diff --git a/mercurial/hg.py b/mercurial/hg.py
--- a/mercurial/hg.py
+++ b/mercurial/hg.py
@@ -1255,6 +1255,9 @@ class localrepository:
         for f in remove:
             self.ui.note("removing %s\n" % f)
             os.unlink(f)
+            # try removing directories that might now be empty
+            try: os.removedirs(os.path.dirname(f))
+            except: pass
         if mode == 'n':
             self.dirstate.forget(remove)
         else:
diff --git a/tests/test-empty-dir b/tests/test-empty-dir
new file mode 100755
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test-empty-dir
@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+
+hg init
+echo 123 > a
+hg add a
+hg commit -t "first" -u test -d "0 0" a
+mkdir sub
+echo 321 > sub/b
+hg add sub/b
+hg commit -t "second" -u test -d "0 0" sub/b
+cat sub/b
+hg co 0
+cat sub/b
+ls sub
+
+true
diff --git a/tests/test-empty-dir.out b/tests/test-empty-dir.out
new file mode 100644
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test-empty-dir.out
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+321
+cat: sub/b: No such file or directory
+ls: sub: No such file or directory