The Saarbrücken “UFO” of 1826 ULRICH MAGIN
ULRICH MAGIN follows up an aerial phenomenon recorded by Fort and finds an unexpected meteoric connection…
One who has never leafed through old newspapers (even if it is now done digitally, without the brittle feel and distinctive smell of paper) knows little of the joys of discovering gems of old-fashioned news. You search for a sea-serpent, and discover of fall of frogs; you look for this fall of frogs and find an old, and very odd, advert for soap – the number of happy moments is hard to describe. And then you find out more about some buried snippet from Fort, and you are smiling again.
Listing several unusual aerial observations, Fort, in chapter 24 of The Book of the Damned, refers to the “grayish object that looked to be about three and a half feet long, rapidly approaching the Earth at Saarbruck, April 1, 1826; sound like thunder; object expanding like a sheet”. 1 The case was taken up by, among others, George Adamski and Desmond Leslie, and later by Jacques Vallee, who all treated it as a typical UFO. 2
Following it up, I found that the person who had first described (though not seen) the phenomenon was none other than the famous “discoverer” of meteorites, Ernst Chladni, who told readers of the Annalen der Physik of a remarkable sight enjoyed by several persons near Saarbrücken.
“The phenomenon occurred on 1 April 1826, some minutes before 4pm, about 400 paces from the brick factory of Heinrich König. Johannes Becker said that as he was carrying some branches he suddenly perceived quite close to him a loud bang
and the sound of thunder, as in an electrical storm. Amazed, he stopped, and looked up.” However, the sky above was blue, with only a few clouds, there was no wind, and it was warm. “Then, the rolling thunder and banging grew louder, leaving him rooted to the spot and unable to flee. His fear increased when he saw, no more than two dozen paces from him in a light spot in the forest, a ‘horrible something’ which approached him like a flash, moving six or seven feet (1.8-2.1m) above the ground. He compared it to two sheets, grey in colour, 14ft (4m) wide and 34ft (10m) high, which hovered parallel to each other; he did not see any flames. He believed himself lost when this ‘miraculous something’ sped toward him, but it crashed to the ground some seven steps away (or so the distance seemed to him), causing a bang as loud as if 1,000 thunderstorms had broken around him. Before the crash, the ‘miraculous something’ had moved like a roller gate and then spread out like a cloth that looked greyish white. A minute of silence followed, then, from the spot where it had touched down, another loud thundering and banging could be heard, and it moved towards the brick
factory. When he had recovered from his shock, he could still hear the noise, and then the boom of what sounded like a terrible whirlwind. When he was able to stand again, he met a man who had also seen the thing, for four or five minutes.” 3
Reports from other witnesses, who were further from the site, were collected by a local priest named Koellner. A road guard called Hasse had heard the thunder, which sounded as if the whole mountain was collapsing. Christian Werner, a brick maker, also heard the terrible noise and smelled sulphur, while Heinrich König said it was like many thunderstorms striking at once. The phenomenon created a whirlwind, which threw several persons working on the fields to the ground. The priest, says Chladni, inspected the “impact site” after the event, but found neither burns nor any damage to the vegetation, nor any trace of a meteoritic stone. Chladni thought the event had been a kind of tornado or – hello Fort! – ‘gelatinous meteor’. He writes: “Now if this event was not a tornado but the fall of a meteoritic exploding mass, it would be one of those where no stones fell but only a resin-like or liquid substance… It is also possible that the witness closest thought that the phenomenon was nearer than it actually was because of an optical illusion.” 4
Other scientists later classed the event as a northern light, although it was seen in bright daylight! 5 While the phenomenon perhaps resembles a whirlwind, Chladni’s description doesn’t really suggest one: a light approaches the witness, moving like a roller gate in a roller mill, opens like a cloth but looks like two sheets, touches the ground, and then, leaving only a loud noise, disappears. One might be excused for trying to link this strange happening to UFO sightings – as did Leslie and Vallee – but what’s fascinating about such old phenomena is that they were reported long before such classifications as ‘UFO’ even existed; therefore, there was no need to make them fit with established models. As Fort wrote in chapter 28 of Lo!: “I have plodded for more than 20 years in the Libraries of New York and London. There are millions of persons who would think this a dreary existence. But the challenges – the excitements – the finds.” NOTES
1 Charles Fort: The Complete Books. New York: Dover 1974, S. 288 – The Book of the Damned, ch 24.
2 I have slightly abridged this report, which runs for several pages.
3 Desmond Leslie, George Adamski, Flying Saucers have Landed, London, Werner Laurie, 1953, p25; Chris Aubeck and Jacques Vallée, Wonders in the Sky, Tarcher, 2009, p301.
4 EFF Chladni, “Ueber eine merkwürdige meteorische Erscheinung, am 1. April 1826, nicht weit von Saarbrücken”, Annalen der Physik, Renger, vol. 83, 1826, pp573–577.
5 Dr A Clemens, Zeitung für die elegante Welt, vol. 33, 1833, p583.
2 ULRICH MAGIN is a longtime contributor to FT and the author of Investigating the Impossible (2011). He lives in Germany.