GHOST STORY

The Royal Stag public house in the nearby village of Datchet has one of the most eerie phenomena in the county.  From time to time, and totally without warning,  a spectral handprint becomes visible on one of the windows.

   According to legend,  the print is made by the ghost of a young boy,  vainly trying to attract the attention of the people in the warm ans comfortable hostelry.  The story goes that the boy was taken to the pub by his father,  a village labourer in Victorian times.

   It was deep midwinter,  and snow lay thick on the ground.  The landlord would not let the boy inside,  and his father told him to wait while he drank his ale.  The boy wandered into the graveyard immediately next door and tried to amuse himself.  It was bitterly cold,   and the mischevious attraction of throwing snowballs at gravestones soon palled.  He ran around in the snow to keep warm,  but quickly became tired in the intense cold,  and went to the light of the alehouse window to look for his father.

   The man seemed to have completely forgotten about his young son,  and stayed inside, drinking.   By now the boy was pitifully cold,  and tapped on the window to try to attract someone`s attention.  His last desperate act was to push the window pane with his hand.   The print froze on the glass.  Exhausted,  he fell asleep in the snow in the graveyard.  By the time he was found he had frozen to death.

   And so the boy`s ghostly handprint appears periodically on the window.  In 1979 a national newspaper told the story accompanied,  accompanied by a photograph of the handprint.  The newspaper got a local glazier to take out the pane of glass so it could be examined.  The glazier replaced the window with a new one.  The old glass was subjected to all sorts of scientific tests,  but nothing was found,  it was just an old window pane,  and eventually the technicians had to admit there was nothing strange whatsoever about it.

   But meanwhile,  the handprint had appeared again - on the brand new pane of glass.  It was a clear imprint of a left palm,  fingers and thumb, quite small,  and almost certainly that of a young child.

   Whatever was manifesting itself at the Royal Stag was obviously not happy with the reaction it was causing.  One night a copy of the newspaper photograph was left on the bar, where locals had been examining and discussing it.  Next morning the landlord came down to find broken glass everywhere.  Bottles and glasses had been smashed all over the the bar and on the floor -  and no one had heard a thing.  Tales of beer glasses moving about became common.  Ghostly footsteps were heard frequently when there was no one to make them,  and strange noises were heard in the cellar.

   Like so many ghostly happenings,  events at the Royal Stag are totally unpredictable and cannot usually be induced.  Who knows when the mysterious handprint will appear again on the window ?  But you can be sure that when it happens,  the TV cameras will be there as quickly as the newsmen can carry them.  Ghosts make good stories and even better television.

Taken from GHOSTS OF BERKSHIRE by IAN McLOUGHLIN.