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Figure on Horseback

John Watson, his mother, and a navigator were driving in a car rally on the night of 28/29 January 1967. They had passed Belvoir Castle and were on a road just south of Denton when, as the car rounded a bend, John Watson suddenly saw a dark, figure on horseback about to cross his path; he jammed on his brakes to avoid a collision.

The figure was dressed in the traditional highwayman garb of tricorn hat and cloak. Neither the navigator nor Mr Watson's mother saw anything. In September 1968 Mr Watson organised another rally in the same area and a companion, Pete Shenton, came up and said that he too had seen the same figure and was able to point to the exact same point. Like Watson, Shenton had been in his car with a navigator and rear seat passenger but only he had seen the apparition. In both cases the figure had simply disappeared immediately the car had braked. In fact in both cars the other passengers were amazed that the car should suddenly have thrown its brakes on although in both cases the passengers were also impressed by the drivers' apparent sincerity. There have been reports of a similar highwayman figure from other people in the area although they are less well corroborated.

There has been some speculation as to why only the drivers should see the figure and not the passengers and it has been suggested that it is the degree of concentration on the road which creates a minor 'altered state of consciousness' in the driver whilst the other passengers remain marginally more relaxed. To explain away one such apparition as 'highway hypnosis' is in fact popular with sceptics whereas this case of two different reports of a very similar figure at the same location would seem to suggest more than that. Rather than the apparition being a product of highway hypnosis, perhaps highway hypnosis itself creates a state where a genuine external event can be perceived as a result of the altered state of consciousness.

Interestingly, the vast majority of lonely road at night UFO sightings also tend to occur just after the car has turned a bend, as was the case in these highwaymen reports. Why these types of events should be so frequently perceived 'from the corner of the eye' by so wide a variety of people throws up important questions about their objective reality. Were it possible to put it to the test, it would be interesting to discover the predispositions of these witnesses, and whether they are genuinely seeing a highwayman in some cases and a UFO in others, or whether all the witnesses are seeing 'something' which, though genuinely external to the percipient, is nonetheless interpreted differently according to the set of the percipient's own mind. France | Ghostly Headless Rider | Gloucestershire | Phantom Coach | Alaska | Belmont County | Broomhill Road mystery | Chicago | Chicago | Cranborne | East End | England | Ghost of a man | Ghostly Vehicles | Grim Spectral Figure | Kent | Knottingly | Lancashire | Lynwood | Lynwood House | Morristown | Perthshire | Sailor | Stamford | Taiwan | The Bride | Wales |