The Jersey Devil and the Fisherman

In May 1909, a man named Captain Doughty supposedly had an altercation with our favorite large flying monster, over an impressive load of fish that the fisherman had just caught early that morning. Other boaters in the area corroborated the story of the attack; A large flying creature, a mix between a large pelican and a pony, began aggressively attacking the fisherman with its talons and beak.

According to Captain Doughty, he struck the animal with a lucky shot with his ore, knocking the creature down into the boat. Witnesses describe the creature as 150 pounds and about 5 feet long. The fisherman claimed to have kept the creature in his house, but local skeptics thought it was probably a rare bird, and no further proof of it being the Jersey Devil was given.

The main complaint from skeptics was that the monster was described differently by the captain than previous witnesses. We maintain that the Jersey Devil is capable of changing forms. Even after falling onto the boat and being tied-up by the fisherman, the fact that no physical evidence of the creature was presented afterwards, while multiple witnesses saw the altercation, means that it is possible the creature escaped Captain Doughty before he got it home.

If the Jersey Devil’s influence is really Satan himself, the fact that the creature is 300 years old and still kicking, should be of no surprise.