Eyes! Eyes! Eyes! Introduction

It was then the "Prairie Squirrels" were at Parvillers that Pete Mullins was sent down the line as a shell-shocked case, with every man in his platoon knowing that he had not been near a shell explosion. Yet none of them derided him, or said that he was swinging the lead, for he was, for the time at least, as pitiful physical wreck as one would care to see.
He kept hiding his face with his hands, and shuddering, and when they got him to bed at the hospital he lay for six days with his face to the wall. When they spoke to him all he would say was "Eyes-eyes-eyes."
Ted Hiller was with Pete all that terrible day when he saw the eyes, and it was Ted who told me the story.

A tale so chilling it could only be true

Hello again fellow traveler, and thank you for joining me in this bizarre land.

Yesterday in my travels I came across a tale so macabre it could easily have been penned by the likes of Poe or Lovecraft, yet the author is not an up and coming genius nor an over looked master. His pen will not present another tale such as this as I suspect he has long passed on, and I truly pray his soul will receive the peace it deserves after the horrors it has endured. For the Author of this piece was a veteran of the Great War, and the tale too terrible is in fact true.

As I am thrilled by classic horrors, they are typically born of the early twentieth century. Naturally I have an affinity for this time period, and one could hardly ignore the most amazing and terrible events that occurred and shaped the world ever after. Naturally I am speaking of the Great War: WWI (1914-1918) and WWII (1939-1945). True to life tales of heroism and suffering. Men living on earthly soil in conditions more resembling a tale of Dante's Inferno than sunny France or perhaps peaceful Russia. And everywhere around them were the dead and dying. Bodies purifying and decaying for days or longer until at some point they could be claimed and placed to rest if at all.

So it is perhaps not so surprising that this macabre terror I am about to bring to you over the next few posts comes from the accounts of an individual who survived such atrocities. Originally published in the LEGION MAGAZINE and later compiled into the book True Canadian War Stories, I bring you William R. Bird's Eyes! Eyes! Eyes!

To their left the staring dead eyes of an enemy's corpse festering in the heat of day. To their right mysterious hateful eyes that could only be in their imagination and to move would mean certain death.

King of Fools

Greetings and Condolences once again my friend. Certainly you didn't think I would let April Fools Day go by without a post. While other Horror sites and blogs are undoubtedly posting about a sub par 1980's slasher flick titled as such, or it's 2008 remake, I aspire to present slightly greater moments in movie history.


The Year is 1482 and city of Paris is in celebration. Here in a great square before the Notre Dame Cathedral it is the Festival of Fools. High above it all we are introduced to Lon' Chaney's Quasimodo, "Deaf - half-blind - shut off from his fellow men by his deformities the bells were the only voice of his groping soul. To the towns people he was an inhuman freak, a monstrous joke of Nature and for their jeers he gave them scorn and bitter hate."


His heart was cold and black with spite for all humanity. But there was one whom he would open his heart to. To her he would offer his love, his devotion, his protection and in the end ultimately his very life.

Esmeralda, a gentle and fair beauty. A champion for what is good and pure. To the unjustly condemned Gringoir the poet she would offer justice and release from his fate. To beautiful and charismatic Phoebus de Chateaupers, Captain of the guard she would offer her heart and desire. So what would she offer one such as Quasimodo?

To him she offered pity and nothing more. The same as she would likely offer to a flogged nag, or a beaten mongrel. She would eventually look upon him kindly but that would be all she was willing to give. And when Quasimodo died, she was enjoying a happy ending in the arms of another and only the bells and his one true friend the Cathedral's minister mourned him.

Perhaps he was the King of the Fools after all.

****Celebrating the 125th anniversary of Lon Chaney Sr. birth April 1, 1883****
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