Ron of Marton has never told a soul the following tale until now and has asked for his identity to be kept secret. In the early 1980s, Ron was driving home to Little Moorsholm one night and, as this was before the Guisborough bypass was built, he passed Guisborough Hall on a narrow, winding road. Being a cautious driver he slowed the car right down, sometimes to walking speed, to navigate the road. It was around 11 o'clock at night too which made him doubly vigilant. As he turned a sharp bend Ron was suddenly aware of someone on the road ahead of him. The figure, seemingly a man wearing what looked like was a monk's habit, was directly in his path and seemed to be crossing the road diagonally. Ron swerved sharply and slammed on his brakes, immediately coming to a halt as he was barely moving. He leapt out of the car as - even though there was no impact sound - he felt sure he must have hit the figure. But as he looked around he found that it was gone.
Ron searched vigorously for the man, checking under his car, the ditches by the sides of the road, everywhere. On either side of the road was thick, dense woodland which Ron couldn't pass through so there was no way the figure could have. There was no trace of anyone else and not a mark on his car. Ron decided he must have imagined the figure, but was so shaken by the event he want back to the spot the next morning and made another search of the area. Again he found nothing. Was it a ghost? An apparition of a monk from the bygone days of ruined Guisborough Priory?
Ron remained understandably shaken by what had happened, but it did nothing to prepare him for a second spooky incident on the same stretch of road barely a week later.
This time Ron was even more cautious of the road as a slight mist hung eerily in the air. It was 8 o'clock on a dark night and again he slowed his speed down to that of a crawl. Suddenly, he was shocked to see five large horses in the middle of the road that were alarmed and spooked by something. His immediate thought was that they had escaped from a local farm and that they too had witnessed the ghostly monk. The frantic horses bucked and reared up as Ron carefully drove past them. On checking his mirrors he found the horses had started following his car. He drove on for half a minute at snail's pace before stopping. Ron considered the horses a potential danger to less cautious drivers and got out of the car to decide what to do.
But the horses were now gone.
They had completely vanished and the night was silent and still. If they had turned back he would still have been able to see them, likewise if they had passed him. Even if they had managed to get into the dense woods he would still have been able to hear them, but there wasn't the slightest trace of them.
Over the years Ron has read reports of drivers who have experienced runaway horses on Whitby Road, but no farmer has ever come forward about losing any such animals. Indeed, upon checking, Ron could find no farm in the immediate vicinity that actually had any horses.
So if you ever find yourself on Whitby Road, keep your speed to a minimum and your wits about you otherwise you might too fall foul of the roadside apparitions.
