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Mystery

Mysterious Maine – Water Monsters and a Spectral Moose

Maine is the northernmost US state found in the United States Northeastern Region and is a part of the New England region, the state is bordered with the nation of Canada and the US state of New Hampshire and has a coast along the Atlantic Ocean. The state capital is Augusta and the largest city is Portland.

The state’s environment includes a jagged and rocky coastline, low rolling hills and the interior of the state is heavily forested, it is in-fact the most forest-covered of any of the US states and there are many beautiful waterways that cross the state as well.

Maine’s economy includes the agricultural and commercial fishing sectors with the state particularly being known for its seafood, lobstering and ground-fishing are the most common commercial fishing that takes place. The state is or was the largest low-bush blueberry producer and also the largest blueberry producer overall. The state’s industrial outputs include paper, wood and lumber products as well as electronic equipment, leather products, food, textiles, as well as bio-technology. Naval shipbuilding and construction are also a large sector in the state. Naturally, tourism and outdoor recreation are also growing sectors.

Is there an unknown sea creature in Casco Bay? Photo in Public Domain.

And now let’s move on to the strange and unexplained of Maine!

Perhaps one of the most well-known cryptids in the state is the water serpent Cassie. The state appears to have several water serpents/monsters, but Cassie seems to be the most popular of them. The large creature is said to have been sighted across the Maine coast at least as far back as the 1700s if stories can be believed although the last known sighting took place about two decades ago.

The sea serpent is said to most commonly have been around the Casco Bay area which is an inlet of the Gulf of Maine and the city of Portland sits on the southern edge of the bay and there is also the Port of Portland, the largest port in the state there as well.

One of the earliest known sightings of the creature come from 1779 and was reported by Edward Preble in the Casco Bay, Preble was to become a famous American naval officer. He was aboard a ship called the Protector at the time he made the sighting and he reported that the unknown creature was moving along the surface of the water, it is said he rowed out towards the creature and shot out it leading to it quickly vanishing away.

There was a flurry of sightings, particularly around the Casco Bay area, during the 1800s and early 1900s.

A 1958 sighting was recounted to a veteran cryptozoologist called Loren Coleman in 1986, Coleman has been investigating the creature of which he named Cassie after Casco Bay for decades, a man called Ole Mikkelson said he and a First Mate (Hairgaard) were fishing off the coast of Cape Elizabeth when they witnessed a large serpent that was coloured like a Flounder fish moving towards them and that the creature would react by moving its head to the sound of the fog horn blaring, they also said it had a forked tail, Hairgaard became quite unsettled by the creature and suggested cutting the fish nets and getting out of there, after some time the creature swam around the boat and took off.

Overall, the serpent is described anywhere from 60-150 feet long and is able to swim at fast speeds and disappear from sight very quickly and it is said to be as thick as a barrel but many different colours have been sighted of the creature from dark green to mottled brown as well as black.

Was a curse placed on the Saco River? Photo in Public Domain.

On to one of the other water monsters of the state is something quite odd and also scary. It is known as the Saco River Monster or also just called the White Monkey due to its horrifying bipedal appearance, looking like some kind of reptilian-human cross. The legend of the monster dates back to the 1500s and is said to come from a curse put on the lake by a Native American shaman.

The Saco River runs through southwestern Maine and drains into Saco Bay.

The legend goes that the Indians in the area worshipped a creature in the Saco River and that one day in 1675 a group of drunken white sailors came and kidnapped the pregnant wife and child of the shaman and threw the child off the Saco falls to test out an Indian belief that an Indian baby can dog paddle at birth, but the child sunk causing the mother to jump in after him but the child was unable to be rescued, some versions also say the pregnant wife died as well, in revenge the shaman called Squandro put a curse on the waters of the river and asked the creature to kill three white men each year as revenge.

Up to that point Squandro, who was sachem of the Sokakis Tribe was seen as a pillar of peace between the whites and natives, but the incident lead to war between the two sides and Squandro’s hatred of whites thereafter and it is said Squandro also influenced a group of natives called the Androscoggins to attack white Saco settlers and dealing the first blow in the King Phillip’s War.

Since then there have been a number of reported sightings of such a terrifying creature over the years in and around the Saco River. The creature is said to look like a pale white human but with webbed hands. The creature was apparently last seen in 1970. The founder of the Mormon Church, Joseph Smith, claimed to see the creature himself at the age of 12 in 1820.

The curse of the river was well known to residents in its area, especially in times pre-dating the 1940s where there was much superstition of swimming in the river and it is said that many would often wait until at least three people had drowned in the river each year before going into the river themselves. In 1947 the Maine Sunday Telegram paper was said to have reported that the curse was broken after there was a year of no drownings, although I am unable to confirm if this was true, on the website of the newspaper most archived content only goes back to 2010, with much before that lost and on other websites said to host its older content no longer seem to do that.

Nonetheless it is an interesting, scary and sad story.

Image by JamesDeMers from Pixabay

Next up is yet another water monster, this was known as the Pocomoonshine lake monster but what is unique about this one is that it is said to be able to leave the lake and traverse over land to other nearby lakes.  

The Pocomoonshine Lake itself is a small four-square mile lake and not very well known outside of its local area, found in Washington County between the towns of Princeton and Alexander. The monster seen in and around the lake and in other nearby lakes is described as at least 4-feet in width and a huge 30-60 feet in length. The lake monster, similar to the Saco River Monster, is said to have spawned from Native American legend related to a conflict. The conflict took place between an Algonquin Shaman called John Neptune and a chief of the Micmac, at some point they agreed to settle the dispute in the waters of the lake, the Micmac chief turned into a water serpent while Neptune became a horned-snail and defeated the serpent and then tied the serpent’s body up on a tree outside the lake.  

There are said to have been a number of sightings in the lake during times of old and also claims of tracks of the monster from where it has left the lake at times. The monster is described like a snake.  

Image by Anja🤗#helpinghands #solidarity#stays healthy🙏 from Pixabay

Now let’s move away from water beasts to round this one off, there is something said to be lurking in Maine known as the Specter Moose. This Moose is said to be massive compared to other Moose, one of the largest known or ever seen and its colouring is described as either a bright white or light grey and it is said to be 10-15 feet tall with a massive set of antlers as much as 10-12 feet in length and those who have seen it have estimated its weight to be as much as 2,500 lbs, some also describe the moose as having a light glow as well. The Moose is also said to be able to vanish at will and walk through solid objects, many hunters who have come across it have claimed they were never able to get close enough to take a shot as it somehow managed to keep distance.

As can be seen from the common description, it is a monster moose but the most unsettling thing about it is that it appears to be invincible with some hunters who have claimed come across it saying that their shots, in the rare number of hunters that were able to get close enough, did nothing against it and only angered the creature, often causing it to chase after the hunters until they hid away from it and it gave up the chase.

The specter moose was first said to be seen in 1891 by a Hunting Guide from Oldtown called Clarence Duffy around Lobster Lake. The Hunting Guide was not close enough to take a shot though, but he told of his story to others in the local area, another called John Ross, a lumberman from Bangor claimed to later see the moose as well, near to the same lake, still in 1891 and after this a further sighting the same year was claimed by a hunter from New York near to Sourdnahunlt Lake, this time several shots were fired at the moose by the hunter but had no apparent effect, the man then escaped the rage of the moose by hiding in a bear cave for about an hour.

Several more sightings happened throughout the rest of the 1890s by hunters and sportsman, numerous who again shot at the creature, only angering it and doing no damage. The legend of the Specter Moose didn’t reach national attention until an article was published by the New York Times on it in 1899.

Numerous more sightings continued into the early 1900s before there was a brief pause but then restarted again for a time in the 1930s. One unsettling story is about a group of hunters near the Molunkus Stream who claimed to kill a large white moose, its throat was then slit and the moose strung up on a tree, the next morning they awoke to find it gone but then the following night the moose returned, seemingly alive despite it still having a slit neck, the hunters shot at it with no effect and the moose then walked away.


And that will do for Maine! Next up will be the strange and the unexplained of the US state of New Hampshire.

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