Well,Charles Hoy Fort apparently objected most strongly to the creation
of a Fortean Society. Most Forteans,even
when they get one hundred per cent incontrovertible facts,will mix in half
truths or even lies to “fill in the gaps” concerning an event. They say it is “in the spirit of Charles
Fort”. Yes,Fort liked a bit of dry wit
but that was his style. To say that,as a
Fortean,you are challenging science to look at mysteries is pointless if you
cannot give straight facts. That is why
Forteans are seen as a loony fringe.
Cryptozoologists. Well,there are
those who stand out in my mind:Ivan T. Sanderson,Bernard Heuvelman,Loren
Coleman and John Green. These people put
in the work and reported facts,though a small amount of speculation is needed
in this subject –but based on
zoological knowledge.
Then there are “The Others”. These
people like to pretend to be scientific but will appear on TV,radio and in the
newspapers making fools of themselves and in some cases issue the most
sensationalist or downright stupid statements that they later have to retract
because someone checked and pointed out they were talking rot. These people will tell you with an inane
chuckle:”No such thing as bad publicity,old chap!” They will also plagiarise.
If the latter type could be
gotten rid of then I might not be too insulted if someone asked whether I was a
cryptozoologist.
I prefer naturalist-research investigator.
The case of the so called “Barking beast Of Bath” is a prime example and
what these Forteans, Cryptozoologists and others say thirty years on I’ll come to
later. First,the case itself and I need to point out that the incidents took
place in the Limpley Stoke, Monkton Combe and Claverton Woods area not in Bath itself.
At the time of this case I was acting jointly as Director of UFO
International and running a branch of the late Ivan T. Sanderson’s SITU
[Society for the Investigation of The Unexplained]. Both slotted in nicely with being Regional
Investigations Co-ordinator [RIC] for the British UFO Research Association
[BUFORA].
It was BUFORA that seemed to want to get me involved and the Press
seemed to be desperate for any UFO group
to get involved! The BUFORA National
Investigations Co-ordinator at the time,Maureen Hall,sent me three newspaper
clippings and urged me to get actively investigating –I was promised that more
revealing information would be forwarded soon.
Suddenly,my phone began to ring non-stop with local and national
reporters from newspapers,radio and TV asking how my investigation was
progressing? I was told several times
that “BUFORAs Press Officer said you were the man to contact”. I got the hint that more was going on than I
was being told.
The Bristol Evening Post of 12th August,1980,reported:
“Beware of the Beast! Anyone stalking the mystery
beast of Brassknocker Hill,Bath,could be in for a
nasty shock,RSPCA Inspector Peter
Meyer warned
today. Renewed hunts are being made for
the creature after a policeman and
a taxi driver
saw a monkey about three feet tall
near the woods
behind the hill at the
weekend. The beast first
appeared last summer,damaging trees
and
frightening wildlife. Efforts to track it down failed.
Today Mr Meyer said:’If it is a
chimp or a
Monkey and it has been living in
the wild for so
Long it could be extremely dangerous…”
The item went on to state that Mr. Meyer’s search on the 11th
had been unsuccessful but that he planned another search that day. Mr. Ron Harper,a retired cabinet maker,who
was then living on the edge of the woods,was convinced that this “beast” was a
monkey. He told reporters:
“It has been here in the wood all
the time but it
comes out in August when it gets
warmer and the
new shoots appear on the
trees. We think that it was
let loose from a car,probably by a
foreigner who
didn’t want to report the loss.”
Mr. Harper repeated the same theory to me. As much as I looked I could find no UFO
angle. The Daily Mirror of 12th
August had a field day and what it was reporting was “interesting”. It reported that a “strange furry creature”
was first seen in the August of 1979 and went on to inform its readers that:
“…shaggy shapes and glaring eyes
made some of
the locals think twice about
venturing out at night.”
When I talked and corresponded with Mr. and Mrs. Harper they made it
very clear that they were in no way afraid of the creature. Mr. Harper was not amused by the Daily Mirror
report.
John Elphinstone,a taxi driver,was driving along when the
beast,according to reporters,”hailed him” from the roadside. A strange shaggy creature flagging down a
taxi? A policeman dispatched to the scene
was just in time to see the creature lope off.
Inspector Mike Price of Bath Police said:
“We were sure that this mystery
creature would turn
out to be a monkey of some
sort. After all,men from
Mars aren’t hairy are they?”
I decided that I really needed to track some of these people down and
see what they were really seeing/thinking.
According to most of the reporters Bath’s
neighbourhood was being invaded by night-crawling hairies from Pluto!
My first port of call was the Royal Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty to Animals [RSPCA] Bath
office. I tried to telephone and make an
appointment to meet Mr. Meyer. It took
several attempts but I then spoke to someone who asked me to hold on. I waited for minutes and was then told “Mr.
Meyer is not here. Can you leave your
telephone number?” The way it was said I
knew I was getting the brush off. I
pointed out that I would be in Bath
the next day –perhaps if I popped in?
Silence. Then several reasons why
Mr. Meyer might not be in the next day.
I left my telephone number and asked if he could contact me urgently it
would be greatly appreciated. I was
using my naturalist hat and never even once mentioned UFOs,shaggy men from Mars
or anything of the kind. By nine o’clock
in the evening it was obvious Mr. Meyer was not going to return my call.
The next day I concluded my business at the Ministry of Defence in Bath and walked around to
the RSPCA office. The person I spoke to
said Mr. Meyer was not in that day but I showed my semi-official [non-UFO]
credentials and the lady went through a door to reappear several minutes later
with another lady. I was told Mr.
Meyer’s was not in and was on leave.
Glancing through a window I saw a man whom I recognised from a TV news item as Mr. Meyer
rush into a car and drive off.
I actually laughed out loud. The
two ladies stared. I handed a business
card to them and pointed out that I was not a nut-case but a naturalist and I
was interested in talking to Mr. Meyer –confidentially if need be— about the
concerns of residents regarding the animal in the woods.
I never did hear from Mr. Meyer or find out why he avoided me –though a
few years later I did get offered one explanation and it involved the “beast”.
When I later contacted the Bristol RSPCA to explain my interest and the
situation I was told,without a moment of hesitation:”You ought to try the
Primate Protection League.” So,I
contacted the International Primate Protection League and explained my interest
as a naturalist. No response to my
letters. I tried telephoning but was
asked to leave my number and someone would get back to me. No one ever did and this was the Secretary of
the League.
I then tried to get a response from the League’s local
representative, Mr. tony Pain. No call
back after I left a message. No
responses to letters. I was beginning to
think the shaggy men from Mars were mind-controlling people –and
that’s a joke,just in case someone
thinks I’m being serious!
A reporter –a stringer for The Daily Telegraph—contacted me and asked if I had heard about the strange
lights being seen at night at the same time that the beast was seen stalking
the area?
I was getting fed up and fast. So
I contacted Bath Police and a very helpful officer told me:”Oh,right. You
really need to read the Daily Mirror article!”
The situation was becoming a farce.
It seemed half the reporters in the country were out at Brassknocker
Hill. I needed to talk to Maureen Hall
at BUFORA and find out just what the
additional information was that she hinted BUFORA had. I got through to Maureen and after a few
pleasantries got down to brass tacks and asked just what it was BUFORA knew
because as far as I was concerned all that had been reported was an escaped
primate. I was promised “certain
information” was going to be forwarded to me very soon. Whichever way I asked I just could not get
any hint of what this information was.
I’d already visited the area where,apparently,”everyone” was said to be
either searching/hunting/pursuing the beast.
I saw no one. Locals responded to
my question:”Have you seen the RSPCA man or journalists around?” with a look of
surprise and,usually,the words:”Are they supposed to be around here?” It seems that,apart from local BBC TV and ITV
news types who went “a bit potty” when the story broke,that was it.
It’s easy to suppose that the article that appeared in The Guardian on
the 23rd August,1979,had much to do with the mystery and confusion. However,when I contacted the reporter,Mr.
Dennis Barker,he could not recall much other than that there was “something” to do with UFOs. All his notes were gone anyway –though he did
later find a couple of contact numbers that I had already told him I had. This was very surprising since it turned out
that it was Mr. barker who tried to rope in UFO International in 1979 –a year
before BUFORA had contacted me.
Barker’s article reported that the four feet tall [1.2m] tall beast had
shattered the peace of the little village “using its Draculaesque teeth”. I love reporters. The beast gave the impression of wearing
white [framed] spectacles. Pigeons,magpies
and jackdaws had vanished from the area and bark had been stripped off trees as
far up as twenty feet [6 m]. Yes,this is
why it was hailed “the barking beast of Bath”,not
because of any vocalisation but because it tore bark from trees. If it had barked I’m sure that it would have
been reported as stalking the quiet village with “werewolvesque teeth”!
The theory was put forward,though I have no idea by whom,that the beast must be able to hang upside-down and
lean over to do the damage. The beast
always did its work at night it seemed.
Bless him,but Mr. Harper then gave reporters [mainly Mr.Barker] a morsel
that they could use to boost the story even more. Mr. Harper reported that it was some kind of
rodent. And he wrote that a man from the
Bath Parks Committee had paid a visit and stated:
“You know,Mr.Harper,if I was not talking
silly,I
would say that you have a squirrel ten times
bigger than normal.”
I’m glad he wasn’t “talking silly”;though I have mused over that line
many a time. Mr. Harper also wrote that
the teeth marks found were “ten to twenty times the size of a squirrel’s”.
I think we need to interject a few facts into this madness. When I spoke to the head of the Bath Parks
Committee he admitted his man had
made the remarks quoted by Mr. Harper.
He wishes that the man had not but he did and was not thinking anyone
would publish them.
There were no Red Squirrels [Sciurus
vulgaris] in the woods around Monkton Combe,Limpley Stoke or any part of Bath. So that would leave the Grey Squirrel [Sciurus carolinensis],of which there was
some evidence but I got the distinct impression that squirrels,like magpies and
pigeons,were “fair game” to humans so the drop in numbers might not be that
unusual.
The total length of a squirrel skull is under 54mm [just over 2 ins],it
has a hind foot measurement of roughly 2.5 x 3 cms [around 1-1.25 ins]. The body length is 200-236mm [roughly 9.5
ins];the tail on average is 165-200mm [roughly 6-9 ins].
The body weight 250-400 g..
So,if in proportion with the teeth at 10-20 times the size of
normal,you’ll get a squirrel with a 0.508-1.016m [20-40 ins] long jaw;a
0.254-0.508m [10-20 ins]hind foot not to mention a 2.29-4.88m [7.5-16 ft] long
body and to which we can add a 1.53-3m [5-10 ft] long tail. More worrying,it
would weigh around 2500 – 5000 g [5.5-11+lbs] body weight—and the ability to
hang upside-down while leaning over!
Impressive. No wonder some
foreigner passing by dumped it from his car.
The Harpers noted that their pet goat would not go near to one tree that
the beast had “attacked”. There were
some fifty other trees damaged in a similar fashion in the area.
At the time of the stripped bark being discovered,no one had actually
seen the alleged beast or,at least,had they it was not reported. This all changed when,at around 00:30
hours,Mr. Christopher Morris and a friend were driving through Monkton
Combe. Both saw the beast in the middle
of the road,illuminated by the car headlights.
“It” was 3-4 feet [90cms- 1.2m] tall and had what seemed to be bright
white rings around the eyes which was interpreted as looking like spectacles. Interestingly,Mr. Morris thought that the
beast “looked like a baboon”,though his companion was quite adamant that it was
a chimpanzee.
Being young and stupid I decided to check the area out and lived rough
for a week,not telling any locals who might be hoaxing or unintentionally
mention the fact to hoaxers. Each
evening I climbed up into a different tree.
Covered in dirt and leaf sap to try to hide my smell.
Just some of the
newsclippings pertaining to The Barking Beast Of Bath and covers the
sensationalist warnings of possible attack by “the beast” to its connection
with UFO sightings. These reflect the
tones taken by local BBC TV and radio as well as Independent TV. More than one reporter refused my invitation
to join me at night in the woods.
In that entire week,while the RSPCA and reporters were supposedly moving
around by the handful I saw no one. No
RSPCA Inspector. No member of the
International Primate Protection League.
Not a solitary reporter. Well,I did hear someone one evening;a couple
decided to go to a tree nearby where they got rather,uh,”involved”. I couldn’t very well make a noise to let them
know I was up a tree closeby or else they may have wondered just what I was doing up the tree. I also had to consider the possibility that
the police might be called and then I’d have to explain to them what I was
doing. I closed my eyes and put my
fingers in my ears –one has standards.
I did find one quite old track in dried out mud that looked like a
chimpanzee foot but damp had gotten into my camera and when I later returned
with casting material there were deer tracks obliterating it. But by a shed frequented by the beast there
was a strong smell. One I knew all too
well. While at Greenway Boys School in
the early 1970s,we one day had a visit from the owner of the Westbury-on-Trym Wildlife
Park a nice spot to visit in Bristol back then. The owner had,in those pre Dangerous Wild
Animals Act days,brought along a chimpanzee with a couple more mundane
creatures. As the chimp was held up to
be handed to me it decided to relieve its bladder…a lot. That smell,mentally,has stayed with me for a
long time now,but in 1979/1980 my hair stood on end when I smelt that same
odour again.
I checked but there were no droppings I could associate with a
chimpanzee. Ron Harper had told me that
he had seen a chimpanzee on several occasions and.later,his widow re-iterated
that they had both seen the chimpanzee on a stone wall that stood next to one
of the damaged trees –the tree their pet goat would not go near.
A few years later [1996] when I wanted to see whether anyone else might
have plucked up courage to finally report their own sighting,I received at
least two phone calls from different sources telling me that there could be
between 2-3 chimpanzees loose in the area.
I checked but it seemed,as I suspected,to be nothing.
I had,through a contact,seen the statement made by two police officers who had clearly seen a chimpanzee –one had been
to Bristol Zoological Gardens a few days before and spent some time watching
the chimps. Sadly,as is procedural,the
reports were later destroyed along with other files when “dead”.
But 1996 saw a letter arrived from the Isle of Benbecula,in the North Atlantic.
The taxi driver mentioned in the press reports,Mr. John Elphinstone,was
now living on the isle but a relative had sent the article mentioning the beast
to him. He wanted me to know that he was
familiar with chimpanzees and their habits and was worried it might be approached
by a child or member of the public with an image of friendly “chimp tea party”
creatures in their heads. It was because
he saw the animal so clearly that he contacted the police and he pointed out
that the policeman had gotten a good long look at it –not the brief glimpse
suggested by the press.
Perhaps one of
the greatest mysteries surrounding The Barking Beast Of Bath involved the Royal
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals [RSPCA]. Contact with the Press/Media was always
strictly guided and watched over. Their
Inspector at Bath
tried to take ludicrous measures to avoid me [as did other staff]. An RSPCA Inspector’s face all over TV news
items as well as in the Press and same Inspector making statements on radio
would,you might think,be known to the RSPCA hierarchy but when Bath HQ told me
I needed to speak to Bristol I got the above letter. The Media sensation was totally ‘unknown’ to
them. In 1981 a similar statement came
from Bath HQ.
Back in 1980,smelly,cold and really needing a bath,I arrived home and
immediately telephoned Maureen Hall. I
told her that it was clear that one of the odd lights seen in 1979 was a
meteorite as that had been seen by amateur astronomers I knew. The other lights seemed to be aircraft and a
military helicopter. I emphasised that
there was no alien or aliens running around the area. What I was then told helped me decide to
leave BUFORA.
I was told that the new chairman had instigated a big publicity push and
had been contacted by Mr. Barker and a seeming promise of publicity was made
[but never kept]. BUFORA had been told
about the meteorite and other information suggested to them that aircraft
lights were the “UFOs” and because there had been a report from the south east
of England
of a UFO and “monkey-like alien in silver” they decided to get me to
investigate:though they never had any
doubt it was an escaped chimpanzee.
Speculation was that Mr. Meyers was a friend of Mr. Pain,the local
Primate Protection League man and one of his colleagues. Mr. Barker,when I spoke to him on the
telephone told me he would send a list of people he’d spoken to and
added:”Check out where the Primate man lives”.
Mr. Pain lived in Limpley Stoke.
The suggestion,unsubstantiated,was that somehow the wall of silence was
due to a chimpanzee escaping locally.
The stripped bark that I saw looked as though it had been torn off in
places but clearly squirrels had been at work on others. No sign of giant squirrel anywhere.
But the idea that the beast “comes out in August when it gets warmer and
the new shoots appear on the trees” was mind boggling. No chimp could have survived the Winter of
1979-1980 out in the open. On the 12th
December,1979,it remained at 8 degrees Celsius for a 24 hour period with sharp
drops in the temperature throughtout the month.
In January,1980 to temperature was fluctuating between 4 degrees Celsius
in the day and 2 degrees at night –and those were town temperatures.
Forraging would not be good for a chimpanzee. My guess was that a chimpanzee kept in the area,had
escaped twice;once in 1979 and again in 1980 and on both occasions was
recaptured after a few days,though chimpanzees once they get the liking for it
become habitual escapees as Longleat Safari Park found out in the early days.
It was as simple as that.
I wrote a report on this for the Flying Saucer Review which rejected the
item because I could not see the cosmic game being played out by paranormal
forces.
A more lengthy item was written
and sent to The Fortean Times who acknowledged it’s receipt and I was told in a
later phone conversation with one of the editors that the article would appear
in the next year [over ten years later and I’m still waiting]
However,UFO groups as well as various Fortean sources got copies of the
report and two even published the articles.
The editor of one still wanted to make it a Fortean mystery despite the
facts and still does. I’ve even put the article online sending out links. So,just to “see”,I ran an internet
search. Not one source gives factual accounts
and American Monsters,Man Beast UK, Farshores,Scottish Big Cats,International
Folklore Tales as well as Tinwiki all list the Beast Of Brassknocker Hill as
either some paranormal Bigfoot type,simple myth and even worse.
Rather like the Dead Aquatic Creatures of Canvey Island [related in Some Things Strange And Sinister],very
little detail is given and even the basic data is distorted to keep it a
mystery,yet I have had several articles published in widely read magazines
explaining the events!
And
when HTV set two very young producers the task of making a 25 minute
documentary on the affair in the mid 1990s they were given complete files and I
arranged for them to meet and film those witnesses still alive. On the day of filming I waited but no TV
crew. Apparently they had decided to opt
for a group of sensationalist Cryptozoologists who had never even visited the
area and the whole programme turned into a very amateurish and horrendous to
watch “Blair Witch Project” spoof –the higher ups at TV Centre were not amused
and I don’t think the producers worked for HTV again.
So,please understand why I don’t like being called a Fortean or
Cryptozoologist.
References
1.
Mystery Of Bath’s Beast Of Bark,The Guardian,23rd August,1979
2.
Taxi! It’s the Beast,Daily Mirror,12th August,1980
3.
Beware Of The Beast!,Bristol
Evening Post,12th August,1980
4.
Report On The Barking Beast Of Bath:Escaped
Chimpanzee,Society for the
Investigation of The Unexplained
[SITU],October,1980. A copy of this
report
was sent to the RSPCA Bristol and Bath as well as Primate
Protection League.
Note:Other letters,documents,etc.,are
contained in my report The Barking Beast Of Bath:1979-1980 now
unavailable. All original material is
still held on file but contain personal information on witnesses,etc. so cannot
be released yet.
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