Lil
speaker
737 appearances
4 recordings
2 series
first heard Oct 2024
last heard Apr 2025
Lil’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
Monuments, plaques and even a museum dedicated to the 18th century explorer Captain Cook, who apprenticed here in Whitby, thread throughout the town. But, as with most early explorers, who so often left trails of native ruin in their wake, I don't know that it's a legacy to be celebrated.
Not one to be forgotten either, though, if only for bearing witness to the past and hopefully learning from the errors of our forebears. But however you feel about the explorer, his statue marks the spot of our first ghost story and serves as a landmark for where witnesses have spotted Whitby's White Wraith.
The arch is formed by the lower jaw of a bowhead whale, a testament to Whitby Harbour's days of whale hunting industry.
The whaling that took place here in the 18th and early 19th century wasn't subsistence whaling, it was commercial, and sadly contributed to the population decline of those giants of the sea, evidenced by the end of the industry in Whitby in 1837, when the last whaling vessel returned empty of its quarry. Crewing the whaling vessels of the 18th and early 19th centuries was a treacherous career.
Doubtless, many of the men, and often quite young boys in the enterprise's employ, wouldn't have had a lot of choice in how they earned a living. They would have had to find work wherever work was offered, and many of them probably knew that it was a job they may never come home from.
It's said that it was from the point where the arch stands, high on the west cliff overlooking the harbour and out to the expanse of the North Sea, that wives and children would wait, watching for their sons and husbands to return from the icy waters of Greenland. But often, they didn't return. In fact, sometimes entire ships were lost to the crushing ice fields, never to be seen again.
And our next ghost... may just be connected with this sad history. Over the years, many similar whalebone arches stood throughout the town, and even up to recent decades, one such arch stood in the pretty gardens of Panit Park, home to the town's art gallery and museum. But the park's resident ghost seemed determined to remind visitors of the less attractive history attached to the monument.
Witnesses reported the heartbreaking sight of a young boy who would appear next to the whalebone arch, looking distressed and sometimes even crying uncontrollably. Nobody knew who he was or why he haunted this spot, but understandably, many wondered if his proximity to the whale jaw indicated that his fate involved some terrible tragedy connected to Whitby's whaling days.
and this seems to have been borne out when the archway was removed from the park in recent years and the young apparition immediately stopped his mysterious appearances. We stand in the rain, slightly mesmerised by the view across to St Mary's Church and the Abbey, both buildings that have stood on the headland in some form since the 12th century, a view that's heady in its timelessness.
I have no doubt that Stoker felt the same and we know that he spent a lot of time gazing out at it from his favourite spot on a small rise where today a commemorative bench bears his name. I squint through the mizzle that's rapidly plastering the hood of my cagoule to my cheeks and forehead and try and imagine spotting a night robe clad figure in the churchyard on the east cliff as Mina did.
From this distance, the grand edifices look doll's house sized, and even in bright moonlight, I'm not sure that I could pick out a tiny figure between the shadows of that graveyard. But I guess Mina must have had better eyesight than me, which, to be fair, doesn't take much.
And, as we're about to find out, she must have been an awful lot fitter than me as well, as she proceeded to run full pelt from one side of the town to the other and up the 199 steps that snake up the side of the East Cliff. But first, it's time to descend the West Cliff, making our way, as Mina did, down Khyber Pass.
But we need to make a quick stop on our way to check out a feature that is marked on every Dracula trail map. The Screaming Tunnel.
Mina describes that she flew down the steep steps to the pier, indicating that she probably didn't traverse the Screaming Tunnel, but took the main route down Khyber Pass, as we do now, passing delicious-smelling chippies and coffee shops on the way and emerging onto Battery Parade, where a battery of protective cannon was erected in the 18th century and the pier that Mina mentions.
Whitby actually has four piers, and although visitors can promenade along them, none are the kind of wide leisure piers full of donut booths, candy floss and helter-skelters such as you might find at Brighton, Bournemouth or Cromer. These are principally functional piers, constructed to provide safe harbour and ease of passage for Whitby's fishing and shipping fleet and any seaborne visitors.
The furthest back into the River Mau is a stubby pier behind which now sits the lifeboat station. It's called Fish Pier and it's aptly named. Even today, it's stacked with worn-looking crab and lobster pots in a timeless scene familiar to every fishing town.
Downstream of this and nearer the harbour mouth is thought to be the oldest pier, which has existed since at least the 1500s according to written records, but was probably around even earlier than that. A little sandy beach has formed in the crook between this pier and the East Cliff, known interchangeably as Tate Hill Sands and Collier's Hope.
And this will become important later in our story, but for now we turn our attention to the more modern western east piers, relatively modern that is, as they would have certainly been in situ by Bram Stoker's time, albeit without the extra pier extenders we see today, popularly compared to the mandibles of some giant insect that sweep out into the sea, guiding ships into the great mouth of the river Esk.
Also present during the time of the author's visits were the two lighthouses that capped the ends of both piers, the 73-foot-tall West Pier Lighthouse, having been built in 1831, and the shorter 55-foot East Pier Lighthouse, which was completed in 1855.
since which time the pair have stood sentinel over Whitby's harbour, providing safe passage for seafarers, with, of course, the hard work of the town's lighthouse keepers, one of whom, it seems, may have never left. I imagine Mina and Lucy strolling along the pier after one of their days exploring, and wonder if it looks much different than it would have in Bram Stoker's time.
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