Highgate Cemetery

The story

Highgate Cemetery is a Victorian burial ground in north London, one of the “Magnificent Seven” large cemeteries planned around the edge of the city. According to English Wikipedia the western cemetery was dedicated on 20 May 1839, with its first burial on 26 May, and an eastern extension opened in 1860. The London Cemetery Company went bankrupt in 1960. In 1967 the catacombs for dissenters were judged dangerous and demolished, and in 1975 the Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust was set up, becoming owner of both sides by 1981. The cemetery is listed Grade I as a park and garden, and Wikipedia gives the same grade to the Egyptian Avenue and the Circle of Lebanon. We could not confirm the listing entry itself: the national heritage list refused our request.

The legend

The vampire story is recent, and it can be followed almost week by week. We read it through Wikipedia, which cites newspapers, and we have not seen a single original page.

On 31 October 1968 a grave was desecrated at Tottenham Park cemetery, with a coffin opened and a stake driven in, reported by the London Evening News of 2 November 1968. That was another cemetery. English Wikipedia, citing a 2001 book by Gareth Medway, says opinion at the time linked it to the Highgate case, but the Highgate letters came more than a year later and we read no evidence of a direct link.

On 24 December 1969 David Farrant said he saw “a grey figure” near Highgate, and he described it in a letter to the Hampstead and Highgate Express published on 6 February 1970. In the following weeks readers wrote in with ghost stories of their own, in issues of 13, 20 and 27 February 1970 according to the notes of the folklorist Bill Ellis cited by Wikipedia; Wikipedia lists a woman in white among them, along with a tall man in a hat and a spectral cyclist, without detail. For the grey figure, Farrant’s letter is the only source of origin we found.

Then the story escalated. Sean Manchester announced an exorcism for Friday 13 March 1970, and after an ITV program that evening a crowd forced its way into the closed cemetery (Express of 13 March, Evening News of 14 March 1970). Wikipedia says Manchester claimed the grey figure was a vampire and that the media added a king of the vampires. A blog run by his supporters says he spoke of an epidemic from south-east Europe and denies that a King Vampire from Wallachia was his phrase. Nobody can verify any of it. Dead animals are said to have been reported at the time: Vice (5 February 2020) mentions animals found drained of blood, and a 2026 Substack essay by Michael Strange cites the Express of March 1970 for foxes. We saw no such page. The same essay argues that the folklore explanation does not account for the foxes.

In August 1970 police found Farrant in the churchyard beside the cemetery with a crucifix and a stake; he was arrested and the case was dismissed in court (Camden, Highgate and Hampstead Record, 21 and 28 August and 2 October 1970). A duel of magicians rumored for Friday 13 April 1973 never took place (Sunday People, 8 April 1973). In July 1974 Farrant was jailed for four years and eight months for damaging memorials and interfering with remains, among other offenses; he insisted Satanists had done the damage (The Times, 18 July 1974, p. 3). He died in April 2019, according to Wikipedia.

The study our sources rely on is Ellis’s article “The Highgate Cemetery Vampire Hunt,” Folklore 104 (1993), pp. 13-39, which Wikipedia calls the most thorough account. Wikipedia describes a media sensation fed by press, television and the rivalry between Farrant and Manchester, and a note citing Ellis applies the term legend tripping to the crowd. Manchester’s supporters reject Ellis’s work. Both men have told their versions in books, and Wikipedia, following Ellis, links the 1972 film Dracula AD 1972 to the affair. We have not read Ellis, only what Wikipedia says about him.

What remains today

The cemetery is a working one: Wikipedia says both sides are still used for burials. It is run by the charitable Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust, and the home page of its official website, which we read on 6 November 2026, does not mention vampires. We know of no physical mark left by the vampire story, but it keeps returning in culture: a comic book (Dampyr no. 45), a Vice article of 5 February 2020, and a stage play in 2025.

Visiting

Highgate Cemetery is open to visitors and charges admission. According to the official site, read on 6 November 2026, one ticket covers both sides; hours were 10:00 to 17:00 from March to October and 10:00 to 16:00 from November to February, and guided tours are recommended. Hours and prices change, so check highgatecemetery.org before you go. Enter only during opening hours. The 1970 crowd that forced its way in is part of the story, not a model to follow. People are still buried here, so behave accordingly. Do not assume a tour covers the vampire episode: the home and visit pages we read do not mention it.

Sources

1. Historic England list entry (List entry 1000810) — Historic England · Open Government Licence
2. Wikimedia Commons category : Highgate Cemetery — Wikimedia Commons
3. Highgate Cemetery — Wikipedia, 2026-11-06
4. Highgate Cemetery (official site) — Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust, 2026-11-06
5. Highgate Vampire — Wikipedia, 2026-11-06
6. Official website
7. Post rejecting Bill Ellis's account (partisan) — Friends of Bishop Seán Manchester, 2026-11-06
8. The Decades-Long Rivalry of London's Two Vampire Hunters — Vice, 2020-02-05
9. The Highgate Vampire: The Monster That Wrote Itself (Michael Strange) — Troubled Minds (Substack), 2026-03-23
10. Visit (official site) — Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust, 2026-11-06
11. Wikipedia article — Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Text written by AI from the sources above and checked by a separate AI fact-check (how we work). Images: credits and licenses under each picture.