The Centauric Spectre of the South

After her coworker encouraged her to contact Linda Godfrey, the unnamed witness - who is now a Greyhound bus driver after having once worked for the IRS - relayed the story of a bizarre and terrifying encounter that she had had in 1966 when she was 8 years old.

## Menaced by a Modern-Day Monstrous Myth

Although she is roughly 58 years old now, the unnamed witness is still haunted by something she, one of her friends, and a few of her younger siblings saw one Summer evening in 1966. Perhaps unwisely, they had decided to sneak out of their houses to '*play in a nearby four-acre park and rec area*' in southern Richmond, Virginia. The kids followed a path from their apartment buildings which led them past the creek that ran through the acreage and through the treeline, to the point that the forest fell away to reveal the play area.

Immediately commencing their merrymaking, the group had only been there a short time before they suddenly heard a strange sound which the witness described as being '*between a movie-style, ghost-like moan and the whinny of a horse*'. This auditory anomaly had apparently been menacing the residents of the witness's apartment block at night for quite a while before then, and although her parents always blamed it on a nearby trucking company - but she thought this made little to no sense on the grounds that the trucks were most active during the day and the menacing moaning was heard only at dusk and nighttime.

Evidently disturbed by the familiarly-chilling sound, the witness turned around towards where it appeared to be coming from only to be confronted by a creature unlike anything she could've conjured in her young mind. It was a tall, dark figure, and it appeared to be watching her '*from about a block away*'. She described the creature as looking to be '*human from the top of its head to the bottom of the torso*', but asserted that the rest of it resembled a horse. She counted a total of six limbs on the equine abberation. The conditions were apparently too dark for her to be able to see its face clearly, but she confirmed that there didn't seem to be any ears and that '*the head area looked much more hairy and shaggy than the smoothly furred remainder*'.

As soon as the creature noticed that it was being watched, it started to run towards the group of terrified children. The arms on its human-like torso were held in a bent position as it ran, with the elbows sticking slightly out to the sides. Shrieking with fear, the witness grabbed her four-year-old brother as the entire group ran for their lives towards the tree line, with the mythological menace in hot pursuit. Even on the grass, the heavy beat of the thing's equine hooves were clearly audible to the group. Legs presumably burning with adrenaline, the group managed to reach the tree line marking the edge of the park.

Stopping for just a brief moment, the witness turned to check on the whereabouts of the horrendous horse-man, and noted that it had seemingly stopped as well, '*about half a block away*' from its horrified quarry. Its rear end and haunches were partially turned as '*the torso and head twisted to watch her*'. At this point, she was able to estimate that it was between 7-8ft tall. The centaur did not come any further, and the terrified children were able to make a hasty beeline back to their houses.

Of course, their parents did not believe them - but apparently the witness's brother and friends still talk about it with her to this day. The witness says that she is not normally one to believe in ghosts, and has not had any other paranormal experiences in her lifetime. However, she still asserts that she remembers this incident '*vividly*', and Godfrey also attested to her credibility by saying that she '*seemed as serious and credible as any eyewitness*' that she's talked to in the past.

## Source

https://lindagodfrey.com/2015/09/03/centaurs-and-elk-men-recent-reports/