Devil's Footprints

The footprints of the devil (English: Devil's Footprints) were a phenomenon that was observed in the English county of Devon in 1855. After heavy snowfalls appeared traces in the form of split hooves in the snow, allegedly went straight over long distances. The imprints were given their name because Superstitious spread that they were caused by Satan. There is some theory about this also puzzles of Devonshire mentioned incident. However, the veracity of individual facts is questioned.

Descriptions

In the night of 8 to 9 February 1855, a few days after it was snowing heavily in Devon. In the morning, residents found tracks in the snow, similar to the split hoof prints. These traces were 1.5 to 2.5 inches wide ( 3.8 to 6.3 cm) and were repeated at a regular interval of eight inches ( 20.3 cm). They ranged in the landscape (added) over estimated up to 100 miles ( 160.9 km ) and followed, except for the change of direction at various points, a dead straight course. The ever-present in the region tracks led over gardens, in the way of lying houses, walls, a barn and other obstacles. On snow covered roofs they were to behold. Even a small drain tube about four inches ( 10.2 cm) diameter tracks should have done.

The area where the tracks occurred ranged from Exmouth to Topsham and over the River Exe to Dawlish and Teignmouth away. In 30 villages, people have puzzled over the unusual footprints in the snow. Later, reports surfaced that she had also played on fields further south in Totnes and Torquay and that hoof prints were also found at Weymouth in Dorset and even in Lincolnshire. Rumors about the monitoring of a devil -like figure in the district of Devon during the terror appeared. A squad of men armed themselves and tried unsuccessfully to make the suspected in an animal Author locate.

Circumstances of the time

Devon is a county in southwestern England. The event touched the the English Channel facing part of the country. The tracks led from the east to the west. At peasant cottages and houses one or two- storey buildings were around 1855 to be found in cities. Many people in the country still tended to superstition. The powers of evil or the devil were suspected behind many unusual events, the understanding of the population still less educated deprived themselves or their negative effects bestowed.

Attempts to explain

About the event there are all kinds of explanations. Some researchers are skeptical that the tracks really lined up together over a hundred miles, and argue that no one would have been able to travel the entire distance at night. Another reason for skepticism are the eyewitness accounts to the prints themselves, which varied in different details. Among the less probable theories about the events include:

• If it were the swindling of ( a ) the unknown, who had produced the tracks in the snow with a hot metal object.
• In a fit of mass hysteria different animal tracks were summarized by the concerned public into one.
• The tracks have been assigned to many animals. Otters, badgers, dogs, cats, donkeys and albatrosses came as author under suspicion.
• In 1855, the tracks were also associated with an allegedly escaped from a menagerie kangaroo. But there was no such loss report, and the animal impossible crossing the wide river Exe argues against this explanation.
• One speculated a weather balloon had broken loose, had been blown away by the snow storm over the area and have left their mark.

Other hand, seems more likely that gerbils or other rodents have caused the tracks. This assumption has also been expressed a few days after the event.

A recent presentation wins from sympathy. Wood mice could be penetrated into farms and settlements due to the unusually cold weather in search of food. On snow they moved jumping, produced a straight -looking line and left it on hoof prints reminiscent tracks in the snow. The distance is almost the same, the pattern of the impression, however, varies slightly and may well have the impression of an open front hoof. The fact that many observed traces abruptly stopped, could lie on the access of birds of prey such as owls, their prey in the snow easily recognizable mice. An accomplished climbers came away the rodents over walls and roofs and would be able to pass through pipes, cracks and small openings.

The rodent theory is convincing in its argument most likely, but whether the event actually happened that way, can not be said with certainty by the time that has elapsed.

Comparable cases

• The London daily newspaper "The Times " reported on 14 March 1840 that have been noted in the Scottish district at Glenorchy, Glenlyon and Glenochay several times after snowfall traces of an unknown animal. They resembled those of a foal of considerable size and were sunken deep in snow.

• Sir James Clark Ross reported on the occasion of his Antarctic expedition 1839-1843, that on the Kerguelen Island horseshoe-shaped footprints were noticed in the snow in May 1840 the then lost on a rock slab without snow. They were those of a pony or donkey comparable. Land animals got the expedition not to face.

• On March 17, 1855 printed " The Illustrated London News " from a letter from Heidelberg alleged comparable, annually recurring tracks in one place in Galicia.

Finally, the Canvey Iceland monster is speculative endeavors in web pages. The there in 1954 and 1955 found the remains of a beach unknown species originate, according to experts of strange -looking Armflossern.

By Mike Dash accumulated knowledge

About the mysterious event gathered the British writer Mike Dash, longtime editor of the magazine " Fortean Times ", over a longer period and felt information sources after. The following facts are based on the report written by him.

Weather anomaly

In the UK, there was at that time an unusually severe winter. The rivers Exe and Teign were frozen over part of their length. It was on February 8, heavy, stormy snowfall until about midnight. Then the temperature rose, and the snow turned into rain. Towards morning to the temperature dropped again, and plated again at daybreak frost the country.

Early search for a rational explanation

The first verifiable report on the mysterious event appeared on 13 February 1855, already mentions the faith of residents, the devil had paid a visit to Devon. But already it contained the presumption of the work of any supernatural power, an escaped from a menagerie monkey could possibly be the reason for the tracks. Gradually came, in time, great bustard, herons, badgers, mice, rats, otters, swan, kangaroo, donkey, cat, wolf, hare, and birds in flocks suspected. Within a few hours after finding there were countless attempts by groups of people to find out what was going on. From the town of Dawlish from an armed troops followed the tracks over a distance of five miles, without discovering anything useful. Others found that traces of stopped in the middle of fields, as if something would be flown away.

Swell

There are few Erstquellen regarding the event, but a lot of secondary sources. The only known written records of eyewitnesses are the papers of the Rev. HT Ellacombe, a living from 1850 until his death in 1885 in Clyst St George vicar. They were discovered in 1952 in a box of the parish. There are also some letters to the " Illustrated London News" on the event, which were also published by the magazine.

The first is from a correspondent who "South Devon " was called and coined many elements of the traditional facts. It contains the list of all the places where the tracks had been spotted. Furthermore, it claims that the tracks would have had exactly all the same size and the same step length, two statements that are not true. Here the track on a 14 foot high wall and on roofs is peddled by the writer or his informants. The writer, the idea behind that twine and refreezing can have the tracks deformed, and asserts that animal tracks were still recognizable. It specifies the length of the track with a hundred miles, that its course was straight and she had crossed at one point the Exe. After finding the Ellacombe papers his identity was revealed. It was a 19 - year-old who as a museum curator made ​​later in Exeter career.

Another witness was Reverend GM Musgrave with his letters to the " Illustrated London News". He contributed to the discovery of leading a haystack track and delivered the declaration of a kangaroo tracks as a contributor. Finally, there is a letter from an anonymous writer, the claw marks of an otter suspected, because they also led through a pipe itself but was not sure. Only these four sources provided first-hand impressions.

A first press articles printed in the year 1855, based in Exeter newspaper " Western Luminary ". Article published then in the " Illustrated London News" and in the " Times ". Only in 1890 was it then in " Notes & Queries" for correspondence with eyewitnesses who remembered. Finally, in 1922 reports were published again. These decades later documented information need to be taken with great caution.

Track

Mike Dash represents in a table that the size and step length of the track gave differing statements from the places in the sources. It must have been different tracks and not one that stretched across the country.