London Ghost Conference

Event information

The London Ghost Conferences is a day dedicated to talks covering many hauntings in the London. Our speakers include historians, parapsychologists, ghost hunters, occultists, Fortean researchers, folklorists, singers and artists each with their own idea on what London's ghosts are and what they mean.

From the Victorian demon Spring-heeled Jack to the Enfield Poltergeist and from the ghosts of Southwark to what haunts Senate House and much more. The London Ghosts Conference is the ideal Halloween event for anyone fascinated by the mysteries of ghosts and London.

Speakers include:

Robert Stephenson - Ghostly London In Your Mind and Under Your Feet
Mark Pilkington & Will Fowler - Vampires of London: A Cinematic Survey
Mike Dash - Spring-heeled Jack
Alan Murdie - The Enfield Poltergeist
Roger Luckhurst - The Priestess of Amen-Ra: The British Museum Mummy Curse
Sarah Sparkes - Ghosts of Senate House
Alan Brooke - Haunted London Underground
Paul Cowdell - 'The Grey Lady - and there IS a Grey Lady!': Ghosts in London's hospitals and theatres.John Fraser - Hunting London's Ghosts: A fringe 'touristic' pastime or a serious pursuit?
Mario Lautier Vella - Like Home (An Illustrated Artist's Talk)
John Constable - Haunted Southwark
Nigel of Bermondsey and Vanessa Woolf - Songs and Stories from Haunted London
Spring-heeled Jane - a short film by Mucky Puppets

We will be running two sets of talks in two rooms.
More speakers and full programme to be confirmed shortly!
Please note that our programme may be subject to change as short notice.

Confirmed talk details (more to follow soon)

Roger Luckhurst: The Priestess of Amen-Ra: The British Museum Mummy Curse
This talk will take us back to the Edwardian period, when stories about a cursed object in the Egyptian rooms of the British Museum began to circulate twenty years before Tutankhamen fever. The true story of how the object was acquired by the Victorian gentleman Thomas Douglas Murray in the 1860s and its adventures in London drawing rooms before arriving in the Museum in 1889 will be detailed. The cast of this odd story includes occultists, Egyptologists, theosophists, psychical researchers, stuffed Pekingese dogs and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Mario Lautier Vella - Like Home (An Illustrated Artist's Talk)
In 2009, artist Mario Lautier Vella discovered his home was haunted. Strange events prompted further investigation, resulting in new artwork that explores ideas around sensing and collaborating with the invisible as well as the uncanny domestic space.

Paul Cowdell: 'The Grey Lady - and there IS a Grey Lady!': ghosts in London's hospitals and theatres.
In a country that already has a reputation for ghosts, certain locations are especially notorious for being haunted. So common are hospital ghosts that one recent gazetteer of British ghosts listed them in a separate chapter, while theatre ghosts are such important indicators of a successful show that there's a strong suspicion that some have been specially invented. Paul be talking about stories he was told during recent field research into contemporary ghost belief: he heard reference to older reported legends alongside unexplained personal experiences interpreted as ghosts. Paul will look at how the two types of story are connected in ghost reports from across the capital.

Rob Stephenson - Ghostly London In Your Mind and Under Your Feet
The veteran and prematurely grey-haired survivor of many ghostly vigils around London will introduce the different types of hauntings reported in the metropolis.

John Fraser - Hunting Londons Ghosts: A fringe 'touristic' pastime or a serious pursuit'?'
Programmes such as Most Haunted have popularised ghost hunting like never before , but is this simply something new for thrill seekers to add to their 'bucket list' , or is it something that has a possible end goal and that should be taken more seriously? John Fraser was former Vice Chair investigatons of the Ghost Club and is currently on the Council of the S.P.R. He is the author of the book 'Ghost Hunting - A Survivors Guide' .

Sarah Sparkes - Ghosts of Senate House

Sarah Sparkes will talk about "The Ghosts of Senate House", a creative research project, which collects and archives tales of hauntings and other unexplained happenings, centred at Senate House, University of London and its immediate surrounds. Sarah is Research Fellow at the SAS UOL and also an artist and curator. Her talk will include examples of some of the stories collected by herself and Christopher Joseph as well as actual recordings she collected for the project.
She will also illustrate how research material was developed into a collaborative, public artwork "The Magical Library Presents: Ghosts of Senate House" for The Bloomsbury Festival in 2011. Sarah Sparkes runs the "GHost" project which she initiated with Ricarda Vidal in 2008.