Wild Man of Warren County

 The Wild Man of Warren County

By Cole Herrold

Bigfoot and other hairy hominid accounts are by far nothing new. They have been reported by early Native Americans, by Vikings who arrived first to North America, by miners and settlers in the early 1800s, and then later on by those who would decidedly distance themselves as far as possible from the natural world. One such early account of a creature that may or may not be some type of Hominid was reported to of roamed throughout Warren County around the late 1860s. While this creature received the name in the early papers as the Wild Man of Warren County, this creature clearly, if the reports are accurate, cannot be the typical Sasquatch or even those bizarre offshoots which have been reported primarily in the Southern states.

The Wild Man of Warren County first made its appearance known in the March 1, 1868 edition of The Vicksburg Herald under the incredible sideshow esque headlines THE WHAT IS IT OUTDONE!-THE WILD MAN OF THE WOODS!- An Extraordinary Creature Discovered in the Forests of Warren County!- A Nondescript Animal of Singular and Frightful Appearance Roaming at Large!- Truth Stranger than Fiction!- the creature was reported to of been seen over the course of several months in the evenings approximately 25 miles from Vicksburg, Mississippi. The major area where the creature was said to reside near the swamps around Bear Creek as well as the Big Black River, which interconnects with the creek. The creature was known in obscurity and appeared to primarily been sighted by individuals who resided in what, due to the times, may have been an African American community. The heinous treatment of those who only three years before were officially set free had been barely managing to scrape a living, and their communities were often in areas that the white landowners refused to own. These areas were often in the most desolate of locations, and apparently, in this area around Bear Creek, they were not alone in their claim to the land. The creature the witnesses described, even without the racial prejudice, seemed extremely improbable the witnesses claimed that this creature was around 8ft tall with each eye as big “as a hens egg," the creature had no nose and no upper lip; his two canines (in the article referred to as eyetooth), these teeth are said to be as long as a man's thumb, these teeth extended down over its chin reaching a total length of 8 inches. The creature’s long arms ended in hands that were tipped with long 6 inch long talons.

The creature's body was described as the following "The hair on its head is stiff and wiry-sweeps the ground as it walks and its parted in the rear and brought down in front on reach side of its singularly formed chest, which is not round or flat, but its angular like that of a fowl. The hair on the body of this being is very stiff and grows to the rear, parting at the angle of the breastbone, growing back and noting with a long stiff growth on his spine which extends back about one foot like a spinal fin of a fish or the bristles on the back of a boar- the hair on his arms is parted and grows in the same way making a long thick brush on the back of the arms, extending from the shoulders to the point of his middle finger; this same peculiarity is observable on his legs”.

The most startling feature of this bizarre beast is that the placement of its feet are unlike anything from the known and unknown world. The reason the creature's feet are so bizarre is that the creature's left foot is backwards while its right foot is pointed towards the front like a typical human's. These feet each were approximately 23 inches in length, making it longer than most bigfoot tracks. These tracks would prove to make the natural tracking of the creature almost impossible. Yet they would not be the only sign of the creature, for when night fell, unearthly cries and howls could be heard emanating in the area. While this creature seems to be completely unlike anything currently that we know of, those who had seen the creature were quite certain that the creature was none other than the most infamous fallen angel, the Devil himself. The individuals who had encountered this alternative resident were often terrified by the experience, and their tales were laughed at by those who felt that thee accounts were nothing but fancies. This would be something that, unfortunately, would not be taken seriously until it was too late.

It was Thursday, February 27, 1868 (some sources claim September 1867), when a group of hunters would encounter the creature. The papers describe how the hunting party, a group of well-known gentlemen, had decided to go bear hunting in the residing swamps around The Big Black River. The group was armed to the teeth not only with several firearms but also with fifteen ill-fated well-trained bear hunting dogs. They left off on their hunt early in the morning; the group were riding several horses to help move over the terrain with the dogs trailing behind. The group was so far unsuccessful, but as they entered a particular area, they came across a series of tracks that seemed to be of a large human's pressed into the soft swampy soil. The group got off their horses to get a better look and noticed that one track always seemed to be turned the opposite way in the track wave. The group was extremely confused by this as there was nothing to them that could explain what could have made the tracks appear like that. Yet in the mind of at least one of the men, the tales of those who have been describing a reversed footed entity began to return to memory. After a reveal to those unfamiliar with the tale, the group gained trophy fever. They needed to bag this creature at all costs. The group called the dogs and had the canines sniff the tracks in the hopes that they could pick up the actual path of the creature. The dog's noses sniffed the various tracks and soon, with a cry of success, positioned themselves in the right direction and began to run at full tilt barking all the way. The men, in a cry almost as loud as the dogs, remounted their horses and began chasing after the dogs.

The dogs were on the move, and the horses were barely able to keep up with them, but they wouldn't have to wait for long. In a few minutes, the men saw a dark form standing near what the group felt was its lair. The men were absolutely terrified to their core as the creature matched almost exactly to what the earlier accounts described. The creature was called Nondescript in the papers of the time, yet this was clearly not the case. The men who would add to the already confirmed description that the creature was like an extremely hairy dark-skinned human and only about 6ft tall. As the men were taking in this creature, the creature seemed to also have been taking in its pursuers as well, but this would not be for long, for soon the creature opened its wide maw and uncurled a horrendous scream before running away with speed faster than a horse's away from the dogs. This raised courage in the men and, in the cry of the hunt, began chasing the dogs and creature even further on their horses. This chase led on for some time until they could see the banks of the Big Black River and, on the other side, the shores of Louisiana. The creature began to slow as it saw the rushing rapids and ultimately stopped at the banks looking back and forth to the other side. The creature was chased 10 miles, and it apparently had enough. The creature began foaming at the mouth, releasing countless cries of anger, and watched as the dogs came closer to it. The first dog was almost on the creature when one of its long arms reached out, capturing the canine. The creature dug its long talons into the flesh of the dog, which whined in agony all the while the creature proceeded with inhuman strength to rip the dog apart. Dropping the remains by its feet.

This was apparently not enough to stop the other canines as the second came up to the creature, and the creature, in a similar manner, grabbed this one as well, but this time used its long protruding tusks to impale this dogs skull killing it instantly. One of the hunters seeing the carnage before him and was terrified for his life, and assumedly the others around him reached into his holster and grabbed the pistol he had brought. The hunter's hands shook; he raised the weapon slowly, taking aim at the hulking monster's hairy form. The creature seemed to stare right at him as the other men were trying to hold back the dogs and horses. The hunter, as sweat dripped down his brow and as his heart seemed to thud straight out of his chest, eventually managed to steady himself and, taking in this gunner's calm, proceeded in firing at the creature's hairy chest. The creature was hit twice by the hunter; it staggered only slightly, seemingly unaffected by such machinery. The creature, however, was not entirely unphased by the weapon, for as soon as the shots hit, the creature once more unleashed an unholy scream and proceeded in what the men thought was fear heading straight towards the crashing waves of the Big Black River. The creature jumped into the dark water, entirely disappearing below the surf. The men watched for any sign of the creature, but it appeared to be gone. The men waited at the shore, guns ready for the chance that the creature might have swam downstream to rearise on the shore, but there was nothing. That was until 5 minutes had gone by, and in almost the exact same spot that the creature descended, it rose to the surface and once again proceeded in polluting the air with an incredible scream that sounded like "the voice of a regiment of soldiers." The men, apparently too frightened by this haunting cry, could only watch as the creature made its way to the opposite side of the shore heading towards the border of Louisiana and ultimately disappeared from sight in the dark swampy forests.

The creature had after this account been seen twice, and there had been several attempts to capture the creature, none of which ever managed to come to fruition. One such account happened on April 11, 1868, when R.H. Hicks and W.W. Hughes encountered the creature in the neighborhood of Carrollton. The creature was also said to of during this time frequent the nearby city of Meadville in Franklin County, yet further details on these accounts have proven difficult to track down. In one newspaper article in the Boston Evening Transcript retelling the details of the Meadville and Warren County account, the editor makes a claim that the backwards footed creature is the same as a creature reported in the Maine Mount Katahdin region where the creature is known by Native Americans, lumberjacks, and woodsmen as "Yo-ho." The creature's appearance is almost identical to those reported in the Vicksburg Herald, yet the creature reported in the Maine mountains allegedly has tracks that are universally backwards as opposed to the one foot reported in the Mississippi variety.

While the "Yo-ho" might have been a version of the creature seen in Mississippi in 1868, some residents of the area felt that the creature may have met its unfortunate or to the resident's fortunate end in the waters of Lake Michigan. The creature, which to those who saw it know it as the Wild Man of Lake Manitou, was believed to of drowned after, in a similar instance that occurred in the Vicksburg Herald, the creature was chased into the waters. Yet, it is important to note that the Wild Man of Lake Manitou is not described as having the same exaggerated features as reported in Mississippi, such as the 8-inch fangs, noseless face, and the single backwards foot. However, with this report, so too ends the accounts of the creature come to be known as the Wild Man of Warren County.

The Wild Man of Warren County is bizarre on a lot of levels. For one thing, the beginning of almost all of the Southern newspaper articles makes it sound that the creature was created to solely make African American individuals seem as though they are superstitious or seeing things that aren't there, but then they throw in the fact that there are other sightings from Caucasians that are included almost to "legitimize" their encounters. While I understand that this was the time when such things were overly rampant and part of the culture in spades, it's still uncomfortable to read and research. Yet putting that aside its interesting as its almost the 1800s equivalent of a military employee or biologist encounter with an unknown creature or at least the quote "credibility" unquote of the time, so to speak, even though there is an extreme irritation as I write this since the African American communities had tons of sightings before this hunting party came about that practically went unreported outside of a spooky tale as a footnote.

While there is certainly a racial prejudice upon the initial reporting that makes this tale difficult to elaborate further. Based on the descriptions given by the African American community, we can see some similarities in the description of the creature to several other hominid creatures reported throughout the world. The backwards feet are a common description for such creatures as the Orang Pendek of Sumatra and the Kalanoro of Madagascar. These creatures are often depicted as hairy hominids with bizarre feet that point backwards with the sole purpose of evading human detection. The long talons of the Wild Man of Warren County are also reminiscent of these creatures in the description of the protruding fangs and long talon-like nails which have been reported on the Kalanoro specifically. The creatures incredible ability to hold its breath for a long period of time is also reminiscent of the Kalanoro as some Madagascar tribes have claimed that the Kalanoro is semiaquatic; this feature is also seen in other Bigfoot encounters in the 1970s and 80s, such as the Murphysboro Mud Monster, the Sabine Thing, The Honey Island Swamp Monster, Lake Worth Monster, and Sykesville Monster.

Now the problem with this comparison is that the creatures that are similar to it anatomologically speaking are extremely small compared to the creature reported in Warren county, which is double the size of the Kalanoro and Orang Pendek. Another problem is the fact that the Kalanoro and the Orang Pendek are reported to have noses and that their feet are universally backwards; however, modern research has shown that with the Orang Pendek, this is just a legend as they do seem to have forward-facing feet. So clearly, the Warren County Wild Man is something entirely different from what has been seen elsewhere.

One possibility is that maybe the Warren County Wild Man might be a typical Sasquatch that had undergone some birth defect or mutation altering the typical sasquatch features to the bizarre entity described. This theory is not new as many of the Southern and Midwestern Bigfoot-type creatures, be they Momo, The Fouke Monster, The Cole Hollow Road Monster, and The Honey Island Swamp Monster, have been reported of having three to four toes which some researchers feel may have been the result of specifically inbreeding in the small populations of the Southern States. Now, this theory is pure speculation as there has never been a truly ecological study of the Sasquatch outside of a speculative biological standpoint, so the true number of creatures of the population in a given area is a true unknown. It also stands to point out that most casts were taken in the same areas today as those with the infamous three-toed tracks almost uniformly tend to have five toes so if there was a problem it has since been irradicated or is affected elsewhere on the creatures.

Skeptically speaking, there is a chance that this is a case of yellow journalism. It's no secret that old newspapers would make up sensational stories to work as propaganda, be satire, or simply to sell papers. Many early monster reports are often felt to be just that, but the interesting thing about this case is that it was written about rather extensively in other states, indicating some believability during the time by other newsmen and publishers. Another element is that this account continued it was not simply a one and done kind of story where some anomalous thing was seen it caused some havoc and then was never seen again there was a story every couple months on the creature implying that it was something more real than just a fake story or something similar. Another element is the fact that certain features of the creature were given surprisingly detailed lengths and descriptions of the anatomy that seem excessive if it were not something potentially real.

This case is one of the most interesting newspaper-oriented cases I think I've come across; not only does it describe one of the weirdest Wild Man accounts ever, but it also shines a light on some of the history of the region. The creature, I think, probably existed and, because of the overwhelming mindset of the region, was not researched or taken as seriously, which is frustrating on an academic level and irritating when one thinks about how the events played out with the earlier witnesses. While their accounts might not have been extensively chronicled as I would have liked, it is extremely important to thank and focus on those who did come forward, even with the stigma of their encounters and the people around them. While their names were not written or accounted their highly detailed description of the creature and its behavior is something that will hopefully live on for as long as there is a record for it.

This article is dedicated to those of the African American Communities of Mississippi, particularly those around Bear Creek and the Big Black River, whose stories were ignored and ridiculed. Your accounts might not be extensively chronicled, but they are remembered, and without them, there would be no context or true backbone to this case. It is in this while your names are not mentioned, your importance to Fortean studies will forever be enshrined.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Hominid/ Mammal

Location: Meadville, Franklin County, and throughout Warren County

Sighted: February 1868 -July 1868

Works Cited:

The Boston Evening Transcript June 27, 1868 (Boston, Massachusetts)

The Cambria Freeman July 16, 1868 (Ebensburg, Pennsylvania)

The Vicksburg Herald March 01, 1868 (Vicksburg, Mississippi)

The Vicksburg Herald April 14, 1868 (Vicksburg, Mississippi)

The Vicksburg Herald August 01, 1868 (Vicksburg, Mississippi)