March 1974

Submitted by Stephen Davis (Contact Information Supplied upon Request to researchers) on Saturday, February 7, 1998

DATE: The initial incidents occurred in March, and continued for four months or so. The sighting took place in the morning while it was still dark. The calls were heard in the morning, but it was light outside when we went to the bus stop - a few months later? This all took place in 1974.

LOCATION: The incident took place in Gwinnet County, a couple of miles away from Norcross - the area used to be much more residential and undeveloped than it is now. The Chattahoochee River was about seven miles away - I assume that this creature had made its way from that direction. I had consequently learned that the area has had several incidents of sightings over the years previous to mine. The events that led up to my sighting occurred over a four month period in the spring of '74. Since then, I have always wished that I could get up close to the creature.

The incident started one day in a swampy area. My friends and I were building a "fort" with bamboo stalks, when we noticed that the animal sounds in the woods had disappeared - it was deathly quiet. Then we heard a large branch snap. We got scared, as the sound had come from only 50-75 feet behind us in the swampy part of the bottoms. We imagined a psychopath with a large knife, and proceeded to quietly leave the area in single file. That is when we heard the animal scream and run toward us by the sound of the stomps in the leaves! Afterwards, we discussed what could possibly have made such noises!? A monster? What? We did not know, but somewhere in the conversation, the possibility of a bigfoot came up, and that seemed more plausible to our fourteen year old minds.

In the subsequent weeks, we found tracks, five-toed and three-toed, but never a trail of them. We would hear far-off animal sounds, and such....we even found an area of pushed down grasses a few days later, in the spot we figured the screams had come from. We had mounted an 'expedition' to look for the creature a few days after the initial incident, and had left our shoe prints in the mud and sand...a couple of days after that, a few of us went back, and, we discovered something very peculiar. In addition to three-toed tracks, we found a series of tracks that looked like the bare feet of children! following our trail of footprints - I am convinced to this day that the creature that had screamed at us was probably a female - with babies! This was the only time we found a trail of tracks. Another time we had found, further back in the woods, a large footprint shape with no discernable features such as toes, etc. on the side of a small creek. On the other side we found another in the mud, which appeared to be the opposite foot. These two footprints were several feet away from each other! A BIG step! I have a picture of the second print. Anyhow, my fiend Mike and I would walk up to the bus stop in the early morning hours, as the dawn began to eventually brighten the sky. He came to my house one morning, with an excitement in his voice, as he told me that he had seen the shadow of the creature across his back yard as he got dressed. He lived just two doors over, and there was a section of woods that ran up behind the houses. He told me that he heard our neighbor's dog barking wildly, and could hear the creature running through the woods behind the houses. I wasn't sure if he could be believed, but I was too excited by the prospect to be skeptical. As we walked up to the bus stop, we proceeded to look back down the street our calusac turned off of, as it dead-ended at a petroleum pipeline field, with the swamp onthe other side. There was also some woods on the left side of the street, with a stip of cleared ground between the edge ofthe woods and the street. There was one street lamp on a telephone pole down there near the end of the road on the left side, andit was under this lamp that we noticed a large, cone-shaped dark area. We knew that there had been no mound of dirt or sticks there before - just level ground. As we watched, the 'mound' decided to stand up and walk toward the end of the street. However, it turned left, picked something off the ground and ducked into the strip of woods there. As we were about three hundred feet from the creature, it appeared dark grey like a shadow. I grabbed Mike's sleeve and said "We gotta get closer!"- of course, he didn't want to.

The creature was estimated to be seven foot tall, and quite skinny. It had wide hips, and its arms were almost to its knees. It also had what appeared to be a sagittal crest at the top of its head. I don't know what color it was, but I would guess, from what I subsequently learned about previous sightings in the area, and from Grover Krantz' book, that it must have been white. It would make sense, would it not, that Krantz' 'Rouge Males' group might very well include any Albinos, or others with 'different traits' form the majority of sasquatch apes, that may very well be shunned into a life of wandering the rest of the North American continent.

OBSERVED: On one morning, I believe it may have been that fall, we were walking (Mike and I) up to the bus stop, and heard a far off two-tone call from the swamp. I 'Answered back', and ina few seconds we heard it again, but this time it seemed to be closer-not so far off. I called again, and immediately we heard a return call, again much closer, as if the creature were moving through the swamp toward us. I called again, and this time it sounded as if it were at the edge of the swamp. Then my step-father yelled at us out their bedroom window, which was in front of house, second floor-they often had their windows open in fair weather. "Alright, alright," I yelled, and a few moments later we heard the call again, this time coming from far, far away as the first call had been. It was a two-toned call - a high pitched note, that turned into a low pitched note. It was definitely a call of some sort.

ENVIRONMENT: Pine forest, creek bottom, somewhat sandy and muddy. Very thick underbrush-swamp-like. There were many large creeks in the area....a sewage treatment plant.....and heavily forested areas to the north and east of the swamp, which was probably only a half-mile square. We also found evidence in the swamp of its previous history - upright ties 15 feet high from the ground-part of an old wall? There were three of them about ten to fifteen feet apart in a row. Further back we found an old rotting outhouse. Then further back still, we found a skinny mound of earth that went straight for several hundred feet - off of this we found some pea plants. The creek in the swamp near where we first encountered the creatures' screams seemed to have been man made. Like a small irrigation ditch. It was about three feet wide, had vertical sides and a flat bottom. All together a very strange place!

ALSO NOTICED: One morning, it was still dark, we walked up to the bus stop, looking back at the swamp, we saw an orange flash of diffuse light spread up and out over the sky above the swamp - duration was about two seconds. Flash lightning? Swamp gas?

ACTIVITIES OF WITNESS(ES): Already described in the above.

WITNESS INFORMATION: Stephen Davis

DATE: Spring of 1978 or 79.

LOCATION: The main sighting report I leave here happened in Limestone Co. Alabama along a slew of the Tennessee River named Elk Creek, approx. 12 miles (northwest, I think) from Athens. The other lesser sightings or encounters I list are all from the southeast Alabama area. They are from Coffee, Geneva, Henry and Pike Counties.

OBSERVED: The main sighting, as I wish to refer to it here, took place in Limestone county along Elk Creek. It occurred in the spring of 1978 or 79. I cannot seem to recall exactly since it has been many years ago.

I'm in my early 30's now but, at the time of the sighting I was 13 or 14. I was on an annual family visit to my Grandparents place in Athens. We had gone out to "the River" for a few days. I can't recall what day it was but I do remember that is was in the early afternoon. I was a typical kid then so naturally I was doing kid stuff. I had a Frog gig and I was down at the boathouse pier throwing it into the shallow water trying to randomly hit something in the water. (I did nail a Crappie but, I did not hurt it bad so I let it go).

At the end of the slew was a swampy area. This area started approx. 175 to 250 yards from my Grandparents cabin. It was shallow water and had several hardwood trees such as Oak or Dogwood, for example, growing within the swamp. The swamp went back perhaps a few miles. (No one in my family nor I myself, except maybe my Grandfather, had ventured too far into that swamp). Along the sloping bank from the cabin to the swamp were 3 other cabins with piers. Across the slew from the cabins is a gentle sloping pasture, next to it are a couple of cabins and boat houses. It seems that every time I was at the boathouse and I looked across the water there were always cows in the pasture.

However, that day I just let the Crappy go and I happened to look out toward the swamp. As I did I noticed something emerge from the swamp, next to and below the pasture fence about 50 feet, and wade into the water of the slew. It was dark in color, black I think, ( this I know because it was a sunny day), it stood upright. It had waded into the water "knee" deep. I did not really pay attention at first thinking it was a Bear. However, I looked again a few seconds later and soon realized it was not a bear. It was tall, approx. 8 or 9 feet, well built, and very hairy. I could not make out any facial features due to the distance, I did not notice a neck and the head was round shaped. The animal proceeded to look both ways, it then bent over at the waist and took its left arm and swung it into the water. I noticed the splash. The animal did this twice. It then stood up and looked straight in my direction. It stood there a few seconds then turned around and walked back into the swamp just like a person would. I stood there and just sort of shrugged my shoulders and went back to messing around.

About 3 or 4 minutes later I looked back toward the swamp again and the creature came back out from the same spot that it had before. It waded "knee" deep into the water once again and did the exact same thing over that it had done before, including looking my direction once again. It then turned around and wandered back into the swamp in the same area it had come out of. It did not come back out again, for I stayed at the pier for about another hour and I keep looking that-a-way several times. To this day I am convinced that it was trying to catch fish. I never felt I was any danger even though it was an odd experience. However, being at that age I did not want to go outside alone after dark for any reason including to use the bathroom. (The cabin bathroom was in the basement and one had to get to it by going outside). It took me a few years too be comfortable there at night.

In regards to that sighting there was something I noticed, there were no cattle to be seen in the pasture at the time of the sighting! The funny side to all this is that I had carried a pair of binoculars down to the pier with me and left them sitting next to me on the upper rail. Not once did it occur to me to pick them up and use them!

A side note. Two weeks earlier two boys had found large human like footprints in that region somewhere as reported in a local newspaper.

About ten years ago my Grandmother sold the place. However, I was in Athens a couple of years ago so I drove out to the River" too see the old place. No one was there so I took the liberty of walking down to the pier and boathouse. Except for a new paint job on the cabin and a refurbished boat house nothing had changed over the years. The slew and swamp were still the same. I remained for an hour picking up fossils since the water was down, it being late summer. During that brief time I looked toward the swamp periodically remembering, wondering, and well, kind of hoping.

ENVIRONMENT: The swamp is shallow water. In it are many hardwood trees such as Oak or Dogwood for example. The rest of the area was either pasture or open areas composed of pine, and hardwood trees along a gentle slope toward the banks of Elk Creek. Naturally, all of this except for the swamp and Creek proper had been altered by people over the years. The only other things noteworthy are the docks, boathouses and Cabins along the slopes of the bank.

ALSO NOTICED: As I noted above I did not notice any cattle in the adjacent pasture to the swamp at the time of the sighting. Large humanlike footprints had been found somewhere in the region a couple of weeks earlier..

ACTIVITIES OF WITNESS(ES): Goofing around as kids do.

DATE(b): First sighting - Aug. 1978 Second sighting- Nov. 1980

LOCATION: In and around Aliceville, AL., in Pickens County. Both my sightings were near Lubbub Creek, which runs into Dead River and from there to the Tombigbee River.

OBSERVED: First, my friend Mike and I, along with 2 girls, were at the city park and heard it bellow from the hill behind us. Three days later we went back again and this time I saw it. I thought it was a tall pole but it looked to be wavering in the breeze that was blowing. I called Mike over to look but it wasn't there. Then it caught my eye. We saw it walking up the hill where we had heard it earlier.

My second sighting was at our family farm, three miles away from the first sighting. I and my friend Bill rode out to the farm that evening to check on things since nobody lived in the house there. As we turned into the driveway the headlights swung, and there it stood, stepping over a 5 strand barb wire fence. It had its hand on the top wire and was swinging its leg over. Its eyes glowed * in the light like an animals. We left in a hurry.

I heard that as many as 100 another people have seen and/or heard this creature over the years. I know that at least one sighting was around Dead River.

ENVIRONMENT: Heavy woods cover Pickens County. Dead River is heavily wooded and also swampy.

ALSO NOTICED: Other sightings and stories of hearing strange moaning or bellowing have been talked about for years.

ACTIVITIES OF WITNESS(ES): In all instances, just talking.