In the dark Hendrick Street in Dublin, there once were two houses said to be some of the most haunted ones in town. Occupied by at least six ghosts, some say they still linger in their old street.
In Smithfield, Dublin, once stood a narrow, unassuming street that locals long avoided after dark. Not much was known about the street between the corn and cattle market of the city. Hendrick Street, now mostly vanished from the map, was for generations whispered about as Dublin’s most haunted street where more than one house had a haunted story.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Ireland
Though the old Dutch Billys houses from the 1730s were demolished in the 1960s, the ground where numbers 7 and 8 once stood is said to remain restless and was the worst location for the haunting going on in the street. The stories claim that no fewer than six spirits are bound to this cursed patch of land, forever replaying the tragedies that once unfolded behind its doors.
The Six Ghosts of Hendrick Street
The haunting of Hendrick Street began long before the bulldozers came. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the area was densely packed with tenements, where poverty, sickness, and despair clung to the air like a fog. Numbers 7 and 8 were said to be especially ill-fated. This is said to have especially been from the 1920s and leading up to the house’s demolitions.
By the turn of the 20th century, Hendrick Street’s reputation had darkened beyond repair. Residents spoke of six distinct apparitions that haunted the adjoining houses.
Tenants rarely stayed long, claiming to hear knocking on the walls at night, furniture moving by itself, and cold hands brushing against their faces in the dark. It was especially inside number 7 and 8 in the street that people were bothered by ghosts.
The Dark History of Number 7
One story in particular tells about a family who moved into number 7. An old house where many people had lived and died. It isn’t really specified exactly when this family moved in, but it is more likely to be from the early to mid 20th century. When they arrived they were warned to not go downstairs after dark. Apparently a woman had died in the house and was heard walking up and down the stairs from midnight to the clock struck five, every night.
The father of the house came home one evening and couldn’t unlock the door. He heard someone coming running down the stairs inside and the door flew open. But when he looked inside, there was no one there, and he only felt the sensation of a cold wind passing him by.
The Ghost by the Fireplace in Number 8
In the neighboring house there was an elderly couple living once. According to the story, they hated each other in life, but seemed to be unable to part in the afterlife. After the man, a horrid mad according to the rumours passed, he remained in the house to haunt his wife.
She hated him so much, she was glad he had died. But one night he came back to shout at her. He was also said to have been lingering by the fireplace. Because of his torment even beyond death, she eventually said to have gotten an exorcism.
Both number 7 and 8 were said to have been demolished as far back as 1953 because of the poor state of them.
Hendrick Street No. 15-19
Not only were the two houses on the street said to be haunted, but so were the buildings right across from them as well. It used to be an industrial block that has now turned into a retail outlet.
According to the rumours, there was a young girl said to haunt the building and would appear in front of people. People walking by would report about seeing faces in the windows of the building when no one was supposed to be inside.
Dublin’s Forgotten Haunting
Today, Hendrick Street is little more than a memory, yet its ghostly reputation has never faded. In its place, The Hendrick Smithfield Hotel has been built in its place. Although the hotel acknowledges the streets’ haunted history, there isn’t really much to go on in terms of newer ghost stories. It is however still a stop on many ghost tours in the city.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
In the pre-civil war Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia, the mausoleum of W.W Pool is said to be the grave of The Richmond Vampire. A more recent urban legend is now also connected with The Church Hill Tunnel collapse.
In Richmond’s historic Hollywood Cemetery, where Confederate generals, U.S. presidents, and thousands of the city’s dead lie beneath elaborate monuments and crumbling headstones, whispers persist of a vampire lurking among the graves.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from the USA
The origins of this legend from Richmond, Virginia, trace back to a real, grim disaster in 1925 — and an even older mausoleum said to house something inhuman that still draw people wanting to check out the alleged vampire lair.
Vampire Mausoleum: William Wortham Pool’s grave in Hollywood Cemetery is thought to be the vampire lair of the Richmond Vampire. //Source: Wikimedia
The Legend of W.W. Pool Mausoleum
Local legend held that W.W. Pool was no ordinary Richmond citizen. Some versions of the tale claimed Pool was an 18th-century Englishman exiled for vampirism, or a practitioner of the dark arts who had achieved unnatural longevity. His tomb, marked with ominous Masonic symbols and resting in one of Richmond’s oldest graveyards, was said to house either Pool himself or the ancient vampire from the tunnel.
Locals nicknamed the creature “The Richmond Vampire” or “The Hollywood Vampire,” and it became a fixture of local ghost tours and urban legend lore. At first the lore centered just around the grave of this mystic man with only initials inscribed at his tomb. WW, looking almost like fangs. There were also the Masonic and Egyptian elements to the grave, making it stand out. People also thought it was strange that for a grave for a man who died in 1922, it was strange that it had 1913 inscribed.
According to one of the stories, a broken glass was found inside the locked and sealed mausoleum. The question was, where did the famed Richmond Vampire go?
Hollywood Cemetery: Variations of the story grew into legend and it has become to be that W.W.Poole is a vampire that haunts Hollywood. Whether the sources mean just the cemetery or if the legend has reached Hollywood, LA yet is not mentioned. Some say he only comes out when there is no moon.
Who was W. W. Pool?
But who really was the man inside the mausoleum? In real life, his name was William Wortham Pool and lived 721 28th St, in Woodland Heights and worked as an accountant. He was in fact not in exile from England, but born in Mississippi and lived seemingly a normal and quiet life.
He had built the tomb for his wife, Alice who died after an illness in 1913 and as an accountant, he chose to just use his initials, as you paid by the letter. William died and joined her in their mausoleum in 1922 when he died of pneumonia at the age of 75.
Perhaps for those looking into the story a bit more, it would have ended there, but instead the vampire lore grew. As the Hollywood Cemetery is adjacent to the Virginia Commonwealth University, the story became popular from the 1960s and especially from the 1980s when it grew almost a cult-like group around the mausoleum, and in the end, another tragedy from the town would merge with the story.
Since 2001, the story of the vampire has been told together with the collapse of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad’s Church Hill Tunnel under the neighborhood in the east called Church Hill and is rarely told without.
The Church Hill Tunnel Collapse
On October 2, 1925, disaster struck as a work crew attempted to reopen the long-abandoned Church Hill Tunnel, a 4,000-foot passage beneath Richmond’s Church Hill neighborhood. They had problems with the tunnels since they started in 1871. The soul was soft and slippery and buildings above it would tilt or sink. Sometimes workers are said to have just vanished.
During excavation, a section of the tunnel collapsed, burying several workers alive in a sudden, suffocating wave of rock, soil, and debris. A section above the work train collapsed, entombing engineer Tom Mason together with around two or three hundred laborers.
According to legend, when they were building the tunnel, they awakened something evil that lived there and was the reason for the tunnel crashing.
Church Hill Tunnel: The inside of the eastern entrance to the Church Hill tunnel in Richmond, Virginia, in 1981. The tunnel collapsed in 1925, and is sealed off at this end by the wall visible in the distance. // Source: Wiki
In the chaos that followed, rescuers and onlookers reportedly saw something horrifying: a blood-covered, grotesque figure with jagged teeth and hanging skin, emerging from the rubble, crouching as if feeding over the victims. The creature — with exposed flesh and sharp, animalistic features — allegedly fled from the tunnel, making its way toward Hollywood Cemetery.
Witnesses claimed it disappeared into the Mausoleum of W.W. Pool, a real tomb located within the cemetery, dating back to 1913. This bizarre incident quickly fueled rumors that a vampire had been awakened by the cave-in.
When this version merged with the existing vampire story is uncertain, but some say it was from the start. Historians and folklorists largely attribute the origin of the vampire tale to the tragic story of Benjamin F. Mosby, a 28-year-old railroad worker caught in the tunnel collapse. He had been shoveling coal into the firebox of a steam locomotive of a work train with no shirt on when the cave-in occurred and the boiler ruptured. Mosby, suffering from severe burns and catastrophic injuries, staggered from the wreckage — his flesh hanging from his bones, blood covering his body — and reportedly died shortly afterward at a Grace Hospital. He was buried at Hollywood Cemetery.
The day laborers Richard Lewis and “H. Smith”, Engine 231 and the ten flatcars remain buried inside the tunnel of misery.
Church Hill Tunnel: This is a picture of the western end of the tunnel. It is completely closed off, unlike the eastern end, and there has been speculation that it deserves better upkeep. Over the years, it has been somewhat forgotten and is now overgrown with weeds and tall grasses
Witnesses in the panic and gloom of the disaster likely misinterpreted the ghastly appearance of Mosby’s mortally wounded body as something supernatural. Over time, as Richmond’s storytelling traditions took hold, Mosby’s tragic death merged with older vampire folklore, birthing the legend of the Richmond Vampire.
Yet despite rational explanations and lack of primary sources, the myth persists and contemporary records only state that Mosby died without any of the other details. If not him, what was the thing they say lurked in the tunnels? To this day, people claim strange sightings around Hollywood Cemetery, eerie noises near the Pool Mausoleum, and spectral figures wandering the grounds at night.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Said to be haunted by headless prisoners who tried to capture Dublin Castle, this storied building has shadows lingering in the corners.
Few places in Ireland carry as much history, blood, and shadow as Dublin Castle, or Caisleán Bhaile Átha Cliath, in the midst of the city. And if we are to believe the rumours, it is also said to house a few ghosts.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Ireland
Built on the site of a Viking fortress and later serving as the seat of British power in Ireland for over 700 years, the castle has seen centuries of political intrigue, imprisonment, executions, and rebellion. With such a dark and turbulent past, you would definitely believe that it could be haunted, but the truth is, that it’s not often that Dublin Castle makes it on the top most haunted castles in Ireland.
The Headless Haunting of Dublin Castle
There are however a few ghost stories here as well though. The most chilling tales speak of the headless spirits of men who tried to storm the fortress long ago. What the battle and time someone tried to storm it is not really mentioned, but there are plenty of battles and sieges that have tried to take control over the castle.
According to this ghost legend, the prisoners of the attack were executed swiftly and without mercy, their remains were buried within the castle grounds. Locals and visitors alike claim that the headless dead have never truly left. Their spectral forms are said to wander the grounds in silence.
The Haunted Upper Yard
The Upper Yard is often spoken of as one of the most unsettling areas here as this was the location of the original medieval castle that stood before a huge fire burned it to the ground in the 1600s. Some visitors have described the uneasy feeling of being watched, while others claim to have glimpsed fleeting apparitions disappearing into the ancient stonework.
There is also a building in the upper yard that is said to be haunted where the original motte-and-bailey castle was. Details are vague about the specific, but some think the haunting is a woman who is mourning her lover she lost in one of the many battles fought on this land.
Other Ghost Stories
One particular haunting experience was told through Spiritedisle’ about a Garda sergeant who was stationed at Dublin Castle in the 1950s. One night the light went out by itself when he was alone in the dormitory. Then he heard something like coal being shoveled into the fire in the kitchen and went to check that he was truly alone. When entering, the room was empty, there was no coal in the fire and the shovel hadn’t moved at all.
Today, Dublin Castle stands as a celebrated historical site and a major tourist attraction. Yet beneath the surface of grandeur and state occasions lingers the weight of all who suffered and died there and are perhaps even haunting it to this day.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Old cities carry old ghost stories, and Bern in Switzerland is no exception. From the old buildings filled with history to the depth of the Aare river, here are some of the most haunted places in Bern.
In Switzerland’s capital, behind its postcard-perfect streets and golden sandstone facades, Bern hides a much darker side when the lights go out. Beneath the Gothic spires, along narrow alleyways, and on timeworn staircases, ghost stories have lingered for centuries and still linger underneath the modern city. Tales of restless monks, cursed people forced to live out eternity as monstrous spirits, weeping mothers, and endless funeral processions to the afterlife.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Switzerland
From the shadow of the mighty cathedral to the crooked passages of the Matte district, Bern is a city where history and legend intertwine, and where the past refuses to stay buried. Although far from a complete list, here you have some of the most haunted places in Bern and some of their haunted tales.
The Headless Ghost Woman of Bern at Junkerngasse 54
The Haunted Street: Junkerngasse street in the old part of Bern in Switzerland and was once a place were the rich lived. Today many of the old houses still remains, including the abandoned ones.//Photo by: Tony Badwy/wikimedia
Among the grand façades of Bern’s most historic street, Junkerngasse 54 stands out not for its elegance, but for the eerie silence that surrounds it. Abandoned for over a century, this seemingly ordinary building has long been the subject of chilling tales, most notably that of the Headless Ghost Woman that has become one of Bern’s most well known ghost stories. It is said that at the stroke of midnight, the spirit of a woman said to be headless appears at the window, haunting the quiet street below. Though the building likely served mundane purposes in its past, its shadowy interior now invites only speculation and spine-tingling legends, adding a dark twist to Bern’s beautifully preserved Old Town.
The Sinful Monk Haunting the Former Monastery House on Junkerngasse
Before Junkerngasse became the street it is today, it used to house a lot of church buildings. The former monastery building, Frienisberghaus on Junkerngasse, once a residence for Cistercian monks from the Frienisberg Monastery, was long believed to be haunted by the ghost of a sinful monk. According to legend, the monk violated a nun during his time in the city, and after the Reformation turned the building to secular use, his restless spirit began to appear at midnight, silently climbing and descending stairs, sighing in torment. Even during the building’s demolition, tools dulled
The Cursed Butcher Apprentice Haunting Rathausgasse in Bern
Rathausgasse: Die Berner Rathausgasse im Regen, 1992, Hotel Glocke. //Source: Christian Boss 1965/Wikimedia
In the heart of Bern’s Old Town, the legend of the ghostly butcher’s apprentice haunts the cobbled streets of Rathausgasse that was once known as Butcher’s Lane. Centuries ago, a cruel apprentice tormented and killed a calf for amusement, and as punishment, he was cursed to roam the area for eternity in the form of the very creature he tortured. People still claim to hear the eerie clatter of hooves echoing down the alleyways at night, though no horse or calf is ever seen. His restless spirit is also said to haunt the nearby Schlachthaus-Theater, formerly a slaughterhouse, where unexplained noises, spectral voices, and falling objects disturb the quiet.
The Mattentreppe, a steep staircase linking Bern’s majestic cathedral to the old Matte district by the Aare River, is said to be one of the city’s most haunted sites. As this list will show, most of Bern’s old stairs have a couple of ghost stories attached to it.
Known for its ties to bathhouses, brothels, and even Casanova, the area holds lingering traces of sorrow and scandal. One ghost is a despairing nobleman who leapt to his death after a maid he’d seduced became pregnant; another is a crippled man who vanishes in laughter when offered help. But the most haunting figure is that of a woman in a wide-brimmed hat who appears each New Year’s Eve, silently ascending the steps from her grave, returning to the home where she once murdered her child. When the cathedral bells toll midnight, her ghost walks again before vanishing into the night mist.
Burgtreppe in Bern: Castle stairs from Mattenenge to Nydegghöfli. // Source
The Burgträppe-Balzli is a familiar name to the people of Bern interested in a ghost story. It is said to be a violent ghost said to haunt the staircase near the long-vanished Nydegg Castle, destroyed in 1268 to prevent rival claims after the fall of the Zähringen dynasty. Though the castle is gone, Balzli’s presence remains, targeting young men with phantom beatings on cold winter nights. Some say his fury is tied to the castle’s mysterious past. Another ghost story tied to the location of the former castle whispers of ghostly builders said to be cursed spirits of those who dismantled the fortress. They return in the fog to tear it down again and again.
Burgtreppe: Castle stairs at Nydegg Church // Source
As it happens, The Burgträppe-Balzli is not the only ghost said to linger in this area. Nydegg Church in Bern stands on the ruins of the old Nydeggburg Castle, once home to Duke Berchtold V of Zähringen, the city’s founder. Though the duke died in 1218 and his dynasty ended with him, legend says his spirit still haunts the area, particularly the narrow alley of Kreuzgasse. On misty nights, he is said to step down from the Zähringer Monument to roam the streets, displeased with what his city has become. Locals also report eerie noises beneath the church from ancient tunnels linked to the old castle and nearby monasteries. This area of Bern, steeped in history, remains haunted by its founder’s restless legacy.
Kindlifresserbrunnen Fountain and the Spirit of the Discarded Children
Ogre Fountain: The Kindlifressenbrunnen literally means the Child Devour Fountain. There are many legends surrounding it, one being that the area around it is haunted, // Source: Andrew Bossi /Wiki
The eerie Kindlifresserbrunnen (“Child Eater Fountain”) stands as a grotesque 16th-century sculpture of an ogre devouring children, shrouded in mystery and unsettling legend. While historians debate its meaning, ranging from mythological Kronos to a jealous brother of Bern’s founder, local folklore speaks of a darker truth. Beneath the fountain once lay tunnels where unwanted children were said to be abandoned. According to legend, their spirits rise at midnight, dancing in the mist for one hour before vanishing again. The fountain is not just a chilling sculpture, but a symbol of Bern’s haunted past, where ghostly children still wander beneath its stone gaze.
Beneath the historic charm of Bern’s Old Town lies the haunted Fricktreppe, a covered medieval staircase said to be stalked by the ghost of former mayor and military commander Hans Franz Nägeli. Though he died in 1579, Nägeli’s restless spirit is rumored to appear at midnight to those who dare stand at the base of the stairs and call his name three times. Locals, especially daring youths, attempt the ritual, but legend warns that Nägeli slaps those who mock him. Haunted by duty or pride, the stern mayor-turned-phantom is said to still patrol the steps he once governed, a spectral guardian of Bern’s storied past.
The Frick Stairs in Bern are haunted by many ghosts. In addition to the military commander, legends also tell of a ghostly funeral procession of mutilated children and crippled dwarves, a headless woman carrying her severed head with bats swirling from her neck, and a pale noblewoman eternally reenacting the murder of her child. These chilling visions, tied to guilt, infanticide, and punishment, have earned the stairs a reputation as a place where Bern’s darkest sins replay themselves in endless, spectral loops.
The Ghost of Könizwald, Bern: The Ghost of General Robert Scipio von Lentulus
The Former Manor in the Woods: The former Campagne Mon Repos estate, once home to General Robert Scipio von Lentulus, now a haunting memory in the woods of Könizwald.
The legend of General Robert Scipio von Lentulus haunts the former estate of Campagne Mon Repos near the Könizwald forest in Bern. A celebrated military figure from the 18th century, Lentulus is said to rest uneasily in a shuttered garden pavilion, rising only when Switzerland is in peril. According to local lore, those who gather at midnight and call his name three times may witness his ghostly form appear to offer a grim omen as well as reassurance. Though the estate was demolished in 1955 and the area is now a wooded green area in the city, the legend endures, portraying Lentulus as a spectral guardian of the nation, summoned only when its fate hangs in the balance.
The Bern Town Hall (Rathaus), a 600-year-old Gothic landmark in the heart of the Old City, is not only a center of politics but also a hotspot for eerie hauntings. Among its ghostly residents are a mourning treasurer who weeps for lost gold, a spectral protector who appears in a golden carriage during times of crisis, and a council of black-clad skeletal officials who argue endlessly at midnight. The corridors echo with the presence of a headless execution victim and the furious cries of a caretaker’s ghostly wife scolding invisible children behind a stove. Together, these restless spirits create an atmosphere of haunting mystery within Bern’s historic seat of power.
During the Christmas season in Bern, ghostly tales come alive with chilling beauty. Locals speak of the Dancing Beguines, spirits of young women once confined to the Klösterlistutz monastery, who rise as flickering lights above the Aare River to dance briefly before vanishing at midnight. Another phantom, a silent old gentleman in 18th-century attire, takes his ritual walk toward the Studerstein, bringing eerie storms and crashes in his wake. And within a quiet house in the Old Town, a homesick ghost of a young woman in traditional dress returns each year to revisit her childhood home.
The Antoniterkirche in Bern, once home to the Antonite monks who cared for the sick and dying, became a place of unrest after the Swiss Reformation of 1528 forced the brothers from the city. Known for treating “holy fire” (ergotism) and for their distinctive blue Tau cross, the Antonites also carried a reputation for superstition, greed, and moral decline, a resentment that exploded into violence when the city turned Protestant. Their Gothic church was desecrated, its sacred objects destroyed, and the monks cast out, but legends claim some never left. Over the centuries, as the building served as a granary, fire station, and now a Lutheran and Orthodox worship space, reports of ghostly chanting, cold drafts, and apparitions of black-robed monks have persisted. One woodcutter famously claimed to have seen the sorrowful prior himself, silently watching.
The Calf Haunting of the Käfigturm: Bern’s Grotesque Ghost of Guilt
The Käfigturm, once Bern’s medieval city gate and later its notorious prison, carries with it a chilling legend of cruelty and punishment that outlived its walls. Said to be haunted by the Käfitier, a grotesque calf ghost, the tower’s curse stems from a jailer infamous for denying prisoners clean water, offering only filth to the thirsty. Condemned by his own cruelty, he is believed to have returned after death in the form of this monstrous beast, forever running between the tower and the Anna Seiler Fountain, drinking desperately yet never quenching his thirst. Witnesses claim to hear heavy thuds and see the ghastly calf rise from the cobblestones, howling into the night. Echoing the tale of the cursed butcher’s apprentice who haunts Rathausgasse as a calf, this story underscores a haunting Bernese motif: cruelty transforms the guilty into the very beasts they once abused. Today, though Käfigturm serves as a center for civic debate and political discourse, its stones still whisper of suffering, judgment, and the ghostly reminder that merciless deeds may earn merciless fates.
Looking closer at the ghost stories told through time, it paints a picture of the history that helped mold the Swiss city to today, but it also shows us what people feared and dreamed about. As mentioned, these are just a few of the many haunted places that make up Bern.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Centuries after the vampire panic starting with the death of Petar Blagojević, another vampire was said to haunt the Serbian village, Kisiljevo. Who was Ruža Vlajna and what happened to her?
In the dark heart of Eastern Europe, along the mist-veiled banks of the Danube, lies the unassuming Serbian village of Kisiljevo. While most of the world remembers Kisiljevo for the infamous Petar Blagojević case of 1725, fewer have heard of a more recent and equally unsettling tale: the haunting of a spectral woman known as Ruža Vlajna.
Kisiljevo’s (Кисиљево) long, uneasy relationship with the undead casts a pall over its history, and even in modern times, villagers recall stories of strange apparitions and restless spirits.
A Village Marked by the Undead
Kisiljevo first gained international notoriety in the early 18th century, when Petar Blagojević, believed to have risen from his grave to torment the living, was staked through the heart by terrified townsfolk. This event is widely considered one of the earliest recorded vampire cases in European history and ignited a wave of vampire hysteria across the region.
But Blagojević was not the only revenant said to haunt this remote riverside community. And some of the last vampire stories coming out of this town are not that long ago at all.
The Ghostly Legend of Ruža Vlajna
Unlike Blagojević, whose story was penned into the records of Austrian authorities, Ruža’s tale survives through recollections passed down by generations of villagers. According to those who have tried to look further into the vampiric cases from the village, the locals have been hesitant at best to divulge any information about the town gossip.
The town used to be a river port town of the Danube, but a dam was built to stop flooding in 1971. Although an old village, it has seen its decline in modern times and in 2022, it was said to be 444 residents. The church is one of the oldest parish churches in nabob preserved in Serbia from 1822.
As told by one resident, Mirko Bogičić, Ruža Vlajna’s sinister activity took place within the lifetime of his own grandfather — suggesting that her hauntings occurred well into the 19th or even early 20th century. She was no distant, ancient legend, but a tangible specter of recent memory.
Villagers claimed that Ruža was an old woman who became a vampire after her death. Her nickname used to be Žapunjica and she would announce her otherworldly presence in an unnerving manner in the middle of the day. She would climb up to the attic and throw things around. When people went to investigate what the sounds were, she would be nowhere to be found. She would also be striking the pots hanging from the eaves of homes at night. The metallic clanging was a warning that the restless dead roamed the streets once more.
But perhaps most unnerving was the claim that Ruža Vlajna was seen walking on the surface of the Danube River.
Was Ruža Ever Staked?
Unlike the detailed and grim fate that befell Petar Blagojević, it’s unknown whether Ruža Vlajna’s haunting was ever resolved as the old lore would have it solved. The oral histories passed down in Kisiljevo never confirm whether the villagers dared to stake her corpse or exhume her grave. Perhaps they could never locate it, or perhaps they feared that disturbing her final resting place would only provoke darker consequences.
Who was she though? Her name and life has not been confirmed through anything other than village stories. The house she used to haunt is said to be torn down. When did she die though? There was one man who allegedly went on TV to talk about this who claimed to have seen her in the 1930s. By then, it was said she had already been dead a century.
Kisiljevo Today: A Town Still Haunted
Though modernity has softened some of Kisiljevo’s superstitions, the town remains indelibly linked to its vampire lore. The sleepy town seems at odds with itself. On one side reluctant to accept its vampiric history, on the other keen to capitalize on it. Stories of restless spirits and inexplicable phenomena still surface from time to time, as though the soil itself remembers.
Ruža Vlajna’s tale endures, not through official records, but through the frightened accounts of villagers reluctant to speak of her after dark. In Kisiljevo, history and horror walk hand in hand — and some legends refuse to die.
Meanwhile, the people of Kisiljevo have many local traditions about death. When a person dies, they keep a lit candle next to the body from the moment of death until the body is placed in the casket at home and perform rituals against evil spirits before placing the body in the coffin. Gold coins were placed over the eyes of the deceased, although today they use regular coins so the dead won’t be broke in the afterlife.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Said to be the mass burial place for the dead Irish Independence rebels from 1798, the Croppie’s Acre in Dublin is said to be haunted by their lingering souls.
Just beyond the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, near the banks of the River Liffey, lies a stretch of green ground known as Croppie’s Acre or Acra na gCraipithe. To the unknowing passerby, it might appear as nothing more than a tranquil patch of grass and trees, but beneath that quiet surface lies one of Dublin’s most haunted and sorrowful places.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Ireland
This was once a mass grave, the final resting place for the rebels of the 1798 uprising and the men known as “Croppies” for their short-cropped hair, a symbol of revolutionary defiance. Hundreds were executed, their bodies dumped without ceremony into the earth, their names and faces forgotten by time. Yet if the stories are true, their spirits have never forgiven such an ending.
The Blood of Rebellion
In the summer of 1798, Ireland was swept by rebellion. Inspired by the ideals of liberty and equality, the United Irishmen rose against British rule. The United Irish were betrayed by one of their leaders and fell into a well-planned ambush.
Many were captured and executed, hanged, beheaded, or shot, their remains discarded in pits near Kilmainham. Croppie’s Acre became their unmarked grave, a place heavy with grief and anger. The monument on 98 Street commemorates fallen Irishmen.
Croppies Acre: Overlooking the National Museum of Ireland, Dublin. //Source: dronepicr/Wikimedia
There have been many archeological investigations in the area, and they have not found any human remains and there have been theories that the bodies was actually tossed in the nearby River Liffey and taken away by the tide. Was the place really a mass grave as the story claims? Local tradition certainly thinks so and it has become a memorial. And with the bloody history, the legend of the place being haunted grew.
A Playground for the Dead
For years the field was used as a football pitch. Children played where rebels once bled into the soil. Players reported feeling strange chills even on warm days, or seeing figures on the edge of the pitch watching silently before fading into nothing.
Some claimed that balls kicked toward the far end of the field would veer suddenly off course, as if struck by an unseen hand. Others refused to play there at all, saying they felt the ground itself shift beneath their feet, as though something was stirring just beneath the surface.
Shadows by the Liffey
In the years since, Croppie’s Acre has been recognized as sacred ground, a memorial to those who died for Ireland’s cause. Yet the hauntings have never fully ceased, although the nature of the haunting remain vague, more like a haunted energy that lingers around the field.
The field has also been closed down for years after being a place were heavy drug users gathered, not really helping the haunted rumours.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Once a green paradise, the legend says the fairies protected the people of Val Gerina valley in the Swiss alps. Driven by greed to impress a woman however, the son meant to continue the tradition and friendship with the fairies, brought it all down.
Deep in the Swiss Alps, where the mountains whisper ancient secrets and the wind carries echoes of forgotten songs, there once existed a valley so green, so lush, it seemed untouched by time or sorrow. This was Val Gerina, a valley close to the Swiss-Italian border in the alps. In Italian sources, it is also known as Valle Aurina.
Read more: Check out all ghost stories from Switzerland
It looks like the Val Gerina valley is found in San Vittore in the Moesa Region, a place hidden away where a lot of the valleys are uninhabited. There is also a Valle Aurina (Ahrntal) in South Tyrol, Italy. Now, it is not certain this is the valley referenced in the story, as the valley in the story vanishes, or at least becomes barren. Back when the story takes place, it was said to be a lush and fertile land and called The Green One. In the middle of the valley was a lake, and on the shore was a little village. It was a place as beautiful as it was mysterious, veiled in alpine mist and guarded by a legend that has outlived the valley itself: the tale of the fairies of Val Gerina.
A Daily Offering to the Hidden Folk
The story begins with Aimone, an old man who lived in a quiet alpine village on the edge of the valley and owned the lush pastures and fields. Solitary by nature, Aimone was known to carry a bucket of fresh milk every day up the mountain, placing it reverently on a flat stone near the summit. Without fail, by morning, the milk would be gone with not a drop spilled, not a trace left behind.
Villagers grew curious. They whispered about wild animals or spirits, and many tried to follow him to discover the secret. But Aimone, fiercely protective of his daily ritual, always chased them away. None dared question him until his son, Pietro, whose curiosity would prove devastating.
Breaking the Pact
One morning, Pietro trailed his father in secret. He watched as Aimone set down the milk on a large altar-shaped stone beneath a rock and left. Determined to see the truth, Pietro waited and waited… but nothing happened. The milk remained. No fairies, no magic.
Disappointed and confused, Pietro returned home only to discover that his favorite goat had mysteriously died during his absence. Seeing his son’s grief, Aimone finally revealed the truth.
For years, he had been feeding the mountain fairies that lived in a cave on the rock overlooking the valley. In return, they had protected his home, animals, and crops. They were shy, unseen beings, living deep in the caves of the Alps, whose magic depended on being respected and left undisturbed.
The Fairy of the Alps from 1885, Henri Fantin-Latour
For generations, their family had been feeding the fairies that protected them and their lush valley. By watching the offering, Pietro had broken the unspoken pact, and the fairies had exacted a price.
When Pietro looked at the rock from far away the next day, it was like he saw two lights, almost white shapes that floated along the path leading up to their cave.
The Seduction of Greed
Years passed. Pietro grew into a young man and fell deeply in love with a woman from the neighboring valley called Lolanda. In some versions she was a foreigner new to town, coming from the city, daughter of a nobleman. She was nothing like the other valley girls and her taste was more luxurious and refined than what Pietro had to offer..
To impress her, he gave her a small black stone inlaid with gold. He had been given it by a shepherd coming with a token so rare and exquisite, she was overwhelmed. Encouraged by her reaction, Pietro promised to bring her more. In some versions she asked him to find more, even handing him a spell that would invoke the help of the fairies.
But precious stones do not fall from the sky, and Pietro knew just where to find them: the fairy caves his father had once told him about in whispers.
Determined and emboldened by greed, Pietro stole into the mountains. Armed with an ancient scroll, said to contain a blood-written spell that could compel the fairies to give up their treasures, he ventured into the heart of the cave. There, with trembling hands, he read the incantation aloud.
The Fall of Val Gerina
The moment the final word passed his lips, the cave began to shake. Stones tumbled, winds howled, and the very mountain seemed to scream in fury. The ground split open beneath Pietro’s feet. He tried to flee, but it was too late. The earth collapsed, swallowing him — and the entire valley of Val Gerina — into a silent abyss.
By morning, the valley they knew had vanished.
Where once there was a verdant paradise, now stood only jagged rock and alpine scree. A barren landscape with no life. Pietro was never seen again. Nor were the fairies — if they had ever truly shown themselves at all.
It is said that no map ever recorded its existence, and no villager could say whether Val Gerina had been real or simply a dream. So, perhaps the Val Gerina mentioned earlier only bares a similar name.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Haunted by its former Fellows, Trinity College in Dublin is said to be filled with eerie spirits where even the bell tolls after dark when the shadows take over campus.
Trinity College Dublin is the oldest surviving university in Ireland, founded in 1592. If we are to believe the rumors, the college is also notorious for its haunted ghost stories and is said to be one of Dublin’s most haunted landmarks.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Ireland
Its alumni include many great names, and some of them are more fitting to study at a haunted college than others. Most notably Bram Stoker, the creator of Dracula, who studied here from 1866 to 1870. But who were the students and staff said to linger even after The Campanile bells rang for the last time?
The Haunted Trinity College
The most infamous haunting is tied to Edward Ford, a former lecturer and Fellow whose stern temperament made him deeply unpopular with the undergraduates as he had a habit of interfering with student matters, being harsh and disciplinarian. He was also very young, being around 28 when he died and is still seen by people around campus.
On March 7th in 1734, after a night of heavy drinking, a group of drunken students decided to teach him a lesson after he had scolded them after they had trashed the rooms of Ford’s colleagues, Hugh Graffan. They entered the Front Gate wearing all white, beating up the porter who was stationed there.
They wanted first to break his windows, but Ford saw them and shot at them with a pistol and injured one from his bedroom window. Now it all escalated and they came back outside of his room at House 25 in the Rubrics with firearms themselves.
They fired shots into his rooms at the Rubrics, the oldest surviving building in the college. Ford had been urged to stay in his bed, but he went to the window in his night dress and confronted the students. Two shots struck Ford in the head and body, mortally wounding him. Although a surgeon was called, he died two hours after being shot, deeply in pain. On his deathbed, he refused to reveal the names of his killers, instead uttering the chilling words: “I do not know, but God forgive them, I do.”
The matter was investigated and four students were accused, but they were all acquitted as most of the witnesses had been drinking and were unable to identify them and had contradictory stories. Although they were acquitted by the court, the Board had all of them expelled from the college.
Ford Haunting the Rubrics Building
Forgiveness didn’t seem to bring him peace however. Since then, Ford’s spirit has been seen wandering the side of the Rubrics at dusk, dressed in his scholar’s powdered wig, gown, and knee breeches.
Students and staff alike have reported catching sight of a figure gliding silently past the red-brick façade, strolling down to Botany Bay before his form vanishes into the shadows before anyone can draw closer. His presence is not vengeful however, although his murderers went without any punishment at all, and went on to have great careers, even after being expelled.
The Legend of The Campanile Bells
The Campanile in Front Square is an iconic landmark of College and was built in 1853 and although there are no ghosts haunting it per se, it certainly has a haunting superstition lingering over it.
Legend has it that if a student walks underneath the Campanile as the bell tolls within the tower, they will fail all of their exams.
Today, the bells are automated, but still, people claim they ring at completely random times and the students avoid it just in case. Some say that there is a way to avoid failing though by touching the foot of former Provost George Salmon’s statue before the bell stops ringing. Salmon is by the way known for promising that no woman would ever study in Trinity.
The Ghost of George Francis Fitzgerald
Another ghost of a former staff member at Trinity College said to haunt the campus is that of George Francis Fitzgerald. He was an Irish theoretical physicist in the 1800s and was working as a tutor at the college. He is mostly known for the Fitzgerald-Lorentz contraction, a theory of the relativity of space to speed. This would become important for Albert Einstein’s special theory of relativity.
Fitzgerald died in 1901 at the young age of 41, after he became ill with stomach problems. Many attribute his illness and death to overwork.
Students now believe that the ghost of Fitzgerald haunts the Physical Laboratory, now known as the Fitzgerald laboratory even though he never stepped foot in the building when he was alive. The Physical Laboratory was built in 1905, four years after Fitzgerald’s death.
The Ghost of Thomas Meredith
Another mathematician said to haunt the halls is the ghost of Thomas Meredith who was a mathematician and a Fellow at Trinity College. He is said to glide across the grass outside the Provost’s House before disappearing when reaching Challoner’s Corner.
There are also those claiming to have seen a ghost standing in the nave of the College Chapel after evensong in the mid 19th century. This ghost however is much more mysterious and not as widely talked about.
Archbishop Narcissus Marsh was the Provost of Trinity College during the 1670s and is also one of the ghosts said to haunt the campus. First and foremost he is said to haunt the Marsh’s library right by the college campus, searching for a lost note between the pages of the books. Read more: The Haunting in Marsh’s Library in Dublin. He is however also reported to have been seen haunting the college campus.
The Ghosts of the Victims of Body Snatching
As many universities in the 18th and 19th century, Trinity College’s medical departments relied heavily on the dead bodies sold to them by body snatchers. Before the Anatomy Act of 1832, only criminals could be used legally for anatomical study. But the market for fresh corpses was higher than dead criminals, so many in medical academia turned to illegal means. A lucrative business once, people dug up freshly buried bodies to sell to the university who dissected them and studied them in the Anatomy Theatres.
In 1999, close to the Eavan Boland Library, construction workers uncovered remains of at least 20 people that had been buried in shallow graves to cover up the crimes of those buying these corpses. Their bones all showed signs of dissection and careless disposal. This was also the case close to Trinity’s old anatomy theatres at the E3 Learning Foundry where they found skeletons dating back as far as 1711.
Even to this day, staff and students claim to have experienced ghostly activity in the School of Medicine. Shadows and disembodied footsteps after nightfall are said to have made at least one night shift worker refuse to come back.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
A true story morphed into a fairytale, the life and death of the French Countess Marie Louise St. Simon-Montleart has become the stuff of legends. Buried in the forest close to Wildegg Castle in Switzerland, it is said she is haunting the castle and the forest, her sanctuary.
High above the Aare River, perched on the Chäschtebärg hill near Möriken-Wildegg in the Swiss canton of Aargau, stands Wildegg Castle. With origins dating back to around 1200, built by the powerful Habsburgs, this proud fortress has witnessed centuries of wars, dynasties, and secrets.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Switzerland
Yet among its long and tangled history, one ghostly tale still lingers in the mists of local legend of an outsider who took sanctuary within the castle walls from the French Revolution. This is the story of the sorrowful queen, Marie Louise St. Simon-Montleart (1763-1804).
A Tale of Loneliness and Loss
They call her a queen of Wildegg Castle in the legends, but she was actually a French Countess. Long ago, Marie Louise lived at Wildegg Castle with her husband, according to legend, a king known more for his indulgence in hunting, carousing, and feasting than for any affection toward his wife.
She was however married to Louis Marie de Montléart. Originally from Paris, she had fled to Switzerland after the French Revolution. It is however true that she was unhappy in their marriage.
Marie Louise St. Simon-Montléart (1763-1804)
In Versailles at the French court, she became close friends with Baroness Sophie von Effinger, who was herself unhappily married and whose ancestral seat was at Wildegg Castle. As the French Revolution ravaged the French Court and Paris, she fled to her friend who took her in as the battle went on. She was accompanied by another Duchess, but it’s unsure if her husband even followed her.
As the legend goes however, her husband neglected the countess, leaving her to wander the vast and shadowed forests surrounding the castle, seeking solace among the ancient trees. Around the Wildegg Castle as her own country went up in flames in the bloody revolution.
The forest, wild and eternal, became her only refuge. It’s said that within its depths, she found peace from her sorrows, the trees whispering comfort to her heavy heart. There, far from the noise of courtly revels, she is believed to have breathed her final breath.
During a later visit to Wildegg in 1804, Marie Louise St. Simon-Montléar died of tuberculosis. As her spirit left her body, a mournful rustling wind swept through the forest, carrying away the last traces of her grief.
The King’s Guilt and a Haunting Memorial
According to the legend of her being the queen of the castle, her husband was overcome with guilt for his neglect, and is said to have built a grand tomb for his lost queen deep within the castle grounds, near her beloved woods. This part is not true, but her grave does really sit in the nearby forest.
The simple rectangular gravestone bears the inscription written by Count von Redern of Bernsdorf :
“Here rests, after the storm of life, a noble woman. Marie Louise St. Simon-Montléart, born in Paris on October 12, 1763, died in Wildegg on June 21, 1804. She was born a violet among thorns and thistles. She fought courageously against bitter misfortune from early childhood to her grave. She died peacefully among friends, happily sensing a higher destiny, for her actions were just and her words true.”
Count von Redern was the business partner of her brother Henri Claude and had accompanied her from Montpellier to Wildegg Castle.
The Forest Grave: The forest grave of Countess Marie Louise St. Simon-Montléar near Wildegg Castle. // Source: Michael Frey & Sundance Raphael / Wikimedia.
To this day, visitors claim to feel a strange, uneasy presence when approaching the grave. On still nights, when the wind stirs the branches and the leaves sigh like whispered words, many say it’s the queen’s restless spirit, forever roaming the forest she loved.
In time, nature reclaimed the resting place, dense trees and creeping vines entwining it as though fulfilling Marie Louise’s unspoken wish to forever be part of the forest. The grave inspired Walter Fähndrich when he wrote “Music for a Forest Grave” in 2001 and The 15-minute piece begins at the time of local sunset from loudspeakers in the vicinity of the grave.
The Girl and the Ghosts
There is another ghostly legend retold by El Rochholz: Swiss Legends from Aargau from 1856 about a girl seeing a ghost around Wildegg Castle. It is said that all those born around midnight on Lent are capable of seeing spirits. But if they keep silent about what they last saw for 24 hours, no ghosts can harm them. There was such a child in the village of Holderbank.
Once upon a time a girl and her colleagues were walking home from work at Wildegg Castle to Holderbank village. It was between 10 or 11 o’clock. As she was crossing, over the mountain to their village, a man dressed in green and armed with a rifle suddenly stepped into her path. She immediately changed her route and after a long detour, she reached her house by 1 o’clock.
The other girls that had been walking with her, didn’t know where she had gone and had already spread the word that she had been shot by a huntsman. She didn’t say a word about it.
Later, as she was on her way from Holderbank to Saffenwil as a bride, a small black dog ran between them. She immediately crossed to the other side of the road, evading once more the spirits she could see. And despite all her fiancés’ questions as to why she was leaving him, she failed to answer him for a full 24 hours, believing the legend about not saying a word after seeing ghosts.
A Castle of Secrets
Wildegg Castle, with its commanding view of the Aare and its centuries of layered history, remains one of Switzerland’s most atmospheric historic sites. Though the Effinger family, the castle’s last noble residents, passed away in 1912 and the property now belongs to the Canton of Aargau, echoes of its haunted past still cling to its stones.
And on certain misty evenings, as the wind stirs the trees on the Chäschtebärg, one might sense a faint rustle — and wonder if it is merely the wind… or Marie Louise St. Simon-Montleart still walking among her trees.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
Crossing through the Jura Mountains in Switzerland, an urban legend about the ghost of a lady in white is said to have haunted the Belchen Tunnel and was widely known and written about in the 80s. Question is, is she still haunting the tunnel?
At the crossroads of Switzerland, Germany, and France, the three peaks collectively known as the Belchen Triangle—particularly the Swiss Belchenflue near Basel—carry an ancient legacy: aligning with solstices in Celtic times. But in modern folklore, this triangle harbors darker secrets—haunted roads, phantom hitchhikers, and unexplainable phenomena that linger in the night.
Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Switzerland
Although there are many legends and urban legends around these parts, no one is more retold than about the Belchen Tunnel, or the Bölchentunnel. According to some local accounts, hikers and drivers have glimpsed strange lights flickering near peaks at night. Though allegedly due to military flares or misleading reflections, these eerie illuminations feed beliefs that the mountains are still guardians of otherworldly mysteries.
The Belchen Triangle: The Belchenflue in Eptingen is one of the most famous mountains in the Basel region. It is not just a striking mountain; it is also part of an ancient mystery. Along with the Belchen peaks in the Black Forest and Alsace, it creates a near-perfect triangle, resembling a Celtic solar calendar. Druids utilized these landmarks to track solstices and equinoxes. Researchers found that the distances and arrangement of these mountains show impressive geometric patterns that illustrate the Pythagorean theorem, highlighting the Celts’ advanced knowledge of astronomy and geometry.
The Haunted Belchen Tunnel
The Belchen tunnel is found on the boundary between the Solothurn and Basel-Landschaft cantons of Switzerland and is said to be one of the most haunted tunnels in the world. The tunnel as it is today, opened in 1966 as part of the A2 motorway from Basel to Chiasso through the Jura Mountains. The Belchen Tunnel quickly became notorious—not for traffic, but for its ghostly encounters. In June 1980, drivers reported picking up a male hitchhiker who vanished mid-tunnel, even as the car sped.
The first stories about the legend was actually said to be of a male ghost haunting the tunnel and hitchhiking from unsuspected cars. June 1980, a man was picked up by the tunnel but vanished from the backseat, although the car was going fast.
By January 1981, the legend had transformed into being a woman haunting the roads and it was written about in the newspapers after an article in the Blick mentioned the legend. “I had many callers on the phone back then who firmly claimed to have seen a ghost in Eptingen,” says Armin Gyger. The retired highway patrolman never believed the callers.
It especially became a well known tale during Shrove Tuesday carnival that year. Sightings shifted to a spectral “White Woman” in flowing robes and it was called the Bölchengespenst. Dozens of frightened calls flooded Basel police.
Belchen Tunnel: North portal of Belchentunnel on A2 motorway, near Eptingen, Switzerland. // Source
The White Lady of the A2 Belchen Tunnel
One chilling account on 26 September in 1983 involved two female lawyers who stopped in Eptingen to help a pale middle-aged woman through the tunnel. They stopped on the hard shoulder and one of the women got out to open the back door to the elderly lady. She seemed clumsy and they asked if she was alright, only for her to whisper, “Something really awful is going to happen,” before disappearing from their backseat as they entered the tunnel.
They reported it to the police who searched the car, but they found nothing. The two women stumbled into the restaurant on the money night between 7 and 8 in the evening and cried, claiming they had something to tell to the owners, Marie-Therese and Paul Burkhardt
This vanishing hitchhiker tale echoes worldwide and became one of the many legends of White Lady or “Weisse Frau” that are so popular in both German and French speaking countries, but few roads are as consistently linked to a single figure. At times, locals also report encounters with a dark-suited man who foretells bad weather or disaster before evaporating into the shadows.
Driving Through the Legend
In addition to the white woman haunting the roads, there is some saying that a group of construction workers died when parts of the tunnel collapsed as they were building it. Their restless spirits are now haunting the tunnel, appearing to those passing through.
The Belchen Triangle whispers of ancient astronomical secrets—but on the A2, at night, its tale turns to the modern and eerie, even after it was renovated completely in 2003. Whether you believe the White Woman is a vanishing hitchhiker of myth, or a restless spirit tied to Alpine lore, travelers are advised: some thresholds should remain uncrossed after dark.
The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
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The MS Nordstjernen spent decades bringing passengers north across the arctic sea, and although the waters can be brought this far north, it always seemed to reach port unharmed. Some think that it could be Ernst, the ship’s ghosts.
The DNT Cabin Flisberget deep in the mystical forest of Finnskogen, bordering Norway and Sweden has a lot of strange tales coming from it. So much so, that it was voted the scariest cabin in the country.
Could one of the musicians on the Titanic be haunting the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, England? Who is the person behind the ghost said to still be playing the violin?
Soria Moria: The Villa Fridheim is often called the Soria Moria castle, a name from Norwegian folktales about the hidden castle where the hero will find the princess. It has also now turned into an expression for expectations about a great place.
Said to be found deep in the mountain range MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry, Ireland, the ruins of Dun Dreach-Fhoula castle is said to be the home of bloodthirsty fairies of the Otherworld. Question is if it’s an ancient legend or a modern hoax.
After being stranded on their little island at Struten Lighthouse in stormy weather with the waves crashing in, a woman succumbed to her illness and has since then been haunting it, still waiting for the help that never came.
The once stately Sauda Fjordhotel is said to be haunted by a remorseful colonel, who took his own life when his womanizing ways lost him the love of his life.
After the Titanic sank in 1912, people started talking about seeing the ghost of Captain Smith around the world. Even after all these years, his death and afterlife have an air of mystery surrounding it and he has become one of the most well known ghosts from the Titanic tragedy.
How big can a haunted area be? Can the whole of Wailua on Kauai Island be haunted? The place certainly seems steeped in tales of Night Marchers and a procession of the dead, making their way down the river to the afterlife.
Rising from their graves, the vampiric Amalanhig from the Philippines are after your flesh and blood. But where did these creatures come from?
Said to be haunted by the people from the funeral home that used to be next door, the Doyle’s Pub in Dublin is said to have more than living patrons having a drink.
In the bordertown of Sweden of Norway, Fredriksten Fortress has seen more bloodshed than many places. But who is the White Lady said to be haunting it, soaring around the clock tower in the night?
