Pevensey Courthouse was built in 1541 and Courts met here right up to 1866 until it was dissolved. It is the smallest Town Hall in England having two cells downstairs and the court house above, but there were a further six cells which are now under the property attached. The attached property was built for the Jailer around 1700. 

   There is a tree outside the  Royal Oak public house, a few yards from the court house with Iron railings around it, which was the site of the stocks. Prisoners were held until their punishment.

   Executions in England were made very public as an example to everyone, and a warning of what would happen if you didn't behave up until 1868. Sussex executions were held in Horsham and later Lewis. However most death sentences were reprieved to transportation away from England.

   Unfortunately most of the actual court house records were burnt in 1886 when it was dissolved, but luckily there are copies of all punishments for England held in London.

   The court house is still as original as it can be, the roof trusses have had some work done on them but the Tudor beams are still there. The place was stripped when it was vacated. The Magistrates bench is probably from the old Pevensey School because it has ink wells in it which they didn't have back in the times of the court. They would have used a large pot with a quill for a pen and it would have been the clerk who did all the writing. 

                                                         Report

   Investigators - Jackie, Bill, Donna, Paul, Kevin, Steve, Jane and Joe.

   Clear dry night in April 2008.

   When we arrived we were told that there had been spirit children running about the court house, which was strange as to why children would be in a court house but still quite exciting. Unfortunately they didn't stay around and the rest of the night was disappointingly quiet.

   We started the evening with a walk around to get the 'feel' of the place, then took temperature readings in various parts of the court and cells. These were pretty consistence through out the night allowing for a slight change as the night went on.

On first entering the court house:-

   Kevin had a strange pins and needles feeling in his face, which continued as we walked around but seemed worse in the cells below the courtroom.

   Paul, Jackie and Donna all felt uncomfortable when entering the robbing room. Paul said he felt the hairs stand up on the back of his neck.

   When walking into the middle cell Jackie felt the presence of an unpleasant man with a  low gruff mans voice, who shouted 'get out'.  She also saw a sad looking lady with a long dress around the age of 30 years old who said 'I didn't steel it'.

   We split into two groups, one group started upstairs and the other downstairs, changing over after a couple of hours.

1st group - Jackie, Donna, Steve and Paul.

   We sat in different areas and asked spirit to come forward and communicate with us. Donna kept seeing something move by the robbing room out of the corner of her eye, so she went into the room with Jackie to see if they could get anything. Donna stood with her back towards a uniform on a stand and after a few moments felt cold and experienced what was like someone breathing down her neck. They changed places and within minutes Jackie felt someone was standing behind her. Donna took a photo and managed to get a small orb on the arm of the uniform. (click on photo to enlarge) They both felt uncomfortable in the room but decided to try and ask questions using a voice recorder, unfortunately nothing was picked up.

   They went back into the main courtroom and tried a séance. Paul sat in the trial box as if waiting sentence, Jackie sat on the floor leaning against the box, Donna and Kevin sat o the benches. Jackie heard a women say 'Only a bit of bloody fruit' (was this the same women as she saw downstairs earlier?) and Kevin got the name Michael. They didn't pick up anything else so thought they would try the Planchette.

   Kevin and Paul changed places. Jackie, Donna and Paul put their fingers lightly on the planchette and ask if there were any spirit would they please communicate with them. The planchette didn't make any sense, just a load of squiggles so they asked again. This time they got the reply 'Why', which was quite amusing, so they said that they wanted to communicate with the spirit world. Jackie then saw a man of average build about 5ft 4 dressed in black, wearing a pirate type hat. He made her feel very uncomfortable and had to tell him to stand back away from her. Donna picked up the name of Samuel. (she later found a Samuel Mott, after researching in the records, who had been found dead in a ditch.) They started chatting amongst themselves then Jackie heard the man say "I'm waiting" which made her laugh, she also sensed a musty smell with him. Kevin who was in the trial box, started to pick up on a man with a moustache and beard, wearing a hat and said he reminded him of the cartoon character Captain Hook in Peter Pan. They asked if spirit would give them a name and it said 'Sir'.  Donna kept feeling a draft on her left side. Kevin came out of the trial box and joined in the planchette. It then spelt 'ready' but have no idea as to why as they couldn't get any more. Jackie thought she saw a shadow by the robbing room door so asked if they would come forward, but they didn't so she went to investigate. Every time she went into the robbing room the planchette stopped and wouldn't go again until she came back out which was a bit strange.

   The groups then changed places.

 1st group in cells - Jackie, Donna, Kevin and Paul - Cells.

   The middle cell felt the most uncomfortable, Donna said she felt cold drafts and the temperature dropped 2deg. but this could also be the fact that it was getting late and getting colder outside. Jackie saw a very disfigured man who she felt had been a nice person. The skin on his face seemed very pitted and the disfigurement seems mainly on his right hand side. (Jane, our host said he had been picked up on several occasions, she believed him to have been an inmate, who had been a nice person and was badly disfigured and believed his name to have been James. Although there is no proof of him) Jan said she was watching the monitor and saw something move, unfortunately after checking all the tapes we didn't find anything. Jackie then saw someone with marks on his face walk past the door and thought he was probably the same person.

 2nd group - In cells, Bill, Joe, Jane and Steve.

   There have been reports of groups and psychics picking up hangings within the court room (from the beams) including a family of four and children as young as four. However, we found this this is highly unlikely after research.  Pre 1723 when the first of the Black Acts was introduced there were not very many capital felonies. Although unlikely it could always be a possibility that Pevensey has a record somewhere pre-1735 but nationally the number of executions was very small and there would be very few indeed in a small town. Children under the age of 14 year were very rarely hanged and it was illegal to pass the death sentence in children below the age of 7.

   There is a very interesting website written by Richard on capital punishment and hangings which can be found at.

http://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org