London's Ghosts and Gruesome Past | The Dark Side of the City

dedicated to Saint Bartholomew who was martyred in Armenia when he was skinned alive and you will see a lot of Effigies to Saint Bartholomew today he acted a few refugees I'm so rude hi everyone Sinead with free tours by foot London oh look there's a creepy guy there behind me ladies and gents who is that oh my God this is going to be a good one ladies and gents it's Halloween it's time to get started the spooky content is coming up ladies and gentlemen let me introduce you to my best friend in the world a fellow tour guide a ghost tour guide we are starting around faringdon station one of the most haunted stations in London in fact the first Railway Network in London coming the Metropolitan line from the Paddington to Farrington station this was opened in 1863 for what founding is most famous for is its screen inspector and I want to take you back to the very dark history of the brutally murdered young girl called Ann Naylor at 13 years of age she had spent most of her life as an orphan working in a workhouse with her sister and that's what's commonplace these young girls were regularly sent to work as apprentices in local businesses whether it be factories or haberdasheries but unfortunately for Annie she met the brutal Duo of mother and daughter Sarah and Sally met yard the sadistic Duo were quick to anger and were sadistic in their punishments of these Young Apprentice girls they regularly starve them beat them and subjected them to hours and of torture and it wasn't quite healthy enough to keep up with the demands of the work that the brunt of the abuse and one morning fearing for her life she attempted an escape but gradually she was caught by the young Sarah machart who brought her back and viciously beat her with a broomstick on the bed not content with the sadistic punishment her mother Sally entered the room and decided she would tie her to the door for three days using roads after three days her lifeless body terrified the other younger apprentices when the Met yards finally realized that they had brutally murdered her they attempted to conceal their crime by sending food up to Annie's room in an attempt to deceive the young apprentices they even left the doors of the Alex open and had said for a period of time that any other skate brutally they stuffed her body in a chest and left it there for two months but of course the smell of Rotting Flesh became all too apparent in the Milner's shop so they attempted a dissection of Annie's body and attempted to burn parts of her flesh the smell of the futured burning flesh became so overpowering and obvious they knew they had to get rid of Annie's remains they dissected our courts and they took her down here to a place called chick Lane where now Farrington station is located and attempted to throw a dissected corpse over the wall quite terrifyingly the following day when the Buddy's roomers were found a coroner had disregarded it as remains that had been used for anatomical research by the surgeons in the area was she ever going to lay a rest would she ever seek her revenge that came four years later over to Europe so for the next four years after Annie's murder this particular spot of London which is now Farrington underground station was haunted by the scream of a girl now this scream was heard so often that people in the local area just assumed the area was haunted they just wrote it off as a ghost now four years later in 1762 a young man living in the area had just had his girlfriend moving with him after his girlfriend had a particularly rough fight with her mum his girlfriend's name was Sally met yard now he just off the cuff one day mentioned to this girl oh by the way now you're living in this area just so you know there's a ghost or a scream of a little girl in this particular area over here Sally met you I broke down in tears and she admitted to her boyfriend well that's where me and my mum dumped the remains of a little girl four years ago that we killed now the boyfriend was horrified so he decided to go to the authorities but of course he didn't want to get his girlfriend in trouble so he went to the authorities told them it was her mum Sarah met yard who'd done the whole crime by herself not believing his girlfriend would be punished as well well sadly for him his plan didn't work both of the net yard women were arrested they were tried found guilty and hanged now during the executions the older Sarah met your other mother she passed out in shock because she couldn't believe she was going to be executed She fainted on the Journey To The Gallows once they got to The Gallows they tried to revive her using smelling salts to no avails what they did is they executed her limp unconscious body as her daughter Sally met yard or she went to The Gallows screaming in floods of Tears begging them not to take her life which of course is exactly what Young Annie Naylor were probably done four years earlier so this day ladies and gentlemen that screaming Specter can be heard all over Harrington station particularly late at night a terrifying haunting screens of a girl who eventually came back to exact her revenge this is one part that is haunted but we're gonna be heading up to Smithfield's Market folks and that's where heading up here you will see cow cross street and as you don't know from other videos that usually in the city of London the names of the streets usually represent the economic activity or the activity at the time so it is on this very street where the cows would cross the river Fleet making their way sometimes traveling very long Journeys up to be butchered and sold at Smithfield's market so let's make our way up let's go to one of the most haunted spots in London you see the Meat Market very shortly the largest and longest running wholesale meat market in the country I wish it originally a capital Market I believe but the area is close to Saint Bartholomew's Hospital s still running Hospital in the world nearly a thousand years old that's right it's back to 11 23 doesn't it and also The Priory that was built in the same area same Bartholomew the great and there's two churches Same by colony of the Great the less I love that I love the way they used to use all English Same by telling me the last so here's the wonderful sir Horace Jones 19th century building same architect who built Tower Bridge he actually built Tower Bridge leadenhall market and fillingscape fish market so the actual architecture of this building is remarkable and it's really not for the faint-hearted if you do decide to head in there you will be smelling so it's definitely not for vegetarians or vegans smell of fresh meat is overpowering in here and that's not the only smells they have detected over the years over here is the butchers I've spoken about a lot of paranormal activity in this area and they've spoken about smell of burning flesh I suppose this book about the screens of Agony of poltergeist and paranormal activity in the area not resolved you to the facts and it was a massive execution site straight ahead and we're going to take you down some very cool dark alleyways and some of these places are not familiar to a lot of people in London so I just want to keep you on the right direction so you'll know exactly where to go you decide to follow this tour yourself now what we are doing today is we're kind of following the root of our ghost tour which is conducted by our wonderful colleague in tour guide Matt Now Matt will make an appearance in this video later on he's going to talk to us a little bit more about primitive surgery is saved by colonies Hospital quite horrific some of the procedures were very archaic shall we say so we're making our way up here to charterhouse square the building here is a stunning example about Tudor Elizabethan and later architecture and I want to show you what was so it was a 14th century carthusian Priory founded by a chap called Walter the money now there was a massive need for graveyards in London even as far back as the 15th century malted many and actually decreased this area that you'll see on the right this land here to be used as a mass burial graveside but we'll come back to that in just a moment but I wanted to show you this amazing Priory that was built in the 14th century in 1371. and it was a carthusian Priory and even to this day inside the building you will see cells of monks that were confined into solitary confinement and also taken vows of silence and I'm going to try and get inside and do a full tour on this Priory I'm in the process of speaking to them but years later when it was sold again um it became an arm house or a school for disadvantaged boys in the area now technically it's used as a retirement home but it's a stunning example of Tudor Elizabethan and Victorian architecture and if you look at the red brick there in parts of the existing Priory you'll see the old Tudor breaks and Walter de many the founder they on Earth his actual remains during a massive renovation of the area there is a tomb in the plaque dedicated him right over there in the right and side of this Courtyard but the white bricks you see on that building were they were installed during a bombing campaign in World War II the building was badly damaged but they reinstated these um the Tudor brick is original white State brick was more recent times this beautiful place where you can get kind of Tours here at the charter house and that's a plan of original building as well of the layout of the entire Charter House but there's something else I want to talk to you about because over here is another very interesting part of the building albeit quite gruesome The Priory was closed down in 1535 during the disillusion of the monasteries by Henry VIII four men refused to leave The Priory that was the prior John Houghton and three other monks and they refused to accept Henry VIII as head of the church the four men then were accused of high treason and they were hung drawn and quartered and parts of their body John houghton's body his arm in particular was actually nails to the door was it that's right it was nailed to the story This original Gatehouse to the Charter House I mean such a gruesome past yet a stunning stunning battling to look at now it's getting a little darker so I'm going to try and film it in a better light but first Rob is going to tell us a little bit about another bit of history in the area well this area of greenery just over here uh looks quite nice doesn't it look like a nice little peaceful Park here in central London but there's a reason it's green there's a reason it hasn't been built on and that's because it contains one of central London's largest plague pits now this isn't the Great Plague of 1665. this is the Black Death now the Black Death can trace its roots to Asia it reached the shores of England in 1348 uh Weymouth to be precise it reached London by 1349 now it kicked off properly in the summer of 1349 it kind of died out around the December time but in that brief window it killed an estimate between 40 and 60 percent of the entire population of the country that's crazy now the population back then was about 6 million roughly so they reckon about three and a half to four million people were killed by the Black Death in just that short couple of month period by the time it burnt itself out Western Europe was decimated over 60 percent of all the people in Western Europe were killed that's crazy it reared its head again about 10 12 years later 1361 and then it killed another 20 of all the people here in the country so not a lot of people survived the 12th century here in London well the Black Death is said to be the deadliest pandemic in all of history wasn't it so how many do the estimator actually buried here Rob uh well there's wild sort of um variations some people say 2 000 other people say 20 000. so up to from two to twenty thousand but of course there are mass Graves as well because there's lack of their there certainly was no room for the dead and effectively and they do occasionally find these uh plague pits when they dig things like the London Underground or the crossrail exactly or the Elizabeth or just down the road there we saw the Elizabeth Line station and there's another one coming up over here so when they were building across well Liverpool Street is another one of them underground where they found a plague pit and under Green Park I believe yeah yeah um I mean one statistic I was reading as well is that because London was so overcrowded Not only was there no room for the living there was no room for the dead so these Church Courtyards they were um just Mass burials they were and one plot of land at all they were they were playing up to 30 bodies in the same um plot so they were literally bursting at the scenes and even if there was Flash storms or lashing rain there's body parts just basically swimming down the Streets of London and that's when they introduced The Magnificent Seven cemeteries after the cemetery act and had to build those beautiful Victorian valhallas which anyway way getting back to that so because of the cholera epidemics and because of well dysentery and scurvy there was one period where they could directly link the cholera to the water being contaminated by rushing flesh so effectively the dead were killing the living in London there's a guy called Jon Snow that's right who traced the cholera pandemic back to one single water pump which was on uh so that's right and um Founding Father are the signs of epidemiology and that water pump still exists it's now there it's got a little plaque on it I think I did that in a solo tour somewhere along the line yeah the old water pump and Soho look at this curious this beautiful place this must be a little Witch's House oh the door's open as well that's quite simply called the cottage look how gorgeous it is so it looks like this might be slightly out of place somebody seems to be just moving in there and I don't want to disturb them but I just want to show you this right in the window there's permanent fixture quite creepy there's a little black cat in the window so this is quite simply called the cottage isn't it beautiful there's a really beautiful like wooden door to look inside okay like a Tudor sneaky look at that big wooden door oh wow I couldn't actually do it because I feel bad the guys just moving in there well let's head up we're gonna up here now to the same Bartholomew the Great and as you'll see the names of the pubs represent of course the meat market in the area there's The Butchers hookers here isn't there there's the old red cow the new farringdon Elizabeth Line Station folks so this is where they would have done the digging over the last sort of five six years that's right that's where they would have Unearthed all these plague victims from the Black Death so many other Corpses it's hard not to imagine how the tubes could be so haunted in London disturbing so many people which they expected were going to be in wrestling slumber well they were much more respectful in the Victorian times compared to today so in the Victorian times if they came across a burial ground on the tube they tended to go around the edge to make an effort of going around the edge of it whereas today they just go straight through the middle of it they do they don't even respect it anymore get all the bodies out they can but um well it was so interesting because the victorians there I mean they took death very seriously I mean the more elaborate the funeral they expected expected the more welcome they would be yeah at the Gates of Heaven and in paradise and one particular thing I found quite disturbing the reason people were so terrified of being dissected is that they genuinely believed that dissective courses would not be accepted into Paradise but uh you had to be when the Rapture happened so when the Rapture happened exactly uh the people all the corpses and the bodies that were whole would rise and float up today if you were dissected you wouldn't rise to the heavens so basically when you were dissected and hundred and quarter for example they were killing you in life but also killing you killing you and Daddy after in the afterlife that's preventing you from your Eternal here's cloth Court by the way and there was a fair here in London as well a cloth fairy I mean look how amazing it is through here there was a cloth Fair here in London that happened once a year and it took about it was about two weeks and people made a lot of money on wool and clothes and so they played their trade and the mayor would arrive and he would cut a piece of cloth to officially open the fair and this is where we believe the cut and the ribbon ceremony originated from but the poet laureate and famous writer down here actually he's written some amazing books in London particularly a guide to London's churches lived here and this is where he lived at number I believe it's 13 43. well 43 my apologies she's the Homer John that she has his blue plaque this is the church Courtyard of Saint Bartholomew the great now I have a little video that I filmed earlier on and we will show you it very shortly but dedicated to Saint Bartholomew who was martyred in Armenia when he was skinned alive and you will see a lot of effigies choose Saint Bartholomew refugees um a lot of them will have pictures of him holding his own skin now this is the courtyard and this would have been the graveyard of Saint Bartholomew the Great side of it I'm going to take you inside now and I've did that during the daytime because it's hard to film at night time around here but so as we enter into the church of Same by colony of the great ladies and gentlemen repeatedly the oldest church in the entire city stunning architecture and one of the oldest surviving examples of Norman architecture in the country it's dedicated to Saint Bartholomew one of The Twelve Apostles I believe he appears in the scripture as Philip and that's disputed but Saint Bartholomew saw a very brutal fate as well he was martyred in the country of Armenia but he died being skinned alive at the request of the brother of the king of Armenia ironically he had managed to convert the king of Armenia but his brother was afraid of the power of the same Bartholomew had over his brother refusing to relinquish his faith he suffered the horrendous death of being skinned alive and we'll see an amazing statue by Damien Hearthstone side here of Saint Bartholomew in just a moment and just as before we head in and just show you two distinguishing features there there is a statue over here the monk who founded this church in 1123 now right here is the ghost that is said to haunt this area but right here himself was a a monk while he was originally a court Chester to Henry the first and right here took a pilgrimage to Rome and whilst there he suffered from a very severe bout of malaria on death's door he prayed to God for help and he begged him to spare his life and The Story Goes he had a vision from Saint Bartholomew and Bartholomew agreed to spare his life provided he converted his ways and became a holy man and built a church in the area hence Saint Bartholomew's and this immediate Church Saint Bartholomew's the great now the land was owned by Henry the first but uh when he came back and he heard about this Vision Henry the first immediately granted him permission to build this church now it was extensively bombed and this would have been originally the knave of the church but let's have a quick look inside now we're here his tomb during an extensive renovation in the 19th century of this church his tomb was uncovered and Builders are construction workers actually opened up his tomb and while he was in peaceful slumber one of the men was very curious about his Footwear and amongst Footwear he stole one of his shoes complete but some of the bones over here and then I said ever since that he haunts this church and what would have been the graveyard while the church is open look inside now again I'll have to be quite quiet this church has been used in several movies Shakespeare in Love for weddings and a funeral um that other one with Gwyneth Paltrow look at this it's London's oldest Parish Church built when Henry the first son of William the Conqueror is King of England that survived the Great Fire of 1666. some of the oldest part of the churches right in here and this is Damien hurst's of Saint Bartholomew holding his skin says the lady lady Chapel and this is reputedly a printing works and in this printing works is where we believe Benjamin Franklin came to another print I'm being respectful in the church folks I hope you can hear me this is the lady Chapel holy icon Chapel Chapel ladies and gentlemen no wonder it was used for so many iconic movies the other and well this is the lady chap oh my apologies so for a period of time was used as a printing Works where we believe Benjamin Franklin once worked in here the organ of the church let's have a look at the tomb of right here [Music] it's nice of the only visitation of the Virgin Mary in London one hour so where she was said to have appeared in this church look at around here the place is stunning now there's the tomb of right here and get around the front there to see it for you [Music] the tune that was that was Disturbed the monk was set to haunt this place frequently the parents is usually in July [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] just to show you how stunningly beautiful it is but how creepy it is at nighttime as well and here's some of the tunes or some of the plaques here commemorating the people who had died now we're also in the vicinity of some very Posh restaurants in this immediate area and I from Wonder ful who are buried alongside them or if these people know that inside behind those grills there is that restaurant if they're on the level of the graveyard St Bartholomew the greats Church haunted by the ghost of right here and no doubt the ghost of Saint Bartholomew who met a very evil fate being skinned alive right now we're going to head through what was the original Tudor gate and this building the spectacular building it was actually covered up for centuries and was only revealed during the after Stone was damaged in the front of the building during the bombing campaign of World War II let's take you through this amazing gate read a little bit about the history here of the skate house was restored in 1932 to the use of the church and memory of the two brothers Aston Webb or a and Ed Albert Alfred Webb FSA also of Frederick dove who work together on the restoration of the fabric of the church for over 40 years have a look at this tonight what are we looking at here of there's a plaque on the wall okay commemorating the funeral of of a man called Sir William Wallace AKA Braveheart AKA Mel Gibson not to be confused with Mel Gibson even though some suggest C2 should be hung drawn and quartered a little less sorry Mel if you ever get to see this video he was executed for his accent sorry for his acting sorry for his activism sorry my apologies on the 700th anniversary of his execution at Smithfield ends on the 23rd of August 1305 and that is going to introduce us to his plaque but first let me just show you the skate house he was believed to be six foot seven William Wallace six foot seven I believe today that's taller than you it is six wow but for a man of the early 14th century foot and a half taller than the average man but can you believe that this is original to the 16th century ladies and gentlemen this incredible building now the actual Archway is 13th century but the building on top is the 16th century and in the 1700s I believe some guy actually covered it up with stone and then during bombing campaign in World War II and the stone was damaged so they removed the stone and this was on the earth this stunning building now here we are back at Smithfield's Market so we're going to take you over here to the commemorative plaque that commemorates the Scottish Rebel William Wallace William Wallace is executed here in Smithfield's Market on the 23rd of August 1305. uh executed for the highest form of treason in the land William Wallace was hung drawn and quartered now to be hung drawn and colored was exceptionally barbaric folks he was stripped naked at the Tower of London both his feet were bound to a horse and cart his naked body was dragged here the one mile Journey right to the center of Smithfield now Saint Bartholomew's hospital is in this area we're going to talk about that in a moment we've just spoke about Saint Bartholomew's Church every year there was a fair day here called Saint Bartholomew's Verde and 60 000 people from all over the country will arrive and that fair day that year this is the 23rd of August 1305 because Edward Longshanks wanted to make sure that there was maximum exposure of the execution of William Wallace so when he arrived here his body was Torn to Pieces after being dragged a mile he was hung within an inch of his life and then revived and they are masculated him they cut off his penis and his testicles some would suggest that even police genitalia and stuffed it in his mouth after that they slowly carved a hole in his stomach and disemboweled him and removed his intestines and they were cut off both his arms both his legs and his head his arms and legs were sent to four different parts of the United Kingdom one to Newcastle three to the other parts of Scotland and then his head was dipped in tire and placed on a spike in London Bridge a brutal brutal form of execution reserved again for the highest form of trees and others to have received that punishment with the likes of what Tyler and of course the Abbott Howton the great Guy Fawkes of the gunpowder plus that's the national attempt the idea behind the quartering because they bury them in four different unmarked burial Graves burial grounds so the supporters of William Wallace didn't have a place to go oh wow so they deliberately buried them in four different Graves they wouldn't say what the graves were and so if you were a supporter of William Wallace you didn't have a place to go to and get actually commemorative and commemorate him and also interesting yeah you wouldn't have a place to kind of launch a campaign from if you will watch US Open Cleaver folks yeah and I mean what most people come here now and they pay their respects here yeah particularly on the anniversary of William Wallace you get a lot of Scottish patrons they're just about to close the gates here ladies and gentlemen but this oh what's the side oh just missed it but that's okay of execution AKA Mary the first AKA Mary tuna so Mary was of course the daughter of King Henry VIII it's one of his uh three children along with Elizabeth the First and Edward VI can we just give a quick panoramic don't we have a sneaker can we have a quick panoramic in here yeah I'd be two minutes that's all I'm telling just wanted to bring you go ahead sorry well this is of course a very confusing time in history because obviously Henry VII uh disbanded the Church Catholic Church founded the Church of England but then his daughter Mary very much quite the opposite in way of thinking she was very much staunch Catholic Catholic Queens so all the people who'd um followed her father and um supported in the Church of England when she became Queen She very swiftly tried to reverse their uh their thinking and those who didn't repent and didn't go back to the Catholic way of thinking was sadly put to rather grisly death Grizzly death involved Burning Alive it was right here at the stake and she was so brutal she insisted Redwood was and used folks because there was a danger you would asphyxiated on the smoke before you felt the Flames tearing at their flesh the brutal Bloody Mary but what's interesting to me is ever because of Bloody Mary but I mean she's responsible for murdering 287 Marion Martyrs they're called now in this area by burning them alive at the state but her father murdered 70 000 people this is the the bizarre thing the Catholic Mary and yet her father is given a full Royal burial and is now buried in Saint George's chapel and what is a patriarchy I guess yeah now coming up here is Saint Bartholomew's Hospital folks now the primary Center of care and cancer coronary care and Cancer Care here in London but again as Rob said earlier the oldest hospital and it's through here we have another couple of ghost stories to tell you oh yes about the area and Rob is going to tell us a little bit more about that but before we do we're gonna head through just show you the courtyard back here let's head in this direction and get a view a Saint Bartholomew the less which was The Priory on the church grounds as well again this built stunning building built by right here as a result of a vision from Saint Bartholomew and I just want to get a perfect view of you gorgeous church for you same Bartholomew the less this is going to take us right into the back of the courtyard which I'll sing Bartholomew's Hospital let's have a quick look through here but here they do a lot of filming in the Laboratories up here Robert's going to tell us a little bit about the ghosts in this area well there's a couple in there Saint Bart's hospital is there um first of all there's a ghost known as the gray nurse and she's believed to be the ghost of a nurse back in the 19th century who accidentally administered a fatal overdose to one of her patients um she was so gutted and and unbelievably overwhelmed at sadness at her mistake that she took her own life now they do say that nurses who work here today if they're ever on the verge of committing the same mistake themselves they feel a phantom Touch of a hand on their shoulder the gray nurse warning them not to do it there's also a very old elevator lift in uh instant Bart's Hospital known by the staff as the coffin lift it dates back to around the early 1900s a nurse was believed to have been murdered in the lift by a deranged patient in the on the basement level and these days the lift um experience is a strange phenomena like the lights flickering on and off um some staff say they get into the lift and they press what for they want to go to instead of taking them up taking down down into the basement level when it reaches the basement level which is where the nurses believe to be murdered the doors open the lights go out no matter how many times they Mash those buttons they cannot get the lift to move so they get out the lift they walk through the basement up the stairs back to the ground floor and guess what's waiting for them there there's no way doors open there's a mind of its own lights on some people even claim they've walked up the stairwell next to the lift and they can hear the lift following them up and when they get to the floor they look and the lifters waiting for them oh my God that's creepy there's also a rather more tragic ghost of a small boy um believed to be I used between six and eight years old who's often seen running through the wards and shouting for his mum and his dad uh believed to be the tragic Spirit of a young boy who sadly passed away and won an awards here at some parts who now haunts the building my God look at this incredible area well this is also the center of where some very brutal surgical procedures took place in the 17 and 1800s and to tell us a little bit more about some of those procedures is my wonderful colleague Matt over to you Matt so the medicine only started changing in 17th century before for ages it was all the same when the doctors of the patient didn't really touch the patient but ask for the date when the person was born and when the problem started so he could make two horoscopes on this to date and comparing the horoscopes would give him the answer what are the chances for this person on this day to survive they believe yes if you look at the sky we see millions of stars and five planets the planets look the same just a little shiny object but the stars are always in the same position planets are moving around today we know that they go with the river and the sun they didn't know this in the Middle Ages so different positions of the planets they believed it's God putting them there to send them messages that's why astrology was a religious thing as well because they believed is deciding God's will through the position of stars and planets wow so if the person died the doctor could say well It Was Written In Stars there was really nothing I could do that's the gods will so that's why the doctors did it to kind of as an insurance if the patient died it was not their fault it was a God's will Written In Stars and in most cases really they couldn't help much one of the most common procedures was letting the blood it was supposed to level the balance of fluid in the body just by cutting a vein and letting some blood out oh my God it was a dirty job so of course doctors didn't want to do it it was done by The Barbers with the very same razors they shaved the beard they would cut the vein and when they started doing this and advertised Barbers started putting a bowl of fresh human blood in window as you can imagine didn't stay fresh for long so to make it nicer they would put outside the window a white piece of cloth with blood stains on it and this cloth with blood waving in the wind gave us this red and white Barbers pole that's right that's all The Barbers have it today but none of them is doing bloodletting anymore thank God yeah they still did it in 19th century in 19th century they did it to cure hysteria attacks in women which was not the real disease but it was a real problem caused by very innocent invention a little metal ring if you have in your shoes when you put the laces through the metal ring this metal ring was deadly when it was put in the corset because this allowed to squeeze women in the course into this hourglass shape figure the corset is called the only garment that could kill because women were so squashed they everything in the bellies was squashed and the ribs pushed into the lungs so the woman of course scores like this couldn't breathe and she was gasping for her and they said oh she's being hysterical and it's always women behaving like this and that's why it's called hysteria because it's from histories which means Womb in Greek oh my God so what to do to calm down this hysterical attack cut her vein and let the blood out and she did come down but only because she lost a lot of blood and that's why they wrongly thought it's helping this problem with hysterical attack stops when the fashion changed and women started wearing loose clothes and then they realized that suddenly women don't have hysterical attacks because they can breathe oh my God they're all in the name of that yes exactly now also for example in 16th century there was a theory that the Cure should look like the body part it's supposed to help deadly for headache they'll give people a walnut because when you open the Walnut it looks like a brain inside the head for teeth egg it was white flowers that looked like hanging teeth for example for toothache yes something that looks like a healthy tooth for example Queen Elizabeth the first she always has this portrait with white face yes which was supposed to mean that she's like Beyond age she's not aging okay if you notice she never Smiles if she would have smiled you would see she had completely rotten teeth rotten teeth she wasn't but she wasn't embarrassed she was very proud of it because everybody envied the rotten teeth of the queen because people knew the thief get like this from eating too much sugar exactly it was one of the most expensive things so apparently poor people would paint teeth with charcoal to make it look rotten from the distance but again the fashion changed you could never think what what was attractive but then the fashion changed because when the queen had white face she wanted the teeth to be white again and the doctor had a solution which was rubbing white sugar into the teeth because he hoped that the white from the sugar will come off on the teeth but of course it only made things worse also another thing for the for the headache if the walnuts didn't help you have to buy a piece of scalp a piece of human skull which doctored ground to the powder mixed with wine and people who drink it if somebody had anemia like they call it weak blood disease these people waited next to execution places when somebody young and healthy was executed they had come off they put the cup quickly to catch the blood to drink it to improve their own blood oh they knew how the system works they believe it's just kind of fills the blood with something better so basically that's vampire Behavior exactly but this is not as medieval as it may think the last time that we know of somebody drunk human blood for medicinal purposes was in 1908. so people read it for very long time believe that somebody's healthiest person's blood will improve your own that is absolutely fine but and it's kind of but this as I always say all these mistakes led to what we have today the current medicine we have because they have to try everything well of course trial and error yes of course you have to get it right but I mean like even in the the surgery at the time if you had a compound fracture or a broken leg they just cut your leg off it was in in the University College London who had a very thriving Medical Department there was a simple leg amputation leg amputation was quite common and the surgeon have to cut the muscle with the knife and then seal the bone with the soul it was in under two minutes cut my mother yes and it was done in under two minutes and quickly tied up to keep the blood so it was sometimes successful but this time it went wrong it was in the operating theater many people watching it and the assistant was holding the leg when the surgeon cut the muscle his knife slipped and get out of her sister's fingers so when it happened the patient bled to death the assistant died from the infection of dirty knife that's right because there was no Listerine and someone who was watching this died of heart attack so three people died during the unsuccessful leg amputation Now ladies and gentlemen we are very grateful for modern day science but uh nowadays that's not the case here in Saint Bartholomew is this one of the best hospitals the most respected hospitals in London important to know so our next stop is there's massive history along here folks and getting back to anatomical research at the time um we're going back again to the graveyards and there was a period of time where there was a massive shortage of bodies for surgeons to dissect for anatomical research so a whole new industry was born and it was called the resurrectionists or the grave robbers initially the graves were being robbed of the corpses freshly dulled courses had just been buried and they would head into the graveyards these gangs are resurrectionists there were cut holes in the top of the coffin they would attach a noose around the courts Corpse's neck and literally lift the corpse through the Earth and they would bring them right across the road here it's a very famous pub called the fortune of War very dark history because it was known for displaying these stolen Corpses inside in the pub and they would attach the name of the body snatcher to the corpses in this Pub and the fortune of War and the surgeons would casually walk across from Saint Bartholomew's Hospital and effectively shop for the corpses that was even talk about how surgeons would haggle over the price of a corpse right at the foot of these courses before this Pub was located here on [ __ ] Lane but it was formerly known as pie corner and you'll see this little gold baby here baby the fat baby of pie corner and there's a little bit of history about it here where is that just on this track here just it tells us a little bit about it this explains it to you the boy at pie Corner was erected to commemorate the stain of the great fire so this is effectively where the great fire ended many people at the time believe the Great Fire of London was a punishment from God for gluttony wasn't it that's the reason they came to that conclusion was the fire began on pudding Lane prodigiously fat to enforce the morale he was originally built into the front of a public house called the fortune of War which used to occupy this site and was pulled down in 1910. what they used to do because you've got Saint Bart's hospital just over the road the doctors and the surgeons would pay on average about five pounds for every fresh body that they were delivered massive money at the time massive money and then where better to go and spend your five pounds that you've just earned over there and not only that they used to pull their teeth as well because teeth um were used um as false teeth essentially that they could make thousands of pounds in other money and then people used to pay the gravediggers more money to actually bury the bodies or the corpses further down so you'll see these posters of safety for the dead is the poster over a coffin and that basically will give you a Priceless six feet seven Shillings eight feet nine Shillings ten feet so the further down your body was just the less likely you would be robbed by the grave snatchers but 1832 the anatomy act came in and that was as a result of a story involving bark and hair uh two Scottish groups well they were actually Irish if they're originally from Ireland and they were caught in Edinburgh because I mean obviously they saw that how profitable it was to sell bunnies so they ended up murdering people I think it was 16 people they murdered but they were very clever in who they murdered Burke and her only attacked people that wouldn't be missed in society like the elderly or the disadvantaged on what mothers who had been cast out of society eventually they were caught up with Burke was executed I believe hair got away with it because he sold out Burke and the anatomy act came in where they made it legal for people in workhouses who hadn't been claimed by relatives to be used for dissection which was exceptionally cruel considering that people believed that if your body was dissected you would never as you said earlier on have a passage into heaven but the reason we keep walking down here this is also [ __ ] Lane because Rob is going to tell us the most incredible story based on this very Road here took place in 1762 now it involves three people a man called William Kent a man called Richard Parsons and a girl called Elizabeth Parsons who was the daughter of Richard now Richard and Elizabeth they owned a house here on [ __ ] Lane uh William Kent was a bit of a shady what you'd probably call a loan shark or um um yeah a bailiff a loan Chuck he'd lent bunny people to people and expected it to be paid back now he rented along with his wife Elizabeth lines he rented Richard Parsons house now Elizabeth lines sadly passed away whilst in the house and after she passed away there was spiritual activity but this all seemed to end as soon as as William Kent left now William Kent then shacked up with Elizabeth lines his younger sister Fanny that's Annie rice now Richard Parsons found out that Fanny lines also died she died of smallpox now William Kent had lent Richard Parsons some money now Richard Parsons didn't pay it back so William Kent took him to court and the favor got the Judgment in his favor so Richard Parsons ended up having to pay back the money to William Kent now he wasn't happy about this a few days or months after this Richard Parsons claimed that there was a ghost in the house now this ghost allegedly was uh Fanny lines the younger sister of Elizabeth lines now the way she'd uh contact the uh the residents of the house Richard and his daughter Elizabeth she makes scratching noises now the scratching noises would come from underneath the bed of Richard Parsons daughter now this story broke in the newspapers everyone was absolutely fascinated by it was actually reported under the amazing headline I promise this is true scratching Fanny the ghost of [ __ ] Lane what a deadline um leading figures at the time including a man called Dr Samuel Johnson famous for writing the dictionary uh they all obsessed they were obsessed with this story um Richard Parsons kept holding seances in his house with his daughter uh Samuel Johnson would attend with other leading figures of the day [ __ ] playing would regularly be thronged with people wanting to hear the sounds of the scratching from under the bed and from the seances they deduced the ghost told them that she'd been murdered by her husband William Kent William Kenton actually poisoned Fanny lines and killed her now because of this William Kent was actually arrested and they investigated the murder and it's the only time in British legal history that a murder trial has gone ahead based on the evidence now eventually they uh looked into the crime they looked into the case led by Samuel Johnson and they concluded that it was actually the daughter of Richard Parsons who was creating the scratching Noises by dragging chains underneath her massive hoax and the idea behind it was Richard Parsons was trying to get William Kent either put in prison or executed and it was all over that financial debt that he had told her that he'd he'd owed him and he'd taken him to court and dragged his name through the mud in the end William Kent was acquitted they found out there was no case to be answered for as for Richard Parsons and his daughter they were pilloried which meant they were putting these stocks and rotten fruit and vegetables were thrown at them and then they did two years inside prison themselves so we tried to get William Kent thrown inside he ended up going inside himself well they got lucky to get out for just two years didn't they but the scratching Fanny of cochlein ghost story lives on well speaking of sounds as they regularly host them here in the pub were approaching now folks in the Via Dog Tavern said to be the most haunted Pub and Brit but right here Saint Sepulcher without new gate this stunning church has massive history with regards to execution inside there there is an execution Bell the execution Bell ladies and gents that's on display here in the Nave in a glass case rung by the clerk outside a condemned prisoner's cell the night before his execution and those prison cells were located right here in what was known as New Gate prison now the highest criminal court in the land the incredible old daily that's coming up here on the left hand side nugo prison was where the last public execution took place in London right across the street by this Fountain here this amazing building which was formerly new gate prison now the Old Bailey those condemned prisoners that were facing execution the following morning will hear the execution Bell and this morbid told all you that in The Condemned old do lie prepare you for tomorrow you shall die watch all and pray the hour is drawing near the two before almighty God will appear examine well yourselves in time repent that you not to Eternal Flames be sent and when Saints a polka's bell tomorrow told the Lord above have mercy on your souls Now ladies and gentlemen one of the most haunted pubs in London is coming up I have done a video on this folks this is the viaduct Tavern and with its proximity to the old bayley and its mysterious prison cells you cannot afford to miss our video that ladies and gentlemen will conclude tonight's ghost tour thanks again you guys Sinead here with free tours by foot London don't forget to like And subscribe myself and Rob will be leaving links to our buy me a coffees and paypals at the bottom if you'd like to buy us a drink in the viaduct Tavern you're more than welcome to do so happy Halloween stay tuned for some very spooky content nice

Channel: Free Tours by Foot - London

Views: 261,223

Keywords: london ghost tour, london, haunted london

Id: LhGN5CbEm54

Length: 58min 11sec (3491 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 06 2022