Jay's Grave

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Jay's Grave (or Kitty Jay's Grave) is supposedly the last resting place of a suicide victim who is thought to have died in the late 18th century. It has become a well-known landmark on Dartmoor, Devon, in South-West England, and is the subject of local folklore, and many a ghost story.

The small burial mound is to be found beside a narrow lane just below Hound Tor. A glass jar on top of the grave is regularly refilled with fresh flowers, although who does this remains a mystery.

[edit] The Legend

The grave is believed to contain the bones of an orphan called Kitty Jay (some reports name her as Mary Jay), who worked on a farm near the village of Manaton. As a teenager, she was apparently raped by a young farmhand and became pregnant. Such was her shame that Kitty Jay hung herself in a barn.

The three local parishes of Widecombe-in-the-Moor, North Bovey and Manaton all refused to bury her body within consecrated ground, so she was buried at a crossroads - a traditional practice for suicide victims at the time. This also happened to be the point at which the three parishes joined. Her remains were discovered in 1860, placed in a coffin and reburied.

The flowers that regularly appear there are the subject of local folklore - some claim they are placed there by pixies. Motorists, passing at night, claim to have glimpsed ghostly figures in their headlights, others report seeing a dark, hooded figure kneeling there.

[edit] Modern uses of the story

The story was the inspiration behind a novel by Celia Ann Leaman called Mary's Child, and Seth Lakeman's Mercury Music Prize nominated album Kitty Jay.

Earlier the story inspired Wishbone Ash (an English Classic rock group) to write a song called "Lady Jay". It appears on the band's 1974 album "There's the Rub".

Pauline Mckay, from Ellesmere Port claimed to be Kitty Jay whilst under hypnosis. Her story can be read on a website dedicated to her at www.kittyjay.co.uk.