A GHOSTLY figure has appeared in the photograph of a holidaymaker snapping his family at Church Cove, Gunwalloe.

Warren Smith and his family were visiting Cornwall earlier in the year and during a trip to St Winwaloe Church on the Lizard Peninsula, he inadvertently took the picture of a mysterious figure of a man in a bowler hat.

He said: "When I came out of the church, I stood on a step for the photo because you can see the sea from there.

"My brother and dad are both in the picture and after I took it we just carried on with our day. It was only when we got home later and had a look at them, that we came across the figure in black - god knows where he came from."

Warren sent the picture to Rupert Matthews, the author of Mysterious Cornwall, who asked a professional to examine it. The conclusion was "origin unknown".

The large black figure has the sea line going through it and also vegetation in front of him, requiring an extremely advanced crop on Photoshop to manufacture such an image.

It is not the only occasion on which Warren says he has experienced such a phenomenon.

He added: "We also had an experience on the rear side of the island in St Ives.

"Whilst on holiday again I went ghost hunting with my father, two brothers and sister in-law. We sat down on the bench, it was 12:10am and we all heard horse hooves really loud and clear coming towards us.

"It got closer and closer over what seemed to be 10-15 seconds, it stopped when it sounded like a few metres away. It sounded exactly as loud as you would expect it to be."

The spooky snap at Gunwalloe has formed the basis of a film by two Cornish You Tubers.

Their channel, Cornish Walking Trails, lifts the lid on walks around the county and they have made a special Hallowe'en edition featuring Warren's picture.

To watch the video following the link: https://youtu.be/pe845_zJqYM