Werewolf stories, p.40
Werewolf Stories, page 40
Beer described the story of the witness in these words: “Climbing a hedge, he stumbled upon an animal ravaging a flock of sheep, and taking careful aim he shot it; the beast reared onto its hind legs to run off into the woods. The dog followed the animal into the trees where there was much hideous snarling unlike any creature he had ever heard before. Suddenly the dog came dashing out of the woods and bolted past its master who, firing a second shot into the trees, also ran for home in great fear.” Beer added that the man “went on to explain his later studies of matters concerning the occult and his realization that the animal he had shot was a werewolf and a member of a well-known local family. [He] further states that he knows the family involved and that they called in help from the church over a decade ago but that they had to withdraw because of the terrible phenomena beyond their comprehension. Now the problem is at a stalemate, the family being aware of the nature of his character and chaining him and locking him behind barred doors every night.”
Are the similarities between this case and the one described to Jon Downes actually evidence of a single story that, over time, became somewhat distorted into two separate ones? Or, incredibly, could it be that the case Trevor Beer described involved yet another member of the affected and afflicted werewolf family to which Jon referred? Maybe, one day, we will know the full and unexpurgated truth of this intriguing and conspiratorial affair. Or perhaps, like so many tales of deep cover-up, it will forever languish in mystery, intrigue, and a closely guarded, locked filing cabinet marked “Top Secret.” A hair-covered wild man, or a real-life werewolf? Perhaps someone out there will resurrect the story and solve the mystery.
Sources:
Redfern, Nick. Interview with Jonathan Downes. Woolsery, Devon, England: CFZ Press, 2000.
World War II Monster-Hound
From a woman who, as a young girl, had a traumatic encounter with an infernal, supernatural hound at the height of World War II, we have the following:
During World War II, as the German Luftwaffe bombed London relentlessly, many families left the city for more remote parts of the country, less likely to attract the enemy’s attention.
“At the time, because of the war, my mother and I usually stayed with an elderly gentleman, who had kindly taken us in as ‘refugees’ from London. We only went back to the capital when the bombing ceased. The cottage where we lived is still in existence, in Bredon, Worcestershire. My encounter took place one late afternoon in summer, when I had been sent to bed but was far from sleepy.
“I was sitting at the end of the big brass bedstead, playing with the ornamental knobs and looking out of the window, when I was aware of a scratching noise, and an enormous black dog had walked from the direction of the fireplace to my left. It passed round the end of the bed, towards the door. As the dog passed between me and the window, it swung its head round to stare at me — it had very large eyes, which glowed from inside as if lit up, and as it looked at me I was quite terrified, and very much aware of the creature’s breath, which was warm and as strong as a gust of wind.
“The animal must have been very tall, as I was sitting on the old-fashioned bedstead, which was quite high, and our eyes were level. Funnily enough, by the time it reached the door, it had vanished. I assure you that I was wide awake at the time, and sat on for quite some long while wondering about what I had seen, and to be truthful, too scared to get into our bed, under the clothes and go to sleep. I clearly remember my mother and our host sitting in the garden in the late sun, talking, and hearing the ringing of the bell on the weekly fried-fish van from Birmingham as it went through the village! I am sure I was not dreaming, and have never forgotten the experience, remembering to the last detail how I felt, what the dog looked like.”
Wulver
Jessie Margaret Saxby (1842–1940) was a well-known folklorist in the 1900s. In 1933 she wrote an excellent book titled Shetland Traditional Lore. In the pages of her Scotland-based book, she penned the following intriguing words: “The Wulver was a creature like a man with a wolf’s head. He had short brown hair all over him. His home was a cave dug out of the side of a steep knowe, half-way up a hill. He didn’t molest folk if folk didn’t molest him. He was fond of fishing, and had a small rock in the deep water which is known to this day as the ‘Wulver’s Stane.’ There he would sit fishing sillaks and piltaks for hour after hour. He was reported to have frequently left a few fish on the window-sill of some poor body.”
Unlike the traditional werewolf, the Wulver was not a shape-shifter. Its semi-human, semi-wolf appearance was natural and unchanging. One of the most fascinating, and certainly disturbing, accounts of a Wulver came from Elliott O’Donnell. Shortly after the start of the twentieth century, O’Donnell interviewed a man named Andrew Warren, who had a startling story to tell. In his book Werwolves, which was published in 1912, O’Donnell carefully recorded every word that Warren had to say. The priceless account reads:
“I was about fifteen years of age at the time, and had for several years been residing with my grandfather, who was an elder in the Kirk [Church] of Scotland. He was much interested in geology, and literally filled the house with fossils from the pits and caves round where we dwelt. One morning he came home in a great state of excitement, and made me go with him to look at some ancient remains he had found at the bottom of a dried-up tarn [lake].
“It’s a werwolf, that’s what it is. A werwolf! This island was once overrun with satyrs and werwolves!”
“‘Look!’ he cried, bending down and pointing at them, ‘here is a human skeleton with a wolf’s head. What do you make of it?’ I told him I did not know, but supposed it must be some kind of monstrosity. ‘It’s a werwolf [sic]’ he rejoined, ‘that’s what it is. A werwolf! This island was once overrun with satyrs and werwolves! Help me carry it to the house.’
“I did as he bid me, and we placed it on the table in the back kitchen. That evening I was left alone in the house, my grandfather and the other members of the household having gone to the kirk. For some time I amused myself reading, and then, fancying I heard a noise in the back premises, I went into the kitchen. There was no one about, and becoming convinced that it could only have been a rat that had disturbed me, I sat on the table alongside the alleged remains of the werwolf, and waited to see if the noises would recommence.
“I was thus waiting in a listless sort of way, my back bent, my elbows on my knees, looking at the floor and thinking of nothing in particular, when there came a loud rat, tat, tat of knuckles on the window-pane. I immediately turned in the direction of the noise and encountered, to my alarm, a dark face looking in at me. At first dim and indistinct, it became more and more complete, until it developed into a very perfectly defined head of a wolf terminating in the neck of a human being.
“Though greatly shocked, my first act was to look in every direction for a possible reflection — but in vain. There was no light either without or within, other than that from the setting sun — nothing that could in any way have produced an illusion. I looked at the face and marked each feature intently. It was unmistakably a wolf’s face, the jaws slightly distended; the lips wreathed in a savage snarl; the teeth sharp and white; the eyes light green; the ears pointed. The expression of the face was diabolically malignant, and as it gazed straight at me my horror was as intense as my wonder. This it seemed to notice, for a look of savage exultation crept into its eyes, and it raised one hand — a slender hand, like that of a woman, though with prodigiously long and curved finger-nails — menacingly, as if about to dash in the window-pane.
“Remembering what my grandfather had told me about evil spirits, I crossed myself; but as this had no effect, and I really feared the thing would get at me, I ran out of the kitchen and shut and locked the door, remaining in the hall till the family returned. My grandfather was much upset when I told him what had happened, and attributed my failure to make the spirit depart to my want of faith. Had he been there, he assured me, he would soon have got rid of it; but he nevertheless made me help him remove the bones from the kitchen, and we reinterred them in the very spot where we had found them, and where, for aught I know to the contrary, they still lie.”
Dr. Karl Shuker, who is an expert on the Wulver, has studied this closely: “Quite aside from its highly sensational storyline, it is rather difficult to take seriously any account featuring someone (Warren’s grandfather) who seriously believed that the Hebrides were ‘… once overrun with satyrs and werwolves’! By comparison, and despite his youthful age, Warren’s own assumption that the skeleton was that of a deformed human would seem eminently more sensible — at least until the remainder of his account is read. Notwithstanding Warren’s claim that his account was factual, however, the arrival of what was presumably another of the deceased wolf-headed entity’s kind, seeking the return of the skeleton to its original resting place, draws upon a common theme in traditional folklore and legend.”
Sources:
Shuker, Karl. “Wulvers and Wolfen and Werewolves, Oh My!! — Tales of the Uninvited.” July 28, 2012. https://karlshuker.blogspot.com/2012/07/wulvers-and-wolfen-and-werewolves-oh-my.html.
Zombie Vampires
From time to time, an investigation will take the average adventurer in a direction very different to that originally anticipated. Exactly that happened to Jon Downes, director of the Centre for Fortean Zoology, and me during a visit to Puerto Rico in 2004. We found ourselves plunged into a deeply weird story of nothing less than a third breed of island vampire. The chupacabra and the vampire of Moca, it seemed, had a rival in the blood-drinking stakes.
Puerto Rico is a place filled to the brim with dark superstitions, beliefs in all manner of paranormal phenomena, and an acceptance that terrible and savage things lurk deep within the woods and forests. I, too, am inclined to think such creatures live there. One such story that really caught our attention was focused on the alleged existence of an isolated village somewhere on the Rio Canóvanas. It’s a river that dominates the municipality of Canóvanas, in the northeast of Puerto Rico, that is noted for its green hills and extensive plains.
According to the tale — which half the film crew and a couple of locals had all heard — the entire population of the village was afflicted by a strange malady. The village folk, we were told, were skinny, pale, and downright anemic-looking. They never surfaced during daylight hours. They only ever dressed in black. The clincher: they fed on nothing but fresh blood. To a pair of English vampire hunters, it all sounded great; it was precisely the sort of thing Jon and I were looking for. That didn’t mean it was true, however. Or did it?
None of the people of the village exceeded four and a half feet in height. Their heads were larger than normal and were marked with prominent blue veins. They were completely lacking in hair.
It has been my experience that behind just about every controversial legend or rumor there is usually at least a nugget of truth, even if it is somewhat distorted. We asked our storytellers to expand on what they knew of this infernal tribe of bloodsuckers. They were happy to do so. The picture their words painted was notably unsettling.
None of the people of the village exceeded four and a half feet in height, we were told. Their heads were larger than normal and were marked with prominent blue veins. They were completely lacking in hair. Some of them had six fingers on each hand. Their noses were almost beak-like. They had skin that gave them a leathery, wrinkled, aged look. Their genitals were supposedly nearly nonexistent. Their voices were oddly high-pitched. They walked with a stiff, robotic gait. And they dined voraciously on human blood.
The symptoms of the so-called vampires that dwelled on the Canóvanas River were those of a rare genetic condition called progeria, which provokes rapid aging in afflicted children.
On hearing all of this, Jon and I looked knowingly at each other. The symptoms that were described to us (aside, that is, from the blood drinking) were not those of vampirism at all but of a distressing, and extremely rare, condition called progeria — a tragic genetic affliction that affects children. It is so rare that, officially at least, only one case exists per every eight million people. Progeria provokes rapid aging and a physical appearance nearly identical to that of the so-called vampires that dwelled on the Canóvanas River. In some cases, those with progeria show signs of polydactylism: an extra digit on the hands or feet. Life spans are usually short, from early teens to (at the absolute extreme) the twenties.
Of course, given the rarity of progeria, this instantly made both of us wonder: how was it possible that an entire village could be affected by this genetic disorder — and across several generations? The answer we got was as amazing as it was controversial.
Back in 1957, something unusual was said to have crashed to earth in the Canóvanas region. Among those we spoke to, opinion was split between a meteorite and a craft from another world. Whatever the culprit, it let loose in the area nothing less than a strange alien virus. This virus wormed its way into the water supply of the village and soon infected the population of 30 or 40. The result was disastrous: every subsequent newborn displayed the awful symptoms of what, to Jon and me, sounded acutely like progeria.
As startling as it may seem, the threat of an alien virus surfacing on our world is one that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) takes very seriously.
According to the text of Article IX of the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, which was collectively signed at Washington, D.C., London, England, and Moscow, Russia, on January 27, 1967, and was put in force on October 10 of that year, “In the exploration and use of outer space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies, States Parties to the Treaty shall be guided by the principle of co-operation and mutual assistance and shall conduct all their activities in outer space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies, with due regard to the corresponding interests of all other States Parties to the Treaty.”
Most significant of all is the next section of the document: “States Parties to the Treaty shall pursue studies of outer space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies, and conduct exploration of them so as to avoid their harmful contamination and also adverse changes in the environment of the Earth resulting from the introduction of extraterrestrial matter and, where necessary, shall adopt appropriate measures for this purpose.”
The main concern revolved around the fear that a deadly virus would be released into the earth’s atmosphere, a worldwide pandemic would begin, and an unstoppable plague would escalate, ultimately killing every one of us.
It must be stressed that the main concern, as described in the document, revolved around the fear that a deadly virus would be released into the earth’s atmosphere, a worldwide pandemic would begin, and an unstoppable plague would escalate, ultimately killing every one of us. But what if that same alien pandemic didn’t kill us but provoked progeria-style symptoms and a craving for human blood?
Such a possibility sounds manifestly unlikely in the extreme. It’s worth noting, however, that the so-called extraterrestrial Grays of alien abduction lore — those dwarfish, skinny, black-eyed, and gray-skinned creatures that are so instantly recognizable to one and all and made famous on the likes of The X-Files — do, admittedly, display far more than a few characteristics of progeria.
On the matter of the Grays possibly being affected by progeria, Flying Saucer Review magazine noted: “If Grays have progeria, then there is a very serious situation out there. An entire civilization may be threatened with extinction because their children and young people are dying. A possible reason why progeria may be so widespread among Grays and not among humans is probably because the Grays have been around much longer than humans and the DNA replication is probably deteriorating, making room for genetic mutations and serious genetic diseases. … One reason why they may want to hybridize with Homo sapiens is to add healthier DNA to their gene pool and to weed out the progeria gene.”
I chatted with Jon about this and had to wonder: Was it feasible that a strange, extraterrestrial plague — or, perhaps, futuristic gene-tinkering linked to the alien abduction phenomenon — had provoked a disastrous outbreak of something that manifested in a combination of progeria and vampirism among the population of a small Puerto Rican village?
It seemed outlandish even to give the matter serious thought. Certainly, when all attempts to verify the story came to absolutely nothing, and even the exact location in question could not be identified, we came to a couple of tentative conclusions. First, perhaps what was being described was not progeria, after all, but the results of decades of in-breeding in a village that was in dire need of new blood (so to speak). Second, the idea that these unfortunate people were vampires was almost certainly born out of superstitious fear of their curious appearance rather than actual proof that they thrived on human blood — which they almost certainly did not.
Unfortunately, regardless of the truth of the matter, everything was against us in this investigation. No one was able to point us in the specific direction of the village. To the best of everyone’s knowledge, no photographs of the villagers existed. And the tight schedule we were on meant that there simply wasn’t time to pursue this admittedly fascinating tale.
While a down-to-earth explanation was probably the likely one, try as we might, neither Jon nor I could fully dismiss from our minds the dark notion that Puerto Rico might harbor a band of unholy vampires of the outer space kind, a band with a voracious need for human blood. It was a chilling thought.
