Ostrich Inn, Colnbrook

The Ostrich Inn at Colnbrook, a timber-framed coaching inn dating to the 12th century, is steeped in one of England’s darkest legends. During the reign of Henry I, the landlord and his wife were said to lure wealthy guests into the Blue Chamber, where a trapdoor beneath the bed dropped victims into a vat of boiling water. Their bodies were later dumped in the nearby River Colne. Thomas Cole, a Reading clothier, was among the last to die before the couple were caught and executed. For centuries after, Cole’s ghost was said to pace the inn’s corridors at midnight.