I never referred to him as the “Hatman” in South Jersey. I just saw something on the so-called “Hatman” that brought the memory and fear streaking through me so I decided to write this.
I’m 26 now, and a Father so that shows how deeply it affected me! I was about 6 years old and I lived at my grandmother’s house in South Jersey. It started with my toys going off in my room, and as usual, my grandparents trying to comfort me told me the batteries were getting low but it kept happening. They would replace the batteries and a week later they’d be dead. I had this one toy I had in my room and I loved it. It was awesome but creepy when it went off and you didn’t set it off!!! It was a Spider-Man clock, it showed both Spider-Man as well as the Green Goblin and lit up. When you pressed it, the back of the clock illuminated the wall above my bed and it would look like Spider-Man climbing the web/climbing the wall and knocking the Green Goblin down and the Green Goblin would always laugh. Well, as a kid it’s a freaky laugh but when you are the one pressing it and watching it, it’s very cool. Well, it began to go off every night by itself scared the crap out of me! I shut the toy off with the switch in the back but it would continue to go off over and over again, I was too scared to leave my bed. I knew it would eventually turn off after a few minutes but it didn’t! After about 30 minutes I mustered the courage to get out of bed and grabbed it. I ran across the house with the toy still going off to our laundry room completely across the house. I tried to get it to shut off but it wouldn’t, I even took out the batteries. Finally, I just smashed the toy on the floor, broke it, and threw it away when it wouldn’t stop.
I had no activity for about a week, everything was quiet. I lay in bed, as usual, just staring around the room until I could finally sleep because I was still scared. About a week later I was just about to fall asleep when my closet door I had evidently left open began to move. I loved WWE Professional Wrestling and would watch it with my Grandfather on TV. The best way I could explain to my Grandmother the next day was that a giant man taller than the closest door with a huge coat and top hat-like the undertaker would wear stood at the front of my closet door and watched me as I lay in my bed frozen and unable to move. He stood there watching me until I either passed out or fell asleep, not sure which it was honestly. When I told her, hoping for the comfort of some sort she said it was a dream and seemed upset. I told her no it wasn’t I watched this man stand there for what felt like forever and not move an inch. She said let’s not talk about him, you don’t want to make him mad!! Do you know how scared I felt from that point!! Like clockwork the following weeks my closet door would open and he would be there! He would stand in front of the closet door and watch me almost every night just far enough outside of my nightlight on the wall to stay just a solid pitch-black figure, I couldn’t see his face but I knew he was looking at me. I’d say after a few weeks of this happening I began to notice the figure did begin to move. He was inching just a tad closer every night, and I could never move just be frozen under my covers. It would almost bob back and forth in and out of the closet, but would only step a little forward, and no more it couldn’t seem to move past my night light.
These visits happened over a period of probably two months. It finally culminated one night during a really bad storm, it was late and I couldn’t sleep due to the thunder and lightning outside the power had gone out. The Hatman was suddenly there in the middle of my room, standing there over my bed. I was in utter fear, I was not able to move, scream or do anything. He suddenly walked straight up to me and bent over, he punched me in the stomach so hard that I threw up all over. I don’t remember what happened after that. The next morning when I woke up with a sore stomach, I went and told my Grandma what happened. Like always, my grandmother said you were just sick and probably had a temp and imagined all that. As a Father now myself, I don’t understand why she wouldn’t listen to me and why she seemed so scared herself. What did she know or think was going on? Why was she so quick to try and convince me it wasn’t real?
Something like that doesn’t stay with you when you are 6 years old until you’re 26 because it was a dream or your imagination. I’m now a proud Father of two and have been an avid believer ever since in the paranormal, and I never dismiss anything my kids tell me right away. I’ve wanted to do my own paranormal research about this ever since because it’s bothered me so much. Today 10/01/22 when I saw a video on YouTube regarding a Hatman haunting and it brought it all back and hit me to my core once again! To sum up the story I only saw the Hatman again for another couple of weeks after he hit me, he never walked toward me again. After a couple of weeks, he vanished with no trace and I never saw him again even after multiple moves from my grandmother’s house because both my parents were in the military. I always feared he would show again, even to this day because of my experience I still make sure EVERY CLOSET DOOR IS SHUT. I mean every door, I actually get upset at my wife if one of our kids leaves a door open at night without meaning to. That’s how much this affected me, I’m still scared this thing will show up for me or one of my kids.