Mississippi is a state located in the Deep South region of the United States of America and is bordered with the US states of Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee and Alabama and has a coast along the Gulf of Mexico. The state capital and largest city is Jackson.
The state has a fairly simple geography pretty much entirely made up of flat lowlands but also with some low hills, many of the hills can be found along the coastal plain. The state has long, hot and humid summers and short, mild winters. The state also can be vulnerable to hurricanes coming in from the Gulf of Mexico during late summer and fall and tornadoes are also another hazard.
The state often ranks badly among other states in things such as education, poverty, health and development. A number of factors has led to the state’s current situation such as its original strong reliance on cotton plantations worked by slaves which came to an end after the American Civil War, slow development, repeated natural disasters slowing progress and using up massive capital investment, and the fact that in 1890 when Democrats gained control of the state’s legislature they changed the state constitution which discouraged corporate industrial development in favour of rural agriculture, further slowing the state’s progress.
Currently the state has a growing gambling sector attracting tourism and the state also has some major automotive manufacturing plants.
But let’s now move on to the strange and the unexplained of the US state of Mississippi.
First of all, we shall start with an alien abduction that was widely publicized at the time it took place in Pascagoula. The event in question happened on October 11th 1973 to two men, Charles Hickson and Calvin Parker Jr. The two men had rushed to the sheriff’s department in Pascagoula after the incident concluded and frantically told police of their terrifying ordeal, puncture wounds in their arms were noted and the men also passed polygraph tests when questioned about the incident.
The incident in question took place after both men had got off work and decided to go fishing at an abandoned boat launch on the Pascagoula River. After the sun went down is when the incident would soon begin, at first Charles Hickson heard what he described as a zipping sound and then when he looked in the direction of the sound, he saw an unexplainable flashing blue light, Calvin had also turned around and then witnessed the object as well, they described it as an object that was at least 30ft in length and had a small dome on top of it.
But it gets stranger yet, while the object continued to hover in midair, the men described three small creatures emerging from it and that they were also hovering in the air as well. That’s when the men became paralyzed, unable to move or do anything as the creatures then came and started pulling them towards the craft, the creatures grabbed the men using pincer-type claws that they had instead of hands.
The men said that they floated into the craft as the creatures pulled them towards it. The men were then subject to some kind of physical examination by what they described as a being with a giant eye on board and were then dropped back off where they had been fishing. The men were left in a great state of distress and fear where they then went to report the incident to the Sheriff department.
The officers tried a number of tactics to try and catch the men out on what they at first thought were two drunk men playing a game, but no matter what they did the men continued to remain genuine, fearful and adamant, which eventually convinced the police officers that something did in-fact take place. The incident soon received much media attention and caused many people to flock to Pascagoula in an attempt to try and see anything otherworldly for themselves.
Hickson would go on to continually talk about what happened, including publishing a book on it, until his death in 2011 while Parker was more reluctant to talk about it, with him eventually skipping town and pledging to move again if anyone recognised him, he also lied originally to the media saying he had passed out during the incident and could not remember anything. In 2018 Parker said he was so scared after the incident that after they had reported it, Parker had gone home and bathed in a bleach bath as he was afraid the creatures may have infected him with something. Parker has also since published his own book (very recently, also in 2018) on the incident with him now opening up more about it.
So just what could have taken place? Did the two men really encounter aliens or some other paranormal creatures? Or was it some kind of hallucination or as some skeptic’s claim sleep paralysis or heightened suggestibility? Nobody truly knows outside of the two witnesses.
Outside of the above Mississippi actually doesn’t really seem to have too much that I can find, certainly nothing specifically localized at least, although I’m sure there is, it’s probably just very obscure. There is another interesting oddity about the Pascagoula River though, a legend connected to Native American folklore. The River is called The Singing River due to numerous visitors claiming they can hear a strange humming/singing noise that can emanate seemingly from the river itself, there are also believed by some to be mermaids living in the river as well.
A July 24th, 1892 New Orleans Times-Picayune article describes the noises as flute-like and that many tourists were often attracted to checking the area out to see if they could hear the strange noises themselves. Rubbing a crystal glass or goblet is said to produce a similar sound to what many claim they are hearing around the river.
A man called Charles E. Chiddsey attempted to solve the mystery and believed through his studying that the noise could be being made by fish, as he had described hearing noises from fish before that sounded almost musical, although this theory isn’t at all proven, but many have chosen to believe this is the reason.
Reports of strange singing/humming from the river have been reported from as far back as 1699 by French settlers. Even the Governor Perier of French Louisiana as the area was known at the time claimed to have heard the singing/humming himself in 1727 when he made a trip there along with some natives.
There is a Native American legend that a mermaid entranced some Pascagoula Indians by singing to them after rising from the Pascagoula River and led to them all drowning themselves in the river and that their spirits are the ones who do the singing/humming that can be heard around the river. Other legends say that the Indians actually drowned themselves as a way to free themselves from the rule of the Spanish or a rival tribe.
Whatever it is, it is still claimed to this day that some people can hear the singing/humming noise from the river if they are lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time, but that it isn’t common, which is where the luck comes in.
So just what could it be? Is it merely some kind of auditory illusion or perhaps the legends are true? Maybe it is just fish or perhaps mermaids? Or maybe there is some kind of realistic natural explanation that is yet to be discovered? This could be one we eventually find out about at some point, but also perhaps not. There are yet to be any recordings of the sounds from the river.
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Finally, I shall round this quite neat blogpost up with an old ghost story to do with Deer Island, off the coast of the resort city of Biloxi. The ghost story is centuries old and is said to be one of the oldest ghost stories in the Southern United States, coming from the early 1800s.
The story goes that two fishermen were spending the night on the island when out of nowhere they heard strange shaking and rattling of nearby palmetto bushes. At first the men were said to have assumed it to be nothing more than wild hogs ruffling about in the bushes, but as they continued to ignore it the sound persisted and also preceded to get louder.
They finally decided to investigate the sound and were shocked to discover the apparition of a headless skeleton that was standing among the bushes as if it were somehow alive, understandably scared the fisherman ran for their lives as the headless skeleton apparition then pursued them towards their boat. Luckily the tale says they managed to get away.
There is a legend that the headless skeleton ghost originated from pirates who buried treasure on the island and then the captain killed one of his own crew by decapitating him as a way of having the crewman’s spirit defend the horde of treasure from those who came to the island. Yes, it sounds like something straight out of Pirates of the Caribbean.
Another group of fishermen in the 1920s also described an account of encountering the spirit on the island when they were exploring it and that they made a hasty getaway from the thing.
In modern days the legend exists in the belief that strange unexplained lights and sounds claimed to be seen and heard on the island by people who have visited it are caused by the headless skeleton spirit.
So that is where I shall leave it for the state of Mississippi, I’m sure there are more legends, mysteries and paranormal stuff in the state that I have not come across, there is some talk of a bigfoot-type creature that may roam the state, just there isn’t much information on it, certainly there will be a number of haunted places like there is anywhere but as I said I am saving such things now for a future project.
Next up we shall be looking at the strange and the unexplained of the US state of Alabama.
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