Sightings - As The Full Moon Rises: Germany, 1998

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

When a US Airman leaves a mysterious shrine’s candles unlit in the German forest, he unknowingly unleashes a centuries-old curse. Sightings is a REVERB and QCODE Original. Find us on instagram @sightingspod Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Some legends exist for a reason. Ancient warnings passed from one generation to the next. Rituals born of superstition that in fact hold back something much, much darker. In the dense forests of Germany, for example, there's a shrine with candles that must never go out. But what happens when duty is forgotten and something ancient stirs beneath the soil? Sometimes a simple flame is all that stands between our world and something hungry that lurks in the dark. and something hungry that lurks in the dark. Welcome to Sightings, the series that takes you inside the world's most mysterious supernatural events. Each week we bring you a thrilling story that puts you at the center of the action,

followed by a discussion that dives into the accounts that inspired this story and our takes on them. I'm McCloud. And I'm Brian, and this week we are about to learn what really happens when the moon is full and someone forgets to do their job. When an American soldier finds himself at the middle of a centuries-old legend, he comes face to face with evil itself. Will he make it out alive? Find out on this episode of Sightings. My name is Zachary Miller, but most people just call me Zach. And in 1988, I was 22 years old and stationed at Hahn Air Force Base in West Germany.

It was the final days of the Cold War. The Berlin Wall hadn't fallen yet, but you could feel change in the air. You could feel it. The whole base had this electric feeling, like we were on the cusp of something historic. And, yeah, I guess you could say something historic did indeed happen to me. If by historic you mean absolutely freaking terrifying. It happened on a Friday night in late summer. Me and three buddies from the base, Carl, Jamie, and Bert, had dinner at this little

tavern in Moorbach that we'd discovered a few months earlier. The owners spoke decent English and they had this schnitzel that was out of this world. So good. Plus beer. Lots of good German beer. Of course, Carl wanted another round, but I was driving and had my shift in a few hours. The guys ragged me, but someone had to stay sober and it sure as hell wasn't going to be any of them. But by the time we left, all three of my friends were feeling pretty good.

Not falling down drunk, but definitely loose. We were about halfway back to the base when Carl started squirming in his seat and he asked me to pull over because he needed to take a leak. I told him we'd be back at base soon, but he insisted he couldn't hold it. Then Jamie and Bert, Giant Dan, that they needed to go too. Funny how that works. So I pulled the truck over to the side of the road, killed the engine, and the guys stumbled into the dense forest that loomed around us. I waited by the truck, thinking about the shift ahead, when I heard Jamie calling out from somewhere in the trees. He sounded confused, maybe even worried, so I followed his voice, pushing through branches until I found him standing at a crossroads of two dirt paths. And there, tucked away in the middle of the forest, was this little structure, a small

stone thing maybe five feet tall with this little alcove that had a weathered image of the Virgin Mary set into it. And beneath that was a small shelf holding a few candles that looked recently burned out given the thin wisps of smoke still rising from their black wicks. It was some kind of shrine, that's the only word for it, but why out here in the middle of the forest? And the thing looked ancient, centuries old at least, but clearly someone had been taking care of it, someone had been lighting those candles. But who? Carl and Bert soon found us, and we all stood there staring at this odd little monument

for a long time. Then I asked if anyone had a lighter, and all three of them looked at me like I'd grown a second head. Jamie made a snark about religion, and truth is, I wasn't religious at all. But I knew better than to mess with stuff like this. You never knew when someone might take offense. Plus, when there's candles involved, they're supposed to be lit, right? So the guys rummaged in their pockets, but everyone came up empty. I thought I might have a lighter in the truck, but Jamie groaned. He wanted to get back to base and get to bed,

and the other guys agreed. And facing a losing battle, I relented. We went back to the truck, I started the engine, and we left those candles on lit in those dark woods. But looking back, I wish I'd trusted my instincts. My shift started normal enough, and for a while it was a normal night at Han. Most of the action happened during the day when the F-16s were running sorties. At night, the base was pretty dead, but all of that changed right after midnight. The radio crackled to life with Guard One reporting a disturbance in the woods southwest of the perimeter fence. I asked what kind of disturbance and the voice on the radio

said they weren't sure. It heard some screaming, then something moving in the brush. Something big. I looked to Sergeant Peters, who was on duty with me, and he nodded, so I responded that backup was on the way, which pretty much meant that I was on the way, along with a few other airmen who happened to be present at the time, Sanders and Martinez. They were guys I trusted. Both had been on the force long enough to know what they were doing, and neither was prone to spooking at shadows. But the moment we crossed into those trees, something fell off. The air was too still, too quiet.

I tried to suck it up, but as my flashlight beam cut through the mist and the trees, it created these weird shadows that seemed to move when we weren't looking directly at them. Sanders seemed to notice it too when he was from Tennessee, someone who'd spent basically his whole life in the woods. But he kept looking over his shoulder as if he thought someone was following us. Meanwhile, Martinez was quiet, unusually quiet for him. But we were soldiers, so we pressed on, and then we stumbled upon the most horrifying sight I think I'd ever seen. I first noticed it when the ground squished beneath my feet. I looked and quickly realized I was standing in a pool of blood. Ahead of us, three dead deer lied scattered on the ground.

Or I assumed they were deer because there wasn't much left of them. They'd been torn apart like nothing I'd seen before. Their throats ripped open, their bellies splayed wide. Ugh, the stench. It was awful. Just awful. Worse, something had clearly been digging through their insides, feeding on them. Eating them. Sanders muttered under his breath and gagged, but I knelt down for a closer look, fighting the urge to vomit myself. Whatever had done this hadn't just killed the deer, it had savaged them, made sport

of it. Martinez suggested it might be wild dogs or maybe a boar, but I could tell from his voice he didn't believe it. But I had to report what I found, even if I couldn't explain it. So I pulled out my radio, but the moment before I started to talk we heard it. A deep, guttural growl coming from the brush to our left. All of us froze and I heard Sanders whisper, asking what the hell was that. Because honestly, it was like nothing I'd ever heard before. I slowly raised my flashlight, trying to spot whatever might be making that sound. But then this massive shape suddenly erupted from the darkness, moving faster than anything

that size had any right to move. I only caught a glimpse of it, but what I saw didn't make sense. Because it was huge, bear-sized at least, but it moved all wrong. Like it wasn't an animal. At all. Then my survival instincts kicked in, and I ran after Sanders and Martinez. Back at base I reported what we'd found to our superior, Lieutenant Reeves, and when I told him it was a bear or something bigger, he scoffed.

Bears hadn't been seen in this part of Germany for more than a century, apparently. But I knew what I'd seen. And given those mutilated deer, the strange sounds in the woods, something was clearly out there. So I requested permission to head back into the woods, this time with a canine unit. I don't know, maybe that was stupid, maybe I just figured if something dangerous was out there the dogs would find it. But as soon as we reached the tree lines, something strange happened.

These were highly trained German shepherds, but they flat out refused to enter those woods. They pulled against their leads, whining and backing away like they'd seen something that terrified them. But I wasn't about to let this go, I don't know, I've always been kind of stubborn and duty bound. But I wasn't about to let this go, I don't know, I've always been kind of stubborn and duty-bound, so... I pushed ahead alone, and soon enough, I saw these huge, dog-like prints in the soil. But as I looked closer, I realized this was no dog I'd ever seen in my life. They were too deep. Like, whatever was making them was incredibly heavy.

And the stride length was all wrong, like it was walking on two legs instead of four. And as I followed the tracks, I found another deer carcass, and as if it was even possible, this one was even worse than the others. It wasn't just killed, it had been destroyed, like whatever killed it had a personal vendetta against the poor creature. But just as I bent to examine the carnage, I heard that growl again, this time much closer than before. So I spun around, my flashlight beam cutting the darkness, and for a split second, I swear, just a split second, I saw it.

A tall shadow standing upright between the trees. Taller than any bear, taller than any man. I dropped my radio and ran,lessly as fast as I could. Behind me, something roared, a sound that shook the trees and rattled me to my core, but thank God it was behind me. I just kept running, branches whipping my face, roots trying to trip me up, and I could hear it behind me getting closer, the sound of its breathing, the snap of branches under its weight.

I veered to the left, hoping to lose it in the denser part of the forest. My lungs burned and my legs felt like lead, but pure terror kept me moving. Then, suddenly, something grabbed me and yanked me behind a tree, and I found myself face to face with a man. German, maybe forty, who face to face with a man. German, maybe forty, who pressed his finger to his lips, his eyes wide with terror, as he whispered for me to be absolutely silent. Don't move. Don't breathe. Or you'll be dead. This stranger and I stood frozen behind that tree, barely daring to breathe. Whatever was out there, it was close, so close I could hear it sniffing the air, moving in slow circles around our position.

Then after an agonizing few minutes, the creature retreated into the darkness, and only then did the German man finally release his grip on my arm. He whispered that it couldn't smell as well as a normal wolf. That's the only reason we were alive. The creature relied more on sight and sound than scent. But my mind hung on only one word he said. Wolf. Before I could ask for clarification, he gestured for me to follow him. We crept through the trees until we reached a small clearing and the man glanced nervously at the sky. I followed his gaze to see the full moon hanging overhead, and a chill washed over me. The man introduced himself as Heinrich.

He'd lived in Moorbach his entire life and knew these woods better than anyone. Knew they hid a secret that had been kept at bay for nearly two hundred years. Until tonight. He said that in 1812, a French soldier named Thomas Schweitzer had deserted Napoleon's army and attacked a farmer and his family in Moorbach. And as she lay dying, the farmer's wife cursed Schweitzer, condemning him to become a ravenous wolf under every full moon. But the curse worked too well, transforming Schweitzer into a beast that terrified the Rhineland for years.

Livestock was torn apart, children ripped from their beds, lone travelers found reduced to scraps of clothing and bone. After years of terror, locals finally slayed the beast at a lonely crossroads in the forest. They buried the body right then and there and erected a small shrine to contain the evil below. A shrine with candles that have remained lit every full moon in order to keep the beast at rest. I realized then that the shrine my friends and I had encountered earlier was the very spot the man was talking about, and since I hadn't re-lit the candles, had I unwittingly

unleashed this evil back into the world? I asked the man how he could stop it and racked my brain for any tidbit I could remember from werewolf movies I'd seen. Silver bullets worked, right? But the man shook his head and told me there was no way to stop it now. It was too strong, too fast, and though our modern weapons might slow it down, it wouldn't kill it. The beast was beyond death now, twisted by dark forces none of us could comprehend. So our best hope, our only hope, was to wait

until sunrise, when it would be forced back underground. I struggled to process all of this. I'm still struggling. It was impossible, right? But before I could ask further questions, sirens began wailing from the direction of the base. The man nodded sadly to me, and I turned and ran, hoping I wouldn't be too late. As I approached the base perimeter, I waved my flashlight wildly until the guards spotted me.

They rushed me inside, faces pale, and told me the whole base was on high alert, that something had been trying to breach the fence. Something more than seven feet tall. But before I could respond, a burst of gunfire erupted from the far side of the base, followed by a crackle across the guards hip radio that the intruder was inside the base. That it had torn through the fence like it was made of paper. After that, everything happened fast. Our CO made the call to cut external power, plunging the base into darkness.

Night vision goggles were distributed, and a plan was made to form a line at one end of the base and push forward, driving the thing into a trap. So I took up position with the team lying in wait at the choke point. My hands felt sweaty on my rifle but I kept scanning the darkness, dreading what might come out of it. The man next to me, a German airman, prayed quietly. In the distance I heard the others advancing, shouting, firing. Then it happened. A massive, dark shape exploded from between two buildings, moving impossibly fast. And before any of us could react, it grabbed the German airman next to me and dragged him screaming into the shadows.

I took off after them, ignoring the shouts of my fellow soldiers. Following the sounds of struggle, I rounded a corner and found myself on a dead end between the mess hall and the gymnasium. And there it was, crouched over the now silent German airman. Through my night vision goggles I could see it clear as day. The thing was enormous, covered in dark fur, standing upright on powerful legs. Its hands ended in long, curved claws, and its wolf-like head featured a pronounced snout filled with bloody teeth. But there was something else, something that made it even more terrifying. A flicker of human intelligence in its eyes. I thought of Schweitzer, the cursed soldier from Heinrich's story, and knew without a doubt that this was him. This was an evil that had persisted for nearly two centuries.

I raised my rifle, but before I could fire, the creature tensed and leaped, not away from me but straight up, clearing a twelve-foot wall like it was nothing. I ran to follow, shouting for backup, but the thing was already moving from rooftop to rooftop with impossible agility. Then, with one final bound, it sailed clean over the perimeter fence and vanished into the dark forest beyond. I heard its howl echo through the trees, a sound of triumph, of freedom, or of hunger still not sated?

We searched those woods until dawn but found nothing except broken branches and tracks that seemed to disappear into thin air. And as the first rays of sunlight broke through the trees, I knew we were too late. The creature was gone now, back to whatever dark place it called home, where it would wait until the next time those candles went out. In the aftermath, a thorough investigation was launched but was ultimately pointless. CCTV footage from across the base showed nothing but confused soldiers running around in chaos, firing at the shadows. But I knew what I'd seen. We all did. I never told anyone about that shrine in the woods.

My buddies were too drunk to remember it or they simply didn't connect it to what happened that night. But I did. And that guilt of knowing that all of this could have been prevented if I just lit those candles, that's haunted me all these years. And sometimes I still think of that poor German airman and all the others who died at Schweitzer's hands over the centuries. And I pray that someone somewhere is keeping those candles lit.

Because that beast is still out there. Waiting in the dark woods of Morbach. Waiting for the flames to dieings. Werewolves! Yeah! Oh man, Brian, we've not had a werewolf story yet, have we? I can't believe we made it this long. I didn't even realize that I needed it until it happened.

And I was like, right, where have you been all my lives? Hopefully far away from me in reality. Absolutely. But in terms of storytelling, I'm so pumped about this one. I loved it because it was just so different than a lot of werewolf stories that I feel like I've heard of. You know, you think of like Little Red Riding Hood or things like that.

Yeah. You know, the Big Bad Wolf kind of stories. You tend to think more, I don't know, medieval, maybe, more know, you think of like Little Red Riding Hood or things like that. Yeah. You know, the Big Bad Wolf kind of stories. You tend to think more, I don't know, medieval, maybe more fantasy, maybe. Absolutely. I think one of the coolest things about this story for me was that it had this modern day affect, I guess. Because like you said, most werewolf stuff seems to be from the Middle Ages or just beyond that in Europe and kind of distant from everything. But then when I heard about this one and it was like, this happened in 1988 and it's based on this old legend basically in Germany, I thought,

what a great way to introduce werewolves to sightings. Yes. But this story of werewolf and Thomas Schweitzer does appear to be a real story in Germany that goes back a couple centuries, really. So I want to kind of, before we talk about what happened in 1988, I think it's important to talk about what is the legend here. I would love that. Because if I'm being completely honest,

I think I'm more into the legend a little bit than what actually happened at the base. Absolutely. Let's go back to 1812 then. Europe is in the middle of the Napoleonic Wars, the continents in chaos, and amidst this mess, this one French soldier named Thomas Johannes Baptiste Schweitzer decides to give up on the fight and return home. So off he goes, traveling through Germany with a bunch of Russian turncoats.

And as they're making their way through Rhineland, they encountered this one secluded farmhouse, the one that was mentioned in the story you read. And they tried to raid it for supplies. Everything went wrong though. And Schweitzer and his men ended up slaughtering the farmer and his sons. What about the wife? Well, the wife watched it happen apparently. Oh.

And upon seeing all of this, she was consumed by rage and curse Schweitzer. And apparently what she said was, from now on, at each full moon, he will change into a rabid wolf. Wow. That's just a very specific curse. It is. That's very German, you know? It's very specific, very straightforward.

I'm so filled with rage. This is exactly what will happen to you. Very precise. In hindsight, it looks like the curse worked because on full moons, this guy found himself consumed by blood lust and turned to rape, murder, cannibalism, lots of evil stuff. But as this chaos is consuming the Rhineland, basically, the locals began realizing that this thing terrorizing their farms was no man. It's a wolf-like creature that walks upright

and he's killing animals, he's killing people apparently, but things really seem to have come to a head when he encountered this young woman named Elizabeth Bearly and forced itself upon her and she ended up impregnated. And this enraged the locals. So they banded together to hunt the creature down. Okay. And the next full moon, they tracked it to its lair and killed it.

Okay. I guess at that crossroads that was mentioned in the story. But they didn't just kill it, they drove a stake through its heart. Sure. They decapitated it. Okay. And then they buried it. Due diligence.

Above that spot. They built a shrine with an image of the Virgin Mary and they lit a candle guarding against its return. Okay, I have so many questions, but maybe to start, let's zoom way out on, and just kind of tackle the notion of werewolves kinda writ large, because this seems to align with all the kind of typical tropes of werewolves kinda writ large, because this seems to align with all the kinda

typical tropes of werewolves. Like, was this the first werewolf story, or do they go back further than that? Oh, they go way back. So the concept of lycanthropy, which is Latin for wolf stuff, goes all the way back to ancient Greece and Rome. But in the 16th century in Germany or France,

there were werewolf trials, kind of like witchcraft trials. Wow. What's really cool about this story though, is that number one, well, as we'll get into it, has that modern element. But in addition to that,

it is really the first real introduction of some things that end up being kind of werewolf tropes. Before this, werewolf stories generally involved someone who could change into being a wolf at will. This seems to be the really the first story that introduced the concept of that transformation being linked to cycles of the moon. So that ultimately became a big Hollywood thing.

Like I can't think of any werewolf movies off the top of my head where someone didn't change into a wolf on the full moon. But before this, it was not a folklore thing, really. So that's kind of a neat thing about the story. Another thing which is unique about this story is that as we heard in the story, the werewolf ends up impregnating the girl. And she ends up having a child, and it ends up being a completely normal human.

Never transforms, never anything, which is the exact opposite of basically every werewolf legend that came before it. From, you know, the 1600s, 1500s. Change-lings, beget change-lings sort of thing. Exactly, where it's like this genetic curse. So that's kind of a really cool aspect of this that kind of brings the folklore a little bit and kind of full circle.

Gotcha. So this encounter in the 80s, is this what brought this kind of story of werewolves to Hollywood and America? Do we know? Well, werewolves were a thing well before the 80s. Oh, right. Wolfman. The classic monster movies. Okay.

But from what I looked at, it does seem like this was a legend in that area of Germany. And there are people, and we'll get into this, but there are people who've come forward and said, this is what happened on this Air Force base. What's interesting about this, that gives me a personal connection, I guess, is I used to live about 20 minutes from this Air Force base.

Whoa. And that whole area, this that gives me a personal connection, I guess, is I used to live about 20 minutes from this Air Force base. Whoa. And that whole area, I can see how these kind of legends might come to life there. Because you've got just this really fairy tale-like environment where you've got these creepy forests all over the place, you know? And it just seems like the kind of place where this is kind of just in the air, almost, so to speak. But, you know, aside from that, you know, the story goes that there were some soldiers. In the story, all of them were drunk, theoretically, but they found the shrine, and they didn't

light the candles, and then the wolf attacked the base, and someone ended up dead, and that's the story. That is the story. That is the story. And like, do we have a main point of contact for the origins of this 80s story? Or is it kind of just kind of an urban legend almost a little bit? It's almost urban legend, yeah. So I wonder if this is kind of an instance where this becomes something that people talk about on these Air Force bases and just kind of takes on a life of its own. So is there any hard evidence or?

There's something. I don't know if I'd call it hard evidence. So, let's start with the really hard stuff. Like, no news reports, no documents from the base itself. Okay. Now, the believer beaver in me might say, well, I don't know if an Air Force base would be readily admitting that they were attacked by a werewolf. Sure, yes. Now, there is a professor at the University of Pittsburgh.

He's an expert on German linguistics, I guess, and he's a folklorist. He wrote about this back in the 90s. And after writing about it in some capacity, he got an email, which he posted online that you can find. And this is what the email said, quote, I was stationed at Hahn Air Base, Germany, from May, 1986 to August, 1989 as a security policeman. And it was my group that witnessed the Morbach werewolf. Whoever told you the story about the monster that you put on your website had very accurate information.

The creature that we saw was definitely an animal and definitely dog or wolf-like. It was about seven to eight feet tall and jumped 12 foot security fence after taking three long leaping steps." End quote. And that's all he wrote? That's all he wrote. I mean, it was just like a, this was the early days of the internet, I guess. So kind of message boardy, but that's kind of all we got other than like people writing

down what they've heard, which gives this kind of an urban legend-y vibe. That said though, as we kind of discussed, like werewolf lore is no stranger to Germany. Okay. So I don't personally doubt that this legend is a thing. Like the legend of Schweitzer and the idea of a soldier, you're like fleeing the Napoleonic Wars, wreaking havoc, and that whether literally a wolf or

not kind of manifesting into this cautionary tale, so to speak. My feeling is the legend is cool, probably not actually about an actual man turning into a wolf, but more as a kind of cautionary tale about like violence and sort of darker nature of man, especially during war times. And on the base, I think it's very plausible that this legend was around the town.

Some airmen or some US soldiers stationed there had heard the legend from just being in the city, from just being there, and started kind of, there's a lot of downtime and Started spooking each other and telling stories and it spiraled into a tale that people believed Mm-hmm, and maybe maybe someone actually maybe there was actually an attack of some sort on this base though you would think there'd be documentation of that and You know the werewolf thing is sort of cover for something awful that happened.

Yeah. Yeah. Everything you're talking about, it feels to me almost like werewolf has become like kind of scapegoat for evil. Yeah. But yeah, I think, is there a believer beaver case to be made here? I would love to believe in the idea of werewolves because they're just so freaking cool. Yeah, they are very cool. I mean, again, my believer beaver is similar to the one on Alcatraz a little bit. Like that there is something essential

to like the storytelling itself and like the purpose of the storytelling that is true and trying to express something true, like about us and our experiences, that in that sense, like I believe. And like that's why these stories hold such wonder for us and kind of captivate our attention. Because it's almost like poetry.

It's almost like a poetic rendering of of these questions we have about ourselves and our connection to nature and, and what we're capable of. That was so poetic in itself, McLeod. And I don't think I can top that, so I concur. And listeners, especially if you're in Germany, shoot us a message, please. Hit us up on Instagram, at SightingsPod, or leave us a comment on Spotify. We love seeing those.

I kind of don't want to leave this one behind, Brian, because there's so much here. I want to just kind of talk about all the werewolf stories and learn more about the legend of werewolves. But Brian, where are we heading to next week? We are heading to Japan next week. It's a really cool mystery story. How mysterious of you. Yeah. It's such a weird, unique story that I don't really, it's unlike anything we've done on the show before.

Okay. I cannot wait. You've got me in such suspense. Well, listeners, we'll see you back same time, same place next week, right here on Sightings. Same time, same place next week right here on Sightings. Sightings is hosted by McLeod, Andrews and Brian Sigley. Produced by Brian Sigley, Chase Kinzer and McLeod, Andrews. Written by Brian Sigley. Story music by Jack Staten.

Series music by Mitch Bain. Mixing and mastering by Pat Kickleiter of Sundial Media. Artwork by Nuno Cernatus. For a list of this episode's sources, check out our website at sightingspodcast.com. Sightings is presented by Reverb and Q-Code. If you like the show, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform

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