Lantern man

A lantern man is an atmospheric ghost light described in the folklore of The Fens of East Anglia, with sightings around Wicken Fen and other areas.¹ According to the stories, first collected by folklorist L.F. Newman,² the lights are believed to be evil spirits who attempt to draw victims to their death in the reed beds.³⁴ Newman writes that the spirits are attracted by the sound of whistling,⁴ and that a way to evade them is to lie face down on the ground with your mouth in the mud.²³ The phenomenon, which seems to be a variation of will-o'-the-wisp folklore, is now dismissed as sightings of combustible marsh gas.⁴

A local fisherman recounted to parapsychologist Peter Underwood how he had once thrown himself to the floor to escape the attention of a lantern man which had been drawn to his whistling.¹³

Another local man recounted how he had attracted the attention of a lantern man while whistling to his dog while walking on the fen. The man had taken shelter at the home of a friend, who hung out a horn on a long pole to distract the spirit. The following morning the horn was found to have been burnt up.²