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St Jamess

In the year 1804 the Coldstream Guards were quartered in Recruit House, now the new Wellington Barracks near the Guards Chapel, which was so terribly bombed with great

loss of life in the Second World War. On the night of 3 January a Coldstream Guards sentry named George Jones was posted on duty between the Cockpit Steps and the lake in St James's Park. What happened in the very early hours of that morning created such fear and alarm throughout the barracks that an immediate full enquiry was ordered by the commanding officer.

Strangely enough, a number of men made declarations on oath, as well as the principal witness, the sentry George Jones, before the magistrate Sir Richard Ford in Westminster. What was most surprising about the ghost of the headless woman, which the terrified sentry saw, was the emergence of other sightings by several soldiers. They had probably been afraid to tell anyone what they had seen or heard for fear of being called a liar, or ridiculed. There is a ring of truth, however, in both the principal statements which gives the evidence of real ghosts an unusual authenticity. The sworn statement by George Jones ran thus:

I do solemnly declare that when guard at Recruit House on or about the 3rd inst., about half past one in the morning, I perceived the figure of a woman without a head rise from the earth at a distance of about two feet before me. I was so alarmed at the circumstance that I had not the power to speak to it, which was my wish. But I distinctly observed that the figure was dressed in a red striped gown with red spots between each stripe, and that part of the dress and figure appeared to me to be enveloped in a cloud. In about the space of two minutes, whilst my eyes were fixed on the object, it vanished from my sight. I was perfectly sober and collected at the time, and being in great trepidation, called to the next sentinel, who met me half-way, and to whom I communicated the strange sight I had seen.

His signed statement is dated 15 January 1804. The haunted area in question was between the Cockpit Steps and the canal which at that time ran through St James's Park and Birdcage Walk. Near there was an empty house, widely believed to be haunted, although when a clergyman decided to locate the ghost by passing a night all alone in the house, he neither saw nor heard anything at all.

Another story was told by a Coldstream Guards sentry in a sworn and signed statement which, though at variance with that of George Jones in many details, still rings true. This sentry, one Richard Donkin, was on duty behind the Armoury House at about midnight when he heard disturbing noises from the haunted house. His statement goes on:

At the same time I heard a voice cry out 'Bring me a light! Bring me a light!' The last word was uttered in so feeble and changeable a tone of voice that I concluded some person was ill, and consequently offered them my assistance. I could however, obtain no answer to my proposal although I repeated it several times, and as often the voice used the same terms. I endeavoured to see the person who called out but in vain. On a sudden the violent noise was renewed which appeared to me to resemble sashes of windows lifted hastily up and down but that they were moved in quick succession and in different parts of the house, nearly at the same time, so it seems to me impossible that one person could accomplish the whole business. I heard several of my regiment say they have heard similar noises and proceedings, but I have never heard the calls accounted for.

One of the most important factors in this whole case is that no other Guards regiment, for the barracks were occupied in turns by other regiments, reported any trouble at all. The reason why only Coldstream Guards saw the headless figure and heard the noises from the empty house may well have been because some twenty years previously a Coldstream Guards sergeant had murdered his wife, cutting off her head and throwing both parts of the corpse into the nearby canal. This event could not have been suppressed, it must have been known throughout the barracks and even beyond and could easily have frightened any sentry on duty at night.

Many years later a civilian reported seeing a woman running towards the park from the Cockpit Steps, wearing a red-and-white dress. Another driver nearly killed, as he thought, a woman rushing across the road from the Cockpit Steps. Her dress had been white, but blood-splashed and she was headless. The phantom, as it was, disappeared into the fog. Noises have also been heard from a nearby empty house, but only by the soldiers and not by the owners. In spite of the most thorough investigations being carried out during and after the statements made to the Westminster magistrate, nothing has explained the ghosts and probably nothing ever will now. Chatham | RAF |