Angel Caught On Camera

An Angel, a wartime romance and a Cotswold mansion are the magic ingredients of a tale which is set to earn a man from Stroud in the UK, £350,000. Stroud architect and researcher into the paranormal, Danny Sullivan, 45, bought a 50 year-old film and a case of documents at a junk shop in Monmouth for £15. It was a bargain of a lifetime. The film, believed to show footage of an Angel at Woodchester Mansion, and the papers have been bought by Hollywood director Tony Kaye, who plans to collaborate with Marlon Brando to make the romantic epic.

The story began during World War One when British soldiers reportedly saw an Angel leading them into battle at Mons in France in August 1914. After the war, returning soldier William Doidge, began his obsessive quest to find out more about the Angel after losing contact with his wartime love, a Belgian woman, identified only as Marie.

He wrote to various societies connected with the supernatural and in 1952 received a letter from an American veteran of World War Two, who had also witnessed the Angel. The serviceman, identified in letters to Doidge only as Doug, had seen the Angel at Woodchester Mansion as an omen of tragedy about to happen.

American and Canadian troops had been stationed at Woodchester Mansion during the Second World War. Disaster struck there in 1944 when around 20 men were drowned in a lake following the apparent collapse of a pontoon bridge. Doug claimed the evening before the tragedy he had seen the Angel hovering over the lake.

He wrote. 'I could see what looked like long white robes. It had no feet and there were shapes like wings behind its shoulders. I can't prove what I saw was an angel, but I swear it's the truth.' Doidge began a vigil at Woodchester Mansion and in the winter of 1952 he captured the Angel on cine camera.

Fifty years later the film, which lasts just a few minutes, was found by Danny Sullivan among the case of papers at the junk shop in Monmouth.

He showed his find to public relations boss Mark Borkowski, who lives near Stroud who told film director Tony Kaye who was enthralled by the tale. Danny, is keeping his feet on the ground, at least until the deal has been finalised. 'Last week I was jumping up and down with excitement,' he said. 'It is the closest we have on film to proof of an angel,' he said. 'I've spent much of my life looking at special visual effects and this is an effect for which I have no explanation.'

Mr Sullivan had failed to get all of Doidge’s papers from the trunk, recently returned to Bonita’s for the missing documents. But the trunk was gone, and with it the end of Doidge’s story. Mr Read Smith (the owner of the shop) said he had no idea what happened to the remaining documents.