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Brits who love to be spooked at Halloween may want to consider a trip to one of the UK's creepiest villages full of tales of hauntings, dark magic and satanic rituals.

On the surface, Clophill in Bedfordshire is a seemingly quintessentially British village with pretty houses, countryside and historic buildings. However, it has a dark side too, with rumours that its abandoned church has actually opened a portal direct to Hell.

It's home to the Church of St Mary the Virgin, a 14th century building that was abandoned for around 170 years after falling into disuse in the 1840s. During this time, the church quickly gained a reputation for being haunted, not to mention it was regularly vandalised.

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However, it's not graffiti that makes this a particularly eerie place; the church was actually built facing the wrong direction away from the sun, leading many to believe that it has inadvertently served as a doorway to Hell. Visitors have reported spotting tall dark shadows and mysterious hooded figures roaming both inside and outside of the building.

Damien O'Dell, head of the Anglia Paranormal Investigation Society (APIS), previously told BedfordshireLive about a theory that the hauntings are remains of 'black magic' rituals from decades ago.

He explained: "There's definitely something strange going on at the church, and my personal view is that it's down to black magic practices held there. I think it's possible for a group of satanists to conjure up something and leave it behind. A sort of guardian or elemental. If this is the case it certainly does its job because it frightens the living daylight out of people."

In fact, the travel experts at StressFreeCarRental.com have determined it to be one of the creepiest places in the UK. The team explained: "Long history of hauntings, dark magic and satanic rituals. However, others speculate it is because it was built on top of an ancient leper colony where those infected, as well as those suffering from the plague, were left to die. There have been multiple instances of the graveyards being attacked and desecrated in rumoured dark mass, witchcraft and Satanic rituals, meaning the location is a favourite for paranormal investigators."

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  Inside the haunted museum where guests are surrounded by ghosts and creepy artefacts

It's therefore no surprise that six researchers set out to get a sense of the place in The Paranormal Diaries: Clophill. Admitting that the village caught their attention because it has "a very bad reputation – people worshipping Satan, or worshipping evil", they investigated claims from locals including that two words were etched in blood on the side of the church reading 'Ne Vide', the Latin for 'no future'.

The group said they had the impression that when it came to discussing the supernatural, they felt that the locals "weren't too happy to talk about it".

Have you had a terrifying experience in a haunted destination? Email us at [email protected]

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