<>#8THE BRITISH SCARESHIP INVASION @3A policeman's sighting of a huge and mysterious airship early in 1909 started a spate of reports of similar terrifying craft. Were they German Zeppelins - or were they something much stranger? @2IN THE EARLY MONTHS OF 1909 an aerial horror began to haunt the imaginations of the British people. The first sighting of a phantom airship to have a major impact on the public consciousness was made by a Cambridge policeman, PC Kettle. He was patrolling Cromwell Road in Peterborough on the morning of 23 March when he heard the sound of a distant motor car. As he continued to 'hear the steady buzz of a high power engine' he suddenly realised that the noise was coming from above. On looking up he saw a bright light attached to a long oblong body outlined against the stars. This strange aerial object crossed the sky at a high speed, and was soon lost from sight. News of the sighting was met with a certain amount of scepticism. Nevertheless, it set the pattern for future 'airship' watchers: reports from people who had seen bright, powerful lamps or searchlights attached to dark bodies making a noisy passage across the night sky soon became numerous. Another common feature of such stories was the happy habit of many self-proclaimed experts of submitting explanations for such marvellous visions. In the case of PC Kettle's sighting, a Peterborough police officer announced to the press that a 'very fine kite flying over the neighbourhood of Cobden Street' had been the cause. The bright light was easily explained as a Chinese lantern that had been attached to the kite. 'But how about the matter of the airship going at a tremendous pace?" asked a reporter. 'Oh, that was a little poetic touch on Kettle's part for the benefit of you interviewers. He did not officially report that, and the wind driving the kite would give the impression of movement,' replied the officer. 'But how do you get over the whirring and beating of engines?' asked the still puzzled reporter. 'Oh, that,' responded the officer, as he went to take his leave, 'was the motor which goes all night in the Co- operative Bakery in Cobden Street!' The bland dismissal of PC Kettle's observation might have carried more weight if it had been released soon after the sighting. Instead, it took the Peterborough police at least six weeks to arrive at this simple answer to the mystery of the airship. It seems they preferred to imply that PC Kettle was a simpleton who could not distinguish between a kite and an airship, rather than to see the Peterborough police force implicated in giving credence to such an unlikely story. At first PC Kettle's observation seemed an isolated occurrence. But around the beginning of May sightings began to be reported daily throughout south-east England. A typical report was made by a Mr C. W. Allen. As he and some friends were driving through @2the village of Kelmarch, Northamptonshire, on 13 May, they heard a loud bang. Then above them they heard the 'tock-tock-tock' sound of a motor engine. Although the sky was dark they were able to see a 100- foot (30 metre) long torpedo-shaped airship that carried lights fore and aft. It was moving swiftly, but this did not prevent the witnesses seeing a platform suspended beneath the craft, which appeared to contain its crew. The airship disappeared in the direction of Peterborough. There were many more such reports. But what were the aircraft? The fact that the exploits of Count Zepplin were well-known in Britain, combined with the antagonism between Germany and Britain, soon led people to believe that German airships were making a reconnaissance in preparation for a future invasion. The major flaw in the hypothesis, however, was the sheer number of airship sighting reports, which came from all regions of Britain. At the time, Germany barely had the resources to make even one or two reconnaissance flights over Britain. For this reason, a few newspapers were prepared to discount the entire phenomenon as imaginary, and sent readers who had reported airship sightings to what they picturesquely called 'lunacy experts'. From one expert, they received this diagnosis: In every thousand men there are always two every night who see strange matters - chromatic rats, luminous owls, moving lights, fiery comets, and things like those. So you can always get plenty of evidence of this sort, particularly when you suggest it to the patient first. @2The most puzzling and sensational sightings was made by an elderly Punch and Judy showman, Mr C. Lethbridge. With this report, made on 18 May, the focus for the airship's activities shifted from the east coast to mid Glamorgan, Wales. By now there were well-attested reports of a 'long-shapped object' with red flashing lights seen over Belfast, Ireland, on 17 May, and there seemed to be no area of Britain left unaffected by the scare. A few hours after his sighting - which amounted to a close encounter - Mr Lethbridge told inquisitive reporters: Yesterday I went to Senghenydd and proceeded to walk home over Caerphilly Mountain. You know that the top of the mountain is a very lonely spot. I reached it about 11 p.m., and when turning the bend at the Summit I was surprised to see a log, tube-shaped affair lying on the grass at the roadside, with two men busily engaged with something nearby. They attracted my close attention because of their peculiar get-up; they appeared to have big, heavy fur coats and fur caps fitting tightly over their heads. I was rather frightened, but I continued to go on until I was within twenty yards (18 metres) of them and then may idea as to their clothing was confirmed. The noise of my little spring-cart seemed to attract them and when they saw me they jumped up and jabbered furiously to each other in a strange lingo - Welsh or something else; it was certainly not English. They hurriedly collected something from the ground, and then I was really frightened. The long thing on the ground rose up slowly. I was standing still all the time, quite amazed, and when it was @2hanging a few feet off the ground the men jumped into a kind of little carriage suspended from it, and gradually the whole affair and the men rose in the air in a zig-zag fashion. When they had cleared the telegraph wires that pass over the mountain, two lights like electric lamps shone out, and the thing went higher into the air and sailed away towards Cardiff. When Mr Lethbridge, accompanied by reporters, returned to the site where he had his encounter, they found several traces of the airships presence. The ground where the 45- foot (14-metre) long object had been seen was churned up as though by a plough-share. All over the area they discovered a quantity of newspaper cuttings of accounts of airship sightings and references to the German emperor and army. Along with these items they found a large quantity of papier-mache packing material, a lid from a tin of metal polish, a few dozen pieces of blue paper bearing strange writing, and a metal pin with a red label attached to it. The label of the pin carried instructions in French and excited attention when some commentators thought that it was part of an explosive device, but further enquiry showed it probably to have been a valve plunger for a motor car tyre. Several witnesses came forward to support Lethbridge's story. In Salisbury Road, Cathays, Cardiff, residents said that on the same evening, between 10.40 and 10.50 p.m., they saw an airship-like object in the air. Additional testimony came from workers on Cardiff docks who, two hours after Lethbridge's encounter, @2saw a fast moving 'boat of cigar shape' flying from the direction of Newport, and going eastwards. The airship carried two lights, and its engines made a loud whirring noise. One witness said, 'We could not see those on board. The airship was too high up for that at night, but it was plain that it was a big airship.' Two gentlemen, a Mr Grahame and a Mr Bond, made some even more extravagant claims, to the effect that they had seen a 200- to 230-foot (60- to 70- metre) long airship 'like a collection of big cigar boxes with the ends out' on Ham Common, London. The occupants of the craft, whom they met on the night of 13 May, they described as a clean shaven Yankee and a German who smoked a calabash pipe. The German asked for some tobacco, which Mr Grahame supplied out of his own pouch. Although they were blinded by a searchlight that played on their faces, the witnesses were able to see that the 'Yankee' was positioned in a kind of wire cage, and in front of him he had a row of levers similar to draught beer pump handles. In front of the German was positioned a map with pins dotted all over it. The encounter apparently came to an abrupt end when the 'Yankee' pulled one of the levers down, 'and then he switched the light off, and the aeroplane went without either of the men saying good-bye.' With such a variety of bizarre reports, it is hardly surprising that the mystery of the phantom scareship that plagued Britain in 1909 has proved difficult to solve. end.