The eerie and unsettling phenomenon of the Black Eyed Children—also known as Black-Eyed Kids or BEKs—remained largely obscure until the mid-1990s. During this time, accounts of these strange entities began surfacing online, prompting an increasing number of people to come forward with their own chilling encounters. However, reports of these ominous visitors date back much further.
One of the earliest recorded instances of such an encounter occurred in 1950, when a 16-year-old boy in rural Virginia returned home in a state of sheer panic. Sobbing uncontrollably, young Harold Whitaker told his father that he had encountered a boy of similar age leaning against a gatepost along his walk home from school. As Harold approached, the boy stepped forward and, in an oddly commanding tone, stated, “I want to go to your house. You will walk me to your house.”
A representation of Black Eyed Children
It was then that Harold noticed the boy’s unsettling, pitch-black eyes. A wave of overwhelming fear and unease washed over him, accompanied by the disturbing sensation that the stranger was somehow reading his thoughts. The dark-eyed adolescent blocked his path, repeating his demand and forbidding Harold from running. Suddenly, Harold felt lightheaded, his mind clouded by an inexplicable urge to obey. But just as he was about to comply, pure panic took hold, and he bolted. As he fled, the last thing he heard was a terrifying, animal-like howl behind him.
Brian Bethel and the Black Eyed Children
Despite earlier cases like Harold’s, it was a 1996 account that truly thrust the Black-Eyed Kids into public consciousness. That year, Brian Bethel, a resident of Abilene, Texas, shared his chilling experience online. According to his post, he had been sitting in his car on North First Street, writing out a check, when an unexpected knock on his driver’s side window startled him. Looking up, he was surprised to see two boys standing outside. By his estimation, they were around 9 and 12 years old. What followed would become one of the most infamous encounters with the Black-Eyed Children.
The older of the two boys spoke first in a flat and emotionless tone, saying they had no money and needed a ride home. There was something profoundly unnatural about them, something that sent an instinctive wave of dread through Bethel. He stammered an excuse, insisting he couldn’t help. At this, the boys’ expressions darkened. Their demeanor shifted as they pressed him, urging him to let them in.
Then, something truly terrifying happened. Bethel glanced down and saw his own hand moving toward the door handle against his will. A surge of panic jolted him back to reality. Fighting the unnatural pull, he quickly rolled up the window, locked the doors, and sped off into the night. When he glanced into his rearview mirror, he was met with an impossible sight. The boys had vanished. There was no sign of them anywhere, as if they had never been there at all.
Black Eyed Children of Cannock Chase
Another chilling encounter unfolded decades later in England’s Staffordshire County. On the morning of September 13, 2004, a husband and wife were walking their dog through the dense woodland of Cannock Chase Nature Reserve. As they neared an area known as Style Cop, the sound of a child’s laughter suddenly filled the air, coming from the shadowy undergrowth.
The couple paused and scanned the trees for the source of the giggling. As abruptly as it had begun, it stopped. They hesitated a moment longer before deciding to continue their walk. When they turned, they found themselves face to face with a young girl standing directly in their path.
She wore an old-fashioned white dress, her expression frozen in a hauntingly unsettling smile. But it was her eyes that held them captive. Two soulless voids of unbroken blackness. The couple attempted to speak to her, but she did not respond. She did not move. She only stared.
The husband later recalled something deeply disturbing. Throughout the encounter, the girl had her head tilted to one side at an unnatural angle that appeared almost painful, as though her neck had been broken. The eerie position of her head resembled that of someone who had been hanged.
The couple’s experience was not unique. Over the years, numerous witnesses have reported seeing the same black-eyed girl in Cannock Chase. Her presence has given rise to speculation about who or what she really is. The mystery remains, unsettling those who have encountered her.
Black Eyed Children, also called as Black Eyed Kids have been reported to be sighted across the world
During the mid-1960s, a series of brutal murders took place along the A34 road, later becoming known as the Cannock Chase murders. The bodies of six-year-old Margaret Reynolds and five-year-old Diana Tift were discovered partially hidden in a ditch at Mansty Gully in January 1966. Both girls had vanished months earlier while traveling to and from school in different parts of the West Midlands.
The following year, another body was found less than a mile away. This time, it was seven-year-old Christine Darby. The police dedicated hundreds of hours to tracking down the killer, but it wasn’t until November 1968 that the case saw a breakthrough. Witnesses to the attempted abduction of a ten-year-old girl in Walsall provided police with a car registration number, leading to the arrest of Raymond Leslie Morris.
Morris was already known to authorities due to his obsession with young girls and had been questioned during the investigation into Christine Darby’s disappearance. While he was in custody, his wife admitted that he had pressured her into giving him a false alibi for the day Darby went missing. He was eventually convicted of her murder and remained in prison until his death in 2014, making him one of England’s longest-serving inmates. Though never convicted for the murders of Reynolds and Tift, many believed he was responsible for their deaths as well.
Soon after Morris’s incarceration, reports of a ghostly girl haunting Cannock Chase began to surface. Many local residents believe the black-eyed girl is the restless spirit of one of his victims, unable to move on. The idea that these haunting figures may be the ghosts of murdered children is a compelling one. Their repeated and unsettling behaviors bear similarities to those associated with phantom hitchhikers. However, most encounters with black-eyed children are too isolated or bizarre to be explained as simple ghost stories. Some believe that rather than being lost spirits, these beings are something else entirely.
Black Eyed Children in Other Cultures
These entities may not be mere lost spirits but something far more sinister. In ancient Celtic traditions, children with black eyes were feared as otherworldly demons, roaming the human world in search of blood rituals and sacrifices. Across the ocean, various Native American cultures held similar beliefs. To the Iroquois, these beings were linked to the Otcon, a malevolent force that sought to infect a tribe from within, turning its members against one another, beginning with the most vulnerable—the children.
As recently as 2017, residents of a Native Oglala reservation at Pine Ridge, South Dakota, called upon a shaman to bless their encampment after a string of disturbing encounters. Over several weeks, strange children with haunting black eyes approached the borders of the camp, coaxing the Sioux children to play with them. Their eerie appearance and soulless eyes, however, frightened the children, who refused to engage. The strangers then turned their attention to the adults, speaking in flat, emotionless voices, asking for food and shelter. When denied, one of the children chillingly asked if anyone had any blood to spare before vanishing into the woods. In the following weeks, several pets went missing, but after the shaman’s blessing, the disturbances ceased.
In many encounters, such as the one in Vermont, witnesses have reported seeing the black-eyed children in the company of mysterious figures believed to be Men in Black. Sometimes, these shadowy individuals are seen chauffeuring the children in dark vehicles. In other cases, they have been observed ushering the black-eyed children away or even visiting witnesses in the aftermath of an encounter. This connection has fueled speculation that the children might be extraterrestrial in origin, or perhaps human children who have been abducted and altered in some way.
The mystery of the Black Eyed Children endures to this date, with new sightings being reported annually.
The fact that they appear to possess psychic influence and the ability to instill overwhelming fear has led some to theorize that they are part of—or escapees from—a classified government experiment. Others believe they are simply an urban legend, a modern creepypasta that has gained traction through online storytelling. A certain percentage of the reports are undoubtedly fabrications, the work of imaginative minds looking to spread fear. The availability of full-eye black sclera contact lenses, often used in horror films, provides a simple explanation for at least some of these encounters. Additionally, certain medications cause the pupils to dilate unnaturally, and environmental lighting could create the illusion of entirely black eyes.
One of the most puzzling aspects of the black-eyed children phenomenon is the lack of photographic or video evidence. In an era dominated by smartphones and advanced surveillance, no compelling footage has surfaced. A subscriber recently shared a supposed encounter while working security at an abandoned building. He described two young figures approaching the fence, asking to take shelter. Initially, they kept their heads down, but when he refused and asked about their parents, they lifted their faces, revealing jet-black eyes. In the CCTV footage, the guard is clearly seen conversing with someone and visibly recoils when he claims to have seen their eyes. However, the security cameras failed to capture the figures entirely, making it appear as though he was speaking to no one.
A recurring theme in supernatural accounts is the emphasis on the eyes. From ghosts to aliens to legendary monsters, many of the most terrifying creatures are said to have eyes that lack pupils or irises, often appearing as a single, unnatural color. Red and black are the most frequently described, colors deeply tied to fear and malevolence across cultures. This common thread suggests that black-eyed children may not be a unique phenomenon but rather a recurring horror archetype, a shape-shifting legend that drifts between ghost stories, extraterrestrial encounters, and paranormal folklore.
Despite the skepticism, reports of encounters with these strange visitors continue to emerge, each one more unsettling than the last. Their motives remain unclear. Their presence remains unexplained. All we can say is this—if you hear an insistent knocking in the dead of night, keep your doors locked, your windows shut, and your camera ready.
Next, read about the Mystery of the Inunaki Village, and then, the Baltic Sea Anomaly!
