Hare & Hounds. Unsolved Mysteries Isle of Wight
Pub with a Passion for Good Cheer and Ghosts
DOWNEND'S landmark pub, the Hare & Hounds is a must-visit for any paranormalist. Great restaurant, superbly located, easy parking and boasts genuine macabre exhibits in the building.
The Hare and Hounds stands close beside a crossroads at the end of the Downs Road; Briddlesford Rd from the north; Long Lane from Newport and Downend Road.
Nearby runs Burnt House Lane. Unlucky spooked travellers and ghost hunters believe it badly haunted; many genuine sightings of ghostly figures.
The Hare & Hounds doesn't offer accommodation but does deliver fantastic food and drink. And of course, close by are sites of historic interest Arreton Manor, Arreton Church; the Arreton Barns Craft Village and the incomparable Robin Hill Park.
During dark nights when wind and rain lash, and lightning flashes wild, tales short and tall are told of the supernatural activity in this old building.
Most relate to a piece of ground a short distance along the Downs Road, a prehistoric burial mound on which a gibbet was installed.
The last man to occupy its iron cage is remembered, and to some degree held responsible for trouble even long after Michal Morey gasped his last on Tuesday morning 19th March 1737.
The Hare & Hounds Haunting
Long gone now, the gibbet's grim frame was dismantled in the 1730s but its main beam was brought inside the building and used to support ceiling in the bar. Not long after, things started happening in the Hare & Hounds.
Supernatural things.
Some who felt a ghostly presence believed the last man to feature on that beam came with it, and now intended to share his displeasure with the still living regulars and visitors.
Chefs didn't stay long in the Hare & Hounds kitchen. Difficult to relax, get the perfect souffle rise when a cold, forceful but invisible prankster fools around with the oven knobs, pots and blades.
Some bad days felt like Hell’s gate burst open in the kitchen; plates flying through the air. Most believed it was Morey’s ghost venting grievance about how his skull is a bar-room object d’art.
"Nonsense" say regulars with some knowledge of biology. The skull is too small; and too old. It is, the skull carbon-dates to a much earlier period; thousands of years before Jesus was born.
And formerly belonged to a teenage female whose story is lost along with the rest of her remains.
Hare & Hounds bravest chefs and barkeeps conceded that malevolent Michal somehow had evaded Hell for what he did. And dedicated the years of his deathless doom making mischief with the menus and adding something special to a cocktail mix.
Peak times and high demand was worse than nightmare when plagued by a ghost with attitude and a bl.odied billhook.
Who Was Michal Morey and What Did He Do?
Morey's story is a sad and tragic drama.
Michal, born in April 1672 lived with his family in nearby Sullens, a rented house in a narrow wooded valley between St. George's Down and Burnt House Lane.
The Morey Family. Michal, Mary and James
Youngest of five children Michal Morey had two brothers, two sisters. He married and fathered daughter Mary, born in November 1696. First of six of Michal's children.
Age 22 Mary moved to Freshwater, married Thomas Dove in September 1718. Four years later the couple returned to live with Michal in Arreton. Their child, James was born in March 1722.
Mary died soon after, aged 26 years.
Five years later Thomas moved out of Michal's house, married Elizabeth Loader in May 1727, Newport. He did not include James in his new family.
Dramatis personae present during the crisis are identified as Michal, grandson James; son Richard, wife Grace and sister-in-law Ann Harvey.
Grandson James was 14 years old when he accompanied Michal on a journey into Arreton woods. Days later, when his body was recovered, it was only possible to identify him by his clothes.
No one knows why Michal found himself in a nuanced test of character, and failed so badly.
Some speculate the motive was money, assuming the boy somehow acquired an amount over which Michal was jealous. Others insist the boy was late bringing Michal a meal when ordered.
Legend adds that to disguise the scene of crime Michal set fire to the house and hid in a nearby cave before his discovery and arrest.
Case File Fact & Fiction
All motive is conjecture, the only facts are reported in a journal. The Political State of Great Britain 1737 edition published this report, the only known facts:
"An old fellow of the Isle of Wight was condemned for the mu.der of his grandson, about 14 years of age. He had bred him up from his cradle; and the child having some way disobliged him, he took him out with him one morning about 6 o'clock in June last, on pretence of going to a market town about seven miles from him to buy necessaries and carried him into a wood, and mu.dered him with a billhook which he had taken with him for that purpose."
"He had c.t off his head and m.ngled his body, and put the whole into two wallets which he also carried with him."
Ghosts Aren't Real
Not the kind of ghost presence you want in your cosy pub.
Thank goodness ghosts aren't real, then.
No one knows what is responsible for the supernatural shenanigans that interfere in the kitchen. "Just imagination," claim ghost-sceptics.
"Too many and too widely experienced to be one person's imaginings," is the reply from bar regulars who all too often say 'farewell' to the latest frightened chef.
The ghost of Michal Morey is the obvious suspect, but those of religious inclination insist he must have gone to Hell for what he did.
Then as now, religious leaders who enjoy a post-service Sunday lunch at the Inn, like every other here, there and everywhere, offer their visions and versions of Heaven and Hell.
And so many of us, the living, accept this in faith, in hope, in wonder.
Pie Crust & Potato Peelings
Many more people who now dine in the Hare & Hounds Inn, especially those of scientific inclination, insist that when we are de.d, we are de.d, and that is all that happens.
Our body returns to dust, all the memories gained, good and bad; all the experience, the talents and interests are snuffed out in that instant of oblivion.
You and I will be no more than last month’s pie crust and potato peelings, mulch, or rotted leaves turned to soil for the inn’s garden. Our life-time’s worth of personality lost to nothingness.
Some diners claim any hope of an afterlife is self-delusion to compensate for this our end, the waste of all that life experience.
People, even those found guilty of such atrocity simply stop existing. All that continued of Michal Morey was the decomposing matter contained within the gibbet's iron cage.
Michal Morey passed away into nothingness.
Are Ghosts Real?
Michal Morey was unlucky. No one wanted to resuscitate him.
In St. Mary's hospital lucky resuscitation does happen, and happens often. People come back from flat-line states with tales of miracle moments in the operating theatre, life and de.th situations.
As staff yelled, "Clear!" and "Charge!" as the electrical shock of the defibrillator twitched their lifeless body, they say they were there watching it happen.
Some claim to have seen a tunnel of light, or heard voices saying "Go back, it’s not your time!"
Maybe the sceptic diners are correct when they say that is just an hallucination, a sweet souffle finale generated by our kindly departing consciousness.
Or maybe the invisible host in the Hare & Hounds pub is Michal Morey.
Thank you for your company on this short ghost hunter's tour of the Isle of Wight's great pubs. If you would like to know more about Margo Williams' investigations and other matters of starters, mains, Heaven and Hell, read this book. Now available from Amazon.
