Tales Of Bigfoot In The UK – The Beast Of Brassknocker Hill (Somerset)

The locale around Brassknocker Hill, just outside Bath in Somerset, was besieged by the most curious of BHMs in the late 1970s.

The first sign that something strange was afoot came in July of 1979, when Ron and Betty Harper discovered that a considerable amount of bark had been ripped off of their old oak tree. Whilst they were used to damage caused by local squirrels, the recent damage was altogether different – it appeared to have been done by an animal with teeth some twenty times bigger than those of a squirrel. To add to the mystery, the abundant wildlife seemed to have fled, leaving the area barren and silent.

By the 1st of August, over fifty local trees had been stripped of bark and branches (up to twenty feet high), and the exodus of fauna was spreading.

This bizarre, four foot long, mammalian monstrosity was described by an eyewitness as being a bear-like beast with huge teeth and white rings around its eyes.

The creature allegedly responsible for the tree mangling and the sudden decline in the local fauna was seen again by an eyewitness later that month. As Christopher Morris drove along an empty night time road through Monkton Combe, he came across a four foot long bear-like creature. It had two striking, circular white rings around its eyes. Whilst Christopher thought the creature was a baboon, his colleague felt it better resembled a chimpanzee.

Over the course of the following year, further eyewitnesses eye-witnesses came forward, giving varying and inconsistent descriptions of the curious animal as something resembling anything from a gibbon to a lemur or even a baboon. The RSPCA issued a warning, advising people to be wary if they took it upon themselves to hunt the potentially dangerous creature. Local retired cabinet maker, Ron Harper, reported having seen the creature, which he believed to be a monkey, on numerous occasions. Both he and his wife regularly saw the creature sat on a stone wall, near to one of the damaged trees. Their pet goat refused to go near the tree. According to Ron, the creature had lived in the woods for a long time, but only became active around August time when the weather heated up and new shoots grew on the trees.

As the hysteria began to build, and the infamy spread to the international press, one local man, 81 year old Frank Green decided to end the terror, and – armed with a shotgun – he began a regular, but ultimately unsuccessful vigil.

When the police responded to a sighting by taxi driver John Elphinstone, two officers arrived in time to see the beast for themselves. Inspector Michael Price opined that what he the creature he saw was a feral chimpanzee.

But all good things must come to an end, and eventually both the eye witness reports as well as the damage to trees tailed off, and the true identity of the Beast of Brassknocker Hill remains a mystery to this day