The Get Into Newcastle guide to the city's most haunted places lists the Town Moor among them. It says the moor was once the local gallows site, that hundreds were put to death there, and that those accused of witchcraft during the mid-17th century witch-finder panic were among them. It adds that the old isolation or smallpox hospital stood on the moor.
The ghostly side is described only in general terms: shadowy figures and disembodied screams. The guide offers no named witness, no date and no particular spot on a moor that covers hundreds of acres, and it jokes that the cause could just be the ghost train at the annual Hoppings fair.
The historical background is stronger than the haunting. Sixteen people were hanged on the Town Moor on 21 August 1650 after the Newcastle witch trials, which has its own entry here. This entry records the later folk belief that the place is uneasy, and treats it as a traditional, undated reputation.
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