Post by Catherine Fearnley on Aug 29, 2004 11:17:39 GMT -5
The Highgate Vampire
The Record Put Straight
People familiar with the famous case of the Highgate ‘Vampire’ that it was David Farrant who was right at the centre of it. He was taken to court in 1970 for ‘hunting a vampire’ but acquitted. That case saw him branded as a ‘vampire hunter’ by the press and others. In 1974, David Farrant duly got into more trouble at Highgate Cemetery for charges which were said in court to relate to ‘vampires’ and ‘witchcraft’. David has always protested his innocence to the later charges; in fact, he later took his case to the European Commission of Human Rights and won various aspects of it. He deals here with the case that originally saw him branded as a ‘vampire hunter’ back in 1970. Please read on …
Dear Ferme,
It was with some interest that I read in your first edition an article that, for a change actually ‘tore apart’ the whole contrived myth of the ‘Highgate Vampire’ and left open to question (or at least, such was my interpretation) the real motives of alleged ‘vampire authorities’ and the like, who, by means of careful manipulation and unqualified assumptions about otherwise innocent facts, manage to create, in the minds of the gullible, legends most fearsome where none had previously existed.
Montague Summers (as rightly implied in your article) was indeed a leading protagonist of this particular brand of ‘psychic research’ - although others have followed in his wake and given ample publicity and book-space to the well-received platitudes of his misguided terminology.
I am making personal comment in this instance because none should know as well as I the real facts which gave rise to the whole sordid and ridiculous episode of a ‘blood-sucking vampire’ that is said to inhabit the catacombs of Highgate’s Old Cemetery, and perhaps its time that the record be set straight. In fact such reports (about a ‘vampire’ in Highgate Cemetery) really originated in the late 1960’s and were originally based on an official investigation by the British Psychic and Occult Society into the possibility of a ‘ghost’ hat had been sighted in and around the Cemetery; although local belief much encouraged by the comments of certain individuals to local newspapers whose only intention seemed to be in obtaining the maximum publicity.
This ‘tall menacing figure’ ( not yet a fully-fledged ‘vampire’) was apparently sighted by many local residents on increasing occasions (although I personally remained sceptical of many of these accounts knowing the effect such stories might have upon an over-active imagination) and it was basically this fact that prompted the BPOS to conduct a séance at Highgate Cemetery one night employing the aid of a professional medium to see if ‘psychic contact’ could be made with the reputed entity.
This ‘magical séance’ took place in mid-August 1970 and its eventual outcome was to be a prime ingrediant in establishing the legend of a ‘vampire’ at Highgate Cemetery, and later to feed the artificial rumours and stories that still give free-licence to the pens of unenlightened writers and journalists.
This might be better understood if it is explained that the séance itself (although unsuccessful in its original motivation) was disturbed by a nightly police patrol who insisted on taking myself to Court to give account of the midnight vigil.
The case, in fact, came before Clerkenwell Magistrates’ Court in September 1970 but was soon dismissed; the Court upholding a Defence submission that it was just as akin for a legitimate occult Society to investigate unexplained phenomena in a cemetery as it was for some to invest vast sums trying to locate the Loch Ness Monster. It seemed a fair verdict; but subsequent Press coverage - much of which reiterated statements to the police about ‘hunting a vampire’ that I denied making in Court and led the Baltimore Sun to remark that apparently it was ‘no longer illegal to hunt vampires in England’! - attracted to Highgate Cemetery scores of ‘free-lance vampire hunters’ all copying what they wrongly believed to be my example. With them perhaps expectedly, came an influx of amateur occultists all anxious to cash in on the available publicity, and as a result, damage and desecration at Highgate Cemetery dramatically increased, much to the concern of the cemetery authorities and the police.
This Court case, then; notwithstanding the earlier local mumblings about a ‘vampire’ which were almost certainly impregnated courtesy of Hammer Films who had previously filmed at Highgate Cemetery in 1968 (and who were to do so again on more than one occasion in the early 1970’s) really began the whole comic saga of the ‘Highgate Vampire’ - ironically perhaps, simultaneously branding myself as an opponent of the ‘fanged creature’.
Of course, it is hardly surprising, taking into account an inherent desire on the part of romantics to ascribe material ‘fact’ to things ‘occult’ and supernatural, that the ‘vampire legend’ at Highgate Cemetery should have persisted. But it does so only as a cleverly perpetrated myth, and assertions of a ‘blood-sucking vampire’ at Highgate Cemetery - whatever over-zealous writers and journalists might choose to say - remain, I am afraid, pure fiction.
David Farrant, President, British Psychic and Occult Society.
This article first appeared in Ferme magazine in 1987 and is Exclusive © of David Farrant
The Record Put Straight
People familiar with the famous case of the Highgate ‘Vampire’ that it was David Farrant who was right at the centre of it. He was taken to court in 1970 for ‘hunting a vampire’ but acquitted. That case saw him branded as a ‘vampire hunter’ by the press and others. In 1974, David Farrant duly got into more trouble at Highgate Cemetery for charges which were said in court to relate to ‘vampires’ and ‘witchcraft’. David has always protested his innocence to the later charges; in fact, he later took his case to the European Commission of Human Rights and won various aspects of it. He deals here with the case that originally saw him branded as a ‘vampire hunter’ back in 1970. Please read on …
Dear Ferme,
It was with some interest that I read in your first edition an article that, for a change actually ‘tore apart’ the whole contrived myth of the ‘Highgate Vampire’ and left open to question (or at least, such was my interpretation) the real motives of alleged ‘vampire authorities’ and the like, who, by means of careful manipulation and unqualified assumptions about otherwise innocent facts, manage to create, in the minds of the gullible, legends most fearsome where none had previously existed.
Montague Summers (as rightly implied in your article) was indeed a leading protagonist of this particular brand of ‘psychic research’ - although others have followed in his wake and given ample publicity and book-space to the well-received platitudes of his misguided terminology.
I am making personal comment in this instance because none should know as well as I the real facts which gave rise to the whole sordid and ridiculous episode of a ‘blood-sucking vampire’ that is said to inhabit the catacombs of Highgate’s Old Cemetery, and perhaps its time that the record be set straight. In fact such reports (about a ‘vampire’ in Highgate Cemetery) really originated in the late 1960’s and were originally based on an official investigation by the British Psychic and Occult Society into the possibility of a ‘ghost’ hat had been sighted in and around the Cemetery; although local belief much encouraged by the comments of certain individuals to local newspapers whose only intention seemed to be in obtaining the maximum publicity.
This ‘tall menacing figure’ ( not yet a fully-fledged ‘vampire’) was apparently sighted by many local residents on increasing occasions (although I personally remained sceptical of many of these accounts knowing the effect such stories might have upon an over-active imagination) and it was basically this fact that prompted the BPOS to conduct a séance at Highgate Cemetery one night employing the aid of a professional medium to see if ‘psychic contact’ could be made with the reputed entity.
This ‘magical séance’ took place in mid-August 1970 and its eventual outcome was to be a prime ingrediant in establishing the legend of a ‘vampire’ at Highgate Cemetery, and later to feed the artificial rumours and stories that still give free-licence to the pens of unenlightened writers and journalists.
This might be better understood if it is explained that the séance itself (although unsuccessful in its original motivation) was disturbed by a nightly police patrol who insisted on taking myself to Court to give account of the midnight vigil.
The case, in fact, came before Clerkenwell Magistrates’ Court in September 1970 but was soon dismissed; the Court upholding a Defence submission that it was just as akin for a legitimate occult Society to investigate unexplained phenomena in a cemetery as it was for some to invest vast sums trying to locate the Loch Ness Monster. It seemed a fair verdict; but subsequent Press coverage - much of which reiterated statements to the police about ‘hunting a vampire’ that I denied making in Court and led the Baltimore Sun to remark that apparently it was ‘no longer illegal to hunt vampires in England’! - attracted to Highgate Cemetery scores of ‘free-lance vampire hunters’ all copying what they wrongly believed to be my example. With them perhaps expectedly, came an influx of amateur occultists all anxious to cash in on the available publicity, and as a result, damage and desecration at Highgate Cemetery dramatically increased, much to the concern of the cemetery authorities and the police.
This Court case, then; notwithstanding the earlier local mumblings about a ‘vampire’ which were almost certainly impregnated courtesy of Hammer Films who had previously filmed at Highgate Cemetery in 1968 (and who were to do so again on more than one occasion in the early 1970’s) really began the whole comic saga of the ‘Highgate Vampire’ - ironically perhaps, simultaneously branding myself as an opponent of the ‘fanged creature’.
Of course, it is hardly surprising, taking into account an inherent desire on the part of romantics to ascribe material ‘fact’ to things ‘occult’ and supernatural, that the ‘vampire legend’ at Highgate Cemetery should have persisted. But it does so only as a cleverly perpetrated myth, and assertions of a ‘blood-sucking vampire’ at Highgate Cemetery - whatever over-zealous writers and journalists might choose to say - remain, I am afraid, pure fiction.
David Farrant, President, British Psychic and Occult Society.
This article first appeared in Ferme magazine in 1987 and is Exclusive © of David Farrant