Kotaku. Track: Californication. Creepy Urban Legends of London(Image: Marc Barker)There’s nothing like a good ghost story. In every settlement since time began, we humans have gathered to whisper frightful tales to one another. Urban legends of corpses returning from the grave; of alligators living beneath our feet, and so on. Sometimes gloomy, overcrowded and alienating places where campfire stories seem so much more believable. Cities like London. The fact that many of its ghost stories are undoubtedly rooted in urban myth and legend only serves to make them more intriguing, perpetuating them for future generations of Londoners. Here are 1. 0 creepy tales from across England’s capital. The Suicide Pool (Epping Forest)Stretching from the fringes of London deep into Essex, Epping Forest has long been a place of myth and mystery. It was here that Dick Turpin’s gang plied their trade and Elizabethan poets found their inspiration. The beautiful Super Famicom-themed 3DS XL that Japan got last year is finally headed to Europe and Australia—two markets whose. Out of context, this is an incredibly normal story, but it suddenly gets very creepy after a few months. One night I went out with a friend near Liverpool St, London. For the men and women who travel into the depths of the Earth, the risks are incredible. But it’s also a place of dark, unsettling legends; the darkest of which has to be the Epping suicide pool.(Image: Prof. DEH)Many decades ago, so the story goes, a young couple in love were followed to a pond by the girl’s father. Although the tale is hazy on what exactly happened next, it’s generally agreed that the two confronted him. Not long after, something strange happened. The waters of the pool turned a dark, impenetrable black. Wildlife began to die at its edges and the clearing soon became barren. Then the bodies started to appear. Comic books are notoriously difficult to make scary. They don’t have the advantage of sound to build atmosphere, and there is no possibility of jump-scares.Very creepy indeed. Last year, a guy came to my house’s door around 9:00 at night. He knocked and I got my mom, and she went out to see what was up. An anthology horror-drama series, each season is conceived as a self-contained mini-series. The first season takes place in 2011 and follows the Harmon family. First a woman was found dead beside the pond. Then a girl was found, her young child dead beside her. Rumours began to surface that the pool was drawing people in, leading them to their deaths. Supposedly, Epping Forest’s suicide pool is still out there somewhere, unmarked on any map, waiting for someone to find it. But we’ll understand if you’d rather not go looking. Just in case. The Corpse Train (Whitechapel)Although it sounds like a low- budget horror movie, the Whitechapel corpse train is probably the most- intriguing item on our list. Unlike many we’ve discussed, it has no supernatural origins or manifestations. Instead, it features a very human horror: hundreds upon hundreds of corpses.(Image: Anthony Woodman)In the early days of the tube, death was not an uncommon occurrence in London’s many hospitals. Faced with overflowing morgues and nowhere to put the steadily- mounting bodies, the Royal London Hospital came up with a solution equal parts genius and grotesque. Without telling anybody, they allegedly installed a new line on the underground running underneath the hospital and into Whitechapel. A line they could use to ferry human cadavers away from the morgue, to lie unremarked upon in the station’s spare ticket office; just metres away from oblivious commuters. As good as this story is, it’s almost- certainly untrue. But it makes for an interesting urban legend; one that communicates our fear of death and the unknown as effectively as any number of ghost stories. The Shadows of Cane Hill (Croydon)If you’re looking for a location for your ghost story, Cane Hill Asylum would be hard to beat. In operation between 1. Image: Paul)Some of them – such as Charlie Chaplin’s mother and the brothers of David Bowie and Michael Caine – would later be immortalised by those they left behind. But the majority lived and died unnoticed, hidden from sight. All of which may explain why they – some say – never left. Over the years, disturbing reports have come in from the derelict hospital of figures moving in the grounds. Others swear they’ve seen shadows flitting by the windows, or vanishing into the night. Dogs are known to fear the site, and it’s said the dead are watching from the windows, turning their cold and envious eyes upon the world of the living. At least, that was once the case. In 2. 01. 0, a fire gutted the hospital. Today, only a shell remains of the place a many lost souls once called home. The Crying Girl (King’s Cross Station)At roughly 7. November 1. 8th 1. King’s Cross Station escalator. The resulting fire gutted the ticket office, killing 3. Today, the terrible memories of the fire still linger on in the form of the crying girl.(Image: Sunil. A young woman with long brown hair, dressed in jeans and a t- shirt, the crying girl has been spotted around the station, seemingly inconsolable with grief. Passengers have reported trying to comfort her, only to see her suddenly disappear in the crowd, or feel their arms going right through her. More creepily, people have heard her sobs when the platforms are empty, and others have smelled smoke curling out from underneath the escalators. Although no- one has ever got a clear look at her, it is thought she’s one of the fire’s victims, her spirit left behind to wait forever on the platform where she died. That said, crying children often turn up in urban legend, many of which are cautionary tales, and may go some way to explaining the King’s Cross haunting. The Beast (Hackney Marshes)With acres of woodland, overgrown paths and a scattering of reed marshes shrouded by mist in the early morning, it’s perhaps no wonder Hackney Marsh has attracted some curious legends. But at least one of these legends goes right past curious and into outright weird.(Image: Derek Harper)It started in 1. Lea River. They’d been decapitated and dumped, left to rot in the stagnant water. Fast forward a year and four young boys decided to take a walk across the marsh one winter morning. It had been a cold night and there was snow on the ground. About halfway across, they stumbled across a strange set of tracks they couldn’t identify. Thinking nothing of it, they walked on. And then they saw it. Something they’d later describe as “a giant, great, growling hairy thing.” Whatever it was, the creature allegedly reared up on its hind legs and roared at them. The boys fled. When 5. So what was it? Urban legend? Local lore today tends towards it being a nasty prank pulled on a group of easily- frightened kids. But officially the mystery remains unsolved, with dog walkers even now keeping one nervous eye out for the mysterious beast. The Screams of the Dead (Bethnal Green Station)In 1. Bethnal Green in East London experienced one of its worst wartime tragedies. Not from bombs or flying shrapnel, but something potentially far deadlier: panic.(Image: Sunil. During a routine air raid siren test, civilians on their way to shelter in the Tube station all happened to converge on the entrance at once. In their panic to get downstairs, some people tripped. As more and more people fell to their knees and bodies kept piling in the door, the panic became a deadly crush. One hundred and seventy- three people were trampled to death, including at least 4. The disaster was Britain’s worst civilian tragedy in the entire war. Over 7. 0 years after the accident, its memory still scars the station. Underground staff and late night passengers have reported hearing women screaming and the sound of children crying. Do the voices of the dead still linger beneath East London’s streets? The only way to be sure is to go down there late at night and find out for yourself. The Faceless Woman (Becontree Station, Barking)If you ever find yourself catching the Tube back from Barking late one night, do yourself a favour and steer clear of Becontree Station. Small and unassuming, the station is nonetheless said to hold one of London’s creepiest ghosts: the faceless woman.(Image: Sunil. The most- famous iteration of the story takes place in 1. A station supervisor was closing up when he heard a rattling on the handle of his office door. Going outside to look, he found a female figure waiting on the platform. She was blonde, in a pale white dress. As she stared into the distance, the supervisor approached. He had almost reached her when she turned around. Where her face should have been, he simply saw a ghastly blank. Other iterations of the story have her appearing directly before someone; or simply standing down the far end of the platform, waiting for a train that’ll never come. It’s theorised that she’s the ghost of someone killed in the 1. Why she’s stayed behind when all the others have long since vanished is a question no- one can answer. However, it’s also worth noting that the faceless woman haunting has been associated with various sites across the world, and may be rooted in urban legend. The Figure in the Studio (Southwark)Not all ghosts have to be seen by dozens of people to qualify as creepy. In fact, some have only ever been seen once.(Image: Andreas Praefcke)The story takes place in the studios of art radio project Resonance FM. In an interview with Londonist, a couple of the station’s presenters recently claimed they’d seen a ghost in the studio late one night. Not just any old ghost, either, but a chillingly malevolent one. According to one presenter, it looked like a shadow with angry, burning eyes. The other said it was the teeth he noticed: sharp, dark, malformed things that the creature bared at him before disappearing. Whatever it was, it hasn’t been seen since. So was it just a hoax tale told for fun? But there’s also the chance that something weird was witnessed. If that’s the case, we don’t even want to think about what that snarling, dark and angry figure might have been. Hardy was visiting the Queens House in Greenwich. At the foot of the Tulip staircase, he paused to take a picture. At the time, he thought no more about it. Until he got his photo back.(Image: Rev. Ralph Hardy via Oddee)It transpired that the Reverend had accidentally taken one of the most- infamous pictures in supernatural history. Featuring a mournful, hooded figure clinging to the railings of the staircase, it appeared to be impossible, the sort of ghostly picture you couldn’t fake. When news of the photograph got out, the British Ghost Club decided to investigate. With recording equipment in tow, they headed to the Queens House to perform a s. Their records of the evening make for some uniquely disturbing reading. Starting at 1. 0.
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