Phantoms of Christmas Past: Festive Ghost Hoaxes, Ghost Hunts and Ghost Panics

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, ghost hoaxes (dressing in a white sheet or a more elaborate costume) and scaring people were rife but seldom studied or written about. These hoaxes frequently led to impromptu ghost hunts by hundreds, sometimes thousands of often drunk vigilantes (and hysterical panics) as rumours of the supposed ghosts would spread round the community. Many of these ghost scares occurred during the Christmas and New Year periods, and this book explores twelve littleknown episodes. Comical but sometimes dark and tragic with entertaining elements of horror and the bizarre, these true Christmas ’ghost’ stories combine spooky local legends, mischievous hoaxes, and comical ghost hunts. At the same time, dour psychic investigators compete with whimsical spiritualists and ghost flashmobs. A unique Christmas book, this is an ideal holiday gift for those interested in ghosts and other fortean phenomena, as well as weird histories and social panics.

Paul Weatherhead is a native of the Calder Valley and was brought up in Hebden Bridge. He has a longstanding obsession with the weird history of the area leading to the first edition of Weird Calderdale in 2003 which went on to become a local bestseller. His research into Alan Godfrey’s alien encounter led to a deeper investigation into the phenomenon, which formed his Master of Arts dissertation about the philosophy of alien abduction. He lives on the hills above Hebden Bridge, UK.