Dolphin Tavern

A man in a tricorn hat and laced ruffles has sometimes been seen and heard walking along the corridors upstairs at night; he has been nicknamed "George." Also reported is a woman wearing Victorian clothing in the pool room and who disappears through a wall, and a young man with fair hair, who, it is said, awakes landlords (and guests too, it would seem) by sitting or standing at the bottom of their beds; whisperings, footsteps and the sensation of being touched on the shoulder have also occurred. It has been suggested that the first of these phantom is the famous "Judge Jeffries"; or he could be a sea captain or just an old smuggler. It has been said that he was hung for a petty crime.

In May 2023, Kay Scoble told me of the time that she was employed here briefly as a cook, from June to August in 1993; "The kitchen isn't known as a part of the building where paranormal activity happens, but my predecessor swore blind she'd seen a knife thrown off the counter. I didn't experience any of the "well known" spirits there, but the cellar was very strange. It was purported to be where the guilty prisoners from Judge Jeffries hanging assizes were hung. The cellar is in two parts - the cold cellar, where the beer kegs etc are kept, and the warm cellar, where the floor is still earth, and it contains random items, and, back then, two enormous chest freezers. There was a very weird ice cold spot in the warm cellar, but it could have been a draught. However, this was an ice cold spot on the hottest, calmest, summer days. The strangest thing of all, though, when I was being trained up, was being told I needed to be nice to the ghosts in the cellar. I was warned that, while most of the time, the freezers wouldn't be a problem, sometimes, it would be impossible to open them. If that ever happened, I had to ask the ghosts nicely to stop messing around and let me open them. I thought nothing of it until I'd been there a few days, and went down to the cellar to get something from the freezer. Lo and behold, the freezer I needed wouldn't open, no matter how hard I pulled. Same with the other one. After getting exasperated for a few minutes, I jokingly asked the ghosts to stop messing around. Immediately, I was able to open both freezers."

Link: Cornwall Live

Link: Cornwall Live

Link: Cornwall Live

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