Has anyone else heard the story of a man called Thomas Johannes Baptist Schwytzer who was a deserter from Napoleon’s army after the battle for Moscow? The story goes that he deserted after the battle and started trying to make his way back to his hometown of Alsace with a small band of Russian deserters. Supposedly when he, and the small band tried to rob a farm and killed the farmer and his son, the poor man’s widow placed a curse on Schwytzer that he would become a savage wolf at every full moon. The story goes that from this point on Schwytzer, as though he wasn’t bad enough already, became worse, losing his inhibitions and going on an orgy of rape, bloodletting, robbery and murder. The legend spread throughout the land tht a werewolf was in the midst of the people and Scwytzer was finally hunted down and killed near the town of Morbach in Germany. His body was buried at a crossroads and a shrine was erected with a lit candle which is supposed to remain lit to keep the werewolf from returning. All returned to peace in the countryside for the next century or so, until one night in 1988 when air force men were returning to their base and saw that the candle had gone out. Laughing and joking with each other about the legend they returned to the base and went to bed. Later on that night the automatic sirens went off. It soon became apparent that someone, or something, had tripped the sensors. A security guard who was sent out to search apparently saw a large, wolf like, animal standing on its hind legs staring at him before it vaulted over a fence and disappeared into the night. Dogs that were brought in to continue the search picked up the animal’s scent but refused to go any further than the perimeter fence. The next morning the candle was relit and the creature, whatever it was, has never been seen since. Thanks for reading.
