour guide who 
claimed Pendle Hill was the closest 
thing we have to a living curse for the 
nights that was something else there was 
a constant wind always rising at dusk it 
didn't sound like wind through the trees 
it sounded vocal not words exactly but 
the cadence of speech like someone 
speaking out of earshot the third night 
I found a dead hair nailed to my front 
door its body was stiff mouth open eyes 
gazed like glass i left it there until 
morning unsure what to do when I opened 
the door again it was gone the cottage 
had an attic narrow stairs leading to a 
low beam space filled with dust and 
abandoned furniture while digging for 
clues about the previous owners I found 
a rolled parchment tucked inside a 
hollow floorboard it was a map handdrawn 
yellowed and covered in strange symbols 
it depicted Pedle Hill with paths not 
found on any modern map near the top was 
a symbol that looked like a circle of 
trees marked the hollow written in old 
English script beneath it were the words 
"Where they did gather and where they do 
still." I asked around in the village 
but no one acknowledged it one man at 
the pub muttered something about the dim 
dyke line and left before finishing his 
pint i followed the map on the fifth day 
against my better judgment it led me 
deep into the upper woodland of Pendle 
Hill through thick fog that settled low 
like a living thing and there it was the 
hollow a circular clearing completely 
silent no wind no bird song and at the 
center stood a stone platform about 
waist high with a rusted iron ring 
embedded in the middle surrounding it 
were 12 scorched stumps arranged in a 
perfect circle i took photos recorded 
notes and left quickly that night 
someone knocked on my door three knocks 
then 
silence i froze remembered what Clivero 
said i didn't move not for hours over 
the next few days things worsened at 
night I began to hear whispers from 
beneath the floorboards phrases in 
dialects I couldn't understand old 
English maybe i recorded them and and 
sent clips to a linguist friend at York 
she responded one line only that's 17th 
century Lancasher they're saying "Bring 
her to the seat." I stopped sleeping 
stopped leaving the cottage every mirror 
in the house began to fog from the 
inside 
even when it wasn't cold on the seventh 
day I found a symbol carved into my 
bedroom wall where I slept it matched 
one from the map on the eighth night I 
saw her i had cracked the window just an 
inch to let in some air it was nearly 
3:00 a.m i was reading through trial 
testimony when I saw movement out by the 
field a woman wearing a long tattered 
scroll walking slowly across the grass 
barefoot her feet not sinking into the 
wet soil she stopped halfway to the hill 
then looked up at my window she smiled 
then raised her hand and every light in 
the cottage went out all at 
once the fire the lanterns my laptop 
pitch black i shut the window and bolted 
it and when I looked again she was gone 
i decided to leave the next morning i 
didn't care about the grand or the 
research anymore but my car was gone not 
broken down but gone i ran back to the 
pub desperate for help mr cleivero 
wasn't there but a woman behind the bar 
said something I'll never forget no one 
lived in that village since Margaret Fel 
went missing in 81 i told her I've been 
staying there that I met Mr clivero the 
house was clean furnished she stared at 
me and whispered "That house was never 
cleared it's locked and condemned the 
floor still blood stained." I left ran 
but I couldn't find the road back to the 
town my legs brought me back to the 
hollow i don't remember how i just ended 
up there this time the stone platform 
was clean the ring glinted in the weak 
sunlight and around me I heard them 
whispers chanting laughter 
screaming but I was alone i stepped into 
the center of the ring and I saw 
something scratched into the stone that 
hadn't been there 
before the 13th returns 
then I heard my name spoken in my 
mother's voice i was found 2 days later 
collapsed outside a barley village hall 
i couldn't speak i couldn't write i 
spent 3 months in psychiatric care they 
said I suffered a breakdown 
hallucinations brought on by 
isolation but I know what I saw what I 
heard and what I brought back because 
sometimes in my apartment in Leeds I 
find symbols drawn in chalk on my 
floorboards and once I woke up to find 
12 black stones arranged in a circle 
around my bed the hollow is still there 
they still gather and I think they want 
me to gather others 
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