It’s hard to believe that anyone would abandon a place boasting beautiful Yorkshire views, but as these four abandoned villages know all too well, it happens. Still eerily standing to this day, here’s our guide to just some of the curious places you can still explore today.
1. Wharram Percy
Located in the East Yorkshire countryside, bordering North Yorkshire, Wharram Percy has quite the curious history. Completely deserted by its inhabitants, Wharram Percy found itself a ghost town by the end of the 1600s – with many believed to have left by force to make room for more sheep farming in the area.
Today, you can see the remains of some of the houses that made up the village, alongside an intact church and set of cottages.
2. Scar House
Once home to 1200 dam workers and their families, Scar House Village is no more – but you can still find its remains today in Nidderdale.
Inhabited only for the time it took to construct Scar House reservoir, the workers were required to leave once their work was done, leaving the village to crumble.
Today, you’ll still found the foundations of many a worker’s house, alongside random staircases that once made up something and a projection hut that you can explore the inside of.
3. West End
cc-by-sa/2.0 – © Chris Heaton – geograph.org.uk/p/738739
Haven’t heard of the village of West End? It’s probably because today, it lives underwater.
Yorkshire’s very own Atlantis (at a push, I suppose), West End once lived below what is now known as Thruscross Reservoir, and was home to around six families before it was submerged.
The village was sacrificed in a bit to create the reservoir, and today, when the water is low, you can still see what remains of West End.
See the former flax mill where the locals worked, alongside ruined foundations of the villagers’ homes, field dividers and the village’s former bridge. The most intact ruin is that of Holme Field Head, which sits on the reservoir’s bank and actually has a number of rooms inside that you can check out.
4. Whorlton
Standing above the village of Swainby, Whorlton has been left to crumble over the centuries – however, some of its history still stands today.
Two legends live on as to why the former village found itself deserted – one which claims its inhabitants were victims of the Black Death, and a less tragic one that claims the villagers simply left for industrial jobs in nearby Swainby. As curious explorers, we prefer the former.
Today, only the grand castle gates and the church remain, with significant amounts of their structures still intact.
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