Yvette Fielding, the face of Most Haunted for more than two decades, has named Shepton Mallet Prison as the scariest location she has ever visited while filming the show. The presenter, known for investigating haunted sites across the globe, said the Somerset prison left her collapsed on the floor.
Collapse in the Hanging Room
Speaking about the latest series for Pluto TV, Fielding said: "It's all about incarceration, judgment and execution. One of the locations is this enormous prison. I've investigated quite a few prisons in my time, but Shepton Mallet was absolutely terrifying – and I collapsed."
The incident took place in the prison's historic hanging room, a site used for military executions during World War II. "We went into this hanging room and it was completely pitch dark," she recalled. "There's a hole in the floor where they would have done the drop, and this knocking and banging started. You could hear it in the walls and the floor. I remember calling out a particular US soldier's name... Then the next thing I knew, I was on the floor and the rest of the team were helping me up."
Fielding added that other team members felt unwell in the same room. "I'm not psychic at all, but a couple of other members of the team did feel a bit nauseous and sick. It really affected a lot of us, and members of the public that go into that particular part of the room often have to come out because they're affected by something. I think there were possibly some innocent people that were imprisoned or hanged. It's a harrowing location... but I would go back in a heartbeat."
Eric Morecambe's Desk and UFO Encounter
At home, Fielding surrounds herself with lighter history, including a writing desk once owned by comedian Eric Morecambe. "Not yet, but I keep praying," she said when asked if the comic had contacted her from beyond. "I keep hoping to hear his voice or for him to move the desk. But I've got so much respect for that man. I'm sitting opposite his hat and his typewriter and I have about four of his pipes. I purposely haven't asked out [to his spirit] because I have so much respect for his family that I just don't think it's right."
Fielding and her husband Karl once had a close encounter of the third kind while driving through Wales to a Most Haunted fan event. "We slowed the car down because we could see these two big balls of light hovering in the sky. Then these two things shot off so quickly. No military thing or normal aeroplane could have done that, so we were blown away," she said. She noted how public acceptance of UFOs has grown: "It's amazing how a lot of people have accepted UFOs now. Around 10 or 20 years ago it was like, 'Oh, you're mad, where's your tinfoil hat?' But now with all these official files coming out, how can anybody not think that there's other beings out there?"
New Investigation at Cogges Manor Farm
Fielding's experiences have changed her view on the afterlife. "When I first started Most Haunted, the thought of death really got me down," she confessed. "Now I know that we do not die. We have a soul that is taken to a different plane where we are reconnected with our loved ones."
This Halloween, Fielding teamed up with Supercell's mobile farming game Hay Day, investigating Oxfordshire's Cogges Manor Farm. "My daughter's a huge gamer, so when she showed me Hay Day, I thought it was so relaxing," she explained. "Then fate stepped in. We went into the farmhouse at night and did a proper Most Haunted investigation. We had poltergeist activity and a séance - the table was jumping around and there was scratching like fingernails underneath the table. We even had knives and forks flying around and a gold goblet in the bedroom that decided it was going to take off. It's the first time in 25 years we've investigated just a farm, and I loved every second."
