Wonders in the Sky (79 page)

25 July 1868, Parrammatta, NSW, Australia
Flying ark, spirit voices, strange formulas, abduction

The following account, based upon a transcript of a manuscript that has never been located, must be taken with great caution. It purports to tell the story of Mr. Frederick William Birmingham, an engineer and local council alderman, who saw what he described as an “Ark” as he was standing under the verandah of his rented cottage in Duck's Lane and looked up to the sky:

“While looking at it (…) I said to myself aloud ‘Well that is a beautiful vessel', I had no sooner ended the sentence than I was made aware that I was not alone, for, to my right hand and a little to the rear of my frontage a distinct voice said, slowly, ‘That's a machine to go through the air'– in a little time I replied ‘it appears to me more like a vessel for going upon the water, but, at all events, it's the loveliest thing I ever saw.' During this part of the conversation the machine made three courses: the first a level, the second a rapid backward descent, and the third left descent, but with a forward and curved easterly movement.”

Birmingham's description goes on:

“The machine then quite stopped the forward motion and descended some twenty feet or so as gently as a feather on to the grass [and] showed its bottom partially, its side fully, and a half front section or view, its peculiar shapings are well impressed upon my mind and the colour seemed to blend with faint, flitting shades of steel blue, below, and appearing tremulous and like what one might term, magnified scales on a large fish, the latter being as it were flying in the air. The machine has not the shape of anything that has life.”

This observation led to a classic contact or abduction scenario:

“Shortly after my declaring it was the loveliest thing I ever saw–the spirit said to me ‘Have you a desire or do you wish to enter upon it?' I replied Yes, – ‘then come'– said the spirit, thereupon we were lifted off the grass and gently carried through the air and onto the upper part of the machine, which was about 20 yards distant from where we were standing – (the spirit appeared like a neutral tint shade and the shape of man in his usual frock dress). While I stood on the machine the spirit moved to a cylinder pointing and indicating its purposes by downward motion of hand then made sign (that another and similar, was beyond and back of the Pilot house – as I term a part of the machine) which former I could not from my position see – the spirit then went further to the right two steps or so and went down in the machine to his waist returned to me and while passing on one side going to the rear of the machine the spirit –
en passant
– and making a sign, pointing, said ‘step in' and I partly turned in the direction indicated to me I saw steps (three, I think) steep ones. I stepped down into the – let me call it – ‘Pilot house' which had a floor about three and one half feet lower than the first or upper floor it was enclosed at the sides, end and top and only open in front, and nothing was in the Pilot house that I could discern but a table with passage all around it, and this table or bench seemed covered all round its sides and top alike a solid or at all events a thing about five feet long or so, and 3 1/2 broad and 2 1/2 feet high covered like with oil skin or something of that sort, or perhaps iron covered with rubber cloth tightly–the side spaces round it were about 2 feet wide and everything appeared very strong, the sides I noticed (when about ‘stepping in') were extremely thick, about six inches – and I wondered why they were so strong in a machine to go through the air.

“I was now alone in the machine at the rear end of the tablet or table resting my fore fingers and thumbs on its edge looking vacantly with downcast eyes upon the table and repenting like at my saying yes – when the spirit previous to my entering upon it had spoken to me – I felt miserably queer – just like one undertaking a billet or post he knows nothing of, so I remained for some considerable time, when I was aroused as it were from my reverie by the voice of the spirit on my right hand (and his hand resting upon the table with several printed paper within it) who said ‘here are some papers for your guidance.'”

Associated with this sighting, and with the papers that contained formulas to make a flying machine, the witness later experienced paranormal phenomena. Prior to the observation of the “Ark” itself he had had a vision of faces in the sky. Some time later he experienced poltergeist phenomena when the latch of a gate kept raising itself in full view without visible cause. In April 1872 he observed three clouds of very peculiar shape, which flew away quickly. He took this observation to be another divine instruction, the meaning of which he could not decipher.

 

Source: The document containing this report has an interesting history. It is known as the
Memorandum Book of Fred Wm. Birmingham, the Engineer to the Council of Parramatta
and subtitled
Aerial Machine
. Researcher Bill Chalker has traced its post-1940s whereabouts and spoken to some of the people involved. It seems it was originally written in ink in a small black imitation-leather book, which came into the possession of a teacher named Wallace Haywood, a resident of Parramatta. In the 1940s he passed the book to a Mrs. N. de Launte, a qualified nurse who was looking after his wife, and she finally gave it to ufologist Tasman V. Homan in the 1950s. Homan made a transcription of the book, including the sketches contained in it, with the help of four other people. A copy of this 15-page typed version was discovered among the papers of an astrologer called June Marsden. Mr. Fred Phillips, then honorary president of the Sydney-based UFO Investigation Centre (UFOIC), showed this to Bill Chalker in 1975. The original (if it exists?) has not been found, hence our reservations.

475.

8 June 1869, Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA: Circle of fire

About 2:30 A.M. an object “larger than the moon when full” was observed in the western sky for half an hour.

“It was of a bright red color, and at intervals of a few minutes, darted forth on every side bright rays like the straws of a broom, and from the ends of these were sent out sparks like those of a Roman candle. Suddenly this would cease, and only the circle or ball of fire remained, when again the rays would blaze out around the whole circumference of the central ball.”

Two witnesses, including the doorman of Pike's Opera House, watched the phenomenon as it went down behind Mount Davidson, following the motion of the stars and “still blazing and sputtering forth sparks and jets of fire.”

 

Source: “Singular Celestial Phenomenon,”
Fort Wayne Daily Democrat
(Fort Wayne, Indiana), 9 June 1869.

476.

7 August 1869, Adamstown, Pennsylvania
A silvery object lands

At noon a luminous object was seen to descend from the sky to a dry, swampless area 200 yards north of the village, which is situated in Lancaster County. “It was square and became a column about 3 or 4 feet in height and about 2 feet in thickness.” The object reflected sunlight “like a column of burnished silver” but after 10 minutes it disappeared. Several people gathered at the spot where it had rested but there were no landing traces.

 

Source:
Reading Eagle
(Pennsylvania), 14 August 1869.

477.

7 August 1869, Ottumwa, Iowa
Astronomer's sighting

About 25 minutes before the totality of the solar eclipse, Professor Zentmayer observed some bright objects crossing from one cusp to the other of the solar crescent.

Each object took two seconds to make the crossing. The points were well-defined and must have been miles away from the telescope, given their sharpness.

Other sources indicate that similar objects were seen at the same time by Professor Swift in Mattoon, Illinois and in Shelbyville, Kentucky by Alvan Clark Jr., George W. Dean and professor Winlock, showing the objects were not local insects or seeds picked up by the wind.

 

Source: Henry Morton, “Solar eclipse—August 7, 1869,”
Journal of the Franklin Institute
, S. 3, 58 (whole series, vol. 88): 200-16, at 213-4; Henry Morton, “Apparence d'une pluie météorique,”
Cosmos: Les Mondes
21: 241-3; “Meteors observed during a total eclipse of the Sun,”
Popular Astronomy
2 (March 1895): 332-3.

478.

Spring 1870, Alen, Norway
Flying object with occupant