Page 39 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Febrary/March 2020 Edition

The Betty & Barney Hill Abduction Case 39

The Betty and Barney

Hill Abduction Case

On September 26, 1961, when a Portsmouth,
New Hampshire, woman sat down to compose a
letter to a UFO researcher, she could not have
known that within a few years she and her
husband would become two of the most famous
UFO witnesses ever, as close to household
names as such persons get. Nor could she have
suspected that their experience would expose a
whole new, heretofore-unsuspected aspect of the
UFO phenomenon, with consequences that
would be felt for decades afterwards. At the
time, however, she was simply someone who
needed reassurance and further information.
The letter was addressed to Donald E.
Keyhoe, a retired Marine Corps major who, as
the author of several best-selling books on the
subject, was a ufologist of unusual prominence.
Soon after their experience, which occurred on
the night of September 19-20, the witnesses,
days later and conducted the first of a series of times Barney looked through the binoculars as
Barney and Betty Hill, sought out UFO
interviews, from which a full account of the well. Reluctant to abandon his plane hypothesis,
literature in the local library and there found
Hills’s conscious memories would be compiled. he was nonetheless puzzled that he could make
Keyhoe’s 1955 book The Flying Saucer
The account that follows draws in art on Webb’s out the fuselage but not wings. And try as he
Conspiracy. Betty’s letter was forwarded to the
report of his early interviews with the witnesses. might, he could not hear any sound emanating
Washington, D.C., headquarters of the National
Barney, 39, and Betty, 41, were an from the craft.
Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena
interracial couple of impeccable reputation. Driving at no more than 5 mph as they
(NICAP), which Keyhoe had directed since
Both were active in the area of civil rights monitored the object’s movements, they entered
January 1957.
movement. Barney, a dispatcher at the Boston the Franconia Notch in the White Mountains.
Betty Hill reported that as they drove
post office, served on the advisory board of the They stopped again and watch the object pass
through a national forest in New Hampshire’s
U.S. Civil Rights Commission and on the board behind the top of Cannon Mountain (4077 feet
White Mountains, a UFO had paced their car.
of directors of the Rockingham County Poverty elevation) a mile away. They caught occasional
Twice they stopped to get a better look at it. On
Program. Betty worked days as a social worker glimpses of it as it moved past the mountaintops.
the second occasion Barney had left the car and
for the state of New Hampshire and devoted her When they resumed the drive, the object
looked into the object as it hovered nearby. He
evenings to volunteer labor for the local chapter reappeared and resumed its position to their
saw “many figures scurrying about as though
of the National Association for the Advancement west. It was travelling parallel to them, low
they were making some hurried type of
of Colored People. They were also devoted enough so that it was sometimes lost behind the
preparation. One figure was observing us from
members of the Unitarian-Universal Church in trees. By now there was no doubt its shape. It
the windows. From the distance this was seen,
Portsmouth. The Hills, in short, were solid was a flattened, circular disc.
the figures appeared to be about the size of a
citizens, not liars or lunatics. Yet their story, Two miles north of North Woodstock,
pencil, and seemed to be dressed in some type of
evening its early version, was a fantastic one, the object descended on a clearing to their
shiny black uniform.” Barney Hill become
and it time it would grow even stranger. immediate right, then stopped and hovered less
“hysterical” and ran back to the car. Strange
On the evening of September 19, the than 100 feet in the air and a few hundred feet
“beeping or buzzing sounds...seemed to be
couple were driving home from a trip to Quebec, away. A blue-white florescent glow shined
striking the trunk of our car” as it accelerated.
going south on U.S. Highway 3. At around 10 through a row along the side. No longer
“We did not observe this object leaving, but we
they left a restaurant in Colebrook, New spinning, the object which looked to be the size
did not see it again, although about 30 miles
Hampshire. Thirty miles later, near Groveton, of a four-engine aircraft, hovered in a slightly
further south we were bombarded by the same
they noticed a bright light below and to the left silted position.
beeping sounds.” Betty Hill further wrote:
of the moon and above Jupiter in the clear Barney stopped the car in the middle of
“At this time we are searching for any
southwester sky. The light headed west, then the road and slipped the pistol into his coat. He
clue that might be helpful to my husband, in
north. At one point it crossed the face of the got out and, and using the roof to brace his arms,
recalling whatever it was he saw that caused him
moon. Barnet thought that it might be a satellite turned the binoculars on the craft. As he was
to panic. His mind has completed blacked out at
or an airplane, perhaps an airliner on its way to doing so, the object crossed the road 100 feet in
this point. Every attempt to recall, leave him
Montreal, but Betty thought it might be front of them and stopped above a field to their
very frightened. We are considering the
something more interesting; her sister had seen a left, though he could hear no noise, Barney kept
possibility of a competent psychiatrist who uses
UFO four years earlier. After a few minutes it telling himself this had to be a helicopter whose
hypnosis.”
curved westward, then eastward in their pilot was playing some kind of joke on them.
The following accounts of the Hills’s
direction. Since their car was the only one on the Barney began walking toward the object,
experience is based on a variety of primary
highway, the Hills wondered uneasily if the craft stopping at intervals to bring the binoculars to
documents and printed materials, including
was interested in them. Barney stopped the car his face. The object resumed its slow descent.
NICAP’s investigative report and a book on the
and retrieved a .22 pistol from the trunk. However, as he gazed through his binoculars, he
case by journalist John G. Fuller.
They were now in a forested, could see a number of humanlike figures,
uninhabited area. Betty was watching the object perhaps as many as 11, inside the windows.
The First Story
still off to the right, through binoculars. It was They were watching him. They stood in a
closer and lower, and Betty could see a band of corridor which encircled the craft at its center,
Walter N. Webb, a Boston astronomer and UFO lights which appeared to run along the edge of a on the wall, acting with what struck Barney as
investigator first heard of the case on October
disc-shaped structure, with a red light on either cold efficiency.
19, when he received a letter from NICAP side of it. The object was moving in a step-like
secretary, Richard Hall, which urged him to pattern, tilting vertically as it initiated each (Continued on Page 40)
meet with the couple. Webb called them two “step.” It was spinning all the while. At various