Introduction And A Brief History Of The Haunting:
"A Cavalier Doth Haunt This Place,
Tis Here His Body bled,
Oft People See His Sad, Young Face,
As He Haunts In Silken Red,"
While the apparition associated with the ‘Three Tuns’ does indeed hail from the English Civil War period, the above verse, appropriate in almost every aspect, does slightly fall short of the truth in-so-much as our particular phantom has only been reported as appearing in ‘Blue’ garb.
Easily the most well known haunted hostelry within the West Midlands region, this 400-500 year old building has no doubt seen more than it’s fair share of infamous deeds and characters over the centuries. Oliver Cromwell is believed to have spent a night here in 1651 and legendary Midlands Highwayman - Tom King – reputedly visited the site for the odd ale or two before setting out to ‘accost’ coaches along the nearby Chester Road.
Local legend has it that a series of tunnels branch out from the cellars of the pub. Nearby Holy Trinity Church is said to lie at the end of one such passageway, while another stretches off in the direction of Hartopp Road some mile or so distant.
According to Colin Smith – President of the Birmingham Society of Ghost Hunters – writing in 1978, the Three Tuns ghost had supposedly been seen some 19 times since 1955. The most popular story to account for the presence of the ghost concerns a ‘Royalist Drummer Boy’ who was captured by Parliamentarian troops and installed in the town ‘Stocks’ where he is said to have received a considerable beating. His broken body was later removed to the cellar of the Three Tuns where, perhaps thankfully, he inevitably drew his last breath.
Ex-Manager, Jimmy Trigg, speaking to the ‘Sutton News’ in October 1983 recalls his personal encounter with the phantom:
“I was down in the cellar one morning at about 10 am, with my Doberman Pincher ‘Jaffa’. I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned round. There, as clear as you are standing in front of me now, was a fine looking 17 or 18 yr old lad who said ‘Excuse me’. As I looked at him, he disappeared before my eye’s. The figure was dressed in a beautiful blue velvet suit with a ruffle at his neck and black patent shoes with large buckles. He had long black hair and a young face. He shocked me at the time, but he wasn't a frightening figure.”
Members of the West Midlands Ghost Club and our friends from the Black Country Paranormal Society conducted a brief vigil at the Three Tuns on Tuesday October the 30th 2000.
Unfortunately, because of security reasons at this point in time, representatives from the two groups concerned were unable to carry out an all night vigil in the cellar of the premises. Instead, the (then) present owner of the pub, Mr. Mark Archer, kindly allowed us to carry out a series of audio / video recordings at the site, ending in a brief vigil during the early hours of the morning of November the 1st.
All of the recordings made during our stay in the ‘Three Tuns’ were checked thoroughly and nothing at all of an anomalous or potentially paranormal nature was detected. A brand new ‘Digital Camera’ being used by W.M. Ghost Club Technician, Roger Simpson, refused to work in the cellar – despite having performed perfectly only a matter of a few hours earlier. Subsequent attempts to use the camera – over the following weeks, etc – met with no problems whatsoever. Prior attempts at using the camera in supposedly haunted sites – Borley Church for example – had proven previously proven problematic.
Sadly, since the above mentioned investigation, group members were not to visit the Three Tuns again until we were invited to attend a meeting of a Birmingham based Ghost Society (now sadly defunct) in early to mid 2006.
2008 Update!!
In early 2008, the W.M.G.C. were - due to the ministrations of group member Steve Chew - able to, once again, spend some time investigating the alleged haunting associated with the 3 Tuns. Our visit of February the 22nd coincided with a night-time stint at the pub involving some media students from the Sutton Coldfield area: Craig, Megan and Emily
Around midnight, the groups set up recording equipment in the (allegedly haunted) cellar of the property and generally 'staked out' the area involved. Unfortunately, due to late lisencing laws, etc, there were patrons still in the bars of the building until around 1.30 am, so the audio portion of our initial recordings would have been fairly compromised throughout this portion of the stay.
During this time, one of our members noticed a small-ish hole in the wall of one section of the cellar - damage that hadn't been present during our previous visit. It was presumed that one of the previous tenants of the premises - having read something of the tunnels allegedly associated with the property - had taken it upon themselves to conduct a little 'amateur exploration' of their own!!! Though - more on the supposed 'tunnels' later........
Activities continued till around 2.30 am, when the 'oldies' of the group (i.e. the W.M.G.C. members!!) began to well and truly feel their beds calling them! Our 'youthful' companions, on the other hand, were evidently up for a real 'all-nighter' and said that they would be staying on.....
Interestingly, as we made to leave the cellar area, we all heard a sound - akin to something plastic falling onto the hard floor - from the beer cellar section of the property?
Upon exiting the cellar and going to say our farewells to the landlord in the bar area - student Craig having accompanied us upstairs, to see us out - both Megan and Emily suddenly appeared, having just been 'spooked' by another strange sound......?
Having shown interest in this recent venture, the Sutton Coldfield Observer ran the following article on 29 February 2008:
"Ghost Club Vows To Keep An Eye On Pub" By John Newton
The spirits were not up to much during a recent inspection of a landmark Sutton pub.
But this was not the finding of a mystery customer's exacting palate.Rather it was the conclusion of West Midlands Ghost Club which held a vigil in the Three Tuns' ancient cellar.
The group still has images taken by one of several cameras to trawl through but it appears to have been a quiet night.
Yet the team, which has visited before, pledges to keep on returning to reportedly one of the town's most haunted buildings.
"We spent a couple of hours there on Friday," said the club's Steve Chew of the cellar's network of tunnels which extend under High Street."Our cameras didn't pick anything up but it's a very famous place for hauntings - it's always had a reputation.
"We did hear a strange sound - a clatter of plastic falling on the floor - for which we could find no cause and that was interesting.
"And most people who have worked there have had an experience.
"It's somewhere we'll always go back to."
He said: "The history and age of the site is an appeal - and talk of a 'drummer boy seems to be ingrained in local folklore - but age need not necessarily be a factor.
"You can have a new house and people have things happen there."
Roundhead troops are said to have murdered a Cavalier drummer boy and dumped his body in the cellar. Linking the pub to a civil war past are claims that Oliver Cromwell stayed at the old coaching inn or even Vesey House which lies a few feet further along High Street to the South.
The club describes itself as a 'small research group - a necessary mix of sceptics and believers'.
It stands as the oldest, investigative group of its type in the region and has been consulted on numerous TV programmes.
Anyone wishing to contact the club should visit the web address is www.westmidlandsghostclub.com
Within the week leading up to the writing of this brief update, the group has been contacted by Craig, telling us that the students had both heard and recorded some 'peculiar sounds' during their stay at the pub. (Our own recordings had been utterly bereft of anything even slightly interesting!)
On a number of occasions, a noise akin to a bottle falling over had been heard by the students - which, according to Craig, had definitely originated from a point fairly close by, in the cellar area. At one point, a noise apparently occurred right next to where Craig was standing...... neeedless to say, causing him to jump a bit!!
Craig has kindly offered to share his finding with the group and, at the time of writing, a club member is currently in the process of viewing the footage concerned.....
In correspondence with a local news reporter who had previously worked at the 3 Tuns (and had some 'ghostly' details to share with us) Steve Chew was kindly forwarded the following Sutton Observer article from 2005 concerning the subject of alleged tunnels at - and around - the historic pub:
"Sutton is no different to any other old English town, in that it boasts all sorts of myths and legends. Along with suggestions that Henry VIII was a regular visitor, the other eyebrow-raiser to particularly endure during the Royal Town’s history has been that a network of tunnels exists under High Street, linking the area’s landmarks. With batteries in his torch, JOHN NEWTON digs deep to discover either way if the truth is under there.
I’ve got tunnel vision this week; only eyes for a subterranean mystery. Or at least a curious, longstanding rumour; even an historic and potentially-leg-pulling wild goose chase. So we’re going underground, beneath the planet of the japes, to find out if Sutton truly has a secret network of interconnecting chasms under High Street.
The story goes that the labyrinthian cellar under landmark pub and former coaching inn the Three Tuns Hotel is linked to a similar system leading from Holy Trinity Church some 100 yards to the south. Pupil tittle-tattle at Bishop Vesey’s Grammar School, on adjoining Lichfield Road to the North, also has it that tunnels stretch from there to the same church site which town benefactor Vesey renovated, transforming it into a place fit for his eternal sleep. But our inquiry has met with what you might call underground resistance.
The investigation began with our man from the council saying: “I’ve spoken to the archaeology team but they haven’t any information – try Marian Baxter at Sutton Library.” Good idea, especially while we look for a torch and hard-hat.
Marian, local studies expert, knows the tunnels drill, so to speak, as does clerk to the school governors Mr Kerry Osbourne (‘yes, the underground tunnel is said to be from the Three Tuns to the church’); parish administrator Carol Young; and historian Roger Lea. The last time the Observer was whispering canyons was in February when John Starkey, president of the Psychic Research Foundation of Great Britain, investigated the pub: “I got a feeling of a parson, he was near to the steps which led down to the cellar – at last it dawned on me that a tunnel may exist between the pub and the nearby church.” But our four experts, keen to fill in the supposed gaps, favour more orthodox scientific research. And science, evidence and number-crunching seem to point to plenty of nooks and crannies, yet suggest talk of an interconnecting system is a literal pipe dream.
“We need Time Team in to excavate,” Marian explained, sensing the Observer was ready to leave a trail of breadcrumbs. “That said, when buildings either side of the Three Tuns were demolished in the 70s, they dug deep for the foundations of the current, next-door job centre but there were no holes found underneath. “It doesn’t meant to say there were none – that area is built on sandstone so if there were any tunnels, it is very unlikely they would have survived. “But the deep excavation showed nothing – there is no proof whatsoever.”
Why do the rumours persist though? It appears to be not so much a case of no smoke without fire as no mystery without history. Light conjecture among our assembled experts suggests that, in principle, any network could have functioned as a secret rat-run in either edgy Civil War times – Oliver Cromwell is rumoured to have stayed at the Three Tuns and Vesey House, which stands further along High Street towards the church – or served purpose during The Reformation. Catholic Sutton felt Protestant influence as Vesey’s axe-happy pal, Henry VIII, who could make you hedge your bets, introduced a new faith amid an infamous marital snag.
“I’m aware of rumours,” continued Marian, “that at the school down in the basement there are bricked-up passages that are hollow behind – a nice little story.” It is just a pity that the numbers do not add up. Kerry Osbourne explains that Holy Trinity had its early-14th Century structure revamped by Vesey in the 1500s. The school however, which by 1527 was standing immediately adjacent to the Church site, relocated to its present-day spot up the road after construction in 1728. “The school wouldn’t have been building tunnels to anywhere then,” Kerry chuckled, “but it’s quite likely there could have at least been cellars at some point.”
Carol Young added of the church: “I’ve heard the rumours, but as far as I’m aware there are no tunnels whatsoever.” There is, she explained, a vague crypt at the ‘wrong’ side of High Street where a small hole above ground, soon to be filled-in, points to what lies beneath. “But what’s down there is very small and there are no tunnels going off it – it’s total rumour.” There are no tales from the crypt, it seems.
Not wishing to kill rumour’s joy completely, Roger Lea, chairman of Sutton’s Local History Research Group, referenced Old Bank Place; a row of cottages just behind High Street which sport a voluminous cellar. But Roger points out that what pours most water on the fun in supposing Sutton has a cavernous take on Atlantis is, ironically, the building of a huge tunnel – the railway tunnel which ensures the cross-city line can pass underneath High Street and into Sutton station. If there was a subterranean village of sorts, a hidden town-within-a-town, its existence would have been uncovered when the rail infrastructure, which passes alongside the Three Tuns, was introduced in the late-19th century.
Having poked a nose in the hole to the crypt, it was time to venture down to the Tuns’ cellar, incidentally where Roundhead troops are said to have murdered and dumped a Cavalier drummer boy. Call me Warren – down there is a true, hive-like network of centuries-old, winding corridors which take you underneath the road and neighbouring job centre toward the church. It’s exciting – being under your town is to be over the moon. By the time a punched hole in a bricked-up passage is peered through, and hollowed darkness sensed beyond, it is impossible not to be carried along with rumour’s romance. Who cares what evidence says? Let’s keep the mystery open, just like Suttonians do with the town’s other evidence-shy, yet stubborn legend that Henry VIII once visited. After all, whether you’re dealing with Henry VIII or searching for secret tunnels, the main thing is to mind your head".