Readers will recall that in our last issue I reported on my
proposed visit to the National Monuments Record at Swindon. The
N.M.R. is the public archive of the Royal Commission on the
Historical Monuments of England and it is housed in an old
railway siding next to the Great Western Railway. The N.M.R. is
funded by the Department of National Heritage and contains over
three million aerial photographs from a variety of sources.
Since the early 1980s some crop circle researchers have raised
the issue of alleged historical records of crop circles in an
attempt to justify their claim that some crop circles are the
result of a rare "natural" phenomenon. Unfortunately
much of the historical evidence is poorly researched and
documented. A further problem concerns the fact that many of the
historical cases are based on retrospectively-made accounts
rather than contemporary accounts made at the time. For these
reasons skeptics of a "natural" explanation have sought
to dismiss the historical record.
One important class of evidence for historical records of crop
circles involves photographic evidence. Unfortunately the handful
of photographs which have surfaced so far have disappointed the
skeptics, who claim that these photographs don't show the same
thing as modern sharp-edged crop circles.
In previous issues The Crop Watcher has detailed
several hundred historical accounts of phenomena which sound like
crop circles (for example see CW14 and CW21).
This evidence includes the 81 "unexplained ground
markings" listed in the UFO Research Manitoba database which
predate 1975, the year in which Doug Bower and Dave Chorley claim
to have "invented" the crop circle phenomenon. There
are also historical accounts of unusual circular markings from
nations all over the world. It is perhaps significant that like
most of the eye witness accounts which have been reported many of
these historical cases involved relatively simple patterns such
as lone singles and doublets. One excellent example of a
contemporary account is the double rings at Evenlode,
Gloucestershire (1960), which were reported in the local press
almost immediately. Unfortunately it has not proved possible to
locate photographs of the Evenlode rings, although your Editor
has seen the BUFORA case report written by John Llewellyn
(who emigrated to Canada many years ago) and an unsuccessful
media appeal for photographs of this event was made by
Gloucestershire Earth Mysteries on our behalf. Regrettably there
have been few concerted attempts to track down further evidence
of the pre Doug and Dave phenomenon discussed throughout the crop
circle literature. It is for this reason that my visit to the
N.M.R. was well overdue.
During my preparation for my archive search I learnt that the
earliest aerial photographs in the N.M.R. date back to 1903.
According to the N.M.R.'s publicity material the photographic
record covers "every inch of England". Most of the
images are black and white but some of the more recent
photographs are in colour.
The N.M.R. holds two collections of aerial photographs - the
specialist collection of oblique photographs and the vertical
collection (which was transferred from Acton in West London in
June 1994). Many of these photographs were taken by the Ordnance
Survey (for surveying purposes), the Royal Air Force and by
commercial companies (such as Meridian Airmaps Ltd and Fairey
Surveys).
In 1992 the Wessex Skeptics visited the N.M.R. at Swindon and
reported finding no aerial photographs of crop circles. Martin
Hempstead supplied the following statement for publication in CW9
:
"You suggest that we have prematurely concluded from our examination of aerial archaeological photographs that crop circles are entirely a post-1979 phenomenon. In fact, although we saw no patterns predating 1980, we have not drawn firm conclusions. This is because our investigation was fairly limited, being based only on brief examination of several hundred photos of two areas that were crop-circle rich in the 1980s. We are planning a much more thorough examination of the archives, which offers the possibility of pinning the phenomenon down quantitatively. We were rather more impressed by the testimony of the aerial archaeologists. We received letters from six, and polled three more by phone; these three contacted about 50 of their colleagues in Britain and the continent. Their information supported the hypothesis that crop circles are a recent phenomenon, unrepresented in the aerial archaeological record prior to about 1980. This is remarkable when one considers that these people have the job of detecting features similar in size and shape to crop circles, and would be failing if they did not take note of them, if only to eliminate them from their research" (letter dated 8 November 1991).
In another letter (dated 7 July 1992) Chris Nash of the Wessex
Skeptics reported that:
"Our own negative findings from sources in this country and abroad, such as the Centre Interdisciplinaire de Recherche Aeriennes in Brussels, certainly don't preclude your finding photographs or reports [of crop circles] from any time in the past. But of course clear evidence of old crop circles would still not rule out a simple man-made explanation".
As I was searching for historical photographs of crop circles
I decided to concentrate not just on circle-rich locations like
Cheesefoot Head and Westbury, but also on locations where we had
received anecdotal reports of crop circles prior to the 1980s. I
also included the site of Melvyn Bell's eye witness account in
1983 (site 4). I prioritised my search into two lists - those
where I had specific locations or dates (list A) and those where
I had only generalised locations and dates (list B). These are
detailed in Table 1 on page 6.
The N.M.R. responded to my request by conducting what is
called a coversearch. Their computerised database can select
photographs based on the date and Ordnance Survey grid reference
supplied. I requested that I only examine photographs taken
during late Spring, the summer, or early autumn, but the
coversearch is not sophisticated enough to select photographs by
season so I was supplied with a list of photographs taken at any
time during the year.
Table 2 on page 6 details the results of the coversearch. The
N.M.R. located 265 photographs at 10 of the 12 requested sites,
plus a hundred other photographs which were not available. I was
supplied with 16 computer printouts detailing the date each
photograph was taken, the height of the aircraft, the scale
(vertical collection only) and other details. On the vertical
collection photographs were categorised by the quality of the
photograph, ie A for excellent, B where cloud cover/poor
photographic quality or haze/air pollution reduces the quality of
the photograph, and C where there was considerable cloud cover or
poor quality imagery. All the plates I inspected were black and
white.
The first photographs I inspected immediately highlighted all the
problems faced by aerial archaeologists. From 2,000 feet it is
easy to see road markings and people, but from 60,000 feet entire
fields seem like tiny spots on a checkerboard landscape. I found
it difficult to use the stereoscope provided (I think it was
faulty) and I was working under pressure as the Sightings
TV crew from Los Angeles were coming to film me in less than five
hours - what would I say if I didn't find anything ?
I worked through the photographs in site number order,
beginning with site number 1 - Evenlode. Unfortunately the N.M.R.
could not locate their aerial photograph of Evenlode taken on
19th August 1960 (about two months after the double rings
appeared) so my search of this particular location was bound to
be fruitless. Using a borrowed magnifying glass and ruler I
searched slowly across the image. Unfortunately I've never
visited Evenlode and have no idea where Bill Edward's farm is
compared with the village itself ! However, I'm fortunate in
having a near photographic memory when it comes to maps, so I
recalled the fact that the village was to the east of the railway
line and river. Here are my notes for these first photographs :
Photo FSL (Fairey Surveys Ltd) 6125, library number 1118A,
taken on June 1st 1961 with a scale of 1:8,000
"Too high ! Sun [directly] overhead. Lots of marks which might be crop circles but [they are] too small to tell. "
Photo 82/1463, library number 1749, taken on August 14th 1956
at a scale of 1: 20,000
"2 small [circular] depressions close to 4294 [grid reference in mms from bottom left hand corner of photo]. 2 large circular features by trees to south of large village on left at reference 4638 [in a] cultivated field - no chalk in bottom".
These two comments highlight the fact that there are many
potential sources of circular marks on aerial photographs and
that it is not always easy to tell what these circular images are
from a height of 10,000 feet. I saw many circular marks in the
corners of fields or near gates, which I interpreted as the marks
left by tractors turning. There were also circular areas with
small black dots in the middle - perhaps these represented some
kind of agricultural activity ?
Despite these problems I ploughed on, making notes of anything
worthy of comment. On the Eastwood photos it was easy to see the
school and estate shown in Andy Collins' map reproduced in CW17.
As the photograph was taken from less than 5,000 feet I could see
people, cars and even the paint marks on the school playing field
and road markings ! In the middle of the adjacent field I could
see a long mass of lodged crop with (perhaps) multiple mini
swirls. These seemed to follow a stream or (more likely) the
course of a dry valley where the water table lay close to the
surface. There was no sign of the large single reported by Gwen
Brooker but this may be because the photographs were taken in the
wrong year or the location was slightly wrong. Who knows ?
The Maiden Bradleigh photos displayed a number of curious
circular markings. On photo ST 81 38 / 1 (NMR 821 frame 363)
there are several "ambiguous circular markings" at grid
references 113031, 017183 and on the extreme right hand edge of
the photo. These were also evident on frames 364 and 365, taken a
fraction of a second later. On frame 365 there is also a large
dark crop mark, some tractor turning marks and some "small
feint circles" at 5574. Again this is not to say that these
were definitely crop circles, merely that odd circular markings
were in evidence on the prints.
On the vertical collection are some curious circles with white
bottoms taken near Maiden Bradley - the location claimed by Mrs
Christine Dutton to have regularly produced crop circles and
rings on her husband's farm between 1914 and 1958. On photo
OS/65114 (library number 10886), taken on 20 June 1965, there is
a large circle with a white base. On photo OS/63083 (library
number 11488), frame 4053, taken on 2 June 1963, there is another
circle at 080057. On frame 4055 there is a slightly oval-shaped
circular marking with a black dot in the middle. Goodness knows
what these circles are !
One of the problems with the interpretation of these
photographs is that on some of the older photographs the emulsion
seems to be potted with marks. These too could be misinterpreted
as crop circles when, in fact, they are nothing of the sort. In
addition many of the photographs were taken by aerial
archaeologists for aerial archaeologists, so many exhibit linear
and circular features which are very clearly crop marks. I felt
pretty confident that I could distinguish crop marks from other
circular markings, but who knows what the ancients did. Perhaps
some circular shaped marks on aerial photographs are the result
of Roman latrines ?
All of this is really frustrating because at the end of the
day the aerial photographic evidence is not quite the objective
tool I had hoped it to be. A degree of personal judgement is
still required.
These issues are highlighted by my discovery of photo 58/2513
(library number 1843), which was taken on 18th July 1958 above
Pepperbox Hill, Whiteparish, Wiltshire (OSGR SU 210250). This
vertical photograph displays at least six circular traces.
Unfortunately the original photograph contained too little
contrast for it to be scanned and reproduced in The Crop
Watcher. However, the scale drawing on the front cover of
this issue illustrates the disposition of five of the six
circular images on the top left hand corner of the original
print.
At A, B and C are three circles with whitish centres. Circle A
appears to be approximately 22 metres in diameter whilst circle B
is smaller (c 15 metres) and circle C smaller still (c 12
metres). In all three (particularly circles A and C) there are
darker areas within the whitish background. When I first saw
these circles I was convinced that this was a major breakthrough.
My reason for doing so was because on the 9th July 1987 farmer
Graham Sparkes insisted to Terence Meaden, Colin Andrews and
myself that in this very field he and his father had seen crop
circles for most of the previous "28" summers (Sparkes'
claim was made at point G). My belief that these images
represented crop circles was also strengthened by the fact that
identical images did not appear on any of the other aerial
photographs of the Pepperbox Hill location that I inspected
(dating from 1946 to 1980).
When I first saw photo 58/2513 the images of circles A, B and
C were very small - about 0.25 mm across - so the interior of
these circles looked much darker than they do on the enlargement
produced by the N.M.R., where they appear quite lightish. When
Terence Meaden examined Professor J.K. St. Joseph's oblique
photograph of the Winterbourne Stoke Bronze Age round barrows he
concluded that light coloured circles on aerial photographs are
not proof of historical crop circles because the light centres
represent the chalk showing through the topsoil and crop.
When I received the N.M.R. enlargement I first noticed circles
D and E. These are much fainter than circles A, B and C, and
strangely their interiors are the same colour and shade as the
surrounding crop. This suggested to me that they are not crop
marks as the latter are normally lighter or darker than
surrounding crop.
In circle D the circular shape is quite clear and the dark
shadow effect of the standing crop can be clearly seen on one
side of the circle. In circle E only the darkened rim can be seen
on one side. My original opinion was that circles D and E are
prime candidates for historic crop circles, as they too are
inside the Pepperbox Hill punchbowl. Circle D is actually in the
field that Graham Sparkes insisted had produced crop circles
during the previous 28 years, whilst circle E was in the next
field along. Both circles were in the lee of a steep escarpment
some 100 metres high, just as Meaden's atmospheric vortex theory
predicts, and both were probably invisible to anyone visiting the
Pepperbox monument on top of the hill. If these are not crop
circles then what are they and why did Graham Sparkes insist that
they were the same phenomenon as the 1987 circles?
At point F on the photograph is some interesting lodging.
There are several circular patches which conceivably might be
wind swirled crop circles. Two circles display central clumps,
the feature reported by Paul Germany in the circles he recalls
from East Anglia during the 1930s. Further down on the original
photograph is a sixth circular mark which could be interpreted as
a ringed single. The circle is positioned very close to the
village of Whiteparish but surprisingly doesn't appear in CERES'
database of historical crop circles. A number of other
white-bottomed circles appear on some of the other prints I
examined (eg there is something that resembles a ragged ringed
single on photo 106G/LA/292, library number 3706 taken at Cley
Hill on 12th May 1945, and another on photo F65 543/RAF/2821,
library number 8138, taken on 27th April 1964). So, if crop
circles are not represented in the aerial archive record, what
are these circles and why did the Wessex Skeptics fail to report
them following their archive search of 1991 ?
Having completed my archive search I sought some professional
opinion. Initially I wrote to Derrick Riley, author of Aerial
Archaeology in Britain (Shire Archaeology, 1982), but
unfortunately Riley died in 1993. Next I contacted The Wessex
Skeptics and they kindly supplied me with the names of three
aerial archaeologist. I stumbled across another aerial
archaeologist at work ! Unfortunately my attempts to enlarge
frame 58/2513 met with repeated and costly failure, so I sent
these experts a laser copy of my enlargement.
Rog Palmer and Chris Cox run Air Photo Services in Cambridge
and they are Editors of the Aerial Archaeology Research Group
Newsletter "AARGnews". They are
"archaeological consultants for aerial photographic
interpretations, accurate mapping and oblique aerial
photography". Their opinion was almost entirely negative:
"None of the marks you have indicated show features similar to the crop circles recorded in recent years. The latter are formed by flattening the crop, usually cereal, to the desired shape. Marks B and C are perhaps the easiest to deal with and give the appearance of reasonably convincing round barrows (burial mounds, most probably of bronze age date). In July these would be visible because the crop would grow more feebly on a chalk mound - even if it was virtually levelled - than on topsoil. It worries me slightly that C seems to be showing more as a disc than a spot, but this does not affect my interpretation. A is less easy to classify because of its disc-like appearance and the sharpness of its outline. It could be another round barrow (the county records should help with A, B and C) but this is one case where I would be happier if I could also see an adjoining frame to assure myself that it was not a processing fault. The squiggles you have drawn near A are almost certainly tractor-made. I can almost convince myself that I can see the two parallel wheel marks in places. Similarly, those to the left all head towards the field entrance, although those towards the top of the frame (south) may show marks of earlier agricultural lynchets - I would need to see more photographs to say anything more definite about those.
D is interesting. What are we seeing ? Here, a stereo pair [of photographs] would definitely be an advantage because, to judge by the shadows D appears to be a slightly sunken disc-shaped feature or a slightly raised ring. If the latter it could mark the location of a disc-barrow - again bronze age but of different form to the round (bowl) barrow, comprising circular ditch and low bank with a central 'nipple' above the primary burial. If it is a sunken feature I would suggest it may show an old marl pit - the chalk is crawling with them. To remind you, what we are seeing in this case appears to be a three dimensional form with the crop growing normally above it - not a form made by flattening crop. Arc E I would write off as a mark on the negative or print. I would also suggest that it is too dark a tone for that particular crop to be capable of producing....
F seems to be a quite unexceptional example of one of the many forms of crop lodging. Your 'circles' (this time really of lowered crop!) would appear to centre on crosses made by successive year's cultivation in different directions - a fairly common farming practice, and visible in other forms in some of the nearby fields....
May I be a little brutal and suggest that when you are examining photographs you keep firmly in mind just what it is you are seeking to identify. I think the example shows that you have been looking primarily for 'circles' but with little consideration as to what those circles are showing. ... Your aim is to detect circles, or other shapes, formed by crop being flattened. You perhaps could help this by trying to find some vertical photographs that show some of the recent examples which may help you to identify some of the 'signals' through which such features show. On these earlier prints, given a degree of direct sunlight, I would expect to detect a 'shadow side' and possible a 'highlight side' to a circular edge and would expect the levelled centre in a cereal field to be showing as a lighter-toned mark than the surrounding normally growing crop (greater reflectance from the stalks than from the plan view of the heads). All of these should be there at whatever stage of ripening (ie from green to yellow).
One of the questions I was asked (I think) by Martin Hempstead was if archaeological photo interpreters would have noticed crop circles when examining photos that pre-date the present outburst of such things. My answer was that we would not be doing our job properly if we had not seen them. In a similar manner to yourself, we will have been searching for breaks in the agricultural pattern - from a circular blob to more involved patterns. Much of the so-called archaeological examination of vertical photos has been done by inexperienced (or non-experienced) personnel who have considerable imagination and have cluttered many of our maps with all sorts if junk. If crop circles had been on these photos they would have found them. In other words, I doubt if any are there."
Susan Smith is an Archaeological Assistant working in the
archaeological section of Hampshire County Council Planning
Department. Susan told me that the interpretation of aerial
photographs was not an "exact" science and that
different aerial archaeologists give different interpretations of
the same features. This opinion was supported by the other aerial
archaeologists I contacted.
Unfortunately Susan Smith has had much less experience in
interpreting aerial photographs than Rog Palmer. For this reason
she was unsure about all the "circles" on figure 1. She
felt that circles A to C were possibly modern in origin, although
she suggested that circle A was possibly a ring ditch. Susan
Smith's opinion was that circles B and C appear in a field of
grass whilst circles A, D, E and F appear in arable crops. There
is a footpath running through the fields B, C and D appear in.
Circle A caused Susan some concern due to the presence of the
curly traces adjacent to the bridleway. Susan was also puzzled by
the linear marks that lay to the south of the A36 (shown at the
top of the plan on the front cover.
On examining circles D and E Susan was less sure. In her
opinion circle D could be the product of an agricultural regime
(eg tractor movements). She noted that under a magnifying glass
circle D displayed a slight kink. Susan was not convinced that
circle D was a ring ditch.
It was interesting to discover that like Rog Palmer Susan
Smith was unimpressed with circle E. She suspected that this
"circle" was a subconscious trick of the mind (i.e. my
mind !) trying to form a circle out of ambiguous visual cues.
Susan Smith confirmed that crop marks can disappear from the
aerial photographic record because they are dependent on numerous
variables, eg the time of the year the photograph was taken, the
type of crop, and whether or not it had been a long dry summer
(which favours the appearance of crop marks).
Susan Smith suggested that I contact Wiltshire County
Council's Library and Museum Service, as they hold a record of
the county's archaeological sites. I was very pleased to receive
the following comments from Roy Canham, the County Archaeologist
(letter dated 3 November 1994) :
"I have examined the photograph which you kindly provided and can offer the following comments :-
Sites A, B and C -
I think these are non archaeological in origin. Ring ditches and similar monuments do not show up in this way in arable land. The three features are shown with such clarity that I have a suspicion they are marks on the negative.
Sites D and E -
Ring ditches showing in arable are normally fairly simple and these features are complex with areas of light and dark showing. They have the appearance of archaeological earthworks as they would show up in grassland but these are located in arable fields and cannot survive as earthworks. I therefore doubt that they are of archaeological origin.
In relation to your comment about ring ditches not appearing on other photographs, I can confirm that this is very common indeed. Soil moisture conditions appear to play a strong part in the formation of crop marks. Furthermore, I have noted photographs in which a ring ditch will appear as a soil mark in one year and not in another, something which I find hard to explain.
I note the other archaeologists you have written to, and I doubt that we will all concur in our evaluations ! "
Finally I also wrote to Kate Fielden, who edits the Wiltshire
Archaeology Magazine, but have not received a reply.
On October 18th I wrote to Dr R.P. Whimster, at the National
Monument Record. Dr Whimster kindly agreed to examine photo
58/2513. This is what he has to say (letter dated 20 December
1994) :
"I have at last had an opportunity to look properly at the original of the 1958 print that you have photocopied to me, together with a partly overlapping print from an adjacent photographic run. The results of my observations will, I fear, be rather disappointing.
1. The photographs in question were taken on 18 July 1958. As would be expected at this time of year, most of the fields are occupied either by maturing cereal crops or established grassland. The only significant exceptions are one or two fields that remain as fallow plough-soil, as witnessed by their pale chalky appearance.
2. Judging from the evidence of vehicle and animal tracks, circles A - C, and probably D, seem to lie in mature managed pasture, while mark E would seem to be in a field of ripening wheat or barley. Interpretations of the cause of such marks fall into three basic categories:
a) that they reflect differential plant growth above subsurface archaeological or geomorphological structures;
b) that they are the result of superficial damage to the vegetation cover, either through disease (eg fungus rings), animal/human action (tethering, cooping, hoaxing etc) or, more controversially, the meteorological phenomena that have been proposed as an explanation of the simpler crop-circle formations.
c) that they have no terrestrial existence at all, but are instead superficial photographic blemishes on the original film or paper print.
3. Turning first to subsurface options, I would not expect Bronze Age burial mounds, infilled ponds and chalk pits or other circular archaeological structures to depict themselves as pale disks in mown or grazed grass (Circles A - C) during anything other than a period of exceptional drought. Though I do not have the detailed meteorological figures to hand, 1958 (unlike its successor, the unusually hot, dry 1959) was no more than an average summer and thus most unlikely to have allowed the formation of parch marks in grass during mid-July. As regards Circles D & E, a subsurface explanation cannot be ruled out, although as with all crop-mark evidence, I would wish to see them recur in a separate year before being confident of the interpretation.
4. Amongst superficial damage options, I would see little justification for an interpretation of circles A - C as exposures of underlying chalky soil (a genuine example of which is provided by the animal-scarring around the gateway to the field containing circles B & C), nor does the present photographic evidence persuade me that fungus rings are the answer. A remaining alternative is that circles A - C represent areas of flattened vegetation whose greater reflective value causes them to appear pale by contrast with the surrounding standing crop.
5. Before speculating further in this direction, there remains the question of a possible photographic explanation for the marks. Unfortunately, the 1958 photographic sortie does not provide us with overlapping stereoscopic cover of circles B - D. We do, however, have overlapping coverage of the area of Witherington Down around SU 202248, and it is this, I believe, that holds the key to your enquiry.
6. Close inspection of the accompanying enlargements shows that your Circle A, though plainly marked on frame 177, is entirely invisible on the overlapping frame 116. In turn, the frame 116 enlargement shows at least two further circles that cannot be detected on frame 117. Examination of other overlapping parts of the two images reveals further examples of the absence/occurrence of circles, leaving me with no option than to infer that they are unique to their individual photographs and thus with no ground reality at all. Of the various available explanations, the most likely is that they are caused by the drying of water droplets on the surface of the negatives during the original processing of the film.
7. Whilst it cannot be proved, in the absence of full overlapping cover, that all of your observed circles are drying marks, it is my professional opinion that this is by far the most likely explanation and the one with which I would prefer to stick in the absence of any stronger evidence to the contrary.
In conclusion to what I hope is not too disappointing a letter, I would offer just one more comment: it is that in the course of twenty years' work in air photographic interpretation I have encountered literally thousands of hitherto undiscovered archaeological sites, but not a single previously un-reported crop-circle - a basically unsustainable ratio if the phenomenon is a natural one occurring more or less randomly through space and time.
Yours Sincerely,
Dr Rowan Whimster."
Dr Whimster has copied parts of frames 116 and 117 to me (with
250 % enlargement) and it is clear that circle A really is
missing from frame 116. For this reason we must accept Dr
Whimster's conclusion that circle A is merely a photographic
blemish and we offer our thanks to him for providing this
incontrovertible solution.
Of course this discovery leaves the remaining circles on frame
58/2513 open to very grave doubts. It is certainly true that
circles B and C closely resemble circle A - the water droplet
mark - so it is almost certain that these circles are also water
droplets on the original negative. Furthermore, circle E failed
to impress any of the aerial archaeologists who inspected frame
58/2513 and should also be discarded on the basis that it is also
dismissed as a photographic fault (which Rog Palmer and Chris Cox
suggest).
It is important to note that Roy Canham, Rog Palmer and Chris
Cox were all suspicious about circles A to C, despite the fact
that they did not have access to the overlapping print available
to Dr Rowan Whimster. This seems to suggest that aerial
archaeologists are very skilled at recognising photographic
faults on aerial prints.
Given this unfortunate outcome what value can we place on
circles D and E ? Rog Palmer and Chris Cox were fairly sure
circle D was a disk barrow, although they would have preferred to
see a stereoscopic view to check the image. Susan Smith was less
willing to venture an opinion about circle D whilst Roy Canham
was ambiguous. Despite the fact that circle D does not appear in
the Wiltshire County Council archaeological record it seems
highly risky to suggest that circle D qualifies as a historical
crop circle in the light of all the negative evidence raised by
these experts. As for circle E, this was summarily dismissed as
either a mark on the negative (Palmer and Cox) or a subconscious
attempt to form a circle out of ambiguous visual clues (Smith).
We should recall that all three aerial archaeologists agreed
that archaeological remains can appear on aerial photographs one
year but not in others. According to a recent letter I have
received from Dr Robin Allen of the Wessex Skeptics some crop
marks in Sussex showed up on an aerial photograph in the 1930s
but then disappeared from the aerial photographic record until
the early 1970s ! This implies that any ambiguous circular trace
found on an aerial photograph should not automatically be assumed
to be a crop circle.
In evaluating all this evidence readers should recall that The
Cerealogist has finally decided to investigate the historical
evidence with an excellent article featuring the early Pepperbox
Hill circles. In issue 12 page 12 George Wingfield states that :
"In the years 1965 to 1970 Suzanne, and other members of Herbert's group, first came across circles in the cropfields near Pepperbox Hill. These circles were uncommon with no more than one or two found in those years when they did appear. They were usually in wheat, and she remembers them as being clockwise and from 20 to 30 yards across though they could have been smaller."
According to Suzanne Padfield there was an article and
photograph of one of these circles in the Salisbury evening paper
in the late 1960s. As far as I know no one has attempted to track
down this crucially important article (however, see footnote
3).
Despite Wingfield's comments we should recall the fact that
back in 1987 Graham Sparkes expressed his opinion that all the
crop circles which had appeared on his land were man-made because
he had chased a group of people off his land and recovered an
incriminating length of rope. If this is true then it is possible
that Doug and Dave's predecessors kept up their campaign for 28
years !
1) The archive search produced a number of candidates
for historical crop circles which can be dismissed in terms of
photographic faults and archaeological traces. This disappointing
outcome strongly suggests that many of the ambiguous circular
markings I found in my archive search were also air bubbles or
processing faults of some kind, rather than images of real
circular features in surface vegetation on the ground.
2) The interpretation of aerial photographic images can
be very misleading if the assistance of a recognised expert in
the interpretation of aerial prints is not sought on every
occasion.
3) Bronze Age ring ditches and round barrows can appear
on aerial photographs one year but not in other years, thus
ensuring that an archaeological interpretation of unusual
circular images becomes difficult to rule-out.
4) Experienced aerial archaeologists claim not to have
seen photographic images of crop circles prior to the modern era.
It is interesting too that none of the aerial archaeologists I
contacted had ever heard of crow-produced circles - a subject The
Crop Watcher will return to in a later issue.
Of course, these conclusions are very disappointing, but they
produce a very peculiar paradox, for on the one hand it is
undeniable that photographs of phenomena which resemble crop
circles pre-dating the modern era exist and it is also undeniable
that several hundred accounts of circles and rings have been
published in the literature, including accounts which date back
to the turn of the century. It is true that some of these
historical cases were contemporary accounts but unfortunately
many were retrospectively reported. Numerous farmers and
witnesses claim a long-established belief in a
meteorologically-produced crop circle phenomenon based on eye
witness testimony. So, if there is no "genuine" crop
circle phenomenon and "all" crop circles are man-made,
what are these people reporting and why do these reports not show
up in the two aerial photographic archive searches which have
been conducted to date?
These facts suggest that further archive searching and
research is required before reaching a definite conclusion on the
matter.
1. Readers should be aware of the cost
of publishing this evidence. It cost £ 10 in petrol to drive to
Swindon. Another £ 15 to have the photo enlarged by the N.M.R.
Another £ 5 attempting to photograph the enlargement (my
attempts failed). A further £ 30 to have copies of three
enlargements made. Then there was postage costs. All told it has
cost me £ 60 to produce this evidence, hence the shortness of
this issue. I have been informed that to employ an aerial
archaeologist to conduct this archive search it would have cost
nearer £ 300 per day.
2. Rog Palmer has written (letter dated
25 January 1995) to point out that many of the vertical
photographs I inspected were taken between August and May, when
circles could not appear in mature arable crops. He states:
"Of the others the timing would have to occur in the two or three weeks between circle appearance and harvest, as they seem to only be made (now) in fairly advanced cereals. The case with oblique [photographs] is perhaps an even stronger case for their non appearance as most of the specialist low-level archaeological reconnaissance takes place at dates coincident with the circles season. We have been photographing examples of them for the last several years if only as a record of the 1980s countryside - but there are no examples from the dates you are interested in. Aerial photographers have been scouring the crops since the end of the last war. Their job is to observe, classify, and photograph, and the unexplained has been as interesting to many of them as the archaeology. Yet no circles ..."
3. On February 10th I visited Salisbury
Local Studies Library to search for the article describing the
Pepperbox Hill circles mentioned in issue 12 of The
Cerealogist. Unfortunately George Wingfield's article
mentions Suzanne Padfield's recollection of an article in the
Salisbury evening newspaper, whilst Salisbury Library only has
micro-film records of the weekly Salisbury & Winchester
Journal. I searched in vain through all the following issues :-
14 May 1965 to 9 September 1965, 2 May 1968 to 5 September 1968,
5 June 1969 to 4 September 1969. I will return later to chase the
remaining years. Curiously, there was also no mention of the
infamous Charlton Crater incident in 1963, although this event
featured in many national newspapers and occurred only 15 miles
from the Journal's base in Salisbury. Again, this is proof that
absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence.
4. I would like to express my sincere
thanks to Rog Palmer, Chris Cox, Susan Smith, Roy Canham and Dr
Rowan Whimster for their invaluable help and advice in writing
this article.
