Shade Primary School

Out towards Portsmouth stands Eagle Crag, named because it looks like an eagle frozen in stone. It was said that witches would launch themselves from there to fly to Pendle…

There was once a woman named Lady Sybil. She lived in a time where a woman and all she owned became the property of her husband. But Lady Sybil was a strong woman who valued her freedom. She roamed the wild hills, often staying out all night to watch the sunrise. She lived a comfortable life, and many suitors. Yet she refused them all.
None of the men could believe she was happy on her own. There had to be a deeper reason for her not wanting them. So word became story became rumour that Lady Sybil was a witch. People claimed she took on the form of a white hart, racing across the moors before flying from Eagle Crag to join the other witches.

Lady Sybil turned down suitor after suitor. Even her servants begged her to take a husband and stop the rumours, but she’d have none of it. However, there was one man, William, who decided to trick her into marriage. Originally he’d simply wanted her estates, although he was a man of property himself. Yet the more they talked, the more he liked him until he found himself falling in love with her, and his offer of marriage was a genuine one.

It made no difference; Lady Sybil still refused him.

So William visited the wise woman, Mother Helston, to ask how to win the woman he’d come to love. She told him that the only way was to corner her and discover her secret. Then she’d be forced to marry him. She instructed William to go hunting on the next full moon, and to take with him a white silken cord. However hard the hunt seemed, he could not give up.

“When the time comes, you’ll know how to use the cord,” she told him. “If you do this and follow your instincts, the Lady will be yours by morning.”

And so, on the next full moon he did as she’d ordered, going hunting with his two dogs. No sooner had they set out than he spotted a white hart. The dogs picked up the scent and the chase began across the fells.

But the dogs couldn’t catch the hart, and slowly William became disheartened. The he recalled Mother Helston’s command, his resolve firmed, and he rode on. Then, out of the trees came a curious black and white dog. It approached his own dogs, and they seemed to immediately accepted it as their leader. The chase resumed at a fast pace. Finally the dogs cornered the exhausted white hart up by Eagle Crag. In the thin moonlight you could almost see its heart beating under its skin. It looked this way and that, almost wondering whether to leap or be taken.

Before it could decide, the black and white dog moved forward and stood. It raised its muzzle and barked three times, then the hart lowered its head. Immediately William knew what to do. He jumped from his horse, took the silken cord and threw it over the hart’s neck. Slowly the hunting party made its way down the hill. Unseen to the others, the black and white dog scampered off into the undergrowth, and not long after mother Helston let herself into her cottage.

William took the hart to Lady Sybil’s barn and tied it firmly in a stall. Then he sat and watched through the rest of the night, until dawn came and the animal shimmered in the light and slowly took on the form of Lady Sybil.

“So now you know my secret,” she said. “Will you betray me as a witch?”
“No,” William answered simply. “I truly love, and I want to protect you. The only way I can do that is to take you for my wife.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“What choice do I have?” she asked. “I lose my freedom either way.”

But it was agreed, and the marriage took place. It was, by and large, a happy one, and Lady Sybil retained all her freedom. The only promise she had to keep was never to roam on the moors as a white hart. 

 Time passed, and Lady Sybil grew restless as the wind blew in her face. But she’d given her word. Still, she reasoned, she’d only given her word not to roam as a white hart. So, in the spring of that year, a moonlight white cat was seen in the farms of the valley. It would stir up the cats and sour the milk in the cows, rumour spread that it was a familiar, a shapeshifter. William had his suspicions, but Lady Sybil was always there when he woke; he didn’t know she’d put a sleeping draught in his wine on the nights she’d roam.

Down at Pivinger Mill, the Miller set his son, Giles to watch. If he cat appeared, he was to kill it on sight. That selfsame night, close to midnight, he heard a noise and slowly hundreds of cats appeared in the mill, howling their songs and dancing. And in the centre of them all was a moonlight white cat. Giles picked up his dagger, walked forwards and began to slice the air around him.

Every cat got away. Almost every cat. As he finally caught his breath, on the floor he was a cat’s paw, a single white paw. He wrapped it in a linen handkerchief, then slept in the barn.

When he awoke in the morning and unwrapped the paw, he saw something strange. Instead of fur, there was skin, and instead of a paw there was the thin, pale hand of a woman. And in an instant he knew whose hand it was. So he went to the great house, knocked on the door, and presented the handkerchief to William.

“I’ll tell no one – as long as you give me my bloody money,” Giles announced.

William had no choice. In exchange for a promise of silence, he gave Giles a bag of coins, and then he went upstairs to the bedroom. Lady Sybil was pale and chilled. Some say that by magic she reattached her hand, but others knew she couldn’t. Instead her fever grew as she thrashed in the bed. Down in the village a drunken Giles had been unable to keep his mouth shut, and the magistrate was preparing a warrant for Lady Sybil’s arrest. William pushed his hands through his hair.

“Why?” he asked.
“I meant no harm,” Lady Sybil answered in a weak voice. “I just needed my freedom.”

He wondered how she’d cope, being tried as a witch. But in the night the fever took a fierce grip, and by morning Lady Sybil was free forever. According to some, she wasn’t buried in hallowed ground, but under the shadow of Eagle Crag. As for William, he died shortly after.

But sometimes, on crisp nights when the moon is full, you can hear the hunt, the three dogs and the white hart on Eagle Crag.  

Poems inspired by the Lady Sybil story

Because She Is Everything - By Sam Battersby

Lady Sybil
A wonderful, wise, wealthy women
Daytime a Lady
Yet night time a creature

Secretly sneaking, scared that people may find her.
Young looking as a warrior
Beautiful as a bouquet of flowers
Independant as a white doe
Lovely as a white cat

Maybe because she is everything.

*********

Alone She Travels by Eleanor James

Lady Sybil wanders the night
Alone she travels
Do not fear what you don't understand
Young but wise.

She sneaks and spies
Young or old you shall never catch her
But I see her in the night
In the darkness she really lives
Living in the body of a doe or a cat

*******

Running In The Wild Space by Luke Glover

I transform to an animal
Running in the wild space
The same kind of animal at my toes
People are the only kind of threat to me
I am a women
And people hurt me
And they breath deeply at me.

*********

Everyone knows that the canal went through Todmorden to make moving goods faster, cheaper and easier. There are a number of locks on the canal – some of them are two-man locks. This is one of the few ghost stories about the canals, for they’re generally not considered old enough to have their own folklore.

            Most bargees wore a gold earring. That way, if they died away from home there’d be the money to pay for a funeral as well as send news of their death home to their families. But one bargee, Tom, loved to gamble. He found himself in the South, gambling so heavily that he took out his gold earring and offered it as a stake. He lost, and become so furious that he got into a fight at the tavern, where he was killed.

Everyone said Tom had been a bad lot and deserved his sad end, but there was one bargee there, a man named William, who couldn’t see it that way. He’d known Tom when they were young. He felt Tom’s family should be informed, but even more that the man should receive a decent burial.

So he went to the morgue, claimed the body and paid for the burial But now he had no money to pay someone to travel home with him and help on the two-man locks. He sat on the docks wondering how to solve the problem. Out of the blue a man appeared and said,
            “I hear you’re looking for crew to help you.”
            “I am,” William admitted, “but I can’t pay much in the way of wages. I’ve incurred expense I hadn’t expected.”
            “I’ll work for very little and we can negotiate the sum when we finish.”
            “Then I’d be happy to have you on board.”

So it was they worked side by side during the days on the canals. In the evenings they’d talk, but the man would always refuse a drink or play cards. He worked as hard as any man, sweating loading and unloading until they arrived near Todmorden on the Calder and Hebble Navigation and went through the last of the two man locks.

“That’ll be the end for me, then,” the man said, “since you won’t need any more help.”William turned and said yes, then went to get his purse. As he counted out his coins, the man told him softly,
            “There’s no need for that. You’ve paid your debt to me twice.”
And with that, before his very eyes, the man disappeared. William realised that his companion for the past weeks had been the ghost of Tom, helping him out. But what was a greater marvel was that he’d eaten with the man and he’d been as real to him as anyone living.

This is a story told among the bargees to this day, and they’ll swear that it’s true.

The following is a work in progress inspired by the Ghost Story on the Canal

Canal Ghost by Jacob Holden

The mist of the water
The death and the slaughter
The barges that followed behind

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Miss Mason is reading a fab book. It gave her the idea to make a quilt....more info to come