St Osyth Village

St Osyth is a small village in the northeast of Essex with a terrifying tale to tell.

It supposedly takes its name from 7th Century Saint and Princess Osgyth who was beheaded by Vikings after she refused to renounce her faith. The legend goes, that after she was beheaded, Osyth rose from the ground, retrieved her head from the floor and walked to the nearby monastery where she knocked on the door three times before collapsing. It is believed that on the 7th October, the St Osyth ghost makes the same walk through Nuns Wood clutching her severed head.

There is also a history of witch persecutions in St Osyth dating back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Fourteen women were trialled for witchcraft and some were convicted and sentenced to death.