midnight
About eleven a company of soldiers came through Horsell , and deployed along the edge of the common to form a cordon . Later a second company marched through Chobham to deploy on the north side of the common . Several officers from the Inkerman barracks had been on the common earlier in the day , and one , Major Eden , was reported to be missing . The colonel of the regiment came to the Chobham bridge and was busy questioning the crowd at midnight . The military authorities were certainly alive to the seriousness of the business . About eleven , the next morning 's papers were able to say , a squadron of hussars , two Maxims , and about four hundred men of the Cardigan regiment started from Aldershot . A few seconds after midnight the crowd in the Chertsey road , Woking , saw a star fall from heaven into the pine woods to the northwest .