Untruth Seekers

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Untruth Seekers

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Find folklore, ghost stories, local history:
https://substack.com/

We are the Untruth Seekers, tasked with the solemn duty to meticulously collect all the facts, alternative facts, and alternatives to the alternative facts across Sussex.

28/10/2026

Looking for ghostly tales from Hastings? Check out the latest episode of Hastings Noise on Hastings Rock Radio.

Host Matt Turpin brought us on to talk about uniquely Hastings hauntings and why we can't stop talking about ghosts.

Here's what's coming up from darker.days.hastings

🕯️Thurs, 29 Oct at 1200 Postcards: Molly from the Untruth Seekers and John D'Anter will share local ghost stories from Hastings and Holington.

🕯️Thurs, 26 Nov at 1200 Postcards: Scott Wood will be diving into urban legends.

🕯️Thurs, 12 Nov at The Good Place: Find Your Own Folklore spooky creative workshop

We've got loads planned. As always, more info in bio or on the Darker Days Hastings website. Hope to see you there 💀🦇
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23/10/2026

Hello, we're the Untruth Seekers.
We investigate the gap between the folklore and the facts, mainly in Sussex and occasionally beyond: ghost stories, local history, old traditions and assorted curiosities. Whether the ghost is real is above our pay grade. Who told the story, and why, is not.

Our favourite investigations:

🌿 Jack in the Green
⚓ 18th century smugglers
🔥 Bonfire Night
⚔️ Norman conquest, 1066
🏰 Cinque Ports
👻 Local ghost stories

What we've got going on:

📖 Books: Our series, From the Confidential Files of the Untruth Seekers, is modern retellings of folklore and ghost stories, woven in with local and historical context

📨 Substack: Sussex Folklore: Field Notes from the Untruth Seekers, at , with new notes from the field and a small ghost allowance

🕯️Events: darker.days.hastings talks and events where we occasionally speak, alongside other speakers well worth hearing

The archives are open. We hope you'll follow along.

Links to everything in our bio🔗
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22/10/2026

Hastings has plenty of ghosts, but I reckon they’re better at history than haunting.

Our lead investigator, Molly, will be speaking at Darker Days Hastings, wandering through the town’s past one strange story at a time: bones, cats, coffins, smugglers and a very ambitious shanty town.

🕯️ Thursday, 29th October
🕯️ 7pm
🕯️ 1200 Postcards, Queens Road, Hastings
🕯️ £5 entry, reserve in advance

Come along. Believing in ghosts is optional. Finding Hastings fascinating is not 💀🕯️
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09/10/2026

Bonfire season is in full swing. As the temperature drops, nothing delights me more than fire, ale, fireworks and a striped jumper 🔥🍻🎇

In my recent Substack article, I credited Jack in the Green with my decision to settle in Hastings. I may have downplayed Bonfire Night’s part in it.

I highly recommend attending your local Bonfire Night, rather than traveling elsewhere. It makes transportation easier, with the added bonus of supporting your local bonfire society.

Bonfire Night has a great deal of history to unpack, and Guy Fawkes is only the first layer. So, as I tend to do, I’m researching and writing a book. It is still very much in the ideation phase, which means I’ll be pondering it this year while taking in the smoky air and sipping ale.

Cheers to everyone taking part. It takes a lot of time, energy and dedication to make this happen year after year.

Always listen to the marshals. Give generously. Be safe. Be kind. 🔥 🍻 🎇
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25/09/2026

Has it always been this busy in Hastings? Or is it just the season? Our calendar is somehow already full of folklore, ghost stories and local history events.

Here's what we're excited about in late September and October in Hastings (& nearby):

🌺 She Wants to be Flowers
Hastings Museum & Art Gallery
7–9pm, Saturday 26 September
Hastings Museum & Art Gallery

🍂 Lore: Art, History and Stories
The Mint House, Pevensey
Thursdays to Sundays, until 17 October
the_mint_house_pevensey

🕯️Netherwood book launch with Antony Clayton
Tadhg Mae Projects, 51a George Street, Hastings Old Town
1–5pm, Sunday 4 October

✒️ Hastings Week Poetry Competition
Entries by email (include name, age, contact details) to judyrogers[at]hotmail.co.uk
Deadline Sunday 11 October

👑 Edith Festival 2026: Edith's Daughters
The Marina Fountain, 26 Caves Road, St Leonards
7–10pm, Saturday 17 October
Check Friends of Edith website

🔥Hastings Bonfire Night
The procession starts at the America Ground, goes down Robertson Street, then A259 to Old Town. Bonfire and fireworks on the beach around 9pm.
7–10pm, Saturday 17 October
Hastings Bonfire Society(HBBS)

👻 Q***r Ass Folk
Stade Hall, Hastings
8–11pm, Saturday 24 October
Q***r Ass Folk

🌾 Passing Through Nature to Eternity
The Mint House, Pevensey
24 October to 8 November
the_mint_house_pevensey

⚓ Pizza & Plays 2: Anna Atkinson
Stade Hall, Hastings
6–11.30pm, Friday 30 October
Spun Glass Theatre

If we missed anything, please do let us know!

We also try to keep up with Sussex-wide events, so send those our way too.
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19/09/2026

Can you guess if this legend is fact or folklore?

Here are the facts: The ale-conner dates to at least 1266, and the job entailed checking that ale sold in the district was fit to drink and fairly priced.

But then the fiction: The leather-breeches bench test doesn't seem to be grounded in Medieval evidence. Its earliest trace is a single unnamed 'authority' quoted by a writer in 1911, but it appears in no earlier source.

The actual 1419 oath ale-conners swore mentions only tasting and assaying the ale, nothing about benches or breeches.

So, we can conclude the tale of an ale-conner testing b**r with his breeches was likely a Victorian invention. Sadly, as it would've made for a more amusing job description.

Regardless, we had a flight of porter, c***r, l***r, and ale at Battle Brewery and tested exclusively with our mouths. The High Street tap room has a nice relaxed atmosphere, and the smoky ale got us excited about bonfire season, which is already upon us 🔥🍻

📍 Battle Brewery, East Sussex
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17/09/2026

Eastbourne Pier opened in 1870, designed by Eugenius Birch, the Victorian engineer who built 14 piers along the British coastline and effectively invented the pleasure pier as a form. His most celebrated was Brighton's West Pier, now a rusting skeleton in the Channel. Eastbourne Pier is what survives of his best work.

In the years since it opened, the pier has been half-demolished by a New Year's Day gale, struck by a wartime mine that deposited ten tons of beach debris on the ballroom roof, set on fire by a theatre employee in 1970, and burned deliberately in 2014, when eighty firefighters worked through the night to save two-thirds of it.

The only ghost sighting we could find was an army officer who leans on the railings for a smoke, then walks back inside through the wall. No source, no name, no explanation.

The pier has survived everything the Channel and its own staff could throw at it. The ghost, by comparison, is the least dramatic thing about it.

Curious about ghost stories, folklore, and local history in Sussex (and occasionally beyond)? Follow for more investigations coming soon 👻🕯️
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11/09/2026

We passed this curious little creature on a walk today. She wasn't too bothered by us, seemingly preoccupied with her own foxy affairs.

After snapping a quick picture of her from across the road, we found ourselves wondering about fox folklore. We don't have much in our files, probably from a lack of looking rather than a lack of it existing, but we did turn up a story from Charlotte Latham, often called the 'godmother' of English folklore studies, and West Sussex has a strong claim on her. She was born in Ashington, West Sussex, and lived most of her adult life in Fittleworth, near Petworth.

Her method was straightforward: she wrote down what the people around her said and did, and, where she could, who said it. The result was 'Some West Sussex Superstitions Lingering in 1868', a list of around 195 items, published a decade later, in 1878, in the first volume of The Folk-Lore Record, which also makes it the founding paper of what became the Folklore Society.

The fox belief is listed in her book, but without a named source or an explanation. It seems to be a very specific, slightly absurd act of mental discipline: avoiding a particular thought at a particular moment.

Now that we've heard the belief, we might actually struggle not to think of a fox tail while cutting our nails on a Monday (despite never having thought of one at that particular moment before 😂)

We also found a vague mention of foxes being associated with witches, though witches seem to have had a whole menagerie of animal associates, conveniently the ones people found mysterious or bothersome.

What fox folklore have you heard? Are there any other rabbit holes...ahem, fox holes...we should investigate next?
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07/09/2026

If you're new around here (or even if you're not!) and you'd like us to see your stuff, just say 'hi' in the comments!

We like:
📍Sussex
🌿 Folklore
👻 Ghost stories
🏰 Local history
🔊 Storytelling
🧺 Traditional crafts
✨ Other stuff?! Surprise us!!

The algorithm is weird and we're all too often at its mercy, so we'd like to take a sliver of control over what we see on social media.

If you're on Substack, we'd love to follow you over there too. (Or another mailing list or website... whatever you're doing, just let us know!)
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05/09/2026

We were planning to do a whole month at once, but there's too much going on in Sussex! A bit late but you still have time to catch some things tomorrow or coming next week.

Anyway, here's what we're excited about in the first two weeks of September!

🎨 We Wunt Be Druv, the Sussex Contemporary exhibition at Lewes Town Hall: Fri 4 – Sun 6 Sept
Sussex Contemporary

⚙️ Eastbourne Steampunk Festival: Sat 5 – Sun 6 Sept
Eastbourne Steampunk Festival

🔥 Uckfield Bonfire Night: Sat 5 Sept

🎭 Rye Arts Festival: Fri 11 – Sat 26 Sept
Rye Arts Festival

🌾 Threshing Weekend at the Weald & Downland Living Museum: Sat 5 – Sun 6 Sept
Weald & Downland Living Museum

📖 Hastings Book Festival: Thurs 10 – Sun 20 Sept
Hastings Book Festival

🚪 Heritage Open Days: Fri 11 – Sun 20 Sept
Heritage Open Days
Hastings Heritage Open Days 2026

🍃 South Downs Folk Festival: Fri 11 – Sun 13 Sept
Southdowns Music Festival

🔥 Crowborough Bonfire Night: Sat 12 Sept

That's all for now, but let us know if you have another recommendation!
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Address

Castle Hill Road
Hastings
TN343JL

Website

https://www.coghurstpress.com/folklore, https://www.coghurstpress.com/blog, https://www.instagram.com/untruthseekers, ht

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