Speaker 1: What happens if you walk into a swamp at night
Speaker 1: and say three times, we have your baby. If you
Speaker 1: do that in the Bare Creek Swamp in Pratful, Alabama,
Speaker 1: you might not like the answer. Legend has it that
Speaker 1: a woman lost her child in that swamp and spent
Speaker 1: the rest of her life trying to find it. It
Speaker 1: isn't clear how the child disappeared. Maybe it wandered off,
Speaker 1: or there are those who say it was taken by
Speaker 1: a war party of the Native Americans. We don't even
Speaker 1: know for sure if the child was a boy or
Speaker 1: a girl. But what we do know is that death
Speaker 1: wasn't enough of a deterrent to make the woman stop looking.
Speaker 1: Imagine how it must have been for that poor woman.
Speaker 1: It probably started like any day she was going about
Speaker 1: doing her chores. It was a long time ago when
Speaker 1: different chores required a whole day's work just to complete
Speaker 1: one task. Maybe it was laundry day. She was busy
Speaker 1: boiling water and shaving strips of soap into it from
Speaker 1: a homemade bar. She would have been bent over while
Speaker 1: scrubbing the bedding and clothes on a washboard before passing
Speaker 1: them through another tub of water to rentse away the
Speaker 1: excess soap and finally hang them out to dry. While
Speaker 1: Mama worked diligently at her burden, the child let's assume
Speaker 1: it was a girl and let's call her Sarah, played
Speaker 1: with her doll in the grass nearby. Mama didn't have
Speaker 1: much time to give little Sarah much attention. She had
Speaker 1: to rely on the child to play contently and stay close.
Speaker 1: Mama probably didn't think much of it. The first time
Speaker 1: she stepped around from behind a freshly hung sheet to
Speaker 1: see her daughter wasn't in her place on the ground, Sarah.
Speaker 1: She most likely called, putting just enough of an edge
Speaker 1: on her voice to warn her daughter to come back
Speaker 1: to her spot. Then she picked up the next sheet
Speaker 1: and hung it. When she stepped around from behind the
Speaker 1: laundry again, her daughter was still nowhere in sight, Sarah.
Speaker 1: She called again, this time with a little more authority.
Speaker 1: A third trip to the clothes line occupied Mamma for
Speaker 1: a few more minutes. When little Sara still wasn't back
Speaker 1: in her place, she probably muttered something like where is
Speaker 1: that child off to As she walked around to the
Speaker 1: side of the house. Sarah wasn't there. She looked around
Speaker 1: and listened for a moment, hoping to hear her little
Speaker 1: girl's laughter. She heard nothing. Mamma continued around to the
Speaker 1: back of the house and then to the other side.
Speaker 1: By the time she'd made her way back to the front,
Speaker 1: she was beginning to worry Sarah. She called out loudly
Speaker 1: and then stopped to listen. A cool breeze rattled the
Speaker 1: budding leaves on the trees, but no child's voice could
Speaker 1: be heard. Panicked now, she left the house yard and
Speaker 1: went down to the barn, scattering the hens that pecked
Speaker 1: at the dirt in her path as she passed. Sarah,
Speaker 1: where are you, she repeatedly called. As she swung open
Speaker 1: the door, the contrast of light and dark temporarily blinded her.
Speaker 1: She stood there for a moment, allowing her eyes to adjust.
Speaker 1: In focus, Sarah, she called out again. A bird took
Speaker 1: flight as she ducked as it swooped low over her
Speaker 1: head to escape through the open door, and silence followed. Slowly,
Speaker 1: With terrified eyes, the woman turned and gazed into the
Speaker 1: swamp that bordered their little house to the south and east. Sarah,
Speaker 1: she whispered, as thoughts of the child wandering in such
Speaker 1: a danger's place filled her mind. She imagined cotton mouths
Speaker 1: and copper heads singing their fangs into the little girl's legs,
Speaker 1: and calculated how quickly she would succumb to such a
Speaker 1: bite without someone there to help. She had visions of
Speaker 1: alligators dragging her precious child into the water and tearing
Speaker 1: her to pieces, and her mind raced through scenarios where
Speaker 1: predators clamped down on the back of the baby's neck
Speaker 1: and dragged her deep into the swamp to gnaw on
Speaker 1: her tiny bones. Dear God know, she managed to cry.
Speaker 1: She raced into the thick briars, mindless of the thorns
Speaker 1: that tore at her own clothes. She had to find
Speaker 1: her baby, she swore, as she'd never stop looking until
Speaker 1: she did. Hours later, her husband came in from the
Speaker 1: fields and found the cabin empty. He called to his wife,
Speaker 1: but she didn't answer. She hadn't started supper, and he
Speaker 1: couldn't help but notice the half finished laundry out in
Speaker 1: the yard. Where was she? He stepped back outside and
Speaker 1: called her name, and then he listened. Sarah. He heard
Speaker 1: somewhere in the distance Sarah. Was she lost? Was his
Speaker 1: wife out looking for her? He followed his wife's path
Speaker 1: into the swamp, calling to her as he went. Sometimes
Speaker 1: he'd stop and listen, and again and again he heard
Speaker 1: his wife's voice calling Sarah. But no matter how hard
Speaker 1: he searched, he couldn't pinpoint the location of the sound.
Speaker 1: Night fell on the swamp, crushing the light and his
Speaker 1: hopes of finding either his wife or his child with it.
Speaker 1: The next morning, he saddled a horse and went to town.
Speaker 1: A search party was formed, and every inch of the
Speaker 1: swamp that could be accessed was searched. There was no
Speaker 1: sign of the man, wife, and child. Once in a while,
Speaker 1: everyone would stop and listen, Sarah. They heard deepen the
Speaker 1: by you, Sarah, but they couldn't tell where it was
Speaker 1: coming from. After several days of looking, they gave up. Eventually,
Speaker 1: the man packed up and moved away. Living so close
Speaker 1: to the place that had swallowed up everything that meant
Speaker 1: anything to him was more than he could stand. No
Speaker 1: one knows whatever happened to him. I'd like to think
Speaker 1: he found happiness somewhere else. As for his wife, they
Speaker 1: say she is still out there searching. So what happens
Speaker 1: if you step into Bear Creek Swamp and say three
Speaker 1: times we've got your baby? Her mother will appear and
Speaker 1: attack you, and if you escape, more power to you.
Speaker 1: But if she catches you, you'll wind up up like
Speaker 1: little Sarah. No one will ever find you. This isn't
Speaker 1: the only story about Bear Creek Swamp. There are tales
Speaker 1: of mysterious lights that appear in the road ahead. The
Speaker 1: ghost of the Alibaimu Indians are often reported drifting in
Speaker 1: and out of the fog and then disappearing altogether. It
Speaker 1: is even said that a civil war battle plays itself
Speaker 1: out over and over again on the breeze at night.
Speaker 1: You'll never find the source, they say, but you will
Speaker 1: hear cannons or is that just someone's still blowing up.
Speaker 1: Aside from these frightening paranormal stories, there's one true and
Speaker 1: verified incident that happened just a few short years ago.
Speaker 1: While on patrol on dirt Road three through the swamp,
Speaker 1: an officer happened to glance over and see a porcelain
Speaker 1: doll sticking up out of the muddy waters. At that time,
Speaker 1: he thought, well, that's odd, but didn't give it much
Speaker 1: more thought until over the next few days, dozens of
Speaker 1: reports came in of a doll's head seen in the swamp.
Speaker 1: The police went out to investigate and discovered a total
Speaker 1: of twenty one dolls impaled on bamboo poles and stuck
Speaker 1: down in the mire. It was a veritable dull graveyard.
Speaker 1: Some of their faces were painted white, further enhancing an
Speaker 1: already grim scene. I don't know who the prankster was
Speaker 1: or who took the time to place all those dolls
Speaker 1: out there, but kudos to you. You succeeded in creating
Speaker 1: one of the creepiest practical jokes I have ever known of.
Speaker 1: All swamps contain an air of mystery, a feeling of
Speaker 1: being otherworldly, whether you feel like you've stepped through some
Speaker 1: kind of a time warp, landed on another planet, or
Speaker 1: passed through the vales that separate life from after life.
Speaker 1: All swamps at some point will impose uncomfortable emotions on
Speaker 1: the bravest of men. When that swamp bears the name Hackemack,
Speaker 1: which means the place where spirits dwell and was originally
Speaker 1: called the devil Swamp by white settlers, those feelings are
Speaker 1: likely to come more frequently and with greater intensity. While
Speaker 1: we tend to think of swamps as being a Southern landscape,
Speaker 1: they're not Hakamack is located in southeastern Massachusetts, square in
Speaker 1: the middle of the legendary Bridgewater Triangle. Stories have poured
Speaker 1: out of that region of weird creatures, ghostly apparitions, and
Speaker 1: unexplainable disappearances for generations. Places like a Sonnet Ledge, where
Speaker 1: even the happiest of souls fell the suicidal urge to
Speaker 1: throw themselves into the waters below, and Easton's Mill Pond,
Speaker 1: where satanic imps were said to be employed by Nathan Seleah,
Speaker 1: a wizard to run the mill at night, can be
Speaker 1: found within the triangle. It seems that everywhere within the
Speaker 1: triangle hides one legend or another, but within the swamp
Speaker 1: there are many. Early one morning, a fisherman was quietly
Speaker 1: running his boat along the banks of the non Catessit River,
Speaker 1: moving into the swamp through a heavy fog, when he
Speaker 1: heard what sounded like a distant drum beeat. It only
Speaker 1: lasted a moment, but it got his attention. He glanced around,
Speaker 1: but the mists were too thick and the sound had stopped,
Speaker 1: so he continued on his journey with nothing more than
Speaker 1: a gentle whirring of his trolling motor to break the silence.
Speaker 1: When he heard it again, and again he stopped and listened.
Speaker 1: The slapping clunk of waves lapping at his boat echoed
Speaker 1: around him, and somewhere a bird called for its mate.
Speaker 1: The wind rustled in the trees, and the occasional raindrop
Speaker 1: fell with a splat against the aluminum seat at the bow.
Speaker 1: The drums he thought he heard were gone, and again
Speaker 1: the warring trolling motor kicked up, and he moved on.
Speaker 1: Now on the edge, the fishermen began to feel as
Speaker 1: though he were being watched. His natural response was to
Speaker 1: watch back, except he didn't know what he was looking for.
Speaker 1: And then he saw it. It was nothing more than
Speaker 1: a patch of fog that seemed a little denser than
Speaker 1: the rest, but it was moving rhythmically. The fisherman cocked
Speaker 1: his head to listen, and there were no drumbeats now,
Speaker 1: just the even gentle, trickling woosh of a paddle being
Speaker 1: swept through the water, over and over as it propelled
Speaker 1: a boat forward. The fisherman craned his eyes hard on
Speaker 1: that point, and the haze was spinning and dissolving and reforming.
Speaker 1: White particles of water disintegrated into darkness and then reformed
Speaker 1: in shades of buff and brown. Tendrils that trailed into
Speaker 1: space solidified into arms, and a spherical object that once
Speaker 1: floated aimlessly, became a human head. Before the fisherman's eyes.
Speaker 1: A Native American slid out of the void and appeared
Speaker 1: to be paddling his canoe toward him. Too stunned to move,
Speaker 1: the fisherman grasped the sides of his boat and waited
Speaker 1: for impact. He was sure this strange man in the
Speaker 1: traditional apparel of the Wampanawag people was going to steer
Speaker 1: his canoe right into him. Seconds before he would have
Speaker 1: done just that, the strange man turned the canoe slightly
Speaker 1: and glided silently past. He was so close that the
Speaker 1: fisherman could have reached out and touched him. The fisherman
Speaker 1: never took his eyes off the bazaar site. As the
Speaker 1: canoe passed, he turned his head to follow, and just
Speaker 1: as it had materialized into existence, it dissolved out of it.
Speaker 1: Not once did the man in the canoe acknowledge the fisherman.
Speaker 1: Seconds after the apparition disappeared, the distant sounds of a
Speaker 1: drum could be heard. One last time. The fisherman might
Speaker 1: have counted himself lucky. That day, another man, this one
Speaker 1: outlaying muskrat lines, had a similar experience. It wasn't drums
Speaker 1: that he heard that morning, but a loud crash startled The
Speaker 1: man looked up to see a massive, hairy beast to
Speaker 1: break through the trees and slog down into the waters
Speaker 1: of the swamp. It growled with a low, menacing rumble
Speaker 1: before passing within a few yards of the terrified man.
Speaker 1: I knew it wasn't a man because it smelled when
Speaker 1: it passed. He would later say it smelled like a skump,
Speaker 1: musky and dirty. Aside from ghostly apparitions and unknown beast,
Speaker 1: Hackamack Swamp has a reputation for another phenomenon. In nineteen
Speaker 1: oh eight, two undertakers were traveling between West Bridgewater and
Speaker 1: Bridgewater when they spotted something in the sky that looked
Speaker 1: to them like a giant lantern. The two men stopped
Speaker 1: and watched the peculiar light while it hovered in place
Speaker 1: for nearly forty minutes. In nineteen oh eight, there were
Speaker 1: no blaming experimental military aircraft for what the undertaker saw.
Speaker 1: Granted Orville and wilbur Wright first achieved flight just south
Speaker 1: of Kittyhawk North Carolina in nineteen oh three, but craft
Speaker 1: capable of hovering in nineteen oh eight I was still
Speaker 1: getting no more than a few feet off the ground
Speaker 1: and never managing to stay in the air for more
Speaker 1: than a few minutes. The first practical helicopter wouldn't come
Speaker 1: into existence until nineteen thirty nine. Even if it were
Speaker 1: possible that the inventors working diligently to give wings to
Speaker 1: man just happened to fly those machines over Hackamack's Swamp
Speaker 1: on the same night that two undertakers happened to be
Speaker 1: traveling past, it doesn't explain the first documented UFO sighting
Speaker 1: ever recorded there. John Winthrop was a lawyer and a Puritan.
Speaker 1: In sixteen thirty he helped establish the Massachusetts Bay Colony,
Speaker 1: the second settlement in New England after the Plymouth Colony.
Speaker 1: For twelve years, he served as governor. During that time,
Speaker 1: he kept an extensive diary of the trials and triumphs
Speaker 1: of his fellow Puritans. One entry in particular is now
Speaker 1: referred to as the first documented u FO siding in
Speaker 1: American history. In his March first, sixteen thirty nine entry,
Speaker 1: Winthrop told the story of John Everell and two others.
Speaker 1: He declared Everell to be a man of good reputation, activity,
Speaker 1: and estate in Boston. The following is an excerpt from
Speaker 1: the diary. In this year, one James Everell, a sober,
Speaker 1: discreet man, and two others saw a great light in
Speaker 1: the night at Muddy River. When it stood still, it
Speaker 1: flamed up and was about three yards square, and when
Speaker 1: it ran, it was contracted into the figure of a swine.
Speaker 1: It ran as swift as an arrow towards Charleston, and
Speaker 1: so up and down for about two or three hours.
Speaker 1: They were come down in their lighter about a mile,
Speaker 1: and when it was over they found themselves carried quite
Speaker 1: back against the tide to the place they came from.
Speaker 1: Diverse other credible persons saw the same light after about
Speaker 1: the same place. These men in good standing with the Governor,
Speaker 1: along with several others, saw these lights over the course
Speaker 1: of three hours. They hovered and darted and shot back
Speaker 1: and forth as these men watched, And when it was
Speaker 1: over they found themselves a full mile upstream from where
Speaker 1: they'd been when they first spotted the lights. Upstream? Were
Speaker 1: these men also the first alien abductees? UFO reports continued
Speaker 1: to come out of this region today. In nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 1: a woman saw lights while she was at a cookout.
Speaker 1: She says they too darted around. At one point, she says,
Speaker 1: they looked as if they were heading right for the
Speaker 1: house where the cookout was being held. What makes her
Speaker 1: story so fascinating is that once the lights disappeared, helicopters
Speaker 1: swarmed the area where they'd been, as if they were
Speaker 1: looking for something. Was our government searching for something? Or
Speaker 1: had they just missed a rendezvous