- Dame Sybil Penn died of small pox in Hampton Court Palace in 1562
- Her ghost was seen by the Victorians when her tomb was moved in 1829
- The palace is also haunted by Catherine Howard, Henry VIII’s fifth wife
- She was dragged to her death through the palace accused of adultery
- Two schoolgirls noticed the strange apparition on a visit to the palace
For nearly 200 years she is rumoured to have haunted the corridors of Hampton Court.
But now the ghost of the famous Grey Lady may finally have been captured on camera – by a schoolgirl and her iPhone.
Holly Hampsheir, 12, thought she was taking a fairly routine photo of her cousin Brook McGee, also 12, during a day out at the 16th century stately home.
Scroll down for video
Holly Hampsheir, left, is being followed though Hampton Court by a ghostly apparition
The 12-year-old school girl turns around only to discover that the ghoul had disappeared
Dame Sybil Penn died of smallpox in 1562 at Hampton Court, pictured, and has been haunting it since
But she appears unwittingly to have captured the spectral figure of Dame Sybil Penn who looms over the schoolgirl as her back is turned.
With flowing dark hair and a full length black gown the woman seems real enough in the picture.
But seconds later Brook turns around and the next image in the series shows no sign of the visitor at all.
The girls didn’t realise what they had encountered at the time and only made the terrifying discovery when looking through their photos of the outing a day later.
Miss McGee, from Hornchurch, Havering, told the Sun: ‘I was totally freaked out.
‘I didn’t see anything.
‘People say the room goes cold when ghosts appear but we had no idea.
‘We haven’t slept properly since.’
Dame Sybil died from after contracting smallpox in 1562.
The camera clearly picks up some distortion in the right hand image which is missing in the left.��
Sightings of the ghost were first reported in 1829, although several other spirits haunt the historic building
A servant at Hampton Court to four Tudor monarchs she was the nurse of Prince Edward and also nursed Elizabeth I through the disease before succumbing to it herself.
Sightings of her ghost began to be reported in 1829 when the church at the palace was rebuilt and her tomb moved.
Soon after strange noises of a person working a spinning wheel were apparently heard through a wall at Hampton Court.
Leave a Reply