Aliens are said to have abducted a couple The uncanny UFO encounter of Betty and Barney Hill
It is the first detailed account of an alien abduction: Barney and Betty Hill's story seems plausible, but what really happened remains unclear. But it certainly gives you goose bumps.
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- In 1961, Betty and Barney Hill reported a UFO sighting while traveling home from their honeymoon. The Hills are even said to have been abducted.
- Under hypnosis, they described detailed investigations by gray beings and later provided a star chart that was assigned to the Zeta Reticuli system.
- Their story strongly influenced the depiction of aliens in pop culture, shaped future UFO sightings and established the image of mysterious extraterrestrial abductions.
Her story shaped today's dialog on encounters of the fourth kind, UFO sightings around the world.
In September 1961, Betty and Barney Hill are driving from Montreal, Canada, to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, USA, on their way home from a belated honeymoon. On the way, they wind through the White Mountains of New Hampshire and witness an extraordinary event.
They are catapulted into the spotlight and report widely on their experience - and do they have proof?
A honeymoon of horror
But first things first: Betty and Barney both had long working days in Portsmouth. Betty was a social worker in child welfare. Barney earned his daily bread as a postman, often driving 100 kilometers a day and continuing to work at night.
The relationship between a white woman and a black man was not yet fully accepted at that time, so the couple also campaigned for civil rights. They always volunteered to help out at their local church and were members of the human rights organization NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People).
So during a long vacation, the Hills planned a road trip from Montreal to Niagara Falls - their stay was to last three days. They had been married for 16 months at the time, but didn't find the time for a honeymoon for a long time. When the time finally came, they got into their car and set off.
On the third and final day of their trip, Betty and Barney leave a restaurant in the US state of Vermont at around 10 pm and hope to make it back to Portsmouth within four hours - they would arrive at 2 am.
During their journey, the couple noticed a bright light in the sky that seemed to be following them. With every kilometer they drive, the light gets bigger and brighter.
Spotted a flat object with binoculars
Barney is a veteran of the Second World War and a man with an affinity for airplanes - he doesn't care much about the light, at least at first. He concludes from his observations that it can't be a passenger flight or a helicopter, as it's the middle of the night. Barney blames the apparition on a satellite that has gone off course.
The light continues to follow the hills, even through the winding roads of the White Mountains. It disappears behind trees, then suddenly reappears.
The couple's curiosity gets the better of them and they pull over to the side of the road to investigate the apparition. With the help of binoculars, Betty realizes that it is not a satellite. According to her report, she sees a fast-moving object in the air that night - a flying saucer. Barney gets a queasy feeling, but nevertheless relies on his pragmatism, his intellect. He is skeptical of an extraterrestrial explanation. But where else could this light come from?
They drive on, but when they reach Lincoln in New Hampshire, the object hovers around 30 meters above their car.
Barney stops abruptly, pulls out his handgun and gets out. He sees something that resembles a jet in size, but it is as flat as an omelette. The Hills make out figures in gray uniforms behind the windows of the object. They tell Betty to put away her binoculars. Barney wants to aim his gun at the object, but he can't - for some inexplicable reason.
Out of sheer fear, the Hills lock themselves in their car and speed off. During their escape, they hear a beeping sound from the trunk, become drowsy and lose consciousness.
The next morning they wake up in their house in Portsmouth with no memory of the events of the night before. However, Barney's shoes are very worn, Betty's dress is torn and her wristwatches have stopped.
Memories under hypnosis
The event has a traumatic effect on Betty. She goes to a library to find out about a civilian group investigating unusual phenomena in the sky and even writes a letter to the US Air Force expressing her concerns about radioactivity. In the years that follow, the couple are haunted by disturbing nightmares, haunted by fears.
They decide to consult the psychiatrist Dr. Benjamin Simon. He is supposed to help them remember the events of the eerie night.
After countless sessions lasting months, Dr. Simon hypnotizes the couple - with success. The Hills report that the UFO landed on their car while they were on the run. The greys had stunned them and transported them on a long ramp into the spaceship.
In the UFO itself, they were separated and examined individually. The gray creatures took hair, fingernail and skin samples - and placed them neatly on a glass table. They were also pricked with needles in their arms, legs and heads. Betty even reports that a needle was pushed into her stomach to take a pregnancy test.
During the abduction, there was also a creature that appeared to be the leader. It watched the experiments. Betty even remembers asking the horror where they were flying to. Under hypnosis, Betty manages to copy the star map and years later a woman named Marjorie Fish assigned this map to the Zeta Reticuli system.
More mystery in alien stories
The story of Betty and Barney Hill was not the first alien abduction story - but it seemed the most plausible and was at least the best documented.
The Hills had a significant impact on the way aliens are portrayed in our society, in pop culture. Suddenly, alien life forms became shrouded in more mystery than before. Investigations and memory lapses have become standard in this context - as in the "X-Files", for example, but also in countless other media such as films or science fiction books.
Although the Hills are now both deceased, the events of the White Mountains have fundamentally changed the image of extraterrestrial visitors forever.
