Lytham Hall is a Grade I listed building located around a mile from the centre of Lytham. It is made up of 78 acres of parkland and was built in the 18th century. Not only is it a beautiful piece of history, but it’s also reported to be quite haunted too!
The property has been owned by the Clifton family for many decades but due to the carelessness of the last Clifton to live there, the building was sold to the Guardian Royal Exchange Assurance to be used as offices in 1963/
Lytham Hall was listed as a Grade I building which is the highest grade. It is treated as being at risk as its condition is now only ‘fair’.
Lytham Town Trust purchased Lytham Hall in 1997, assisted by a donation from BAE systems and it is on a long term lease of 99 years to The Heritage Trust For The North West.
There have been plenty of stories of Lytham Hall being haunted and recently, several volunteers working at the hall have reported some strange goings on.
One Sunday, a group of volunteers were handing out leaflets and raising money when they heard the sound of a car pulling up at the gatehouse. when they went outside to greet the visitor, they found no car there. When they went back into the gatehouse, one of the volunteers explained that it was not a rare occurrence and that they had experienced the same thing on several occasions. The volunteers began to share their own experiences, which seemed to happen most often in cooler weather. On discussing the events that they experienced, the volunteers realised that there was possibly something strange going on in the Hall and that is wasn’t just their imaginations.
Shortly after the volunteers had finished discussing their experiences a man walked up to the gatehouse looking distressed. He asked the volunteers if the grounds were haunted, which obviously was quite a shock to the volunteers given what they had just been discussing.
The man explained that when he was crossing the road towards the gatehouse, the air around him suddenly became so cold that he could see his breath in front of his face. The experience continued until he had moved away from the spot. None of the volunteers nor the visitor professed to believe in ghosts, but all of them felt shaken by their experiences.
It is known from stories passed down that John Talbot Clifton wad a great lover of cars, especially cars he could drive as quickly as possible up to the front gate. Could it had been the ghost of Talbot driving his motor car once again?
