Roswell 1947 - Documents on the witnesses

AFFIDAVIT

(1) My name is Sappho Henderson.

(2) My address is: 8338 Sale Ave. West Hill Ca. 92103.

(3) I am retired.

(4) My husband was Oliver Wendell Henderson, who was called "Pappy," because he was older than the other enlisted men in his squadron during World War II and had prematurely gray hair. We met during World War II, when he flew with the 446th Bomb Squadron; he flew B-24s and had 30 missions over Germany, for which he received two Distinguished Flying Crosses and the Air Medal with Four Oak Leaf Clusters.

(5) After the war, he returned home and was sent to Galveston Air Force Base, then transferred to Pueblo AFB, and then sent to Roswell (later Walker AFB), where we stayed for 13 years.

(6) While he was stationed at Roswell, he ran the "Green Hornet Airline," which involved flying C-S4s and C-47s, carrying VIPs, scientists and materials from Roswell to the Pacific during the atom bomb tests. He had to have a Top Secret clearance for this responsibility. After separating from the service, he operated a construction business in Roswell. He died on March 25, 1986.

(7) In 1980 or 1981, he picked up a newspaper at a grocery store where we were living in San Diego. One article described the crash of a UFO outside Roswell, with the bodies of aliens discovered beside the craft, He pointed out the article to me and said, "I want you to read this article, because it's a true story. I'm the pilot who flew the wreckage of the UFO to Dayton, Ohio. I guess now that they're putting it in the paper, I can tell you about this. I wanted to tell you for years." Pappy never discussed his work because of his security clearance.

(8) He described the beings as small with large heads for their size. He said the material that their suits were made of was different than anything he had ever seen. He said they looked strange. I believe he mentioned that the bodies had been packed in dry ice to preserve them. He was not aware of the book [The Roswell Incident] that had been published about this event at the time he told me this.

(9) I have not been paid or given anything of value to make this statement, Which is the truth to the best of my recollection.

Roswell

CASE 10) The crash and recovery of an "alien" object near Roswell, New Mexico in July 1947, so well documented by researchers Bill Moore and Stan Friedman, and others, is a case that should cause skeptics to think twice before they impugn the existence of UFOs or the plausibility of the extraterrestrial hypothesis. Though most of Roswell's firsthand sources were civilian, the overall evidence supporting this "nut-and-bolt" incident is massive. Of significance, ironically, is the report that news of the UFO's discovery at the base slipped out in an "uncleared" press release by the PIO, 1st Lt. Walter Haut. Had it not been for a fast and effective coverup, the full story once in public domain could have rewritten what we know as history. Having been informed, perhaps mankind in his philosophical and geopolitical pursuits would have chosen a wiser course.

Except for rumors, the truth about Roswell did not surface until 1978 when the late Jesse Marcel told an NBC radio newsman, Steve Tom in Chicago, about his official role as the intelligence officer assigned to the crash site to retrieve the scattered debris. On April 7, 1978, Tom called me and linked me up with Marcel in Houma, Louisiana, to get his story firsthand. This led to other calls to Marcel, and upon learning that we had served in the 5th Air Force, during WWII, in the same combat areas in Leyte, of the Phillipines, we developed a feeling of camaraderie and talked about meeting together for a UFO discussion in the near future. For the moment he confirmed that the debris he combed from the crash site on the Brazel ranch was not the remains of a balloon and that he had observed on a fragment of metal beam, a row of symbols looking like hieroglyphics. (See Status Report II, Case A-10, and the foregoing Kecksburg case describing hieroglyphic symbols.) Regretfully, I never got to meet Jesse Marcel as we had hoped to do. During 1978 when the floodgates opened for me with enormous C/R input I was working at full capacity and plans to go "here and there" were dropped. Bill Moore, however, concentrating on his book, The Roswell Incident, made the trip and interviewed Marcel. Following is one statement, in part, by Marcel that still had some questions unanswered:

"... that next afternoon, we loaded everything into a B-29 on orders from Colonel Blanchard and flew it all to Ft. Worth. I was scheduled to fly it all the way to Wright Field in Ohio, but when we got to Carswell at Ft. Worth, the general nixed it. He took control at this point, told the press it was all a weather balloon, and ordered me not to talk to the press under any circumstances. I was pulled off the flight and someone else was assigned to fly the stuff up to Wright Field...".

My Status Reports do pay off. Thanks to one reader, John August, in Hawaii, I got the "missing link" referred to by Marcel as the officer who flew the B-29 with the Roswell remains to Wright Field. Following up his initial phone call with the news Labor Day 1988, August wrote, in part, the following:

"Confirmation of the Roswell crash reached me through a Maui resident who claimed that her father, Captain O.W. Henderson, flew the retrieved spaceship from Roswell to Wright Field on a B-29. According to Henderson's wife, who was reached by phone, a news officer reported the incident but it was quickly quieted down. On February 17, 1981 the story appeared in the tabloid Globe and Henderson admitted to his wife and daughter that the story was true. The crew, she said, were little people with exceptionally large heads ... At the time Henderson was stationed with the 509th Bomb Group at Roswell. It was an elite group for which all involved required high-security clearances. Besides being a highly decorated pilot during WWII, with over 30 combat missions, Henderson was in charge of the movement of all passengers and freight transported by air for organizations participating in the atomic bomb tests and the Manhattan Project..."

Enclosed, as a result of August's attentive spadework, were copies of photos showing Captain Henderson and flight crew and a letter of commendation for an "excellent job accomplished" from Carl Spaatz, Commanding General, AAF, forwarded to Colonel William Blanchard, Commander, 509th, etc.

For verification, August footnoted his letter with Mrs. Henderson's address and phone number. Calling her October 1, 1988 I explained my work; asked many questions to which she cordially responded and got approval to publish her name in this report, minus address. She said that her husband, known as "Pappy" among his buddies, passed away in 1986 and stated unequivocally that he flew the B-29 with the Roswell wreckage, to Wright field and kept the secret faithfully until 1981. She remembers his comment, "I've been dying to tell you for years, but couldn't. It was top secret."

When I asked Mrs. Henderson if he had ever described the object he transported, she said he told her "it was strange," avoiding details. Avoiding details, it seems goes with the business of covert work if one must talk at all. [...].

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