In search of a Spirit- Hannah Phillips and the ghost of Astley Abbotts

It was warm day in April when we journeyed to Astley Abbotts in search of a ghost. The beauty of the surrounding area seemed to contrast with our purpose, everywhere we looked there was life and light, but gentle whispers of spring didn’t help Hannah, she was still over three centuries’ dead. Her melancholy tale and its tangible remains were what inspired us to visit St Calixtus church that day, and piece together the threads of her story.

St Calixtus church sits in the hamlet of Astley Abbotts, which is north of Bridgnorth. It’s a stunning building, mainly Norman in origin, though it has Anglo Saxon roots, and Roman Tufa stone has been found in the walls. The church is a tapestry of the countless generations who have crossed its threshold since its consecration in 1138. I love buildings like this, they seem to hum with the weight of their history, they ensure that the past stays present, tangible to us still. Our journey took us through the same countryside where generations of my family once worked the land. The continuity of the surroundings is startling; it never changes much round here.  As we weaved through the patchwork of fields, I kept a watchful eye out for their ghosts still guiding the plough. How familiar had her story been to them? One can only wonder now.

The ghost of Hannah Phillip’s feels tangible, almost familiar, and this lies in part due to its similarities with other folklore. We will share more about Hannah later in the article, but folklore states that she drowned on the eve of her wedding and haunts the area still.  Found across the length and breadth of Britain (and further afield) the drowned maiden is a motif that can be witnessed cross culturally, and though presentations may differ, there are stark similarities in their stories. Some have historical origins, whilst others are purely folkloric, though this doesn’t diminish their relevance. The drowned maiden is just one of the folkloric characters within Shropshire lore that is associated with water. Though a landlocked county, we have a series of tales concerning mermaids, such as the one who is said to ‘haunt’ the depths of Dairy Pit near the Wrekin. Jenny Greenteeth is a water creature found in many British counties, and she is said to dwell in Shropshire’s rivers and meres, ready to drag her unsuspecting victims to their deaths. Even our eponymous river – The Severn; was a goddess once who met a watery end. The drowned maiden joins the ranks of female spirits who embody the often, tumultuous power of open bodies of water. She either symbolises their indiscriminate nature in her vengeful acts or is a woman who falls victim to it. The drowned maiden is usually virginal, at the advent of a major life event or marred by tragedy. She manifests either as an unforgiving spirit, desperate for retribution, or as in Hannah Phillip’s case, a tragic, gloomy haunting. As well as this I would argue that the drowned maiden is linked to the wider body of white lady folklore.

Tales of white ladies are another cross-cultural haunting with the legends usually concerning accidental death, murder or suicide. They have similar themes and often the White Lady’s death is spurred on by a husband or fiancé and inspired by a form of unfulfilled or unrequited love. An obvious parallel between Hannah Phillip’s story can be found in the story of the White Lady of Longnor, which at one point was thought to be Shropshire’s most famous Ghost story.

The White Lady of Longnor was reputed to be a beautiful young woman (as they so often are in these tales) who sadly took her own life through drowning after being deserted at the altar. Her folk tale straddles the line between white lady and drowned maiden, demonstrating how such tropes entwine. The White Lady of Longnor haunted a body of water known as ‘The Black pool’ and the road bridge into Longnor. She is said to rise from the watery depths and wander the area in a white wedding dress, trying to find her lost love. She was a fairly frequently reported haunting during the 19^th and early 20th centuries. One story sees her seducing a young man on his walk home, only for her to ‘melt into thin air’ during their embrace. Another tale states that she danced with locals at ‘The Villa’ a sort of village hall where young people would meet to dance and drink. At first, she seemed like a beautiful young woman, dressed in white, but soon, her demeanour changed.  She danced furiously, almost inhumanly so, until locals realised her identity. As quickly as the thought crossed their minds, she had disappeared. She has been witnessed on the road bridge as well as in other parts of Longnor. Whether there is any truth in the story of the white lady of Longnor or not, it is clear to see how the tale has influenced other stories within the county and is an example of a wider body of lore.

Certainly, such motifs contribute to the story of Hannah Phillips and can be found throughout Shropshire folklore. As I have shared previously, many of Shropshire’s female spirits are marred by tragedy and have suffered greatly in life, which is why their legacy often continues in the form of a haunting. However, I do not want to suggest that we should reduce Hannah to folklore, simply because her story has parallels with other regional folk tales, as there is at least some evidence to suggest that Hannah Philips lived. The continuation of her story is a potent symbol which is worthy of further exploration. Though details of her life are scant, we can understand a little about the community she belonged to, simply because her story endured. The fact that Hannah continued to haunt her community suggests that her untimely passing inspired an outpouring of grief, that would later be interpreted as a ghost story.  Perhaps any unnatural portents or the thrashing of the wind came to indicate that she hadn’t truly left them, that she shouldn’t be forgotten. Ghosts are never just ghosts after all; they are a conduit, a window into a world otherwise closed to us. Sometimes a female spirit signifies more than one woman, she becomes representative of a whole group, a collective womanhood, who were otherwise left out of traditional narratives. However, perhaps my biggest reason for suggesting that Hannah Phillips existed historically is the maiden’s garland bearing her name that can be found within St Calixtus church.

The maiden’s garland is what drew me to St Calixtus that day, a fragile but tangible reminder of a community’s grief, an aide-mémoire that Hannah had once lived and was loved enough to be remembered. Such funerary mementoes are quite rare now, though several wonderful examples are on display in Minsterley church and in 2020 a maiden’s garland was rediscovered in Shrawardine church. This fragile heart shaped garland was in commemoration of a 15-year-old girl called Dolly Newcombe, who had died in 1753. Just like Hannah she had drowned. It is remarkable that these items have stood the test of time and that we can witness a 300-year-old grief. Maiden’s garlands can also be found in areas such as Derbyshire, showing traces of a wider practice.

The ‘innocent and pure custom’ of commemorating a person through a maiden’s garland has been referred to by many names, such as ‘virgins crown’, and ‘crants’ (thought to link with the German word for crown). They are generally crown shaped garlands which are used as a funeral memento for women who died very young, or a virgin (Though there are some examples of male ones too). They are usually made of paper flowers, rosettes and ribbons which are also fixed to some form of frame. They were carried on the coffin as part of the funeral procession, and either left on the grave or placed in a prominent position in the church. There are several theories regarding the origins of the maiden garland. Most of our surviving maiden’s garlands date from the 18^th century but there are tantalising references to the practice dating from earlier centuries. Shakespeare refers to it in Hamlet when describing the burial of Ophelia.

‘Here she is allow'd her virgin crants,
her maiden strewments, and the bringing home
of bell and burial.’ 

These delicate memorials feel incredibly intimate, a sentimental reminder that this person mattered. Shropshire has a rich body of death folklore that includes funerary customs and the maiden’s garland certainly would have played its role in this. Such folklore allows a conduit for grief and allows an individual to navigate the complex emotions that death causes. In some parts of Shropshire, it was noted that excessive grieving, particularly in a public setting caused distress to the recently deceased which could, in turn stop their spirit from passing on. Perhaps then the simplicity of the maidens’ garland encapsulates the desire to remember, without the excessive emotion which could hinder the dead woman’s passage into the spirit world. Though it is difficult to quantify folk belief and practice, it is fair to suggest that at one point the maidens garland would have played a role in funerary customs in the county. However, we are told that by the 20^th century it had ‘almost entirely fallen into disuse." Due to the fragility of these objects, it is amazing that we can still witness an artifact like a maiden’s garland in its original location.

As we opened the heavy wooden door and peered inside the church, it was as if Hannah herself was calling me. Now, I spend a lot of my free time visiting old churches, soaking up their atmosphere and searching for their secrets and sometimes, it’s hard to find what you are looking for. You must search every nook and quiet corner. This wasn’t the case with Hannah Phillip’s maiden garland. Even in the gloom of an unlit church my eyes were drawn to the glass cabinet which contained the remnants of three centuries worth of grief. It was as if Hannah wanted to be found.

Hanging upon an iron rod, it seemed so fragile, as if the rising and falling of my chest would cause it to scatter, to fade into nothing. May 10^th.. That was the date in which Hannah Philips would die. The cold iron seemed to only emphasise that Hannah was dead. I stood for a moment, taking it all in, peering at the still legible handwriting on a scrap of paper that bore a commemoration to her. How had she been remembered in the years after her death? The whole church felt like a tomb, resounding with the memory of those who mourned her. Without this faded cloth Hannah Phillips might have been forgotten.

Though we have little historical precedence for her life, the local folklore suggests that Hannah grew up in a house near the river. There is a tantalising reference to her found in ‘Nooks and Corners of Shropshire’ where it also states that she grew up near the river and died on the eve of her wedding. Charlotte Burne mentions in the footnotes of ‘A sheaf of Gleanings’ that there were parish records that referenced Hannah. She states that the parish register records the burial of Hannah, daughter of Mr Richard Philips and Sarah, his wife in May 1707. She goes on to mention that the Philips’s lived in ‘a picturesque half-timbered house overlooking the churchyard of Astley Abbotts church’ all of which seems to match up with the local tale. The remainder of our knowledge is resigned to folklore.

During Hannah’s lifetime we are told that the river was much easier to ford than now, with several areas that you could cross over with little issue. Hannah Philips was said to have also been the sort happy and bright young woman that too often appears in such tales. Versions of the story vary, but it is said that a day or two before her wedding day, Hannah set off to the church to aid the preparations, which saw her cross the river. However, the water was much higher and faster than usual. Hannah slipped on a wet stone and fell into the water. She was swept away, down into the depths. Though she struggled, she was soon unconscious, her poor body at the mercy of the water. Hannah Phillips was to never be seen alive again. Folklore states that her body sank down into an underground cave, and that her clutch handbag was the only trace of her found, floating downstream. After a frantic search, her remains were later recovered.

The community was bereft, as was her future husband, who struggled to deal with her passing. We have little knowledge about the funeral, or the aftermath of Hannah’s death as what remains of her story has become obscured by folklore. Interestingly, there are very few references to her ghost until the advent of the 20^th century, when her spirit is seen to wander again. Perhaps she had haunted prior to this, but people simply hadn’t paid attention or perhaps her story hadn’t been shared outside of its community of origin. Her ghost story states that Hannah haunts the roads near where she drowned and is sometimes seen coming out of the water. Tragically, she is said to be still trying to find her way to the church to marry her beloved, all these years later.

Reports of her haunting vary, but she is sometimes seen in her wedding dress. Some state she wears dark, dishevelled clothing.  Other reports suggest physical phenomena, such as feelings of profound sadness or feelings of unease when they are near the spot she passed.

One account from the middle of the 20^th century comes from a couple who had moved to the wider area, into a house just north of Bridgnorth. Driving home one evening at twilight, the man passed an area known locally as the Boldings, which isn’t too far from Astley Abbots. The Boldings has a road that cuts through it, some oak trees and hedges, as well as a layby and a little pool which sits in a field. Quite suddenly he saw the shape of a woman, floating towards him. He described her as a young woman, wearing ‘dark peasant dress’ with a shawl over her head. Her attire was very dated, which cemented the fact that she belonged to a previous century. She didn’t look when she crossed the road, she simply floated forward, causing the couple to swerve their car to avoid her. When they looked behind them, they watched the woman fade away. Had this been Hannah Philips? Locals seemed to believe so, when they shared the experience with them over the following weeks. Hannah was seen in the years after this experience, but of late her spirit is not as frequent, so we are left with the maiden’s garland as an enduring memorial of her life.

I did not see Hannah Philips ghost that day, but that didn’t matter. She was everywhere I looked, her spirit was embodied by the silence of the church, the gentle singing of the birds, the wind blowing through my hair. Her story is important, even if details about her life are scant, and the fact that there is no known grave for Hannah makes the maiden’s garland even more pertinent. It is our link to her, our reminder that she, and other women like her were important. They are important. Hannah reminds me of so many of Shropshire’s female spirits, whose suffering or untimely death sent shock waves into the communities they belonged to. One of the reasons I keep returning to the female ghosts of Shropshire is to give them a voice and try and piece together their significance. The idea of Hannah being snatched from those who loved her must be a story that resonates deeply with those who also experienced a loss that felt indiscriminate, or profoundly unfair. Hannah is a conduit for their grief too, and perhaps she could even come to represent our own private griefs. Her story is also a brilliant example of how a community engages with an event and develops their own narratives. Her haunting may have been influenced by other tales, but nevertheless, her spirit feels incredibly rooted to the locality.

 There is another ghost that is said to haunt the roads in and around Astley Abbots. It is said that a young man is seen wandering the roads in and around the village and appears to be searching. He is described as wearing his ‘Sunday best’ wearing a flower in his lapel. Some have speculated that this may be Hannah’s beloved, still trying to find her. If he really is her former love, I truly hope that one day, their spirits are reunited.