Medium, identified!

A little bit of this and not so much of that

As part of a ritual which allegedly took place at Highgate Cemetery in 1971, David Farrant recruited the services of a medium to summon the Highgate vampire: 'To the North of the Circle a small "sealed" triangle was cast (also containing a small fire) where the entity would be summoned to appear, and hopefully, be able to "communicate" with a psychic medium who would be inside the protective Circle.'

'As midnight approached, the medium began to make the Commands for manifestation'.

The temperature in the Circle suddenly dropped. The candles blew out. A misty shape began to form. The only thing missing? Thunder and lightning.

'The medium spoke aloud, attempting to aid "its" materialisation and all at once, two eyes could be seen at the top of the moving black form.' Farrant had seen these eyes before: 'They were the same eyes that I had witnessed inside the gate, dull red and almost diabolically evil; only this time, they had increased in strength to such a degree that it was like being confronted by some "living presence".'

The medium decided enough was enough of this supernatural tomfoolery, so Farrant and the medium 'performed a rite of banishment during which the entity promptly vanished.'

Who was this androgynous, anonymous medium? How are we supposed to verify the claims and their experience? Unfortunately, Farrant's account doesn't name our psychic sleuth. We've reached a dead-end.

Or have we? As it happens, I have an article he wrote in 1975 which reveals the medium's identity.

It turns out, the medium's name was—David Farrant. 'I arose to begin the Commands of manifestation'¹, 'I spoke aloud, trying to help its materialisation . . . Seeing the dangers involved in prolonging the ceremony, without hesitation (though with some effort) I performed a ritual of banishment during which the entity vanished.'²

Despite being published only four years after the supposed manifestation, the article relates no familiarity with the smoky entity's eyes, suggesting a latter-day revision to add 'atmosphere' to the tale.

---

^{1. D Farrant, 'Invoking the vampire', New Witchcraft, vol. 1, no. 4, 1975, p. 37.↩}  

^{2. ibid., p. 38.↩}

Revamp

After I shut down Diary of an amateur vampirologist and started a new blog, I've decided this one could do with a shake-up, too. It's been a while a while since I've toyed around with it.

To see what the blog looked like till now, click on the image to the right. But it's not just the layout I want to change with this thing, but the 'tone', too. Some of it. I want it to have more of a scholarly tone. The previous entry gave a taste of that.

Now that I know how to create footnotes in HTML, the main text won't be encumbered with intrusive author-date referencing.

I've also been wondering whether I should merge this and my WordPress blog of the same name. We'll see.

Tomb aux folles

Yesterday was International Talk Like a Pirate Day. To (belatedly) commemorate the occasion, let's take a peek at a paranormal pirate 'investigated' by David Farrant.

He reproduced an article covering the event from the Evening News, dated 'Wednesday 1, 1972'. While a month would've been helpful for citation purposes, we can pinpoint it to November, thanks to contemporary coverage of the case (e.g. 'Halloween ghost couple held', Daily Express, 1 November 1972, p. 13). Citations have never been Farrant's strong-point.

However, far from detailing any supernatural activity, the press coverage concerns the arrest of Farrant and his assistant, Victoria Jervis (listed as 'Lucy Grant' in the Daily Express account) while conducting a summoning ritual in St. Mary's churchyard, Monken Hadley, Barnet. On Hallowe'en night, no less.

The reproduced Evening News article describes Farrant's intent: 'Farrant, 33-year-old President [Farrant would have been 26 at the time, as he was born on 23 January 1946] of the British Psychic and Occult Society [his organisation was not called this until 1983. Farrant must have incorrectly transcribed the article], explained . . . "The ghost of Wallmsley the Pirate comes out twice a year - on Hallowe'en and Christmas Eve."' The source for this tale, was 'local stories'.

The couple were charged with 'disfiguring a churchyard' ('Halloween ghost couple held'), which later articles would clarify as 'indecent behaviour under the Ecclesiastical Courts Jurisdiction Act of 1860' ('"Ghost watchers" fined for ritual in churchyard', The Guardian, 23 November 1972, p. 10). They were fined £10. The same article mentions the presence of a reporter, who, according to Farrant was only there to 'be a witness if the spirit appeared'. He also denied informing the press. If that's the case, he certainly chose a strange 'witness'.

There is evidence that Farrant didn't tip-off the press, in this instance: mainly because it's clear he got his assistant, Victoria Jervis, to do it instead. After being subpoenaed for another one of Farrant's trials (in 1974), here's what she had to say about her involvement in the ritual:

I have tried to put most of what happened out of my mind. The false letters I wrote to a local paper were to stimulate publicity for the accused. I saw him almost every weekend in the second half of 1972 and I went to Spain with him for a fortnight at the end of June that same year. I was arrested with him in Monken Hadley Churchyard. That incident upset me very much. Afterwards, my doctor prescribed tranquilisers for me.

She added, 'You have photograhed [sic] me a number of times in your flat with no clothes on. One photograph was published in 1972 with a false caption claiming I was a member of your Society, which I never was.'

And reporter in question? 'By coincidence, her cousin was a reporter on the Barnet Press', as Farrant mentioned in Dark secrets: a true story of Satanism, Black Magic and modern day Witchcraft exhortations (London: British Psychic and Occult Society, 2001), p. 70. The irony is, Jervis was not even 'qualified' to participate, as the same page says: 'For the purpose of this ritual, I planned to use a psychic medium (in fact, one who helped in the Highgate Cemetery ritual some two years before) but, as she was unavailable at Hallowe'en, I chose an assistant called Victoria Jervis instead.'

After noting that Jervis was 'visibly shaken' by this event, he went on to say, 'Her cousin had certainly come across a good story but, now, before the case had even come to court, the episode had found its way into the national press' (p. 71).

The funny thing is, all these troubles could've been avoided if Farrant took the trouble to conduct an actual investigation, rather than trespassing on church property to conduct rituals in the dead of night. The 'mystery' of our ghostly pirate, Tom Wallmsley [sic], was unravelled by Jennie Lee Cobban.

For those unfamiliar with Cobban, a local historian and archaeologist in Barnet, she was the original founder of the Highgate Vampire Society. According to Farrant:

So lets begin at the beginning: in the latter part of 1995 a historian from Barnet started The Highgate Vampire Society. Her name was Jennie Lee-Cobham [sic]. She began the Society when she was researching material for a book (published in 1996) on ghosts in North London, including Highgate and the Barnet area. This was started mainly as an historical Society, but in 1997, the work-load got a bit too much for Jennie and she asked me if I would be interested in taking this over from her and running it as a ‘sister society’ to the British Psychic and Occult Society. I agreed, and kept the name and the membership she had gathered up to that point.

A similar version of events was recounted on the Arcadia forum:

In 1995, a lady called Jennie Lee Cobban was researching a book on the history of Barnet and Enfield, and had contacted myself. She was particularly interested in a case I was involved with at Monken Hadley churchyard, when I was arrested for 'summoning up a pirate's ghost' in the churchyard, in October 1972. She was also interested in the so-called Highgate 'vampire' case that had occurred in Highgate in the early 1970s.

She had been commissioned to write a book on the history of Barnet and Enfield, and she also wanted to include the so-called Highgate Vampire case as well.

For this purpose I was invited to her home in 1995, and learned that she had done a lot of research into the Highgate 'vampire' case. Because of all the interest, she had at that time formed a society, the Highgate Vampire Society, which she had set up to deal with the interest into this particular subject.

Her book came out in 1997 [sic], and was titled 'Geofrrey de Mandeville and London's Camelot: Ghosts, Mysteries and the Occult in Barnet', and dealt with these aspects, as well as including a chapter on myself.

As part of her research - as said - Jenny had already formed the Highgate Vampire Society, and because of domestic reasons she asked me if I would be willing to 'take this over'. I did so, using the name, and all of her initial membership.

Those are probably the only references you'll find to its founding, as this 'history' is not mentioned in the Highgate Vampire Society page. If anything, it alludes to Farrant being its sole founder and Cobban's role has been all but 'erased':

But in 1997, following a mass of speculation about the so-called Highgate Vampire and misguided controversy that had come to surround his name - not least because this had spread to a world wide interest in the case - David Farrant decided to form the Highgate Vampire Society, its purpose (as he said at the time) . . . “One of our main aims will be to become a repository for all the oral history and written data concerning the Highgate Vampire”.

While Cobban makes no mention of founding the society in the book Farrant mentions, Geoffrey de Mandeville and London's Camelot: ghosts, mysteries and the occult in Barnet (Barnet, U.K.: The Author, 1996), she does deal with the Monken Hadley case:

David may console himself with the knowledge that even had he managed to conduct his ceremony uninteruppted in 1972, he would still not have managed to raise the ghost of a pirate at Monken Hadley, because no pirate was ever buried there (p. 138).

She went on to say, 'The gravestone in question is that of Walter Walmsley who died in 1723 at the age of 42. His grave is certainly decorated with a design of a skull and crossbones (still just about discernible), but this was a very common funerary emblem and was never intended to imply that a pirate had been buried in the grave.' Indeed, the 'skull and crossbones' motif was used by pirates because of its symbolism, not to signify pirate graves. Here's more on trends with tombstone motifs:

Early monuments and grave stones in Europe and in old New England were crude and were carved with frightening motifs like winged skulls, skeletons and angels of death. The idea was to frighten the living with the very idea of death. In this way, they were apt to live a more righteous life after seeing the images of decay and horror on the markers of the dead. It would not be until the latter part of the 1800’s that scenes of eternal peace would replace those of damnation.

'Coincidentally', Farrant does not mention these revelations in his subsequent books which cover the case. A classic example of 'mystery mongering'. Therefore, it's safe to assume the story's a bunch of arrrse.

Edit (26 January 2012):  Farrant actually does acknowledge the revelations in one of his publications, Rob Milne's Return of the vampire hunter: an exclusive interview with reclusive vampire hunter, David Farrant (London: British Psychic and Occult Society, 2003). Sort of: 'A ghostly pirate. Presumably the reason it was supposed to be the ghost of a pirate was because a very small 17th century gravestone known as the pirates [sic] grave, had a skull and crossbones on it and so people imagined that it was a pirate (p. 12).

However, this revelation is obviously derived from Cobban, sans acknowledgement. After all, what was Farrant trying to summon, if he was aware of this 'urban legend's origins at the time?

Articles in VIEN

On Friday, I received a few issues of the Vampire Information Exchange (VIE) newsletter, VIEN, which discussed the Highgate vampire case.

I chased 'em up based on the citations they were given in Rob Brautigam's article, 'The vampire hoax of Highgate Cemetery'. After reading through them, I was left wondering: was it worth chasing them up in the first place? Here are the articles in question:

Paul B. Thomson [sic]:
"The Highgate Vampire"
in: "Vampire Information Exchange Newsletter" issues 22 and 23
VIEN, New York, USA, 1984

Jeanne Youngson :
"Highgate - Fact or Fraud ?"
in: "Vampire Information Exchange Newsletter" issue 23
VIEN, New York, USA, 1984

I recognised the first article as something that'd also been reprinted in Fate (May 1985, pp. 74–80)*, which, in turn, was originally published in the Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained's journal, Pursuit, vol. 16, no. 3. VIEN adds that the article was originally printed in 1983. It also mentions that Thompson was a former VIE member.


The difference between 'em, is that the Fate reprint omits the reference list that VIEN's version retains. So, you could go out of your way to score the VIEN issues featuring Thompson's article—and believe you me, they're not easy to come by—or, you read its 'missing' reference list here. It's from VIEN's 23rd issue (November 1984, p. 12). I've rendered the underlined titles in italics:

Hampstead and Highgate Express: Feb. 6, 13, 20, 27, March 6, 1970.

Letter from Jean B. Pateman, August 6, 1975

London Times: Aug. 7, 30, 1970; June 11, 15; July 2, 13, 18, 1974.

Occult, newsletter of the British Occult Society, Vol. 14, No. 11, March 13, 1981.

Summers, Montague, The Vampire: His Kith and Kin, University Books.

Sylvaine Super Star, privately published in France, ca. 1980. Her bibliography contains references to the Highgate Cemetery case.

Underwood, Peter, The Vampire's Bedside Companion, Leslie Frewin, London, 1975.

Some interesting stuff there. For starters, Occult, appears to be a precursor to The Cross and the Stake, the Vampire Research Society's newsletter, which, in turn, transmogrified into an online forum of the same name. The volume and issue number of Occult is quite daunting: it must be nearly impossible to score a single issue of the newsletter, little alone all the issues.

Sylvaine Super Star is no doubt the work of French actress, Sylvaine Charlet, who Manchester captions 'a glamourous and invaluable ally' in the '85 edition of The Highgate vampire (1985, p. 100). According to the book, she also accompanied him on vampire vigils...and masquerade ball (pp. 118—20, 123—4).

Thompson's article, itself, makes references to the MS which would later become The Highgate vampire (1985). I definitely recommend Thompson's article, but it might be easier and cheaper to score it from Fate. I, however, am gonna try and find the original Pursuit version, as I'm a stickler for first editions and such.

Youngson's 'Highgate - fact or fraud?' (November 1984, pp. 19—20), on the other hand, appears to be an original article. She was the president of the Count Dracula Fan Club (now Vampire Empire). The article recounts a recent trip to Highgate Cemetery, in which she is taken on tour by a 'member-volunteer'. Naturally, she asks about the vampire, who mentions that such accounts are discredited by the cemetery's caretakers, the Friends of Highgate Cemetery. There's even a perfectly rational explanation for the mysterious dead foxes allegedly found in the cemetery—something neither Manchester nor Farrant seem to have mentioned in their writings.

She is very critical of Farrant's behaviour at the cemetery, however, she mistakenly assumes he was responsible for a corpse being propped up in a car (someone else came forward during Farrant's 1974 trial, admitting to the crime). Lastly, she deals with the 'controversy' over the cemetery's setting for Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897). It is commonly assumed that vampiress, Lucy Westenra's tomb was located there. However, closer readings of Stoker's novel (which Youngson alludes to), have produced very different results.

The issue, itself, is billed as a 'Highgate Cemetery Edition'. Apart from the remainder of Thompson and Youngson's article, it also includes reprints of articles from The Times (referred to as the London Times, due to the paper's American publication) and one from the National Examiner, 'Real-life vampires roam cemetery' (August, 1984). Despite the article's date, its content harkens back to Manchester's 'Highgate vampire' chapter for Underwood's The vampire's bedside companion (1975).

However, there is one very noticeable difference. The assistants featured in Manchester's chapter, are here described as 'two policemen'. Surely there's an error here. That's probably not surprising, considering the paper's reputation: 'Like other tabloids, its contents have often come under question, and it has been derided for its sensationalistic writing.'

So, can I recommend chasing up these issues? Apart from Youngson's original article, no, not really. If you want newspaper articles, you're better off finding the originals, especially with the advent of digital archives. Thompson's article is a goodie, but if you can get it elsewhere, why bother? Its not even the original printing.

That's not to dismiss the VIEN altogether. After all, I've heard of some juicy stuff in the newsletter's sixth issue. Who knows, there might be more interesting tidbits buried there. But I think it's safe to say that you can give these ones a miss.

* A Fate article I already had.

Presenting the amazing...paranormal escalator!

Props goes to fellow forum member, Cú Chulainn, for sharing a fascinating article on the way (alleged) paranormal phenomena can morph from witness to media.

Maurice Townsend's 'The paranormal escalator' illustrates the need to pay close attention to an eyewitness's original testimony. Go back to the source. It's easy for an original account to morph into something else, especially when overlaid with paranormal assumptions and interpretations on the alleged sightings in question. Benjamin Radford depicts this scenario in Scientific paranormal investigation: how to solve unexplained mysteries (Coralles, N.M.: Rhombus Publishing Company, 2010):

"I saw a Bigfoot."
"How do you know it was a Bigfoot?"
"It was large and dark and hairy and standing on two legs."
"Okay, so you saw something large, dark, hairy, and standing on two legs. But no one knows for certain what a Bigfoot is. So how can you positively identify what you saw as a Bigfoot?" (p. 21)

This supernatural presumption is a hallmark of paranormal investigation. The 'answer' is often pre-determined, despite the use of scientific equipment to make the investigation seem 'legit'. Radford discusses the 'logic' behind this and why it's inherently faulty:

Some people believe that paranormal phenomena are inherently unknowable . . . I have encountered the same position elsewhere; during a haunted house investigation in California for a TV show, I had a friendly discussion with a member of a ghost hunting group. I asked him why the evidence for ghosts never seemed to get any better, and he replied that ghosts were scientifically unprovable. I pointed out that his team . . . had brought with them a huge van full of thousands of dollars' worth of cameras, EMF detectors, and ghost hunting gadgets of all descriptions. What was the point of all that, I asked him? If he was certain that ghosts existed—and he was equally certain that their presence could not be scientifically measured—then all the high tech equipment they used was by definition worthless (pp. 53—4).

In other words, be wary of 'scientific evidence' of the paranormal and those who claim to have it! Especially when 'magical' elements rear their head during supposedly 'serious' investigations:

There are certain methods I can't really talk about. But the Society get together to form a psychic chain and direct the psychic energy towards the person in question., a bit like an exorcism. We very rarely do this unless its a very serious case, and this was a very serious case.

Though, when you think about it, if the paranormal can be examined through scientific means, then is it truly paranormal? Is it really supernatural? After all, if such phenomena can be 'measured' and demonstrated, consistently, doesn't that just make it natural phenomena yet to be verified with sufficient evidence? But if the evidence thus far isn't sufficient - at least, by scientific standards - then what exactly is being measured in the first place? Round and round we go.

Don't get me wrong. I'm far from discouraging attempts to verify the existence of the supernatural via scientific means. On the contrary: knock yourself out! However, the paranormal, by its very nature, is an 'extraordinary claim' that requires extraordinary evidence. The evidence, itself, must withstand rigorous - but fair and reasoned scrutiny - to justify itself as valid 'evidence'. Every alternate solution should be exhausted before a paranormal explanation is put forth.

When it comes to Highgate, how exactly do we prove that the cemetery was haunted by a vampire, ghost or 'psychic entity'? What is the evidence? To that effect, we are dependent on eyewitness testimony. But, as the 'paranormal escalator' shows, this, in itself, is not sufficient. Therefore, we have to examine the building blocks of which the case is composed. That's one reason I was asking about certain Victorian era sightings.

Essentially, these sightings were being used to 'prove' that the cemetery had been 'latently' haunted and its descriptions paralleled contemporary sightings. If so, let's look at the source. Let's see if they do match or whether the claim was pulled out of thin air or, perhaps clumsily shoehorned into something that didn't quite fit. You can see how that went down.

Therefore, the best approach I advise when examining the vampire/ghost/psychic entity is to examine the way the cases have been composed. What was the evidence the main protagonists used to arrive at their supernatural claims? Does it withstand scrutiny? Have all rational explanations been eliminated? Have the investigators displayed sufficient expertise - or deferred to it - to eliminate rational explanations? Are their accounts consistent? Are their investigative techniques sound? Are they prone to lying and misrepresentation? And so on.

In the meantime, I highly recommend scoring a copy of Radford's book. It's also on Kindle, if you're so inclined.