Spooky Isles' piece on haunted Peterborough, by Josie Palmer, notes that the Cowgate area, now close to Queensgate Shopping Centre, was once a graveyard that was removed when the shopping centre was built. It was reportedly one of the last known places to be raided by bodysnatchers.
Two cases are given. Huntingdonshire Quarter Sessions records show that in December 1830 the recently buried body of Jane Mason was dug up from Yaxley churchyard by labourers William Patrick and William Whayley of Forncett. They said a Mr Grimmer offered them half a sovereign to take the body, to be sent to London. They were seen by Mason's son and the churchwarden, who fired shots, and the men fled. The body was later found buried in a shallow grave in the Cowgate cemetery. In 1862 the Peterborough Examiner reported another episode: an evening cart outside the cemetery, two men loading sacks, an alarm, and a chase ending near Norman Cross where the men abandoned their load and ran across the fields.
The haunting claim is a single line: according to local reports, the victims still wander Cowgate, trapped and angry. A different Spooky Isles article on Peterborough's haunted places says a child is heard giggling and footsteps are heard in Queensgate when it is closed, and suggests former residents of the homes and shops that stood there. The two are separate claims and the sources give no dates or witnesses.
The historical bodysnatching is documented in those sources; the ghost tradition is thin.
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