Windhouse is a laird's house on the hill road above Mid Yell. The building dates from 1707, was substantially rebuilt in 1895 and was left empty in the 1920s. It has long been called the most haunted house in Shetland, and some writers go further and say the whole of Britain.
The figures
The stories name a small cast. The Lady in Silk is said to have been a mistress or housekeeper who fell down the stairs and broke her neck; she walks in circles at the top of the stair, sighs and disappears, and people report hearing the rustle of her dress and petticoats. A tall man in a long black coat and top hat is said to wander the rooms, and one guess is that he was a tax collector. A servant girl is seen climbing a set of steps that do not exist. A dog is heard and sometimes seen.
Bones in the walls
Several discoveries are tied to the tales. One account says a woman's skeleton was found under the floorboards of the main stairs during renovations in 1880. An 1887 report describes a skeleton about six feet long found by workmen with its arms folded and no sign of a coffin, and a child's skeleton wrapped in sheepskin is said to have turned up in the early 1900s when a nailed-up shutter was removed. In 2017 two skeletons, thought on first reports to date from the 13th or 14th century, were found buried close to the surface, which fits the old claim that the house sits on a forgotten graveyard.
How firm is it
The dates of the bone finds come from modern retellings, not from a source seen here, so treat the exact years with care. The ghosts themselves are tradition with no named witnesses. The 2017 burials are the one solid modern fact in the story. Windhouse is a ruin on open moor, so go with care and respect the ground.
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