For some time now, publications about UFO crashes that happened before the landmark Roswell incident in July 1947 began to appear in the print media and on the Internet. The most famous are the UFO crashes on the Green Island near Rostov in June 1941, just before the start of World War II, and a similar incident in April 1941 in the American state of Missouri.
Late guests
The story, which once happened in Missouri, became public in the summer of 1984. A certain Floy Huffman, suffering from a serious illness and taking a course of chemotherapy, but being in her right mind and firm memory, feeling the approach of death, decided to tell her granddaughter Charlotte Mann about what she had kept secret for many years. Her story concerned the events of distant 1941, which took place near the small town of Cape Girardeau, on the banks of the great Mississippi River, Missouri.
One evening in April, two strangers came to the home of the Reverend William Huffman, still a young pastor of the Red Star Baptist Church, husband of Floy and grandfather of Charlotte. They turned to the priest with a request to go with them to the crash site in order to pay their last respects to the lost pilots. The pastor agreed and drove with the newcomers in a completely ordinary, not a police car. They drove along the riverbank for about 15 miles, and when they arrived at the scene, Father William immediately realized that something unusual had happened there.
From the very beginning, he was struck by the appearance of the lost aircraft. The pastor had to travel by plane several times, and he knew very well what both civilian and military airplanes looked like. The same thing that lay in a clearing near the river bank did not even remotely look like an airplane: it was an all-metal aircraft, shaped like a giant saucer. There were no seams or joints in it, and only in one place was a large hole with ragged edges gaping. Through it, William looked inside the outlandish apparatus. There was a metal chair, unusual-looking instruments and consoles with dials, as well as many other objects that the pastor had never seen before and which later was difficult for him to describe. Huffman was struck by the numerous inscriptions inside the object,which did not resemble any known script, but vaguely resembled ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.
Mysterious pilots
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The dead pilots of the aircraft, whose corpses lay not far from it, looked more than strange. They were three creatures that only resembled humans. The pastor realized that these strange creatures had arrived on a strange ship, and it was for them that he was called here. Two, as they would now say, the enlonauts were lying side by side, and the third a little further away. Apparently, this third did not die when the apparatus hit the ground immediately, like his comrades, and he managed to make a dozen steps before he collapsed dead to the ground.
Around - a lot of people crowded: military, police, firefighters. They talked among themselves, talked about some kind of whirlwind of flame. Despite the fact that traces of fire were visible around, and the grass and bushes were still smoking in places, the dead humanoids were not affected by the fire. Paying the last honors to the unknown wanderers of the Universe, Pastor Huffman read a prayer for the dead over them.
Meanwhile, police photographers appeared next to the UFO. Two servicemen lifted one of the humanoids on the ground and, supporting him from both sides, put him on his feet so that the photographers could take full-length pictures. Now the Reverend William was able to see him better. The strange creature was only about 120 cm tall, and his body seemed soft, almost amorphous, as if devoid of a skeleton. The pilot was tightly fitted with a jumpsuit that had no seams or fasteners, made of something similar to aluminum foil, in places corrugated. The overly long arms had equally disproportionately long fingers - three on each hand.
According to the story of Floy Huffman, FBI officers conducted a conversation with each of the people who found themselves at the crash site. The pastor was told that he should adhere to the following version: nothing happened at this place, and what you saw, you just imagined. Remember: you have not seen anything here, and our conversation with you is a state secret that must be kept under seven seals and not shared with anyone.
However, the Reverend William was so shocked by what he saw, that on his return home he nevertheless told his wife and sons about the strange incident, however, taking from them in turn a promise to keep what they had heard a secret. And Floy kept her word for 43 long years.
The photo
Of course, Floy Huffman is hardly the only witness to that long-standing mysterious story. Her granddaughter Charlotte, who, together with her younger sister as a child, had occasion to hear snatches of conversations between her father and uncle about the same story, also kept her memories. Moreover, she remembered exactly that in their house there was a photograph of a strange creature with a UFO, which eventually disappeared somewhere. Charlotte's sister confirmed this information, saying in her written statement that as a teenager she had heard conversations about a mysterious deceased creature over which her grandfather had once read a prayer for the dead. Once she even caught a glimpse of a photograph of an enlonaut. Clares Shade, the brother of the policeman who was the sheriff of Cape Girardeau in 1941, was also ready to testify.
The case was investigated by ufologist and journalist Ryan Wood, during a meeting with whom Charlotte Mann recalled important details of a long history. She told Boud that about two weeks after the disaster, an unknown young man approached William Huffman (some ufologists now claim his name was Garland D. Fronabugger) and said that he saw the pastor at the scene of the tragedy and heard him read the funeral prayer over strange creatures, and this made a deep impression on him. Then the young man added that he managed to quietly take a picture of one of the creatures, and the pastor would probably be interested in getting such a photo. He gave the monk the photograph, bowed and left. The photograph was kept by Charlotte's grandfather and was never seen by anyone other than family members.
After William's death, the picture was inherited by one of his sons, Charlotte's father, Guy Huffman. He did not make a big secret from the picture, and once, in 1954, one of his friends persuaded him to give the photo to him for a while. She never returned to Charlotte's father.
A similar story
In total, according to Ryan Wood, there have been approximately 86 UFO disasters to date - from the first recorded in Texas in 1897 to the 1997 crash in Somalia. The Texas incident took place on April 17, 1897 over the small town of Aurora, then numbering about 3,000 inhabitants and located north of Dallas. As the Dallas Morning News reported, the cigar-shaped UFO swam slowly in the sky over Aurora and crashed into a windmill belonging to Judge J. Proctor to the north of the city. There was a deafening explosion, and UFO debris scattered in different directions badly damaged the beautiful garden, which also belonged to the judge.
The UFO pilot was killed. It was a small creature, its body was severely damaged by the explosion. The newspaper referred to him as a creature “out of this world,” and an officer from nearby Fort Worth concluded that he was a Martian. Information has been preserved that, together with the enlonaut, records were found made by unknown hieroglyphs, which were probably some kind of documents. The mysterious creature was buried in the local cemetery in compliance with all Christian rituals. The grave remained unnamed. The wreckage of his ship was thrown by the inhabitants of Aurora into a well located not far from the windmill.
Much later, in 1945, a certain Brawley Oates acquired from an aged judge Proctor the site where the mill had previously stood. The new owner decided to clear the well of alien debris in order to start using it again as a source of water. Having done this work, he fell asleep from an attack of arthritis. Oates believed this was due to the consumption of water contaminated with UFO debris. After that, Oates blocked the well from above with a powerful concrete slab, and already on top of it he built a utility outbuilding. Judging by the date stamped on the plate, this was done already in 1957.
As you can see, this story has certain parallels with the incident near Cape Girardeau: the small stature of the alien, his funeral service according to the Christian rite and hieroglyphic inscriptions found in the ship, used by humanoids. However, the incident on the outskirts of Aurora is also hardly the oldest, since references to "sky ships" and their crews can be found even in medieval chronicles. Cases of at least their breakdowns were also recorded then.
Magazine: Secrets of the 20th century №7