They Took a Picture of an Empty Staircase. Two Figures Appeared on the Film.

On June 19, 1966, a retired Canadian minister and his wife were visiting the Queen’s House in Greenwich, London, when they stopped to take a picture of its famous spiral staircase. The Reverend R. W. Hardy positioned his camera at the bottom of the stairs while his wife stood nearby. Neither saw anything unusual that afternoon, but when their film was developed back in Canada, two mysterious figures appeared to be climbing the staircase.

One figure looked like a hooded person leaning forward with a hand gripping the railing. A second, fainter shape was farther up the stairs, partly hidden by the shadows. The Hardys couldn’t understand how either figure had appeared when nobody had been standing there.

The Staircase Was Closed to Visitors

The Queen’s House had stood in Greenwich for more than three centuries when the couple visited. Designed by architect Inigo Jones, the former royal residence had become part of the National Maritime Museum. Its Tulip Stairs were famous for their curved stone steps and ornate iron railings, which formed an elegant spiral through the building.

The couple wanted a picture of the staircase to take home, but a rope barrier and a No Admittance sign prevented visitors from climbing it. A small group of tourists stepped aside so Hardy could use his camera without anyone blocking the view. His wife kept an eye on the stairs while he took the picture.

Hardy was using a Zeiss Ikon camera with Kodachrome colour film. He didn’t use a flash, relying instead on daylight and the electric lights mounted along the walls. The couple finished their visit and returned home without giving the moment another thought.

The Strange Details in the Picture

After the film was developed, the Hardys took a closer look at the figures. The darker shape seemed to be wearing a hood, while both figures appeared to have hands resting on the railing. One hand even seemed to have a ring on its finger.

The unusual angle made the figures difficult to understand at first. Much of the dark shape filling the left side of the image was actually the underside of the staircase. Beyond it, the two figures appeared to be climbing upward, one following closely behind the other.

Hardy eventually shared the picture with Hector McQueen, a relative who belonged to the Ghost Club. McQueen brought it to the attention of Peter Underwood, the organization’s president and an experienced paranormal investigator. Underwood arranged for the film to be examined and began studying the strange shapes himself.

Kodak specialists examined the image for possible alterations, they found no evidence that the film had been tampered with. Underwood also considered whether someone moving during the camera’s exposure might have produced the strange effect.

That explanation presented a problem because the Hardys insisted nobody had passed through the scene. Underwood was also interested in the positioning of the hands, which suggested two separate people rather than one person appearing twice. The Ghost Club decided the case deserved a closer investigation at the Queen’s House itself.

Seven Investigators Spent the Night Inside

On June 24, 1967, seven Ghost Club members entered the building for an overnight investigation. They brought cameras, sound-recording equipment, thermometers and notebooks to document anything unusual. Security officers remained on duty while the group examined the rooms and corridors.

The investigators wore soft-soled shoes to avoid confusing their own footsteps with unexplained sounds. They synchronized their watches so everyone could record the exact time of anything they experienced. They also used ordinary and infrared cameras in the hope of capturing something their eyes couldn’t see.

During the night, the group monitored temperatures, recorded sounds and held a séance near the staircase. They examined different parts of the building but didn’t manage to capture any figures resembling those in Hardy’s picture. Underwood continued studying the case afterward and included it in his writing about haunted places.

A Woman Walked Through a Wall

Decades later, another employee at the Queen’s House experienced something that brought renewed attention to its reputation. On May 20, 2002, gallery assistant Tony Anderson was talking with two colleagues when he noticed a woman moving across an upper balcony. She was dressed in pale, old-fashioned clothing with a wide skirt resembling a crinoline dress.

Anderson watched as the woman appeared to glide across the balcony. Instead of continuing toward a doorway, she passed directly through a wall and disappeared. He later described the encounter as one of the strangest experiences he’d ever had inside the building.

Royal Museums Greenwich eventually included Anderson’s experience in its account of the Queen’s House ghost stories. The museum also preserved the history of Hardy’s 1966 picture and the Ghost Club investigation that followed. Visitors interested in the haunting could now read about the experiences of people who had been inside the building decades apart.

The Tulip Stairs remain one of the Queen’s House’s most recognizable features, and the original image survives in the Peter Underwood collection. Visitors can still see the winding stone staircase and the distinctive iron railings where the strange figures appeared.