The Temple Bar - 'Spooks at a country pub'
This old country pub is in a small rural village called Ewyas Harold which is in the Golden Valley part of the beautiful Herefordshire countryside. With surrounding hills, fresh country air and lovely views this old pub sets the scene for the peaceful village.
The Temple Bar is full of ghost stories and has a local reputation in the village of it's ghostly occurrences. The history of The Temple proves to be very secretive and many people have looked in to the pub's history. Past owners and even the village's local historian searched the record's to try and unearth some of the pub's past, but to no avail, there is only a small amount of history that is known and that is available in the public domain, the rest is a mystery.
The pub has two parts, one side is the lounge, this is where people wine and dine and this is on the left hand side, this part of the building is the newest and dates to around 1700-1800. The other side of the pub is the bar area, this was originally an old barn and is the oldest part of the pub.
The bar area is considered to be quite unique as the floor of this part of the pub is creepily believed to be made from old gravestones which were taken from the old church in the village many years ago. This part of the pub was originally a market hall and a corn exchange was situated upstairs and the downstairs part would have been where the stables were.
It is believed that the pub got it's name from a connection with court and that's why a judge is seen on the pubs outside sign. It is said that a Courthouse was originally at the pub in the old part. This courthouse would only deal with common cases and disputes, nothing to serious.
Many disturbances from the world of the paranormal have occurred at the Inn, the pub's customers have also had first hand accounts of these happenings.
In 1992 the Castle family moved into the pub and within a week unexplained ghostly phenomenon was happening. One member of the family was helping out one Friday afternoon by putting some bottles into the fridge when he heard somebody walking across the room into the lounge area in old fashioned heavy boots, baring in mind that all the doors were shut and locked this couldn't be explained and so understandably the person was a bit shook up and frightened.
The owner as also witnessed a full apparition and many times the pub's main window that was in the bar would constantly open and close. A few weeks after the family moved they were chatting at the bar, getting to know the local villagers, one lady who was talking to them was the local district nurse who was telling the family all about their new village, all seemed well but a week later the family were in complete shock and disbelief when they spoke to somebody out of conversation one day about the district nurse that they had a conversation with, they found out that she was actually dead and had died many years before, the nurse was also seen by other customers who were sat in the bar that day.
The main ghost of The Temple is the ghost of a little boy who as been seen on numerous occasions, he as been sighted in the oldest part of The pub and in a room upstairs which the family named 'the haunted room'. One family member refuses to go near that room altogether.
The ghostly little boy was seen frequently by a family member who has since passed away. There is a rumour that a Jockey was murdered in the oldest part of the pub, there is no record of this but the story as gone around for years.
If the jockey was a relatively short man in life then his spirit could be mistaken for a small child, who knows! Glasses smashing, cold spots, heavy footsteps and constant slamming doors are just some of the things that take place at the pub daily, the alarms have also gone off on their own accord .
The pub even has a ghost of a dog that has been felt brushing past the legs of customers. One customer left her mobile phone at the pub one afternoon and so she rang the pub to see if anybody handed it in, the phone was nowhere to be seen and so things were left like that, however three weeks later the mobile phone was found under the table in the lounge, the lounge is cleaned twice a day so this incident left the customer and the owner's baffled.
The Temple Bar has many more ghost stories to share and for a pub which is tucked away in the Herefordshire countryside it definitely proves to be a haunted treat and a pub that is truly worth visiting.
Below is the main bar room inside the spooky Temple Bar
