A phantom coach and four.
Location: Mickleton - General area
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Another site where this popular local folkloric phantom vehicle would be driven around after dark.
Location: Old Hill - Private residence along Lansbury Road
Type: Other
Date / Time: May 1999
Further Comments: A family fled their home after hearing loud bangs and scratching sounds throughout the night. An uncle who stayed after the family left realised the noises were coming from the chimney and, together with a gas engineer, freed a trapped cat that fled the scene.
Location: Oldbury - Blue Ball public house
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Late twentieth century
Further Comments: This figure, complete with an old beaten up hat, has been seen walking through a wall in the bar area.
Location: Quarry Bank - Private residence
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: 1993/94
Further Comments: A ghosthunter said he had been called to visit a property in this village after items moved from room to room, and pictures removed from walls.
Location: Romsley - Bromsgrove Road
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 02 May 2010
Further Comments: The local press carried a story that Parasearch were investigating this road after receiving a report of a phantom black haired woman in a cream coloured cloak who stood on the roadside holding a staff.
Location: Rowley Regis - Bluestone Walk
Type: UFO
Date / Time: 4 January 1979
Further Comments: Three figures, all less than four foot tall with tissue paper wings, drifted into a house in the town and interrogated a housewife for an hour. She said they looked like fairies, though they had laser beams on top of their heads and left via an eight foot long UFO.
Location: Rowley Regis - Haden Hall
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Eighteenth century onwards
Further Comments: Elaine (or Eleanor) and a monk were walled up alive in a secret tunnel which ran between the hall and Hales Abbey after their secret affair was discovered. She is said to now appear near the hall searching for her long dead lover, her hands clasped in regret. Another ghost which haunts the site has been named as Annie Eliza, the last Haden.
Location: Sedgley - Beacon Hotel
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1990s
Further Comments: Former landlady Sarah may still keep an eye on her former pub; one witness observed a female form walking through a wall, while sounds of movement can be detected emerging from empty rooms. A man in old fashioned clothing has also been observed on the site.
Location: Sedgley - Turls Hill
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Folklore places a veiled lady with her two adult sons in this area. The woman's children are said to have taken their own lives nearby in separate incidents.
Location: Sedgley - White Lion Inn
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: The inn appeared in the local press in 2023 when placed on the market, with one of the unique selling points being two ghosts (a Royalist soldier, and a former landlady).
Location: Shard End - All Saints Church and Shard End Lake areas
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1991
Further Comments: A man wearing a top hat and black-tailed coat, carrying a cane is said to haunt this area, and may have been spotted several times by the same witness in 1991.
Location: Smethwick - Black Patch Park, area near the canal
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970
Further Comments: This female entity vanished in front of one witness who walked through the park pushing a pram.
Location: Smethwick - St Philip's Church
Type: Other
Date / Time: Circa 1954, mid-summer
Further Comments: Two young boys playing in the church grounds were close to the statue of Saint Philip. They watched the left hand suddenly break off and fall to the ground, leaving a black void in place of the hand. The boys looked away for a few minutes and when they looked back the left hand was back in place.
Location: Smethwick - Thimblemill Baths
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2010s
Further Comments: Popular with ghost hunting teams, this building is reputedly home to several paranormal entities, including a horse, a figure in a green boiler suit, and a female named Emily.
A ghostly grey lady.
Location: Smethwick - Warley Abbey (no longer standing)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: Unknown
Further Comments: Though the area is now a public park, the area where the abbey once stood is still haunted by the lady in grey. It is rumoured she committed suicide after a love affair.
Location: Solihull - Park Hall (demolished 1970), Castle Bromwich
Type: Other
Date / Time: Pre-1970 (or 1930)
Further Comments: A family living in the hall left in 1930 after being driven out by the ghost (or, at least, stories about the ghost). Tales of a phantom being seen or strange noises heard persisted for a few more decades, although a 1958 newspaper article featured a local Alderman who claimed any haunting on the site to be a myth.
Location: Solihull - Private residence, Chelmsley Wood
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 2018/9
Further Comments: A shadowy figure wearing a Fedora and coat was spotted by several occupants of a flat. Electronic toys would also turn themselves on for no apparent reason.
Location: Solihull - Red Lion (aka The Lion Sport & Eat), Shirley
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: August 2021
Further Comments: This pub featured in local press after a vase moved unaided and fell from a shelf. It was reportedly not the first time items had been relocated.
Location: Solihull - Road between town and Elmdon Heath
Type: Other
Date / Time: 1907
Further Comments: Tales of a phantom dressed in white were put to bed after a worker was found walking along the road by police at night. It was said he wore white to ensure he was seen by motorcyclists.
Location: Stechford - The Meadway
Type: UFO
Date / Time: 1982
Further Comments: Driving back from work in the early hours of the morning, this witness spotted a halo shaped object hovering and darting around the sky before vanishing.
Location: Stourbridge - Badgers Sett public house (was Gypsy's Tent pub)
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: 1970s onwards
Further Comments: Nicknamed Bella, the phantom woman said to haunt the cellar and bar area is said to be connected to the body of a female which was found in Wych Hazel nearby. A ghostly male in uniform has also been spotted on the road outside the pub.
Location: Stourbridge - Hagley Wood
Type: Other
Date / Time: 1940s
Further Comments: A woman discovered inside the hollow trunk of a Wych Hazel was thought to have been murdered in an unknown ritual. Shortly after the crime, graffiti sprang up asking 'who put Bella in the Wych Elm?'. The crime remains unsolved to this day, and animals are reported to be weary of the area.
Location: Stourbridge - Old Manor House
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: January 1927
Further Comments: Arthur Robinson Wright wrote that hundreds of people flocked to this house after a ghostly, seven foot tall nurse appeared.
Location: Stourbridge - Private residence, Wollescote
Type: Haunting Manifestation
Date / Time: July 1983
Further Comments: A witness listened to the sound of an old fashioned steam train approach her bedroom before feeling something rush past her.
Location: Stourbridge - The One Stop Shop, Norton
Type: Poltergeist
Date / Time: 2003
Further Comments: This shop was plagued by poltergeist like behaviour, the management putting the blame on 'bad electrics', while staff and visitors saying that the contents of the shelves were being pushed to the ground by 'something else'. A local psychic claimed the ghost of an old woman was to blame, and that he had moved her on.