Plas Teg

The story

Plas Teg is a Jacobean house near Pontblyddyn (Hope) in Flintshire, between Wrexham and Mold. It was built around 1610 by Sir John Trevor I, a courtier of James I, according to Cadw and the historian Mark Baker on BBC Wales. He died in 1630 according to Wikipedia, in 1629 according to Cadw; his wife died in 1643. Cadw says the house was twice sacked by parliamentary troops two years later. Wikipedia says it stood empty, Baker that it was tenanted out. It stayed with Trevor descendants into the early 20th century. In the Second World War it housed soldiers, and in 1945 it was sold to an auction company and used as a store. Cadw dates the Grade I listing to 14 February 1952, and a public outcry stopped its demolition; a descendant then bought and partly restored it (Baker). A couple bought it in the late 1970s and lived in part of it. It was bought again in 1986 and restored with Cadw support, and opened to the public about ten months later, according to Wikipedia. Wikipedia dates the closure to the public to 2022, though a tourism site already called it closed in December 2021. BBC News reported in January 2025 that its contents were going to auction.

The legend

The oldest pages we found are from BBC Wales's North East Weird guide. A capture of August 2003 says the house has long been associated with strange sightings and prints readers' experiences, some recalled from about five years earlier. A page captured in June 2004 describes a public ghost vigil at the house with a medium and the Cheshire Paranormal Society, who had by then been visiting for about seven years. There the medium, not a record, tells of a daughter in love with a farmer, found dead in one of two wells, a farmer who hanged himself, and a Sir John Trevor driving a pony and trap. A 2004 reader also mentions a hanging room used by a circuit judge.

The names come later in what we read. Catherine Cavendish's 2016 blog and the tourism site Haunted Rooms (2021) tell of Dorothy Trevor, a woman in white, said to be a daughter of Sir John Trevor I, who fell down a well while retrieving her jewels before eloping with Iorwerth, a farmer's son. Her ghost is said to appear on the main road nearby. Iorwerth is said to have hanged himself and to look for her in the grounds. Other tales from the same sites: a gardener grabbed by hands and pulled toward the well around 1900, with no name; Elizabeth Trevor-Roper, 16, who died at the well in 1815, a date not confirmed by a primary source; and a Sir John Trevor V who supposedly killed his wife and died in a carriage accident. We did not verify these people in a genealogy.

A Grey Lady on the same road, an old woman seen gliding across the carriageway, is called the most popular of the region's grey ladies by the author Richard Holland, in a 2009 BBC Wales piece by Nick Bourne. Holland says a driver who thought she had hit someone called the police, and that the driver later told the story on a BBC One program. He gives no date. A 2004 BBC page mentions a Judge's bedroom, the 2016 blog says the house was used as a court under Judge Jeffreys, and Wikipedia says the second edition of Mark Baker's book tackles the theories about him. We could not read those books, or any book by Holland.

We found no trace earlier than 2003. The tales then spread through a television program, Ghost Hunting with Girls Aloud, filmed in 2006 and announced for ITV2, and through blogs and tourism sites. The claim of about 15 ghosts comes without a named list. The well stories look to us like stock place legends rather than local records. Only that first program is a ghost show; the later ones Wikipedia lists (Country House Rescue 2010, 2015 and 2019 programs) are about the house or people, and we did not recheck them.

What remains today

The house still stands, privately owned, and its future looks uncertain after the closure and the contents sale. Cadw's record calls it one of Wales's finest Jacobean houses.

Visiting

Plas Teg is private and has been closed to the public since 2022, according to Wikipedia; a blog said it was no longer open in December 2023. We give no access directions and suggest no entry. Only an organized visit could be a legal way in, and we know of none at present.

Sources

1. Wikimedia Commons category : Plas Teg — Wikimedia Commons
2. Girls Aloud' haunted mansion ordeal — Wales Online, 2006
3. Listed Buildings Full Report 7, Plas Teg — Cadw
4. Medium sees Plas Teg's ghosts, capture of 13 June 2004 — BBC Wales, Internet Archive capture, 2004
5. Myths and legends about ghostly grey ladies — BBC Wales, 2009-09-17
6. Plas Teg — Haunted Rooms
7. Plas Teg: Exploring the hall's history — BBC Wales, 2010-03-02
8. Plas Teg: Girls Aloud ghost-hunting mansion contents for sale — BBC News, 2025-01-26
9. Plas Teg: home to 15 ghosts and more — Catherine Cavendish (blog), 2016
10. Plas Teg readers' stories, capture of 26 June 2004 — BBC Wales, Internet Archive capture, 2004
11. Plas Teg, the seat of T. B. Trevor Roper Esqr — National Library of Wales via Europeana · http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/
12. Plas Teg (Weird guide), capture of 13 August 2003 — BBC Wales, Internet Archive capture, 2003
13. 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.