Would you wander in the woods alone? You’ll probably be fine, what harm can it do? That’s what everyone says, before they go to Cannock Chase. 

“Cannock Chase is one of the most active paranormal hotspots in the whole of the British Isles” says paranormal author and investigator, Lee Brickley who has devoted his years to studying the conspiracy of the Cannock Chase ghost sightings. 

The Chase is known for its peaceful nature, its large forests for hiking and its huge wild deer population. 

Cannock Chase is believed to be a portal to the unknown and for many years individuals have come forward to voice their encounters with oddities of the paranormal. Sightings such as small ghostly children with big black eyes, large Victorian ghost-like figures, and big black pumas roaming around land.

The Black Eyed Children conspiracy is based on The Cannock Chase murders that occurred in the late sixties where the bodies of three young girls were found. The murders happened over a span of two years and a man named Raymond Morris was arrested after attempting to abduct another potential victim and he was sentenced to life in prison. 

A couple of campers in 2021 confessed to encountering one of the Black Eyed Children, who seemed to be giggling and moving in ways that ‘humans can’t move’ when trying to hide behind trees. 

The ghosts are said to be the young girls who were murdered, and they haunt the area where they were found. A resident of Cannock, Gary Shipman, visits the Chase for leisure and to investigate for paranormal activity with his EVP recorder, which are often used to capture spirit voices. 

“It was around 2am when we came out of the German Cemetery in the Chase, and opposite in the trees there was some movement. We stood and watched, shone our torches but we couldn’t see anything or hear anyone. 

Then, suddenly we heard a young girl’s voice say “help me, please help me.” So we went a little bit closer and I saw part of a white figure, it looked like their clothes but it turned away so we couldn’t see anything else. I was wearing an EVP recorder at the time so I still have the recording on there. It was really strange.” 

“I had another experience in the same area of Cannock Chase when me and my friend were walking back to our car at about 3 in the morning. We heard a noise behind us, probably about one hundred metres away, so we shone our torches and there was a figure crouched down, we started walking towards it. 

The figure then stood up and looked straight towards us. I’m not exaggerating when I say that it must have been about eight feet tall. The figure then turned away and leapt into the trees, we also ran pretty quickly back to our car then.” 

Another local, Ryan Hartfield, had a similar experience with a large ghostly man. The conspiracy says that he resembles Slenderman, and he wears a long overcoat. He usually appears in Castle Ring, a part of the Chase where it is believed that satanic rituals were performed there many years ago. And many residents say they have never felt at ease there. 

“I was driving up to Cannock Wood with my mates, we were probably in our twenties at the time. As we were driving past the shop, my friend suddenly stopped the car. We had a look to see why he’d stopped and it was because this figure had stepped out in front of us and was walking across the road. I didn’t think anything of it at first until I had a proper look at him.

It looked like a fisherman, with a long black coat and hat, we could see all the creases on his clothing but we could see straight through him. I couldn’t believe my eyes, I thought I was just seeing things but when I went to turn to my mate to tell him, I could see the look on his face and I knew then that it was not a real person we were looking at.

We watched it as it walked to the other side of the road and then vanished. My mates were in just as much shock as I was. All three of us had witnessed it and I’ve never seen anything like it since but it scared the sh*t out of us.”

While many are convinced that Cannock Chase holds untold mysteries and spooky conspiracies, not everyone is a believer. Michael Humphrey, a Cannock local, has grown up around the Chase and stands firmly behind his belief that there has never been any strange activity at all. 

“I have walked around Cannock Chase day and night, many many times and I have always been alone. The only thing I’ve ever been scared of is my own shadow or bumping into a sleeping deer. 

There isn’t any evidence backing these theories of black eyed ghosts and all that nonsense but I think people just like to have something to talk about, maybe it’s thrilling for them. People love a good ghost story, but they’ll believe anything nowadays, and everything is a conspiracy, especially on FaceBook.

In my opinion it’s probably teenagers messing around. If you go to the Chase with the purpose of finding all these ‘ghosts’, you’d convince yourself that any old noise means something so I’m not that surprised that people are still going on about it.” 

One of the most debatable theories in the UK is that big cats are roaming the countryside, but in Cannock Chase many people have reported seeing phantom cats or British black pumas. In Shirley McGregor’s account she claimed she and her husband spotted a big black cat over twenty years ago.

“My husband, daughter and I saw a big black cat, it looked like a panther. We were driving through Cannock Chase to get to Rugeley in the evening, and then this big cat crossed the road. 

My husband put the hazards on and stopped the car. It was crouched down by the side of the road looking at us with huge yellow eyes. 

We stayed in the car for a few minutes, watching it but then it ran off. It was far too big to be a domestic cat, this was before phone cameras but we have no doubt in what we saw.” 

It is believed that these exotic cats were released into the wild in the 1970s and the ones that are roaming around are actually in the area. There were pictures released in the last few years of a black puma in Cannock Chase known as The Staffordshire Panther but it has never been captured since. Although it is a common conspiracy in the British countryside it is now to be confirmed true but sightings are still extremely rare.  

Gary Shipman also recalls a time where he was walking his dog and encountered something strange. “My dog Lucy had lost her ball and because she wouldn’t ever run away from us, we started looking for it with her. 

My wife and I were both walking at around dusk by the old German cemetery and while we were looking for Lucy’s ball we’d managed to both get lost. This was the first time it had happened and we usually walked in the day-time but it was getting quite dark. 

Out of nowhere this lone lady started walking up to us. We asked her how to get back to the graves but she just stared at us blankly and carried on walking but it was more like weird hovering. When my wife looked back at her, she was gone. It really creeped us out, more my wife than me but I still think about it sometimes and it must have been about ten years ago now.”

After all of these accounts, from Cannock Chase locals themselves, I will ask you again, would you wander alone in these woods at night?