A plain wooden chair. A Yorkshire murder. And a warning that has followed one object for generations.

In North Yorkshire, inside Thirsk Museum, a chair hangs suspended safely out of reach. According to local legend, anyone who sits in it will meet a sudden and untimely death. Its story is tied to Thomas Busby, a man executed in 1702 for the murder of his father-in-law, Daniel Auty, near Sandhutton crossroads.

For years, the chair was kept at the Busby Stoop Inn, where locals, travellers, and sceptics could see it for themselves. Around it grew stories of dares, accidents, wartime deaths, strange coincidences, and warnings too persistent to ignore. Some accounts are rooted firmly in history. Others live in that darker space between folklore, pub memory, and local dread.

In this episode of Dark Matters, we examine the real murder behind the legend, the cursed reputation of Busby’s chair, its removal to Thirsk Museum, and the uncomfortable question at the centre of every cursed object story: when does ordinary furniture become something people are genuinely afraid to touch?

A real execution. A haunted inn. A chair lifted out of reach. And a legend that still asks whether some objects carry more than age, wood, and memory.

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A family home in Lancashire. A dark hallway no one wants to face. And a presence that seems to move through the rooms as if it still belongs there.

When Klare’s family moved into a smart semi-detached dormer bungalow in 1988, the house seemed like a fresh start. But before long, the upstairs landing, the entrance hall, and the quiet hours of the night began to carry an atmosphere none of them could easily dismiss.

There were sounds from empty rooms. Footsteps, plugs, voices, unexplained music, and the feeling of being watched from the dark. Then came the sightings: a shadow-like man at the foot of the stairs, a figure groaning at the end of a bed, someone passing outside a bathroom window where no one should have been, and later, stranger moments still — including a woman seated silently in the bedroom, dogs reacting to something unseen, and a baby monitor that seemed to record an event that never physically happened.

In this case from The Witness Files, one family’s long-running experience asks what happens when a house becomes peaceful enough to live in… but never quite ordinary enough to trust.

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Inside the atmospheric rooms of Himley Hall, an unusual evening unfolds - part paranormal investigation, part public vigil, and part live demonstration of mediumship.

Joined by The Wright Paranormal team, spiritual medium and psychic artist Emily Baker, and fifty members of the public, this episode captures a more intimate side of the unexplained: not simply the history of a haunted location, but the personal moments people take away from it.

Throughout the night, guests share the messages they felt they received, ranging from humorous and unexpected details to deeply emotional experiences connected with grief, memory, family, and comfort. Erin reflects on a message that seemed to speak to her relationship with her mother. Tommy recalls a lighter moment involving his driving lessons. Sam shares a personal and funny exchange that stayed with her. Gail speaks about an experience that brought her a sense of peace.

The episode also features a conversation with Emily Baker about her work as a spiritual medium and psychic artist, the nature of public readings, and the responsibility of delivering messages that can feel profoundly meaningful to those receiving them.

Recorded at Himley Hall, this is a reflective and human episode of Haunted UK Podcast's - On The Road - exploring belief, atmosphere, mediumship, and the powerful emotional spaces where history, memory, and the paranormal seem to meet.

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Beneath the mountains of northern Mexico, legends of witches, spirits, and haunted places still linger after dark.

Known for its dramatic mountains and modern skyline, Monterrey is one of Mexico's most important cities. Yet beyond the bustling streets lies a darker history filled with haunted mansions, mysterious legends, supernatural folklore, and stories passed down through generations.

Join us as we explore the haunted history and folklore of Monterrey, uncovering the shadows that still linger beneath the mountains of northern Mexico.

EPISODE CREDITS:

Written by: Melissa West

Narrated by: Steven Holloway

Produced by: Pink Flamingo Home Studio

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Some hauntings seem to come from outside us.

A figure in a room. A voice in the dark. A presence moving through a house. But for Asher, the most unsettling presence in her life may have been something far more intimate — a former version of herself.

From childhood, Asher experienced strange dreams, disturbing images, powerful instincts, and an unexplained pull towards places, symbols, and behaviours she couldn’t understand. Years later, during a past life regression she entered with deep scepticism, she found herself inside another life: a woman of power, isolation, duty, grief, and loss.

What emerged was a story that seemed to echo through Asher’s own life in startling ways. A medieval setting. A royal identity. A life connected to Poland. A deep loneliness. A fear of childbirth. A recurring sense of inherited duty. And afterwards, research that appeared to lead her towards Queen Jadwiga, a historical figure whose life carried strange parallels with the memories uncovered under hypnosis.

But this account does not end with regression. Asher’s experiences also include near-death timing, protective presences, unexplained movement, spiritual awakening, and encounters with what she describes as lost souls seeking help.

A thoughtful, strange, and deeply personal episode exploring past life memory, reincarnation, spiritual encounters, and the possibility that some hauntings may not be tied to a place at all… but to the unresolved echoes of who we once were.

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Beyond the jazz clubs and barbecue smoke lies a darker side of the American heartland, one shaped by frontier violence, ghost stories, and enduring legends.

Kansas City is often known for its jazz, railroads, and rich frontier history, but beneath the surface lies a city filled with ghost stories, urban legends, and echoes of a turbulent past. Join us as we explore the hauntings, folklore, and hidden history of Kansas City, from Civil War violence and historic theatres to infamous haunted locations and some of the American Midwest's most enduring supernatural legends.

EPISODE CREDITS

Written by – Melissa West

Narrated by – Steven Holloway

Produced by – Pink Flamingo Home Studio

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A shape forming in an old refectory. A drinks can struck by something that wasn’t there. A blistered figure in a West Witton bedroom… and a white lady drifting through the walls of an Elizabethan manor.

In this collection of Fright Bites, four listener accounts bring together fleeting but unforgettable moments of the unexplained. A volunteer in a historic house sees white smoke gather into something almost human, before a later joke is answered by an icy touch to the face. On a quiet Essex road in the 1990s, an empty can shoots from beneath a parked car with no visible cause. A holiday cottage in West Witton becomes the setting for a series of disturbing night-time encounters connected to the legend of Owd Bartle. And at a Wiltshire manor, a witness recalls the white lady, the children who came and went, and other apparitions tied to old buildings and older memories.

Short, intimate, and witness-led, these are the kinds of experiences that leave no easy explanation - only the lasting sense that something briefly crossed over into ordinary life.

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Hospitals are places where life and death sit closer than most of us ever see.

For one nurse, the unexplained began long before her career in intensive care. As a child, she saw shadows, sensed presences, and experienced strange figures in the family home. Later, in an old farm cottage, lights switched on by themselves, kettles boiled without touch, footsteps moved through empty rooms, and even the family dog seemed to follow someone no one else could see.

But it was during her years working in ICU that those experiences took on a deeper and more unsettling meaning.

Across night shifts, COVID wards, closed bays, and quiet corridors, she and her colleagues witnessed shadows moving past doorways, equipment shifting on its own, sudden changes in temperature, unseen hands, disembodied voices, and the shape of a person standing behind a patient’s curtain where no one should have been.

Most moving of all are the accounts from patients nearing the end of life — many of them describing visits from loved ones who had already passed, telling them it would be all right.

This Witness Files case is a thoughtful, intimate account of hospital hauntings, end-of-life experiences, and the quiet possibility that some wards never truly sleep.

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