A Very British Vampire
Or how a sinister figure once haunted the Cumbrian countryside
This is a piece of British folklore I read as a child (from different sources), and it both terrified me, but also influenced my creativity; including the art piece above. I’ve rewritten the story here, with some added creative touches of my own.
Amelia Cranswell just couldn’t sleep; her dark bedroom was stifling, after what had been a long hot summer’s day. The girl got up, went over to the main window and opened the shutters, a weak, if welcome night breeze enough to make her smile. She looked out over the large moonlit lawn of Croglin Grange, the cottage that she and her two older brothers, Edward and Michael, were renting from a cousin, before her eyes settled on a low wall separating her home from the local churchyard. What appeared to be two small lights, like fireflies, hovered in the surrounding darkness beneath an old tree, enchanting Amelia at first, before she noticed that both lights kept a fixed distance from each other; almost like a pair of eyes.
Suddenly cold, Amelia reached for the shutter handles, but then froze as she watched the lights suddenly move — if never apart — and grow as something dropped off the wall, and then crept towards the cottage. A thin shape, almost skeletal, moved like a huge spider against patches of moonlit grass; the creature pausing every few moments before it continued to scuttle forward, its gaze always fixed on Amelia. The sight of a hairless head leaving shadow finally broke her spell, and made the girl lock both shutters, before she hurried back to bed and stared at the window.
All was still at first, except the breeze that seemed to have grown fiercer, before Amelia suddenly saw a face at the glass; skull-like, with eyes burning in empty sockets, no nose and horribly sharp teeth. The creature reached one bony claw for the shutter handle, the resulting squeaks, and a reptilian hiss of frustration making Amelia wince, before the face finally faded.
Letting her heart settle, Amelia then slowly got off the bed, intending to wake her brothers and tell them about their nocturnal visitor — before a new sound made her freeze again. A sharp tap-tap-tapping pierced the quiet of the bedroom . . . followed by the sudden breaking of glass; Amelia was too terrified to move before she saw clawed fingers reach through the space left by a removed pane— and turn the latch key.
The creature was inside before she knew it, Amelia being knocked to the floor, the touch of teeth against her throat finally releasing a terrified scream. It took a moment before Amelia’s brothers finally burst into the bedroom, just in time to catch something dart out the open shutter — with Edward following in pursuit, while Michael tended to his sobbing sister. The creature quickly vanished into darkness however, so Edward ran for the village doctor and brought him back to the cottage. Despite her shock, Amelia was otherwise unharmed, bar two tiny cuts to her neck; this detail making Edward whisper a word to Thomas . . . before both brothers dismissed it with nervous laughter.
On Dr. Hodgson’s advice, the Cranswells all went to Switzerland for a few weeks, the change of scenery and fresh mountain air helping Amelia slowly recover from her ordeal, until one day she suggested returning to England. ‘Well, we do have a lease to honor,’ she said smiling, ‘And I am fine now. After all, lunatics do not escape every day, and are always caught. Yes?’
‘Yes indeed,’ said Edward and looked to Michael, the same single, if unspoken word passing between them before they nodded — not wanting to frighten their sister again, and risk a possible relapse. On returning to Croglin Grange a week later however, both brothers made sure they kept loaded pistols by their beds — escaped lunatic or not, or possibly, something worse. Amelia settled back into her former routine, and so life went on, the autumn leaves littering the lawn soon being swept away by winter winds.
On one particularly stormy evening, Amelia lay in bed with her eyes shut, yet unable to sleep as rain dashed the roof, before a remembered sound made her suddenly sit up — and listen to a dimmed, if still distinct tap-tap-tapping. She looked towards the window, and saw the same hideous face from a few months before — its sharp teeth now fully bared in a feral grin.
This time Amelia didn’t hesitate and screamed, her brothers almost instantly appearing in the bedroom, with Edward firing his pistol before he again chased something out the window, across the lawn, over the wall, and into the churchyard. Stopping to catch his breath, young Cranswell watched the spidery figure vanish into a small mausoleum, with Edward then hurrying away to fetch Dr. Hodgson.
Despite her second shock, Amelia recovered quickly, and then listened along with her brothers, as Hodgson explained certain events of the past few weeks. A local woman had approached the doctor, worried about her young son’s suddenly ailing health, the once happy child now pale and always dreading bedtime; when he claimed a ‘thin man’ would come to his bedroom window, and then sometimes, even into the bedroom itself. The boy might have died too, if it weren’t for an emergency blood transfusion from his father, both parents then making sure the child slept in their bedroom at night, with all windows being doubly secured. Another man, a local farmer, told Hodgson that he had seen something ‘like a human insect’ scuttle across his farmyard one evening, and later found two of his sheep and one cow, dead in their overnight shelters; the animals either partially or totally drained of blood.
This last detail made Edward and Michael finally visit the village elders at daybreak, and a crowd soon descended on the mausoleum Edward had noted hours before. Inside the ancient family vault, the brothers and their companions found seven coffins — six all smashed and their contents scattered everywhere, and one untouched in a corner. This coffin’s lid was removed, and torchlight revealed the same shriveled face Amelia had described at her window, the thing now seeming asleep, were it not for a faint spark in its eye sockets. Edward pointed out a fresh wound on one of the creature’s withered legs; as if made with a pistol shot.
So the villagers, led by Michael, quickly built a pyre, the undamaged coffin being placed on top of the structure before Edward set it alight. A hideous, if brief shriek from the blaze made both Cranswells nod to each other — their suspicions confirmed, and relieved to know that fire would keep their sister safe, and destroy the vampire, forever.
The Vampire Of Croglin Grange story has appeared in many books of folklore down the years, though it originated from the writer Augustus Hare, and declared as fact in his autobiography (as apparently told to him by a Captain Edward Fisher). And while Croglin, and Croglin Grange (or Croglin Low Hall, a similar building which matches this description) do exist as real places, it’s now believed that the vampire is simply a piece of fiction; probably told to scare others as entertainment. The story certainly shares elements with the Victorian penny dreadful Varney The Vampire, and itself may have influenced (or even borrowed from) the short story An Episode Of Cathedral History, by M.R. James (and it very much influenced my animated short One Winter’s Night). Though whether fact or fiction, this tale can still make the flesh creep, especially after sunset . . . and have you lock every window before bedtime.
