Man Finds Secret Passage In His 500 Year Old Home's Library
Hidden passageways, a locked chest and centuries-old books are just some of the surprises a man has found in his 500-year-old Sussex family home
Freddy Goodall discovered the passageways hidden behind a bookshelf in the home. He believes they once extended to nearby buildings and a church.
Goodall, who posted videos of the underground labryrinth on TikTok and Instagram, said he had been "looking through photos of the house from the 1800s when he noticed a doorway.
The hidden room connected to passageways and to unused rooms full of cobwebs.
It was not uncommon for houses to boast secret passages for the servants and other staff to use, as they were typically not allowed to use “official”' corridors and staircases.
“The passageways run all the way from one end of the house to the other,” he said. "When the passageways were in use, I believe there were some running miles underground to nearby buildings and a church.
“I found a safe containing old historical documentation relating to the house,” he said. "I have found other artifacts including old books from when the house was a school. I will look for new things in the future."
Goodall suspects that mischievous pupils may have snuck down into the passageways. "I would imagine [the passageways] were used for maintenance purposes, although I found many names inscribed into the wall that looked like school pupils that snuck down there," he said.
Sussex, England
July, 2021
Freddy Goodall
#Mystery #TikTok #Incredible
I can't begin to imagine how much money you'd have to have to own a house that big in Sussex, big enough for you to not notice or worry about a fairly sizable chunk of floor space that's unaccounted for.
Also enough money to not worry about the difference between a staircase and a ladder.
You don't need any money at all when your parents are rich.
2:40 the Patek on his arm tells it all
If I had a pound for every time you unnecessarily started a sentence with 'so' I could buy the house. That 'old ladder ' looked very new.
Harry is going to take it from you ☺️
Not disappointed at all. The historical value of what you found is value enough.
Yes 😍😍😍😍
Agreed
I’m joking but let’s say he did find tiny gold coins currently worth over $1,500 each, would you really want to tell people? Especially considering it would be taxed away as an inheritance fee as if people aren’t allowed to pass down their hard earned money to their descendants. people actually vote in the monsters that make it that your children can’t enjoy what you’ve worked for. And those same politicians become rich as they sell $60 shirts saying eat the rich as they cry bartender and poor, but they literally grew up in a mansion and you wonder how The middle class has their wealth not allowed to pass on to the next generation, but every president except for the two dutch (US) presidents were somehow related to John the worst of England and seem to be doing quite well. Yes, even Obama has English royal blood in him.
The REAL treasure was the friends we made along the way 🥰
lol its so fake, like they had all those materials 500 years ago xD. there is fucking isolation material in it..
The library itself to me is the real treasure.
Agree. I've always wanted a library in my house.
Yep
😂
The first house I bought was built around the 1900's and had a very small basement most of the house was on footings. While replacing the flooring I found a trap door in a closet that led down to a root cellar type area with shelving and a lot of old liquor bottles from the prohibition days. There was also a box of .45 ammunition on the shelf.
Ah, you found the man cave. Good job.
ah you found the "is this the day" room
OP WAS THERE STILL LIQUOR IN THE BOTTLES
@@kepinpin5277 lmfaoooo
@@dionysusxian drink it no balls
A lot of big old buildings have these hidden access spaces. Often they would exist to make it easy for workmen to perform some kinds of maintenance without disturbing the household or damaging the "public" side of a building. Years ago I lived in a big old Victorian mansion in Rhode Island that was converted into apartments and I found three of these access spaces. I had the "penthouse" which simply means I lived on the top floor where the servants had once lived but I had the whole floor, or did I? I discovered a whole wing that was under the roof that was just empty. In it I found hundreds of old magazines and newspapers from the 1800's just stacked up. it appeared that nobody had been in that space for a century. Basically it was a big unfinished attic space. It also had three original windows one of them being stained glass. My apartment as I described might sound big but it was only about 600 square feet (about 55 sq meters) but that space added over 200 sq feet. So I ran some extension cords and gave it a pain job and I had extra storage and a nice little hobby room my landlord didn't' even know about. At the other end of my apartment was a closet which if the back wall was slid sideways it revealed a vertical shaft roughly a yard square with an iron ladder attached to the wall and it went down to a lower level and my downstairs neighbor and I figured out that it ran right behind his living room closet. A third hidden space was located under the kitchen cabinets. I had never noticed but there was a space between the kitchen and bathroom about six feet by 8 feet where all the pipes ran. You had to open the lower cabinet door next to the sink in the kitchen and there was a panel and if you turned a knob and pushed in it was a door just big enough for an average person to get through. From there with a flashlight I could see the pipes going into the tub, toilet and sink and the drain pipes going out. But there was enough space for roughly 200 cubic feet of storage though I never used it because it was awkward. Other tenants told me there were additional hidden spaces in other parts of the mansion. The basement had a tunnel that went out under the front lawn, under the street in front of the home and across the street and connected up to another mansion's basement except that building had burned down in the 1970's so the tunnel just terminated in a big pile of dirt where the demolition crew simply filled in the hole with dirt. We figured the brick arch roof of that tunnel probably wasn't very safe so we backed away and never ventured across the street under ground. Interestingly the tunnel intersected partially with the city's water and sewer system which we had to climb under as that passage was only four feet high. .
Dude, this comment was incredibly cool! Fascinating. This should be the most thumbs upped comment in my opinion. 😅
Sounds like where bad Ronald lived...
Great adventure. Thanks 😊
I’m intrigued that you called the Rhode Island house “Victorian”, was she your Queen too?
In the uk, it can be for more nefarious deeds. Sussex is on the coast and has a very long history of smuggling. Many households have secret rooms and tunnels for moving items under the radar of taxation or illegality.
Those are not rooms, That is the crawl space and the attic. Most houses have those.
Most houses? None I've lived in have had them. And I've lived it some pretty big old houses.
@@MsPinkwolf that’s because big houses usually have basements instead of crawl spaces, and attics are sizable enough to turn into livable space. Greetings from the middle class!
@@samsaasen4922 lol 😂
@@MsPinkwolf did you check behind the book shelf? Lol
My 3 year old house also has a crawl space and attic ! Lmao
Thank you for showing quick progress, and opening the safe without multiple videos dragging out the process.
I think this is stage for a few reasons. 1) the creepy ladder is made out of newer 2x4 that aren''t all that old . 2) the safe by some stairs. The lock box inside has to date from around 1950 or so. I m guessing when he bought the house he was told about it . It's cool and would be interesting to do sift through the dirt under it to see what might have been dropped. I just don't think this is a forgotten secret room.
Ya at one point you can actually see PVC pipe too. Pretty sure they didn't have PVC in the mid 19th century.
I imagine the house has changed hands throughout the decades, with each new owner adding newer stuff to it. The passages could've been used repurposed as maintenance tunnels for the last renovation before it was sealed off.
That house has been worked on over the years. How does that make it staged. Clearly you can see that the house has areas that are unused.
its still cool tho lol
I agree, it totally looks like an area of recent construction probably adding additions to the existing house, the timber is way too new and even the brickwork looks too modern it's definitely not 500 years old.
My Great Grand Aunt's house was similar. When we were children staying over one summer me and my cousin found hidden rooms that was full of old 19th century clothing, furniture, books and lots of other things. We found several such rooms and I am sure there must have been others.
WOW!!! 😳
Wow ❤️
Tell us how you're born in old money without telling us you're born in old money 👍🏼
@@MollyHJohns trust me you don’t want this lifestyle. More money more problems.
@@B_COOPER nah, ill take those problems. Better to have those problems than broke problems.
Can we all agree that almost every person dreams to find a hidden room/passageway in their house? (Provided it's not full nefarious things)
Interesting story, just a shame it was filmed in portrait rather than landscape mode which rather ruins the viewing experience
Yeah portrait is made for selfies, as we are rather vertical creatures.
It didn't ruin my viewing experience at all!
It's standard TikTok format isn't it?
Being posted on tik tok ruined the experience lmao. China now knows that houses entire layout plan.
I never even noticed till I read your comment.
You need to understand that history (at least to me) has value as well. Seeing those letters and reading gives you a glance back in time. I love stuff like that. Thanks for sharing.
I'm from the US. I found this immensely interesting. I don't care that there wasn't anything of huge value. I just enjoyed the journey. (By the way, I can't imagine living in a place like that. It's amazing. I also really liked the old photos of your home from days gone by.)
What a fun adventure! Thanks for sharing with everyone!
My house is only 30 years old, built by my Grandfather. Made a small hiding place for stuff, just for fun, but also to hide some stuff from my monthly housecleaners! (I've had bad experiences once or twice.) Watched a vid of a guy in San Francisco who found a hidden room ... then found later it had a hidden door to a second hidden room ... ended up with a line of 4 hidden spaces that finally exited into the basement. He's thinking maybe its from the alcohol Prohibition days in the U.S.
That was amazing ! I'm so glad you didn't over sensualize it. It was perfect. I would really love to hear the whole letter 💌
Would absolutely love to have a personal library.
Me too, and I don't even read books.
A Kindle and a bathroom will work in a pinch.
I guarantee he hasn’t touched a single book in there
@@Tzreoaor you didnt watch the video! he touched them to remove them off the shelf 😂
Pretty obvious this room was previously discovered. The wood you removed to get in was clearly fresh wood.
I think this is staged, he knew about the room all along. Imagine owning a house and not knowing the way to the attic...
I believe that finding secret passages in your home 😮 is an awesome find In itself! Congratulations! 🎉
Hello how are you doing?
yeah - I found a couple of back passages in my home
Great history beyond the safe alone!!!! Thanks for not dragging this out in multiple videos...
Most houses of this kind of status had a full compliment of staff, from housekeepers to cooks to gardeners. These staff required rooms in which to live and work. They often also had secondary staircases and hallways to move around the house without disturbing the family and their guests. I think what we're seeing here is a mix of both. The stairs he found (with the safe) are too substantial to be mere maintenance rooms, but the opening behind the bookcase looks more like just a crawlspace left behind during construction. I think he's just found a crawlspace and followed it to find staff hallways that were likely blocked up and forgotten when it became uneconomical to have a staff, and too costly to renovate or make use of those drab spaces.
Plus 19th century (and earlier) staff staircases were built to lower (less safe) standards than the main house stairs so it may be better to "decommission" them than to risk anyone falling down them and getting hurt.
This "secret passage" dates from the 20th century, not 500 years ago. It provides access to pipes and other things that might need replacing or repair.
It does not say it is a 500 year old passage it says the house is 500 years old. Clearly the house has been worked in different eras.
Yes, and as another person mentioned, the corridors were perhaps to distribute the heat from the boilers throughout the house. Nice having easy access to the roof and crawlspaces for repair.
When I was a kid my dad was in the British army. He was posted over to Germany a couple of times. One of the bases we lived on dated from WW1. Dad took me to a big hall with wooden panels all around the walls. One of the panels opened,revealing a secret escape passage. The passage lead in to a tunnel which lead outside. I've always thought it was really cool.
I lived in a 140 year old house growing up till i was 12 , we rarely ever used the basement because the amount of work it needed i remember how it scared me as a kid id think chucky was gunna sweep my ankles as im going down 😂, but we had a huge hole under the house/ foundation that had our water pipes it was a crawlspace essentially and on the right side towards the walls covered in dirt and dust were 10-15 suit cases filled with old clothes and shoes all was left i lived in spokane washington. The clothes were at least from the 40’s
Was very interesting! I love that there were historical records in the safe! Much better find than jewelry. The books and letter tell a story, so that is priceless ❤
WHY FILM SOMETHING LIKE THIS ON TIKTOK??? I really hate that platform
me too. I don't why I hate TikTok
It is a dreadful platform. KZhead shorts are a travesty.
His mom and dad's house lmao
Wow that wooden ladder is looking great for 500 years old 😂 I don’t see why he had to pretend he didn’t know it was there
You have an amazing home. I wish you the best and maintaining, restoring and discovering it.
Dude I can't imagine being rich and owning a 500 year old home.
How is that not exciting? That is the most intriguing thing I've seen in ages!
Fascinating. No doubt that if anything of real value was found, they wouldn't announce to anyone beyond their immediate friends and family.
Not a secret “room”. It was a crawl space for maintenance. 2x4 ladder looked rather new. I worked on a house built circa 1777 in Vermont that may have been an inn as it had the stage coach stop and a carriage house too. This house did indeed have a secret room. The old swinging bookcase trick opened to a 20’x30’ room. Nicely decorated too.
So you had a big room that couldn't be maintanance room what was it for? And you found it untouched or it was in use?
@@kevincampos3797 The owners of the house knew it was there. They showed it to me. It was nicely decorated and was possibly used for meetings? This was certainly built for very moneyed people back in the day.
We love these things! I used to dream about finding rooms all the time!
So far, this is the best trailer for the House of Leaves movie.
Thamks soo much for opening your house to the world. 🥰🥰🥰 It was soo amazing to see and exciting.
Interesting. The lockbox looked relatively modern.
How the heck has this youth afforded this place?!?
It's his parents house he lives in it
Someone must have known about the hidden room because they didn't have screws when the house or the room were built.
That's fabulous treasure! Thank you for sharing.
Some old safes can be very dangerous to open..I had one with tear gas in glass mount inside the door and other areas, some can have explosives
This was fun to watch. Thank you.
“This room is huge”… staring into an empty attic.
*Well, I give this vid a solid 10 out of 10 for the instant gratification of not having to wait more than a few seconds between videos...* 👍👍👍
I have heard that those chambers under the home could serve several purposes, but some of them were used as a form of central heating. Heat up those spaces and all the connecting rooms are heated up by the central source, but in the summer time it helped keep them cool. Would make sense that they are for maintenance work though. Pretty awesome! Cant believe the way that you just chunked those scraps of book back onto the floor!
That makes sense!
The house is 500 years old. Those are almost certainly priest holes, in which Catholic priests -- or clergy of whatever religious group in England was being persecuted at the time -- could hide (if necessary) after performing forbidden religious rites.
Best comment!
Wonderful historic finds...The passages are quite a hidden feature. Thanks for sharing.
One of my most common recurring dreams is finding a secret room or wing in my home. I have no idea what it means, but since it's a recurring dream, I suspect it's my brain trying to sort through something. This feels like one of my dreams, except I usually find an entire in-law suite's worth of space. Yeah, that's weird. It definitely means something.
I have had that same recurring dream for many years, but the details of the hidden space will change. I'm glad to know that I am not the only one. It's always a little disappointing to awaken from that dream.
Should’ve sent the safe to LockPickingLawyer. Most of those safes are empty but the antique safes themselves are worth quite a bit if they are undamaged.
The fact he found stuff in the safe that the previous owners stored away at some point is pretty interesting. I am sure that house has other secrets to be unlocked.
I can't imagine the shipping cost.
@@p0llenp0ny Yeah the size and weight would add up. Especially for overseas.
Would love to see an approximate floor plan of the hidden section of the house!
I had a dream as a kid with a library like that and a secret passage that ran throughout the house. It also lead to a secret room that looked like a secret reading space with a recliner and lamp…
Read the book, "The Velvet Room". Similar to your dream.😊
@@dlbstl I’ll check it out!
I could live just in that library. 😳
I find it unbelievably odd that people who have the good fortune to find some hidden room and the like will advertise the fact internationally on the web and detail everything they do and find. If I was so fortunate, I would absolutely keep it, and anything I found in the room a secret.
When I bought my first castle at 22 years old it had alot of hidden treasures, and rooms.
Thoroughly enjoyed your video! Can't wait to see more!
thanks for that vid bro! That was awesome!👌
So exciting! Thank you for sharing this!
:42 i got chills, great video right away showing the areas…!
You house looks amazing to explore...so much history 😍
It is so interesting!! Having secret passages in your own house! I do need more videos on these. tqvm for sharing
Wow, that’s awesome to live in a house like that with so much history in it. I wish I could see it in person. I love English history and I’ve been to the UK before. Lord willing I hope to visit Scotland next. Enjoy your beautiful historical home. Thanks for sharing
Its awesome to see people take care of these historic homes instead of building new ones
I think that was more or less a way for workers to access areas of the house for repairs and whatnot
No. It is an area of the house that did not get used over the years especially in modern times.
This is fascinating! Thank you for sharing with us!
You are very blessed to have such wealth and a beautiful library like this one with all this great history.
Stunning house! How fun with all the interesting little crawlspaces. Thank you for sharing.
Watching this video was so entertaining. I loved that you did it in a way that made it interesting without a lot of wasted time! I really enjoyed it!
It was alot of fun an I was very excited to see each segment. Thank you for sharing.
The library alone is literally bigger than my whole apartment :')
I enjoy these types of videos. I've seen a few videos where people have found hidden stairwells within there homes while renovating old chateaus. I think they were calling the stairwells servants stairs. I'm in the US so we don't have such things in our older homes. Maybe the Biltmore in NC probably does as it's massive.
Many older large homes had a separate, smaller staircase for servants, so they could travel from the kitchen/workrooms to their attic rooms without intruding on the family areas.
Vineville Court (apartments) on Vineville Ave. in Mâcon, Georgia, USA, had servant stairs & servant entrances when I lived there in 1990s.
You mentioned North Carolina.... In Charlotte the large old house on Morehead Street and has the bridge for South Blvd under it, they used to run across each other long ago but were made into a ramped interchange, then the ramps were removed to make the roads 4 lanes.... Anyway in this large house, it has an older smaller stair case in the back that has been sealed up and covered multiple times. The crawl spaces behind the walls still had all the various lighting methods. I mean gas piping at mid wall level for gas light sconces, that then were electrical back when it was single strand "ceramic knob insulators" then upgraded over the years. What has been built and taken off and out of that house in paragraphs of history and that would be only what I found when working on building and removing a "Hunted House" that was in there one year. The shelving in the basement had newspaper from the 1930's and 1940's on top but when you lifted those up you saw where the wooden shelves had been covered with newspaper from the late 1800's. In all the nooks and crannies you could find evidence left telling the story of this large old house that used to overlook (today I-277) but prior the Brooklyn Neighborhood(now having he name reused from the neighborhood small community that was outside Charlotte city limits. This House precedes the building of the nicer older homes and remote suburb that had street car service to cover such a large remote distance which is called the Dilworth Part of Uptown..... This old history is many old large homes, it just not documented and the workers couldn't document stuff but did talk amongst themselves. City code inspectors that had been to the building all through their multiple decades would tell stories of what was once there.... The one thing in the south and especial North Carolina is no preservation of history and historic buildings. If it more than 50 years old it has to go for something newer and shinier. If you don't the city will send the jack booted code enforcement against you until you give up and sell because you can't afford to meet their "gotta look nice new, (City fo Charlotte does not care if you are suffering , disabled....etc. if your grass gets too high, if you home doesn't promote that this land of perfect with everything up to Biddy hens standards...) They'll start harassing you, fine for grass getting too high, having to depend on free help because you can't afford a lawn service, means you're at their mercy for when they feel like and those fines from the city are you problem...... and then the city will put liens against you home for these "fines" that will be forced collected through their courts to take your home, making you homeless.... Then that old home will be sold and they tear down too build something new on the lot, because finally they got rid of that owner living in that old house hurting their values and ruining the image of Charlotte as modern city. Sounds absurd and impossible to be true type of rant, did to me until I'm living it.
Many old mansion level homes in the US have servant's passages, but some of them have been renovated out to reclaim the space. These old European houses are from an era when an entire floor might be devoted to cooking and employed a dozen people, never mind all the maids, butlers, nannies, etc. In any case, we built a mansion in Norfolk, VA not that long ago that was riddled with "hidden" service passages. It even had a hidden elevator in it. It was a monumental waste of space, but that's what the guy wanted and it was pretty cool.
Thank you so much for sharing all of this! The true treasure is the book about the house itself, I imagine.
I would not call it a hidden room, but rather access to a crawl space. The documents/books/letters are interesting and I hope that you preserve them.
Honestly this is so cool. To get that information adds at least sentimental value to the house beside the historical info!
this was really cool, thank you for sharing !
That is some house you have! Very lucky fellow. Beautiful.
Amazing house, videos, and finds! Thank you for sharing!
I thought this was a fun video to watch. I appreciated that it was all one video and you didn’t leave us hanging. Cool history and even cooler house!
I don't know that access-panels and standard size crawl-spaces really qualify as "secret passages"
Greetings from Vancouver Island B.C.Canada. Loved this video.I have always loved mysteries,and even though not being there physicality.You Tube has opened that door.Great video!Thanks for sharing😃
OMG, I was so dismayed when I saw the state of the ceiling in that grand room in the first shot ( :04 ) but then you at 1:03 you go back and the ceiling is BEAUTIFUL! I know its not my place, not my business and shouldnt be my concern, but thank you for doing such lovely restoration work on the ceiling!
Fantastic! Thank you for sharing.
This is amazing and very exciting. Thank you so much. Blessings. Ruthie. California USA.
I think that is so cool! What an awesome adventure!!! Thank you for taking us on it with you.
Thank you for posting this. My life is also a sad disappointment and your video helped me.
No one’s life is a sad disappointment, happiness is on the inside. I find talking to God helps me. Please seek counseling so you don’t feel that way. You might try walking on the beach to help you feel better. Either way please know that I’m praying for you
Nice to hear Cannons playing in the background. Great band.
2:30 is EXACTLY how evil spirits escape their prisons.
This was a great video. It was fun in a historical sense, showing parts of this house hidden from the world.
Totally cool! I’m not upset you didn’t find jewels or something. I just love the discovery and the fun of seeing it. Plus, the old documents are beautiful. My favorite was actually the conservatory. I’d just love to have that library…
That was very exciting! Thank you!
Always use a grinder. You were very lucky the blowtorch didn't burn the contents of the safe. An amazing historical find. It may rewrite the history books for the area.
Check out those old books in the underground room. Check for original dates that the books were printed.
It would be a dream to live in house like that. I love anything historical I have such an interest in it. Its absolutely lovely.
Nothing beats British humour.... "toss a hammer at it." Basements can be a wonderful adventure.
Not disappointed at all! After seeing so many fake videos, you really just start to appreciate authenticity...
Many houses have hidden cellars that used to be water tanks. They became useless when water pumps were replaced by running water.
Yeah, the first castle i bought at 23 years old had a few hidden rooms. Found a few marble statues under the library in the second one.
Good Gods that's some effort; I hope there is something cool in there! Loved the old corridors and paperwork. Stairs leading to attic and crawlspaces, neat, allowing repair/upgrading without tearing it apart. Now? I'd love to see you use some of those new spaces that aren't strictly for construction! A wine cellar? A mushroom room? A reading niche? You'd have to permenently move a bookshelf and have a door built in, but it might be really cool. I wonder what some of the areas were built FOR?
Extremely cool and interesting. Thanks for sharing!
Cool; thanks for posting.
Such a great delivery you seem like interesting person to follow
That is so cool! Would love to hear more about the history of this place.
Thank you for a fascinating post. Love your home. South africa 🇿🇦