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The Kersey Time Slip is an example of a spooky event that sent people into a bygone era through a mysterious portal in a quaint English village, writes RICK HALE
Kersey Time Slip Mystery
Recently my son and I were having a conversation and he asked, “Dad, is time travel possible?”
Please note that my son is a super jock. Cross country, basketball, track and field – he’s not the kind of kid who likes science fiction.
For example, after watching an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, he said, and I quote, “That was stupid. It was just a group of people walking around and talking.” Funny, yes, but it only killed me a little bit.
So I explained that time travel is not impossible; it’s just unlikely. In order to work, it would have to travel faster than the speed of light. Or generating the power of a thousand suns to make it happen.
It’s a bummer, I know. But this sci-fi fantasy nerd remains hopeful that one day we’ll figure out how to break that barrier.
But what if we could bypass that whole pesky energy thing? What if there was another way to beat time?
Some theoretical physicists believe that there are places that act as gateways to another time and place.
These time shifts, as they call them, can propel someone back in time. And there have been a few where normal people found themselves in a different era.
One of these time shifts occurred in the town of Suffolk Kersey in 1957, when three military cadets found themselves in a bizarre situation that none of them wanted to understand.
A simple task
1957 was a good year for Britain. The country was rebuilding after the horrors of World War II, people were back to work and all was at peace.
In the autumn of that year, three Royal Navy cadets, William Laing, Michael Crowley and Ray Baker, were given a simple task.
Their senior officers instructed them to perform a simple map reading exercise and report their findings back to them.
After walking several miles through the rolling Suffolk countryside, the young men decided to take a short break from their job.
In the distance they could make out the town of Kersey and hear the church bells, indicating that a religious service was being performed.
So the three young men started heading into town for a bite to eat and possibly a pint before returning to their exercise.
Little did they know that their world would collapse if the bizarre took over.
A strange sensation
As the three cadets approached the village, all three noticed a strange feeling.
The three young men noticed that the closer they got, everything around them suddenly became deathly quiet.
The church bells suddenly fell silent and there was an eerie silence that the three could not comprehend. It was almost as if the world had fallen away and they were the only three left.
The cadets noticed that the only signs of life in the village were ducks swimming calmly in a pond.
The streets of Kersey were silent, completely devoid of life. And it only gets stranger as they explore the city.
A medieval village
As they walked deeper into the city, they noticed that the church, which had been visible from afar, was no longer there.
And there were no telephone lines, which were everywhere in Britain by then. And there wasn’t a single car in sight.
One of the cadets commented that it was as if they had stepped back in time into a medieval village. Long before the amenities of modern life.
According to the cadets, the houses were built by hand, with thatched roofs that have not been used for centuries.
In one of the buildings, what appeared to be a butcher’s shop, a pig carcass was hanging on a hook. A carcass that had turned green from mold.
Fear strikes
After a short time of exploration, fear and anxiety began to settle in the hearts of the three cadets.
They feared two things if they stayed. First, loneliness would drive them crazy.
Or they feared being stuck in a village that was clearly lost in time forever. So they did the only thing they could think of: they fled for their lives.
After quite a bit of running, the world returned to normal. The church bells rang again. And from a distance they could see signs of life in the village.
The nightmare, if you could call it that, was gone. And everything was right in the world.
Many years later, Laing returned to the village and met Andrew MacKenzie, a noted paranormal investigator.
According to MacKenzie, the cadets experienced a time slip. A rare event that gives people a glimpse into an era long gone.
Some may merely see events, while others, like the cadets, become active participants in the passage of time.
But now, as with any report of unexplained phenomena, we must consider what the skeptics have to say.
The skeptics said the cadets were either lying about their experiences or because they may not have returned to their schools on time.
Or it was quiet in the city because it was Sunday and everyone was at church. And they mistook the charming architecture for something much older.
Regardless of what you believe, the young cadets insisted their story was true.
Making this one of Britain’s greatest and most enduring mysteries.
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