Mumbles from Planet Dan

Ghost Hill is a place in Taverham, near Norwich.
Part 1: where did Ghost Hill get its name is here

This is a (slightly edited) version of my
original article first written in December, 2000

After a couple of years of first writing about Ghost Hill, a Drayton resident, Mr Charles Jarvis emailed me with lots of information. He wrote:

As a child I was told that during the First World War there was an army training camp in the Drayton area. When a draft of soldiers were due to leave for France several men deserted and one of them climbed into a high tree in the area known today as Ghost Hills. He bound himself with a rope into the upper branches of the tree, but his bondage was such that he could no longer free himself and eventualy he died of exposure. His body remained in the tree un-noticed for many months (remember in those days few people would have visited the woods).

Many months later a party of people visited the woods and whilst walking through that area of the woods one of the soldier’s limbs fell down in front of them.

Charles Jarvis

I spent most of my childhood in Drayton and I attended the original Drayton Primary School. This story was related by my late aunt Mrs K.Haverson, one of the two teachers at the school, and much later in life she repeated the story to me. She learned of the story from a Major Rudguard (retired) who had a small estate in the vilage.

Ghost Hill, 1985
In January 1985 it snowed heavily.

Best remembered for St Edmund middle school’s heaters breaking down, and sledging conditions since have only briefly been rivalled in early 1991.

In those days digital cameras didn’t exist – these are the only photos I have of Ghost Hill then, with the exception of bonfire night 1984 (at night, so not much use). Remember the sand humps?

All built on and long gone now.