Ghostly Goings on at Gawthorpe

On Saturday 13^th February there were some famous ghost hunting visitors to Gawthorpe Hall.  Yvette Fielding and her team of intrepid ghost hunters came to do a 2 hour live show of Most Haunted to see what spirits, phantoms and ghostly presences they could find in the panelling and stonework of this 400 year old building.

It all begins very differently – there are several visits during the week by producers, directors, live link satellite people and many more who make sure that everything is going to work perfectly on the night. 

On the Wednesday before, interviews were held with staff from the Hall asking about their ghostly experiences, which made everyone nervous when they knew they were going to be filmed, but it was heavily edited in the final version! On the day of the live shoot the crew begin arriving at 9am to install cameras, cabling and all of the equipment needed to make sure that every bump and bang in the night is captured and recorded. 

During the afternoon the stars of the show arrive and the preparation for the live show begins in earnest with make up, a guided tour of the building so none of them get lost in the dark and some more filming of the Hall in the daylight.  It was really exciting to see the background to how a live show is put together and all of the hard work and preparation that is needed for it.  Miles of cabling was fed through the building from the basement right up into the Tower on the roof on the third floor. 

Before they even began filming for the live show knocking noises could be heard, the chandelier started swinging and Yvette and team were sensing unusual spirit activity. 

As it approached 9pm all of the lights in the Hall were switched off and anyone not involved in filming was moved out of the building so they didn’t make any noise in the background.  Yvette and her team were in position ready with their night vision cameras, sound equipment, ouija boards and senses all honed to detect anything unusual. 

They began on the ground floor were several unusual spirits were felt in the Dining Room and at the bottom of the stairs, on several occasions Karl felt something behind him and cold draughts were felt blowing past the team.  On the top floor in the room that used to be the nursery they heard whistling, a football and crayons were thrown across the room, and the spirits of several children were felt.

The live show finished in the Tower where several really powerful and unusual spirits were felt and in every room knocking was heard really loudly coming from underneath the feet of the crew. Once the show went off the air Yvette and her team continued to do a vigil in the Tower, this and some other footage that there wasn’t time to put in the live show will be shown on Tuesday 16^th February 10pm on the Living Channel.   Once filming was over Yvette said to the Hall manager that this was one of the best houses that they had been in, they had a huge amount of paranormal activity and that although the house looked beautiful during the day it was a completely different story in the night time. 

For the staff at the Hall it was a fascinating experience to see how a show like this is put together and we feel that any spirits that are in the Hall are all friendly ones, so don’t be afraid of coming to visit us to find out for yourself when we open again in April.

Rachel Pollitt

Assistant Keeper at Gawthorpe Hall