Within Haunted Rutland
Why Did Ashwell Prison Become a Ghost Hunt Site?
Ashwell Prison shows how a closed modern institution became Rutland's most obvious setting for organised paranormal tourism.
On this page
- From Category C prison to enterprise park
- Why prison buildings attract ghost hunters
- Rutland, Leicestershire and listing confusion
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Introduction
Ashwell Prison became a ghost-hunt site because it had the right afterlife for modern haunted tourism: a closed prison, empty wings, perimeter fencing, a recent public scandal, and enough surviving institutional fabric to let visitors imagine being locked inside after dark. Unlike Rutland’s older manor-house and churchyard legends, Ashwell is not a centuries-old ghost story. Its haunted reputation is mainly a post-closure one, shaped by commercial ghost-hunt listings that describe shadow figures, voices, footsteps, moving objects, headaches, cold touches and oppressive feelings in the abandoned buildings. Those claims should be treated as reported experiences and promotional folklore, not established fact. What makes Ashwell important to Rutland’s haunted map is the transformation itself: a modern Category C prison, closed in 2011 and partly redeveloped as Oakham Enterprise Park, became the county’s most obvious venue for organised paranormal nights.[legislation.gov.uk]legislation.gov.ukThe Closure of Prisons Order 2011…
From Category C prison to enterprise park
HMP Ashwell stood near Oakham in Rutland, around two miles south of Ashwell village and in the parish of Burley. Official parliamentary wording from 2009 described it as “near Oakham in Rutland” and as a Category C training prison. It had not always been that kind of institution: the same ministerial statement said Ashwell was originally an open prison and was fenced to upgrade it to Category C in the 1980s. That detail matters for the later ghost-hunt image, because the place’s atmosphere depends heavily on visible security: fences, blocks, corridors, landings and the idea of controlled movement.[Hansard]hansard.parliament.ukHansard HMP AshwellHansard HMP Ashwell
The event that gave Ashwell its bleak modern notoriety was the serious disturbance of 11 April 2009. In Parliament, the Ministry of Justice said more than 400 prisoners were involved, and described a split between older non-cellular accommodation for 425 prisoners and newer cellular accommodation for 194. Contemporary reporting similarly described a large-scale prison riot, with roads sealed off, smoke over the buildings, minor injuries to three prisoners and major damage to the jail.[Hansard]hansard.parliament.ukHansard HMP AshwellHansard HMP Ashwell
The prison’s closure followed soon afterwards. The Closure of Prisons Order 2011 formally named “H.M. Prison Ashwell, in Rutland” among the prisons to be closed when the order came into force on 30 April 2011. That official phrasing is useful because many ghost-hunt pages later blur Ashwell into Leicestershire; the legal closure document places it squarely in Rutland.[Legislation.gov.uk]legislation.gov.ukThe Closure of Prisons Order 2011…
After closure, the site did not simply become a ruin. Rutland County Council’s economic strategy described the transformation of the former prison into Oakham Enterprise Park, a 23-acre redevelopment supported by an interest-free Growing Places loan. The council reported remediation of former prison administration, health, welfare and training facilities, creating 61 lettable units with more than 95% of 70,000 square feet leased at the time of the strategy. In other words, Ashwell’s afterlife split in two: part practical regeneration project, part eerie night-time attraction.[Rutland County Council]rutland.gov.ukRutland County Council
What ghost hunters say is there
The ghost stories attached to Ashwell are mostly recent and experience-based. They do not appear to rest on a named historical apparition, a medieval legend, a documented haunting case or a long chain of local folklore collection. Instead, the claims are the kind often produced around abandoned institutions: shadows, noises, touches, voices, figures at windows and a sense of pressure in particular rooms.
Haunted Houses lists the venue as Ashwell Prison at Oakham Enterprise Park, Oakham, Rutland, with events running from 9 pm to 3 am and tickets advertised from £59. Its promotional description says visitors use ghost-hunting equipment, take part in “Victorian experiments including Ouija Boards”, and explore the former prison with experienced hosts. The same listing claims reported activity includes spectral figures, whispering voices, footsteps, dark figures seen by former staff, a face glimpsed at a window, loud crashes, unpleasant feelings and headaches in “paranormally active areas”.[haunted-houses.co.uk]haunted-houses.co.ukAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses EventsAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses Events
Haunted Happenings, another ghost-event company, presents Ashwell as “Ashwell Prison - Oakham, Leicestershire”, while also saying it was acquired by Rutland County Council after closure. Its claims include cell doors opened by unseen hands, shadowy figures on upper balcony wings, objects moving across the floor, voices from abandoned cells and footsteps on landings. These details are vivid, but they are still vendor-hosted claims attached to a paid event listing, so they need to be read as part of the site’s commercial ghost-hunt identity rather than as independently verified evidence.[hauntedhappenings.co.uk]hauntedhappenings.co.ukAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts, LeicestershireAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts, Leicestershire
That does not make the stories worthless. Folklore often begins in precisely this kind of setting: repeated visits, repeated retellings, memorable sensations and a building whose layout invites interpretation. The most important distinction is between “Ashwell is haunted” and “Ashwell has become a place where people report and perform haunting experiences”. The second claim is well supported by the event listings. The first remains a belief, not a settled historical fact.
Why prison buildings attract ghost hunters
Ashwell’s appeal is not hard to understand. Prisons are designed around restriction, surveillance and separation. Even without believing in ghosts, a visitor can feel the emotional force of locked doors, empty corridors, cells, landings and perimeter fences. When such a building closes, the ordinary explanations for its sounds change: wind, heating systems, loose materials, birds, footsteps from other groups and distant traffic can all become harder to place in the dark.
The commercial language around Ashwell leans heavily into that setting. Haunted Houses describes the prison as “immense in size and enclosed behind high fencing”, saying it has a “creep factor by day” and a darker appearance at night. Haunted Happenings similarly emphasises scale, isolation and numerous investigation areas. The selling point is not a single famous ghost; it is the chance to move through an emptied institution after hours and interpret its sensations as possible paranormal activity.[haunted-houses.co.uk]haunted-houses.co.ukAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses EventsAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses Events
Ashwell also has a stronger public-memory hook than many purpose-built ghost venues. The 2009 riot, the subsequent closure and the rapid reuse of the land give the site a before-and-after story. For Rutland, a county often marketed through stone villages, churches, Oakham Castle and rural heritage, Ashwell offers a much harsher texture: late twentieth-century imprisonment, public disorder, government disposal and regeneration. Rutland County Council’s own heritage framing highlights Roman and Anglo-Saxon settlements, Oakham Castle, ancient churches, stone-built villages and two historic market towns; Ashwell sits outside that picturesque pattern and is therefore unusually stark in the county’s haunted geography.[Rutland County Council]rutland.gov.ukOpen source on rutland.gov.uk.
Rutland, Leicestershire and listing confusion
One of the most useful things to clear up is location. Ashwell Prison belongs in a Rutland haunted-history page, even though several paranormal listings and older casual references call it Leicestershire. The strongest official sources are clear: the 2009 Hansard statement places HMP Ashwell near Oakham in Rutland, and the 2011 closure order names “H.M. Prison Ashwell, in Rutland”.[Hansard]hansard.parliament.ukHansard HMP AshwellHansard HMP Ashwell
The confusion has understandable roots. Rutland was absorbed into Leicestershire for local-government purposes in 1974 and regained separate unitary authority status in 1997. This has left a residue of regional shorthand, postal habit and search-engine labelling in which Oakham or Ashwell may be pulled into Leicestershire even when the historic and modern county identity is Rutland. Rutland’s own public identity remains strongly county-based; the council says future local-government arrangements should keep Rutland’s historic name and identity, and Wikishire presents Rutland as a distinct historic county bounded by Leicestershire, Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire.[rutlandhighsheriff.com]rutlandhighsheriff.comOpen source on rutlandhighsheriff.com.
For readers following haunted places by historic county, Ashwell should therefore be mapped to Rutland. The Leicestershire wording on some ghost-hunt pages is useful evidence of how venues are marketed regionally, but it should not move the site out of Rutland’s haunted afterlife.
How credible is the haunting?
Ashwell’s haunted reputation is credible as a modern ghost-hunt tradition, but weak as a documented historical haunting. The best-supported facts are the prison’s real location, status, disturbance, closure and redevelopment. Those are anchored in parliamentary, legislative and council sources. The reported paranormal details come mainly from event companies selling overnight investigations, where atmosphere, expectation and entertainment are part of the product.[parliament.uk]hansard.parliament.ukHansard HMP AshwellHansard HMP Ashwell
A careful reading gives three levels of confidence:
High confidence: Ashwell was a real Rutland prison, upgraded from open-prison origins to Category C use, affected by a major 2009 disturbance, formally closed in 2011 and partly redeveloped as Oakham Enterprise Park.[parliament.uk]hansard.parliament.ukHansard HMP AshwellHansard HMP Ashwell
Medium confidence: The site has been used and marketed for organised ghost hunts, with paid events, equipment-led investigations and after-dark access forming part of its public afterlife.[haunted-houses.co.uk]haunted-houses.co.ukAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses EventsAshwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses Events
Low confidence: Specific claims about figures, voices, moving objects, touches or hostile presences remain anecdotal. They are not impossible as experiences, but the sources available publicly are promotional rather than independently investigative.
That balance is what makes Ashwell interesting. It is not Rutland’s oldest legend, nor its most folkloric apparition. It is a case study in how a county’s haunted map keeps changing: not only through castles, halls and churchyards, but through decommissioned modern institutions that acquire an eerie second life once the official purpose has gone.
Why Ashwell matters to Rutland’s haunted map
Ashwell Prison adds a different kind of haunting to Rutland. Exton Hall’s Mistletoe Bough belongs to the world of family legend and old-house romance; church and rectory stories belong to parish memory; Ashwell belongs to the modern haunted-experience economy. Its ghosts are less like inherited village lore and more like post-industrial folklore, shaped by access, ticketing, equipment, group expectation and the visual power of abandonment.
That makes the prison’s “afterlife” more than a set of spooky claims. It shows how haunted places are made in the present. A building closes, its official story is archived in legislation and council redevelopment documents, its traumatic public moments remain searchable, and then its empty corridors become available for new kinds of storytelling. In Rutland, where the supernatural landscape is usually quiet, rural and domestic, Ashwell stands out because it is recent, institutional and deliberately investigated after dark.
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Further Reading
Books and field guides related to Why Did Ashwell Prison Become a Ghost Hunt Site?. Use these as the next step if you want deeper reading beyond the article.
The Mammoth Book of Haunted House Stories
First published 2000. Subjects: ghost stories, haunted house stories, ghost story anthology, Ghost stories.
The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland
First published 2006. Subjects: Nonfiction, Reference, Superstition, Dictionaries, History.
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Endnotes
1.
Source: legislation.gov.uk
Link:https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2011/646/made/data.html
Source snippet
The Closure of Prisons Order 2011...
2.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Title: Rutland County Council Business accommodation to let | Rutland County Council
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/businesses/business-accommodation-let
3.
Source: haunted-houses.co.uk
Title: Ashwell Prison Ghost Hunts | Rutland | Haunted Houses Events
Link:https://www.haunted-houses.co.uk/ghost-hunt/ashwell-prison/
4.
Source: hansard.parliament.uk
Title: Hansard HMP Ashwell
Link:https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2009-04-20/debates/0904202000010/HMPAshwell
5.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Title: Rutland County Council
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/sites/default/files/2022-10/Economic%20Growth%20Strategy%202014-2021.pdf
6.
Source: hauntedhappenings.co.uk
Title: Ashwell Prison Ghost Hunts, Leicestershire
Link:https://www.hauntedhappenings.co.uk/ashwell-prison/
7.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/libraries-culture-leisure/local-history-heritage
8.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/council-councillors/local-government-reorganisation
9.
Source: haunted-houses.co.uk
Title: Ashwell Prison Ghost Hunt
Link:https://www.haunted-houses.co.uk/event/ashwell-prison-ghost-hunt-saturday-4th-july-2026/
10.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/sites/default/files/2022-10/RC171-180.pdf
11.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Title: SGB7 St George’s Barracks Master Plan as at 18 11 18 (18 November 2019)
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/sites/default/files/2022-10/SGB7%20-%20St%20George%27s%20Barracks%20Master%20Plan%20as%20at%2018-11-18%20%2818%20November%202019%29.pdf
Published: November 2019
12.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/rutland-information-service/directory/n0ugqxe8fie
13.
Source: rutland.gov.uk
Link:https://www.rutland.gov.uk/rutland-information-service/directory/hgrddsxuq4a
14.
Source: hmiprisons.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk
Link:https://hmiprisons.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/our-reports/
15.
Source: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk
Link:https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7c8917ed915d48c24106af/0883.pdf
16.
Source: publications.parliament.uk
Link:https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmhansrd/cm090420/wmstext/90420m0001.htm
17.
Source: edm.parliament.uk
Title: uk PRISO N CLOSURES
Link:https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/42354/prison-closures
18.
Source: hansard.parliament.uk
Title: uk Ashwell Prison
Link:https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2009-12-15/debates/09121599000038/AshwellPrison
19.
Source: prisonsinspectoratescotland.gov.uk
Title: Publications H M INSPECTORATE OF PRISONS HMP ABERDEEN
Link:https://prisonsinspectoratescotland.gov.uk/publications?page=50
20.
Source: GOV.UK
Title: hm chief inspector of prisons annual report 2024 to 2025
Link:https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hm-chief-inspector-of-prisons-annual-report-2024-to-2025
21.
Source: leicestershire.gov.uk
Link:https://www.leicestershire.gov.uk/about-the-council/council-plans/local-government-reorganisation/why-change-local-government
22.
Source: rutlandhighsheriff.com
Link:https://rutlandhighsheriff.com/county/
23.
Source: wikishire.co.uk
Link:https://wikishire.co.uk/wiki/Rutland
24.
Source: facebook.com
Link:https://www.facebook.com/groups/1133158046812819/posts/26276463328722277/
25.
Source: facebook.com
Link:https://www.facebook.com/groups/787598881383740/posts/4285789604897966/
26.
Source: facebook.com
Link:https://www.facebook.com/RealCounties/photos/the-county-of-rutland-is-a-small-landlocked-shire-of-the-midlandsrutland-is-the-/902082232075345/
27.
Source: Wikipedia
Title: Rutland County Council
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutland_County_Council
28.
Source: Wikipedia
Title: Oakham Castle
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakham_Castle
29.
Source: kimballclose.co.uk
Title: oakham enterprise park
Link:https://kimballclose.co.uk/info/oakham-enterprise-park/
30.
Source: kimballclose.co.uk
Title: Oakham Enterprise Park
Link:https://www.kimballclose.co.uk/home/information/oakham-enterprise-park
31.
Source: martinbrookes.blogspot.com
Title: rutland county council to sell ashwell
Link:https://martinbrookes.blogspot.com/2013/02/rutland-county-council-to-sell-ashwell.html
32.
Source: essexghosthunters.co.uk
Title: Ashwell prison
Link:https://www.essexghosthunters.co.uk/events/ashwell-prison
33.
Source: gazetteer.org.uk
Link:https://gazetteer.org.uk/place/Rutland
34.
Source: visionofbritain.org.uk
Link:https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/17258
Additional References
35.
Source: youtube.com
Title: HALLOWEEN Special: GHOSTS of Ashwell Prison Feat. @Amys Crypt
Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1joQI8jLbeo
Source snippet
This Prison Has A TURBULENT Past & DISTURBING PARANORMAL Activity...
36.
Source: youtube.com
Title: We Explore The HAUNTED ASHWELL PRISON | What was Making all that Noise!
Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3KYimusFOE
Source snippet
The Ouija Brothers Ashwell Prison Investigation...
37.
Source: youtube.com
Title: HAUNTED Prison that Locals FEAR! ft. @theouijabrothers
Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hx62jIvZh3k
Source snippet
HALLOWEEN Special: GHOSTS of Ashwell Prison Feat. @AmysCrypt...
38.
Source: oakhamcastle.org
Link:https://www.oakhamcastle.org/about/
39.
Source: hauntingnights.co.uk
Link:https://hauntingnights.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Ashwell-Prison-Guest-Email.pdf
40.
Source: doingtime.co.uk
Link:https://doingtime.co.uk/hmip-reports/
41.
Source: oakhamcastle.org
Link:https://www.oakhamcastle.org/our-history/
42.
Source: facebook.com
Link:https://www.facebook.com/groups/821475598748033/posts/1967616370800611/
43.
Source: facebook.com
Link:https://www.facebook.com/OakhamCastle/posts/discover-oakhams-rich-history-heritage-join-us-for-a-guided-walking-tour-through/1637844571681297/
44.
Source: clink.co.uk
Link:https://www.clink.co.uk/paranormal-clink.html
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