Cette page en français
The article below was published in the daily newspaper Le Courrier Picard, Abbeville issue, France, page 4, on September 16, 1954.
See the case file.
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We had to - by the way - talk about it yesterday! While we regretted (almost) that our city and its district had not yet had the "good fortune" to record the appearance of a flying saucer, a young butcher boy came to declare to the Office of our newspaper, that an Abbeville female resident had seen - with her own eyes seen - a saucer in the sky of the Ponthieu, above the Marais Saint-Paul.
We almost didn't take it seriously!
- Go tell the eyewitness to come and see us and bring us the saucer, we replied!
But, thinking about it, we went to the address indicated: at Mme Vve Bonnard's, 79 1/2 years old, at the Marais Saint-Paul.
An investigation is an investigation! Here's what ours gave:
In a small house, in an alley just walkable and bounded by tall grass, we find Mrs widow Bonnard that her rare neighbors envy because... "she saw a flying saucer!" (The era of privileges is not abolished...)
The younger kids joke around a little; but she defends herself with an ardor which should convince, it seemsm the most pessimistic.
- What is it? she tells us. Do you know that there are people who say that I am mad... gosh! but these people are crazy!...
So, madam, did you see this flying saucer?
- As I see you... It was round, in the shape of a bowl... Lit everywhere, from bottom to top, from top to bottom...
- A parade saucer, we think, with improved lights, like the lanterns of a Martian July 14.
But hush. Let's listen....
- Yes sir, and the saucer was advancing slowly, slowly, silently. No engine, nothing. How beautiful it was, how beautiful it was.
- And where did it go, this saucer?
There, Sir... not far away... It was so beautiful that I can't say. It passed over the Marais Saint-Paul, at a height that I cannot locate well, between the Portelette and the Faubourg Rouvroy, in the direction of the sea... Yes, I even made this reflection, that it was heading towards the sea. I remember it very well. I was in bed, and I saw it pass majestically, with red and white luminous bulbs... I was alone at home, but there must have been others who saw it.
- No news in this direction, as far as we are concerned...
- That's odd! my kids had gone to town and they haven't seen it either. If they had been there, they would have called. But when they got back, I told them about it and told them that I did see a flying saucer before I died...
What is not - let's be serious - a matter of laughing!
Without playing Saint-Thomas, we are perplexed. But the saucer lady continues:
- It was beautiful, very beautiful! More beautiful than an airplane. It was like a basin flying in the air, all lit up with a vertical rod...
- A kind of chandelier then?
- If you want! But I can't believe there was someone inside, as they say. It is true after all, that on planes, when you don't know what it is, who could say that there is someone in it?
This is a point of absolute truth!
- You know, continues our interlocutor, these are not things to joke about. Ones does not make up a "canard" (sic). I have already seen planes during the last two wars, but I have never seen rhis...
- You don't think you've been hallucinated, as can happen to everyone?
The lady brandishes her cane and explodes (almost):
- I have never had a fad, sir! I can see clearly and I can hear well. It was like I tell you. And you who are journalists, you must know how a flying saucer is made!
So here, we admit humbly, but without shame, that we have never seen one... but patience!
- It's a thing, continues Ms., like I've never seen before. But it was beautiful, it was beautiful.
It must have been beautiful, because she only repeats this....
And you will only have to inform yourself, she tells us, as we leave her, where it came from ...
- Okay, madam... We're going to call the sky!
Unfortunately, the sky did not respond and, to make matters worse, the operator on duty did not want to put us in communication with the planet Mars, for the sentimental reason that we were born under the sign of Aquarius.
Thus, in Abbeville, the mystery of flying saucers remains unresolved!
