Haunted Museums London

Three quarters of the way through our series and we are still finding plenty of ghostly tales to keep you entertained . Take a look at our latest listings and visit one of these fabulous London Museums if you dare!

Old Operating Theatre Museum

https://oldoperatingtheatre.com/

In the shade of the Towering Shard  lies an early 18th Century Church. Housed within it’s attic the oldest operating theatre in Europe, predating both anaesthetic and antiseptic.

The Church housing the theatre was once part of the old St Thomas hospital along with its original herb garett. A place once used by the hospitals resident apothecary to dry and store herbs and medications.

Described in 1821 as “fitted with wooden storage racks the dried heads of opium plants filled it’s rafters”. By 1822 part of the garrett had been converted into a purpose built operating theatre.

For the first time windows were added changing its function from simple storage space to working theatre.

Patients at the operating theatre were all women, poor, and in the main unable to contribute to their medical care. Using opiates or alcohol to dull the senses meant amputations could take less than a minute.Post 1847 ether or chloroform were in wide use, however the theatre had closed it’s doors  before the age of antiseptics, and the risk of death was high.

A hundred students crowd into the small theatre vying to get a good view and  watch some of the UK’s finest surgeons perform.

Lack of understanding around the cause of infection saw mortality rates soar. The surgeon was as likely to wash his hands after the event as before. Their old frock coats  were “stiff and stinking with pus and blood”.

Ominously, placed beneath the operating bench, a sawdust box absorbs the bodily fluids.

Under these unsanitary, brutal conditions no wonder ghosts walk its walls wailing and screaming in agony.

The Old Woman in Black

Weeping and wailing she is believed to be either a relative of the deceased or a victim of the surgery itself.

The Woman in White

Floating  through the surgery, emiting light or glowing -her history remains unknown.

A Strange Occurance

While preparing for the day a disturbance was heard. On checking the theatre all the cabinet doors and drawers were flung open with force.

Refusing to stay in the museum alone she returned with a colleague who corroborated the story.

Ragged School Museum

https://www.raggedschoolmuseum.org.uk/visiting/

Developed in working class districts and attended by destitute  children these 19th Century charitable organisations provided elementary schooling, religious instruction, clothing clubs and bootblack brigades.

The school opened in 1877 being the largest of its kind at the time. At it’s height the school had more than a thousand weekday pupils with over 2,400 attending it’s Sunday School.

The Museum features  a reconstructed Victorian classroom and typical East End kitchen. Keeping true to it’s history from the turn of the last Century  it’s easy to understand how the ghosts of these children continue to feel at home here.

Their sinister presence resides as laughter or crying can be heard in empty, echoing  rooms.

Stories of dark shadowy figures, disembodied voices and paranormal activity abound. Balls of light manifest in dark corners and an aparition can take you by surprise in the basement.

Tales of horror from it’s days as a school and reports of ghostly goings on make this truly one of London’s most haunted.