My dad told me this story of an episode that happened back when he was newly married. (early 1960's) It was winter time in Northeastern Illinois. It was gently snowing all evening, and him and his buddies were sitting around the fire talking for most of the evening. The wind stared to get a lot colder as it got closer to midnight and my dad and his friends decided to call it a night. After they all said their good byes and went their sepparate ways, my dad went inside. His wife was already asleep in the bedroom. As my dad was getting undressed and ready for bed. He got this overwhelming feeling of dread and a feeling that someone or something was watching him. The feeling was so strong that he could not bring himself to look behind him out the window. He stood there motionless, frozen in unexplainable fear. After what seemed like an age, the feeling went away as abruptly as it came on. He quickly got dressed again, and ended up sleeping on the couch down stairs. The next morning, his two friends came over ( they happened to live on the same block.). They had said that they experienced the exact same feeling around the same time as my father. When they went into the back yard, they found in the fresh snow, perfect holes in the ground about 6" around, and perfectly 6' from each other in a straight line that went through all his neighbors back yards. They got about 5 houses down, looking at these weird tracks in the snow, then the tracks dissappeared. This experience never was repeated, and never was explained. It still creeps me out to this day thinking about it.

I remember reading something like this happening before. But the tracks that were created went across the house roof and were probably not as deep. It was believed to be something along the lines of a/the devil. I'm not sure if it happened to multiple houses or not.

eesh. that is creeepy. I'm always a little freaked out by watchers.

Very creepy.

I'm surprised he left his wife in the room though....

He didn't like her very much I guess! They ended up getting divorce a few years later. Which in a weird way I'm thankful for... I'm from my dad's second wife!

Ah! So it all worked out for the best!!


Did you Dad ever mention what he and his buddies were discussing that evening?

eh, he said just usual stuff, sports, jobs... mundane conversation between friends...






























































Oh, and deciding wether or not to serve Satan... haa... joking.

Mmmm I bet they had the old ouija board out, followed by tarot cards, rune stones and ended up studying numerology! Sport and mundane things instead!

I am only kidding

Creepy to say the least!

Sounds like the Topsham Tracks

(This is from my old website)

1855 February 8th - Topsham, Devon, England
A man named Albert Brailsford left his home and stepped into the fresh blanket of snow which had been deposited during the night hours. Brailsford was then the principal of the school in Topsham. Upon reaching the street he noticed that the crisp white surface had already been disturbed. What was more, the tracks made there were quite unique and formed a single line of hoofprints. Each hoofprint was four inches in length and lay at eight inch intervals and seemingly ran off for some length into the distance. Brailsford puzzled at the sight. He knew of no animal which would make such tracks. He met with some villagers and together they followed the line until they reached a brick wall where it came to a halt. No tracks led away from the wall. It was as if whatever had walked there had simply disappeared upon reaching it. The snow on the top had not been disturbed. Suddenly someone discovered that the tracks continued on the other side. Indeed, it was as if the creature had simply stepped over or through the wall.

Those mysterious tracks continued, and they continued for some distance in a most peculiar way. They passed through a haystack without any disruption of the snow on its top, and they even went underneath gooseberry bushes. More worrying, they were seen to pass over rooftops. They seemed to be 'melted' into the snow. Occasionally, the hoofprints stepped right up to a front door of a home, then turned and walked away in another direction. The villagers followed the line through the landscape. It extended through Clyst St.George, Woodbury, Bicton, East Budleigh, Exmouth, Powderham, Kenton, Starcross, Dawlish, Teignmouth, Newton Abbot, Torquay and finally Totnes. In all, the tracks covered more than forty miles of countryside. On this journey the tracks crossed the river Exe with no pause and apparently no hesitation, only to continue again on the far bank.

1855 February 16th
The London Times published an article about the mysterious hoofprints.

1855 February 17th
Another story appeared this time in the Plymouth Gazette and included in the article a Reverend Musgrove proposed that the tracks had been made by a kangaroo. In the Exeter Flying Post the explanation was a bird. In the following hubbub other suggestions were made among which were: badgers, polecats and a great bustard (a fast running land bird). One man from Sudbury claimed that he had discovered tracks made by rats which, on the surface, were similar to the 'devil's footprints'. He claimed that the rats had been leaping over the snow in order to travel and had made impressions which were roughly horseshoe-shaped.

Interesting story. For someone to look in the window would they of had to be elevated? Maybe someone was using stilts.......doesn't seem very likely - could you imagine looking out your window and seeing some weirdo on stilts bookin' it across you back yard?

sounds like the black eyed people.... sense of dread and fear are common when a black eyed person is present

and for the marks it left as it left......there is a story about one of the black eyed people moving swiftly as if they teleported mabye the leave marks....( although it doesnt say anything about the marks...that maybe becuase it wasnt snowing they therefore coulnt see them)

its a bit hard to understand wat ive written but i hope it helps^_^

Were the witnesses confined to your father and his buddies? What do you think this apparition wanted from you.

Strange you posting that.

It reminds me of a story I read in a book about spooky folk tales I had once. It's a French story and was called "la Druse". It's a bit hazy now, but it was about two sisters, who lived in a log-cabin somewhere alone in the mountains; and one was so full of jealousy and hatred for the other that eventually she died, but her hatred and jealousy split off from her and became a creature of it's own. It had the shape of a horrid woman-thing, with arms, claws, a torso, but only one hoofed horse-leg...On cold wintery nights the sister heard her howling outside, stomp over the roof, and in the morning found the prints of just the hoof in the snow...

And- when I googled around on the net to see if I could find the story, I came across this, from Columbia:

"They say that Patasola (One-legged woman) is the spirit of an unfaithful woman who had an affair with her husband's boss; when the husband found out this he whacked his boss into pieces with his machete and cut off one of his wife's legs. She ran away on only one leg until she bled to death.
Other people say that the One-legged was a woman who lost one leg because she was cutting firewood on a Good Friday when nobody is allowed to do any work; she was condemned to roam the Earth on one leg, crying of pain with the pecularity that if you hear her from far-away she is close by and if you hear her from close by she is far away.
It's a female figure with only one leg that looks like a tree trunk, ending in a hoof or bear claws, moving very fast. She has only one breast and her arms are very long and end in claws. Her countenance is terrible: her hair is tangled and she has great tiger eyes, enourmous maw and sharp fangs.
She lives in the mountains and has been seen singing up in a tree waiting for the moonrise. She is the defendor of mountains and wild animals. She thinks of herself as the Queen of the Jungle surrounded by wild beasts and poisonous insects. She hunts hunters, miners and woodcutters; she hates tilled earth, machetes and dogs."

Interesting, huh ?

PS: Incidentally, "Druse" in German is a bad type of infection that horses can get on their hooves...

Thank you very much! I hope I sleep tonight.

That is a very interesting story before. I've seen posts on this forum before about people fealing that "something is watching them". Myself, i've never experianced it, but it definatly sounds very spooky. It really makes you wonder, and those weird tracks that your dad saw as well, it really put a cutting edge on the story. Mabye he is just trying to scare you.

JJO

Hey SeaMare, I liked those stories & had never heard of them before...

I especially liked: She is the defendor of mountains and wild animals. She thinks of herself as the Queen of the Jungle surrounded by wild beasts and poisonous insects. She hunts hunters, miners and woodcutters; she hates tilled earth, machetes and dogs."

Apart from the tilled earth & dogs bit...


I'm wondering if someone could emulate this with 'power risers' these days... They're soooo cool - I want a pair...

Thanks Loonboy, they're interesting correlations, I think so too... I like the "She hunts hunters"-bit !...

What do you mean by 'power-riser' ? I know the tool, but ???

I mean these babies...

hahah....stinky old satan was a late night walk..i have read some tales of goat footprints on snow going over houses and walls then disappear nowhere

I was thinking the same thing.
The first thing I would do is go see my wife, geez.

Isn't there anyone who has caught such a monster? any information?

Time to get out the 22's boys!!

i came across a similar account a few years back in a book called "Amazing spooks and mysteries"

"the devils hoofprints"

"there was heavy snowfall in devon on the night of the 9 febuary 1855. when dawn broke, the whole county was covered with a white snowy blanket, but something else had happened during the night, for stretched across the country was a long, straight line of strange footprints. the trail could be followed for 160 kilometers (100 miles) over fields, walls, straight through sheds, and even along roof tops of houses. there were many theories as to what had caused the mysterious prints, but the people, but the people of devon had their own explanation - they were caused by the devil.

Hello Kreatorkind,

I just found this thread, and it closely resembles my experience finding round footprints 6' apart in the snow. (See my thread.)

The footprints I saw had claw marks around them. Can you ask your dad if the footprints he saw had claw marks around them?

TIA!