The Black Swan: York's Haunted Inn on Peasholme Green
A timber-framed house of 1560, on the site of a medieval Lord Mayor's home, that became a pub in the eighteenth century. Its recorded ghosts are a pair of legs on the stairs, a workman in a bowler hat and a woman in white who gazes into the fire.
The Black Swan stands on Peasholme Green, just inside York’s old city. Its jettied, timber-framed front dates from 1560. Behind it lies the site of a medieval house that, according to the Yorkshire Post, was built in 1417 for William Bowes, a merchant and Sheriff of York who later became Lord Mayor. The building was a private home for centuries and became a pub in the late eighteenth century. It is now one of York’s best-known haunted pubs. Its ghosts, as recorded in the main British ghost catalogue, are an odd trio. There is the lower half of a man seen walking down the stairs, a workman in a bowler hat, and a woman in a white dress who watches the fireplace.
The house
The Black Swan sits on the site of an important medieval house. Wikipedia and the Yorkshire Post both say it was lived in by a run of Lord Mayors of York and Members of Parliament. The Yorkshire Post gives the founding story. It says the house was built in 1417 for William Bowes, merchant and Sheriff of York, who became Lord Mayor in 1428. That is the source of the 1417 date often given for the pub. Remains of a medieval inn are said to lie beneath the present building.
In 1560 the property was rebuilt by Martin Bowes. The jettied, timber-framed centre of the front dates from that rebuild. In 1670 the York merchant and politician Henry Thompson made large alterations. He rebuilt parts in brick and remodelled the inside. Early in the eighteenth century the house belonged to his brother Edward Thompson, who sat in the House of Commons from 1722 to 1742. Both brothers were wine merchants in York.
The house became a pub in the late eighteenth century. Much of the 1670 interior survives, including the entrance hall, the Smoke Room and an upstairs room with a trompe l’oeil painting. The Royal Commission on Historical Monuments photographed its seventeenth-century panelling for its 1981 inventory of central York. A brick and timber extension of 1670 stands to the right of the old front, and an extension of 1940 to the left.
The pub
By the 1930s the Black Swan belonged to the Tadcaster Tower brewery, which renovated it with care for its history. Bass owned it later. It was listed Grade II* in 1954. The Campaign for Real Ale rates its interior as of outstanding national historic importance.
The Yorkshire Post records some of the pub’s later life. William Briggs was landlord in the late nineteenth century. In the 1910s, under Fred Wright, the Layerthorpe Cycling Club made the pub its base. Edgar Henry was landlord by 1959 and claimed that in 1884 a York brickmaker had sold his wife there, over a glass of ale, for one shilling and sixpence. The Black Swan has hosted a folk club since 1978 and a folk festival since 2003. In 2009 it won Folk Club of the Year at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.
Two other traditions cling to the building. One says a secret passage runs under the road to St Cuthbert’s Church. There is no evidence for it, though a cupboard holds a few steps that end at a blank wall. The other links the house to the family of General James Wolfe. The Yorkshire Post repeats a claim that the Wolfes lived nearby before leaving for America. We have not been able to confirm it.
The ghosts on record
The Paranormal Database has one entry for the Black Swan, citing published media. It describes three ghosts. The first is seen coming down a staircase. Only the lower part of a man’s body appears, so witnesses see a pair of legs. The other two are in the bar. One is a workman in Victorian clothing and a bowler hat. The other is a lady in a white dress who gazes into the fireplace. The entry gives no dates and names no witnesses.
The pub is open about its reputation. In 2023 its owner, Maggie Anderton, told the Yorkshire Post that it gets a lot of trade in October because it is “listed as one of the haunted pubs.” She said four or five paranormal investigation groups come regularly, hiring one of the bedrooms for overnight vigils. Visitors, she said, want to hear “the real stories, not just the stuff that is written at the back of the menus.”
What we removed
Earlier versions of this page told a very different story. They said the Black Swan was haunted above all by phantom children who laugh and run on the upper floors, by a Tudor woman searching for them, by an old man in a wig drinking in a corner booth, and by shadow figures. They linked the children to York’s plague years. They described glasses sliding, beer taps turning on at night, knocking in threes and cold spots. They backed all of this with italic quotes from unnamed staff, customers, a medium and a bartender, and gave a count of 100 witnesses.
We could not find any of these ghosts in the Paranormal Database, the press or any other source. None of the three recorded ghosts is a child or a Tudor woman. We have removed the invented material.
How to read the case
The Black Swan is a fine and well-documented old building, with a history that can be traced through named owners from 1560. Its haunting is much less solid. The recorded ghosts come to us without dates or witnesses. They have been retold on ghost walks and menus for years, and the pub now draws trade from them.
That does not mean nobody has seen anything there. It means the stories cannot yet be checked. Old timber houses creak and shift, and a firelit bar is full of moving shadows. A building that hosts ghost hunters overnight will collect reports, and the reports will shape what the next visitor expects.
We class the haunting as unverified.
Visiting
The Black Swan is at 23 Peasholme Green, a short walk from the Shambles and York Minster. It is a working pub with food, drink and rooms. York has many other haunted sites, including the Treasurer’s House, the Golden Fleece and York Minster.
Sources
- Wikipedia, The Black Swan, York - the medieval house, the 1560 and 1670 rebuilds, the Thompsons, conversion to a pub, listing, CAMRA rating and folk club
- Liana Jacob, “Black Swan, York: History of one of the most ‘haunted’ pubs in Yorkshire”, Yorkshire Post, 1 November 2023 - William Bowes and 1417, later landlords, the tunnel story, and owner Maggie Anderton on ghost trade
- British History Online, RCHME York volume 5, Plate 170: 17th-century panelling, The Black Swan and Stonegate - 1981 inventory photograph of the panelling
- The Paranormal Database, Yorkshire (entry #1708, Legs, Black Swan Inn) - the three recorded ghosts