The Headless Horseman is a character that is part of the animated feature The Smurfs: The Legend Of Smurfy Hollow. He is the ghost that legends say haunts the area in the Smurf Forest known as Smurfy Hollow, and who is unable to cross the covered bridge that leads into that region.
In the story, Gutsy creates a shadow form of the Headless Horseman to scare Brainy away from the secret patch of smurfberries he had discovered and used to win the annual Smurfberry Harvest contests. Later on in the story, as Gutsy and Brainy deal with trying to rescue Smurfette from Gargamel, the real Headless Horseman appears, scaring the Smurfs as well as the evil wizard and his cat Azrael. As the five of them flee to the covered bridge which is their only form of protection against the ghost, Gargamel taunts the Headless Horseman, who responds by throwing a flaming pumpkin which causes the floor of the bridge to collapse below the wizard and his cat, sending them downstream and over the waterfalls. By the end of the story, it is revealed that Papa Smurf created the Headless Horseman by using his magic to change an ordinary goat into a ghost.