Blists Hill Victorian Ghost Story Trail where you can learn about the customs and rituals of Halloween this year from the 22nd October until the 30th October.
Writer’s in the Victorian era wrote popular stories about ghosts and spirits. Charles Dickens gave us the Signal Man and MR James wrote too many ghost stories to list here. Some of these stories will be included on the Ghost Story Trail.
Explore Blists Hills many shops, cottages and work places and hear more about these games and traditions. See how ‘Trick or Treating’ has developed from children and adults dressing up and going door to door singing and offering prayers for “the souls of the givers and their friends”. Souls cakes would be given to the callers as ‘alms’. Soul Cakes, which are really biscuits will be for sale in the Bakery.
The history of Halloween goes back a lot further than the Victorian era but they were able to build on customs from previous generations with the advancement of technology bringing items into the more humble home.
Halloween was thought to be a night for prying into the future, conjuring up the super natural or ghostly apparitions. We do however still enjoy these parlour games on Halloween.
The Prince Albert Players will be performing each afternoon during the week. They will be including Shropshire Ghost Stories in their enactments along with scenes from Sweeney Todd.
Enjoy your Ghost Story Trail at Blists Hill and learning about a Victorian Halloween.
The photograph in the header of this blog post was taken by Kelsie Cabeceiras from Pexels.
