The Warminster Christmas Thing

At 1:25 AM, Mildred Head woke to a strange noise. Initially thinking it was twigs on the roof, she soon heard loud hailstones and a mysterious humming sound in a calm night. And this was only the beginning of a terrifying Christmas morning.

(As heard on the Weird Darkness episode, “‘Twas The Mystery Before Christmas“)

Everything started early on Christmas morning, 1964, in the quiet village of Warminster, England. Some 15 miles from the famous Stonehenge monument, this small town of 10,000 was about to become known all over the world for something a little stranger.

At 1:25 AM, a woman named Mildred Head was startled awake by a strange noise. At first, she thought twigs were scratching the top of the roof. Then the noise intensified with the sound of giant hailstones beating down. It was clear and calm outside her window that night — but she heard a strange humming sound growing louder and then fading to a whisper.

Mrs. Head wasn’t the only one hearing strange things that Christmas morning. Hours later, soldiers sleeping at a camp nearby were jolted awake as if a gigantic chimney had been ripped from the roof and scattered across the camp. At 6:30 AM, Roger Rump and his wife heard what sounded like all 5,000 tiles on their roof being lifted up and banging back down again. At the same time, a woman named Marjorie Bye was walking to church when she was floored by what she said were “savage sound waves.”

More than 30 people in total described hearing the mysterious sounds that Christmas morning. Because no one could see whatever was making the sounds, the townspeople dubbed it “The Thing.” The surreal occurrences extended into the new year. Come February 1965 a flock of pigeons began dying off—dying off in droves, that is. By June, people started noticing strange things in the sky.

These objects were described differently by different witnesses. Some described seeing something iridescent and cigar-shaped with blinking lights. Others described spotting what appeared to be “twin red-hot pokers” hanging in the sky. One even described witnessing something resembling a train car with round windows that burned like flames.

Word of these strange doings spread rapidly. By August 1965, some 8,000 inquisitive visitors had arrived in Warminster hoping to catch a glimpse of “The Thing” themselves. When a local man named Gordon Faulkner snapped a picture of what he claimed was a flying saucer in September, the story made the newspapers throughout England, and even crossed over to America.

A local newspaper reporter, Arthur Shuttlewood, planted himself firmly in the corner of the events. Initially he was skeptical about the stories but came to believe that visitors from other worlds were coming to Warminster after seeing something strange in the sky himself. He wrote multiple books about “The Thing,” and helped put the town on the map as a place for UFO sightings.

The town has since embraced its newfound fame. Shops started selling UFO-themed souvenirs, and people gathered on nearby hills to watch the night sky. The BBC even made a documentary about Warminster, “Pie in the Sky”, in 1966.

By the early 1970s, reports of bizarre sounds and images began to fade. Some speculated that the strange happenings could have been due to classified military experiments, given that a large military training area was just down the road. Others felt something plainly beyond explanation had occurred in Warminster.

Today no one really knows what caused the odd events of Warminster. And a small town mural, painted in 2015, depicting several UFOs flying over the local landscape still connects the community with its mysterious visitor. People still sometimes gather on hillsides around town hoping to see mysterious lights in the sky, hoping for a peek at “The Thing” that once put their sleepy town on the world map.

And the Warminster Thing itself? It remains mysterious, with its truth known only to the Thing itself, but it should teach us that sometimes the most intriguing mystique can spring forth from a Christmas morning in an ordinary town.

SOURCES LISTED AT https://weirddarkness.com/christmasmysteries/