Kidnapped By Bigfoot?

The Albert Ostman Abduction

By TCC Team Member Dorraine Fisher

            There are very few stories of humans being abducted by sasquatches, but the Albert Ostman story is probably the most famous. And his detailed descriptions of the creatures’ behavior still ring true to this day.

            Ostman claimed to have never heard of sasquatches when he entered the Toba Inlet near Lund, British Columbia as a prospector in 1924. An old Indian that served as his guide explained about these hairy “people” that lived in the forests there.

            Ostman didn’t believe the myths told by the natives and he dismissed the stories. But the guide still insisted these “people” were very real and still lived in the area, as Ostman would learn soon enough.

            He and the guide arrived at the inlet mouth late one afternoon and made camp. The guide had supper with him and they made arrangements for him to return for Ostman in the same spot in three weeks time.

            Ostman hiked the area northeast of his location, did some hunting, and prospected for several days before he found a spot for his permanent camp about ten miles in that direction. He built a permanent fireplace for cooking, and he made himself a permanent bed to sleep in. He claimed he was a very heavy sleeper if he could get comfortable, and his new bed proved to be comfortable enough.

            He awoke the following morning to find his things had been moved around, but nothing was missing. The following night, he loaded his rifle and slipped it under the edge of his sleeping bag.

            The next morning he awoke to find his pack, that had been hanging on a pole, had been emptied and turned upside down. And some food items were missing, but nothing was torn apart, so he didn’t suspect a bear. He checked the area for tracks but found none, and he climbed up on a big rock with his rifle where he could watch the camp for a while, but nothing showed up there.

            The next night he made special preparations and planned to stay up all night to see if he could see the visitor, but he said he must have fallen asleep.

            He awakened to something picking him up, and it took him a moment to wake up and realize what was happening. He was still in his sleeping bag. He then felt like he was being “tossed on horseback” but could feel that whatever was carrying him was walking. 

            This is where Ostman’s account gives some striking details about being carried. He wanted to get to his knife, but it was positioned in such a way underneath him and he couldn’t get to it. He claims he had a firm grip on his rifle the whole time that had been inside the bag.

            “I could feel myself rise for every step,” he later told author John Green. “What was carrying me was breathing hard and sometimes gave a slight cough. Now, I knew this must be one of the mountain Sasquatch giants the Indian told me about.”
            He had slipped his boots inside his sleeping bag before he went to sleep in order to protect them. And he said he could feel the hobnail from one of the soles cutting into his foot while the creature was carrying him. “It hurt me terribly, but I could not move,” he explained.

            And he described the discomfort inside the sleeping bag. “It was very hot inside. It was lucky for me this fellow's hand was not big enough to close up the whole bag when he picked me up — there was a small opening at the top, otherwise I would have choked to death.”

            He guessed the whole uncomfortable trip to be about three hours long. When the creature finally put him down, it was still dark. And as he sat up and tried to get his circulation back, he could hear them “talking” to each other and he described what was happening:

            “I could hear now it was at least four of them, they were standing around me, and continuously chattering. I had never heard of Sasquatch before the Indian told me about them. But I knew I was right among them.”

            But what he didn’t know was how he would get away from them.

            He finally found the strength to stand up as the figures of them were becoming clearer as the sun rose higher in the sky.

            “What you fellas want with me?” he asked them, only to be answered by more chatter.

            As it got lighter outside, he could see them clearly, describing them as people, completely covered with hair and no clothes. His account was of a family of four, what he described as an “old man,” “old woman,” and two young ones he described as a boy and girl who seemed afraid of him.

            As he watched them chattering, he got the impression that the female was not too thrilled about what the male had dragged home. “The old man was waving his arms and telling them all what he had in mind,” Ostman said.

            And then they left him for a while to check his pack the creature had carried from his camp along with him, and to figure out where he was.  He went through his things and went about the business of getting food and water while the creatures watched him curiously from nearby. And on his way back, he could see where the family had been sleeping.

            “On the east side wall of this valley was a shelf in the mountain side, with overhanging rock, looking something like a big undercut in a big tree about 10 feet deep and 30 feet wide. The floor was covered with lots of dry moss, and they had some kind of blankets woven of narrow strips of cedar bark, packed with dry moss. They looked very practical and warm — with no need of washing.”

            The young male was becoming more curious and getting closer to him, so Ostman gave him his snuff box which he played with for quite a while, showing it to the others. But other than that, the first day with them was uneventful.

            The next morning, Ostman was determined to leave and he packed his pack, rolled his sleeping bag, and injected the shells into the barrel of his rifle. He attempted to walk out of the area, but was forced back by the old male. Ostman said, “I pointed to the opening. I wanted to go out. But he stood there pushing towards me — and said something that sounded like "Soka, soka."

            Ostman, afraid that his 30-30 rifle wouldn’t have much impact on the large male, decided to pull back and wait it out.

            The two young ones had been curious about him and he thought if he could make friends with them, they might help him. He gave the young male another snuff box with some snuff left in it. Ostman thought maybe the “boy” would give some to the older male.

            The next day, the female came back with food, and Ostman made dippers out of a couple of his food cans and gave them to the young ones to play with. When he showed the young male how to dip it in water, he seemed pleased, almost smiling. Then Ostman took a bite of his snuff, smacked his lips and said, “That’s good!”

            He tried to get the older male to come to him. He thought if he could get him to eat some snuff it would most certainly kill him. And Ostman, since he now saw these creatures as people, could reason it out in his mind that this wasn’t murder since the old male ate it on his own. And the creature kept coming closer and closer to him every day.

            One morning, after Ostman built a fire and made himself some breakfast, the male came within ten feet of him and sat down. Ostman pulled out his snuff box to take a pinch only to have the “old man”  snatch it out of his hand. And to his surprise, he emptied the entire box into his mouth and swallowed.

            Not long afterward, his eyes began to roll back in his head. Ostman described the scene.  “I could see he was sick. Then he grabbed my coffee can that was quite cold by this time, he emptied that in his mouth, grounds and all. That did no good. He stuck his head between his legs and rolled forwards a few times away from me. Then he began to squeal like a stuck pig. I grabbed my rifle.”

            The “old man” ran to find water. Seeing his only chance to escape, Ostman packed up what things he could quickly collect. The young male ran over to his mother who had also begun squealing. Ostman made a run for it, but the old female was right behind him. He turned and shot his rifle over her head and kept running toward the hills.

            “Must have made three miles in some world record time,” Ostman said. “I came to a turn in the canyon and I had the sun on my left, that meant I was going south, and the canyon turned west. I decided to climb the ridge ahead of me. I knew that I must have two mountain ridges between me and salt water and by climbing this ridge I would have a good view of this canyon, so I could see if the Sasquatch were coming after me. I had a light pack and was making good time up this hill. I stopped soon after to look back to where I came from, but nobody followed me. As I came over the ridge I could see Mt. Baker, then I knew I was going in the right direction.”

            Ostman, tired and sick after traveling quite a way, eventually came across a loggers’ camp at Sechelt Inlet where he stayed until the next morning. He caught a boat from there to Vancouver.

He had told the loggers he was a prospector and got lost. He said nothing about the sasquatches for fear they’d think he was crazy.