15 Most Terrifying Things Ever Found in People's Basements


Creepy basements - they're a staple of horror movies, particularly in titles like The Silence of the Lambs and The Conjuring. But of all the scary basements featured on the big screen, nothing can compare to the real life horrors discovered by everyday people beneath their homes and businesses.

From mysterious wells, medical oddities, skeletal remains, animals, and even other people, this list of creepy things found in basements will surely raise the hair on the back of your neck.



1. An Ancient Burial Ground



When Helen Weisensel of Jefferson County, Wisconsin began digging in her basement whilst renovating her house she made a gruesome discovery. Weisensel had uncovered the skull of a child along with a wide assortment of other human remains. She notified the local authorities who discovered that her house was actually built on top of a long forgotten burial ground.

Experts estimated that the cemetery could have been up to 170 years old and may have contained the remains of hundreds of people. Weisensel had to cease all work on her renovations until she could get approval from the State Historical Society.

2. 1,200 Skeletal Remains in House Belonging to Benjamin Franklin



A home on Craven St. in London had a mass grave of over 1,200 skeletal remains, both human and animal, beneath the soil of its basement. They all dated back to roughly 1757- 1775 - exactly the time frame during which notable American founding father Benjamin Franklin lived there.

But this discovery did not reveal Franklin as a secret serial killer; rather, the home was used by William Hewson as a secret anatomy school. At the time, dissecting corpses, even for medical study, was illegal, so Franklin allowed his friend Hewson to use his basement as a literal underground medical classroom, where students could learn without fear of repercussions.

3. Creepy Dolls



From the outside Hanny’s located in downtown Phoenix, Arizona appears to be a normal restaurant and bar. When a reddit user found their way into the basement however, they posted this creepy photo of what they saw. Like a scene straight out of a horror movie, creepy dolls have been arranged along a large table, just like the famous painting The Last Supper, by Leonardo Da Vinci.

The building used to be an old department store but no one knows who set the dolls up or the reason for such an eerie scene. It looks as though someone has thrown coins onto the table, perhaps as an offering to appease the unsettling dolls.

4. Mysterious Well



When a new homeowner discovered a trap door in the basement of his new home, he was shocked to discover an 8-foot-deep by 4-foot-wide cement well filled with water. The well had no pipes or holes, which made it even more bizarre. After snapping some photos of his creepy discovery, he filled it in with stones and sold the house.

5. A Hidden Chapel



In September 2010, Pat and Diana Farla of Telford, Shropshire in England discovered a chapel hidden beneath their home that was believed to date back to the 1700s.

The discovery came about after the couple, having imbibed a little Good Friday cheer, decided to finally find out where the metal grate near their front door led. It's possible the hidden chapel served as a place of worship for persecuted Catholics.

6. Underground Prison



In 2013, Ariel Castro was arrested when authorities discovered that he’d been keeping women imprisoned in his basement as sex slaves. Between 2000-2004, three women ranging between 14-20 had all been kidnapped by Castro. They were discovered when neighbors heard one of the women calling for help.

7. 100-Year-Old Ouija Board



In 2016, a construction worker discovered a 100 year old Ouija board buried within the walls of a house he was working on. He noticed that it had been placed upside down leading some to speculate the person who hid it may have done so to protect themselves. Had they contacted something sinister from the other side and hid the board in an attempt to break contact?

The construction worker posted a photo of the board on Reddit where he was warned by readers to leave the Ouija board where he found it!

8. Mummified Remains



In 2010, two woman made an awful discovery while cleaning a basement in a Los Angeles apartment building. Inside a trunk, wrapped in newspaper from the 1930’s were 2 mummified infants along with several pieces of Peter Pan memorabilia including the book Peter Pan, written by J.M. Barrie and a membership card to the Peter Pan Woodland Club.

In a weird coincidence, the owner of the trunk was a nurse by the name of Janet M. Barrie, the same initials, J. M. Barrie as the famous writer. DNA tests proved that the infants were Barrie’s children but why they were stored away in the basement of an LA apartment remains a mystery. The truth may never be known as Barry passed away in 1994.

9. Gun Room



An Imugarian, going by the username JerryTheCunt, discovered that his new home had a hidden gun room in the basement. While he was doing the sorting, he noticed an oddly placed sheet of plywood when he was heading upstairs. Since he had not seen it before, he decided to move it.

Little did he know that the secret he was going to unveil was out of this world. Behind, there was an opening to a secret room that was spectacular and horrifying at the same time. There were numerous empty gun cases, user manuals, and a safe.

He had just stumbled upon an ‘armory’ that was full of weapons. In a different safe in the corner, there was ammunition, so much that it seemed the previous owner never wanted to run out of bullets. There were also a grenade and hundreds of pennies.

He went ahead and shared his findings on Imgur. That was back on October 8, 2015.

10. A WWII German Panzer Tank



In July 2015, a man in the wealthy German suburb of Heikendorf was found to possess a decommissioned World War II-era Panzer (Panther) tank, which he had stowed away in his basement.

He also possessed a German cannon and torpedo, and was apparently an avid collector of WWII arms. The tank was well-known in the town, with the mayor reporting the man was "chugging around in that thing during the snow catastrophe in 1978."

11. The Previous Owner



In 2007, a man named Jorge Giro purchased a house in the town of Roses, Spain. A local bank had repossessed the house from its previous owner and put it up for auction after they had failed to make their mortgage repayments.

When Giro entered the house he was shocked to discover that the previous owner was still there. She had passed away some years ago and the salty, seaside air had preserved her mummified corpse.

Bizarrely, in the 6 years that the previous owner’s mortgage was outstanding, the bank had never sent anyone to the house to investigate. Equally as baffling was the fact that the real estate agent hadn’t bothered to check the condition of the house prior to the auction.

12. Two Fetuses in Jars



Workers tasked with renovating an old building in Hannibal, MO uncovered two fetuses preserved in jars of formaldehyde in the basement. The discovery bolstered rumors that the property once housed an illegal abortion clinic established sometime in the early 1900s.

13. A Secret Roommate



Ohio State University students made a startling discovery in September 2013, when they found a locker in the basement of their house that led into a secret room, complete with textbooks and photographs on the wall. The room was apparently inhabited by "Jeremy," a complete stranger to the other residents of the house.

The matter was resolved peacefully - Jeremy simply vacated his sweet secret room. Still, the tenants have no idea how many keys to their home might be floating around town.

14. Strange Hidden Room

This discovery was made in 2014 by a Reddit user going by the username lmbrjack. He found a hidden crawl space that led to a locked door while he was poking around his attic.

The crawlspace led to an evil-looking door (that was locked), which led into a strange room. The room had all its walls, ceiling, and floor covered using soundproofing material.

lmbrjack also discovered a strange briefcase that contained envelopes with currency from different parts of the world, an old jewelry box, and four silver ingots that were one-ounce each. There was also a safe that contained six VHSC tapes though he was unable to play them. He later gave the tapes to the cops.

15. Dungeoun-Like Rooms



A man who had moved into a new apartment was surprised to find a trapdoor in front of his bathroom. The apartment was somewhere in Britain and had lovely wooden floors, high ceilings, and a loft. Like any other curious human, he decided to be adventurous and opened the door to unearth what was underneath.

At first, the man thought the room was not a big deal until he noticed stairs. It turned out the house had been built on an old English monastery and had passages underneath. These passages led to rooms that resembled dungeons. There was a complex system of paths that led down there, and it seemed as if his apartment had the entrance to this underground ‘vault.’ The owner was a Redditor going by the name demc7, and he went ahead to post the photos on Imgur. He even admitted that he thought it was a great deal.

Sources : one, two, three