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00:01I'm Tim Tate, I've been an investigative journalist for almost half a century.
00:08And what I specialise in is exploring official archives, unearthing dusty old files from government departments, spy agencies, the police.
00:20This strange figure looks very much like an astronaut.
00:23And what I have found in those collections, both in Britain and in the United States, is a truly extraordinary
00:32collection of real-life X-Files.
00:36True cryptids are the Yeti, the Mongolian death worm, death worm, death worm.
00:41And those files disclose investigations by the police, by governments, by spy agencies.
00:48Shortly after that transmission, Captain Shaffner's radio went dark.
00:54To examine and uncover the truth about phenomena which are truly out of this world.
01:01It's a great piece of branding, the death ray. Everyone knows where they stand, the death ray, the death ray.
01:15The first X-File we open takes us above the clouds, where an examination of a spate of frighteningly similar
01:23air crashes can't ignore the possibility that their cause has otherworldly origins.
01:29In the wake of World War II, passenger air travel rarely took off due to new technology, the jet engine.
01:36Comet jetliner pioneering the first pure jet commercial airline service.
01:41Britain sought to lead the way with the de Havilland comet, but then a series of crashes saw the project
01:46halted.
01:47And what was causing the comets to mysteriously fall out of the sky?
01:51Was there an, as yet, unidentified design flaw?
01:54Or could the answer have an otherworldly explanation?
01:59On Thursday, November the 4th, 1954, one of the strangest exchanges ever recorded in Britain's remarkable collection of X-Files,
02:08occurred at the Institute of Civil Engineers in Westminster, presided over by Sir Lionel Heald.
02:14And Sir Lionel Heald's question in the august halls of a public inquiry asked whether the plane crashes could have
02:25been caused by contact with a flying saucer.
02:38The de Havilland comet was the first jet passenger airliner.
02:43The world now had its first passenger jet air service.
02:46Prior to the comet, all passenger aircraft were piston-engined aircraft, as used in bombers during the war.
02:54The airliners were noisy, couldn't fly particularly high, so they'd be buffeted in the winds as they flew along.
03:01The comet airliner was able to get up to much higher heights, which was a much more stable journey for
03:09the passengers.
03:10So all in all, the comet was a much, much improved airliner.
03:16In fact, some of the advertising actually showed somebody building a stack of cards on one of the tables.
03:25And here, 40,000 feet over the Alps, en route Rome, first of five stops on the 6,700-mile
03:31flight.
03:32London to Rome, two and a half hours.
03:34On Sunday, January 10th, 1954, at 10.30 a.m., BOAC comet GALYP took off from Rome Airport.
03:44It climbed to 31,000 feet and headed off over the Mediterranean Sea.
03:49But barely 200 miles into its journey, it exploded, killing all on board.
03:54Local fishermen reported seeing a ball of light in the sky and hearing an enormous bang.
04:01The initial mystery that surrounded the comet was the fact that they couldn't find the cause.
04:06They had tested the aircraft considerably prior to its entering of service.
04:11And this was actually the first comet to enter commercial service, so it was a trusted aircraft.
04:17So then the investigators had to look for this deadly problem.
04:23It would take several months to reassemble the parts of the comet
04:27to try and determine the cause of the disaster.
04:30All of the fleet were taken out of service for 10 weeks.
04:33And 60 modifications were made to the aircraft to allow them to fly again.
04:40Once they flew again after the 10 weeks, a further three weeks elapsed.
04:45And another plane crashed that was on charter to South African Airways
04:51in exactly the same way, oddly enough, in the same area, off Elba.
04:57Following this second comet air crash of April 1954, the fleet was grounded indefinitely.
05:03The fact that this was such a trusted aircraft added to the mystery and the intrigue,
05:08as well as the fact that the crew were so experienced.
05:11These were pilots that had served in the Second World War
05:14that had distinguished flying crosses, flying medals.
05:17And so for this aircraft to have such a disaster, it was very unsettling for the aviation industry,
05:24and particularly in Britain.
05:25There was a lot of speculation.
05:27What was it?
05:28Was it sabotage?
05:30Was it terrorism?
05:31What caused these two aircraft to explode and all these people to die as a result?
05:36But the investigation into the reassembled comet ruled out both sabotage and the terrorist bomb.
05:42The rational, if excitable, newspaper coverage gave way to more conspiratorial thinking.
05:52And British government files, files maintained by the Air Ministry,
05:57began filling up with claims that something supernatural or paranormal had been involved.
06:07So this was something that was actually amazingly taken seriously by the Board of Inquiry.
06:14So in the National Archives, there were files of letters from members of the public saying,
06:19have you looked at the possibility that the comet was struck by a flying saucer over the Mediterranean?
06:25And people saw a big flash and explosion in the sky.
06:27So it was like perhaps quite logical that maybe there was another object involved.
06:32And that goes some way to explaining the extraordinary exchange between Sir Lionel Heald, QC,
06:39and the Director of the Aircraft Establishment during the inquiry into the comet disasters.
06:47From this point on, stories spread that the doomed comets may have been victim of some kind of alien attack.
06:57The higher and faster the jet planes went, the stranger their encounters became,
07:03all adding to the UFO myth.
07:05When the report into the comet disasters was finally finished,
07:09it was indeed a tale of the unknown.
07:11But this was a case of pushing the envelope beyond the capacity of the plane.
07:15The flight reached operating height, which was round about 35,000 feet.
07:24At that height, the structure of the hull failed,
07:30which is likened to being sitting somewhere in a 500-pound bomb going off.
07:37So it exploded and blew the whole plane apart, effectively at that height.
07:47The aircraft in pieces with the passengers all on board,
07:55who would have been dead by then,
07:57then fell to the sea off the Isle of Elba.
08:15What they eventually discovered going through all of these tests
08:19was that actually 70% of the stress on the aircraft
08:22that came from the pressurisation cycles
08:24was actually located at the front.
08:27It was around where the windows were.
08:29The reason why they burst was because
08:32the rivets had been punched into the metal,
08:37creating the hole by which the rivet was sealed.
08:41But around it were minute cracks,
08:44which elongated over a period of time.
08:47The phenomenon of metal fatigue was not yet fully known in this era.
08:53So as a result, this was a case of trying to over-engineer it,
08:57but also using metal that was ultimately far too thin to take these strains.
09:02The Comet jetliner pioneering the first pure jet commercial airline service.
09:06In this footage of early jet passengers,
09:09you can see that unlike modern jet planes,
09:11the windows are not round.
09:13This also played a part in both disasters.
09:15The windows were slightly square where you get a window that's round.
09:21There's less pressure on all points around the window.
09:26When the window is slightly square,
09:29there's more pressure on the corners than there is on any other section of the window.
09:41Hatfield, England, the 72-tonne four-jet Comet 3,
09:44destined for transatlantic service, is unveiled.
09:47This giant is the latest improvement of the original Comet airliner.
09:51The Comet 1 was grounded due to a series of accidents.
09:54They uprated the engines to make the more powerful engines,
09:58and they also re-skinned the plane.
10:00So they put a thicker skin on the aircraft,
10:03and they obviously modified the way they made the windows.
10:07But the skin made it more able to withstand any pressure situations.
10:13The Comet 3 will be modified to comply with the inquiry's suggestions.
10:17Both disasters had been caused by metal fatigue,
10:20an ill-understood problem at the time,
10:23and were definitely not the result of attacks by spacecraft from Mars.
10:31Non-stop New York to London in six hours,
10:35as Britain hopes her commercial jetliners will set a new pace over the Atlantic.
10:40But while the cause of the crashes appear to have been identified,
10:44it couldn't save the makers of the doomed airliner,
10:47de Havilland,
10:48or the British aircraft industry.
11:15We often hear eyewitness accounts of strange things at sea,
11:19but if we take a closer look,
11:21and they become even stranger,
11:23then they might well make their way into the British X-Files.
11:35Paranormal encounters on land or in the sky
11:38are difficult enough to understand,
11:40but when something strange happens at sea,
11:42the possibilities that lurk in the fathoms below
11:44conjure even greater primordial fears in our fragile minds.
11:48The sea is a very alien and dangerous environment for human beings.
11:53It's filled with dangerous animals,
11:56things like giant squid,
11:58the great white shark,
11:59the saltwater crocodile,
12:00an animal that makes the great white shark look like a pussycat.
12:04and it's deep.
12:05We can't see beneath the waves.
12:07It's a psychological thing.
12:09We never know what's lurking there.
12:11There could be anything,
12:12something ready to devour us.
12:14We could be dragged down by undercurrents,
12:16or we could be caught in a storm.
12:18So the turmoil of the depths of the seas and what lurks there
12:22is as much psychological as it is an actual physical thing,
12:26and we populate it with monsters,
12:29perhaps with good reason,
12:30perhaps because there are monsters.
12:37Sometimes sailors get a glimpse of these monsters,
12:40but these are often dismissed
12:42because they are so fleeting and vague.
12:44But that is not the case of a sighting made in 1848
12:48by the British frigate HMS Daedalus.
12:52HMS Daedalus was a mid-19th century Navy warship,
12:58and it was on a long voyage,
13:01and it was sort of had a very experienced captain
13:04and a very experienced crew.
13:06A HMS Daedalus had been employed fighting pirates
13:11off the coast of Borneo,
13:12and she was on the long voyage back to England.
13:17About halfway there,
13:18on August the 6th, 1848,
13:21at about 5.30 in the evening,
13:25Captain Peter McQuay
13:26and six other people
13:29saw what they said was a sea serpent.
13:33It was a long, straight-bodied creature,
13:37they described,
13:38with a head and neck
13:39just above the water's surface.
13:43The visible portion that they could see
13:46above the waves
13:47was approximately 60 feet long,
13:49and its head
13:50was held out of the water
13:53at around 4 feet high.
13:56The witnesses thought that
13:58there was considerably more of the creature
14:01below the water.
14:02and it had a mane
14:05resembling seaweed.
14:06They said that it didn't move side to side
14:09like a snake
14:10or up and down
14:11like a marine mammal,
14:12but it just seemed to slide along in the water.
14:16They described the head of the sea serpent
14:19and an estimate of what the tail would have been,
14:22and assumed that it was about
14:2360 feet long sea serpent.
14:25Captain Peter McQuay said that
14:28if it was on land
14:31and it was a man he'd have known,
14:35he would have been close enough
14:36to recognise his face.
14:37That's how close it was.
14:39And it was in view
14:41for a good 20 minutes,
14:42which was a long sighting.
14:44If only one person sees it,
14:46then it's only one person's opinion.
14:48But in this case,
14:49it was the captain,
14:50the lieutenant,
14:50a couple of men.
14:51But what's really interesting about this
14:53is that he was a really proper captain.
14:56And so he recorded
14:57latitude, longitude,
14:59and of course,
15:00being an experienced captain,
15:01all of this information
15:02is very, very accurate.
15:04Whilst the captain's log
15:06records all the nautical details,
15:08such as position, speed,
15:09and weather conditions,
15:11it makes no mention of the sighting.
15:13But there was a very good reason for this.
15:16There was a ship's
15:19superstition
15:20dating probably
15:21from about that time
15:23that mentioning
15:24the sea serpent
15:27in the log
15:27would bring
15:28a lot of very bad luck.
15:30Tongs wagged.
15:32Somehow, the story got out
15:33and the media seized on it
15:35in a feeding frenzy
15:36not unlike the tabloids
15:38of today.
15:39A letter
15:40was published
15:41in the Times.
15:43There was a much
15:43exaggerated account
15:45in the Times.
15:46The stories reported
15:47in the newspapers
15:48might have been exaggerated,
15:50but these were accompanied
15:51by illustrations
15:52based on drawings
15:53made by the ship's
15:54first lieutenant,
15:55Edgar Drummond.
15:56There were some illustrations
15:57produced by the
15:59illustrated London News,
16:01which were very detailed,
16:04but of course not necessarily
16:07very representative
16:08of what was seen.
16:10What was much more representative
16:13of what was seen
16:14was the diary
16:17of Lieutenant Drummond,
16:19which only resurfaced
16:21recently.
16:22There's an illustration
16:24in the diary
16:25which is a lot less elaborate
16:27than the illustrated
16:30London News pictures.
16:34Drummond's illustration
16:36does not show
16:37the typical representation
16:38of a sea serpent
16:39with a long body
16:40and humps,
16:41which might have been expected
16:42if he was following
16:43nautical tradition.
16:45There have been sightings
16:46of sea serpents
16:48as far back
16:49as ancient Babylon
16:51and Mesopotamia.
16:52They're seen all over the world
16:54in every sea and ocean
16:56and sightings have continued
16:59to the present day.
17:00There seem to be
17:00a number of different types,
17:03but the two primary ones
17:05are an animal
17:05with a long neck
17:06and a bulky body
17:08and an elongate animal
17:10that throws its body
17:11into a series of loops
17:13or humps.
17:14There was a lot of speculation
17:16as to are these things
17:18an unrecognised animal,
17:21not are these things
17:22as real,
17:22but are they
17:23an unrecognised animal?
17:25In an attempt
17:26to try to explain
17:27the sighting,
17:28numerous experts
17:28came forward
17:29offering their own
17:30interpretations.
17:32Henry Lee,
17:33who was directing
17:35the Brighton Aquarium
17:36and wrote a book
17:37about giant squid
17:39possibly being the subject
17:41of sea serpent encounters,
17:43so he thought
17:44it was a squid
17:45perhaps trailing its tentacles
17:48across the surface.
17:50In the meantime,
17:52there is the discovery
17:53of marine reptiles
17:56from the Jurassic
17:57on the south coast
17:59of England,
18:00which are now
18:00being publicised.
18:02And people began
18:03to think of
18:04the sea serpent
18:05not as a mythical
18:08Scandinavian tradition,
18:10but more as a plesiosaur
18:13with a much longer neck
18:15but a much shorter body.
18:19Even the Natural History Museum
18:21in London got involved.
18:23Richard Owen made suggestions
18:25that angered the captain
18:26and crew of the Daedalus
18:27and ended in an angry exchange
18:30of letters.
18:31Owen suggested
18:32that he'd seen
18:33an elephant seal,
18:34which doesn't grow
18:35to nearly that size,
18:37and he's not found
18:37in the area.
18:38Then he suggested
18:39it was a native canoe
18:40that had harpooned
18:41a whale
18:42and it was being dragged
18:43along by the whale.
18:44And then he said
18:45it was a whale shark,
18:47which doesn't remotely
18:48resemble
18:49what the people saw.
18:52And the captain
18:53and his crew
18:54argued quite fiercely
18:55against that.
18:56Eventually,
18:57it was decided
18:58that no,
19:00that's not what this is.
19:01It's an anomaly.
19:03And it stayed an anomaly
19:04for a very long time.
19:06I don't think
19:06the crew were lying.
19:07I think they reported
19:08accurately what they saw.
19:10And I'm a believer
19:11in sea serpents.
19:12I think there are
19:13a number of large
19:15unknown animals
19:15that we call sea serpents
19:17living in the seas
19:19and oceans
19:19right up to the present day
19:21that we have no
19:23explanation for.
19:25But in this case,
19:26I think there is
19:27an explanation.
19:34Recently,
19:35because there was
19:36so much precise information,
19:38someone had a look at this
19:40and sort of said,
19:41well, you know,
19:41if you look at this
19:42and think of it
19:43in terms of the animals
19:44we do know,
19:45this sighting
19:46and the behavior
19:47of the animal
19:48is consistent
19:49with a rockal whale,
19:50a sea whale,
19:51which is a baleen whale
19:52who eat plankton,
19:54basically.
19:55And in order to do this,
19:56they skim along the surface
19:57with their mouths open.
19:58And so the top
19:59of this animal's jaw
20:01would be above the water
20:03and they would be going along
20:05at just about
20:06the same speed
20:08that the captain suggested.
20:11And indeed,
20:11if you see pictures
20:12of the sea whale
20:13sort of going along
20:14and you kind of don't know
20:16that it's a whale,
20:17then it does look
20:18very mysterious.
20:19It does look very,
20:20very strange
20:20because you can't see the eyes
20:22because of the way
20:23it's going.
20:24But it's taken a very long time
20:26to really come
20:27to an explanation.
20:30And one of the reasons
20:31you can come
20:31to such a good explanation,
20:32which is very rare,
20:34is because it was such
20:34interesting,
20:36specific information
20:37to start with.
20:39But not everyone
20:40is convinced
20:41that we can explain away
20:42the phenomena
20:43of sea serpents
20:44quite so easily.
20:47These things
20:48have been reported
20:48since time immemorial.
20:51And we must remember
20:53the ancient legends
20:54of dragons
20:54all over the world.
20:56in ancient cultures
20:58like Babylon,
20:59Sumeria,
21:00China,
21:01Japan,
21:02they all associate
21:03them with water,
21:04the ancient element
21:05of water,
21:06rather than fire.
21:07And there could be
21:08a reason for that.
21:10Just because one
21:11sea serpent sighting
21:13has an explanation,
21:14it doesn't mean
21:15that all of them do.
21:17It's like saying
21:18that if one Rembrandt
21:20painting turns out
21:21to be a hoax,
21:22there's no such thing
21:22as Rembrandt.
21:47and there's no such thing
21:50as Rembrandt.
21:52And there's no such thing
21:55as Rembrandt.
21:56And there's no such thing
21:56as Rembrandt.
21:56it would change the way
21:58we think of death itself.
22:04Most ghost stories
22:05are told late at night
22:07in an eerie atmosphere
22:08designed to create fear
22:10in the listener.
22:10But one ghost story
22:12not only resulted
22:13in a very real death,
22:15but also had consequences
22:16that were still reverberating
22:18180 years later.
22:19The tale of the Hammersmith ghost
22:23and the murder
22:24which resulted from it
22:25has a unique place
22:27in Britain's collection
22:28of X-Files.
22:30Because although
22:30the arrest, trial
22:32and conviction
22:33of the ghost's killer
22:35were all wrapped up
22:36within a space
22:37of just 10 days
22:39in January 1804,
22:42the case itself
22:44would pose
22:46substantial legal problems
22:48for the next
22:50180 years.
22:57Hammersmith,
22:58which was still
22:59very much
23:00part of the countryside
23:01rather than
23:02the great metropolis,
23:04became awash
23:05with rumours
23:06that the ghost
23:07of a suicide
23:08had left
23:10its grave
23:11in the churchyard
23:12and was menacing
23:14the neighbourhood.
23:24There were several
23:24notable sightings
23:25of the ghost itself.
23:27One of them
23:27was a man
23:28by the name
23:28of Thomas Groom
23:29who was the drayman
23:30to the local brewer,
23:31Mr Burgess.
23:32He was actually
23:33walking through
23:34the churchyard
23:34of Hammersmith
23:35one night
23:36when suddenly
23:37the ghost
23:37came out
23:38from behind
23:39a tombstone
23:39and grabbed him
23:40by the throat.
23:41and he said
23:42he struggled
23:42with the ghost
23:43for a few months
23:43and then he hit out
23:44at it with his fist
23:45and connected
23:46with something
23:46he said
23:46it felt very soft
23:48like a grape coat.
23:49He managed
23:49to then wriggle free
23:50but he actually
23:51took to his bed
23:52when he got home
23:53he took to his bed
23:53for over a week
23:54he was that terrified
23:55by his experience.
23:56The ghost
23:57on one occasion
23:58attacked a wagon
23:59full of people
24:00travelling by night
24:02through Hammersmith.
24:03It also appeared
24:04to one woman
24:05who was pregnant
24:07and threw her
24:08into a terrible
24:09state of hysterics
24:11and was blamed
24:12for a miscarriage.
24:14One of the appearances
24:14that was reported
24:16at the time
24:17was a man called
24:18Thomas Millwood
24:18who was 22 years old
24:20he was a bricklayer
24:21some accounts
24:22said a plasterer
24:22he was walking
24:23along Hammersmith
24:24Terrace one night
24:25when a couple
24:27going past
24:27and a coach
24:28started screaming
24:28saying
24:29it's a Hammersmith ghost
24:30it's a Hammersmith ghost
24:30and he became
24:31quite irate
24:32and told them off
24:33I'm no more
24:35a ghost than you are
24:36and he thought
24:37it was hilarious
24:37and he went home
24:38and told his mother-in-law
24:39his mother-in-law
24:40said you know
24:41you really have
24:42to be careful
24:43because he was dressed
24:44being a bricklayer
24:45he was dressed
24:46in his regulation
24:48outfit or work clothes
24:50which consisted
24:50of white canvas
24:52overcoat
24:53white waistcoat
24:54white trousers
24:55hanging over his shoes
24:56so that's what
24:57the people had seen
24:58and why they thought
24:58he was a ghost.
25:01whilst the British
25:02X-files don't
25:03contain the name
25:04of the ghost
25:05they do tell us
25:06why he was
25:07attacking people
25:09as far as we can
25:10ascertain
25:11the actual person
25:13who came back
25:14from the dead
25:15as a revenant
25:16had committed suicide
25:18the previous year
25:20now up until
25:221824
25:23it was a practice
25:24that suicides
25:26were buried
25:27not in churchyards
25:28but at crossroads
25:30sometimes with a stake
25:32through the heart
25:33the ghost had become
25:34so commonplace
25:36nightly appearances
25:38were happening
25:38all around Hammersmith
25:40that in early January
25:421804
25:42a clergyman
25:43and a gentleman
25:44offered a reward
25:45of five guineas
25:46to anybody
25:47who would go out
25:47and capture the ghost
25:49so in early January
25:501804
25:51you get lots of young men
25:52going out
25:53into the dark of night
25:54armed with guns
25:55and fouling pieces
25:57and pistols
25:58determined to apprehend
26:00the ghost
26:02on December the 29th
26:04a night watchman
26:05called William Girdler
26:07stumbled into the tap room
26:09of a local pub
26:10and said he had just seen
26:13the Hammersmith ghost
26:15and he regaled
26:17the customers in the bar
26:19with the spine-chilling details
26:22of the white-clad spectre
26:28one of those in the bar
26:29that night
26:30was Francis Smith
26:31and he resolved
26:33that over the next few nights
26:35he would go ghost hunting
26:36after first fortifying himself
26:39with drink
26:40he went out
26:42and sat waiting
26:43for the ghost
26:44having first collected
26:46his fouling piece
26:47basically a gun
26:49which was used
26:50for shooting
26:51ducks
26:52and geese
26:53and he sat there
26:55until he saw
26:56a white figure
26:57coming up the lane
26:59about ten o'clock
27:01in the evening
27:01he was shocked
27:03by the sudden
27:05appearance
27:06of the ghost
27:07he was hunting
27:09it rose up
27:10in front of him
27:12and Smith cried out
27:14damn you
27:15who are you
27:16damn you
27:16I'll shoot you
27:17and when the ghost
27:18didn't reply
27:20he fired
27:21a single shot
27:23the shot
27:24hit
27:25the ghost
27:26which crumpled
27:28to the path
27:29in front of him
27:33and Thomas Millwood
27:34was dressed in his
27:35work outfit
27:36his white waistcoat
27:38his white overcoat
27:39his white trousers
27:40and Francis Smith
27:42simply cocked
27:43his fouling piece
27:43demanded who he was
27:44Millwood made
27:45no reply
27:46so Francis Smith
27:48shot him
27:48and
27:50he died instantly
27:52he was killed instantly
27:52by the bullet
27:53it actually hit him
27:54under the chin
27:55and he died instantly
27:56Smith very quickly
27:58and to his credit
27:59realised what he'd done
28:01that he had shot
28:02to death
28:03someone
28:04posing
28:04as a ghost
28:06and he confessed
28:08his crime
28:15in January 1804
28:17he appeared
28:18at the Central Criminal Court
28:19or the Old Bailey
28:20on a charge
28:21of willful murder
28:22of Thomas Millwood
28:23Francis Smith's defence
28:25was
28:26that he hadn't
28:27intended to shoot
28:28Thomas Millwood
28:29he'd simply gone out
28:30and intended to shoot
28:31the ghost
28:31and his defence was
28:32he bore no malice
28:33whatsoever
28:34against Thomas Millwood
28:35so therefore
28:36he hadn't murdered him
28:37unfortunately
28:38the court
28:39took a different view
28:41as the law stood
28:42at the time
28:45deaths
28:45had to be
28:46the fault
28:47of somebody
28:47and this
28:49was a case
28:49of murder
28:50as the judge said
28:51the law is the law
28:52and the law states
28:53that if you
28:54shoot somebody dead
28:55and it's not self-defence
28:57if it's not done
28:58under official sanction
28:59then it's murder
29:00the jury returned
29:02with a verdict
29:03it convicted
29:05Francis Smith
29:06of willful murder
29:07and the judge
29:08donned the black cap
29:11and imposed
29:12the only sentence
29:13allowed by law
29:15death
29:16fortunately
29:17a recommendation
29:18of mercy
29:20was made
29:21to the king
29:23the pleas
29:24reached
29:25his majesty
29:26King George III
29:28who granted
29:29a royal pardon
29:31and so
29:31the sentence
29:32was commuted
29:33to one of hard labour
29:35for six months
29:37the trial
29:38of Francis Smith
29:39and the tragedy
29:40of the shooting
29:40dead of Thomas Millwood
29:42did lead to
29:43information being given
29:45to the local magistrate
29:46whereby
29:46at least one of the
29:47perpetrators
29:48who may have been
29:49the ghost
29:49was identified
29:50and it was a local man
29:51by the name of
29:52John Graham
29:52John Graham
29:53was very religious
29:54he attended a local chapel
29:55he had a family
29:57in short
29:58he was the last person
29:59you'd expect to go out
30:00at night
30:00disguised as a ghost
30:02and the magistrate
30:02asked him why he'd done it
30:03and he said
30:04well I did it
30:05to take revenge
30:06on my apprentices
30:07because they'd been
30:08terrifying my children
30:09with stories of ghosts
30:10so consequently
30:11I decided to get revenge
30:12on them
30:13that's why I went out
30:14as a ghost
30:14but he maintained
30:16he'd only ever done it once
30:17so that meant
30:18that the ghost
30:20was still out there
30:21somewhere
30:23it might have started
30:24out as a prank
30:25and ended up
30:26in a tragic death
30:28but the Hammersmith ghost
30:29would reverberate
30:30across the centuries
30:32then in 1949
30:34a leading academic lawyer
30:36called Glanville Williams
30:38rediscovered the curious case
30:40of the Hammersmith ghost
30:41Glanville Williams
30:43raised the case
30:45of the Hammersmith ghost
30:46as part of
30:47a wider debate
30:49about reforming
30:51the law of manslaughter
30:52this led to
30:54the Homicide Act
30:551957
30:56which introduces
30:58the plea
30:59of diminished responsibility
31:00and similarly
31:02the law on mistake
31:03developed
31:04until finally
31:05in 1984
31:06it was accepted
31:08that an unreasonable
31:10mistake
31:11might also
31:12provide some degree
31:14of mitigation
31:14or excuse
31:16as much as
31:17a reasonable
31:17honest mistake
31:19and at that point
31:21the case of the Hammersmith ghost
31:24became one of
31:26effectively
31:27a historical precedent
31:29because that was
31:30a real life case
31:32where the situation
31:33of a mistake
31:35an unreasonable one
31:37suddenly came into its own
31:40but it took
31:41it took
31:42180 years
31:44for the law
31:45to actually evolve
31:46to recognise it
31:47and then
31:48it took
31:49to protect
31:49of the
31:49the
31:49of the
31:49of the
31:50again
31:58and
31:59the
31:59of the
32:00of the
32:00of the
32:00of the
32:04the
32:14we
32:14were
32:15well
32:15were
32:15then
32:15not
32:16the
32:16of the
32:17When a photograph seems to show something extraordinary, we tend to look for an extraordinary explanation.
32:23But that isn't always where the truth is to be found.
32:28When we think of photographs of paranormal phenomena, we expect to see dark, blurry, mysterious images.
32:35What we don't expect is a little girl holding a bunch of flowers.
32:39But that is exactly what we see in one of the most mysterious images ever taken
32:43that has remained an enigma for over 60 years.
32:47Jim Templeton was a firefighter who was based near Carlisle in Cumbria.
32:55And he was also a very keen photographer.
32:57And during the 1960s, he took one of the most bizarre, baffling, iconic mystery photographs
33:05in the history of anomalous photography.
33:07In May 1964, he was out with his wife and daughter.
33:12Not only was he trying out his new camera, but he wanted to take some pictures of his wife
33:17because she'd just bought a new dress.
33:20So it seemed an ideal opportunity for him to play around with his camera
33:26and spend some time with his family.
33:28Jim was there with his wife and his young daughter.
33:31And they were in Solway Firth in Cumbria.
33:35And as far as Jim can remember, there was nobody else around.
33:38They were there by themselves.
33:40So he'd set up his camera and he got his daughter, Elizabeth, to pose.
33:47And really lovely photo.
33:48His wife was standing behind him and took a series of pictures
33:52and didn't see anything unusual.
33:56In the days before mobile phones, pictures taken on a film camera weren't instantly accessible.
34:02You had to take the film to a specialist laboratory and have it developed,
34:06which normally took a week or so before they were sent back to you.
34:09About a week later, he went back to the chemist to collect the pictures.
34:14And he spoke about the photographs and the assistant looked through the photographs with him.
34:20And the assistant pointed out that one of the pictures was ruined by somebody in the background.
34:26And then when Jim looked at the picture, he realised this strange figure looked very much like an astronaut.
34:34When the assistant handed them back to him, she said,
34:37it's just a pity about that one picture which was spoiled by the spaceman in the back of the shot.
34:45And he thought, what? As you would.
34:49And looked through the photographs and lo and behold, standing in the background,
34:53almost like floating behind the head of Elizabeth, is this figure that you can only describe as a spaceman.
34:59It looks very much like a NASA astronaut of that period, wearing a big white spacesuit, a helmet with a
35:09black visor.
35:11Everyone had been watching it on TV, the astronauts in their spacesuits.
35:14So everyone knew what an astronaut looked like. Silvery white suits and the domed helmets.
35:20And this figure that is standing behind Elizabeth looks like an astronaut that's sort of turned.
35:26You can see the helmet almost, and you can see the white suit.
35:31And so he was absolutely baffled. What on earth is this figure?
35:36When he wasn't taking photographs, Jim Templeton was a fireman.
35:39And he was used to dealing with the police. So that was his first port of call.
35:45You know, I've got this weird photograph, you know, with this strange figure on it.
35:49And it was taken overlooking the Solway Firth, where there's these Ministry of Defence establishments.
35:54Could it be something that we need to let the Ministry of Defence know about?
35:57So they looked at it. They couldn't explain it. They didn't think it was like a double exposure or anything
36:04of that kind.
36:05The head of Carlisle's CID told Templeton that it wasn't a hoax. It was a genuine photograph.
36:12They thought that someone had wandered into the shot and had been caught momentarily by Jim.
36:17And that Jim hadn't seen them when he took the photograph.
36:20Templeton was adamant that that was not the case.
36:22And no one could have wandered into the photograph without him and his wife noticing.
36:29When the story of the Solway Spaceman and the picture that Jim had took appeared in national and local newspapers,
36:41the family became instant media celebrities.
36:46Newspaper reporters, television crews trekked to the Templeton's house to interview Jim and Alice and Elizabeth.
36:55The photo got into the media. It went all around the world. He had people writing to him from Australia,
37:01from South America.
37:02He was absolutely open about it. He used to, he had a collection of prints of his famous photo and
37:07he was happy to give them to people randomly who was interested in the subject.
37:12Never tried to make any money out of it. He said, if you use the print, if you publish it,
37:17make a donation to charity.
37:19So he had no financial sort of interest in making money out of that image.
37:25He just wanted to get to the bottom of it. Who was that figure in the photograph?
37:30As well as people who believed the face value of the story, there were people who also thought it was
37:35a fake.
37:36Back in those days, you couldn't just take a digital print. You had to have negatives.
37:40There was original material and Jim was unwilling to part with it. But Kodak could see the prints.
37:47Kodak's technicians came back and said, what we can tell you is that the film hasn't been altered.
37:54What it shows is what you captured. There's been nothing superimposed or modified about that still frame.
38:04They actually offered a reward of a three years supply of film if somebody come up to explain how it
38:13was faked.
38:14I don't think he was a hoaxer, even though he admitted to me that he liked playing around with trick
38:19photography.
38:20I didn't detect any idea that he deliberately faked that photograph.
38:26That is all I can say. And as someone who's worked as a journalist for decades, I can read people.
38:32I can tell when someone is spinning a yarn. And I didn't pick that up from Jim Templeton.
38:38What had started as a day out at a local beauty spot was fast becoming a media sensation.
38:44And it wasn't long before the story found a strange resonance on the other side of the world.
38:51In Woomera, Australia, they were testing a missile called the Blue Streak.
38:55And the Blue Streak had been partially built at Cumbria. So there was this link.
39:00There were two technicians there who said they saw something like the Solway spaceman actually there.
39:06The mission had to be aborted and technicians saw on the rocket range two figures that looked exactly like the
39:16figure in Jim Templeton's photograph.
39:18So this got back to Jim in England and he took it on board as being significant.
39:24I mean, he was looking for an answer. Is this connected to my photograph?
39:30But reports of strange things on in Australia weren't the only incident that made Jim Templeton wonder how far his
39:37story had travelled.
39:38He was about to get some unwanted visitors.
39:41Jim Templeton did say that he was visited by two strange men who wore black suits.
39:47So these two guys, dressed all in black, the classic men in black MIB, said,
39:54Yeah, we're from the ministry. You're not to talk about this. We're interested in the photograph. Can you take us
39:59to where you took the photograph?
40:02When he asked them their names, they refused to give them. They said, we don't use names. We use numeric
40:11designations.
40:12I am number nine, said one of them, and I am number 11, said the other.
40:19So they drove him out to the Solway Firth in this Jaguar car. And one of the guys said to
40:24him, when you saw the spaceman, what did it look like?
40:27What did you see through the camera? And he says, I didn't see anything. That's the whole point.
40:32I didn't see anything until we had the photos developed. And he said, well, at that point, the guy just
40:38said, OK, thank you very much.
40:39And they both turned around, trotted off back to the car, leaving him there thinking, hold on a minute.
40:44Are you going to give me a lift back to the fire station? They got him. The Jaguar disappeared, leaving
40:49him to walk back to the road about five miles.
40:53This could, of course, have been just a couple of UFO fans who were drilling Jim for extra information, really.
41:01He was convinced at that time that these were genuine officials from the Ministry of Defence.
41:07He said, no, I'm convinced they were from the MOD and they were looking into how the photograph was taken
41:12and whether there was any significance from an intelligence point of view.
41:23If these really were government officials, then the reason the photograph would have been of interest
41:28could be that it was taken in the vicinity of a nuclear power station.
41:32And that also provides a possible explanation for how a man from outer space has wandered into the back of
41:38Jim's incredible photograph.
41:40Because of the power station nearby, there were inspectors who wore spacesuit type outfits to test the radioactive levels in
41:51the nearby Selway Firth.
41:53One theory is that one of them appeared in the scene just as Jim was taking the photograph.
42:00I think the most logical explanation for it is the one that was suggested by the CID in Carlisle at
42:09the time when they looked at the image.
42:12Because they had access to the stripper negatives, not just the one with the spaceman in inverted commas on it.
42:20They could see what Jim had photographed before and after.
42:25And I've seen some of the other images and they don't often get published.
42:28And what you see on the other images is Jim's wife kneeling down beside him as they're getting Elizabeth to
42:35pose with the flowers.
42:37And she's got a very distinctive blue and white patterned dress on.
42:43And I think what happened was his wife sort of momentarily walked behind the camera into the background, turned her
42:50back and that's when he took the shot.
42:52And what you're seeing is the light reflecting off her dress as she turns around and walks back behind the
42:58camera.
42:59And if he was concentrating on getting a really good shot of his daughter, he wouldn't necessarily remember his wife
43:05getting into the background of the shot just for a few seconds.
43:09And she might not have even realised that that's what happened herself.
43:13So that is my best guess.
43:16But apart from that, I haven't a clue.
43:24Next time on Britain's X-Files.
43:27Did an angel rescue British soldiers in World War One?
43:31Can people really foresee terrible tragedies?
43:34Why was a woman charged with witchcraft during World War Two?
43:39And did a reckless climate experiment destroy a Devonshire village?
43:43That's why the world we aren't seeing was the case.
43:50The First Life of the Game.
43:5215.
43:5516.
43:5620.
43:5620.
43:5720.
43:5920.
44:0120.
44:0621.
44:0821.
44:0921.
44:1022.
44:13Sous-titrage FR ?
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