Sighting record / 1870
March 22, 1870. The barque Lady of the Lake was alone in the North Atlantic, about 400 miles north of the Equator. At 6:30 in the evening, the sailors saw something in the sky. They reported to the Captain. It looked like a cloud. Light gray. Circular, divided inside into four parts, with a broader arm reaching beyond the rim and curving back like a tail. It hung much lower than the other clouds. Then it moved. Against the wind. Captain Frederick William Banner wrote it into his log, drew it, and watched until it was lost in the evening darkness. Three years later it appeared in a meteorological journal. In 1919, Charles Fort brought it to a far wider audience.
The Lady of the Lake was a barque under Captain Frederick William Banner. On 22 March 1870 she was in the North Atlantic at Lat. 5° 47' N., Long. 27° 52' W. That is about 400 miles north of the Equator and 860 miles from the coast of West Africa. Open water. No land in sight. The conditions were clear, with north-northeast winds.