#MEwx For Halloween, I've posted the very mysterious tale of "The Kennebec Creature."

Every Haloween I’m struck by how little gets written about the Augusta area that’s spooky (other than what’s going on in the legislature that is). Lacking anything genuine in the records that is remotely scarey, I thought I’d post this story. It’s a tale about Augusta’s crypto-creature.

There are tales in Augusta, very old tales, that have never been “officialy” told.  These tales have been whispered from generation to generation, first by native Americans, and then by early European settlers. The telling of this one is, as I’ve noted above, long overdue.

To give you an idea where this tale originates, my wife and I live in Kennebec County, specifically on Augusta’s North end.  The house we live in was built by one of her colonial ancestors back in the late 1780’s and the land it sits on spans 44 densely wooded acres that backs up to I-95. That all used to be thickly forested land out there.   

The origins of this  tale, like so many others  is lost to time.  What we know is that, in 1628, In what is now known as the Kennebec Valley, the Cushnoc Trading post was established on the banks of the Kennebec river by early English traders and explorers to establish trade with native Americans.  The explorers were warned by the Indians  to beware of what they called “the Bec.”  To shorten the tale a bit, the true name of “the Bec” was at that time, known only to the tribes who lived and hunted this region.  However, they refused to speak it aloud believing that to speak it was to summon it.

By 1661 the Cushnoc Trading Post had been abandoned but the tale of “the Bec” persisted. Early descriptions of what has become locally known as the “Kennebec creature,” remain essentially unchanged since 1628 when white explorers first heard about it from the Indians.

It’s height is said to be between 4 and 5 feet and is powerfully built. Eye witness accounts agree that it has powerful broad shoulders, a deep and thickly muscled chest, stocky legs and a head that seems to be jhammed directly on top of it’s shoulders.  It is completely covered by brown, thick, bear-like fur and leaves a human-like footprint with 4 toes that are tipped with thick, sharp claws.  Looking “more or less human” it’s eyes are said to be large, narrow and wrap nearly a third of the way around the side of it’s head.  If true, this would afford it the best binocular vision of almost any known primate. Descriptions of it’s ears seem to vary.  Some descriptions claim that it’s ears are rounded and seem “bear like” in an odd way. Rooted in the sides of its head, the ears extend up above the top of its head. Other descriptions assert that the ears are pointed like those of a cat, and can be rotated nearly 180 degrees, which would give it excellent hearing without needing to rotate its head.

Finding verified historic accounts of this creature is as elusive as the creature itself.  Efforts to find anyone willing to speak of “the Kennebec Creature” has proven to be nearly impossible. 

Even the Elders of native American tribes from the Passamaquoddy, MicMac, Algonquin, Penobscot, Abenaki and even as far away as the Mohawk flatly refuse to even have a conversation about it. The old cultural belief that to “speak of it summons it” remains deeply rooted.

Even eye witness accounts or rumors of “the Kennebec Creature” by European settlers from early colonial times are either nonexistent or have been so well buried that they are unverifiable.  This is, to an extent, understandable when such accounts would have been viewed as “demonic” and Heretical” by the strict religious leaders of early New England colonial society.

“The Kennebec Creature” remains an unsubstantiated rumor that only inhabits hushed conversations and whispers with historians and genealogists who refuse to acknowledge any part of the old tales to this very day for fear of damaging their professional reputation.

As in all such tales, you can still get a glimpse of it through the obscurity of time. 

For example, there is this account from 1934, handed down word of mouth in the Buckshaw family (a local north Augusta family) about the time grandpa Buckshaw saw “the Kennebec Creature.”  According to family legend, The elder Buckshaw was returning from a visit to the outhouse when he heard one of his goats “setting up a fuss.”  Running to the goat pen, he was just in time to see one of his best milking goats that weighed nearly 90 pounds, tucked under the arm of a creature that was “about 4 feet tall, covered in dark brown fur, legging it towards the tree line as if the goat weighed little more than a chicken.”  When he yelled at it in an effort to get it to drop his goat, it stopped, turned and looked back at him “with the most evil eyes I’ve ever seen.”

From that day until his death some 35 years later he never went to the outhouse without a loaded shotgun.

Then there was the incident that occurred in 1954 on what is today known as West River Road in Augusta’s North end.  Frank LeGuirq, a 34 year old Marine Corps veteran of some of the worst fighting in the South Pacific during World War II was driving his loaded logging truck South towards Augusta when he came around a bend in the road.  “It was one of those mornings when the fog was up from the river and real thick.”  He later told his wife Olive.  “The sun wasn’t up all the way, and with the fog I couldn’t see very far.  As I came around the bend a young adult moose bolted out of the fog from the river side of the road right in front of me as if something was chasing it.  I couldn’t avoid hitting it.  I managed to get my truck stopped about 150 feet down the road, right across from the Cling cemetary,  to look over the damage to the front of my truck. That moose had to weigh in around 350 or 450 pounds. After looking at the crushed grill, busted headlight and bent fender, I figured I’d better go back and see if the moose was down and dead, or still alive.  Since the war I can’t abide seeing an animal suffer, so I pulled my 300 Savage deer rifle out of the truck’s cab and walked back up the road.  About that time a breeze kicked up and cleared a good bit of the fog away.  I saw, and this is the God’s honest truth,  a creature with pointy ears, covered in dark brown fur about 5 feet tall, glaring at me with the most frightening eyes I’ve ever seen as it walked away from me.  What made me rack a round into the chamber was this – “it” had one hand buried inside the flesh of the neck of that dead moose and was walking away with it into the woods with as little effort as you’d have dragging a trash bag full of dry leaves to the trash pile.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  It was dragging a dead moose weighing  350 or 450 pounds with just one hand.  It’s tracks looked nearly human, only with 4 toes that had to be tipped with heavy sharp claws.”

   Several years later I-95 was being built up through Maine to the Canadian border by the Federal Highway Department.  That’s a lot of tree clearing and digging out in the woods.  While road construction crew members in this area initially reported numerous sightings of “The Kennebec Creature” the reports dropped to near zero after the highway construction company let it be known that such reports were “obvious indicators of on-the-job drinking” constituting grounds for immediate dismissal if they did not stop.

More recently, Tony Kirk, whose family boasts a 230 year presence on Augusta’s West River Road, sold his house and land to move down to North Carolina.  He said:  “Yes, I’ve seen that thing a few times.  Sometimes you can feel it looking at you from over there.”  And jerked his thickly bearded chin towards a heavy tree line that borders the acres of hay field next to his house.  “When the cows bunch up all facing the trees, and all of the wildlife goes quiet, you know it’s there.  That’s why I’m selling out an moving down to North Carolina to be close to our kids and grandkids.  They don’t need to inherit this place with that thing out there.”

When asked why he felt that way, he thumbed his suspenders straight and rubbed his beard.  “Last year I was out in those woods checking on some pine trees I was thinking of having logged, when I came across the remains of an adult black bear.  They grow to be about 250 to 300 pounds.  There was about 30 pounds of this one left, and the ground was covered with human like footprints with 4 toes that seemed tipped with thick claws.  Some prints were large, some smaller, like more than one creature had made them. The ground was all torn up like the bear had been in a darn good fight with whatever made those footprints.  The blood on the ground was still wet.  Anything that can take down a full grown bear and then eat most of it isn’t the sort of thing I want to be around.”

The people who purchased the farm from him refused to speak with anyone about what seems to be lurking out in that tree line.

We caught up with Tony’s daughter down in North Carolina for a few words about the Kennebec creature.  Major Brandy Costin, Army Special Forces infiltration, sniper and unarmed combat instructor was quite frank with us in her opinion of her parents move to North Carolina.  “Oh something’s in those woods up in Augusta all right, and whatever it is, its good.  I tracked it a few times last year when we were up visiting Mom and dad with the kids.  I’m pretty good at stealthy tracking in the woods, but that thing kept getting around behind me and all I ever saw of it was those 4 toed footprints.  Moving down here was the smartest thing for them to do.”

Most recently Bevin O’Ryan, a highly regarded crypto-zoologist from Newburyport Massachusetts came to the woods in Augusta’s North end to investigate the Kennebec Creature.

Laden with video and audio recording equipment, he left his Toyota RAV4 in the middle of an overgrown logging road out in the woods on Augusta’s North end and hiked in to set up cameras and recorders at various locations.  Everything was attached to heat and motion-sensitive triggers in the hope of getting video or audio evidence of the creature. He returned to his SUV at midday to eat some lunch and collect his camping gear. His plan was to spend the night in the woods to try and catch a glimpse of the elusive creature.

He discovered that all of his food was gone. Whatever had taken it had ripped the tailgate completely off of his RAV4 to get it.  The gate was laying on the ground next to his car and there was one set of footprints, human like, with 4 toes tipped with thick, sharp claws  leading out of the woods to the back of his car, then back into them.

That wasn’t the end of it. Not wanting to leave several thousand dollars worth of motion sensors and recording equipment in the woods, O’Ryan retraced his path  into the woods to retrieve everything and “call it a day.” 

As he retraced his path, he hadn’t made it 50 feet on his back trail when he looked down to see that another set of footprints, human like, with 4 toes tipped in claws, had been behind him when he’d returned to his car after setting up his equipment.

As far as anyone knows those motion sensors and recording equipment is still out in those woods.

To this day only muted rumors of “The Kennebec Creature” have been murmured between locals, but never to anyone in authority for fear of being labeled a “nutcase.” You will not find anyone working for Fish and game or Forestry willing to talk about it either.

How do I feel about our local historic monster?  I feel about it the same way I feel about ghosts.  That is to say, if it’s real enough to hurt you, it’s real enough to stop .45 caliber the hard way.  At least that was until the day before yesterday.

A guy living just up the Road from us has a string of black walnut trees in back of his place with several oak trees as well.  Each fall the acorns and black wallnuts are real abundant and the squirrels go into food-gathering high gear.  Every year we see them busily storing up nuts for the winter.  The squirrel population around here this year seems to be way down though.

Two days ago The guy, who smokes venison and beef in a smokehouse out behind his garage came home to find that a part of the back wall of his smokehouse had been ripped out about 5 feet up from the ground and about 3 feet wide. All of the smoked meat in it was gone.

There was only one set of tracks leading up to the back of the smokehouse, and one set leading away, back into the woods.  The tracks going away were deeper than the ones leading up to it, as if the creature that made them was carrying something heavy.  The tracks looked human, with 4 toes that have claws for toenails.

Like I said, this guy lives just up the road, so I keep my 12 gauge with 3 inch magnum ball bearing loads in it leaning at the back door now. 

You folks reading this can believe whatever you want to.

 

So there it is, my Halloween story about Augusta. By the way, you do realize that not one single word of it is true, right?