Hampton Court’s Security Cameras Caught a Ghostly Figure

The fire doors were standing wide open, but nobody was there. Security staff at Hampton Court Palace had hurried to a restricted part of the building after an alarm went off. There was no sign of anyone entering or leaving.

It was October 6, 2003, and the officers decided to check the security cameras. What they found was strange enough to make them keep watching that particular entrance.

The Doors Opened by Themselves

The doors led from an exhibition area toward the palace gardens. They were modern fire doors fitted with emergency push bars, and visitors weren’t supposed to be using that entrance.

The corridor leading to them was closed to the public. A curtain and a sign marked it as a private area, and the passage was normally dark except for the green fire exit sign.

When staff reviewed the recording, they watched the doors suddenly swing wide open. There was nobody standing beside them, and nothing visible had pushed against the bars.

The officers secured the entrance, reset the alarm and returned to their duties. But the following afternoon, the same alarm sounded again.

This time, they found the doors already closed. When they checked the recording, they discovered something they hadn’t seen the previous day.

Someone Appeared on the Camera

The footage showed a tall figure emerging through the doorway, dressed in what looked like old-fashioned robes. Its face was unusually pale, almost white, and it appeared to be wearing a hood.

The figure reached toward the open doors and began pulling them shut. It seemed to struggle briefly before finally managing to close them, then disappeared from view.

The security officers were stunned. They had seen plenty of people wandering around Hampton Court in historical costumes, but this figure looked unlike anyone they recognized.

One of the guards, James Faukes, later told reporters that his first reaction was to assume someone was playing a joke. He showed the recording to colleagues and began asking questions.

Nobody Recognized the Costume

Hampton Court employs people who dress in historical clothing to bring the palace’s Tudor past to life. The security team naturally wondered whether one of those performers had wandered into the restricted corridor.

But the staff responsible for the costumes said they didn’t own anything resembling the outfit in the recording. According to palace guide Sarah Slater, none of the costumed interpreters had been working in that part of the building.

The figure’s skull-like face gave it an appearance that reminded viewers of a familiar cartoon villain. Before long, it had acquired a nickname: Skeletor, after the villain from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe.

The name was funny enough. The footage was considerably less amusing to the people who had been watching it in the security office.

A Visitor Had Seen Something Too

While investigating the recording, staff discovered another curious detail. On the same day that the strange figure appeared, a visitor had written in the palace’s guest book that she believed she had seen a ghost in the same area.

The visitor hadn’t been shown the footage. She had simply reported an unusual encounter during her visit, and the timing caught the attention of the palace staff.

On October 8, the fire door alarm sounded for a third consecutive afternoon. Security officers returned to find the entrance open again.

The cameras had recorded the doors swinging wide, but the mysterious visitor hadn’t returned. After that day, the strange activity at the entrance stopped.

The Footage Became International News

The palace spent roughly two months investigating before the recording reached the public. Staff questioned colleagues and tried to establish who had been near the entrance.

In December 2003, newspapers and television stations began sharing images from the recording. The story traveled around the world, reaching audiences as far away as Australia, India and Peru.

Hampton Court spokeswoman Vikki Wood told the Associated Press that the palace hadn’t manufactured the footage. The staff genuinely didn’t know who the figure was.

The recording was short and grainy, showing the doors opening and the mysterious visitor struggling to close them. Sarah Slater later explained that the widely circulated clip had been shortened, leaving out a longer gap between the doors opening and the figure’s appearance.

Hampton Court was already famous for its ghost stories. Catherine Howard, Henry VIII’s fifth wife, was said to haunt the gallery where she supposedly ran screaming while begging the king to spare her life.

Jane Seymour, another of Henry’s wives, was also said to wander parts of the palace carrying a candle. Visitors had reported strange sounds, sudden chills and unexplained figures for generations.

Now the palace had something very different from those old stories. People could watch the mysterious visitor for themselves, and the security officers who discovered the footage were just as puzzled as everyone else.

The Palace Had One More Surprise

Years after the incident, Sarah Slater was working at Hampton Court with a colleague when the two began joking about the famous ghost. They were locking up at the end of the day, and Slater remembered commenting that at least Skeletor hadn’t made another appearance. Almost immediately, something happened behind her colleague.

A nearby toilet door was being held open by a heavy wooden wedge. Suddenly, according to Slater, the wedge shot out from beneath the door, and the door slammed shut with tremendous force. It missed her colleague by about an inch.

Both women were startled. Slater thought somebody must have been inside the toilet and slammed the door, so they opened it to investigate.

The room was empty.