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The hills are alive ...with weird stories of ghosts, UFOs, fairies and flying dinosaurs
Since ancient times the moors and valleys of the Pennines have been fertile ground for strange sightings and weird phenomena. Now a new book relates over 100 case histories. Angela Barnes reports.
A glance at the topographical map of the United Kingdom will reveal why the Pennine Hills are called the backbone of England. However, what maps and geographical boundaries can't tell you is the huge store of stories and legends centered on the area.
For these hills, say some, are haunted – and always have been. They form what believers in the strange and mysterious call a "window area" – and one of the most important in Europe.
For centuries, reports of extraordinary phenomena on our bleak moors, valley hamlets and cotton-bred townships have been far beyond the level experienced elsewhere.
This area has generated more tales of boggarts and monsters, ghosts and UFOs than virtually anywhere else in the northern hemisphere. And the trend shows no sign of abating.
Says Jenny Randles, a professional researcher in the field of strange phenomena for 25 years: "The Pennines are special –I know because I was born there in the Rossendale Valley. I have often seen their power in action." Now she has written a book which claims to reveal the mysterious energy at work in this remarkable area.
She says the concept of a window area dates back to the 1960s when an idiosyncratic New York journalist, John Keel, suggested that there might be pockets of bizarre activity scattered around the globe "that act almost like portals into another reality.
"The idea of windows as tunnels between alternative universes also owed something to the concept of the Bermuda Triangle which developed in the sixties. This is a supposedly mysterious region where ships and aircraft disappear in unprecedented numbers.
"About 100 regions around the world seem to qualify as window areas. How do we define a real window? And are the Pennine Hills such a place? They certainly are in my view, they are as real as a window gets.
She claims that in September 1982 in Shipley Glen, William Green saw a huge 'bird' – with a wing span at least 6ft, perhaps more –which appeared in mid-afternoon 'flying in a rather haphazard manner' and 'keeping fairly low'.
Monster
Three days later another sighting occurred at nearby Yeadon, where Jean Schofield saw the huge 'monster bird' surrounded by a flock of rooks. She saw it head off towards Leeds-Bradford Airport.
"Sightings were also recorded in Pudsey, Eldwick and Thackley."
Sightings of the "Yorkshire flying dinosaur" among others are recorded in Jenny's book, Supernatural Pennines.
"One case that I investigated at first hand occurred on the moors outside Todmorden. The isolated cottage that I visited was the centre of a series of 'action replay' events – not some dramatic battle or the death throes of an aircraft, but something of stunning triviality. Nellie, who lived there, described how she had heard on several occasions the sound of her son coming home on his motorbike.
"She heard a complete repeat of this event, as the bike drove up the hillside, parked in the yard, the door opened and her son entered. The only problem was that none of these things were really happening, at least not then. They had occurred years earlier but her son did not now visit the house on a motorcycle."
She adds: "You will find reports of fairies throughout the Pennines right up until the 20th century. Cottingley is the scene of the famous hoax photographs, Ilkley's rocky moor is long said to be the home of goblins and fairies. A doctor named Dixon was walking over the moors towards his home at Rylstone when he saw a 'tribe of fairies dancing in a ring of moonlight' on a limestone ridge long reputed to be the home of otherworldly creatures.
Creatures
"The way in which simple sightings can turn out to be more confusing –almost bending reality –is revealed in a case from Alverthorpe, near Wakefield. Walter Parr was an engineer who on a cold night had headed off to the pub to meet some friends. But on the way, he found himself in an odd state of consciousness. For no apparent reason he took a route across some mud-sodden fields –a short cut that he would never normally follow. Halfway across, he realised that a huge light in the sky was paying him undue attention and swooping towards him.
"It was a long oval or 'squashed rugby ball' shape and surrounded by a greenish mist. He realised for the first time that he had been 'cut off' from reality in a very odd way.
"But if you want to encounter aliens then one of the best places to go seems to be Todmorden. Alien contacts are very common here. I have investigated about 12 of them within just a few miles of one another. No other area of the UK compares with that ratio.
"The most famous occurred in November 1980 when a police officer, Alan Godfrey, encountered a swirling grey spinning top that blow-dried the rain-sodden tarmac as he was on early morning patrol. Under regression from several psychiatrists he later recalled a bizarre on-board abduction by entities the size of children."
Since ancient times, the moors and valleys within the Pennine hills have been fertile ground for strange phenomena. Supernatural Pennines claims to relate over 100 of case histories which have come to light through regional surveys and in-depth examinations.
Noises
There are cases of poltergeist-inducing rain, humming noises emerging from the ground, big cats roaming ghost-like through the peaks, ice bombs raining on houses from clear skies, mysterious burns to the skin and extinguishing of street lights.
Says Jenny: "Often places where such phenomena abound are remote and inaccessible to scientific research. The Pennines are not and offer a unique opportunity to hunt, trap and perhaps one day harness the energy that triggers strange forces within its midst."
As far as West Yorkshire is concerned, Jenny comments: "This large county has a dense population (especially in the Leeds-Bradford metropolitan area). However, it is on the less populated north-west corner of the county that attention should focus in particular – the part that borders the Calder Valley to the west and Ilkley to the north. Perhaps not surprisingly, this is where the most activity has been generated.
"Holmfirth is a pretty village south of Huddersfield, famed for the BBC's Last of the Summer Wine. Scholes is a tiny hamlet a mile away and the scene of a series of events witnessed by Audrey Hanson.
"They began when the room in which she was playing as a child was suddenly filled with an intense glow that seemed to ooze from the walls as though they were 'painted in glow worms'. There was also a faint humming/whining. It was almost as if Audrey was plugged in to another dimension. On another occasion whilst relaxing by a stream, she suddenly found herself transported to the same place but in a different time.
"Audrey also had a sighting of what we now call a UFO to the east of Leeds. Whilst leaving the railway station one winter's day in 1942 she saw an orange/red ball float from the sky low over a cricket pitch. She watched it edge slowly in her direction and felt a sensation like a tickling –perhaps a result of the electrostatic field. The object shot off towards Garforth and was apparently seen at the same time by a friend of Audrey's who lived in the nearby village of Barwick in Elmet."
Jenny adds: "They say that buying and selling a house is one of the most stressful activities in which a human being can engage and that was certainly true for Mrs Belmont of Ingrow, near Haworth.
Garden
Having shown some prospective buyers around, the three of them stood in the garden discussing the sale when the sky above them noticeably darkened. Bemused, they looked up to see an enormous black 'cloud' that obliterated the stars. They were looking at the flat base of a huge object hovering silently overhead. Then a sequence of lights appeared 'like Christmas illuminations being switched on'.
"The unexpected event had unfortunate consequences. Her would-be buyers fled in the car, muttering something about the area being 'spooked'. They were never heard from again."
• Supernatural Pennines is published by Hale and priced at 11.99 .
angela.barnes@ypn.co.uk
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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