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Avoiding the Toll
Johnny o’ the Grass was a wiseman from Louth, and allegedly got his powers by making a deal with the Devil. An old tale informs us that he rode up to Tibs Toll-bar, near Girsby Hall, and was told he had to pay a toll for his donkey but not for himself…
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St Botolph & the Devil
It is often windy around St Botolph’s Church, commonly referred to as the Boston Stump. This wind is often particularly strong on the footpath by the tower, the most exposed spot in the churchyard. But don’t make the mistake of thinking that is because this side of the churchyard is next to the river, which…
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Little Hugh
The tale of Little Saint Hugh is perhaps the most prominent of several antisemitic tales of child murder that proliferated in England in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. His death in 1255 led to the Crown prosecuting alleged Jewish ritual child murder…
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Doddington Hall Ghosts
One of Doddington’s several reported ghosts is that of a young woman is said to jump from the roof of this Jacobean stately home (which can be visited), screaming as she falls. It is said that she is escaping the unwanted advances of a squire.
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Nocton Hall Ghosts
Nocton Hall (a ruin since it burned down in mysterious circumstances in 2004) is a nineteenth-century country house built on the site of a fifteenth-century country house, itself built in the once-extensive grounds of a dissolved medieval priory…
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The Metheringham Lass
A variant of the ‘phantom hitchhiker’ contemporary legend, common in twentieth-century and contemporary folklore concerning ghosts. The ghost of a young woman is said to flag down unsuspecting motorists at night, on a road adjacent to the former RAF Metheringham…
Lincolnshire Folk Tales Project 