Clifton House on North Queen Street was opened in 1774 by the Belfast Charitable Society. It combined a poorhouse for 36 inmates with a 24-bed infirmary, and in 1800 it was the first place in Ireland to test the newly developed smallpox vaccine on patients. It is now the base of the Society and houses sheltered accommodation.
A former employee told her story to ghost writers. In the 1980s she worked as a nurse there. On the first floor a corridor led to Ward 14, with a few steps down to it, and the lights were kept dim at night. Many times staff heard footsteps going up and down those steps and checked on the patients, but nobody was there. She said they sometimes saw figures, especially when a death was pending. The basement felt frightening and nobody liked to go down at night because of a sense of a presence.
The account is a single report, and Haunted Rooms and other sites repeat it without adding new witnesses.
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