Bettiscombe, by Horse Mill Cross - geograph

Bettiscombe is a small village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...

in west

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of , ...

, England, situated in the

Marshwood Vale The Marshwood Vale (or Vale of Marshwood) is a low-lying, bowl-shaped valley of Lower Lias clay, in the western tip of the county of Dorset in south-west England. It lies to the north of the A35 trunk road between the towns of Bridport and Lyme R ...

west of

Beaminster Beaminster ( ) is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated in the Dorset Council administrative area approximately northwest of the county town Dorchester. It is sited in a bowl-shaped valley near the source of the small River ...

Dorset County Council Dorset County Council (DCC) was the county council for the county of Dorset in England. It provided the upper tier of local government, below which were district councils, and town and parish councils. The county council had 46 elected council ...

's 2013 mid-year estimate of the population of the civil parish is 50.

History

The parish church, dedicated to St Stephen, has two windows in the

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may terminate in an apse. Ov ...

and possibly one in the west tower dating from about 1400, although the rest of the structure was rebuilt by John Hicks in 1862.

Skull legend

Bettiscombe Manor, a

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals w ...

in the village, is known as "The House of the

Screaming skull A screaming skull is a paranormal object, a human skull which per legend speaks, screams, or otherwise haunts its environs. The legend is most found in England and other English-speaking regions. The Bettiscombe screaming skull of Dorset, Englan ...

" due to a legend dating from the 19th century. Other ghost stories are also associated with the manor. The legend maintains that the skull is that of a Jamaican slave belonging to John Frederick Pinney. Azariah Pinney's descendants disposed of their

Nevis Nevis is a small island in the Caribbean Sea that forms part of the inner arc of the Leeward Islands chain of the West Indies. Nevis and the neighbouring island of Saint Kitts constitute one country: the Federation of Saint Kitts and ...

estates and returned to the family home of Bettiscombe Manor in 1830, accompanied by one of the family's black slaves. While in his master's service, the servant was taken seriously ill with suspected tuberculosis. As he lay dying, the servant swore that he would never rest unless his body was returned to his homeland of Nevis, but when he died, John Frederick Pinney refused to pay for such an expensive burial and instead had the body interred in the grounds of St. Stephen's Church cemetery. After the burial, ill fortune plagued the village for many months and screams and crying were heard coming from the cemetery. Other disturbances were reported from the manor house, such as windows rattling and doors slamming of their own accord. The villagers went to the manor to seek advice. The body of the servant was exhumed and the body taken to the manor house. In the process of time the skeleton has long since vanished, except for the skull where it has remained in the house for centuries. In 1963 a professor of human and comparative anatomy at the

Royal College of Surgeons The Royal College of Surgeons is an ancient college (a form of corporation) established in England to regulate the activity of surgeons. Derivative organisations survive in many present and former members of the Commonwealth. These organisations a ...

stated that the skull was not that of a black man but that of a European female aged between twenty-five and thirty.

References

External links

The Legend of the Screaming Skull
Villages in Dorset {{Dorset-geo-stub

History

Skull legend

See also

References

External links