The True Story of the Worlds First Documented Alien Abduction: Conscious Memory Fades
Betty then told Dr. Simon that she was escorted along a path in the woods by two of the small men. An additional two men were in front of her, and when she turned her head, she saw Barney being assisted by two men. Barney’s eyes were closed and he appeared to be asleep. Betty be- came angry and attempted to awaken Barney, but he seemed oblivious to his situation. It was as if he hadn’t heard Betty’s voice. A bit further along the path, Betty turned around and called his name again, “Barney, wake up!” But he didn’t respond. Then the man who was walking beside her inquired, “Oh—is his name Barney?” And she turned around and looked at the man, and figured it was none of his business, so she didn’t speak to him. When Betty failed to reply, the man reassured her there was no reason to be afraid. They only wanted to do a few tests, and when the tests were completed she and Barney would be returned to the car unharmed, and they could go about their way.
Betty added more detail to this account in a later session when she stated:
We go…the path winds in the woods and it winds around…to the craft on the ground. It was metal…like an oval…or something like that. You know…like it wasn’t shiny. It was a very moonlit night…it wasn’t quite as clear as daylight, but I could see. It was on the ground and there was like a rim around the edge. The rim was a little bit above the ground, and there was a ramp that came down.
It was big. There was a clearing in the woods with trees around it, except I think not big….I thought that I would get the hell out of there if I could. I couldn’t seem to. This man was beside me. All I could say was, “Barney, Barney, wake up.” Now let us compare Betty’s nightmares to her hypnotically recovered memories.
The following is an excerpt from her first nightmare:
We reached a small clearing in the woods. In front of us was a disc almost as wide as my house is long. It was darkened, but appeared to be metallic. No lights or windows were seen and I had the impression that we were approaching from the back of it. We stepped up a step or two to go onto the ramp, leading to a door.
At this point, I became frightened again and refused to walk. The leader spoke firmly but gently, reassuring me that I had no reason to be afraid. But the more delay I caused the longer I would be away from the car. I shrugged my shoulders and agreed that we might as well get it over with; I seem to have no choice in this situation.
At first glance, this segment seems to confirm that Betty’s dream is nearly identical to her hypnotic recall. Upon closer inspection, however, we find subtle differences between Betty’s dream and her hypnotically recovered memory. The men in her dream were relaxed and friendly in a professional way. The leader was firm but gentle and reassuring when she refused to enter the craft. However, under hypnosis, the man behind her became angry when she resisted entering the craft. Finally, in her dream the man reasoned with her that the longer she remains uncooperative, the longer she will be away from her car, so she complies. This stands in stark contrast to the regression, in which she resists their attempts to force her onto the craft. Then, the humanoids grip her arms, and she becomes helpless to resist.
The apparent disparity between Betty’s nightmare material and her hypnotic recall suggests that perhaps her traumatic dreams were part of the dream-state process of resolving conflict. Her nightmares repeated certain aspects of the traumatic event, whereas other elements were changed or missing. One must ask the question, did Betty create a false memory in order to protect herself from the horrific reality of her situation? Or, did Betty add confabulated details to fill in a gap where no biographical memory existed?
Kathy attempted to answer this question in a 2004 interview with Betty. We must remain cognizant of the fact that Betty’s posthypnotic memory of this event was somewhat different from both the hypnosis and the dream. Her later account explained the damage that was done to her dress at the entrance to the craft.
She recounted:
At first Barney tried to fight them off, but only for a short time. They had him under some kind of control. He couldn’t get away. I’m still talking to Barney saying, “You damn fool. Why don’t you wake up?” As we were being led into the craft, we were being held or controlled by the men. He had about six of them. There were ruts in the road. They are practically carrying him. When he was being taken through the woods the tips of his shoes were dragging on the ground. So, the tips of his shoes were scarred.
With me it was different. I was more or less walking under my own power. Only at this point I’m thinking, “Who do these characters think they are? What do they think they’re doing? I don’t know where we’re going, but I’m not doing it.” I don’t know if I was yelling or just thinking it, but I was objecting. I was resisting.
And I got almost up to the craft when I started fighting. When they were holding me it certainly was not a weak grip. I know that they had a good, strong grasp on my arms. 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.
When we got up to the craft, I was still struggling, but at this point, I sort of threw up my hands and said, “The heck with it. I don’t have any control here. They’ve already got Barney close to being onboard, so I might as well stop my fighting and go ahead and behave myself.” So, I went up to the craft…I only had a short distance to go, so I went up to this oval-edged door like you see on a ship, and Barney had already stepped inside. It was like a platform and it set on the ground, and then, there was a little spot that was up about six inches at the most. You stepped on that, over the six inches, and through this oval-shaped door. Inside the craft, we could see that there was a platform that circled the interior, and the rooms, as such, were higher than the floor of the interior.
Now, let us compare the content of this portion of Barney’s hypnotic regression to that of Betty’s, remembering that Barney was somnambulistic at this stage. On February 29, 1964, Barney recalled, “They were by my side and I had a funny feeling because I knew they were holding me but I couldn’t feel them. I felt floating…suspended. I only became aware that I could not feel them when we were going up an incline, and then, I felt that I could not feel them. Yet, my arms were in a position of being supported. My elbows were out and I was moving, but I was not walking.”
In a later unpublished regression Barney added more detail: I’m out of the car and I’m going down the road into the woods. There’s an orange glow. There’s something there….Oh! Oh! If only I had my gun. What do they want? The crazy eyes are with me. They’re with me. We go up a ramp. My feet just bumped, and I’m in a corridor. I don’t want to go and I don’t know where Betty is. The eyes are telling me to be calm. I’ll be calm. I’ll be calm. If I’m not harmed I won’t strike out, but I will strike out if I am harmed in any way. I’m numb. I’m numb. I have no feeling in my fingers. My legs are numb.
It is apparent that Barney’s description is consistent with what one might expect from a person whose eyes are closed. He is numb and in an altered state, but his account supports Betty’s. When his feet bump the opening to the craft he realizes that, although his legs are numb, he is being supported. This information suggests that the tops of Barney’s shoes were scuffed along the path through the woods and when his feet slid over the raised opening in the doorway. This is further supported by his statement, “I am only thinking of mental pictures because my eyes are closed, and I think I am going up a slight incline, and my feet are not bumping on the rocks.”
In a 1966 meeting in Dr. Simon’s home with J. Allen Hynek and the Hills, Dr. Simon induced a deep hypnotic trance in both Betty and Barney simultaneously. Then he instructed the Hills to answer Hynek’s questions. Hynek attempted to elicit specific details about the Hills’ experience that had previously gone unanswered. Dr. Simon demonstrated his ability to “switch off” the auditory input to one person, while the other underwent interrogation. He used this technique from time to time during the 1964 hypnosis sessions whenever there was an interruption.
When Hynek inquired about the temperature inside the interior of the craft, Barney stated that it was different from the night air. It was cooler. Later, when Barney was “switched off” and Betty was asked the same question, her reply was consistent with Barney’s. This detailed in- formation cannot be found in Betty’s dream sequence, and their stories correlate point by point in minute detail.
Now we will examine the content of the couple’s individual memories of their experience onboard the craft.