Monkswood ghost

[Bradley1234]

I’m curious to hear more about the history of the Monkswood area after seeing a figure on Wetherby Road in the early hours. I’ll attach a pic to show the exact location where I saw it. As well as sharing the story, I’d love to hear if anyone has more info on the area’s history.

To the story. Well it was about half 3 in the morning, I often ride my bike late at night and nearly never see anyone else on that road. The street lights are turned off on this stretch at midnight so it can be creepy, especially the bit with woods on both sides. At the turn off to Kentmere Gate, leading to the Monkswood estate, a few street lights are left on, then darkness to the top leading to the Ring Road.

It was at the edge of the darkness as I was coming towards the Kentmere Gate turnoff that I saw the figure ahead of me. Not right in front of me, but a little distance. It was a dark solid figure. Real enough for me to assume at first that it was just someone walking, but as it was 3am I didn’t want to walk past them so I was about to get off the path, but stopped and looked. the figure started to cross the road and literally seemed to just dissolve into the ground as it crossed. It crossed the entire road but by the time it had got to the other side it looked almost half the size, like half a person walking

It appeared featureless and like a dark shadow but solid and human shaped. I found it totally thrilling. I always said to myself that if I ever saw a ghost that I’d run to it. So I did. At the same moment the figure appeared, my bike chain came off, so I hesitantly ran the few feet to the spot I saw it, taking me a few seconds. Hesitant only because it looked so real that it was still possible it was an actual person. I stopped and listened. The direction it went in is longish grass. If it was a person I would have heard them in the grass. No one was there. And despite feeling like I was being watched, I stayed there for a few minutes listening.

I remembered as I was waiting that I’d had another, less obvious experience on the same road a few weeks before (ghosts are like busses I guess). I was in about the same spot but this figure was at the top of the road near the roundabout where Wetherby Road meets the ring road. It was late again, maybe 2am and at the top of the road I see what basically looked like if someone was on a white bike, wearing white clothes, and riding down the road at a fast speed. Weatherby road is like a hill at that point so you can really pick up some speed on a bike. It literally looked like someone was on a bike on the path riding towards me. To the point that I stepped off the path onto the road waiting for them to come flying past me. As I said, there is a stretch of darkness, then the light at the Kentmere Gate turnoff. So i was looking into the darkness seeing where they had gone. But of course nothing came out the other side.

I am on that road a lot so I know what’s normal in terms of how car lights reflect or how tree branches in eye line look. So those two experiences weren’t normal. The area also has a really rich but not well recorded history. As the name Monkswood would suggest there is a lot of stuff with monks, although the monks at Kirkstall wore white and the second figure I saw was black. The monks would I suppose walk from Kirkstall to Monkswood and used it for sheep as well as quarrying.

Roundhay Grange still stands with a road leading to it just off Wetherby road, a few feet up from where I saw the figure. Closer by was a house called Ash Bank House which is just an empty field now, but it stood until around the 1960s with the estate built around it. That house would have been just on the other side of the road where I saw the figure. There are a few accounts of the house from people who grew up on the estate, a lot of them mention, unprompted, about it being haunted or creepy, saying that as kids they were scared to play near the house cos of ghost stories, with one guy on the leodis.net website mentioning ‘black robed monks’ on that road.

There is also a tunnel underneath Wetherby Road that I’m interested to hear more about (photo attached). It must have been something to do with Ash Bank House that used to stand there. It also goes pretty much directly under where I saw the figure melt into the road. It’s a strange tunnel in that there is often water coming out of it but I have no idea where the source of the water is once it goes under the road. So if anyone knows more about it would be great if not i’ll just go up there myself lol