On December 10, 1904, an unsettling article appeared in the English newspaper, the Hexham Courant....under the heading of Wolf at Large in Allendale:“Local farmers from the village of Allendale, very near to Hexham, had reported the loss of their livestock, so serious that many sheep were being stabled at night to protect them. A shepherd found two of his flock slaughtered, one with its entrails hanging out, and all that remained of the other was its head and horns. Many of the sheep had been bitten about the neck and the legs - common with an attack made by a wolf.”
“Hysteria soon set in. During the night, lanterns were kept burning to scare away the wolf, and women and children were ordered to keep to the busy roads and be home before dusk. The ‘Hexham Wolf Committee’ was soon set up to organize search parties and hunts to bring down the beast using specialized hunting dogs, the ‘Haydon Hounds’, but even they could not find the wolf. The Wolf Committee took the next step and hired Mr. W. Briddick, a trained tracker. But he was also unsuccessful, despite searching the woods.”
There was growing speculation that the most likely culprit was a grey wolf that had escaped from its owner, Captain Bain of Shotley Bridge, three months earlier. This wolf was on record in the Shotley Bridge police station as being four and a half months old and not much of a threat to either man or beast.
The search for the Wolf of Allendale continued throughout December. On the 29th, it was faced down by two men, but escaped by jumping a high wall. The following day, it was seen attacking a black-faced ewe, running the sheep into a wire.
One afternoon in late December, according to the newspaper, the wolf was encountered by some local boys and a group of women who frightened the animal by screaming in their excitement.
The panic, however, seemed to be brought to a halt early in 1905, when the body of a wolf was found on a railway line in Cumwinton, Cumbria, some 30 miles (48km) west of Hexhamshire. Captain Bain sped to the scene, only to profess the beast far too mature to be the cub he had lost. The Hexham Courant reported on 7 January, 1905 that the wolf found at Cumwinton was not the Wolf of Allendale.By the end of 1905, reports had diminished sharply and interest began to wane. Soon, the sightings and killings ceased altogether, and the Wolf of Allendale was relegated to local history.
The events in Hexhamshire were not the only peculiar incidents at the time. Charles Fort commented that this period seemed to see an unprecedented level of weirdness that gripped Great Britain. These incidents included strange lights and supernatural forces at work in Wales, teleportation experiences, several hauntings and mysterious fires that killed residents.
Overall, life in Hexhamshire went back to normal and it remain so for several generations...until the Winter of 1972.
In February, 1972 the Robson boys were weeding their parent's garden not 10 minutes walk from where the 'Wolf of Allendale' stalked the woods. The pair soon unearthed two carved stone heads both about the size of tennis balls. A few nights after the discovery, neighbour Ellen Dodd was sitting up late with her daughter when both of them saw what they described as a 'half-man/half-beast' enter the bedroom. Although both mother and daughter screamed in terror, the creature seemed disinterested and walked off down the stairs. It was heard to be 'padding down the stairs as if on its hind legs', and the front door was later found open.
Dr. Anne Ross took an interest in the apparently Celtic carved stone heads and took possession of the Hexham pair. She had several others that were similar and wanted to compare them, believing these were at least 2000 years old. Dr. Ross lived and worked in Southampton at the time, and had heard nothing of the strange goings-on and apparent return of the 'Wolf of Allendale' associated with the carved heads. A few nights later at around 2.00am, she woke from sleep feeling cold and frightened. Looking up she saw a strange figure in the doorway of her bedroom. She later stated:
It was about six feet high, slightly stooping, and it was black, against the white door, and it was half animal and half man. The upper part, I would have said, was a wolf, and the lower part was human and, I would have again said, that it was covered with a kind of black, very dark fur. It went out and I just saw it clearly, and then it disappeared, and something made me run after it, a thing I wouldn't normally have done, but I felt compelled to run after it. I got out of bed and I ran, and I could hear it going down the stairs, then it disappeared towards the back of the house.
Dr. Ross simply dismiss the event as a nightmare, but when she later returned home with her husband, archaeologist Richard Feacham, they found their teenage daughter, Berenice, distraught and in tears. After some coaxing she managed to explain the reason for her state, and Anne suddenly realized that she had not been dreaming the night before. As Berenice later told, she had returned to the empty house at 4.00pm. As it opened the front door she saw a large shape rushing down the stairs toward her. Halfway down, the thing suddenly stopped and vaulted the banisters, landing with a soft thud like a heavy animal with thickly padded feet.
Dr.Ross decided that the stone heads were the source of the problem, and promptly disposed of her whole collection. The Hexham finds were soon passed into the hands of other collectors, including the British Museum, where they were displayed to the public for a short time until reports of eerie occurrences forced them into storage.
Reportedly, the stone heads were examined at Southampton and Newcastle Universities for proof of their age. Chemist Dr. Don Robins noticed that the stone heads contained a large amount of quartz, therefore hypothesizing that they were somehow storing energy. The heads were later buried in an undisclosed location however, this resulted in unusual goings on in the area of the burial. Now the heads seem to have disappeared without a trace. These artifacts have disappeared from public knowledge and their current whereabouts are unknown.
Sources:
www.bbc.co.uk
www.mania.com
www.forteantimes.com
www.unexplained-mysteries.com
www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk
www.hexhamcourant.co.uk
Fort, Charles - Lo! - 1931
The Wolf of Allendale / The Hexham Heads
