The article below was published in the daily newspaper Le Courrier de Saône-et-Loire, France, page 8, on September 24, 1954.
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PARIS. -- The file on flying saucers and flying cigars has grown significantly in recent days. After the mysterious craft observed in the sky over Rome, where its presence led to an official investigation, witnesses - often credible ones - have now provided consistent reports of similar phenomena they claim to have observed over various regions of France.
CHATEAUROUX. -- While returning from patrol during the night of Tuesday to Wednesday, two gendarmes from Châteauroux, Messrs. Courtaud and Peninon, reported to their superior that they had seen, between 9:15 PM and 9:45 PM, over La Fleuranderie, in the commune of Montierchaume (Indre), a luminous craft hovering in the sky at an altitude of approximately 1,500 meters, followed by two others of a greenish hue at a higher altitude. The three mysterious objects, after turning at a right angle, reportedly headed in a northwest-southeast direction.
LA ROCHELLE. -- About thirty people from the Sigournais region claim to have seen a mysterious craft in the sky for half an hour yesterday, late in the afternoon. They believe it to be a flying cigar, surrounded by bluish-violet vapors.
LODEVE. -- The mysterious flying cigar reported in Puy-de-Dôme and in the sky over Rome was also seen on Saturday, September 18, at exactly 7:00 p.m. by three credible residents of Lodève, in the northern part of the Hérault department. The object was flying at an altitude of about 1,500 meters and was heading south.
The witnesses observed for nearly five minutes a streamlined front section towing a brilliantly lit, fire-red globe, moving silently at approximately the speed of a conventional airplane.
Mr. de Léotard, a deputy from the Seine, in a written question, "asks the Secretary of State for the Armed Forces (Air) whether the recent testimonies concerning 'flying saucers' and 'flying cigars' have not only intrigued public opinion but also raised concerns. He inquires:
1° Whether instructions have already been given for these phenomena to be systematically and scientifically observed;
2° Whether these 'saucers' or 'cigars' could be pursued for closer observation so that the public may know exactly whether they are a matter of collective autosuggestion to be dispelled, or if these phenomena should be considered from the standpoint of security and national defense.
Several residents of the Moselle claim to have witnessed the movements of a mysterious craft—a flying saucer or cigar—but only after three days of silence did they decide to make their observations public.
It was Mr. Louis Moll, a rural guard in Oberdorf, who informed the gendarmes about what he saw.
- "I did not want to speak earlier," stated the rural guard, "for fear of being taken for a visionary by my fellow citizens. But what I saw seemed so extraordinary that I could not keep silent any longer."
"It was Sunday evening," he said. "I was returning home around 9:15 PM when my attention was caught by a strange glow coming from the east and approaching the ground a few hundred meters from the road, near Tromborn. The craft hovered at a very low altitude for about forty seconds before ascending vertically and disappearing towards the southeast."
CHATEAUROUX. -- Gendarmes Courtaud and Peninon, who were on patrol during the night of September 21 to 22, claim to have seen between 9:15 PM and 9:45 PM, over La Fleuranderie, in the commune of Montierchaume (Indre), a luminous craft hovering in the sky at an altitude of about 1,500 meters, followed by two other objects of a brighter greenish color.
