The visually graphic and specifically physical description of this ghost, a bloated, water-distorted face and shredded clothing, distinguishes him sharply from the more conventionally dressed and composed apparitions recorded at most other sites throughout this register, the emphasis on his post-mortem physical deterioration giving this haunting a notably more visceral, horror-oriented character than the typically more dignified grey and white ladies and historical figures recorded elsewhere.
The drowning-ghost motif itself is a well established category within English water-death folklore, the victim's spirit remaining tied to the specific stretch of river or water where they died, a pattern recorded in various forms throughout this wider register including at Bosham in West Sussex and at the stream near Bramshott in Hampshire, though the Tidmarsh account's specific emphasis on physical decay rather than emotional distress or a lingering presence sets it apart from those more conventionally sorrowful tellings.
No name, date, or documented account of an actual drowning at this stretch of the River Pang has been traced in the sources consulted for this entry, and the story is recorded here as local tradition rather than established historical fact, consistent with the honestly thin sourcing applied throughout this register to similarly undocumented but genuinely locally circulating water-death ghost stories.
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