Hampton Court Palace

OVERVIEW

A Tudor and Baroque palace twelve miles up the Thames from central London, begun in 1514 for Cardinal Wolsey, taken over by Henry VIII in 1529, and half-rebuilt for William III in the 1690s. Historic Royal Palaces keeps it and its gardens, maze and vine. The palace's own history pages carry the hauntings, and the gallery outside the Chapel Royal is officially called the Haunted Gallery.

HISTORY

Jane Seymour died here in October 1537, twelve days after giving birth to Edward VI. In November 1541 Henry was told of Catherine Howard's adultery while at Mass in the chapel; she was confined in her rooms and then sent to the Tower and beheaded in February 1542. The legend that she broke from her guards and ran screaming along the gallery to reach the king is contradicted by the palace itself, which notes that her apartments and route no longer exist.

REPORTED ACTIVITY

Catherine Howard's screams in the Haunted Gallery are the palace's best-known story, and Historic Royal Palaces reports more sightings and faintings on that stretch than anywhere else in the building. Jane Seymour is said to walk the Silverstick Stairs with a candle; Sybil Penn, Edward VI's nurse, the 'Grey Lady', after her tomb was disturbed in 1829. In December 2003 security cameras recorded a set of fire doors swinging open with a figure in a long coat standing in them, three days running; staff could not account for it and the footage went round the world. The palace tells all of these itself.

VISITING

Open daily, ticketed; the Haunted Gallery is on the Tudor route. Seasonal ghost tours are run by the palace.