Gil Trudeau the Red Dog Fox

 Gil Trudeau The Red Dog Fox

By Cole Herrold

In Pennsylvania, both ghost and werewolf accounts are surprisingly common. Sure, Pennsylvania has a reputation for being a major paranormal hotspot mainly because of cryptid and UFO-centered areas like the Chestnut Ridge or Coudersport Triangle, and ghosts are overly fond of making their presence known in Gettysburg but rarely do the two seem to meet. I covered one encounter recently of the Ghost Werewolf of Northumberland County (see entry for more information), which is the spectral form of a werewolf that was shot and killed; however, while it definitely seems unlikely that such a manifestation could possibly be recorded there is in fact not just one but two spectral lycanthropes that are said to roam in the wilds of Pennsylvania. In Brandywine Creek, also known as Brandywine River, there are rumors of a spectral red figure that is rumored to haunt both the Pennsylvania and, on some occasions, Delaware side of the river.

The origin of this apparition can be traced back to the American Revolution, specifically the time around the Battle of the Brandywine in September of 1777. A young French descended man by the name of Gil Trudeau (some sources specifically focused on Delaware’s account spell it Gil Thoreau) whose father served General Lafayette in the continental army. Gil's age was estimated to be anywhere from being a teenager to 45, but from the more detailed occurrences of the account, it appears that he was more than likely somewhere in the ballpark of 16-25. However, while he was merely a boy, he was an incredible tracker and mountain man. His appearance was rugged as someone who had spent most of his life in the woods, but he did have one vibrant feature, which was his bright red hair.

During the all-consuming war, Gil, along with his father, joined the growing army militia against the British, but unlike the others in the brigade, he was not a soldier but a guide and scout for the soldiers to help them in their war against the invading Red Coats. Gil proved a useful guide as the platoon he was involved with worked their way up through the central states of the 13 colonies. Yet somewhere along the platoon's journey up to Delaware County, Pennsylvania, something happened to Gil, and the rest of the troops seemed to notice. While he managed to continue being a guide and making his keep doing so, when the nights of the full moon would come, he would disappear.

The troop would notice Gil's disappearance, but search parties were never made, nor were there ever any suspicion of him aiding their enemies as he would always return a day or two later. Gil in these periods was usually tired, scratched, battered, occasionally covered in blood yet seemingly refreshed, almost as though whatever happened to him reinvigorated his senses. The soldier's seeing that Gil was a mountain man, thought that perhaps this was his way of checking out the area since the moonlight would help make paths clearer at night and living off the land could explain the blood and cuts, whereas others in the platoon felt that Gil was called by the moon and that something more sinister was at foot.

However, while the men came up with rational explanations for Gil's absence, they noticed that whenever Gil was gone, there was seemingly a surge in wolves and other large animals in the area. The group would hear yips and strange cries in the night that were like a fox's only louder and clearer, and animals and livestock around the area would be found torn to shred and partially feasted on. Yet, for the longest time, they could not see the creature that was causing the havoc around the campsites. This, however, would not last long as one night, a group of soldiers nestled around a roaring fire noticed a bizarre figure running near the edge of the campsite. As the group looked at the running form, they noticed that it was a gigantic fox-like creature. The animal was bright red in color but bigger than a wolf. They would see the creature only when Gil was gone for those days, and it always seemed to follow the platoon. Whenever they would move site on a full moon, it was there often darting near the edge running into brushes and hiding in the shadows as it watched the platoon in almost a guardian sort of way.

As is with most human nature, the men were filled with both fear and want of the creature's hide, and so on several occasions, they would aim their muskets at the creature and fire. However, the creature always managed to elude them as it showed almost an intelligence like that of a human's. As the soldiers sat beside the fire, they began to discuss the creature, and while they did so, a new hypothesis sprung up based on an ancient belief. The soldiers whispered remembered lore of men who could change form from wolf to man by magic or infection and that these shapeshifters stalked the night hunting like uncontrolled killing machines.

Sometime later, the moon once again was full, and Gil slipped off into the darkness. The first night of his departure, the men heard the sound of strange dog-like cries, but more alarming was the fact that as this creature called out into the night, other similar wolf-like sounds seemed to answer the beast's yips and howls. These noises freaked the men out to the point that they had felt for the safety of the platoon; they had to put a guard at the edge of the campsite to watch for any potential beast that would seek to harm the group.

On the second night of Gil's disappearance, a guard walked the path along the edge of the camp, musket in hand, watching tentatively for any possible movement. As he stood looking out into the darkness, he saw a bright red blur run in front of him, and realizing it was the red beast they'd seen over the course of weeks, he lifted his rifle and took aim at the creature. Yet either because of the creature's swift movement, the gunman's aim, or the impenetrable darkness, he missed the shot, and the creature vanished like a phantasm. It would not be so lucky on the next night.

On the third night, a guard was walking along the perimeter dead set on killing the beast. The sentry was armed with a preloaded musket and was attempting to blend into the darkness to avoid being seen by the creature. Being a hunter, he thought that perhaps the best way to capture the beast was to sit by a tree and wait for it to come into the area. This is a method that hunters have used for generations to hunt deer and other animals. As he sat near the path, it was getting close to midnight, and almost as if on cue, the creature slowly began to walk out in front of him from the encroaching darkness. He noticed that it looked like a fox, but it was bigger than any dog or wolf that he had ever seen. His head was lowered to give the impression that he was asleep, but in reality, he was waiting for the ideal moment to take the shot as the creature seemingly felt that it was not in danger. The full moon in the sky seemed to make the creature's pelt shine like a bright target, and the sentry watched as it slowed its steps in front of him. The man ever so slowly proceeded to lift the musket to a height and steadiness that as he breathed slowly allowed him to take the shot.

The creature gave a yip of pain, and the man uncurled a smile, knowing that he had hit his target. The creature made a mad chase through the woods, and the man realizing it is dangerous to follow a wounded animal, especially at night, decided to let the creature run off until morning. The others in his platoon were awoken by the loud ringing shot and ran towards the noise, and the soldier hollered to them, explaining that he had shot the creature. The group congratulated him but since they were unsure if the creature was dead stayed up the rest of the night to watch for any vengeful attack from the creature. It was a quiet night, and when dawn's first light broke, the group went to where the creature was hit and began to follow the blood trail that led deep into the woods. For over an hour, they followed the blood, but as the men looked at the trail, they noticed that there was something peculiar about it as at times it would be at the height of something the size of an incredibly large wolf would be but in other cases it was on tree branches and much higher than it should have been. They had found a large puddle of blood near an old, rooted tree where it seemed to rest, and they knew that the creature was not going to survive the shot and that the trail seemed to be heading towards the River, seemingly to become hydrated. The men rounded a curve as they followed the blood, and there leaning against a tree near the water's edge, was the creature. As the men came closer to it, the creature raised its head and seemed to plead for help giving faint dog-like whines as the platoon surrounded the creature muskets aimed. The creature then, with teary eyes, slowly lowered its head on a nearby root and gave a deep sigh and with it gave up the ghost. The sentry that shot the creature smiled and began to grab his hunting knife as he wanted the creature's hide, but as he bent down to begin the skinning and gutting process, a peculiar thing began to happen. In a scene reminiscent of Universal's, the Wolf Man or perhaps more grotesquely like in John Landis’s An American Werewolf in London, the creature began to change the fur began to recede, and the body seemed to change its form and in a matter of second there laying on the ground was the body of Gil Trudeau his red hair tussling in the breeze. The group realizing what had just occurred were at a loss for words and seemingly could do one thing; they buried him right in that spot. After a moment of silence and the erection of a cross seemingly pulled from the Evil Dead, the platoon moved on. There was a war still to fight, and so the group moved from battle to battle, some of them losing their lives in the process, but after the war ended, the group would remember their fallen lycanthrope and would tell his tale around campfires late at night to their children and grandchildren keeping alive the story of the red-haired man.

Years later, people who would walk around Brandywine Creek would report seeing a bright red fox-like creature that would disappear when approached. This is believed to be Gil's ghost which even in death seemed to be cursed. Gil's spirit is said to be a shape-changer as the few reports that do occur from the area have claimed to see a ghost man, ghost red fox creature, ghost wolf, and even a ghost deer and ghost bear, which are often believed to be connected to him somehow yet reports of them are extremely rare, and most visitors to the area tend to see a ghost fox or ghost wolf. Today locals to the area retell the tale of Gil Trudeau and his shape-shifting ghost and have coined him officially the Red Dog Fox.

With stories like this, there is definitely some inkling of truth to it, but just where fact starts and fiction ends are difficult to tell. The encounter above and lore is the most accurate version of the encounter; other resources will change Gil's age and even the time when he died. Books, particularly those focused on Delaware, will mention the Revolutionary War but will state that Gil died in the 1830s, which is not even in United States history associated with any war. When one looks at the Pennsylvania sources, however, there is a stricter timeline where one can point when each event happened, which I've been able to record in this telling.

Now with all that said, what are we to make of this account. The story itself is very similar to countless other werewolf legends and folktales that have sprung up over the years, and this account bears a strong comparison to the Ghost Werewolf of Northumberland County case as both feature accounts of a creature seen in the area, livestock, and animals were killed, the creature however seemingly was not aggressive yet almost protective towards specific people May in the Northumberland case and the platoon in this one, the creature, however, was ultimately killed and discovered to be a person who regularly acted strangely and ultimately the lycanthrope was buried in an unnamed grave, and now their spirit haunts the area. These similarities in these accounts are uncanny and tend to lean more towards folklore than fact. In my research in trying to decipher the truth from the legend in both cases, I was able to verify that the Northumberland County case was authentic as descendants of May still live in the state and claim that the events did take place, whereas with this case I've come up cold. In this case, the only specifically named individuals are Gil Trudeau and General Lafayette. I had attempted to see if anyone in General Lafayette's platoon had the last name of Trudeau since Gil's father was allegedly in his ranks, but I could not find a mention to him and, therefore, no evidence of Gil being a potentially real person. The fact that Gil was put in an unnamed grave also makes it difficult to prove his existence.

Now with that said, it is interesting that people to this day allegedly claim to see spectral animals that match the description of what Gil was supposed to transform into. So perhaps this account could be an authentic case much like the Northumberland one. The only issue with the ghost animal aspect, however, is that there's also the chance that these entities are completely unrelated. Ghost animals are surprisingly common, and particularly ghost wolves known as spook wolves have been reported all across the United States, so maybe what is being seen today is an example of this kind of phenomenon and that the story of Gil Trudeau was a myth of sorts to help explain the phenomenon.

There's also another interesting side note to this case the area of Brandywine Creek is very close to Chester, which is home to another red-haired manimal. The Ape Boy of Chester Swamp is a bigfoot-like creature that has incredibly bright red hair. The Ape-Boy has a legend involving how it came to the swamps around Chester, and it deals with the boy being shunned by society to the point that he decided to live in the swamps, ultimately becoming feral. Now clearly, this is entirely different from Gil Trudeau, but in many ways, it's a very similar story a teenager who lives in the woods and ultimately becomes a red haired creature is very similar the only difference is that Gil turned into a were-fox whereas the Ape-Boy is more primate-like. Perhaps they are the same legend just told slightly different for whatever reason, or perhaps the Gil Trudeau encounter was, in fact, a misidentified Ape-Boy encounter; the platoon thought it was some large canine because of the fur color and size and that when the creature was shot what they thought was an animal turned out to be something more human, and so they buried it. When viewed this way, it's similar to other accounts of people who have allegedly shot bigfoot in the past. Or perhaps the ghost sightings of a red creature are not of a ghost but sightings of an Ape-Boy. With all that said, however, this is simply speculation, and there's no real definitive answer.

The case of Gil Trudeau is an extremely bizarre enigma that is similar to other accounts, but there is a lot of ambiguity with it that makes an official ruling difficult. My personal thoughts are mixed as there's a very good chance that this is just a folktale created as some tragic tale which is a common theme in almost every werewolf flick, especially in such classics as Werewolf of London, The Wolf Man, and An American Werewolf in London but there’s always that chance that it did happen. The name drop of General Lafayette is particularly interesting as it's very similar to Andrew Jackson being mentioned in connection to the Bell Witch or Stephen Decatur and Joseph Bonaparte, who saw the Jersey Devil in the 1800s, it just is a weirdly specific detail that might actually be based on reality. Whatever the truth, I’m sure we will have no definitive answer unless some diary is recovered or some war journal is brought forth confirming the strange events that occurred along Brandywine Creek.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Paranormal Entity

Location: Brandywine Creek, Delaware County, Pennsylvania, and Brandywine Creek State Park, Wilmington, New Castle County, Delaware

Sighted: September 1777 to Modern times

Works Cited:

Haunted Delaware By Patricia A. Martinelli

Haunted Places: The National Directory: Ghostly Abodes, Sacred Sites, UFO Landings and Other Supernatural Locations By Dennis William Hauck

Monsters of Pennsylvania By Patty A. Wilson

Supernatural Lore of Pennsylvania: Ghosts, Monsters, and Miracles By Thomas White

Threatened By a Potential Werewolf

 

Threatened by a Potential Werewolf

By Cole Herrold

Now before I even begin the telling of this case, I do need to stress that this encounter needs to be taken with a grain of salt. This account is similar in interpretation to some of the non-supernatural encounters of Men in Black and Black Eyed Kids as there is the chance this entire encounter could be simply an interaction with an overly bizarre behaving human. I first came across this encounter in Patty A. Wilson’s Monsters of Pennsylvania and found it seemingly nestled in between genuine Werewolf or Dogman encounters, and while skeptical, I felt that it was interesting enough to be brought into the spotlight.

A man who chose to be referred to only as Hank was walking down the street when he saw that a holistic and organic shop with whom he had been a patron on several occasions had an embossed Going Out of Business sign in the window. Hank, surprised as he knew the woman who owned the shop fairly well, proceeded to enter the store and began to check out the bargains and discounted prices. As he looked down the rows of shelves filled with crystals and herbs, he noticed the woman near a particular shelf tearing down a display and began to strike up a conversation with her. After dispensing with the pleasantries, he began to ask why she was closing up her shop. Hank had inquired whether her business was actually doing poorly even though every time he was a patron, he noticed that the store was almost always packed. She confirmed that the business was doing well, but there was a look of concern on her face. So, Hank asked once more, "Well Why are you closing down?"

It was at that final question she began to look around, and Hank could tell the woman was extremely frightened as though she was waiting for some prophetic axe to drop. The woman walked over to the door rather quickly and began to look to see if, by chance, someone was going to be coming in rather soon and, seeing that the sidewalk was clear, came back over and stated, "I probably shouldn't say anything." Yet she leaned in close to Hank and continued, "But I'm terribly frightened and I just have to tell someone. If I remember correctly you're a ghost hunter, so maybe you wont think I'm totally crazy". Hank confirmed that he was and that he certainly wouldn't think that the shopkeeper was crazy and that he would keep anything she told him confidentially. Hank was expecting the lady to tell him about a menacing shadow figure or a full-bodied apparition or a particularly peculiar poltergeist, but what she began to tell him both intrigued him and totally surprised him.

The lady began by stating, "About a month ago, a man came in here and asked me for some herbs. He also wanted Belladonna, and I explained to him that it was a hallucinogen and that its prohibited to sell it. He then asked for some other herbs and Wolf's Bane. I laughed and said, 'Are you planning to become a Werewolf or what?' because I recognized the herbs as having once been used in concoctions for that long ago." Apparently, this little jest was something that the man did not take too lightly for soon the moment which gave the shopkeeper so much glee would change her life as the man suddenly seemed to become aggressive she would go on stating, “I couldn’t believe the change that came over the man. He grabbed my wrist and squeezed it until it really hurt. ‘Why do you say that?’ He demanded. I laughed to calm him down and told him that it was just a joke. The man looked angry, almost evil. He threatened me. ‘I belong to a group of werewolves that meet in one of the state parks. We hunt and mate and are free there. We need the herbs. You’ll get them for us’. He was really frightening me now. I don’t know if what he said was true or not, but I know that he believed what he said. Well, I sold him the herbs and was glad to be rid of him. He’s come back once since then to reinforce his threats to kill me if I talked. He claims that he and his fellow werewolves were responsible for a dog attack that made the paper a couple weeks ago. Anyhow, I don’t care if he’s for real or not. I just think that he’s scary. I’m selling out and moving. I know that it sounds crazy, but I half believe the fellow. You didn’t see his eyes when he talked to me. There is something wrong with him. I’m not even going to open a shop where I move to. I don’t want him to ever find me again”. The woman once more glanced around, almost half expecting her lycanthropic patron to be behind her, and ended her tale with the following to Hank "anyhow I’m leaving. Just please don’t say anything until I leave next week. I’m afraid of him”.

Hank promised that he would keep her account secret and managed to keep her secret safe for over a year. This secret would then be revealed to Patty A. Wilson when the two talked, and he could not help but ask if she knew of any similar accounts from the area. Patty was surprised by the story but was aware of several werewolf/Dogman sightings reported in the general area, including one that occurred only several months earlier where a Bigfooting friend of hers came to her with an account from a terrified young man who encountered one in a state park in Ohio. Yet no werewolves masquerading as human reports were in her files, making this, if authentic, a particularly unique case.

While there has never been an official follow-up with this case for understandable reasons, there is an interesting postscript to this incident that makes it extremely interesting. This encounter occurred along the Pennsylvania-Ohio Border, which means the state park the saleswoman was talking about was either in Erie, Crawford, Mercer, Lawrence, and a portion of Beaver Counties. This seriously whittles down the search location, meaning it could be in Maurice K. Goddard State Park, Oil Creek State Park, Presque Island State Park, Pymatuning State Park, McConnell Mills State Park, and Raccoon Creek State Park. Of all of the state parks, only two are practically on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border, and they are the Pymatuning State Park and the Raccoon Creek State Park. So, chances are one of the two parks are most likely the ones the witness/would-be werewolf were talking about.

As for the area where the group of lycanthropes are said to roam, it is interesting that the sanctuary for these creatures is in an area where Dogman and Werewolf-like creatures have been reported in the area since at least the 1960s and certainly earlier than that. I had already discussed a similar case of a lycanthropic creature that appeared in the 1800s in Northumberland County that I've come to call the Ghost Werewolf of Northumberland, but other sightings of creatures such as the Westmoreland Werewolf, The Mercer County Man-Wolf, and the Mud Creek Road Monster of Troy are just some of the countless cases of Dogman and Werewolf like creature sightings said to of occurred in Pennsylvania. Sightings of strange half-human half canines are said to still occur; the latest sighting, at least to my knowledge, occurred in 2019 and was mentioned briefly on Stan Gordon's UFO Anomalies Zone.

While this account has several interesting similarities to historical accounts of similar creatures being seen in the area, we as researchers must put that aside and look at it as secondary for this encounter is very different from a bigfoot or even classic Dogman sighting where it's just a creature seen in an area where there are similar creatures. This account is essentially an extremely aggressive man claiming to use some mystical or occult practices to transform into a werewolf, and he, outside of some threats, has had no other evidence to support his claims. Now with that said, how can we break this down even further. Well, it would seem that there are only two options, either A. He is simply trying to intimidate this woman, possibly for herbs that could help him get high or B. He actually is telling the truth, and he is a classic lycanthrope.

Skeptically speaking option, A seems to be the only answer people threaten and act aggressive for all sorts of reasons, so it would make sense that if it means going the extra mile to scare a woman into giving up the goods or even getting a discount, people will do it. Now I will say going so far as to claim that you're a werewolf seems a little overkill, but who knows, perhaps that's this guy's wheelhouse, or maybe he's some sort of overly zealous furry. All we can really do is speculate why this guy would follow up on his creature claims.

Now, as for option B, even though it seems extremely unlikely, there is an incredibly long history of tales of people transforming into a werewolf either via curse, magic, deal with the devil, etc. So perhaps there is some truth to this, seeing as this kind of phenomenon occurs in every culture in Africa there are reports and claims of Werehyenas, in South America Werejaguars, in Asia Weretigers even in the Americas with tales of Skinwalkers witches who transform into the form of coyotes its almost implausible to me that every culture has seemingly come up with basically the same types of creatures without some sort of preexisting form for these stories. So perhaps that is what this phenomenon truly is.

Adding to the plausibility of this being an authentic possibility, all one needs to look at is the history of Dogmen and similar creatures. Unlike Bigfoot, lake monsters, Chupacabras, living dinosaurs, and almost every other conceivable cryptid, Dogmen are rarely authentically photographed, rarely have any physical evidence, and have basically no audio files; they evidence wise have basically nothing. Bigfoot has countless hair, scat, footprint, fingerprints, handprint samples; Champ has been caught on sonar and has been recorded echolocating, even the most esoteric of cryptids, Mothman and the Jersey Devil, have been photographed a few times. For dogmen, almost every photo has been a hoax, be it the Onaway photo or the CCTV photo, and the only compelling evidence has been some incredibly high claw marks and an occasional footprint. It's flabbergasting to me how a creature that recently has been seen on almost every other day has basically nothing to show for its existence but a ton of anecdotal evidence. Now with that said, if these creatures were genuine shapeshifters, it would sort of make sense. Unlike Bigfoot, who spends 100% of his time in the woods, or Nessie, who spends 80% of her time in the water and 20% on land, they almost have to leave traces of themselves behind, whereas a creature that can change from a human form to an animal or monster has the best camouflage around for they can hide in plain sight. They would only transform if they like An American Werewolf in London or the Wolfman they were confined to transformation by the lunar seasons, but if they were like the werewolves in the Howling, they could transform whenever they wanted so they could seriously leave barely any trace evidence that is until they get hungry.

This account, to me personally, is very difficult to peg for it's very bizarre. I personally tend to lean more on the skeptical side on this case; however, this encounter clearly shook the shopkeeper to the point that it almost could not have been just a crazy kook who thinks he's a werewolf. Some of the details he drops also are extremely interesting, but unfortunately, upon further digging, I could not validate any of his claims. One thing, though, I really wish would have been transcribed was the complete list of herbs the man wanted so that I could have checked to see if the list would match any known ancient concoction for werewolfism. If I could have had access to this, I could see if he actually knew more about occult practices as opposed to simply being an avid horror fan as the only herbs referenced are the ones that appear in almost every werewolf movie ever made as either a cure or cause for werewolfism but unfortunately this probably will simply be another layer to the mystery. Until then, the area near the Pennsylvania-Ohio border should be on high alert, for while the man was the only supposed werewolf that came forward, he did say that there was an entire pack in the woodlands, so who knows what horror they could wreak when the moon is full.  

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Human, Lycanthrope, 

Location: Pennsylvania- Ohio Border

Sighted: Unspecified Sometime Before 2010

Works Cited:

Monsters of Pennsylvania By Patty A. Wilson

Ghost Werewolf of Northumberland County

 

Ghost Werewolf of Northumberland County

By Cole Herrold

During the span of the 1800s, a ton of bizarre accounts occurred. These accounts are filled with all manner of creatures, from yellow-skinned horned creatures to merfolk. One of the most prevalent creature accounts were reports of hairy upright dogs that seemingly were supernatural in origin. These entities, known colloquially as werewolves, have a tradition beyond time, and memorial tales of these entities can be traced all the way back to ancient Greece with tales of King Lycaon. Most of these accounts describe a human either condemned to shift in form from a man to a wolf-type creature. Other versions of this transformative beast describe a deal with the devil for power. These accounts were prominent in Europe, but when people immigrated to America, tales of werewolves came with them. These accounts unsurprisingly managed to continue on in Pennsylvania. The most famous case of a werewolf in Pennsylvania is sometimes known as the Line Mountain Werewolf or the Northumberland Werewolf, but this lycanthrope is different from other cases as it not only features a horrific shapeshifter but also the existence of the creature after its death.

During some time in the 1800s, May Paul, a 12-year-old farm girl who lived in the Schwaben Valley in Northumberland County. May, due to the fact that she lived on a farm in the country, had several chores that were more than just important for her to do. One of these tasks was to watch and tend over the sheep that her family had for the sole purpose of sheering for wool. This wool helped clothe as well as pay for the necessary supplies that the family needed to make it through each day. The area around the farm was not fenced in, and there was not a neighbor for miles, so oftentimes, she would take the herd and travel around looking for ideal patches of grass for the animals to graze in. Now while there were large areas of pasture, it was bordered by dark, secluded shadow shrouded woodland, and there in the woodland area lived a local hermit.

The hermit was very much disliked in town, and the man tended to keep to himself as he lived in a shanty shack in the forest. Now the man had no contact with just about anyone on the outside, but he did slowly develop a relationship with May. Now this relationship was nothing intimate, the two barely spoke a word to each other, but they did share some company on the times when the man would leave the dark embrace of the forest and would sit on a set of fallen logs that appeared as a natural fence from his property to hers. The man would watch the girl as she worked, and this would continue for the entire day until she ultimately would return home with her livestock.

May, as the time went on, soon started to speak to the man, and he would be both respectful to her and talk to her admiringly. The hermit and her continued to do this for some time until, eventually, the two became very close and ultimately became friends. The man was relatively new to the area, and even though Mary and him were close, the townsfolk could not help but gossip about the man. The people were extremely concerned for unlike May, who spent time talking to the man, so all they could think was that this man was outside of the natural order of what they felt was normal in their world. They knew not the man's name, where he lived, what he did for a living, and so the townsfolk were very suspicious about this man.

The townsfolk, however, while curious about the man, had other fish to fry as their area had been besieged around the same time as the man arrived a huge mass death of livestock in the area. The animals were torn apart, their flesh chewed and gnawed as though some large predator had come through the land decimating all that was in its way. The townsfolk expected the usual predators, mountain lions, bears, coyotes, but as time went on, they had their answer. Over the course of several nights, many of the farmers heard the eerie sound of their animals being slaughtered they would run out, and there standing near the bleeding husk of their livelihood, was an incredibly large wolf. This wolf which appeared to be the leader, was not alone as several other smaller wolves were also running around aiding its siege on the farms. The townsfolk were obviously concerned, and they seemed to be unable to stop this onslaught.

It was around this time that whispers of gossip became combined, and the memory of werewolves flashed in everyone’s mind. The townsfolk soon returned to the old hermit and felt that it was odd that the old man and the wolves seemed to of occurred at the same time. This connection was added to when it broke that the Hermit and May had a kind of friendship and that her livestock were the only ones spared from wolves assault. Rumors spread; some felt he was a witch, causing a curse on the area. Others felt that the old man himself might have been a lycanthrope. The villagers became on guard for the man, and word of the rumors reached May's parents.

One night when May arrived home from grazing her cattle, her parents were waiting for her. The group entered the farmhouse, and her parents strongly urged her to cease her friendship with the old man. The girl, however, could not see how the sweet old man that she befriended was the monster that the rumors seemed to indicate, and so she continued their friendship. May, however, could not shake the rumors from town and had information that the others knew not. She did have some experiences with the wolves in the area. On several occasions during the day when out her herd had been encircled by wolves, their forms skittering between the trees in the tree line. They were circling her and ready to pounce on multiple times. May had gotten her herding staff ready to protect herself and her livestock on multiple occasions as she waited for the worse, but she thankfully never had to. The wolves always would slink back and then disappear as if startled or spooked by something she was unaware of, and then almost instantly after that point, the old man would come from the woods.

These carnivorous attacks would occur for some years after they began, and no wolf hunt seemed to stop the almost coordinated assault. All the while, May and the old man continued to be friends, and her sheep remained unblighted by the creatures. All this would change, however, when one dark night, a tired old farmer had arisen from sleep after hearing the sound of something large in his barn. The old farmer grabbed a rifle and lantern and headed out towards the barn to investigate the sound. The farmer started to move the heavy doors and as he peered into the darkness with a lantern in hand and there in the barn was a huge grizzled grey wolf. The wolf began to charge towards the farmer; the old man could not even get the rifle to his shoulder by the time the creature was in front of him. The old man braced himself for the worst expecting the long fangs to pierce his flesh and render him asunder, but instead, the wolf ran straight past him. The old farmer, seeing he could live another day, regained his wits and, lifting the gun to his shoulder, took aim at the great grey form. The man taking a shuttered breath pulled the trigger, the projectile skimming through the air before ultimately taking root into the beast. The farmer could hear a loud whimper and knew that he had hit the beast as it ran off into the woods.

The farmer, now revitalized by the scent of the hunt, ran towards where he hit the creature and, shining his lantern, noticed a dark crimson on the green grass. The crimson was a trail leading him towards his quarry, and so he pursued; he followed the blood into the shrouded darkness and continued to do so for some time until his wits caught up with him. Realizing that it is overly dangerous to track a wounded wolf in the dark, he decided that he should return home and continue the search in the light of day. The following day the farmer returned to the spot where he shot the wolf and refollowed the still crimson carpet through the woods. During this time, there was a bounty on wolves, and a sum of 25 dollars a wolf was being paid for each brought in, so the farmer was more than driven to find the beast. He traveled the area for some time before ultimately finding that the trail ended in a large thicket. He could not make out anything detailed in the thicket, but he could see that a large still form was there. Holding up the gun on the chance that the animal was still alive, he cautiously moved the brush to the side, waiting for a head to turn or for the sound of a menacing growl, but instead, he got the shock of his life. There lying in the grass was the form of a man completely naked.

The farmer bent down, seeing this, and began to roll the man over. He recognized the man right away; it was the hermit everyone in town was talking about. He looked at the man's body, expecting to see claw or teeth marks thinking maybe after he shot the wolf in its wounded state, it attacked this man. This he found was not to be the case, for there in the man's chest was a large gaping bullet wound and around his body a pool of blood. He had bled to death. As the farmer stared at the man, he did notice that there were some unusual features that seemed different from when he saw him last; the hermit's body had hair on his palms and beneath his feet and on his ears. The farmer stared in disbelief and also noted that as he began to move the man's body, the corpse's mouth opened, revealing that the man had several large wolf-like teeth. The farmer, unbelieving what he saw, lifted the remains up and took it to a spot near the mountain ridge in the area to bury before ultimately returning and telling the town of the man's death.

Word spread around the town of the event that occurred the following night, and when May heard the news, she was completely overcome with sorrow. This sorrow, however, was soon replaced by hate as she heard that people still claimed that the old man was a werewolf and responsible for the events around the area. May continued to deny this even to her death, claiming that the man was kind and certainly not a horrendous monster. The villagers, however, did not care for her assertions as after the hermit died, the attacks from the wolves also began to dwindle to relatively normal rates as opposed to the sheer savagery that occurred over the years. While wolf attacks did occur after the hermit's death, May and her family continued to never have a problem with the canines, and whenever there potentially was a problem, a large gray wolf would appear from the woods near the area where the old man used to come from, and the other wolves would back down. Whenever May would look back over towards where the wolf was, however, it would simply vanish.

To this day, people still claim that the hermit's spirit resides in the woods and the area where May and him used to frequent. People will say that spectral old man will sit in the exact spot where the man used to, and on more frequent occasions, a large grey wolf will also appear in the area and will sit in the exact same spot. The area where the man was buried and where the apparition is said to still be seen has even been named after the event as the area is now known as "Die Woolf Man's Grob" or "the Wolf Man's Grave." 

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Spectral Transmogrified human

Location: Schwaben Valley, Northumberland County, Pennsylvania

Sighted: Sometime in the 1800s

Works Cited:

Hunting the American Werewolf: Beast Men in Wisconsin and Beyond By Linda S. Godfrey

Monsters of Pennsylvania By Patty A. Wilson

Supernatural Lore of Pennsylvania: Ghosts, Monsters, and Miracles By Thomas White

The Werewolf Book: The Encyclopedia of Shape-Shifting Beings By Brad Steiger