During the period immediately before Hampton Court Palace was open to the General Public, (in 1838), soldiers were posted there from various regiments of the British Army, and had been ever since the last King to reside there permanently, George II, had left.
In an area, (known even today as the most haunted), of the Tudor building redecorated in Georgian style, 'The Cumberland Suite', the soldiers would file through it's corridors going about their business on a regular basis. One spring, the soldiers began to hear strange muttering noises from behind a wall, the noises were female and were accompanied by a strange whirring sound, such as that of a spinning wheel. These unearthly moans continued for some months.
The soldiers who were Lancers, having heard this so often, reported it to their Commanding Officer whom, in turn, reported it to the Comptroller of the Works at the Palace. The Comptroller, intrigued by the fact that so many sober gentlemen should imagine such happenings, went to the area in question to investigate which was on the first floor [second floor in U.S. terminology].
Having studied the maps extant and finding nothing unusual, and deducing that the view from any adjacent windows was useless, the Comptroller decided to go down to the tiny courtyard below and view upwards at the eerie wall. He soon realised that there was an average sized window and a small window in a position that did not show on any map. It also was apparent that there was no entrance into what must be a room that had been blocked off in Georgian times, (it is still not known why it had been blocked off, but there have allegedly been some unusual sightings of ghosts there, one of a dog. Perhaps they felt it was unholy.).
The Comptroller had the Georgian panelling taken down which revealed where the doorway had been blocked. When they broke through the doorway, they discovered a perfectly preserved Tudor room, (the so-called Wolsey Closet), which incredibly had some ceiling embellishments that are extremely rare for the period, (even the present curators do not emphasise enough upon it's value), Prince of Wales feathers.
The Prince of Wales was Henry VIII's son, Edward. Later Edward VI, he was christened at Hampton Court and had a wet-nurse/nanny called Sybil Penn. This room was probably a nursery where Sybil Penn looked after the young Prince.
The Comptroller realised all of this. A few years later at the local Inn in Hampton town, he happened to strike a conservation with the local Chaplain. He told him of the story about the soldiers and the moans and the splendid find. The Chaplin was quite surprised when the Comptroller told him exactly when it had all happened, for it coincided exactly with the time that his gravediggers had mistakenly disturbed Sybil Penn's remains. The Chaplain had to order and re-consecrate her reburial. After swapping dates, the pair were amazed that the moaning had ceased at the same time as Sybil Penn's reconsecration which had taken a few months to find a suitable place......
