UK Trip #16: A Good Book About "Scotland's Ghastly Ghosts"

by Charles Sinclair

(Our TRIP BLOG will resume tomorrow)
  Today, I'm taking time to review a book about "SCOTLAND'S GHASTLY GHOSTS" that I read after we toured Edinburgh, Scotland. Anyone interested in the paranormal and the U.K. will want to read this book.
   Edinburgh, Scotland is a very haunted city where a lot of executions and killings occurred especially from the 1100s when the town was first settled. There were also rampant bouts of disease, disgustingly unsanity conditions, a large population in a small area and a lot of thievery. There were a lot of unsettled souls in the country, and that was conveyed in a book I bought and read while on vacation there called "Scotland's Ghastly Ghosts"  by Charles Sinclair.
    Sinclair takes the reader to castles and cityscapes that includes the "Headless Horseman of MacLains," the "Ghostly Drummer of Cortachy Castle," a scorching kiss from a female ghost of Meggernie, and a phantom cannonball that seems to smash through a window over and over bringing bad news for the living. There are other stories, too, of a man that murdered his wife and hid her body in in 2 pieces, in a castle that she now haunts (in pieces); and the ghosts in the  underground vaults of the city of Edinburgh.
  The book is full of interesting and quite startling stories of hauntings in Scotland. It's well worth reading, especially if you plan on ever visiting.  - Rob


   STORY OF THE GHOSTLY, DEADLY DRUMMER OF CORTACHY CASTLE
(Source: http://haunted-scotland.co.uk/cortachy-castle/)(Edited by R.Gutro)

Paranormal Phenomena : This is a story of a ghostly drummer at Cortachy Castle that is heard drumming when a member of the Ogilvy family is to die at the castle. According to Haunted Scotland.Co.UK, in folklore, the drummer boy betrayed the Ogilvys by failing to warn them of an approaching enemy force. He suffered their revenge by being thrown from the battlements inside his drum.

Cortachy Castle. Cr: haunted-scotland.co.uk

   The story begins at Christmas, 1844 when a a guest named Miss Dalrymple heard the beating of a drum as she dressed for dinner. During dinner she questioned Lord and Lady Airlie, her hosts, about the identity of the drummer. The Lord and Lady Airlie told Miss Dalrymple that the last time the drummer was heard, the first Lady Airlie died shortly after.
   Miss Dalrymple heard the drummer again the next morning and fled the castle. Within six months, Lady Airlie died apparently by suicide out of fear that the Drummer was drumming for her.
   Five years later on August 19, 1849 the drummer visited Englishman in a shooting party. The male visitor questioned several people about the drumming, but everyone denied hearing anything. However he was told that the 9th Earl of Airlie had become seriously ill requiring Lord Ogilvy’s presence. The Earl died the next day.
   It wasn't until 1881, 32 years later, that Lady Dalkeith and Lady Skelmersdale both heard the drummer at the same time. That same night, in America, Lord Airlie died. The family were later to learn that the sound of the drum was heard exactly one hour before his death.