There are few North East mysteries as strange—or as quietly unsettling—as the tale of the Hexham Heads. It began in 1971 in the market town of Hexham, when two young brothers, Colin and Leslie Robson, were playing in their back garden. As children do, they were digging about in the soil when they uncovered something unusual—two small stone heads, each roughly carved, no bigger than a cricket ball, with exaggerated features and hollow, staring eyes. At first, it seemed like nothing more than a curious find. Their parents, John and Anne Robson, brought the objects inside, placing them on a shelf. But soon after, the house began to change. Strange things were reported almost immediately. Objects moved on their own. There were scratching sounds in the night. The boys spoke of a “half-man, half-beast” creature they claimed to see lurking in their room. Mrs Robson, too, reported hearing something pacing upstairs when no one else was awake. What made the story all the more unsettling was the consistency of the accounts. This wasn’t a single moment of fright—it was something that seemed to linger. The heads themselves became the focus of attention. Some believed they were ancient, possibly Celtic in origin—ritual objects tied to old, forgotten practices. Others dismissed them as modern carvings, nothing more than coincidence wrapped in imagination. The family eventually contacted experts, including members of the British Museum. The heads were examined, but no definitive conclusion was reached about their age or origin. While some archaeologists were sceptical, the story had already taken on a life of its own. Enter Dr. Anne Ross, an expert in Celtic studies, who believed the heads might indeed have ritual significance. She took possession of them for further study—and for a time, the disturbances in the Robson household seemed to stop. But the calm didn’t last. Reports later emerged that similar strange occurrences followed the heads wherever they went. Visitors spoke of unease, of things not quite right. Then, as quietly as they had appeared, the Hexham Heads vanished. Lost, misplaced, or perhaps deliberately hidden away—they have not been seen publicly since. To this day, the mystery remains unsolved. Were they ancient artefacts tied to Britain’s distant past? A case of mass suggestion and fear taking hold in a family home? Or something stranger still, rooted in folklore that refuses to stay buried? In the North East, stories like this tend to linger—passed down in pubs, in living rooms, in half-whispered conversations. The Hexham Heads are one of those tales. Not quite history, not quite myth—but something in between. And like many things unearthed from the ground, perhaps they were never meant to be found at all. #mystery #hexham #northumberland #saxon #scary - @north.east.stories