Haunted Castles of Britain and Ireland by Richard Jones

The disembodied head of an old man, with a grey wispy beard and terrible eyes was seen, sometimes accompanied by a severed arm, which seemed intent on shaking Coltheart's hand. Thomas Colt-heart, a lawyer, and his wife were beset in their new home by numerous apparitions. soon new residents came to live in Mary King's Close and, by 1685, it had become common knowledge that spirits from the plague year were still there. The men hacked the rotting cadavers to pieces and wheeled them away. Once the pestilence had abated, the stench from the corpses became unbearable, and two butchers were sent to clear away the detritus of the deceased. The city fathers, to contain the contagion walled the district and left the residents to die. One of the worst outbreaks came in 1645 and the residents of Mary King's Close were decimated by it. Plague was a frequent visitor to Edinburgh's rat-infested tenements. He was unable to tell them what he had seen, and such was the shock to his system that he died shortly afterwards. Rushing upstairs, the friends threw open the door, and found their companion, rigid with terror, his eyes bulging from their sockets. A little after midnight there was a faint ring, which was followed by a ferocious pealing of the bell. It was agreed, however, that should he require assistance he would ring the servants' bell to summon his friends. One of them was a nobleman, who scoffing at tales that a hideous entity was residing within the haunted room, vowed to spend the night there. This unnamed Raw Head and Bloody Bones, or whatever it is, has been sufficiently awful to have caused the death, in convulsions, of at least two foolhardy persons who have dared to sleep in that chamber. It seems that a Something or Other, very terrible indeed, haunts or did haunt a particular room. Happenings so terrifying that, for much of the 19th century, 50 Berkeley Square was known as 'the most haunted house in London.' Charles Harper in Haunted Houses, published in 1907, stated that '.

Yet there is nothing in the yellowed pages of the books on display that comes close to matching the sinister happenings that were once an everyday occurrence within these walls. For more than 50 years it has been the premises of Maggs Bros, antiquarian booksellers. Sweeping staircases, high plaster ceilings, overmantel mirrors, and marble floors and fireplaces, lend the building a Dickensian air.

The plain Georgian exterior of 50 Berkeley Square belies an interior that still retains much of its 18th-century grandeur.

Haunted Castles of Britain and Ireland by Richard Jones