Bestiary · Apparition / Noble Ghost
Raynham Hall
Raynham Hall: seat of the Townshend family in Norfolk, home to the Brown Lady, the most famous ghost photograph ever taken. A naval captain fired his revolver at her in 1836. A hundred years later, two photographers captured her on film.
Primary Sources
- Country Life magazine, 26 December 1936
- Florence Marryat, The Life and Letters of Captain Marryat (1872)
- Townshend family records, Raynham Hall
Protections
- A loaded revolver (ineffective)
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Lady Dorothy Walpole was born in 1686, the sister of Robert Walpole, Britain’s first Prime Minister. She married Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend, the agricultural reformer known as “Turnip Townshend.” He discovered her affair with Lord Wharton. According to family tradition, he confined her to Raynham Hall and forbade her from seeing her children. She died in 1726. The official cause was smallpox.
Her ghost wears brown brocade, carries a lantern, and has empty sockets where her eyes should be.
The Captain
In 1836, Captain Frederick Marryat stayed at Raynham Hall on a hunting trip. Marryat was a decorated Royal Navy officer and a successful novelist. He asked for the most haunted room to debunk the myth. On the third night, walking with two nephews of his host through a darkened corridor, the three men saw a light approaching from the far end. Marryat recognized the figure from a portrait of Dorothy Walpole hanging in the hall. The apparition drew closer and “grinned in a malicious and diabolical manner.” Marryat raised his revolver and fired directly at the figure’s face.
The figure vanished. The bullet was found in the door behind where it had stood.
The Photograph
In September 1936, Captain Hubert C. Provand and his assistant Indre Shira were photographing Raynham Hall for Country Life magazine. The assignment was architectural. After taking one photograph of the grand oak staircase, Shira saw “a vapoury form gradually assuming the appearance of a woman” drifting down the stairs. Provand removed the lens cap and fired the flashbulb.
When the plate was developed, it showed a translucent, veiled figure on the staircase. Country Life published the photograph on December 26, 1936. The planned architectural article was replaced with the ghost story.
Analysts have suggested double exposure, a smeared lens, or light refraction. The photograph has never been definitively proven to be faked. Since 1936, documented sightings of the Brown Lady have become rare.
Sources
Bibliography. The same list is held in the article’s frontmatter for the citation tools that read it programmatically.
- Country Life magazine, 26 December 1936
- Florence Marryat, The Life and Letters of Captain Marryat (1872)
- Townshend family records, Raynham Hall
