One snowy morning in the 1850's, a mysterious trail of footprints in the snow was found. Were these animal tracks, or something more demonic at work?
The night of February 9, 1855 was a cold, snowy one in Devon, England. In fact, a couple of inches of snow blanketed the ground.
Along with the bird and animal tracks one would expect to find, another set of footprints was discovered by local residents: a set of mysterious hoof-prints. The prints were 4 inches in length, 2.75 inches wide, and spaced about 8 inches apart. Whatever made them walked on two legs. They formed a trail that went over haystacks, walls, rooftops, and gardens.
The prints started off in a garden and stopped short in the middle of a field approximately 100 miles away. At one point, they went into a shed and came out on the other side- apparently, whatever made them went through a six-inch hole. Outside of a church in Woodbury, the prints looked like they had been burned into the snow by a hot iron.
Scores of people saw the strange prints and the story sparked a heated debate about what could have made them.
A naturalist suggested that the prints were made by a badger - he pointed out that they put their hind paws into the prints made by their front feet.
Other theorists suggest that the prints were made by one of any number of animals: squirrel, rat, otter, fox, donkey, a pony with a broken shoe, or some type of cat. A wild theory involved a kangaroo escaping from some kind of travelling circus, making the footprints, and then returning to its cage before anyone realized it had been missing. A group of hunters searched for whatever was responsible for the footprints, but was unable to track down the culprit.
Local residents, though, locked their doors and kept their children in after dark while they held on to the belief that the Devil had visited Devon that night - and the proof was in the footprints.
