The Headless Horses Of Boulge Hall

The following account of a haunting was published in ‘County Folk-Lore: Suffolk’ (1893) edited by Lady Camilla Gurdon. Her source was a Mr Redstone. ‘At Boulge Hall, upon the stroke of twelve at midnight, a coach drawn by a pair of headless horses, and driven by a headless coachman, who dismounts to open the lodge gates, takes back the ghost of the late owner, Mr. FitzGerald. A man from Debach stayed up one night to see if it were true, and he was wholly frighted by the sight.”

Boulge Hall was demolished in 1955. The Hall entered the Fitzgerald family in 1801 when it was bought by John Fitzgerald for his daughter. Her husband John Fitzgerald (formerly Purcell) (Born 25 December 1775 – Died 18 March 1852) was a British Member of Parliament. They moved into Boulge Hall in 1835.

Their younger son was the poet Edward FitzGerald (Born 31 March 1809 – Died 14 June 1883) and he lived in a cottage in the grounds of Bougle Hall until his brother inherited the estate.

It was later bought by Sir Robert Eaton White, 1st Baronet (Born 1864 – Died 1940) in whose family it remained.

Gurdon gives another of the Boulge Hall carriage haunting.  It was taken from a written account given to Mr Redstone. ‘Boulge Hall said to be haunted by a Mrs. Short, who is called the ”Queen of Hell.” “She murdered a gentleman at Boulge Hall. The stain is on the floor where she murdered him. Now (that is 70 years after) she come out of the gate in a carriage with a pair of horses that have got no heads. She wears a silk dress. There is a light on the carriage, and a man drives the horses. About three years ago a servant girl lived there. Mrs. Short went into her room and pulled all her things off her. The girl said she felt it’s (the ghost’s) breath like a wolf upon her.”