Unidentified animals · Greenwich, Cumberland County
The Greenwich “Jersey Devil” that fed on William Hyman’s chickens (1925)
One contemporary local newspaper report · Animal not identified
A December 1925 newspaper reported that a Greenwich farmer shot an unidentified animal that hopped like a kangaroo, after it killed a number of his chickens.
A kangaroo-hopping raider
On December 17, 1925, the Monitor-Register of Woodstown, in Salem County, published a short item headed “Another ‘Jersey Devil’ Is Found at Greenwich.” It reported that “Wm. Hyman, Greenwich farmer,” had shot an animal the previous week after it killed a number of his chickens. The paper said the animal, by Hyman’s account, “hops like a kangaroo.” It described the creature as about the size of an Airedale, with dark tawny fur, forequarters higher than its rear, and four webbed toes on its hind feet. It also noted that the long teeth in the upper jaw met the fangs in the lower jaw exactly. The paper offered no identification, calling the animal “as puzzling as the strange beasts found previously.”
Not the only puzzling animal that season
The same item noted that the paper had recently run what it called exclusive stories about another unidentified animal, also called a Jersey Devil by many, found in the woods along the Harding Highway near Franklinville. It then described a third animal, the “‘Prehistoric’ Jersey Devil,” found some time earlier near Franklinville, which had jointed paddles instead of front feet but was otherwise much like the Greenwich animal. Henry Finger of Franklinville, the paper said, had sent the first specimen to the University of Pennsylvania, where “as yet experts have been unable to identify it.” No follow-up naming a species for any of the three animals was located.
What the record does and does not show
This is one brief item in a small-town weekly, not a scientific report. It describes an animal that was shot and examined rather than glimpsed in flight, which sets it apart from the winged Jersey Devil of the January 1909 newspaper wave. The paper does not say what became of the carcass, whether anyone else examined it, or where in Greenwich the shooting happened.
Sources and research limits
- The Monitor-Register (Woodstown, Salem Co., N.J.), December 17, 1925, page 1, “Another ‘Jersey Devil’ Is Found at Greenwich” — The page's OCR text was retrieved from the Library of Congress Chronicling America full-text service and read on September 11, 2026. It is the only account located. The item does not name a more specific location within Greenwich, does not say how many people saw the animal, and gives no date for the earlier Franklinville find.