Flying Object appeared to be a fire ember

To Whom It May Concern: After watching a show on UFO sightings on History Channel, I’m motivated to tell of this event.
I, along with some friends have seen something we cannot explain. This is not a hoax, yet may be easily explained. 
The event took place in Western Kentucky some time in approximately 1974.  My friends and I were walking to a camping sight at night.  We were in a large open field, approx 30 acres.  We had a good view of a clear night sky. 
One friend says: "look at that!"  In the sky was an orange light that looked like an ember from a fire.  Its movement also resembled an ember rising up off of a fire.  We looked around 360 degrees and saw no fire anywhere.  We watched this ‘ember’ fly across the sky, rising and falling and looping around until it had flown out of sight behind the tree line.
Observations:  It looked and moved like a glowing ember off of a fire.
It was not close to the ground and appeared to be extremely high in the sky, or even in space.  We really couldn’t tell for sure what its altitude was.
There was only one.
Its color and brightness didn’t appear to change, though it did have tiny sparks flying off it, as if  wind was blowing on it.
Though we live in the quite countryside, we could hear no sound coming from it.
Witness indicates that the date of the incident is approximate.  PD