The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill | Morbid | Podcast | Forensic Files

hey weirdos I'm Ash I'm Elena and this is [Music] morbid she just burped Elena just did all big recording
old burp we should put it in we should keep it in that would be horrifying for people to hear first as soon as they
turn on their thing I would love it if I turned on my radio when I heard a burp my Roo my
Roo we are all kinds of [ __ ] goofy today we're feeling Wily today what's your case my case has to do with the
UFO fantastic I was like we're feeling goofy what's your case yeah that's the right energy to take into this I think
um I'm going to talk about the Betty and Barney Hill um abduction story what um Betty and Barney Hill I would like to
start this off by saying they are uh such a precious couple and I love them both I love them both so much you will
also love them by the end of this they they just seem delightful I love them right now and you know you take what you
will from this but I think it happened I think UFOs are real in fact I wanted to
shout out a new show that well it's actually not new but it's new to me um that I've been watching on Showtime I
was telling you about it the other day oh yeah it's JJ Abrams UFO show and it is so good it's either three or four
parts I watched the first two and it is like chilling it's a it's an interesting
subject everyone I know sometimes it gets the the old the old look over people are like UFOs I'm not really
interested and it's like I don't know maybe it should be you sure about that you sure about that that's kind of like
what the show goes over like how it's been like like oh like so TD when you really look into it but and when you
look into we'll cover some more of these because they're very fascinating I love
them when you get like a mass sighting where it's like 200 people see one or like the one in the birk shears in
Massachusetts where over 200 people saw it something's ay there like you know we
can't we can't discount it I love it so let's get into this because it's a quite
a tail get into it yeah so we're going to start with talking about who Betty and Barney Hill are so you can get an
idea of them how they came together all that fun stuff oh they're the cutest couple in the nation they're real cute
so Unice Elizabeth Betty Barrett was born June 28th 1919 in Newton New Hampshire a Cana yeah and grew up on a
farm in Kingston New Hampshire which is a small town near the Massachusetts border Massachusetts what what um you
know farming was definitely a difficult and somewhat unprofitable life at the time but the bear were a super
close-knit very cute very supportive family seemed like everything was you know pretty top-notch on there that end
but you know she was a very curious very creative very highly intelligent child and she spent a lot of her early life
just dreaming about Escaping The Farm life and going onto other opportunities according to her college
friend Maryann Franklin who we'll mention later too uh Betty's first attempt at becoming independent and
breaking out on her own was when she tried to join a traveling circus as an acrobat in training that's incredible
but her parents wouldn't let her go lame they wouldn't let her join the circus why not so after graduating from high
school in 1937 she enrolled at the University of New Hampshire UNH I've been there many times um she met and
befriended her her college friend that we just mentioned Marian Franklin there Marian Franklin was the only black
student on that campus oh at the time God imagine being in that position no I cannot on any level in any Galaxy and
what time period was this um this was in 1937 oh God uh so it was through maryan
Franklin that Betty learned this is like really the first she learned about the extent of the inequality and
marginalization experienced by black Americans around the country but particularly in the South um and this is
when Betty began really taking part in advocating for Liberal causes hell yeah um later Franklin said she was very
active she may have had a problem as a result of that because so many people at the time were not accepting of racial
Racial equality so she stepped out because she met Mary and Franklin became her friend and was like [ __ ] this I'm
going to stand up for you hell yeah I love [ __ ] yeah Betty Betty forever Betty
forever now in the summer following her sophomore year she um contracted a difficult and very longlasting abdominal
infection and it actually stopped her from going back to UNH for her junior year she was
like really sick um so instead while she was kind of healing up and you know while she was feeling better but not
able to return to school she took a job waiting tables at Rudy's Farm Kitchen in
Hampton New Hampshire Rudy Hampton is like a Seaside Town not far away from where she grew up I know Hampton and uh
working there is when she met Bob Stewart who was the cook at Rudy uh she was immediately drawn to Bob this is not
Bernie by the way I was like I don't care about Bob she was immediately drawn to Bob she said like he had a very warm
personality he was very Charming got now what she said about Bob was Bob Stewart
seemed like the best thing on the horizon so I grabbed him oh that's cute no so they dated for a little bit and
got married in June 1941 and according to Betty um Bob had an ex-wife at the time and it was then that his ex-wife
heard about him getting remarried was not pleased about it so Betty said she picked up the three kids and dumped them
at Bob's mother's house oh and at this time Bob's mother was not able to care for three young children that were her
grandchildren that's a lot so Bob and Betty took sole custody of the children and three years after this Betty
officially adopted them oh wow yeah became a full-time mother full-time Homemaker um and Bob ended up getting a
much better paying job at the Portsmith Naval Naval Shipyard the shipyard at the
time was super super active because World War II was coming to a close lots of stuff going on literally everything
going on in the story already yeah and at this point you look like okay this seems positive you know like they they
took the kids Betty stepped up and was like you know you're mine now I'm going to take care of you but then you know
once he gets the job at the shipyard all of a sudden she found out that Bob had been cheating on her with multiple women
oh [ __ ] bob see I knew he was no Berry yeah and she said at first I thought he
was a pretty good guy and it took me years to find out different oh that's really sad so after 14 years of marriage
and raising his three children they ended up divorcing in 1955 kidding me she raised his kids and he was cheating
on her all the while yeah what a douche luckily she did get some money from the divorce settlement good and so she
bought her own house in Portsmith New Hampshire and found a job at a local department store she was like I'm I'm
going to start start over so not long after she moved into the house she suddenly was approached by a
representative from the Gulf oil company and they wanted to buy the house on behalf of the company what she's like I
literally just bought this well and then she was like I just bought it this is like my first independent fora into the
world like I'm feeling a little like weird territorial about this but she was like you know what I'm going to be a
boss [ __ ] and I'm going to negotiate the [ __ ] out of this and she ended up getting more than twice what the company
had initially offered and happily sold them the house Betty is a boss ass [ __ ]
so not long after though she was like well it was nice she was like I'm a little worried I'm going to miss that
house cuz it was like my first independent thing you know like all a sudden she was like wait I kind of feel
like I kind of gave that up a little too quick so she went back to the gulf representative just out of curiosity she
was like I'm just going to shoot my shot and she said what do you plan to do with
that you know I I never really asked you what are the plans here and they said oh
we're just going to tear it down why like okay how about I offer you $1 and I take the house and have it
relocated to another lot and you can keep the lot are you serious and they agreed for a dollar so she made twice
the money they offered her on that house and then got to keep it she bought the house back for $1 got to keep the entire
thing and just gave them the property what a story yeah already and she moved the house to a nearby lot and she lived
there for the rest of her life incredible I love that I'm so glad that she didn't have to give it up I know it
really worked out your first house is so special yeah like that you get on your own you know and after what she went
through it's like hell yeah Betty so in the summer of 1956 the house is being relocated from one lot to another and
during that time Betty had to stay at a boarding house that was owned by a couple who recently moved to New
Hampshire from Philadelphia now while at this boarding house she met Barney Hill
let's go now at the time Barney was in the area on vacation with his wife Ruby and their young children oh and stayed
at the like just for a time at the boarding house while they were passing through initially the hills and Betty
they all got along very well she liked all of them they were all friends they they kept in touch they decided that you
know everything was cool okay and later Barney and his wife ended up separating in
1957 and they were not to like this was all long distance and stuff it's not like they were like meeting up or
anything like that like they were genuinely friends it just happened they end up
separating immediately he was like he ended up talking to Betty and was like she's such a good friend and blah for
you and soon their friendship developed into romance and you know there was no funny business beforehand it doesn't
sound like that it was just friendship that developed into something else that's beautiful now let's talk about
Barney Let's so Barne calling him Barry earlier I'm sorry that's okay kept saying he's no Barry I mean he's no that
guy was no Barry either so you were right he was not that so Barney Hill was born July 29th 1922 what
does that make him July 29th hold on hold on my brain is farting [ __ ] okay my sister's birthday is
July 25th and she is a Leo so I think that's Leo okay I'll take it so a Leo and a cancer I don't know how those two
things line up yeah that's fine uh he was born in Newport News Virginia but little as was known about his early life
um he ended up dropping out of high school and he worked a bit as a store clerk and then he ended up joining the
Army he served there for three years as a truck driver in World War II uh he ended up being honorably discharged in
1943 after a grenade incident oh wow and it was during his time in the military that he met and married his first wife
Ruby and they had two sons in the decade that followed okay now after um after his discharge he found work as a mail
carrier with the post office in Philadelphia and this is when he became very active in what was at the time the
very burining civil rights movement and other community causes um he served as a
committee man for his son's Boy Scout Troop oh yeah now at first Betty and Barney's relationship like I said was
long distance they ended up really just talking through letters and phone calls how romantic I know but then it changed
in the summer of 1957 because she re-enrolled that UNH and took an inter internship position with the Leighton
Farm school which was a home for delinquent girls in Philadelphia oh wow now the internship in Philadelphia made
it possible for Betty and Barney to be together in person love it they were romance romance romance and when the
internship ended a few months later they were now facing being long distance again so Barney made the decision to
relocate with Betty I love that so for Barney he had spent most of his life in and around Philadelphia so this was a
big decision a big mood he was move he was up you know uprooting his whole life yeah and he had children too that he was
like I'm going to have to really make this work and he was also going to be relocating to New Hampshire which was a
place where he would be one of very few black people in the entire State yeah even today the population is only 10%
people of color most of whom live in the larger cities not like the smaller areas
right so this was like at the time especially a big source of stress yeah nerve-wracking I cannot claim to know
what this feels like no way so for Barney the shift was very stressful but he did acclimate very quickly to life in
Port Portsmith so he ended up making a lot of friends very easily hell yeah um with the tenants and Betty's building
and some of the people in her Social Circle so he really just fell right into it he had a good Community yeah and as a
US postal worker he was able to transfer from his job in Philadelphia to one in Boston like pretty easily nice so that
wasn't an issue but the transfer meant that he would be working one of the shittiest shifts because he was
transferred in uh which happened to be opposite Betty's schedule so they hardly saw each other at first oh that sucks
and it's like they're just getting out of this long distance thing now when Betty and Barney married in May 1960
their work schedules were so intense that they couldn't even take a honeymoon at first they had to go right back to
work after getting married uh it would end up being uh 16 months before Barney was able to take time off from his
postal route to actually go on a beded honeymoon oh my God that sucks so on September 15th 1961 he finally got
approval to take a few days off from his job and he decided he was going to surprise Betty with a trip to Niagara
Falls in Montreal oh my gosh awesome and he got the news on a Friday evening so he planned to wait until Monday he was
like he told her what was going to happen but he was like we're going to go Monday cuz that's when the banks open
and we can begin our trip right but Betty was like I don't even care what we do I just want to be together and like
go so she was like I don't even care about the banks I don't care about getting more money like so they just
pulled the cash they had on hand which was $70 in total oh my God and Betty was like that's enough it's fine with me and
she was like if we stick to a tight budget we bring food with us we just don't eat at a ton of restaurants we'll
be good we just want to like spend time together that's it like let's just go so
I love them now early Sunday morning September 17th they packed up some food their stuff and they brought their daxon
delie in the backseat and they began making their way to Canada I love this now they very strictly adhered to their
budget on the first few days so Betty and Barney decided you know what we're going to make our way downtown to
downtown Montreal on Tuesday Morning September 19th we'll book a motel for the night we'll take in a show in the
city it'll be great it's so romantic I know but they got directions from somebody
and unfortunately that person uh only spoke French so oh they misunderstood and it caused them to get
lost on their way from Niagara to Montreal so they were driving east and they realized they had gotten very lost
from the downtown area where the hell are we they' kind of wasted a lot of their day so they decided you know what
let's just find a hotel for the night we'll try again tomorrow but then they realized oh wait it's difficult to find
a hotel that's going to let a dog in oh true so to make matters worse there was also a tropical storm making its way up
the East Coast from the southern states it was going to make driving conditions difficult it kind of felt like it was
like all converging at once yeah so they were like you know what why don't we just start the 5H hour drive back to New
Hampshire like you know what we're still together we're still making the trip together so even though they had heard
that storm warning they said that the skies were very clear and they were by all weather accounts by the time that
Betty and Barney passed over the border into the mountains of Northern New Hampshire so they were driving South
along i93 and Ashland when Betty saw what she thought was a shooting star and she pointed it out to Barney but as they
got closer it occurred to both Betty and Barney that whatever it was in the sky it had stopped moving oh it was just
hovering in the air the thing which was large and they both said was cigar shaped okay seeming at the time it began
to move forward slowly and then it began going upwards like ascending again and this is when Betty was like Barney pull
over on the side of the road we need to get a better look at this like what the [ __ ] is that so outside of the car they
looked up at this Wild Thing above them yeah they were super confused not really
understanding what the hell was up there and they were also wondering how is this
thing just hovering Motionless in the air like that yeah like gravity doesn't necessarily work like that and they
couldn't hear anything like propeller is like a like helicopter that's creepy so
Betty gave um gave Barney the binoculars they had brought with them on the trip and Betty later recalled and as he
looked up he could see a row of men standing in the windows looking down at them I'm looking at the pictures right
now like that they drew and I'm like oh what uh what so one by one apparently the figures watching through the window
walked away and then the ship began to sending in their Direction so they had no idea what to do so they both jumped
back in the car and headed south on Route three and the object is following them now oh and they said it was moving
in a very erratic pattern above them yeah and I so Barney really didn't want to freak Betty out so he was trying to
act like everything was fine and he was he said he was trying to be as calm as possible and just drive home yeah and
his only reason was he didn't want to upset Betty oh so at one point Barney entertained the idea of stopping at a
cabin or a Motor Lodge maybe just to be near other people cuz he was like we were just freaked out but he was like
honestly I think we should just keep going so they drove for about a half hour and then they rounded a curve near
Indian head which is a natural rock form formation and and actually a landmark in
francon Franconia not um and they came to this like large open area and as soon as they came into this area they saw the
flying object hovering about 100 ft up in the area right in front of their car oh and so Barney was startled by this
and he said he slammed his foot on the brake cuz he wasn't ready for it and it was in the middle of the road that they
came to a stop and he said he grabbed Betty's revolver and binoculars and got out of the car and moved closer to just
see what the [ __ ] this thing was oh this is terrifying and he said he approached
and the thing tilted forward slightly and two red lights began to Glow as fins on the side of the object began to part
and the object started moving slowly forward the [ __ ] he was [ __ ] terrified and he rushed back into the
car and told B uh Betty we got to get the [ __ ] out of here yeah like goodbye now they raced down the highway the
object is literally above them still pursuing them essentially right and after a few minutes Betty and Barney
could hear a buzzing sound and then they felt a strong vibration and a few minutes later they heard the buzzing
again louder now followed by a much stronger vibration and this is when they said there was haziness like this part
is kind of missed time because they later said that they would uh they they recalled encountering some kind of
Roadblock and seeing a large Red Orb on the ground but they couldn't like the details were really fuzzy they were like
I can't I don't I can't put these pieces together so the next thing they really remember was feeling this desperate need
to be around other people they just didn't want to be alone oh and so Barney drove for a while searching for a
restaurant that would be open something that other people would be around but they couldn't find anything open at that
time oh God so they were like let's just get home so based on when they left Montreal and how long they'd been
driving they expected to reach Portsmouth around 3:00 a.m. but when they did reach home they were surprised
because the sun was coming up what and Betty wrote in her diary we entered our home turned on the lights and went over
to the window and looked Skyward we felt very calm peaceful relaxed we sat at at
the kitchen table looked at each other shook our heads in puzzlement and asked each other do you believe what happened
we agreed it was unbelievable but it had really happened so they're exhausted yeah
confused they what happened this chunk of time and Benny and bar decided you know let's get some sleep let's have a
little nap like sleep it off see how we feel in the morning when we wake up in a
few hours sure and when they woke up a few hours later Barney said you know what this is still bothering both of us
so he said why don't you go into another room I'll sit here and we're going to draw what we saw okay so they did that
and they drew what they saw and when they reconvened a few minutes later they saw that it was remarkably similar with
they drawn so they they took that as okay we both saw this like this wasn't a hallucination we saw it now as far as
Barney was concerned though even through this he was like this story even though
I believe we saw it is beyond belief and he was like for our jobs and for our reputation in the community we should
just keep this to ourselves I get that and just have this experience with each other especially that time period you
don't want to like go stiring with [ __ ] and of course Betty who was never one to
give in any public pressure very much disagreed with this but she was like this was incredible like we we can't
just keep this to ourselves but she was like you know what I respect and understand your concern and so she was
like you know what I'm not going to run wild but can I tell my sister and he was
like of course you can thing is technically he's like a government employee so he's probably like I'm not
about to talk about this [ __ ] and he was they were both very active in the um civil rights community and like the in
activism and they didn't want this to overshadow or take away from any of the work they were doing so they were
worried about that which is really sad though it is really sad so she called her sister Janet and who she called the
only person who she could tell her story to without prejudice Janet listened and
she was like wow this is wild but I believe you and then she was like okay I'll call you back so after hearing her
sister's story Janet Miller phoned her neighbor who's a physicist and asked for advice about like anything he could tell
him you know a physicist that seems like a a right person to talk to he's like she's like I don't know you're really
smart yeah and coincidentally the neighbor had guests over that night and one of them was the former Chief of
Police from the nearby town of Newton okay he said no this isn't crazy like don't worry and he said all UFO sighting
should be reported to the peace Air Force Base like that's what we do so like tell her to report it okay so Janet
thanked him hung up told Betty you know this is what you need to do and also gave her a basic experiment that the
physicist had suggested that she try okay now according to the physicist Betty was to take a compass out to the
car and walk slowly around the vehicle and just make note of any unusual changes in the compass as she walked now
Barney was like I'm not doing that he was like I'm done with this he was like I want this behind us I don't even want
to do this so he ref refused to go outside so Betty did it by herself uh and she said nothing unusual happened as
she walked around the car and then she said and then she reached the trunk and she said she noticed a bunch of unusual
shiny spots on the surface and she said about a size of a half dollar or silver dollar pretty big and she said she'd
never seen them before so she placed the compass on the spots and it would spin wildly
and she said as I was watching this I was filled with an unexplained feeling of absolute Terror I was standing there
in the rain under the street light and telling myself don't scream keep calm and don't be afraid everything is all
right I would be scared too so a few days later Betty did as her sister suggested as well and called the peace
Air Force Base to report the whole experience Barney's probably like you better stop Bar's like Jesus so they
gave a basic description of what they'd seen you know but they but he insisted they leave the part about seeing the
humanoid figures looking at them out the window cuz he was like I I'm bad he was
like very ashamed of this and it was very sad so a few hours later they got a call back okay from major Paul Henderson
who had several follow-up questions and later Betty and Barney would learn that Henderson had taken detailed notes and
submitted their description to Project Blue Book yes which is a study of unidentified flying objects conducted by
the US Air Force between 1952 and 19 69 mhm so major Henderson's report to Project Blue Book is basically what we
described it's almost exactly that just it includes but it also included a comment that provides um a little more
insight into after their trip in the report he notes during a later conversation with Mr Hill he volunteered
the observation that he did not originally intend to report the incident he says that on looking back he feels
that the whole thing is incredible and he feels somewhat foolish he just kept cannot believe that such a thing could
or did happen so in 1961 Barney Hill was the local chairman of the uh NAACP okay and a strong proud civil
rights activist who was working tirelessly to advance the cause of equality in the community and in a
community that wasn't very receptive to begin with so he was he was working [ __ ] hard like overtime and so he was
also the founding board member of the Rockingham Community Action Program which is an organization that provides
social and financial support to those in need wow and one that is still a vital part of the social service network on
the Sea Coast today [ __ ] and he's also a black man from the south who was married
to a white woman in a state where many residen were not going to accept or you know we're actively speaking out against
interracial marriage right so because of all that to Barne the UFO incident was it was distracting from all his work he
was doing and he said it was embarrassing and he was worried that any tabloid kind of publicity that came
along with it would tarnish the battle that both of them were fighting for equality and dignity so as far as he was
concerned they done their Duty they reported the sighting to the proper authorities and now he was like we're
moving on right now Betty on the other hand was she wasn't like forced doing anything but she just was having trouble
letting the experience go which I can understand that side of it too like how could you not have trouble with that
exactly so just days after reporting the incident she went to the library and started checking out books about aliens
and UFOs and she just wanted to hear other similar experiences just to I think she was also just trying to
convince herself I didn't like have a la hallucination so her motivation was definitely just like you know Betty was
a was a stubborn gal yeah she was strong W but also strange things have been had been happening
since this whole situation that she didn't know what to do about even aside from those like half dollar things yeah
so about 10 days after coming home uh Betty started having nightmares about the experience and she would also have
these really scary early morning flashbacks oo um and these flashbacks were really scary experiences from that
evening but ones she didn't initially remember so they were like they she wasn't certain if they were real if they
were a dream what was happening but they were very Vivid flashbacks yeah and she
said at first I didn't tell anyone about them they were so weird oh so from her reading all the library books Betty
eventually came across a report written by Donald Kio which was um he was a former major with the US Marines and was
the director of the national investigations committee on air on aerial phenomena which is naikap uh this
is a civilian group dedicated to investigating reports of UFOs okay in October 1961 Betty wrote a letter to
naikap told them about the experience and was just like I just want to let you guys know about this if you can just
take a look into things see if it's similar to something else yeah so she got a response a few weeks later and um
they let her know that they would be con that she was going to be contacted by Boston base NCAP member Walter web they
were very interested now a few weeks later web did come in contact with the hills and
recorded their story for naikap in a report titled a dramatic UFO encounter in the White Mountains of New Hampshire
now the description of the experience and web's report is again the same one that was given to Project Blue Book but
this time Barney allowed them to include the part about seeing the humanoid creatures in the window but they it was
like it was really the the the missing time that was the thing that was really bothering the hills like that time per
it was like this is all weird yes but like we're more concerned what the [ __ ] happened in this time period that
neither one of us can remember right and it was web's report that brought Betty and Barney story to the attention of
Robert homman who was a former interrogator for the US Army who was now working for IBM in the
1960s Homan was really interested as well in that missing time element of their story and as a former interrogator
he knew there were plenty of ways of recovering memories or forgotten details that could be useful they've had to do
it but contrary to apparently popular belief about this it wasn't homman who eventually suggested hypnosis as a w of
figuring this out it was actually his friend and fellow nightcap member Jim McDonald's who suggested that Jim
McDonald's was a former member of the US military in the CIA [ __ ] uh he met the
hills through homman and in the later half of 1961 he became very interested and very involved in filling in those
gaps of missing time for them he would go back to the scene of the encounter like they really went for this so these
efforts eventually LED them to a hypnosis session and this is when the details were uncovered so throughout
1962 and 63 Betty and to a much lesser extent Barney Dove Way deeper into the investigation into their experience
um they were very encouraged by the members of naikap and former military members who had taken intense interest
in this so they were still you know Barney was still very conscious about how this could make them look if the
story really got out so he was a little reluctant to spend time diving into the investigation but he tried to help
whenever he could yeah um and unfortunately about a year after the initial experience Barney's Health took
a turn oh no and he started experiencing debilitating head headaches and nausea and what's worse is his primary care
doctors couldn't figure out why radiation so believing the cause of Barney's symptoms was probably largely
psychological his doctor referred him to Dr Benjamin Simon who was a very well-known renowned and celebrated
neuros psychiatrist and had a practice in Boston Boston's Back Bay neighborhood okay so according to Betty's niece niece
Katherine Martin Dr Simon quote was skeptical about the existence of UFOs as extraterrestrial aircraft but he agreed
to work with Barney because he was worried and he truly believed that this problem was psychological in nature oh
no so when Barney and Betty actually went to Boston for his initial consult with Dr Simon uh in December 1963 they
both told the story together and it was so elaborate and they were so insistent on it that Dr Simon was like I'm going
to insist that you also receive treatment with me to Betty okay and she was like you know what I
want to help Barney get better so I'll do it so sure like I'll absolutely go through this okay so he was one of the
country's leading neuros psychiatrists at the time so he made a name for himself with a lot of things but um one
of the things he made a name for himself with was incorporating hypnosis into his
treatment plans oh that's cool um but he was quick to let the hills know you may
have seen stage hypnosis or like on late night shows or on you know these little
things but this is very different and he said he had actually pioneered the use of hypnosis to treat PTSD and soldiers
return returning from World War II oh [ __ ] so to Simon he said Barney symptoms
Beed a striking resemblance to the trauma related symptoms of soldiers which led him to believe that this could
be beneficial for both of them now beginning in late February 1964 they began a 3-we period of very
intense hypnosis sessions uh to try to uncover the these memories so for the first session Dr Simon was very pleased
he said because it seemed like Betty and Barney were excellent subjects for this
he said they had a great ability to fall into a deep trans-like State pretty quickly and easily and he put them in
different soundproof rooms so that they couldn't influence each other of course and in the earliest sessions both Betty
and Barney described the drive from niag or to Niagara of looking for a motel of
Barney's apprehension because he was very uncertain of the Civil Rights situation Canada so he was a little
nervous okay and in the second session Simon moved forward in time and started asking about their experiences while in
Niagara Falls and it was during the second session that Betty and Barney's descriptions of events kind of differed
a little bit um with Betty stated they got lost after asking for directions and Barney stated that he misread the map
okay insignificant difference in the grand scheme of things yeah I don't think that's like a big thing so through
the first few sessions with Dr Simon it was clear that Betty and Barney's accounts of the
trip differed in a lot of very insignificant ways um this is kind of hinting at the UN reliability of
hypnosis because emotions factor into our perception and memories of yeah everybody perceives things differently
and this is what's interesting because they definitely had different priorities and different different um focuses on
this trip and I think it it really colored their experience because in the transcripts of Barney's
hypnosis sessions it's clear that the trip to Canada or anywhere at that time was really stressful for him and
dominated by anxiety and concerns over how them as an interracial couple would be received in unfamiliar parts of the
USA and Canada I hate that he had to even go through that while he was on his honeymoon yeah that like that was his
main concern or that anybody has to go through that and in Betty's accounts hers are focus on the logistics of
travel and the anxieties about reaching their destination right so this is I don't believe their in you know their
inconsistencies and discrepancies are like deceit on any cu they're very insignificant not that like the deceit
wouldn't make sense it's not the details of like the the abduction or whatever I
think it's just that there's obvious differences in their priorities and fears and
worries and it comes out during hypnosis right which is interesting yeah Now by late March Dr Simon had done a ton of
sessions to establish a baseline okay and he was finally ready to go into the experience so Betty and Barney um at
first both described the scenario the exact same way that they did to the authorities at peace Air Force Base and
IAP and still under hypnosis under hynosis and like interesting and Barney said while the craft was following down
the highway following them down the highway he said I began to feel very alarmed and hope for some traffic so
again I wanted a other people to be around right now when he came to the part of the story where they had rounded
Indian Head uh Barney became visibly distressed and he actually asked to be woken up oh and Dr Simon assured him
you're safe you're in my office nothing's going to happen to you like please continue right and so Barney said
in a very anxious tone it's right over my head God what is it and I try to maintain control so Betty cannot tell
I'm scared God I'm scared oh that's like heartbreaking now clearly upset at this
point he became screaming uncontrollably oh my God and then became hysterical and
needed several minutes to compose himself before they went on holy [ __ ] did he have to get woken up or and well
like I think he I think they composed him while asleep but then he continued and he said this this is the transcript
this is ridiculous oh it's huge oh my God I can see it it's there and there are lights oh gez I don't believe this I
don't believe this I don't believe this it's huge and there are people there and
they're looking back at me oh my God help me if there is a God help me coming closer I'm coming closer there's a man
up there and he's not going to let me go away oh oh it's big 80 feet look at it oh look at it two red lights they're on
the side of it it's like it's like a pancake it looks I'm not going to say it I don't believe flying saucers are I'm
not going to say it I don't ever want to say that word again oh like so stressed
even under hypnosis I know I'm like oh my goodness and he struggled to continue but eventually composed himself enough
to describe the feeling of panic he felt when he said the humanoid creatures when
he saw those humanoid creatures um he said he saw one man who he believed to be the leader he was round-faced and
reminded him of a redheaded Irishman he said was he was a not too big man dressed in a military SC style cap and
black shiny jacket with a scarf D dangling over his left shoulder Barney also said he noticed the man had almond
shaped eyes which he'd never seen before for and that he conve the eyes conveyed
a terrifying Menace the likes of which he had experienced but he said only with some of the worst people he had ever
encountered jez and later he he remarked the man in Black in the black shiny jacket reminded me of a Nazi oh wow
that's really scary now in the session that followed he pre Dr Simon pressed Barney on what happened next and he said
that they tried to get away but encountered a roadblock that he' previously described as a fiery red ball
so the transcript says I made a turn and I never knew this I don't know why I had
to make that turn and I was lost I saw I was on a strange area of the highway that I had never been before and I was
being stopped I was very uncomfortable but somehow the eyes of the men in the craft were telling me that I should be
calm and I would not be harmed and to relax and I saw those men coming towards me oh in her sessions Betty's
recollection was very similar okay and to the dreams that she was having after they got home so in her session she
described watching as the men emerged from the craft took hold of Barney and led almost carrying him into the craft
and then came back to get her and she said they had him under some kind of control and he couldn't get away and she
said when they returned for her she remembered walking voluntarily to the ship with the men she's like my man is
in there yeah she was like I'll go get him right so she said I was more or less walking under my own power and then she
said as we neared the door um that she began fighting the men until they got a hold of her and marched her inside okay
she said they bruised me a little bit I had torn my dress in the struggle it had
a built-in lining and I was struggling so badly that the stitching on the inside of the dress had been torn out so
in places it was hanging down oh wow now inside the ship Betty described being taken to an examination room with Barney
which he described as being like a Hospital operating room and in Betty's recollection she said her clothing were
removed and they began examining her body she said and this is going to get like kind of graphic just to let
everybody know okay I could feel them turning me over and putting something in my rectum oh God she said I felt it Go
in very easily and then it was withdrawn as they examined her body and collected
specimen she said nothing hurt she said she could hear them humming in a low tone and she said she
believed they were communicating to each other that way it sounded like a conversation but hums okay and Barney
also described here seeing the men communicate with hums okay and he said but he saw them open their mouth to make
the noise she hadn't seen them when they were communicating like that sure so like Betty Barney also recalled being
pred and ped prodded by the captors and he said I have the most peculiar feeling
that something was placed against my genital parts and he said it was more as if my parts were in a solution of
something that was there that had sub substance to it that had body to it so he claimed that the men took many
samples from every orifice of his body wow leaving him with the feeling of having been touched mhm so in the final
exam Betty says the men performed what she understood to be kind of a pregnancy test by inserting a large needle into
her navl and she said I would say the needle was 4 in Long 6 in maybe and she said there was a tube attached to it and
they didn't leave it in very long just a second what now once it was removed she
was left alone in the room with the man they believe to be the leader okay and she started she said we had a
conversation so according to Betty the leader gave her a book to read and she said the text went up and down it was
different it had short lines and some were very thin and some were medium and some were heavy they had some dots and
they had some straight lines and curved lines and she asked the leader where they had come from and the man asked how
much she knew about the universe and then got up and directed her attention to a large map on the wall and she said
the map looked like what she assumed were stars or like the Galaxy of some sort but she said very different from
any star map I've ever seen it doesn't look like what you are picturing but she said something about it felt like that's
what it was yeah context clues and the leader asked Betty um where Betty thought she was on the map what and she
laughed and said I have no idea and he said if you don't know where you are there wouldn't be any point in telling
you where I am what which is like chilling that's so I don't even understand he's like I
could point to you where I'm from but if you don't know where you are right now then what's the point so creepy and I
was like okay okay Mr depth like for real like that was like philosophical you little hipster I was like I liked
that but according to Betty she spoke with him for a little more a little more time about various aspects of human life
on Earth until finally the conversation ended and Betty and Barney were allowed to dress and were escorted back to their
car by two men and they regained what I guess could be described as Consciousness at that point and we're
just driving along Route three towards Portsmith weird so the whole thing took like a couple hours I guess I guess like
the time just like jumped yeah so from the moment he began working with the hills Dr Simon was very clear that he
had little if any interest in UFOs wow and was entirely motivated by his desire to just help Barney Hill relieve his
stress symptoms yeah um so when he was asked questions later like years later about this whole experience he was very
reluctant to engage in anything that could treat UFOs as a serious subject he was like uh like in the introduction to
a book about the Hill's experience called the interrupted Journey um he wrote the Charisma of hypnosis has
tended to Foster the belief that hypnosis is the magical and loyal road to the truth in one sense this is so but
it must be understood that hypnosis is the pathway to the truth as it is felt and understood by the patient the truth
is what he believes to be the truth and this may or not be consistent with the ultimate non-personal truth okay so when
the hypnosis session was done Betty and Barney continued their relationship with
Dr Simon through more traditional therapy as well um a year actually and they ended up being in correspondence
for many years after like they kept in touch they were they kept the relationship nice and I think Dr Simon
is like listen this is what was told the transcripts are true they both had genuine reactions their emotions about
it were genuine they were in different rooms when they told these stories and they line up almost perfectly and he
said and he's saying they are not deceiving us this could very well be the truth like the absolute non-personal
truth reality yeah or it could be that both of them truly believe that this happened and that this is what they
experienced in some way shape or form whether it be whatever you know what I mean like
this could be just their truth but we will not know like that's all we know is that they both came out with these
things under hypnosis in separate rooms with very real emotions attached to them
and no sign of Deceit that's crazy which is like that really all you can take out
of that and be like that's pretty incredible it is that's I think that's the perfect word for it incredible and
honestly this probably would have been the end of their experience with like the world of UFOs and alien abductions
like them going through this hypnosis session um but an unexpected newspaper item in the Boston traveler in the fall
of 1965 took them out of the ordinary citizens who just went through this and dealt with it on their own kind of thing
to like the biggest names in the UFO commit yeah so in November 1963 the way it happened is really shitty too I feel
bad for them they didn't seek this out I hate that so Betty and Barney were invited by the two-state UFO study group
to present their story to the group's um members at a private event in quinsey Massachusetts the group had found out
about the hills through naikap and had reached out to Betty um at the time when she was very desperate for answers so
she was like I'll participate to this like private event oh no investigators like you're all just like it's the same
kind of thing as naikap like this is it's private it's private they're just trying to understand this they're not
here for publicity um and what sucks is that she didn't know and a lot of other people didn't know that a reporter for
the Boston traveler John Latrell was in the audience that night and recorded the
entire presentation isn't that illegal it's a real [ __ ] move and it gets shittier cuz you can't record people
without their consent I don't know what the situation is there huh but 2 years later in the fall of 65 Latrell was
writing an article about another reported UFO incident uh in exitor New Hampshire which is known as the exitor
incident yep uh and he reached out to the hills for comment on this like talking about this other incident and he
said he wanted to include their story in the article to kind of beef it up and they still wanted to remain anonymous a
little bit they were like we dealt with this on our own we shared our story with
the you know with the private group so they could do their investigation to help them but we're not looking to be in
newspapers and [ __ ] so they declined to speak with him they were like no we would like and they said the only thing
we will ask is do not include us in the article at all fair we don't want our incident in there we don't want any of
it so um so yeah it's so and Betty said I do not know this is what she had said I
do not know what effect publicity would have on Barney's position in so many of the things he is doing that's what she
said to him I don't want publicity because it's going to ruin what he's done for the community and that's been
his number one thing throughout this whole process ordeal um being a slimy [ __ ] and ignoring the Hill's request to
remain nomus which was very black and white like literally told him do not include us in that he still did Latrell
published the article on the Boston traveler on October 25th 1965 and he frequently referenced the hills
experience and quoted heavily from Betty's presentation at the uh conference in quiny how did he get away
with that not only that it also very much trivialized and sensationalized their story for like his own game yeah
um and it also caused them to seriously question who the [ __ ] they could trust
anymore they were like what the [ __ ] we told you not to include us so cuz aside
from that presentation in 1963 to the private group and talking to the government agents they talked about with
it Betty had only told her sister and maybe like one or two close friends about the incident private so the fact
that he was doing this felt like a Betrayal on like a massive front what an [ __ ] so the article in the Boston
traveler prompted a ton of calls from reporters all around New England all wanting comments and interviews and
Betty recalled I took the newspaper and locked myself in the bathroom I was stunned unbelieving I noted it was going
to be a series to run for 5 days oh oh no now the next day when she went to work Betty to work at the New Hampshire
Division of Welfare she was met at the door by flurry of reporters all trying to get a comment and later when Betty
and Barney arrived home after work the phone was ringing off the hook and they just wanted to like go on with their
lives yeah they did their due diligence they did everything they were asked to do right they didn't seek this in the
days after that they were approached by strangers everywhere they went asking questions some some people wanted
autographs oh that's so weird and it sucks it's so sad and it's like all of this they had no way of knowing that
doing that private speech just to people who they were trying to help and not gain any publicity that it was going to
have the potential to compromise their jobs and undermine all the Civil Rights work that Barney and and Betty had done
up until this point so seeing no other option at this moment Betty and Barney were like all right we got to try to get
in front of this now it's out like so we now we got to take control of it so they
said not latrell's article included their story but also quoted them without their permission so that was a serious
misrepresentation right they had no way of controlling that um and it misrepresented their experience and it
misrepresented them as people so they were like you know what we'll go out and we tell the story and we'll be like we
have we have to now so on the evening of November 30th 1965 they held their own event at the Garrison Inn in do New
Hampshire which was only a few miles from their home in Portsmith and they talked to a crowd of more than 600
people who attended oh my God they were probably so nervous yeah and Betty opened up the program by giving a brief
overview of the history of UFO sightings I love her she said up until the 19th century there have been over 300
scientific recordings of us UFOs and this rate has continued up until the present time and as evidence Betty
shared stories of sailors and other respectable citizens who reported the sightings including the recent sighting
in exiter that had started this whole thing so with the introduction uh after the introduction Betty and Barney began
the presentation part and they told their entire version of the events Barney said I thought it was probably a
helicopter but I heard no familiar worrying of the propellers I then became quite apprehensive got back into the car
and continued driving Southward he finished telling the story and then the audience just went nuts asking questions
uh wanting to know whether they appeared threatening hostile like very normal questions sure and they and you know
they answered they did not feel like at first they were scared but they didn't come off as hostile or threatening and
they didn't hurt them um and the audience was like were like did you suffer any ill effects from this like
were you hurt did you you know and Barney said no we we feel pretty F and we both felt like we had just been in
contact with something and they said alien it's a very very hard feeling to describe so for Betty and Barney so that
worked out well because people were asking genuine questions L to them story so for Betty and Barney who were very
anxious telling their story publicly the overwhelmingly positive response from the audience was definitely validation
for their experience they deserved that and this did begin a lifelong um in involvement in the pursuit of evidence
of UFOs and extraterrestrial terrestrial to Earth it's really hard to say um in the years that followed their experience
became you know a popular book The interrupted Journey which was adapted into a television film the UFO incident
y um starring James Earl Jones and Estelle Parson Parsons as Betty and Barney love uh there were books movies
lots of media that followed all that craziness now unfortunately on February 2th
1969 Barney Hill died unexpectedly from a cerebral hemorrhage oh my God he was only 46 years old oh my God they only
got that much time together that's awful and what's even worse is despite everything he had done in his life for
the Civil Rights Movement his community his obituary in the Portsmouth Herald focused almost entirely on the UFO
incident that's really shitty the opening paragraph say describes his as a Portsmith Postman who maintained he and
his wife were taken captive aboard a UFO in the White Mountains it's like okay he
did like a gazillion other wonderful things for his community that's so shitty um now he died only a year after
Betty's father died oh God po Betty and a few months after their beloved Dash and delie died no so she was devastated
and it took months before she could even you know function yeah but her lifelong
friend Maryann Franklin from college um said she always suspected that Betty never stopped grieving for her
soulmate like just RI my heart out ruined me they were soulmates they absolutely were no
in the years after Barney died Betty threw herself into the world of UFO stuff um you know speaking at
conferences she gave interviews she would she investigated she was like I'm going to find answers yeah well you
probably spend the rest of your life wondering what the [ __ ] happened to me but she also maintained her full-time
job as a social worker for the New Hampshire Department of Welfare wow and by the late 1990s at that point she was
like you know what I'll just fade into the background in the UFO stuff like I'm going to gracefully bow out and just let
someone else take that over yeah and she was just kind of done with the attention
at that point um and so she said and you know what she said I I'm no longer really questions consumed with questions
about the universe so I feel like very content peaceful and so she was like decided to transfer into a new hobby
which is family genealogy very cool and she said she was just really interested that some of her ancestors met the
pilgrims now on October 17th 2004 Betty Hill died from lung cancer in her the Portsmith home she lived in since the
1950s the one that she bought for a dollar back after back for a dollar she was 85 years old hell yeah Betty and
although Betty and Barney Hill will definitely be remembered by most for this fantastic tale that occurred in
September 1961 it is very important to remember them as also hugely important in their in civil rights movements in
their Community inequality of course like they committed their entire lives both them to that like that should be
also right up there with this wild incident that happened perhaps above it one might think exactly so that is the
story of Betty and Barney Hill what a wild story believe something happened man I believe them yeah I believe
something happened that [ __ ] is so scary it'll be interesting to see what you guys believe and just be nice about it
especially now so much more [ __ ] is coming out about yeah aliens and if you don't believe it that's fine just don't
yeah just don't be mean don't be mean to people who do or people who are interested in it yeah exactly there's
plenty of things that people are interested in that you're not and vice versa sometimes the internet can make it
like if you believe certain things then you're a piece of dog [ __ ] and I'm going
to [ __ ] all over you for it don't do that don't be that person on the internet don't be that guy have
important discussions about it cuz this is interesting it is interesting I agree
and Betty and Barney Hill for life I love their love yeah wow so yeah well with that we hope you keep listening and
we hope you keep it we but it's weird that you get abducted by aliens yeah don't keep it that way keep it that
weird bye [Music]

In the fall of 1961, Betty and Barney Hill took a trip to Niagara Falls. On the drive back from Canada to their home in Portsmouth, NH, the Hills claimed their trip was interrupted when, after stopping to investigate a strange flying object hovering above the car, the couple was abducted by what Barney later described as “beings [that] were somehow not human.”

Thank you to the wondrous Dave White for Research Assistance!

References:

Friedman, Stanton, and Kathleen Marden. 2007. Captured! The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience. Red Wheel : Newburyport, MA.

Palmer, Barry. 1965. "Portsmouth couple wes 600 persons here." Nashua Telegraph, December 1: 3.

Public Broadcasting Sysetm. 1997. Nova: Kidnapped by UFOs? Boston, MA, April 1.

Robinson, J. Dennis. 1999. "The Grounding of Betty Hill." The Portsmouth Herald, February 5.

—. 2008. The UFO romance of Betty and Barney Hill. Accessed August 17, 2023. http://www.seacoastnh.com/the-ufo-romance-of-betty-and-barney-hill/?showall=1.

The Portsmouth Herald. 1969. "Barney Hill dies in city at age 46." The Portsmouth Herald, February 26: 3.

Brief Summary

Betty and Barney Hill recount their 1961 UFO abduction experience and its impact on their lives and activism.

Key points

Betty and Barney Hill: A Love Story. The story of Betty and Barney Hill unfolds, showcasing their sweet romance and struggles.
UFO Encounter. Betty and Barney witness a mysterious object in the sky that changes their lives forever.
The Terrifying Pursuit. Betty and Barney race down the highway, pursued by an unidentified object.
Unexplained Missing Time. Betty and Barney experience a gap in their memory after the encounter.
Hypnosis Sessions Begin. Barney and Betty undergo hypnosis to uncover their memories of the encounter.
Barney's Terrifying Encounter. Barney describes a round-faced man with almond-shaped eyes that conveyed menace.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Betty is a boss ass [ __ ]!

Elena celebrating Betty's negotiation skills.

8:02WatchOct 3, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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