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November 22, 2019 16 mins
In the early hours of March 14th 1928, below deck of an ocean liner just off the coast of West Africa, former RAF pilot Colonel George Henderson reportedly experienced a 'crisis apparition' of his friend and fellow pilot, Captain Raymond Hinchcliffe saying he was lost and in great danger.
What Henderson is said not to have known at the time, is that Hinchcliffe, and his co-pilot, Elsie Mackay were 3000 thousands miles away, high in the clouds, and fated never to be seen again...
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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:11):
Welcome to Unexplained Extra with me Richard McClane Smith, where
for the weeks in between episodes we look at stories
and ideas that, for one reason or other, didn't make
it into the previous show. Last week's episode of View
from a Hill took a look at the haunting tale
of the infamous Coonian ghost House in Ireland. As was

(00:33):
mentioned briefly in the episode, it is said that author
Sean Leslie, who wrote about the Coonyan Haunting in his
nineteen fifty six book Ghost Stories, did himself grow up
in a haunted house. Castle Leslie and the surrounding estate,
located in County Monaghan in the north of Ireland, has

(00:53):
been owned by the Leslie family since the sixteen sixties,
although the current castle was built in eighteen seventy. Now
a high end hotel, the lavish, stately property has been
home to a number of distinguished occupants over the years,
some of which, it is alleged, have never truly left.

(01:14):
When Sean Leslie's mother, Leone, was approaching the end of
her life, she spent much of her time bedridden in
what was known as the Mauve Room. Shortly before she died,
it is said that her nurse witnessed her conversing with
an elderly woman who was assumed to be just a
good friend of Leone's. Later, after Leonie had died, the

(01:38):
nurse was attending a memorial service at Leslie Castle when
she recognized the elderly friend in a family painting. The
woman was Lady Constance Leslie, Leonie's mother in law, who
died twenty years before. A second ghost said to aunt
the castle is that of Norman Leslie, Leoni's son, and

(02:02):
Sean Leslie's brother. A number of visitors claimed to have
seen an apparition fitting Norman's description in the room known
ominously as the Red Room. It was there in nineteen
fourteen that Leoni is said to have awoken suddenly to
find her son standing next to her, despite the fact

(02:23):
that he was overseas fighting in the First World War
at the time. Leoni discovered shortly after that Norman had
been killed in battle. As some might point out, it
could be claimed that Leoni hadn't seen a ghost at all,
but instead experienced what is referred to as a crisis apparition,

(02:46):
a supposed momentary vision of a loved one that some
belief can occur in a moment of extreme stress. This
story put me in mind of a similar incident that
has claimed to have taken place just over a decade later.
Early one morning, aboard a large steamship out somewhere off
the coast of West Africa in the early hours of

(03:15):
March fourteenth, nineteen twenty eight, Below deck of the Grand
ocean liner S S. Barrabole, somewhere to the south of
the Canary Islands, Squadron leader Rivers old Meadow was fast
asleep in his cabin. Also on board was old Meadow's
good friend and colleague, Colonel George Henderson. The former RIF

(03:39):
pilots and veterans of the Great War, were returning from
South Africa after a six month stint demonstrating the latest
in aviation technology. It had just gone to a m
when Old Meadow was startled awake by the sound of
someone crashing into his room. Hurriedly switching on the light,

(04:00):
he was bemused to find his friend, Colonel Henderson standing
before him in his pajamas, with a look of shock
on his face and in the grip of an obvious
and distressing panic. God Rivers. He cried something ghastly has happened?
Hinch has been in my cabin by patch and all
it was ghastly. He kept repeating, over and over again, Hendy,

(04:24):
what am I going to do? What am I going
to do? I've got this woman with me and I'm lost,
I'm lost. And then he disappeared in front of my eyes,
just completely disappeared. Old Meadow stared for a moment, trying
to take it all in, then, thinking the best course
of action was to try and calm his friend down,

(04:47):
poured Henderson a stiff drink. As Henderson sipped his whiskey,
the pair tried to comprehend what had taken place. Hinch
was their mutual friend and fellow former RF pilot, Captain
Raymond Hinchcliff. The three of them were said to have
formed a strong bond, having flown together during the Great War,

(05:10):
the only problem being that Hinchcliff wasn't on board the ship.
Since they both knew Hinchcliff to be flying commercial planes
in Europe, they could only assume that Henderson's vision had
been at best and especially lucid dream or at worst,
a portent of an imminent threat to their friend. As

(05:31):
for the identity, of the mysterious woman he apparently spoke of.
They had absolutely no idea. Having eventually calmed down, Henderson
returned to his cabin and did his best to get
back to sleep. As it happened, Hinchcliff wasn't in Europe
at all, but was instead flying somewhere over the Atlantic

(05:53):
while taking part in a record breaking attempt to fly
to America. It was two days days later when the
news reached all those on board the s s barable
that the plane Captain Hinchcliffe had been flying in was
now missing over the Atlantic. The vision, it seemed, had

(06:14):
been portentous after all. However, there was no mention of
any woman on board with him. Since Hinchcliffe had been
attempting the journey alongside his good friend and co pilot
for the flight, Gordon Sinclair, or so people thought, are

(06:34):
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Slash Unexplained Podcast. Elsie McKay was born in eighteen ninety three,

(07:46):
the daughter of wealthy businessman James McKay, who would go
on to become the chairman of the Peninsula and Oriental
Steam Navigation Company better known as p and O. After
eloping with actor Den Windham in nineteen seventeen, Elsie was
said to have been disinherited by her family before embarking

(08:07):
on a successful career as an actor in her own right,
starring in a number of silent movies over the next
few years. When the marriage ended abruptly in nineteen twenty two,
Elsie was welcomed back into the family, after which, with
the help of her father, she embarked on a second
career as an interior decorator, going on to design the

(08:29):
interiors for a number of his company's vessels. Elsie's true passion, however,
was flying. In the years since the end of the
First World War, air flight and speed records had been
rapidly tumbling as aviation technology continued to advance at an
exponential rate. Elsie had followed them all with increasing excitement.

(08:54):
In June nineteen nineteen, John Alcock and Arthur Brown were
the first to cross the Antic, followed by Portuguese aviators
Geigo Coutino and sat Dura Cabral in nineteen twenty two,
who flew from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro. Five years later,
Charles Limburgh caught the public imagination with his extraordinary solo

(09:16):
crossing from the United States to Europe, and before long,
Elsie was dreaming of creating her own record to become
the first woman to cross the Atlantic, despite the reservations
of her father, who worried about the dangers of such
a venture. Elsie, who'd always plowed her own furrow, began

(09:37):
preparations in earnest and by the end of nineteen twenty
seven had purchased a six seater aircraft named the Endeavor
to complete the trip. What she needed next was a
co pilot. Captain Raymond Hinchcliffe needed little convincing, having lost

(09:57):
an eye during an aerial dog fight towards the end
into the war, The pilot, who'd become famous for his eyepatch,
was by the late twenties finding it harder and harder
to judge his take off and landings. With Mackay offering
not only the prize money for becoming the first woman
to complete the Atlantic crossing, she also offered to ensure

(10:18):
his life for ten thousand pounds close to five hundred
and fifty thousand British pounds today, enough for the thirty
three year old Hinchcliffe to retire altogether and spend the
rest of his time at home with his wife and children.
Worried that her father might try to stop her, Elsie
took pains to keep the trip secret from him and

(10:41):
the press, even threatening to sue one prominent paper when
they got wind of the planned adventure. In order to
throw them off the scent, Hinchcliffe's friend Gordon Sinclair was
asked to put his name forward as the official copilot
on the flight plan. Sinclair even went as far as

(11:03):
to stay at a hotel close to the airfield in
which they would begin their flight on the night before
they were due to leave. By then, Sinclair's involvement had
been leaked to the press, and by the morning of
the flight a number of papers were heralding Hinchcliff's attempted
journey to New York, with Sinclair accompanying him as his

(11:23):
co pilot. Sinclair had even agreed to go into hiding
until Hinchcliff and McKay had completed their journey. On the
morning of Tuesday, March thirteenth, at r F Cranwell Airfield

(11:43):
in the east of England, Captain Hinchcliffe clambered into the
cockpit of the Endeavor and moments later Elsie McKay was
smuggled on board without anyone noticing. A few minutes later,
as a light snow began to fall, the pair were
taking off into the sky. As they embarked on their

(12:04):
ambitious three and a half thousand mile journey across the Atlantic.
At one thirty pm, chief lighthouse keeper at Mysen Head
on the southwest coast of Cork in Ireland, looked up
to see mackay's six seater monoplane shooting overhead toward America.

(12:25):
Not long after, the crew on board a steamship out
in the Atlantic on route from France also witnessed the endeavor,
by then heading on into increasingly stormy weather. Many hours later,
roughly three thousand kilometers away, the S S. Barrabole was
drawing closer to the Canary Islands when Squadron leader Rivers

(12:49):
old Meadow was shocked awake by the arrival of Colonel
George Henderson in his cabin, claiming to have seen a
vision of a deeply distressed Hinchcliff. A five thousand strong
crowd waited at Michael Field in Long Island, Newfoundland, to
welcome the safe arrival of Hinchcliffe and what they assumed

(13:10):
to be his co pilot, Gordon Sinclair, but the plain
was never seen again. In December nineteen twenty eight, a
wheel with a serial number traced back to Elsie McKay's
endeavor washed ashore in Donegal, Northwest Island. The only part

(13:30):
of her plain that was ever found, or at least
that is how the story was told by writer John G.
Fuller in his nineteen seventy eight book The Airmen Who
Would Not Die, which drew largely on a letter that
Fuller claimed to have found written by Rivers Old Meadow
in nineteen sixty one. Though there is no disputing the

(13:53):
fate that befell Elsie McKay and Captain Raymond Hinchcliffe, doubts
were raised regarding the extraordinary claim of Henderson's supposed vision
on the night of their disappearance. In two and eighteen,
Robert Chamran and Steve Hume, writing in the Journal of
the Society for Psychical Research, exposed a number of holes

(14:15):
in the story, not least of all that the SS
Barraball had not in fact set self for England until
mid April of nineteen twenty eight, which would have put
Henderson and old Meadow on board the vessel a good
two weeks after Mackay and Hinchcliffe's disappearance had come to light.
Though some have sought to excuse the inconsistency that no

(14:38):
one as yet has managed to uncover a copy of
Old Meadows supposed nineteen sixty one letter describing the extraordinary
event has only helped to cast further doubt on the story. Unexplained,
the book and audiobook, featuring ten stories that have never

(15:00):
before been covered on the show, is now available to
buy worldwide. You can purchase through Amazon, Barnes and Noble,
and Waterstones, among other bookstores. All elements of Unexplained, including
the show's music, are produced by me Richard McClain smith.
Please subscribe and rate the show wherever you listen to podcasts,
and feel free to get in touch with any thoughts

(15:21):
or ideas regarding the stories you've heard on the show.
Perhaps you have an explanation of your own you'd like
to share. You can reach us online at Unexplained podcast
dot com or Twitter at Unexplained Pod and Facebook at
Facebook dot com, Forward slash Unexplained Podcast. Now it's time

(15:48):
to take care of yourself. To make time for you,
Tell a doc gives you access to a licensed therapist
to help you get back to feeling your best. Speak
to a licensed therapist by phone or video anytime between
seven am to nine pm local time, seven days a week.
TELEDOC therapy is available through most insurance or employers download

(16:11):
the app, or visit teledoc dot com Forward slash Unexplained
podcast Today to get started. That's t e ladoc dot
com Slash Unexplained Podcast
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Richard MacLean Smith

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