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The phenomenon that was the 'Angels of Mons' was experienced by a British troops retreating in the aftermath of
the Battle of Mons on the Western Front in August 1914.
Numerous soldiers claimed to have seen visions in the sky of St George surrounded by angels, horsemen and cavalry.

The visions, which were subsequently charitably attributed to the extreme tiredness of the British troops, most
of who had not slept in days, oringinated in a short story published by the journalist 'Arthur Machen( an author of
occult fiction) in London Evening News at the close of the month following the battle, entitled 'The Bowmen'

It was in the period of hectic retreat , when the British troops would have been so vulnerable to a pursuing
enemy, that something extraordinary occurred. British troops claimed that they had seen an apparition in the
Sky of three angelic figures who appeared to ward off the attacks of the enemy.
The retreat was successfully accomplished and the British troops lived to fight another day. The only link between the Mons retreat and Machen's story was its beginning, which observed that troops of the
British Expeditionary Force were in retreat; Mons itself was not mentioned. However the BBF was save in Machen's
story by the appearance of St. George et al.

Bizarrely veterans of the battle subsequently lent support to Machen's story, ensuring that the apparent visions took
on a legendary quality both during and after the war.
For a while towards the end of 1914 and into 1915 many people in Britain apparently gave Machen's story some
credence, somewhat to the embarrassment of the latter, who repeatedly denied any element of fact in his story,
"writing the itself is nothing"- a stance which merely heaped sceptical disbelief upon Machen ( with one cleric
refusing to believe Machen's word).

If nothing else, the fantasy never the less proved a remarkable morale booster in Britain at a time when military
success on the battlefield was proving elusive.

Dear Hope, a post that sparked a flood of memories, I visited Mons a few times when I lived in Belgium taking visitors there. I had completely forgotten about the tale of the Angels of Mons, which had actually been told to me by one of those visitors who was actually a singer/songwriter by trade but also an expert on the First World War.

There is this amazing picture ‘The Angels of Mons’ - painted by Marcel Gillis that is exhibited in the Grand Place in Mons which I thought most worthy of your post, and beneath the painting is a quote from an infantryman describing the Mons Angels sighting, published in a story run by a London newspaper at the time.



This story, allegedly from the lips of a Lancashire Fusilier wounded in the Battle of the Frontiers, was reported by nurse Phyllis Campbell in the London Evening News (31 July 1915):

'It’s true, sister. We all saw it. First there was a sort of a yellow mist like, sort of risin’ before the Germans as they came to the top of a hill, come on like a solid wall they did…no use fighting the whole German race, thinks I; it’s all up with us. The next minute comes this funny cloud of light, and when it clears there’s a tall man with yellow hair in golden armour, on a white horse, holding his sword up, and his mouth open as if to say, ‘Come on boys! I’ll put the kybosh on the devils.’ The minute I saw it, I knew we were going to win. It fair bucked me up – yes, sister, thank you…'

I love watching The Blue Angels.  Talk about holding your breath on some of their stunts.  They are literally breath taking...especially when they fly right over you.