CLAMPETT CASTLE
Location: Nestled in the picturesque English countryside, Clampett Castle is located in Kent County, England near the small village of Tunbridge, about thirty miles from London, England.
Description: Clampett Castle is a vast Elizabethan stronghold almost six hundred years old in age. Dwarfed only by Penshurst Castle and Gardens, the impressive estate rests on twenty acres of lush land comprising lush gardens, tall bushes and a rolling wooded countryside. The castle boasts almost forty bedrooms including stone and brick turrets, arched windows, battlements, towers and pitched chestnut roofs. The lavish interior boasts few modern conveniences and includes fine royal fixtures and antiques for a taste of living history. A few actual suits of armor decorate the place.
Ghostly Manifestations:
With countryside so rich in history and lore, the castles of England boast a
great wealth of ghostly legends and phantom accounts going back almost nine
hundred years. Clampett Castle is no exception. The ghost of Lady Clementine has
been part of the local lore since the Nineteenth Century. Her spirit has been
seen oft times in all parts of the restored edifice.
The staff and housekeepers have reported
several occurrences over several years. Fleeting white images dash from unused
rooms and a lightly moving figure has been seen moving through darkened windows.
A faint voice can be sometimes heard from a distance as if a young woman were
singing to herself in another room. The sound of footsteps and the swish of long
skirts over the wood floors have followed housekeepers on their rounds. In one
bedroom, the outline of a human figure appears often on the bed no matter how
often the bed is straightened. That room is now never checked out to guests. It
is Lady Clementine’s room and as harmless as she seems, no many people are
interested in sharing the room with her disembodied spirit.
“I believe Lady Clementine exists,” John
Faversham, the major domo who oversees the managerial duties of Clampett Castle,
has watched over the maintenance for almost fifty years. “I’m very proud to
have such a grand lady looking over us. I’ve heard the stories of all the
other stately castles of England and I truly honestly believe that Lady
Clementine is a much more regal and fine presence to have over those silly
creatures screaming their heads off at night every where else.”
Playful, helpful and protective, Lady
Clementine is always trying to find new ways of making herself known to the
living. In the kitchen, she has been known to put things away when she things
they are done with. Relentless in her activities, she has put away pots and pans
set out to prepare dinner, dropped skillets loudly on to solid stone floors and
when things get to quiet, she reminds Faversham who’s really running things by
locking doors and closing windows left open to cool off the place.
“I once made the misfortunate mistake of
locking myself out of my own office.” Faversham recalls. “I was called on an
errand to approve some landscaping and in my absence, a loud thunderous crack of
thunder had filled the great hall. It was almost a great explosion. Everybody
heard it. I rushed in to see what had fallen or collapsed and as it turned out,
one of the housekeepers reported that my office door had slammed shut by itself
and locked in the process. It was a most bewildering thing. The next thing I
know, my phone in there starts ringing and I can’t get the door opened. It’s
never been locked, I’ve never had a key to it, but I could not open it. I had
five handymen working on it as the phone continued ringing until it finally
stopped. I finally got in by squeezing through the window which we had pried
open and guess what, the phone was found off the hook.”
At times, Lady Clementine proves to be very
fascinated by modern contrivances such as the electric lights in addition to the
telephone. Lights tend to go out when she is around, and mysterious persons from
other rooms eavesdrop on conversations. The cook calling for a food delivery
heard someone pick up another extension and listen in to her call. She told the
other person to hang up, but they never did. A few hours later, an unused phone
in the stables was found hanging off the hook.
“The odd thing about it,” Faversham adds.
“Is that you can’t just pick up the phone and eavesdrop. Different parts of
the castle are reached by dialing certain numbers so whoever eavesdropped did it
by just lifting the receiver and not dialing the extension for the kitchen. It
was truly fascinating if not a bit disturbing.”
Lady Clementine has also frightened quite a few people by appearing too quickly. As a result, she seems to very rarely take form as an apparition. Nevertheless, she has been noticed by accident by employees and guests by sheer chance. She has been seen on balconies and staircases in the elaborate estate. Guests have seen her standing by their bed in the middle of the night or silently wandering down the hall. A few tourists have also lost things like glasses, small overnight bags, rings of keys and watches, but they always return sooner or later. The castle staff now has a policy that if anything vanishes on a stay that they can pay parcel post for the object to be mailed back to them.
"What's odd," Faversham adds.
"Is that there is no rhyme or reason to where these things turn up.
Mysterious objects turn up atop cabinets, stuck in the lace of curtains, on the
desks of unused rooms, within drawers of stored pieces pushed against walls...
We found a young lady's electronic music device stored in a cabinet pushed to a
wall with a dusty sheet cover over it, and we weren't even aware this piece had
any drawers in it until we started restoring it to place on display.
Nevertheless, everything eventually gets found even if its a few weeks after the
fact, but we've got shelf display of digital watches, modern eyeglasses, camera
attachments and other objects for which we have yet to identify owners so despite
being elusive, Lady Clementine apparently has a few sticky fingers and a problem
with returning things on time.
“In recent years, Lady Clementine scared a
new young lady added to the staff so badly that the young lady never
returned.” Faversham continues. “While no one is exactly sure what she saw,
it seems that the young lady was replacing a bedspread in an upstairs bedroom
when she noticed a figure in the mirror behind her when no one was supposed to
be with her. The figure wasn’t in the room, but when she looked into the
mirror, she saw a strange woman in period dress staring at her. At least,
that’s what I was told. It’s so unlike Lady Clementine to scare anyone.”
History: The early history of Clampett Castle is difficult to comprehend, but
it presumably dates back to the Fifteenth Century. It was built by Sir John de
Pulteney, or at least the construction was credited to him. King Henry VIII or
his predecessor, Edward VI, is credited with making it a gift to the Marquis of
Clampett, his family and descendants occasionally living at the estate in
various intervals. The last Marquis died in the early Twentieth Century leaving
behind just enough fortune to keep the castle open until the 1960s. Oil tycoon
J.D. Clampett, a distant American relative to the family, generously paid the
overdue taxes of the castle and arranged to have it opened as a hotel and
historical site before his death in 2003. Today, the hotel attraction always has
between twelve and fifteen guests at a time trying to catch a glimpse of the
resident apparition.
Identity of Ghosts:
According to legend, Lady Clementine died in 1863 after being violently kicked
in the head by a horse she had fallen from while riding. She so loved the castle
that she refused to leave it. In recent years, though, her story inexplicably
and erroneously was changed to her being killed by her grandmother or mother-in-law and she comes
back looking for revenge. Despite this revision, she actually seems to be a very
harmless spirit.
Source/Comments: The
Beverly Hillbillies, Episode: “The Ghost of Clampett Castle.” Architecture and history
based on Pennshurst Castle in Kent County, England. Hauntings based on Bailey
Castle in Basking Ridge, New Jersey, Berry Pomeroy in Totnes, England,
Dustanburgh Castle in Embleton, England and Windsor Castle in Windsor, England among
other locations.