Page 43 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Febrary/March 2020 Edition

The Betty & Barney Hill Abduction Case 43

The Betty and Barney

Hill Abduction Case

Continued from Page 42

“Even if I allowed more time than I know we
took at those roadside stops,” Barney told writer
John G. Fuller, “there still were at least two
hours missing out of that night’s trip.”
Betty was so upset that she put her head
on the table. She searched her memory and got
stuck on a vague, odd image of the moon on the
ground. How could she have thought that, and
where did she get the idea? She did not know,
and Jackson and Hohman told her she could not
have seen the moon, since it had set earlier in the
evening. Maybe, they went on, the “moon” was
not the moon but something else.
All that afternoon the Hills tried to
reconstruct what had happened to them. Try as
they might, they could recall almost nothing of the first time that they had talked about the event hearing, and after the sessions Barney was
the 35 miles between Indian Head and Ashland. in a public forum. The second would be a less instructed not to remember what he had said.
Apparently they both had suffered amnesia. The formal presentation at a UFO study group in Betty underwent her first hypnosis on March 7.
subject of hypnosis came up. Perhaps hypnosis Quincy Center, Massachusetts, the following The experience was an emotional one for both of
could unlock the missing memories. Betty November 3, and that evening would prove to be them. Barney in particular experienced intense
thought of her dreams. Could they have been crucial to the resolution of the case.(or to its fright; his testimony was punctuated with
more than dreams? Barney was apprehensive deeper mystification). Another speaker at the screams and sobs. As in his conscious recall of
about hypnosis, but it “might clear up Betty and gathering, Capt. Ben Swett of Pease AFB, was the event, in his present-tense recounting he
her nonsense about her dreams,” Barney said. intrigued by the missing-time aspect of the story. firmly resisted the UFO identification; under
No one knew a psychiatrist who practiced When the Hills told him of earlier suggestions hypnosis events forced him to confront an
hypnosis, however. that they try hypnosis, Swett, who was himself a unimaginable alien presence - which he again
Starting in February 1962, the Hills practicing hypnotist, said he thought that was an rejected as soon as the amnesia set in.
began making regular trips searching without excellent idea. The experience Betty related under
success for the encounter site. They hoped that So Barney brought it up to Dr. Stephens hypnosis was essentially the one she had
exposure to the setting of the sighting would at their next session, and Stephens in turn previewed in her 1961 dreams, except that this
trigger memories. These trips were numerous contacted Benjamin Simon, a well-known time the aliens had neither hair nor big noses.
and went on for months, but nothing happened. Boston psychiatrist who had long employed Barney’s account was sketchier, perhaps
(They would not locate the site until September hypnosis in his practice. An appointment was set because by both his testimony and Betty’s he
1965 and then it would be by accident.) In up, and the Hills showed up at Dr. Simon’s kept his eyes closed during much of the
March they learned of Patrick J. Quirke, a office on December 14. Betty was the more encounter. Barney reported that the leather strap
psychiatrist who served as medical director of anxious of the two, because she had a nagging holding the binoculars had broken as he ran
the Baldpate Sanitarium in Georgetown, fear that her “dreams” were in fact memories of from the field where he had been watching the
Massachusetts, 10 miles from Portsmouth. They what had happened to them. Barney, on the other hovering UFO. He spoke of driving off Route 3,
made an appointment with Dr. Quirke, who hand, was concerned mostly about whether he guided against his will. The same “mind voice”
listened sympathetically to their story. Quirke, could be hypnotized at all. instructed him to take yet one more detour, this
who was interested in UFOs, said he doubted Simon concluded early on that the UFO one leading him into deep woods. After driving
that they had experienced a collective experience had more to do with Barney’s some distance, Barney spotted six men standing
hallucination. He discouraged them from trying problems than Barney was willing to in the road. A bright orange glow illuminated the
hypnosis; the effect might be traumatic, he acknowledge. This diagnosis had nothing to do road, but he could not see its source. The figures,
warned. It would be better to let the memories with the psychiatrists’ feelings about UFOs. He dressed alike in dark clothing, waved him to
return naturally. was a committed skeptic who rejected out of stop, and he did so. Three approached the car
In February or March warts appeared in hand the notion that UFOs could be and told him not to be afraid. Their words
a near-perfect circle around Barney’s groin. extraterrestrial spacecraft. As Webb would soothed him slightly but did not alleviate all of
They were removed surgically. Their write, “He proved to be so skeptical of the his fear. The leader told him to close his eyes.
significance would not be apparent until later. spaceship hypothesis that he refused to read the With this instruction Barney had a peculiar
Meanwhile other stresses, which Barney thought literature and sighting reports I made available impression: “I felt like the eyes had pushed into
were unrelated to the UFO experience, plagued to him on the subject.” Nonetheless, it was clear my eyes.”
him. He had had problems with alcohol in the to Simon that the Hills believed that they had The men helped Barney out of the car.
past, and now he was drinking again. He also seen a UFO. Simon did not doubt that they had He felt weak and had to be assisted; two of the
developed ulcers. In the summer Barney visited seen something, probably an earthly men positioned themselves on either side of
a second psychiatrist, Duncan Stephens of the experimental aircraft, and this had set in motion him. He could feel his shoes dragging along the
Exeter Clinic, Exeter, New Hampshire, and an anxiety-provoking psychological experience ground.
commenced therapy. Over the months Barney whose sources it might be possible to uncover His eyes still closed, he was walked up a
discussed many things, among them his UFO through hypnosis. ramp, and he stumbled over the bulkhead. Once
experience. Though he did not consider it central inside he felt himself going down a corridor and
to his problems, he did wonder at his seemingly Revelations under hypnosis entering a room. He opened his eyes to see three
inexplicable panic. Like Quirke before him, Dr. Over the next six months, beginning January 4 men and a blue, spotlessly clean, wedge-shaped
Stephens rejected the notion that the Hills had and ending on June 6, 1964, the Hills lade “operating room.”
hallucinated simultaneously. periodic trips to Boston and Simon’s office. To Be Continued In The Next Edition of
The Hills discussed their UFO sighting Barney was the first to undergo The ‘X’ Chronicles Newspaper. []
at a church gathering on March 3, 1963. It was hypnosis. The sessions took place out of Betty’s