Bignoux, FR being encounter — February 16, 1969

Jean-Claude Baillon learned of the Château des Martins episode during a family visit in August 1969 and then interviewed the caretaker, Mr. Meingault. The witness could not supply a precise date. Cross-checking placed it near the end of winter, probably around February 16, 1969. The familiar exact-day catalogue entry is therefore more definite than the original investigation. The château stood near Bignoux, northeast of Poitiers. On a moonless night, Meingault heard the horses galloping around their enclosure. From the château steps he saw them running, then noticed two intensely bright eyes between bushes and the paddock fence. He later described the eyes as pale green and estimated their height at about 1.15 metres above the ground. That is the height of the eyes, not a measured stature for a visible humanoid. He could not describe a face or body in the darkness. After retrieving a gun, he walked around the grounds and briefly thought a shadow was pursuing the horses through a thicket. He fired into the air to frighten a possible attacker, then went indoors. The animals remained disturbed the next morning. The paddock fence was broken in more than ten places; Baillon saw that damage months later, but found no footprints. By then rain and snow could have erased traces. The witness rejected a stray-dog explanation but did not claim to know what he had seen. Baillon discussed a local monster legend as speculation. No UFO was reported. The plate shows only the caretaker, frightened horses and ambiguous eye-like points, without inventing a ghost’s anatomy.