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Oliver's Castle

Hillfort

Folklore

Headless Ghost.--On Roundway Down a headless ghost is said to walk. Some years ago a shepherd declared that he met it, that it walked some distance by his side, and then vanished. The gentleman to whom he told the story asked why he did not speak to the ghost. "I was afraid," he replied, "for if I hadn't spoken proper to him he'd a tore 'un to pieces." A barrow is near the place, which was excavated some time ago, when a skeleton (not headless) was found. Since the barrow was opened the ghost has ceased to walk.
Death and Burial Customs in Wiltshire
L. A. Law; W. Crooke
Folklore, Vol. 11, No. 3. (Sep., 1900), pp. 344-347.

I don't know how well this equates to the source of the following:
We have been reading the story of the man who carried his head under his arm and disappeared by a barrow on Roundway Hill, near Devizes, but has not been seen since the opening of the barrow and the finding therein of a skeleton lying on its left side in a doubled-up position.*

*Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette, May 16, 1895.
Wiltshire Notes and Queries , June 1895, p482.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
1st October 2006ce
Edited 18th January 2008ce

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