Jersey Devil sightings map
The Jersey Devil is the name attached to reports of a winged, hooved figure in and around the New Jersey Pine Barrens, most famously during a week of sightings in January 1909. The name carries a legend with it; this page is only the reports that use it, and it records what was reported, not what was there.
Other names in the sources: Leeds Devil.
Background reading on Wikipedia: Jersey Devil.
We map claims, not creatures. A case is what some source says someone saw or heard, with the link to that source. It is not proof that anything was there, and a retelling counts once, not as a second sighting.
By the numbers
37 cases on the map, 3 of them first-hand (the witness telling it). A case may stand on several documents; copies and reprints are not confirmations.
Best-documented cases
Ranked by independent sources first, then documents, then first-hand accounts. This says how well a claim is documented, not whether it is true.
Jersey Devil · Woodbury Heights, New Jersey · 1929
Police and a posse in Woodbury Heights are searching for a creature described as a shaggy black monster with a pig's snout that kills swine and chases children.
Jersey Devil · Burlington, New Jersey · 1909
Witnesses report finding the carcass of a strange animal with hoofprints and kangaroo-like tail in the woods near Klnkora, which they claim explains puzzling hoofprints left in the snow last winter.
Jersey Devil · Hightown, Virginia · 1910
David Meezo reports seeing a strange bird or beast with a horse-like head and mule legs flying over him in Hightown.
Jersey Devil · Swedesboro, New Jersey · 1927
Huckleberry pickers in Swedesboro report seeing a feathered quadruped about the size of a fox with a cry half bark and half hoot.
Jersey Devil · Salem, New Jersey · 1927
The Atlantic City Daily Press expressed disdain for the comparison to the Jersey Devil, noting its traditional winter appearance and hoof-like marks in snow.
Jersey Devil · Girl Scouts of Central & Southern New Jersey, New Jersey · 1927
The text reports that the Jersey Devil was said to appear in August with cloven hoofs and a long tail, making an uncanny noise while leaping over pumpkin vines.
Further reading
- 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 - In Search of Prehistoric Survivors, Karl Shuker (1995)
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.