Water Monster · Essex County, Massachusetts · 1817
MA-1817ID case-123ed03667Added to map Oct 30, 2026
- Creature
- Water Monster
- When
- 1817to the year
- Where
- Essex County, Massachusettsto county level
- Reports
- 2 documents1 independent
The account
Witness reports that in 1817, a gigantic sea snake appeared off Cape Ann, Massachusetts, described as dark chocolate colored and 60 to 100 feet long with a caterpillar motion.
Trace the source trail → every document, in time order, and how they connect
We map claims, not creatures: this is what the sources say, not proof. How a case is built
Details
- Creature
- Water Monster
- Where
- Essex County, Massachusetts, United States
mapped to county level · from the report's own words, generalized to a larger area - When
- 1817
- Account
- Not first-hand (retold or reported by someone else)
- Backed by
- 1 independent source (2 documents; copies and reprints are not confirmations)
- Added to map
- Oct 30, 2026
- Case id
- case-123ed03667
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Source trail (2)
Down the rabbit hole → 2 documents, and how they connect
Every link goes to where we found the account. The earliest we found is marked; it is the earliest found, not necessarily the original.
- Image 3 of Mower County transcript (Lansing, Minn.), June 22, 1892
Newspaper · 1892-06-22
Earliest found, not necessarily the original. - Image 2 of Fairhaven herald (Fairhaven, Wash.), July 10, 1892
Newspaper · 1892-07-10
Further reading
- The Great New England Sea Serpent, J. P. O'Neill (1999)
Account of the 1817 Gloucester sightings and later reports.
Borrow on Internet Archive - On the Track of Unknown Animals, Bernard Heuvelmans (1959)
The founding work of cryptozoology.
Borrow on Internet Archive - Cryptozoology A to Z, Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark (1999)
Encyclopedia of reported creatures.
Borrow on Internet Archive - Abominable Science!, Daniel Loxton and Donald Prothero (2013)
Skeptical history of the Yeti, Nessie and others.
Borrow on Internet Archive
Books we have not reproduced: borrow them free at archive.org. Listing a book is not an endorsement of its claims.