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Jersey Devil
The Jersey Devil, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, January 1909.
Creature
Name:	Jersey Devil
AKA:	Leeds Devil
Classification
Grouping:	Cryptid
Sub grouping:	Hominid
Data
First reported:	1800s
Country:	United States
Region:	Pine Barrens (New Jersey)
Habitat:	Forest
Status:	Folk Lore

The Jersey Devil, sometimes called the Leeds Devil, is a legendary creature or cryptid said to inhabit the Pine Barrens in southern New Jersey. The creature is often described as a flying biped with hooves, but there are many variations.

Contents 1 Legends 1.1 Blue Hole Home 2 Encounters 3 Descriptions 4 Origins 5 The Jersey Devil in popular culture 6 Trivia 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links

The most popular version of the Jersey Devil legend begins in the 18th century when Deborah Smith from England immigrated to the Pine Barrens in southern New Jersey to marry a Mr. Leeds, a rather vain man who wanted several heirs to continue the family name. Consequently, the new wife was continually pregnant. After bearing twelve healthy children, she was dismayed to be pregnant with her thirteenth. She cursed the unborn child, declaring a preference to bear the Devil's child rather than another Leeds. Apparently, her wish was granted as the new child had cloven hooves, claws, and a tail. The horrific newborn proceeded to eat the other Leeds children and the parents, before escaping through the chimney to begin its reign of terror. ^{[1] [2]} This version is contradicted by the fact that Mother Leeds has descendants that, as of 1998, still lived in Atlantic County New Jersey according to a New York Times article dated April 26, 1998 (Section 14NJ, Page 8). There are several variations of the Leeds tale, such as one claiming that when Mrs Leeds became pregnant with her thirteenth child, she remarked, "May it be a devil!"^[3] The belief that a deformed child was the work of Satan or a curse was still common during the 1800s.^[4]

An important piece of the Jersey Devil legend concerns its supposed home at the Blue Hole located near Winslow, New Jersey. According to popular folklore, the blue hole is not only bottomless but also acts as one of the many gateways to Hell. The water in the hole is abnormally cold, even during the summer months, averaging only 58 degrees Fahrenheit year-round.^[5] In addition, the hole is said to have a whirlpool effect on any person brave enough to enter its temptous depths. Unlike many of the surrounding rivers and lakes in the region, the blue hole possesses crystal clear water, which serves as another one of its many eccentric features. In the 1920s, geologists put forth various explanations for the hole. One theory suggested that the hole is a crater from a prehistoric meteorite while another theory proposed that the hole is a sprung or glacier carved spring, misidentified as a pingo in the magazine Weird N.J.^[6].

In 1778, Commodore Stephen Decatur, a naval hero, visited the Hanover Iron Works in the Barrens to test cannonballs at a firing range, where he allegedly witnessed a strange, pale white creature winging overhead. Using cannonfire, Decatur punctured the wing membrane of the creature, which continued flying apparently unfazed to the amazement of onlookers. Dating on this encounter is incorrect, as Decatur was not born until 1779. More likely, this incident occurred between 1816 and 1820, when Decatur was the Naval Commissioner responsible for testing equipment and materials used to build new warships.

In 1840, the devil was blamed for several livestock killings. 1841 saw similar attacks, accompanied by strange tracks and unearthly screams. The devil made an 1859 appearance in Haddonfield. Bridgeton witnessed a flurry of sightings during the winter of 1873. About 1887, the Jersey Devil was sighted near a house, and terrified one of the children, who called the Devil "it"; the Devil was also sighted in the woods soon after that, and just as in Stephen Decatur's encounter, the Devil was shot in the right wing, but still kept flying.

Joseph Bonaparte (eldest brother of Emperor Napoleon) is said to have witnessed the Jersey Devil while hunting on his Bordentown, New Jersey estate around 1820.

January 1909, however, saw the most frenetic period of Devil sightings ever recorded. Thousands of people claimed to witness the Jersey Devil during the week of January 16 – 23. Newspapers nationwide followed the story and published eyewitness reports. Hysteria gripped the entire state during this terrible week.

• 16th (Saturday) — The creature was sighted flying over Woodbury.
• 17th (Sunday) — In Bristol, Pennsylvania, several people saw the creature and tracks were found in the snow the following day.
• 18th (Monday) — Burlington was covered in strange tracks that seemed to defy logic; some were found on rooftops, while others started and stopped abruptly with no apparent origin or destination. Similar footprints were found in several other towns.
• 19th (Tuesday) — Nelson Evans and his wife, of Gloucester, allegedly saw the creature outside their window at 2:30 AM .
  • Mr Evans gave a descriptive account as follows: "It was about eight feet and a half high, with a head like a collie dog and a face like a horse. It had a long neck, wings about two feet long, and its back legs were like those of a crane, and it had horse's hooves. It walked on its back legs and held up two short front legs with paws on them. It didn't use the front legs at all while we were watching. My wife and I were scared, I tell you, but I managed to open the window and say, 'Shoo!' and it turned around, barked at me, and flew away."
  • Two Gloucester hunters tracked the creature's perplexing trail for twenty miles. The trail appeared to "jump" fences and squeeze under eight-inch gaps. Similar trails were reported in several other towns.
• 20th (Wednesday) — In Haddonfield and Collingswood, posses were formed to find the devil. They supposedly watched the creature fly toward Moorestown, where it was later seen by at least two more people.
• 21st (Thursday) — The creature attacked a trolley car in Haddon Heights, but was chased off. Trolley cars in several other towns began to maintain armed guards, and several poultry farmers found their chickens dead. The devil was reported to collide with an electric rail in Clayton, but was not killed. A telegraph worker near Atlantic City claimed to have shot the devil, only to watch it limp into the woods. The creature apparently was not fazed as it continued the rampage through Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and West Collingswood, New Jersey (where it was supposedly hosed by the local fire department). The devil seemed poised to attack nearby people, who defensively threw any available objects at it. The creature suddenly flew away -- and reemerged in Camden to injure a dog, ripping a chunk of flesh from its cheek before the dog's owner drove it away. This was the first reported devil attack on a living creature.
• 22nd (Friday) — Last day of sightings. Many towns were panic stricken, with many businesses and schools closed in fear. Fortunately, the creature was seen only a few times that day and did not attack.

In addition to these encounters, the creature was seen flying over several other towns. Since the week of terror in 1909, sightings have been much less frequent, but did not end by any means. In 1951 there was another panic in Gibbstown, New Jersey, after local boys claimed to have seen a screaming humanoid monster. As recently as 1991, a pizza delivery driver in Edison, New Jersey described a night encounter with a white, horselike creature. (EDIT: This was possibly the White Stag, a creature also claimed to inhabit New Jersey.) In Freehold, New Jersey, in 2007, a woman supposedly saw a huge creature with batlike wings near her home. In August of the same year, a young man driving home near the border of Mount Laurel and Moorestown, New Jersey reported a similar sighting, claiming that he spotted a "gargoyle-like creature with partially spread bat wings" of an enormous wingspan perched in some trees near the road. There are currently several websites and magazines (such as Weird NJ) which catalog sightings of the Devil.

Many different descriptions have been offered by alleged witnesses of the creature, which are as follows:

• "I looked out upon the Delaware and saw flying diagonally across what appeared to be a large crane, but which was emitting a glow like a firefly. Its head resembled that of a ram, with curled horns, and its long thick neck was thrust forward in flight. It had long thin wings and short legs, the front legs shorter than the hind." — E.W. Minster, Bristol, PA. Sighted on January 16, 1909.^{[citation needed]}
• "It was three feet high... long black hair over its entire body, arms and hands like a monkey, face like a dog, split hooves [...] and a tail a foot long". — George Snyder, Moorestown, NJ. Sighted on January 20, 1909.^[7]
• "In general appearance it resembled a giraffe... It has a long neck and from what glimpse I got of its head its features are hideous. It has wings of a fairly good size and of course in the darkness looked black. Its legs are long and somewhat slender and were held in just such a position as a swan's when it is flying...It looked to be about four feet high". — Lewis Boeger, Haddon Heights, NJ. Sighted on January 21, 1909.^[7]
• "As nearly as I can describe the terror, it had the head of a horse, the wings of a bat and a tail like a rat's, only longer". — Howard Campbell, who claimed to have shot the devil near Atlantic City (see above). Sighted on January 21, 1909.^{[citation needed]}
• "It was 8 feet high, with glowing red eyes and a long spiked tongue. I reckoned that I was brown bread when it took flight and zipped towards me as quick as a pecker". — Jersey Devil victim Kevin Fanning on February 28th 1909.

While the descriptions vary, several aspects remain fairly constant, such as the devil's long neck, wings and hooves. The creature is often said to have a horselike head and tail. Its reputed height varies from about three feet to more than seven feet. Many sightings report the creature to have glowing red eyes that can paralyze a man, and that it utters a high, humanlike scream.

There are many possible origins of the Jersey Devil legend, though it has no basis in Native American folklore, and is thought to be a creative manifestation of the English settlers. The aptly named Pine Barrens were shunned by most early settlers as a desolate, threatening place. Being relatively isolated, the barrens were a natural refuge for those wanting to remain hidden, including religious dissenters, loyalists, fugitives and military deserters in colonial times. Such individuals formed solitary groups and were pejoratively called "pineys", some of whom became notorious bandits known as "pine robbers". Pineys were further demonized after two early twentieth century eugenics studies depicted them as congenital idiots and criminals. It is easy to imagine early tales of terrible monsters arising from a combination of sightings of genuine animals such as bears, the activities of pineys, and fear of the barrens.

Outdoorsman and author Tom Brown Jr spent several seasons living in the wilderness of the Pine Barrens. He recounts occasions when terrified hikers mistook him for the Jersey Devil, after he covered his whole body with mud to repel mosquitoes.

Not surprisingly, the Jersey Devil legend is fueled by the various testimonials of those who believed to have encountered the creature, from precolonial times to the present day, as there are still reported sightings within the New Jersey area.

• In the Extreme Ghostbusters episode "The Jersey Devil", the Ghostbusters encounter the Jersey Devil while driving through New Jersey. The creature is described as a "Class 3 Bioferric Spectre, a demonic life force inhabiting iron ore and other minerals." The devil was supposedly created when a demon possessed smelting ore in a forge in Hanover, New Jersey. The Ghostbusters destroy the devil using an old cannon to blast it back into the forge before smelting it down.

• There is a Jersey Devil Monster in My Pocket action figure (#115), as well as one in the Cryptozoology Action Figures line.

• The fifth episode of The X-Files centers on murders committed by the "Jersey Devil", which turns out to be feral humans.

• In the 1998 PlayStation game, Jersey Devil, the creature is a Batman-like cartoon superhero discovered by a mad scientist's assistant during a night walk to find new creatures on which to experiment. The baby devil escapes dissection (thanks to his physical appearance) and disappears into the night, only to return years later to fight the mad scientist's mutant vegetable army.

• The 1998 movie The Last Broadcast centers on the brutal and mysterious murders of a public-access television crew that traveled into the Pine Barrens in search of the Jersey Devil.

• Dante Tomaselli's 2005 film Satan's Playground depicts a family who runs afoul of a murderous backwoods family that may be responsible for the birth of the Jersey Devil.

• A minor B-grade horror film, 13th Child: Legend of the Jersey Devil, was filmed on location in the Pine Barrens.

• In the DeLorme New Jersey Atlas & Gazetter, on page 56, near to a marker for the Pine Barrens, there is a very small image which, when viewed closely, appears to be a winged devil.

• The NHL team, the New Jersey Devils, is named after the beast, as was an earlier, unrelated team, the Jersey Devils of the Eastern Hockey League.

• An episode of Cartoon Network's The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest centered around the Jersey Devil. The "creature" turns out to be the descendants of Colonial and British Revolutionary War soldiers inhabiting the barrens and fighting over the original Declaration of Independence which either validates the war or makes it inconsequential as the colonies would never have informed Parliament of their intentions. The original Declaration of Independence is later recovered by perhaps the real Jersey Devil.

• There is a hip-hop producer named Nu Jerzey Devil.

• The second story arc of the Marvel comic book Marvel Knights 4 featured the Fantastic Four encountering the legends during a camping trip in the Pine Barrens, revealing the devil to be extraterrestrial.

• South Jersey Rebellion Productions published a comic book titled Jersey Devil, created by Tony DiGerolamo in the early 1990s featuring the creature as a Crow-like anti-hero.

• The devil is a prisoner of the Golden Boughs Retirement Community in the Vertigo comic book series Jack of Fables.

• The short story "The Barrens" by F. Paul Wilson deals with two people who go into the Pine Barrens to look for the Jersey Devil. However, it turns out that the leader is not in fact looking for the devil at all, but for something far more sinister.

• Two horror novels by Robert Dunbar, The Pines and The Shore, concern the legend of the Jersey Devil.

• H. P. Lovecraft's novel The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath features a species of creatures called Shantaks, which are similar in form to the Jersey Devil.

• The creature is mentioned in episode 12 of the MTV Animated series 'Downtown'.

• The ABC Family television show Real Scary Stories featured a fictional segment about the Jersey Devil. In the story, a team had been sent to find the creature, but only one member claims to have witnessed something, and is so apparently traumatized that she refuses to discuss the matter. The creature was also featured on the ABC Family documentary show Scariest Places on Earth, which featured the New Jersey Devil Hunters searching for the beast in the Pine Barrens.

• The third song on Coheed and Cambria's album The Second Stage Turbine Blade is entitled Devil In Jersey City, however, the song has nothing to do with the legend except the title.

• In 2007, a film crew from Virginia launched an expedition into the pine forests of Jersey and captured controversial film of what they claim was indeed the Jersey Devil. While the film still must undergo scientific analysis, it has been confirmed the film is authentic. Camera man Owen Howell from Fredericksburg, Virginia has been credited with shooting the controversial footage.

• The Jersey Devil is highlighted in the section titled "Four cryptozoological monsters" in John Hodgman's The Areas of My Expertise.

• The Jersey Devil was most recently featured in the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie as one of 13 monsters unleashed upon humanity thousands of years ago and fights Raphael in a diner. Here he is portrayed as a small impish red devil.

• The Jersey Devil appears as an evil ghost in the Nicktoon Danny Phantom when the title character's family gets lost in the Pine Barrens

• The 177th Fighter Wing, part of the New Jersey Air National Guard, is known as the Jersey Devils. They fly F-16s out of Atlantic City International Airport.

• The book Phantom of the Pines by James F. McCloy and Ray Miller Jr. depicts the happenings of the Jersey Devil.

• Lilli Lopez' poem entitled Hey, Mother Leeds--The Midwife's Lament, is found in the collection of poems, Story Poems of the Coastal Pinelands. It is a unique look at the Jersey Devil story from the midwife of Mother Leeds' point of view.

• Darren DeBari' short video trilogy titled The Legend of the Jersey Devil Part 1,2, and 3can be found on youtube. Part 1, 2, and 3 deal with various aspects of the legend throwing in some scares, famous pictures, and a fictitious plot about a missing filmmaker.

• In the Kids Cartoon American Dragon: Jake Long , Jake battled the Jersey devil on a campout in Jersey.

• A professional wrestler from Manchester, New Hampshire competes in WAW as The Jersey Devil. He is former World Champion, 2-time U.S. Champion, and 3-time Team Champion. He was inducted into the WAW Hall of Fame in 2006.

• During the heyday of Jersey Devil sightings in 1909, the Philadelphia Zoo posted a $10,000 reward for the creature's capture. The offer prompted a variety of hoaxes, including a kangaroo with artificial wings. The reward remains available to this day.
• A bizarre rotting corpse vaguely matching the Jersey Devil description was discovered in 1957, leaving some to believe the creature was dead. However, there have been many sightings since that time. ^[8]
• Some people think the Sandhill Crane (who has a 7 feet wingspan) is the basis of the Jersey Devil stories.

• Loveland Lizard
• Chupacabra
• Werewolf
• Bigfoot
• Mothman
• Dover Demon
• Canvey Island Monster

• The Jersey Devil, by James F. McCloy and Ray Miller, Jr., Middle Atlantic Press. ISBN 0-912608-11-0
• Tales of the Jersey Devil, by Geoffrey Girard., Middle Atlantic Press. ISBN 0-9754419-2-2
• A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America, by Donald Culross Peattie, pp. 20 – 23.
• The Tracker, by Tom Brown, Jr.

• Weird NJ's History and Eyewitness Accounts of the Jersey Devil
• Land of the Devil — The World's Largest Jersey Devil website
• Channel 6 Action News special on the Jersey Devil
• The Jersey Devil Fact Sheet — A compilation of Information on the Jersey Devil. Created by Bruce A Fox
• The Legend of the Jersey Devil — New Jersey Pinelands Commission
• "What is the Jersey Devil" - a good summary as well as fun activities for all ages to explore the Jersey Devil myth in New Jersey, from the New Jersey Digital Highway, the cultural heritage portal for New Jersey's libraries, museums and archives.
• "The Jersey Devil" — Elk Township (Local Area Mythology)
• The Jersey Devil of the Pine Barrens
• Weird New Jersey
• NJ Devil Hunters — A group that organizes hunts for the creature. Home to a large catalog of sightings from the 18th century to the present.
• South Jersey Tourism Corporation
• Jersey Devil video game
• Jersey Devil Productions Filmmaker Louis Bottino's production company that creates South Jersey inspired horror films, including 2005's Lake's Edge
• New York Times article, Oct. 29, 2007