Hampton Court Palace is notorious as a haunted Royal residence. It has to earn its keep and fund repairs by using the history that took place within its walls as a carrot to bring in tourists. Sometimes this includes using its unseen residents as publicity fodder.
This report first appeared in www.psychic-tymes.com, volume 1 issue 3, November & December 2000.

I first heard of the experiment by Dr Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire over the Internet. It was then followed up by a large article in one of my local newspapers, the Esher News & Mail, dated 31st May 2000. It seemed an interesting idea to try and involve myself in the experiment.

It was hyped up in my local newspaper as "Believers in the paranormal will be awaiting the outcome of an unique experiment being carried out at Hampton Court Palace this week which could finally lay to rest the ghost of Catherine Howard. Parapsychologists from Hertfordshire University were recently called in by the palace to monitor any paranormal activity in the Haunted Gallery, where a number of unexplained sightings of Catherine have been reported over the years."

The article went on to say "Dr Richard Wiseman, a lecturer in psychological phenomena at Hertfordshire University, was asked to come to the palace after two women fainted in the same spot during two separate evening lantern-light tours. Afterwards, they reported feeling cold, as if they had been punched, and then feeling hot."

Of the experiment, the article said "Dr Wiseman and his team installed thermal imaging equipment and a magnetometer in the Haunted Gallery…The equipment will monitor any changes in atmosphere that could account for the reported ghostly appearances of the tragic Queen and give some scientific explanations of people's reactions."

The press report went on to say that members of the public would be asked to fill in questionnaires and get to see normally locked rooms, I had to find a way of involving myself in one of the sessions! I turned up at 9am on Saturday 3rd of June, just as the Palace opened its doors for business. The main entrance through the Clock Tower was blocked as the palace was being made ready for the summer music festival. That meant I walked down a side entrance I had rarely been before, and never in the misty morning. It was haunted, I could hear the clash and clamour on the wind of a busy kitchen, not of this time. I smiled, perhaps it was a fine auger for the impending experiment.

I went into the office designated as the place to pick up tickets for the days activities at Hampton Court. I picket up ticket number two on the first session of the day and I had one and a half hours to kill until the tour took place. I spent a useful half hour talking to the guard on the door behind which was the room stuffed full of monitoring equipment. He told me a few of the stories regarding the palace that he had had experience of and those stories he had heard first or second hand from other members of staff.

Apparently there is a famous Black Dog spectre that walks through the grounds. He told me of a night when he was closing up the palace after a candle-light tour. The mist was curling up to a height of three feet and the Clock Court was empty. He noticed a click-clack of toe nails against the cobbles and thought that at last he would see one of the famous ghosts of the Palace, the black dog. Needless to say he was scared out of his wits until he realized that the click-clack was really the tick-tock of the clock, making a different sound in the deadening mist of a dank November evening.

He also told me of the basis of the stories surrounding ghostly Catherine Howard shrieking down the corridor. Until the Victorian period, when the Palace was first opened to the public gaze, there had been no reports of a haunting in the Long Gallery. After the opening the cleaners started to say something was to be seen in the Gallery. Was the ghost awakened by the public gaze, or where rumours started to get the public in? Victorian England was noted for its interest in ghosts and the paranormal.

This experiment would be my chance to find out. I was looking forward to seeing if I could sense any of the ghosts in Hampton Court Palace. Normally there are too many people about to make it worth my while to open my sixth sense to see if anyone or anything is there. This time I would get to sit in areas normally away from the public eye. I would also be positively encouraged to use my abilities to see if anything from the 'other side' was about.

After finishing talking with the guard I went to have a welcome cup of tea in the café, and then stopped to meditate in the Chapel Royal prior to joining in the experiment. The chapel had a few visitors looking around as I quietly meditated. Gradually I became aware of two spirits, a child and a woman, both from different periods. I prayed for them and as time wore on left to return to the room where the crowd was gathering to take part in Dr Wiseman's experiment.

There was an interesting mix of people from all countries and all ages. One couple had brought two small children with them. There was a crowd of Italians chattering loudly amongst themselves and I wondered if they would ever be quiet enough to sense any ghosts! There were a sprinkling of middle-aged and white-haired pensioners. All in all a wide band of humans eagerly awaiting the tour.

Dr Wiseman opened the room for us all to enter. He split us into two bands, each one would go with a member of the ghost-busting team to the two designated areas he wanted us to sense ghosts in.

I had chosen to sit on the left-hand side of the room, in one of the back rows. I had noticed on entering the room that that was a 'hot spot'. I concentrated and found that there was a woman on a prie-dieu in the corner of the room, dressed in Tudor costume. She was fairly young in age. Whether it was Catherine Howard or not I could not say, she was too caught up in her own business of praying to pay any attention to me or the others now filling the small room to overflowing.

Dr Wiseman began giving a short talk on the nature of the ghostly areas we were being asked view. He showed us the results they were getting from the magnetometer and temperature sensing equipment. He told us the story of Sybil Penn, the foster mother of Henry VIII's son Edward. She is supposed to be the lady who haunted the room we were in, the Prince of Wales' Closet. She lived and died in the Palace, long after her charge, King Edward VI died, having the room as a grace and favour apartment (much of the Palace is still used as grace and favour apartments for retired royal household members). This meant that the room would have been haunted for nigh on 400 years. During some repairs to the building a spinning wheel was found bricked into the fireplace. An interesting point he raised was that the ghost was often described as being seen spinning. Sybil Penn's grave was in Hampton Church and he elaborated that her spirit haunting the room seemed to become more prevalent after Hampton Church had been struck by lightening and damaged her grave.

Dr Wiseman went on to list the type of equipment they were using in the experiment, magnetometers, thermal imaging cameras, light sensors, temperature sensors and film. He asked us to fill in the diagram at the back of our questionnaires, and to fill in the questions. He was particularly interested in temperature fluctuations and our reactions to atmosphere.

After the talk we were taken through the palace to the long gallery and told to get 'sensing'. By the time we were out and about the palace was filling with visitors. We had to go through a large crowd watching and listening to a play enactment of Catherine Howard's story. We were brought to the corridor Dr Wiseman was interested in and let loose. I went up and down the gallery a few times trying to see if I could sense anything. I found a couple of 'hot spots' and dully recorded them on my sheet. He had asked us to check Cardinal Wolsey's closet and I felt that there was something there. We also were allowed to enter a small kitchen, normally closed to the public. It was haunted as well, unfortunately they also had a leaking electricity junction box in the room which interfered with the ghostly emanations. Finally I moved on to the Georgian part of the palace and found a very solid ghost in Georgian dress wanting to 'talk' to me.

I returned to Dr Wiseman and asked where the experiment finished as I had found rather a substantial spook. Unfortunately the Duke of Cumberland's rooms were not part of the experiment so the spook I had just interacted with was not relevant to the experiment in hand. Dr Wiseman was interested enough to ask me about my results, he noticed I had written rather a lot on my sheet. I explained that I was psychic and these were my findings. He walked me through the areas concerned and asked me to elaborate, which I did. He seemed more keen on cold spots even though I explained I felt ghosts as hot spots. The cold spots were duly marked even though I kept insisting they were air-ducts and not ghosts.

After taking time to go through my sheet with him I asked if I could have access to the results of the experiment and was given his address at the university so that I could be sent a short synopsis of the results. After two requests I am still waiting for them. It has been four months since the experiment and I have to assume that either there were no results, or they have not yet finished sifting through them, or they have no intention of sending out the short description. I will leave that to your imagination. I held this report over from the last issue of psychic-tymes I have no intention of waiting any longer from input from Dr Wiseman.

Did I find Catherine Howard? Was the praying lady in the Prince of Wales' Closet her or Sybil Penn? Who was the Georgian gentleman in the other rooms? All in all I can say is it was all a mystery. I would still give my right hand to stay a night in the palace and envy Dr Wiseman his chance to sleep for a week in one of the apartments within the palace! I could have had such fun talking to all the ghosts that walk the palace.

© 2000 Judy Farncombe, Farncombe Publishing