UFO Britannia: Part 4 – A Strange Sixties

Continued from Part 3

There seems to have been a lull in Close Encounters in the early to mid 1960s across Britain. Maybe that new fangled invention TV had become cheap enough to keep people from gazing at the skies at night?

Others think that a Ministry of Defence enforced press silence had been put in place along with a policy of ridicule and that this had led to people being reluctant to report sightings officially. There certainly seems to have been a reduction in released reports from the military (something close to zero) during the era.

The graph of reported UAP (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) tells it all.




But there were still some interesting stories being told. Here are just a few of them. Others may want to add any interesting omissions?

Wood Green, London UFOs 1966

Peering out of his window at 2am on August 15th 1966, Keith Palmer delayed his visit to the bathroom as he noticed an object in the sky approaching his home in Wood Green, North London. He woke his wife just as the disc shaped object stopped and hovered over an old tree about 150 yards from his home. Unable to discern any markings due to the bright light emitted by the object it suddenly shot out two smaller discs. The discs aligned themselves on either side of the object and shone two conical shaped beams of pure white light down onto the ground below.



Palmer leaned out of the window for a clear view. The lights went out and the smaller discs returned to the larger object. Both Palmer and his wife then heard a humming noise and became very concerned as the disc moved towards their house. It was now apparent that the object was not a disc but more pear shaped with revolving lights on the underside. The object went out of sight as it passed over their home.

Next morning Keith Palmer awoke with sunburn like rash on his face whilst his wife and son complained of a sore neck and headaches. It was also discovered that an elderberry bush had died close to the tree where the object hovered and that depressions were found in the ground and some of grass flattened in the vicinity.

Although the evidence is circumstantial in this case we have another re-occurring feature of the UFO phenomenon causing a rash or burning of the skin on the witness.

The Warminster ‘Thing’

There are, a number of strange reports from the English town of Warminster dating back to the start of the 1960s and the “Warminster Thing” as it became known. But it is generally accepted to have started early on Christmas morning in 1964 when a loud high-pitched menacing sound was heard by Marjory Bye on her way to church. The sound was so intense that she could feel it pounding in her head, neck and shoulders. Reports of these sonic disturbances came in from all over Warminster. Witnesses talked of “the thing” .No one had seen the source of the sounds. Some were even been knocked to the ground from the noise.

By June 1965 flying saucers were seen, cigar-shaped objects, fireballs, huge mother ships and scout ships. Over the 1965 August Bank Holiday a public meeting was held to allay the fears of the populace of Warminster.

Local journalist Arthur Shuttlewood assumed these sightings were of Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs). Arthur eventually became a hardcore believer, expressing passionate views on the alien manifestations of Warminster and coining the phrase “The Thing”. He later authored a book in 1967, “The Warminster Mystery”, on the experience and was instrumental in making the phenomenon national news.

Gordon Faulkner took the famous photo of a Warminster UFO used on the cover of Shuttleworth’s book. He sent it to Shuttleworth, who had the Daily Mirror reproduce it, on Sept 10th 1965 along with an accompanying report. The “Warminster Thing” became national news.

Interest grew from afar and BBC even produced a TV documentary “Pie in the Sky” shown in 1966 covering the story.

news.bbc.co.uk...

Arthur Shuttleworth meanwhile claimed he had been receiving phone calls from alien occupants of the craft in his book. Although he did admit these calls could have easily been faked he later went on to claim that an Aryan looking human being visited him and revealed the calls were real. Sightings continued on a regular basis finally fading to almost nothing by 1977.

With the army based on nearby Salisbury Plain, Warminster is a well known military town. This gave rise to a theory that the noise and the sighting could have been caused by military experiments. But believers disagreed ing that the military were one of the reasons Warminster had been chosen for visitations. Whatever the reason for the coming of The Thing, it certainly put Warminster on the map and remains a major piece of British UFO lore.

More here:
www.ufo-warminster.co.uk...
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Montford Bridge UFO Incident on the A5 – 1966

According to author Nick Redfern a declassified report made by Corporal Rickwood of the RAF’s Provost and Security Services provides an intriguing story from the mid 1960s .

Twenty two year old Diane Foulkes, had been driving home to Shrewsbury along the A5 road around midnight on 8th November 1966. She noticed a bright circular, object in the sky emitting beams of light from the sky towards her vehicle as she got close to the River Severn.






Corporal R.A. Rickwood of the RAF's Provost and Security Services wrote in his report:

"...she could see rays of light shooting from the object which appeared to keep station with her car until she arrived home. At one time during the journey the object travelled near her and the rays seemed to come towards the right hand side of her car. She felt a bump against that side as if they had struck it." "At this moment she felt as if she had received an electric shock and had felt a severe pain in her neck. The left-hand side headlight of the car also went out. This made her extremely frightened. When she got home she felt very ill and had complained to her parents…… "There is no evidence to associate the incidents complained of with the Royal Air Force and the complainant Miss Foulkes is now satisfied that the incidents are unexplainable and in no way connected with the Armed Forces."

Interestingly, the UFO seems to have drained the power from the headlights of Diane Foulkes’ car. Another common theme in UFO reports around the world. It also highly significant that the RAF sent an investigator out and points to how seriously the topic was taken in private whilst a curtain of ridicule was promoted publicly.

The most glaring statement is that the Foulkes was convinced that the incident was unexplainable and not connected with the military. As long as the MoD could avoid responsibility then it seems they did not care for the safety and protection of their citizens!

www.ufocasebook.com...
ufoupdateslist.com...


continued below >>>

Dorset Flying Cross – 1967

The Autumn of 1967 saw a new wave of UFO sightings across the United Kingdom and coincided with the mysterious Mothman sightings across the Atlantic. Amongst reports of the usual saucer and cigar shape craft there were also witnesses to lampshade and cross shaped UFOs. One of the best documented is by former RAF officer “Angus” Brooks.



While walking his dogs in strong winds during late morning of 26 October 1967 at Moigne Downs in Dorset, Brooks witnessed a contrail and then an object descending at phenomenal speed . It abruptly levelled out at a height of approximately 250 feet, some quarter of a mile from where he had settled down into an indentation in the hillside to shelter from the winds.

Brooks described the object as a central circular body with a leading fuselage in the front and three separate fuselages at the rear. As he watched the three rear fuselages moved so that with the fourth fuselage they formed a cross shape. Brooks reported no obvious power units or noise and despite very strong Force 8 gales, the object apparently maintained this position for over twenty minutes.

During the encounter Angus Brooks' Alsatian, returned to his side showing signs of distress and refusing his commands to sit. Brooks noted that on future walks in the vicinity, his dog appeared very nervous. The animal died of “acute cystitis” (a disorder of the urinary bladder) about six weeks later at the age of 12. He was also accompanied by his 4 year old Dalmatian who appeared unaffected by the incident.

Brooks said the UFO was made of a translucent material. Dark shadows were dotted along the bottoms of the fuselages and centre chamber. Nose cones and groove fins were seen along the bases of the fuselages. The centre chamber was an estimated 25 feet in diameter and 12 feet high. The fuselages he estimated to be about 75 ft. long, 7 ft. high and 8 ft. wide. The UFO seemed like it was hovering somewhere between the Winfrith Atomic Station and Portland Underwater Defence Station and about a mile inland from the USAF Communications Unit at Ringstead Bay. At 11:47 a.m., the craft flew to the east-northeast and disappeared.


A team of researchers from the Ministry of Defence interviewed Mr Brooks and offered their explanation:

He had seen a vitreous floater in the fluid of his eyeball. The sighting had appeared dramatic due to Brooks' entering a dream like state as he sheltered from the wind. They attributed the behaviour of his Alsatian to the dog finding Brooks in a trance. This was followed by a confirmation that radar cover detected nothing of note and, what has now become a standard disclaimer, about the MoD being open minded but having no evidence to confirm the existence of extra-terrestrials.

Brooks was not impressed with the MOD's explanation and wrote a response to their report. He refuted the conclusions and stated that he had previously had no intention to become involved in the UFO topic but had become “interested enough to be doing some think tank work on this”.

As a footnote, Malcolm Williams an ophthalmic optician from London wrote in to FSR (V14 No 6) and claimed that a floater would not remain stationery for 20 minutes. He felt that the MoD would use this is a popular alibi and advised readers to close one eye then the other to eliminate any possibility of the floater excuse being used in the future!

More information :
www.ufocasebook.com...

Flying Saucer Review Vol 14 No.1 and Vol 14 No.4













By the end of the 1960s, in the US, the Condon Report had concluded that there was no real tangible evidence for extra-terrestrial visitation and Project Bluebook was wrapped up as a new decade beckoned. Here in Britain thinking began to change after 22 years of UFO reports. It seemed that the 1950s belief in nuts and bolts flying saucers flown by beings from other planets was being questioned, doubted even. Serious researchers began to talk of “other universes” and dimensions. The disappointment of finding nothing living on the moon and the probability that intelligent life was nowhere around us in the solar system had changed attitudes.

Next we will visit the 1970s which saw the last days of a more innocent era of UFOlogy before dark government conspiracy stories circulated, sinister alien abductions began to grip the world and little grey men replaced little green ones.

Part 5 - 1970s continues here
www.abovetopsecret.com...