Winter's Gibbet
★ In our guides ↓

On Our List

Winter's Gibbet

A lonely replica gibbet on the moor above Elsdon, marking where William Winter's body hung in chains after the 1791 murder of Margaret Crozier. Eerie even at noon.

Address:

Steng Cross, near Elsdon, Northumberland

Hours:

Open access at all times

Best visited in daylight

Map

Good to Know

Winter's Gibbet stands on Steng Cross, the highest point of the old drove road across the moor, about two miles south-east of Elsdon. In 1791, William Winter robbed and murdered Margaret Crozier at her home at the Raw, near Elsdon. After he was hanged in Newcastle, his body was brought back and hung in chains here, within sight of the scene of the crime. The original gibbet is long gone; the one standing today is a 19th-century replica put up by the Trevelyans of Wallington, complete with a carved wooden head. Beside it is the stone base of the medieval Steng Cross, and both are Grade II listed.

Why it's on our list: it's one of the most unsettling spots in the county, and it needs no ghost to make it so. Peter tells the full story in our Haunted Northumberland guide.

Worth knowing: the site is remote and exposed, with no facilities, but there's a small parking spot just across the road. Visit in daylight, dress for moorland weather, and combine it with a wander around Elsdon village if you're nearby.

A Little Note From Heather & Sand

We haven't quite made it here ourselves yet, but it's on our list!

We're working our way around Northumberland, personally visiting and reviewing as many of the places featured in our Listed section as we can. It's a tough job, but somebody has to do it.

In the meantime, we do our homework. Before adding somewhere to Heather & Sand, we research it, look at what other visitors have to say and check that it has a good reputation. If the feedback isn't encouraging, it generally doesn't make our list.

Of course, a little online research is no substitute for muddy boots, a decent coffee and seeing somewhere for ourselves. So until we've visited, we'll leave the personal review to one side.

A little about us...

Heather & Sand is our little corner of Northumberland — a collection of places, stories, walks and discoveries from a county we love.

Through our Journal, Guide and Listed pages, we hope to help you discover somewhere new, revisit an old favourite or simply enjoy a little Northumberland from wherever you happen to be.

Tom, Lucy & the Heather & Sand crew.

Featured in our guides

Haunted Northumberland: Ghost Stories, Dark Legends & Eerie Places to Explore