Grays and Tilbury Gazette for August 18th:
âHave you seen the angels?â is the latest topic which is arousing interest in Grays. Although stories are varied, and, as usual, conflicting, most circumstantial tales are going round regarding alleged angelic visitations seen from the beach on the evenings of Tuesday and Wednesday this week. It is not a case of the âAngels of Monsâ this time, for all the stories agree that those now seen are harbingers of Peace â¦
âAll Argent Street was out after them,â said one speaker. âThey appeared over the Exmouth, two of them sitting on two rainbows with âPeaceâ in between. Then they faded away, leaving only the rainbow.â This was on Tuesday evening, when a rainbow did actually appear ⦠Inquiries in Argent Street failed to elicit more definite confirmation, though it was clearly a similar version of the apparition that had been going the rounds. âIt was three angels, I was told,â said one speaker ⦠âThey had roses wreathed in their hair,â added another story-teller, who had evidently heard a more detailed version â¦
In another version, coming from a relative of one said to have witnessed the apparition ⦠the angels are generally seen about 9.30. According to her they are the âAngels of Monsâ, but the description given is rather different from that of those legendary beings. These visitations are three angels seated and chained together, a long chain linking them up â¦
Everyone agreed that they were âPeace Angelsâ and one prophesied that the âAngels of Monsâ were due to arrive next week. In fact, from all accounts the sea wall is likely to have an increase of traffic during the next few nights ⦠Numerous mothers agreed that they had heard tales of âangelsâ from their children, and generally expressed the opinion that probably the youngsters were getting a bit ânervyâ in the present times of stress, and hence the remarkable âvisions.â In all probability the tale had its origin somewhat in this way.
The following week this attractive story was given a new twist, the same paper reporting on the 25th:
A fresh version was given to a Gazette representative by a Globe Terrace resident. Speaking of the previous Tuesday evening, she said: âI donât know about any angels, but I saw a wonderful cloud. We were out with my landlady and the children, and we were looking at the rainbow. Then I saw a white cloud a little distance away. It was shaped just like a woman.â
She continued: âI donât know what it was, but it was just like a woman. It quite unnerved me. My husband is away in the army, and I thought it meant something over the water. I couldnât sleep for thinking of it. It was a wonderful thing. Iâve never seen a cloud like it before and donât want to again.â
The paper concluded that the so-called âRiverside Apparitionsâ were caused either by the Northern Lights, or else a rare conjunction of cloud and sunlight producing an effect known as rayons de crépuscule , or rays of twilight. It is also possible that impressionable children deliberately exaggerated an unusual (but wholly natural) meteorological phenomenon, much in the same spirit that Elsie Wright and Frances Griffith created the celebrated Cottingley fairy photographs, fabricated just a month earlier. Then again, aerial angels would also be reported by civilians during the Battle of Britain in 1940.
No less dubious was a report in the Daily News in February 1930, based on an American newspaper story. According to Colonel Friedrich Herzenwirth, said to be a former member of the German intelligence service:
The Angels of Mons were motion pictures thrown upon âscreensâ of foggy white cloudbanks in Flanders by cinematographic projecting machines mounted in German aeroplanes which hovered above the British lines
âHave you seen the angels?â is the latest topic which is arousing interest in Grays. Although stories are varied, and, as usual, conflicting, most circumstantial tales are going round regarding alleged angelic visitations seen from the beach on the evenings of Tuesday and Wednesday this week. It is not a case of the âAngels of Monsâ this time, for all the stories agree that those now seen are harbingers of Peace â¦
âAll Argent Street was out after them,â said one speaker. âThey appeared over the Exmouth, two of them sitting on two rainbows with âPeaceâ in between. Then they faded away, leaving only the rainbow.â This was on Tuesday evening, when a rainbow did actually appear ⦠Inquiries in Argent Street failed to elicit more definite confirmation, though it was clearly a similar version of the apparition that had been going the rounds. âIt was three angels, I was told,â said one speaker ⦠âThey had roses wreathed in their hair,â added another story-teller, who had evidently heard a more detailed version â¦
In another version, coming from a relative of one said to have witnessed the apparition ⦠the angels are generally seen about 9.30. According to her they are the âAngels of Monsâ, but the description given is rather different from that of those legendary beings. These visitations are three angels seated and chained together, a long chain linking them up â¦
Everyone agreed that they were âPeace Angelsâ and one prophesied that the âAngels of Monsâ were due to arrive next week. In fact, from all accounts the sea wall is likely to have an increase of traffic during the next few nights ⦠Numerous mothers agreed that they had heard tales of âangelsâ from their children, and generally expressed the opinion that probably the youngsters were getting a bit ânervyâ in the present times of stress, and hence the remarkable âvisions.â In all probability the tale had its origin somewhat in this way.
The following week this attractive story was given a new twist, the same paper reporting on the 25th:
A fresh version was given to a Gazette representative by a Globe Terrace resident. Speaking of the previous Tuesday evening, she said: âI donât know about any angels, but I saw a wonderful cloud. We were out with my landlady and the children, and we were looking at the rainbow. Then I saw a white cloud a little distance away. It was shaped just like a woman.â
She continued: âI donât know what it was, but it was just like a woman. It quite unnerved me. My husband is away in the army, and I thought it meant something over the water. I couldnât sleep for thinking of it. It was a wonderful thing. Iâve never seen a cloud like it before and donât want to again.â
The paper concluded that the so-called âRiverside Apparitionsâ were caused either by the Northern Lights, or else a rare conjunction of cloud and sunlight producing an effect known as rayons de crépuscule , or rays of twilight. It is also possible that impressionable children deliberately exaggerated an unusual (but wholly natural) meteorological phenomenon, much in the same spirit that Elsie Wright and Frances Griffith created the celebrated Cottingley fairy photographs, fabricated just a month earlier. Then again, aerial angels would also be reported by civilians during the Battle of Britain in 1940.
No less dubious was a report in the Daily News in February 1930, based on an American newspaper story. According to Colonel Friedrich Herzenwirth, said to be a former member of the German intelligence service:
The Angels of Mons were motion pictures thrown upon âscreensâ of foggy white cloudbanks in Flanders by cinematographic projecting machines mounted in German aeroplanes which hovered above the British lines
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