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January 19, 1909, Gloucester City, Pennsylvania, USA, Mr. and Mrs Nelson Evans:

Brief summary of the event and follow-up:

"Jersey Devil" literature reports that on January 19, 1909, at 2:30 a.m., at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans, a Gloucester City paperhanger, of the 200 block of Mercer Street, strange noises awakened the frightened couple. Peering out of their bedroom window, they watched for full 10 minutes what was called the "Jersey Devil" cavorting on the roof of their shed. According to the Press, Mr. Evans went to the police headquarters and gave this statement:

"About two o'clock", said the paper hanger, "my wife and I were aroused by a noise on our shed roof. I went to the window and looked out and then I called her. We saw the strangest beast or bird, I don't know which, you ever heard of."

"It was about three and a half feet high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It has a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hoofs. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them."

"As far as I could tell, the thing seemed to be trying to get into the shed. My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me, and then flew away."

His wife reportedly told basically the same story, adding that the creature's wings "made no sound at all until it began flapping its wings. Then it sounded s-zzz s-zzz s-zzz just like the muffled sound a woodsaw makes when it strikes a rotten place."

Hundreds of curious people flocked to the Evans home the next day, where Evans gave escorted tours to his shed. The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin published a sketch supposed to show the creature.

Basic information table:

Narratives:

[Ref. su1:] "THE SUN" NEWSPAPER:

/p>

[*] A local cider brand.

[Ref. wn1:] "WINCHESTER NEWS" NEWSPAPER:

/p>

[Ref. mm1:] JAMES MCCLOY AND RAY MILLER:

The authors indicate that on Tuesday, January 19, 1909, at 2:30 a.m., at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans, a Gloucester City paperhanger, of the 200 block of Mercer Street, strange noises awakened the frightened couple. Peering out of their bedroom window, they watched for full 10 minutes the Jersey Devil cavorting before their eyes on the roof of their shed.

These 10 minutes allowed Evans to give a detailed impression:

"It was about three feet and a half high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while we were watching. My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say, "Shoo!" and it turned around, barked at me, and flew away."

His wife told basically the same, adding a detail about the sound of the creature's wings:

"It made no sound at all until it began flapping its wings. Then it sounded s-zzz s-zzz s-zzz just like the muffled sound a woodsaw makes when it strikes a rotten place."

[Ref. jc1:] JEROME CLARK:

Jerome Clark says on January 21, 1909, at 2 a.m., Nelson Evans of Gloucester City heard something on the roof of the shed in his backyard, he investigated and according to the Philadelphia Public Ledger of the 22nd, he saw:

"It was about three feet and a half high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hoofs. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while we were watching. My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me and flew away."

[Ref. ks1:] KARL N. SHUKER:

The author says that in January 1909, the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin carried the drawing of the Jersey devil based on the eyewitness descriptions of Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans of Gloucester City, New Jersey.

[Ref. jc2:] JEROME CLARK:

Jerome Clark says on January 21, 1909, at 2 a.m., Nelson Evans of Gloucester City heard something on the roof of the shed in his backyard, he investigated and according to the Philadelphia Public Ledger of the 22nd, he saw:

"It was about three feet and a half high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hoofs. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while we were watching. My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me and flew away."

[Ref. mm2:] JAMES MCCLOY AND RAY MILLER:

The authors indicate that during the rash of sightings that week of 1909, Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans, of Gloucester City, had a good look at the Devil as he walked around the roof of their shed for a full 10 minutes late in the night. Terrified, they noticed its features and Evans told a local paper the 3.5-foot-tall creature had a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. "It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them." Evans managed to shoo it away but said that the departing creature "turned around, barked at me, and flew away. Hundreds of the curious flocked to the home the next day, where Evans gave escorted tours to his shed.

[Ref. ch1:] CHARLES H. HAPGOOD:

The author says a famous Jersey Devil incident occurred on January 19, 1909, in Gloucester City, where Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans saw it from the bedroom window at 2 a.m. They watched it 10 minutes as it cavorted on the roof of their shed, and an illustration appeared in the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin a few days later.

[Ref. wi1:] WIKIMEDIA COMMONS:

Semi-famous newspaper illustration of the New Jersey Devil, from Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, January 1909. It was drawn from an account of a Devil sighting by Nelson Evans of Glouchester, New Jersey, USA: "It was about three and a half feet high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while we (he and Mrs. Evans) were watching."

[Ref. ar1:] ALBERT ROSALES:

Albert Rosales indicates that in Bristol, New Jersey, on January 19, 1909 at 02:00 a.m., "A husband and wife spotted a strange creature on the roof of their shed. They watched it for about ten minutes. It was about 3-feet and a half tall, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, its back legs were like those of a crane and it had horse’s hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short legs with paws on them. The husband attempted to scare the creature by yelling at it, but it turned around, barked, barked at him, and then flew away."

Albert Rosales indicates that the source is "Jerry A Young, Mysterious Monsters".

[Ref. ar1:] ALBERT ROSALES:

Albert Rosales indicates that in Gloucester City, Pennsylvania, on January 21, 1909 at 02:00 a.m., "Nelson Evans heard something on the roof of the shed in his backyard. On investigating he encountered a bizarre creature described as about 3 ft and a half tall, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck and wings about 2 ft long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse’s hoofs. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. When it saw the witness it turned around baked at him and then flew away."

Albert Rosales indicates that the source is "Jerome Clark, Unexplained!".

[Ref. sl1:] STEVEN LEMONGELLO:

The writer tells of the Jersey Devil sightings from January 16 to 22, 1909, 100 years ago, refering to the 1976 book "The Jersey Devil" by James F. McCloy and Ray Miller Jr.

He says the Evans family in Gloucester saw the Devil on their roof, leading to the scientifically accurate cartoon from the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin that illustrates this story, in which the Devil "appears rather emaciated. Whether that's due to not feasting enough on the flesh of young children is as yet unclear."

He writes the good farmer Nelson Evans said: "My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me, and flew away."

[Ref. ch1:] MICHAEL NEWTON:

The author says that in Gloucester at 2:30 a.m. on January 19, 1909, Nelson Evans and his wife saw the Jersey Devil outside their home. Nelson described it as about eight feet and a half high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while they were watching. Both were scared, but Mr. Evans managed to open the window and say, 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me, and flew away.

Two local hunters followed its trail for 20 miles, and then lost it.

[Ref. oh1:] OLIVER HO:

The author says that on January 19, 1909, a man named Nelson Evans saw the creature in front of his house. he was scared but managed to chase the monster off. It made a barking sound at him and then flew away.

[Ref. gm1:] "JERSEY DEVIL" GOOGLE MAP:

[Ref. jv1:] JUANITA ROSE VIOLINI:

This author says that on January 19, 1909, in New Jersey, at 2:30 a.m., Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Evans, awakened by a strange noise, looked out their window and watched the Jersey Devil on their shed rooftop for ten minutes before Mr. Evans bravely chased it away.

Points to consider:

Before discussing this particular case, I must make some general remarks about what was called the "Jersey Devil".

In Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, for nearly two centuries at least, some people give reports of encounters with a "creature" whose descriptions suggested that it was some sort of "devil", though in my opinion it was often merely a large bird in migration there, the sandhill crane.

Ufologically, these stories are mostly not considered as related in any way with UFOs or UFO occupants, in my opinion too they should not be part of a catalog of "close encounters of the third kind".

However, some ufologists included such stories in such catalogs, thinking for some reason it does have something to do with the UFO question. Most of the time, they do not include all the Jersey Devil reports, but only a few of them, maybe due to lack of documentation or maybe for some other reason I do not understand.

So I have to include all these stories, because if some source considers, rightly or wrongly, that this a UFO-related, then it is within my scope, not to immediately and arbitrarily disregard their idea, but to evaluate it, and thus to collect the documentation and the comments about it. And therefore, I have to check and document all reported, not just those selected arbitrarily by these ufologists who believed this is UFO material. This is why you cans see I have a file for each Jersey Devil reports, even those that were never included in the ufology literature.

I should note that most stories are fragmentary, often because the sources write about several observations, and what is said about one report is supposed to be implicitly true for the others. I do not do it that way; I publish case files individually and discuss each on its own merits or issues, and offer a specific assessment for each case. But of course, generalities can be said on these reports. As I do not want to disconnect individual reports from these generalities, I make the following notes.

I want to first list the various explanations offered for the "Jersey Devil" - they could apply its late equivalent the West Virginia "Mothman" which was introduced in UFO books the 1960s:

• "Devil" per se, a creature from hell, the one that Christian traditions talks about. It is not far from the explanations that claimed "witches" made this Devil appear using witchcraft.
• "Devil" in the sense that there would be some sort of "parallel world" that shelters evil creatures who occasionally pop in "our" world. It is further argued that UFOs and their occupants are of the same nature, in an attempt to support a "theory of everything" claiming the existence of some "other worlds" or "parallel worlds or "other dimensions".
• UFO occupants, aliens; some rare ufologists seem to consider that any unusual creature must come down from some spacecraft, whether it is a "Bigfoot", "Chupacabras", "Devil" ou whatever else. A variant thereof proposes that all these creatures are "engineered" by more "classic" extraterrestrial beings.
• Some cryptozoologists put forth that the "Jersey Devil" is some ordinary earthly animal hitherto undiscovered by mainstream science. Most cryptozoologist do not vehemently claim this as if it was a proven fact, but merely suggest it is a possibility among other possibilities.
• Some cryptozoologists felt that the Jersey Devil may be a "Bigfoot". This generally does not fit well with the descriptions, whereas a known bird fits better. Yes, some reports mention a four-legged creature, but generally with wings too.
• It was suggested the Jersey Devil is a Pterodactyl, the prehistoric dinosaur-bird, allegedly still living nowadays. Or some other survivor of the distant prehistoric times.
• An investigation by cryptozoologist Ivan Sanderson made him explain that there was a real estate scam in 1909 there in which people had created false traces of the "Jersey Devil." Most debaters admit this, but consider, rightly in my opinion, it could not be the single explanation for all the reports. This does not mean that other reports could not be hoaxes too, and some definitely were, as the "Hyman" case or the case of the dead kangaroo fitted with wings.
• Some offer a pure "folklore" explanation. There would never have been any true observation, everything would be purely invented nonsense. It can obviously be suggested that some, if not all, of the stories are of this nature. It is clear that a Jersey Devil folklore has emerged, but it cannot be used as evidence that all reports were entirely imaginary from the start.
• At the time, a "malformed" and abandoned child ("the baby of Mrs. Leeds") was said to be the explanation. But it turned out that the descriptions, the geographical and temporal span, leave little credence to this explanation if it was supposed to be the only one.
• Various birds were named as an explanation for the Jersey Devil. Some are completely unsuitable, too small or too different from the descriptions. However, one bird seems to be an excellent candidate, the sandhill crane. In each of my "Jersey Devil" case file, I obviously check this explanation out. I am neither the first nor the only one to propose it, however, many authors made no mention of the sandhill crane, preferring to highlight the ridiculous "explanation" explanations to support their favorite one. For example they would ridicule the "Mrs. Leeds' baby" explanation to try to convince the Jersey Devil must have been "supernatural".

Now let's see this report.

The sketch given by Wikipedia [wi1] was printed in almost every book evoking the "Jersey Devil", and countless websites, usually without the association to the specific case, and no reference to a source. Occasionally it is mirrored, sometimes colorized with one or the other color.

With a better resolution, it looks like here below - hoofs at the front legs, horseshoed (!) hoofs at the hind legs:

A website says it was "drawn by the police" but I doubt it, it looks like drawn by a crafted illustrator.

Except for the "front legs", the "creature" seems to be a bird of respectable size and frightening looks.

One will not fail to note that this reportedly happened at two in the morning, thus in dark night, and that the shed was not perhaps not right next to the witnesses. With the ambient "Jersey Devil" craze already well covered by the newspapers, it is not stupid to think that a sandhill crane was spotted.

Mr. Evans himself said that "its hind legs were like those of a crane", and the "hoofs" of a horse could have be a misinterpretation due to shadows caused by a depression of the legs in the snowy roof of the shed. The press had reported "mysterious traces" compared to horses or ponies, previously.

There is not enough information to make the sandhill crane explanation a certainty, but there is not a single piece of information that would support she saw a real devil, or an alien, or a pterodactyl, "Bigfoot" or anything extraordinary.

/p>

"Sandhill Crane" (Grus canadensis) - pictures above - is a species of big crane living in North America, Canada, and in the extreme northeast of Siberia. Some are resident, some are migratory, passing sometimes indeed by the states where the "Jersey Devil" was reported.

Its wingspan can reach more than 2 meters.

List of issues:

Evaluation:

Possible confusion, bird, sandhill crane.

Sources references:

* = Source I checked.
? = Source I am told about but could not check yet. Help appreciated.

• [su1] * Article in the newspaper The Sun, New York, USA, page 2, January 21, 1909.
• [---] ? Article in the newspaper Philadelphia Public Ledger, Philadelphia, USA, January 22, 1909.
• [---] ? Article in the newspaper Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Philadelphia, USA, 1909.
• [wn1] * Article in the newspaper The Winchester News, Winchester, Kentucky, USA, page 3, March 4, 1909.
• [---] ? New York Folklore Quarterly, New York Folklore Society, Volume 30, page 239, 1973.
• [mm1] * "The Jersey Devil", book by James F. McCloy, Ray Miller, Jr., Middle Atlantic Press publishers, USA, 1976.
• [---] ? New Jersey Folklore, Volume 1, American Studies Department, Douglass College, Rutgers University, page 4, 1978.
• [---] ? "Mysterious Monsters: Real or Unreal?", book by Jerry A. Young, Willowisp Press publishers, USA, 1983.
• [---] ? "The Unexplained II: mysteries of mind, space and time", book by Peter Brookesmith, Marshall Cavendish Corporation publishers, USA, page 1128, 1985.
• [mm1] * "The Jersey Devil", book by James F. McCloy, Ray Miller, Jr., BB&A publishers, USA, pp 45-46, 1987.
• [---] ? "Creatures from Elsewhere: Weird Animals That No-One Can Explain", book by Peter Brookesmith, Book Sales publishers, USA, page 26, 1989.
• [jc1] * "Unexplained!", book by Jerome Clark, Visible Ink publishers, USA, pp 197-198, 1993.
• [---] ? "Encyclopedia of Hoaxes 1", book by Gordon Stein, Gale publishers, USA, page 253, 1993.
• [---] ? "Encyclopedia of strange and unexplained physical phenomena", book by Jerome Clark, Gale Research International publishers, USA, page 168, 1993.
• [---] ? "The First Pet History of the World", book by David Comfort, Simon and Schuster publishers, USA, page 221, 1994.
• [ks1] * "The Unexplained: An Illustrated Guide to the World's Natural and Paranormal Mysteries", book by Karl P. N. Shuker, JG Press publishers, page 132, 1996.
• [jc2] * "Unexplained: Strange Sightings, Incredible Occurrences and Puzzling Physical Phenomena", book by Jerome Clark, Visible Ink Press publishers, USA, pp 562-563, 1998.
• [mm2] * "Phantom of the Pines: More Tales of the Jersey Devil", book by James F. McCloy, Ray Miller, Jr, BB&A publishers, USA, pp 31-32, 1998.
• [ch1] * "Mystery in Acambaro: Did Dinosaurs Survive Until Recently?", book by Charles H. Hapgood, Adventures Unlimited Press publishers, USA, page 61, 2000.
• [---] ? "Strange Highways: a guidebook to American mysteries & the unexplained", book by Jerry D. Coleman, Whitechapel Productions Press publishers, U-K., page 122, 2003.
• [---] ? "Footprints in Stone: The Significance of Foot- And Hand-Prints and Other Imprints Left by Early Men, Giants, Heroes, Devils, Saints, Animals, Ghosts, Witches, Fairies and Monsters", book by Janet Bord, Heart of Albion Press publishers, U-K., page 159, 2004.
• [---] ? "Chambers Dictionary of the Unexplained", book by Una McGovern, Chambers publishers, USA, page 356, 2007.
• [oh1] * "Mutants and Monsters", book by Oliver Ho, Sterling publishers, USA, page 70, 2008.
• [gm1] * Google Maps, 2010, at maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&t=h&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=111307155664998215229.000492efa03d92c95c0b9
• [wi1] * Wikimedia Commons website, March 2007, at commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nj_devil_notgreyscale.png
• [ar1] * "1909 Humanoid Reports, compiled by Albert Rosales, circa 2006, at www.aforteanosla.com.ar/albert/anuarios/1909%20Humanoid%20Reports.pdf
• [sl1] * "Believe it or not, this little devil had a wild week 100 years ago", article by Steven Lemongello, Staff writer, in the newspaper The Press of Atlantic City, Atlantic City, New Jersey, USA, January 12, 2009.
• [mn1] * "Hidden Animals: A Field Guide to Batsquatch, Chupacabra, and Other Elusive Creatures", book by Michael Newton, ABC-Clio publishers, USA, page 155, 2009.
• [jv1] * "Almanac of the Infamous, the Incredible, and the Ignored", book by Juanita Rose Violini, Weiser Books publishers, page 15, 2010.

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This page was last updated on July 15, 2013.