Time Travel - Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain - The Ghost of Versailles

It was a warm summers day, on the 10th of August 1901, and two friends, Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain, were enjoying a day out in Versailles France, as part of their vacation. As the day slowly drew closer to evening, the two ladies decided to visit the Petit Trianon,
and began to make their way slowly around the lovely gardens, admiring the flowers and commenting on what a lovely holiday they had been enjoying. They had both visited the palace and decided that they didn't want to leave until they had explored everything that the park had to offer.
And this is when the strange story started to unfold. The following events are one of the most amazing tales of possible time travel, or spontaneous time slips ever recorded.

After walking around for some time, they suddenly realised that they had no idea where they were. They had both become lost, and couldn't understand why they did not recognise any landmarks.
After turning a corner, they both saw a deserted farmhouse, and noticed an old farm plough by the side of the road.

After a few minutes a sudden feeling of oppression started to descend on them, and they both began to feel very strange. Suddenly out of nowhere they saw two men approaching them, dressed in strange attire. As the men got closer, the ladies realised that the men were wearing
these strange clothes, which they did not recognise. Long greyish green coats and tricorn hats. Approaching the men, the ladies asked them how to get to the Petit Trianon, and they were directed down a path that they hadn't seen before.

The dark mood had become very heavy by this time, and the women were beginning to feel quite ill. The cloying scent of flowers and the warmth of the day, began to take there toll. They decided to rest underneath a tree, and using their fans to produce a semblance of breeze, they realised to their astonishment, that everything had become very still and overly quiet. By this time both ladies were becoming a little uneasy. Anne and Eleanor were not young women prone to moments of fancy and panic, they were both respected academics, and known in their circle of friends to be very serious and intelligent. But by now, they both realised that something was not quite right. After spotting a gazebo, they decided to go over and have a rest.

Much to their surprise there was a man leaning against one of the posts. They had no idea where he had come from, but were dismayed to see the unpleasant look on his face. He had obviously suffered from small pox, as his face was pitted and unpleasant.
Just then, the ladies heard someone shouting that they were going the wrong way, and not being able to see who it was, they decided to take the advice anyway and turned back around and much to their surprise, they both saw a small bridge, which they were being
directed to cross.
Not wanting any trouble they made their way over the bridge and saw what they believed to be the Petit Trianon.

As they got nearer, they both saw a woman sitting on a stool, sketching. She was wearing an old fashioned dress which was covered with a pale green scarf. At this point, Anne and Eleanor both felt very heavy and suppressed again. The air felt as though it had got very
thick and still. They both watched the woman sketching for some time, trying to get their breath back. Suddenly a footman came rushing out of a nearby building and began herding them towards another entrance to the Petite Trianon. he said that they were on the wrong side and directed them to the right door. By the time they had gone around the corner of the building, they saw a wedding party, and realised that at that same time, the strange mood and stillness had lifted as though time had started up again.

Three months later, when Anne and Eleanor met up again and where talking about the trip, Anne happened to mention the strange woman that she had seen sketching. Eleanor looked at her in amazement.
'I never saw a woman sketching' she exclaimed. They were intrigued by this mystery and decided to write down exactly what had happened. By this time, events began to take a strange turn. Both ladies realised that they had seen different things, at different locations.
Investigating further, they realised that in fact on that day that they had visited the gardens, it had been the Anniversary of the sacking of the Tuileries, which was the events surrounding Marie Antoinette, and Louis the XV1. They had both witnessed the massacre
of their Swiss guards, and then been imprisoned in the Hall of the Assembly.

Anne and Eleanor began to think that maybe they had seen the ghost of Marie Antoinette, or somehow picked up a memory of that time, when Marie Antoinette had been sketching just before the massacre. Neither of the ladies knew about this at the time of the
visit to the garden, they only discovered this after serious study three months later.
As if to confirm their suspicion, Anne came across a picture of Marie Antoinette sitting in exactly the same place, and wearing exactly the same clothes that she had seen herself while experiencing the strange occurence in France.
In January 1902, Eleanor decided to retrace the steps that they had taken, and went back to the gardens to see what she could find.
Nothing.
The place was completely different from what both of the ladies had experienced.

Determined to get to the bottom of the story, both ladies contacted the Society for Psychical research, declaring that the Trianon was haunted.The Society decided that their story was not worth researching and after the initial disappointment, both ladies decided that they would do research of their own. They were convinced that they had seen the ghost of Marie Antoinette or had somehow traveled back into the past. They began to write an account of exactly what had happened. Reading books and searching through any documents that they could find, they began to realise that, what they had both seen was an accurate picture of what had taken place in 1789 Versailles. Neither of the woman had any knowledge of history, and especially not of thiis particular period. The 18th century was not a time that they had studied and felt that this in itself vindicated their story. They became very frustrated. They were not liars, and both ladies had nothing to gain by making up this story. In fact it could go a long way to ruining their reputation.

In 1911, they published a book titled An Adventure, under the pseudonyms of Miss Morison and Miss Lamont. Below is the evidence that they put together for the book.

They had both seen a plough, but discovered that there was no plough at the time of the visit. But there had been one in the past.

The bridge that they had crossed, did not exist in their time, but was there in 1789.

Marie Antoinette's Swiss guard wore green uniforms, Which is what the ladies both saw.

Comte De Vaudreuil was an enemy of Marie Antoinette. He had a very pockmarked face. Exactly the same as the sinister looking man, that the two ladies had seen.

The door that the footman had rushed out of, just before he saw the ladies and told them to go around to the front of the building, had in fact been barred up years before, and had not been touched since.

This last fact to me, seems the most relevant. If they had seen a reenactment, or somebody just innocently coming out of the door, it would add to the explanation. But this one simple fact, the door being barred for all of those years, says to me that something strange did happen.

After the death of both ladies a few years later, certain incidents in the book started to be questioned. For example. How do we know that they did not read about that time period after visiting France, and subconsciously added points to prove the story to the public?

Yes I understand why they would do it. I they were both fakes. But why would they say something like this, if it had not happened. My point is this. If they did elaborate the story slightly, I believe it was because they were both just trying to make sense of it.

On the day of their visit to the Petit Trianon near Versailles, the weather was hot and stormy. The sky was full of strange electrical phenomena. More so than usual. Is this somehow connected to the incident?

Maybe on that anniversary of such a traumatic day for Marie Antoinette, crossed with such strange electrical storms, a portal opened and Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain stepped back in time, and witnessed the final moments of Marie Antoinette's freedom, before history stepped in and changed her life forever.

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