I have not the slightest doubt other counties can show equally long lists of haunted houses, only I have not found them so easy of access, moreover the genial nature of the inhabitants of Northamptonshire (especially) has attracted as well as aided me in my research, and although the burly Midland yeoman is inclined to scoff at things superphysical, his satire is not so objectionable as is that of the supercilious middle-class Londoner.
Again, Northamptonshire is very rich in well preserved old country mansions—I know of no other county where there are so many—and as most of these houses have at one time or another witnessed some grim tragedy, it is not surprising that they are now the scenes of occult manifestations.
Doubtless one would find similar phenomena in smaller habitations were the latter of the same early date, for crime was then just as prevalent among the poor as among the rich, but the inferior material with which cottages have been built causes their comparatively speaking early dissolution, and we rarely find a cottage now standing which was built more than a century ago.
From this it must not be deduced that hauntings are confined to old buildings nor that past crime alone begat ghosts; nothing of the sort, modern villas are frequently subjected to psychic phenomena whilst the phantoms of present-day suicides and murderers are decidedly as numerous as of yore.
But whereas in olden times, crime was fairly common in villages, it is now chiefly confined to towns, and the houses that have witnessed murders, &c., are not infrequently entirely demolished or made to undergo some very radical alterations—hence the ghosts disappear with their surroundings.
This more so, perhaps, in the provinces than in London, as there are too many crimes in the latter for any particular one to be remembered for any length of time, not long enough in fact to permanently damn the letting of a house.
The word ghost is very elastic, it may be used in reference to many different types of spirits, and is, in fact, only the designation for that genus of which the departed soul of man is but a species.
Now Northamptonshire is very rich in species; species of all kinds; spirits of men, of beasts, of vegetables! and species of elementals—elemental being in itself, a genus which includes many various types, too numerous indeed, for any attempt at classification in this work.
It is no uncommon thing to meet with some locality (usually barren) or village (generally on the site of barrows or Druidical remains as, for example, Guilsborough) where the nature of the hauntings is dual; a complexity that is, fortunately, of rarer occurrence in houses.
Concerning the latter, Lee mentions one instance, i.e., “The Gybe Farm,” in his book, “More Glimpses of the Unseen World” whilst I will take this opportunity to quote another case of dual haunting, i.e., Carne House, which is situated at the utmost extremity of a village to the south-east of Northampton.