France, location unknown — 17 June 1777
An unidentified Messier object
During a lunar eclipse, astronomer Charles Messier observed dark objects moving in parallel directions, which he described as “large and swift and they were ships, yet like bells.” “These, Messier says, may have been hailstones or seeds in the air; but they were more probably small meteorites.”
Source: “Observations of the transits of intra-mercurial planets or other bodies across the Sun’s disk,” The Observatory 29 (1879): 136. Fig. 33: French astronomer Charles Messier Case: W312