Princess Diana, James Hewitt and the ‘Alien Big Cat’ in Britain

Forget the rumours that James Hewitt is the real father of Prince Henry, or as he is known more popularly, Prince Harry. Forget all about the conspiracy theories surrounding Diana’s tragic death in 1997.

This one is a bit lower key. It only involves the secret affair between James Hewitt, Princess Diana and the sighting of an Alien Big Cat back in the 1980s.

Now the largest natural feline to inhabit the British Isles is the Scottish Wildcat, an animal not much larger than your average domestic cat, and hardly considered a dangerous predator. But for at least four decades there have continuously been sightings and reports of ‘Alien Big Cats’ from all around the British Isles.

This particular story comes from Nick Redfern’s blog and his book “True Stories of Real-Life Monsters” and centres on Jonathan Downes of the Centre for Fortean Zoology based in Britain.

Jonathan Downes

Back in 1983, a Devon farmer suffered a massive loss of livestock when over a period of a few months something like 100 of his sheep were violently attacked. Their throats were slashed by what looked like a wild animal. Rumours had long persisted of a large feline dubbed the “Beast of Exmoor” roaming the surrounding moorlands and dating back to the early 1970s. But no one was entirely sure where it had come from nor how many sightings were actually made.

Yet surprisingly the government ordered a detachment of Royal Marine Snipers be deployed to the area to search for and eliminate any such ‘predator’. “Operation Beastie” as it was called however ended with the official report detailing that if there were any large cats then they had successfully evaded the military and the search was called off after 3 days for fear of injuring one of many press photographers in the area.

Above: Royal Marines during Operation Beastie

However late one evening in the late 1980s Jonathan Downes received an anonymous telephone call of a very strange nature. The gentleman on the other end of the line explained his purpose was to pass on information regarding Alien Big Cat Sightings in the South West of England. Firstly he wanted to reveal that Royal Marines involved in “Operation Beastie” had actually sighted a number of ‘Alien Big Cats’ roaming the British landscape but had not seen it through to completion.



The problem the marines had was that these animals were roaming on the edges of private land and the estate belonged to a wealthy and powerful owner. A lesser experienced member of the team had panicked after sighting, not one but, three large ‘unidentified’ cats prowling around the countryside. He fired off shot after shot, killing all three cats. With the group having not only trespassed onto private land but also having discharged firearms the big cats bodies were quickly disposed of and the marines stealthily left the private estate and a cover-up was put in place.

Jonathan Downes mysterious informant then revealed that he had been a member of a British Intelligence Services security team monitoring the movements of the Princess of Wales a few years later. This was around the middle of 1986 when her ‘secret liaisons’ with Major James Hewitt had began. (NB that the affair was not made public knowledge until 1995).

Downes was told that the team was set up to ensure that the Princess did not become a victim of a terrorist attack from the likes of the IRA. One night they were stationed in the Devonshire village of Bratton Clovelly keeping a watchful eye as the Princess visited Hewitt’s home there.

As they focused their night vision equipment onto the Princess and James Hewitt they also spotted an enormous ‘alien big cat’ on the prowl in the same area. The decision to fire and take down the big cat could not be taken lightly. It would alert Diana and James Hewitt and quite possibly many other members of the local community.



Should the security team’s presence be revealed to Hewitt and Diana this would make them aware that the intelligence community (probably under orders from Buckingham Palace) were watching them. Beyond that the press would follow up and not only get their “Big Cat” story but relish the prospect of a right royal scandal. Something the ‘People at the Palace’ would never approve of.

So the troops waited and waited, anxiously observing the big cat as it wandered around Hewitt’s property, until it crept out of sight eventually vanishing into the night. The whole ‘affair’ was hushed up and the security troops were reminded of their responsibilities to keep the matter under wraps under the terms of the Official Secrets Act.

Of course it could all have been a wind-up.

But Downes says of his informer.

“It must be said in his defence that he told me this long before the liaison [between Diana and Hewitt] became public knowledge. It was certainly the first time I had heard of the scandal that was, years later, to rock both the nation and the monarchy.”

“Interesting if true” as a certain 'former' member of the UK Ministry of Defence might say.



Sources and Reference:

mysteriousuniverse.org...

mysteriousuniverse.org...

True Stories of Real-Life Monsters (Off the Record!) – Nick Redfern

At last, an interesting thread

Forget all about the conspiracy theories surrounding Diana’s tragic death in 1997

No

I bet it wasn't a cat wandering around that estate, I bet it was Charlie in disguise spying on Diana.

originally posted by: VoidHawk
I bet it wasn't a cat wandering around that estate, I bet it was Charlie in disguise spying on Diana.

I have a quarter finished thread on the scandals and rumours involving the Royals. But I just can't get around to finishing it off. So I decided to put out a tiny part of it that I couldn't see on here.

Whether it's true I have no idea.

Apparently James Hewitt and Jonathan Downes attended the same school at the same time and Downes was told of the Hewitt- Diana affair years before the world knew.

Does that make it any more believable?

It's open to debate and there is no hard evidence just an awful lot of hearsay.

I remember in 1984, staying in a youth hostel for a week in Exford, which is on Exmoor. We had a local Ranger give us a talk on life on Exmoor and at the end of it, told us about the 'Exmoor Beast' and the deaths of livestock.

At the very end though, I remember he said, 'Of course, no one has ever seen it, but it's likely to be a Panther which has been released into the Wild'.

Who knows, but they never admitted capturing or killing anything, yet the type of livestock mutilation resembles a 'Big Cat attack'? But what I would say is that there was either a few of them to kill 100 sheep, or it was absolutely nothing to do with Big Cats?

originally posted by: VoidHawk
I bet it wasn't a cat wandering around that estate, I bet it was Charlie in disguise spying on Diana.

HRH may have been checking up on his "Cat".
But he was much better with her than the "Dog" he is with now.
Sorry to my Brittish friends but as an American I can get away with such slander. (Even though it is a bit low brow)
But as I said above, my defense is that I'm an "American".

I flagged, I have to speak up....huh!!
I saw my first one in 1968 in irving texas....had a 20 ga. but didn't even get alarmed...
they're alien because they have canine faces....like a pit bull.
I've posted many times about them....they disappear supernaturally!. I gotta tell ya

originally posted by: mirageman

originally posted by: VoidHawk
I bet it wasn't a cat wandering around that estate, I bet it was Charlie in disguise spying on Diana.

I have a quarter finished thread on the scandals and rumours involving the Royals. But I just can't get around to finishing it off. So I decided to put out a tiny part of it that I couldn't see on here.

Whether it's true I have no idea.

Apparently James Hewitt and Jonathan Downes attended the same school at the same time and Downes was told of the Hewitt- Diana affair years before the world knew.

Does that make it any more believable?

No it doesn't.

That's quite easy to claim in retrospect or does he have more substantial proof that he knew about it?

I think it is likely, when legislation started changing, that big cats were 'let go', but I also suspect, given the high level of kills attributed to the Beast of Exmoor, that most of those reports were part truth, part insurance fiddle.

a reply to: Spader

HRH may have been checking up on his "Cat". But he was much better with her than the "Dog" he is with now.

More of an old nag IMHO and hence the 'long face'.

originally posted by: GBP/JPY
I flagged, I have to speak up....huh!!
I saw my first one in 1968 in irving texas....had a 20 ga. but didn't even get alarmed...
they're alien because they have canine faces....like a pit bull.
I've posted many times about them....they disappear supernaturally!. I gotta tell ya

The folklore does have it that these creatures may be 'supernatural' or ghost like. Although many sightings are attributed to misperceptions of other animals. There is also the possibility that some of these wild animals have been released by owners when the laws were brought in regarding keeping wild animals in captivity.

Still happening across the south of england as a quick search will show.

www.loughboroughecho.net... -been-spotted-10148226

THE mysterious big black cat has been spotted in Shepshed.

The beastly creature - described as “the size of a puma” - was spotted in Iveshead Road, in the field on the right of the Charley Road junction.

a reply to: Anaana

Hello Anaana. Nice to see our paths cross again.

That's quite easy to claim in retrospect or does he have more substantial proof that he knew about it? I think it is likely, when legislation started changing, that big cats were 'let go', but I also suspect, given the high level of kills attributed to the Beast of Exmoor, that most of those reports were part truth, part insurance fiddle.

Unfortunately the book doesn't really expand much beyond what is written on the blog. It seems that Jonathan Downes did mention this story to others pre-95 and was even trying to glean more information when he became a subject to investigation by Special Branch because they suspected he was trying to pass information regarding Diana on to the IRA under the cover of a "Big Cat" information.

In early 2006, it was revealed that shortly after Jonathan Downes received his mysterious, late-night call, an elite arm of the British Police Force took a deep interest in the famous creature-seeking author and his big-cat pursuits. The name of this elite unit is Special Branch, and its work typically concerns counter-terrorism. It so transpires that Special Branch had come to a very odd wholly erroneous conclusion regarding Downes and the story told to him by his clandestine informant, which Downes quickly pursued with understandable enthusiasm and vigour. For a while, Special Branch was concerned that Downes was using the big cat investigation as an ingenious form of camouflage to try and uncover further, damaging information about the royal family, Princess Diana and James Hewitt, that he was going to share it all with none other than the highest echelons of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), which of course would lead to a scandal of massive proportions for the British establishment. ....

There is really not enough information to nail it down beyond any reasonable doubt. But just enough there to make you think "..maybe?".

Releasing of "big cats" by private owners before and after the Dangerous Wild Animals Act was passed in 1976 seems a very likely explanation for sightings of these animals down the years. Although some 4 decades later sightings are still made. So did they breed in the wild? Or is there another explanation.

I suspect that unless a human being comes to harm then the government is happy to turn a blind eye to this subject. Imagine the panic and damage to local economies if it was made public that there are dangerous big cats out there but we don't know exactly how many and are not sure of their location(s).

a reply to: johnb

That link seems to be broken but this one refers to the same story : Big Cat in Shepshed

Loughborough is in the East Midlands and some 200 miles ??? from Devon and although it's not an every day occurrence we do get them from all over the British Isles. Is it all a case of mistaken identity? Or are there really wild animals prowling through the British countryside?

A good friend of mine from my school days joined the marines on leaving. He was on operation beasty and told me how one night his patrol were bivied up against a drystone wall when they heard a weird noise from behind it. 3 of the lads jumped up and let rip with the SA80's taking out about 12 sheep. When they got back to camp they had to endure a game of "space invaders" involving sidestepping back and forth whilst making errr arrr noises, during which the rest of the barracks threw various nasty things at them all while dressed in their best parade kit lol.

originally posted by: mirageman
Hello Anaana. Nice to see our paths cross again.

I do apologise, I quite forgot my manners. Hello, very nice to see you too.

originally posted by: mirageman
Unfortunately the book doesn't really expand much beyond what is written on the blog. It seems that Jonathan Downes did mention this story to others pre-95 and was even trying to glean more information when he became a subject to investigation by Special Branch because they suspected he was trying to pass information regarding Diana on to the IRA under the cover of a "Big Cat" information.

As I understood it, Hewitt and Diana were an open secret in that although it was officially acknowledged, that it was known in some circles and that in fact the affair, because of who she was, had to be facilitated by others in collusion. If he moved in the circles that he claims to have done, then I don't doubt that it is possibly he had heard that rumour, I only doubt that that knowledge would give credence to claims of having access to higher level information, I suppose.

originally posted by: mirageman
There is really not enough information to nail it down beyond any reasonable doubt. But just enough there to make you think "..maybe?".

Yeah, I'll give you that. Although, I am wondering if maybe Downes was lifted by Special Branch for stalking Diana and that the rest is a conflation of his own justification to them for stalking Diana.

originally posted by: mirageman
Releasing of "big cats" by private owners before and after the Dangerous Wild Animals Act was passed in 1976 seems a very likely explanation for sightings of these animals down the years. Although some 4 decades later sightings are still made. So did they breed in the wild? Or is there another explanation.

It would require two cats of the same species, and obviously, of either sex, to be released in sufficient proximity to each other to be aware of each other, and not in competition with each other for food. Sex drive doesn't kick in if survival is a factor. I'd LOVE there to be big cats roaming the countryside like you would not believe, but if that is the case, I would expect them to be solitary (since most felines are anyway). Also, while it is easy to keep yourself concealed, hungry, curious cubs are another matter entirely.

originally posted by: mirageman
I suspect that unless a human being comes to harm then the government is happy to turn a blind eye to this subject. Imagine the panic and damage to local economies if it was made public that there are dangerous big cats out there but we don't know exactly how many and are not sure of their location(s).

They're warm blooded creatures, we have the technology to find those. I don't think there would be too much panic...and we're not really, as a nation, much for panic anyway. That said, I was at London Zoo at the end of August, and I was sat with my camera at the clear wall focusing on the tiger at the other end of the enclosure. Her mate eyeballs me and makes a bee-line for me, spreading himself at my feet, between me and her, baring his teeth. I was exceptionally grateful for that inch of perspex. BIG teeth, and feet the size of my face!



I wouldn't want to meet him down in the woods today...he's never gonna let me tickle his tummy.