Beyond the Veil Magazine

The Pascagoula Abduction Revisited

Issue #52: April 1983

On the evening of October 11, 1973, Charles Hickson and Calvin Parker were fishing from a pier on the Pascagoula River in Mississippi. What happened next would make headlines worldwide and remains, ten years later, one of the strangest abduction cases on record.

The Encounter

Hickson, forty-two, and Parker, nineteen, had been fishing for approximately half an hour when they heard a peculiar whirring sound behind them. Turning, they observed a football-shaped craft hovering over the river.

A door opened in the craft. Three beings emerged, floating toward the men without walking.

The beings were unlike any described before or since. They were approximately five feet tall, with grey, wrinkled skin. Instead of hands, they had lobster-like claws. Their legs were fused together. They had no visible eyes, merely slits where eyes might be.

The beings seized Hickson and Parker. Hickson was floated into the craft, where he was examined by an eye-like device that moved around his paralysed body. Parker apparently fainted and could not describe his experience in detail.

After an uncertain period, the men found themselves back on the pier. The craft departed. Hickson and Parker drove to the sheriff’s office to report what had happened.

The Investigation

Sheriff Fred Diamond was initially sceptical. But both men were clearly terrified. Parker was so distressed he required medical attention.

Diamond left the men alone in an interview room, secretly recording their conversation. He hoped to catch them discussing their hoax.

Instead, he recorded two men in genuine distress, trying to make sense of an experience that had shattered their understanding of reality.

“I was scared to death,” Parker says on the tape. “And I have to go home and face my wife.”

“We better tell what happened,” Hickson responds. “I’ve never seen anything like that before in my life. You can’t make up something like that.”

The tape convinced Diamond that the men genuinely believed what they reported.

The Aftermath

The case attracted immediate attention. Dr. J. Allen Hynek investigated within days. The men submitted to polygraph examinations, which they passed.

Hickson has continued to speak publicly about his experience, maintaining his account without significant variation over the decade.

Parker, more private, suffered psychological difficulties in the years following. The experience traumatised him deeply.

Neither man has profited significantly from the encounter. Both have faced ridicule and scepticism. Their lives were disrupted rather than enhanced by their claims.

The Beings

The Pascagoula beings differ markedly from other reported entities:

• Their fused legs and claw-like appendages are unique
• They moved by floating rather than walking
• Their robotic appearance suggests mechanical rather than biological origin
• They showed no apparent communication or emotion

Some researchers suggest the beings were not aliens themselves but robots or drones operated remotely. Others propose they represent a fundamentally different type of entity than the “greys” reported in other abductions.

Supporting Evidence

Several elements support the witnesses’ credibility:

The Secret Recording: Diamond’s tape captured genuine distress, not rehearsed performance.

Polygraph Results: Both men passed lie detector tests administered by a skilled examiner.

Behavioural Consistency: Neither man has changed his story or sought to profit from it.

Witness Separation: Hickson and Parker were questioned separately. Their accounts, where they overlap, are consistent.

Sceptical Responses

Critics have proposed alternative explanations:

Hallucination: Both men might have experienced shared hallucination, perhaps triggered by alcohol or drugs. But both were tested and found sober.

Hoax: The men might have invented the story for attention. But neither has profited, and their recorded conversation suggests genuine confusion.

Misidentification: Some unusual but conventional experience might have been interpreted as an abduction. But what conventional experience produces such specific, consistent memories?

Ten Years On

Charles Hickson continues to speak about his experience. He has become an advocate for taking abduction claims seriously.

Calvin Parker has largely retreated from public view. The experience marked him deeply.

The Pascagoula case remains anomalous. The beings described there have never been reported elsewhere. The experience stands alone, unrepeated and unexplained.

Perhaps Hickson and Parker encountered something that has not returned. Perhaps the beings were scouts, observers, or researchers who completed their work in one encounter.

Whatever the truth, two men from Mississippi had their lives changed forever on an autumn evening ten years ago. They have never wavered from their account.

Readers with information about similar encounters are invited to contact our research department.