A short one today, folks!

Dartmoor is a unique region in Southern England, unlike anywhere you’ve seen, and its eerie nature lends itself perfectly to stories of ghosts and monsters, as evident by the hundreds and hundreds of folk tales from the area. Some of them feature the ghosts of lords, a great cat-like beast, or the devil himself.

However, one of the most curious stories on Dartmoor is also one of the most modern. It is the story of the Hairy Hands. This is a very special ghost story, because it has been reported several times by separate individuals over the course of the early 20^th century, and it all takes place on one, very specific road. The B3212 past Postbridge.

Drivers would come along in their cars or motorcycles, speeding across the moor, before they would be forced off the road, sometimes with fatal results. Surviving victims reported that it seemed as though some strange force had taken hold and twisted their steering wheels, trying to force them into their doom! The first reports appeared in 1909, and already then some were describing the mysterious force as a pair of disembodied hands, appearing out of nowhere.

The story gradually garnered more and more attention, especially after the hands supposedly caused the death of the medical officer of Dartmoor Prison in 1921. Two girls who had been riding in his motorcycle sidecar described how the hands had gripped the handlebars and twisted the vehicle out of control. Later, a Captain in charge of one of the Dartmoor military training areas barely got away with his life in a similar situation, writing an official report on the event.

Occasional sightings continued up through the first half of the century, and with the occasional fatal accident, but since the 1940s, no-one has suffered the wrath of the hairy hands. Today the legend lives on as yet another scary tale among the children growing up around the moor. The hands have migrated to the marshes around Postbridge, and it is said that if you walk among at night, the Hairy Hands will burst up from the bog, grab your legs and pull you under. I guess they found that to be a more effective way of haunting.