GUEST BLOGGER RICHARD HOLLAND: Big eels in British Columbia

Once again we hand you over to guest blogger Richard Holland, editor of Paranormal Magazine, and all round good bloke. He is a regular visitor tho these pages, and I am sure that you will all agree with me that this is jolly good news for all of us..

Flicking through an old copy of ‘Wide World’ magazine (May, 1926), I find a few newspaper clippings which I hope will prove of interest. The subject of the sea serpent was a chestnut in ‘Wide World’, with correspondents regularly sending in info from around the globe to the editor’s mail bag. The first clipping, from a British Columbia publication, should especially appeal to Mr Downes, who has had notable success when it comes to elongate Anguilla:

‘SEA SERPENT TRACKED TO LAIR AT LAST – The age long sea serpent mystery appeared to have uncoiled itself today when John P Babcock, Deputy Commissioner of Fisheries, was notified that Queen Charlotte Island Indians had identified the notorious sea serpents of their neighborhood as huge eels which live there in large numbers.

‘John J Can Valkenburg who has been investigating the sea serpent story all Summer and who claims to have seen one of these interesting creatures, is responsible for tracing the monsters to their den. From ancient Indians living in the Queen Charlotte Islands he has learned that for many years the natives have been accustomed to catch astoundingly large eels at rare interviews. These eels, the Indians say, live in a dark, slimy cave at the northern part of the Islands. Here many years ago an Indian brave, aided by six logs [dogs?], did battle with one of the monsters and killed it after a fierce fight. The eel killed in this encounter was nearly forty feet long.

‘The Indians’ description of the eels, says Mr Van Valkenburg, tallies precisely with the strange creature which he saw swimming near his home a few weeks ago. “They have a very large head, big nostrils and the mouth is equipped with very long, sharp teeth,” he states. Mr van Valkenburg announces that he will shortly make an expedition to the home of the eels, invade their cave and kill one if he can, thus solving the sea serpent mystery for all time.’

Or not. Needless, to say, there is no follow-up. The editor does inform us, however, that: ‘Another correspondent in British Columbia tells us that some time ago he met two prospectors who had a nerve-trying encounter with a monster “snake” of this kind while cruising in the same vicinity in a rowboat. Both were reliable men of excellent repute.’

Several months later, in the August 1926 issue, we have a new sighting reported, and this time it includes a sketch of the thing. The following report was reproduced from the ‘Tacoma Ledger’ and refers to a sighting by Captain House, an officer of the Fishery Protection service, of the Canadian Government vessel, the ‘Cloyah’. He spotted the monster when the ‘Cloyah’ entered Wright Sound, 50 miles south of Prince Rupert, BC, en route to New Westminster. Capt House’s report reads as follows:

‘The first appearance was the object rising spirally out of the water and then straightening out to about thirty feet high above the surface, retaining this position for half a minute. The last position was when it recoiled back into the water, churning it to a white foam, and submerged in the same way as it came up, at a rapid rate of speed.

‘As the sun was shining through the clouds the body took on a bright glistening green and bronze colour. The head appeared to have several dark ridges, also long pieces of thick skin, much like kelp, hanging from its head, also shining as if water was dripping from it.’

Capt House’s sketch of the twisty critter is reproduced here.

The thing caught further south, in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, was no less impressive but no one dared be so bold as to pronounce it ‘eel’, or ‘serpent’ or even ‘fish’. From the ‘Boston Globe’:

‘SEA MONSTER AT BOOTHBAY HARBOR. Aug 25 – The strangest denizen of the deep that was ever seen by fishermen or anyone else in this vicinity was towed here today from Monhegan Island by Capt Cass Brackett. It measures 33 feet long, is estimated to weight about eight tons, has an enormous girth and a mouth so big that it is said an ordinary sized flour barrel could be hidden away between its toothless jaws.

‘Scientists from the numerous resorts in this vicinity came here today to look at the monster and went away with the statement that while it resembled a whale and looked something like a shark they weren’t quite sure whether it was a descendant of the sea serpent or the devil fish.’

Surely they couldn’t confuse a fish with a cephalopod? A fish-cum-squid would be a curiosity indeed. Perhaps a ray is meant by the term ‘devil fish’? I know such vague archive reports have little value alone but I offer these here in the hope that they are not well-known and may therefore be useful to anyone studying the fishy cryptids of these particular regions who can add these snippets to their sum of knowledge.

Richard Holland, Editor of Paranormal Magazine (www.paranormalmagazine.co.uk) and Uncanny UK (www.uncannyuk.com).