LETTERS
to find herself as a healer, and
developing paranoia “about all
the things that other astral enti-
ties could do”; a talented painter,
these fears led her to destroy
some of her bestwork. In these
respects,Jefferies’s account can
be read as a contemporaryreal-
lifeversion of time-honoured cau-
tionary talesabout the dangers of
dabbling in the occult. However,
Jefferies also provides something
of a happy ending, stating that
hisex-wifeeventually “went on
to doreallygreat things in heal-
ing and had a lot of success with
healing horses.There’s big money
in the gee-gees, and she flew all
over Europe giving winnersa
helping hand and made and lost
several fortunes along theway”
(pp 104-106).
Dean Ballinger
Hamilton, New ZealandMetaphysical
temptations
GraemeJefferies is a New
Zealandmusician with an
international cultfollowingfor
hismusical endeavours in 1980s
NZ post-punk bands Nocturnal
Projections andThis Kind Of
Punishment, and his subsequent
(and still-active) indie outfit
The Cakekitchen. In hisrecently
published memoirTime Flowing
Backwards(Mosaic Press 2018),
Jefferiesrecounts a curious
period in Germany when his life
took on a distinctly paranormal
bent.Then living in Reckling-
hausen,Jefferies’s German
wife developed an interest in
New Age practices courtesy ofa
friend who introduced her to the
use of pendulums as a divina-
tion technique. However, thisinterest quickly got out of hand
for Jefferies as his wife “drifted
into a crowd that had more to do
withfaith healing, ghost healing,
andeven some aspects of black
magic”.
His wife quickly succumbed
to the metaphysical tempta-
tions of magic and spiritualism,
whichJefferiesevocatively
describes in thefollowing pas-
sage: “To this day, I don’treally
understand some of the things
I saw during her initiations into
some of these practices. She
had a communication with what
she saidwas her spirit guard-
ian.You could actually see it
sometimes. Itwas unknowable
and otherworldly. I can’treally
compare it to anything else that’s
describable in terms of human
language. It certainlywasn’t
human. It presented itself asaform of crystallized light. It could
penetrate a three-foot-wide stone
wall like itwas a pound of butter.
It may have been more than just
one entity.
“Therewas noway ofreally
knowing what shewas immers-
ing herself in.To this day, I don’t
really know what these things
reallywere but she trusted them
implicitly. Thingswere going
seriously wrong.The rogues and
thevagabonds of the spiritworld
were notmycup of tea.They
could tellyou anything. I only
wanted to knowabout Reiki to
fix myself up or maybe one of
myfriends, but these strange
creatures of lightwere becoming
really important to [her]”.
The marriagegraduallyfound-
ered as her behaviour became
more and more erratic, leaving
Jefferies several times in orderSunday morning. There
are at least two super-
natural stories attached
to it. Onewas that the Devil
lobbed a huge lump of earth
at Evesham Abbey, newly com-
pleted nearby. St Ecgwin saw it
incoming, so he prayed and it
fell to earth, creating Meon Hill.
Another is that theWild Hunt
used to pass over there. There
was an IronAge hillfort there,
so I don’t know if the belief
has something to do with that.
The other victim mentioned in
the article, Anne(e)Tennant,
came from a village calledLong
Compton. This is just down the
hill from the Rollright Stones,
which have all kinds of associa-
tions with the supernatural and
witchcraft. Itwas said at one
time that there were enough
witches inLong Compton to
draw a fully loaded haywagonup Long Compton Hill.
Gary Stocker
Radford Semele, WarwickshireI took this photo(above)a
couple of monthsago whilst
I was over the road, in the
church there, conductinga
funeral. I had absolutely no
idea that 1940s ‘witchcraft’
murder victim CharlesWalton
apparently lived in thisvery
row of cottages inLower
Quinton [FT381:47]. It was the
thatched fox on the roof that
caught my attention.
Bruce Chatterton
By emailEerie parallels
I’m struck, reading Cathi Uns-
worth ’s account of the Meon
Hill incident [FT381:44-51],
by what a recurring scenariothis is. In both the Clophill and
ClaphamWood cases, docu-
mented byKevin Gates and
Toyne Newton respectively, we
have a hill, occult activity, taci-
turn and suspicious villagers,
and the death of an old man.
Harry Snelling, retired vicar of
Clapham andPatching,was
found dead in the area in mys-
terious circumstances. In 1986
Tim Humphrey encountereda
Black Dog in BluebellWood, a
site near Clophill also notori-
ous for Black Magic, and not
long afterwards his grandfather
was found dead in the vicinity
near chalk pits, although foul
play was ruled out. Finally, Fay’s
unease and decision to turn
back on Meon Hill echoes the
experiences of CharlesWalker
climbing into ClaphamWood,
and those of many visitors to
Clophill ascending Old Church
Path. I don’t know what’s going
on here; a kind of morphic
resonance, perhaps?- I’ ve just bought someTesco
flat peaches. Thevariety, ac-
cording to the label, isUFO 4!
Edible UFOs? I’ve heard of the
mince pie Martians and Joe
Simonton’s outer space pan-
cakes, but this is ridiculous!
Richard George
St Albans, Hertfordshire
Meon HillRegarding the article about
CharlesWalton being murdered
on Meon Hill [FT381:44-51]:
therewas a piece about this
on the BBC TV programme
Nationwidesometime in the
mid 1970s. Iwas still at primary
school at the time. I remember
them filming in the pub; no one
in there would speak to them
and a lot finished their drinks
and went. My father says that
he can remember it happening.I
have since read an article saying
that the murderwas overwages
and that the killergave the
murder an occult spin to throw
investigators off the scent. In
the late 1970s/early 80s Iwas
in a scout group at Newbold-
on-Stour, nearLower Quinton.
We used to borrow a transitvan
from one of their community
groups if we went camping. As
youngsters I remember that we
used to tell tall(and probably
untrue) friend-of-a-friend stories
about Meon Hill, so it had a lot
of supernatural stories associ-
ated with it.
A couple of summersago
and a few months later with
a walking group, I went fora
walk round Meon Hill. The first
time was a beautiful summer’s74 FT383