Bedtime Stories

The Vietnam War was a conflict defined by brutality and uncertainty. Dense jungle concealed ambushes, artillery shattered the night, and young soldiers were forced to fight an enemy they could rarely see. It was a war of exhaustion, paranoia and relentless fear. Yet for some who served there, the Viet Cong were not the only threat moving through the trees. In whispered accounts that surfaced years later, they spoke of another presence in those jungles; an enemy unexplained.

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We have previously examined three forested regions of the United Kingdom, each of which has become a focal point for reports of high strangeness. Cannock Chase brought with it accounts of shadowed figures, cryptids and unexplained encounters. Clapham Wood revealed whispers of spectral entities and deeply unsettling phenomena. Pembrey Forest, outwardly quiet and unassuming, carried its own catalogue of strange sights and unnerving experiences. Now, we turn to another woodland. A forest where reports do not centre on a single apparition or isolated creature, but on a bewildering array of entities, sightings and encounters, spanning generations. This time, we step into the darkness of Delamere.

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Throughout history, there are countless examples of places or objects said to bring suffering to those connected with them, earning a reputation for being cursed. In earlier episodes, we have explored several of these stories, from infamously unlucky motor vehicles to the final resting place of a convicted murderer. In this episode, we turn our attention to the preserved remains of an Ice Age hunter, a body some believe is linked to a series of unexplained deaths. Together, these events have come to be known as The Iceman’s Curse.

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Some places sit quietly on the map, rarely drawing attention beyond those who live nearby. Others become known not for what happens there once, but for what keeps happening again and again; events that resist explanation, leave no clear record, and blur the line between history and testimony. In the mid twentieth century, a remote corner of Indonesia became the focus of a series of accounts that defied easy categorisation. Fishermen, villagers, and visiting outsiders all described encounters that did not fit local folklore, modern science, or conventional misunderstanding. What follows is not a single incident, but a pattern; fragmented, unsettling, and difficult to dismiss.

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He set off expecting nothing more than a long drive. A journey from Oregon to Florida, planned, ordinary, and uneventful. Somewhere along the way, however, Timothy Braddy disappeared. His truck would later be found parked beside a high school, undamaged and unlocked, as though he had stepped away briefly and never returned. There were no signs of violence, no clear reason for him to stop, and no trace of where he went next. What followed was not clarity, but silence. And with it, a question that still has no answer: how does someone simply vanish in plain sight?

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Tracks used by kind permission of Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

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