YEAR: 2023

SEASON: Spring

MONTH: April

DATE: 14

STATE: Tennessee

COUNTY: Lincoln County

LOCATION DETAILS: Investigator (MM) note:
The incident occurred on the property of the witness. She does not want the property identified specficially but it is in the vicinity of Vanzant Road. This clump of hills is just north of Elk River and northeast of Dellrose. See maps below.

NEAREST TOWN: Dellrose

NEAREST ROAD: Hwy 273

OBSERVED: Now my story, which I still struggle with understanding. I am not convinced there was a creature but I can’t find a good explanation for my initial thoughts or experience.

My experience happened in April of 2023. That night I was up gaming on my computer at 2 am. I had turned the sound down just enough that, if my boys were in bed, I wouldn’t have disturbed them. It was still decently loud however.

I always bring in the cats at night because I’ve lost a few to coyotes and cars in the dark. I also have a hole in the foundation of the house that was knocked out to treat it for termites years ago that the cats like to crawl through and hang out under the floor. This night, at first, I thought one was still outside. As I was gaming, I started hearing this real deep growl that sounded similar to one of my cats. You know, sometimes cats will do deeper growls as an initial warning and get louder pitched as the threat advances.

The sound seemed muffled so I assumed my cat was under the house growling at the neighbor’s cat. I ignored it knowing there was no way I’d be able to get my cat in until he ventured out from under the house.

The growling grew louder and less muffled. At some point the sound went from this muffled growl to a growl to, what I can only describe as a cow in distress. At least, that is what I initially thought as it’s the only thing close I could compare it to.

At this point it was loud and sounded like it was right outside my office window, about 4 feet from my desk. I had turned off my speaker to listen because at this point I was completely bewildered to what I was listening to. Was a cow attacking my cat? What the hell was going on? Was it even a cow ? We do have cows across the street on the hillside but I never hear them from in the house, and this sounded right outside my window.

I started questioning if it was a cow and knowing that there wasn’t anything out here that posed a threat to me, and fearing for what I presumed was my cat facing off some unknown creature, I flew to my feet to run outside.

For whatever reason as I got up I glanced at my office window. The curtains were open, and I froze. Staring at me were a set of "eyes". Around that time all the noise stopped. There is no way to truly explain the shock and terror I felt. These eyes were watching me rather at a side glance. We held gaze for a couple of seconds. As I stared back I saw them completely turn and glide away.

I grabbed my cell phone and tried to calmly leave the room to a no window area, which was difficult as all my windows on that side of the house had open curtains.

I honestly thought it was a ‘person’ because my initial thought was a peeping tom. Honestly, originally I thought it was my creepy neighbor and just assumed he had been snooping.

Then I realized that was unlikely, that he wouldn't have held my gaze but probably hide, so it must have been my oldest son’s friends out drinking beer in the driveway and screwing with me. It was a Friday night after all.

I ran upstairs to find my youngest son. Just needed to be around someone, maybe get him to go outside and tell them to knock it off as I was still deeply startled.

Upon reaching the top of the stairs, I found both of my boys asleep and that’s when I started to panic so I called my 3rd boy. As I recounted the story I realized, whatever was outside my window wasn’t human because the eyes were a luminescent yellow green… and I was totally dumbfound and relieved. Maybe it was a deer...

The next day, still deeply troubled by the experience, I finally got up the nerve to venture outside and look under the window. Nothing. No tracks or any indication of anything was under my window.

I measured where those eyes hit and if said creature was standing flush with the glass it would have stood about 6 feet tall. I am assuming, because he wasn’t right at the window, whatever it was may have been taller. I don’t know why my brain thought ‘human’ as all I saw were ‘eyes’.

I’ve replayed this experience over and over and still cannot completely rationalize what happened. I’ve gone over tons of animal sounds. Thinking back, the growl proceeded into that cow bleating like sound.

Haven’t been able to find anything that could do both. I've considered lighting bugs, but the temperature dropped that night to 45*. We don't have many lighting bugs in April here, and even less at 2 am.

All 3 of my boys have had other odd experiences around here in the past 3 years here but I'm unsure if they are related.

ALSO NOTICED: My boys also had odd experiences with in 3 years of my experience. Green floating orb, large crouching creature beside the highway, advancing odd wet lung sucking death rattle and grunting creature in the tree line by the house, something hitting our camper behind the house.

OTHER WITNESSES: 1 person, PC gaming.

OTHER STORIES: My best friend saw something large and dark on my parent's upper deck of their house 2 miles away back in the 90s.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: This occurred around 2 am. It had gotten down to 45* that night. No rain. Moon was Waning Crescent with an illumination of 36.93%. I don't know about cloud cover, but it was a pretty dark night.

ENVIRONMENT: Agricultural fields with a few houses, small creek behind the road past a hay field. In front of my road on the other side is a wooded hill.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Wayne Tillett:

I conducted a phone interview with the witness on 5/23/24 and discussed in detail her sighting through the window as well as the various experiences that her family have had near their home over the years.

I found the witness very credible and well spoken. She is a well respected professional in her field in the lower Tennessee/ Alabama area and prefers to remain unidentified.

When asked about the "eye glow" that she saw that evening, she said it was more like a reflection type of light like you'd see from a deer or similar animal. The eyes were in a three-quarter stance as if the creature was watching with its head slightly turned to the side. As she noticed it, the eyes slowly moved away from the window and disappeared as it walked away.

Living very close to her town I drove down a few days later to her county to see some of the roads and areas that she pointed out during our conversation. According to her landmarks that she provided I could easily see how a few of these creatures could make their way through the surrounding sparsely populated community and not be readily noticed.

One road in particular, which is named Vanzant road, she commented in her interview that she "sometimes feels creeped out" when she makes the drive through there. This road is very close to her house (everything in Dellrose is close to her house). Vanzant is a 2-mile gravel road in the country with a few small farms and heavily wooded area on both sides.

She gave me more detail about the other odd occurrences near her home. One in particular was from her youngest son at 16 years old, who had decided to set up his own "apartment" in the backyard in an old RV.

Soon he was hearing scary growling and chortling sounds from the woods behind, as well as a heavy slam against the wall of the camper one night waking him from his sleep.

Another son told her that one evening while driving home a few years earlier, he observed a dark hairy thing with long arms appearing to be feasting on a dinner of road kill from the side of the road.

This area of Tennessee has many attractive elements for sasquatches: Creeks, dense woods, tall hills, deep valleys, plenty of flora and fauna.

Based on her truthfulness that I perceived from our conversation along with a quick investigation of her small town and immediate area I do believe her story. I will be returning to this area in the near future for further investigation to be sure.

____________________________________________

Investigator Matt Moneymaker notes:

I spoke with this very impressive witness. She does not want her name published because she is a professional archeologist.

She mentioned that the figure standing outside her office window would have been able to see her computer screen on which she was gaming.

Take this report in context with the other reports in the cluster. The BFRO page for Lincoln County sightings shows these reports, which all have a caption beginning with "ELK RIVER / DELLROSE CLUSTER"

You can click these images for larger versions.









Here are links for those other two reports in the cluster:

BFRO REPORT 58593

BFRO REPORT 50250

About BFRO Investigator Wayne Tillett:

Since 2020 Wayne has been on many BFRO field expeditions as well as other private and public Bigfoot expeditions and searches. With his art and people skills he has interviewed several eyewitnesses and drawn what they saw from their descriptions.

Wayne recently co-organized BFRO Tennessee Fall 2024 Expedition.