Hayden recalls seeing a fox hunt through the grounds of Craig-y-nos in the early 1930’s and being “frightened to death”.
Well, in the early 1950’s we too witnessed an unusual event from Ward 2 balcony.
We weren't frightened. Just marvelled at this strange phenomena.
We were, after all, half prepared for it. Had we not for the past six months or so watched the night sky with growing fascination?
We had no name for what we saw. Yet these mysterious lights had become part of our lives.
I am surprised that so far nobody has mentioned them, perhaps for fear of being ridiculed, or having it dismissed as merely a product of overactive children's imaginations.
Except at least six, maybe even eight girls on the balcony witnessed the event one summer morning along with Miss White, our teacher.
But I jump forward. Lets begin at the beginning of this little story.
We first noticed these strange lights darting around the sky one evening.
It was in an area to the right of the Sleeping Giant mountain, an area which I now know has the quarry and railway station where Adelina Patti had a waiting room built for her convenience.
At first we thought these lights were aeroplanes, except they made no noise and would go backwards or sideways as well as forward.
They appeared at regular intervals, probably every few weeks. We grew accustomed to their presence in the night sky and would point them out to each other on the balcony. We certainly didn't mention it to the staff. They would have laughed at us in disbelief .
I doubt if it was even known within Ward 2 itself for that was a separate community.
Until one day something happened which changed all that. We were having a lesson, I believe it was hygiene, from Miss White, our teacher, and she was standing as usual in the middle of the French doors so that she could talk at the same time to both the girls inside Ward 2 and those of us on the balcony.
I think I was the first to notice this strange large metallic round object, like a giant silver globe hovering around the top of the Sleeping Giant mountain.
“They have come back in daylight!” we whispered excitedly to each other.
The object seem to hang as if suspended above the Sleeping Giant then it disappeared, only to reappear further up the valley towards Brecon.
“Its coming towards us!”
We couldn't contain our excitement and Miss White wanted to know what all the fuss was about.
She followed our gaze. Now it was her turn to be astonished.
We all watched as this silver globe, began travelling down the valley.
Miss White rushed off to get Dr Huppert.
As the object came nearer the castle it emitted a low humming sound. It had some kind of an engine. It did not move in a straight line but rather floated like some giant silver balloon.
We could see no windows in this strange object. As it came within several hundred yards of the castle it began moving away to the left and we lost sight of it.
By the time Dr Huppert arrived it had gone.
I can still see her now leaning over the balcony with a puzzled expression on her face. Neither she nor Miss White could offer an explanation.
We hoped this would be the start of more day time visits and the following week there was a surge of excitement again on the balcony as we heard the low hum of a machine in the distance.
It was not to be. Imagine our disappointment when it turned out to be an helicopter. Now the curious thing is that this was the first time we had ever seen one in the valley. And we never did again.
And the lights in the sky never did return with the same intensity after that daytime visit.
Many years later I learnt that the Brecon Beacons was a “hot spot” for UFOs in the early 1950s.
And when I did my research earlier this year in the Powys Archives I went through Miss White’s log book looking for a reference to this incident.
There was nothing. This is not surprising since her daily log merely noted that either the school was open or that Mrs Thomas was away ill - again!
I can only offer two possible explanations.
The first is that this was some kind of military experiment, after all the army were stationed in the area, except that there is no machine invented that will go vertical, sideways, backwards as well as forward...
The second alternative, far-fetched as it may seem, is that we had witnessed some kind of time travel.
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