Originally published by New Criminologist, 5/4/2005.

One of Dartmoor's most famous and enigmatic landmarks is "Jay's Grave", a sad and lonely burial mound lying beside a remote road that runs below Hound Tor, between Swine Down and Heatree Cross. It is said to contain the remains of a poor servant girl who took her own life more than two hundred years ago, after being rejected by her lover.

A simple glass jar is set atop the mound, and each day, without fail, fresh flowers are lovingly replenished. . . but by whom? On balmy, moonlit nights, when the moon casts an ethereal glow over the landscape, it has been claimed that a dark figure has been seen kneeling at the site, heavily muffled in a hood and cloak. With the moor swathed in a damp clinging mist, we set out to explore the mystery. Our team of investigators arrived at the site to the accompanying cacophony of howling wind and lashing rain. We had left our hotel in the market town of Newton Abbot on a pleasant spring morning.

The sky was a watery blue, and thin tendrils of sunlight filtered through the skittering clouds, auguring well for the journey ahead. …