The Faeries of Blackheath Wood

Tags

Blackheath Wood, Ciaran Foy, Fae, Faeries, Fairies, short films

The Victorian ideal of a fairy as scantily clad nymphet, still a popular image for the fae today. Luis Ricardo Falero 1888.

Just a short post this week…having managed to put my back out doing DIY I don’t know if I want to stand up, lie down or pace around because doing anything is just toooooo painful :0(  Anyway, enough of this moaning – on with the post.

In a desperate attempt to take my mind of my back I re-watched a fabulous short film about faeries on You Tube.  I recall first coming across this particularly dark tale of the little folk on the excellent Angry Scholar Blog (but I can’t find the link to the actual post itself).

I grew up reading a musty collection of Edwardian children’s books handed down from my grandparents, my parents and then to me.  Hence I grew up thinking that fairies were all rather elegant ‘gels’ who fluttered around flower petals in rather chic if not risqué 1920’s flapper dresses.  As soon as I began reading folk-tales about the wee folk and their less pleasant habits I soon adjusted my view of faeries…nevertheless the harmless flower fairy image has persisted well into the twenty-first century.

The famous Cottingly fairies hoax of the 1920’s.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For anyone still clinging to this twee Tinkerbell view of faeries,  Ciaran Foy’s dark little masterpiece The Faeries of Blackheath Woods may make you think twice about following those dainty little flappers into the deep dark woods…

ENJOY….

 

 

 

Shadow People: Cinema, SUNDS and Superstition

Tags

Cambodia, Cambodian ghosts, dab tsuam, horror films, Matthew Arnold, Old Hag Phenom, sleep paralysis, SUNDS, The Shadow People, udden Unexpected Nocturnal Death Syndrome

The Shadow People (2012): Film by Matthew Arnold

SPOILER ALERT: if you are planning on watching this movie, then avoid this post!!

The other day I was just browsing through YouTube when I came across the straight to DVD, 2012 horror film, the Shadow People. Initially I was a little wary about watching the film as I am not known for being one of the bravest people when it comes to scary films (I am completely unable to watch anything to do with voodoo or demonic possession without hiding behind a cushion or friend). So I was a little concerned about what effect the film would have on my overactive imagination. The clinch was that the film opened up in Cambodia and being at the moment a resident of that country, I was immediately hooked. I mean there are not many films of any genre that begin in Cambodia!

The story follows the experiences of world weary loser, late night radio talk show host Charlie Crowe played by the excellent Dallas Roberts. Crowe’s graveyard slot is under threat due to low listener figures. That is until he receives a phone call from frightened teenager, Jeff Pyatt. Jeff is terrified of unseen forces that come for him when he falls asleep. Charlie dismisses it initially as a crank call. Soon afterwards he receives a mysterious package on his doorstep containing pictures of what looks like an experiment from the late 70s being conducted on the sleeping forms of a number of men of South East Asian origins. That same night Charlie again receives a call from Jeff who claims to be holding a gun. During the conversation a gunshot is heard. The boy is found alive and admitted to hospital for his own safety. Charlie is convinced by his radio bosses to interview the boy. When he arrives at the hospital, he finds out that Jeff had died in his sleep, an event which has baffled the medical personnel as Jeff was physically healthy when he was brought in. This leads Charlie on a one man campaign to find out the truth behind the boy’s death, the photographs and the phenomenon known as the Shadow People.

Nosferatu, Dir. FW Mirnau, 1922

Through his research Charlie becomes increasingly convinced that the Shadow People are real. Eventually Charlie begins to see them for himself and discovers that they feed of delta waves emanating from the brain. Along the way he is joined by a sceptical CDC investigator, Sophie Lacombe (Alison Eastwood). Together they find an old film of the 1970s experiments which contains footage of something that looks to be a moving shadow. Crowe insists that this is the definitive proof he has been searching for and wants to reveal the evidence to the world, Lacombe is less sure. She still maintains the 1970s deaths were due to a medical condition known either as Sudden Unexpected Death Syndrome or Sudden Unexpected Nocturnal Death Syndrome (SUNDS). Lacombe believes that the recent spate of deaths are the result of the placebo effect i.e. if you believe something is real, it becomes real. This leads to the crux of the story, that whether or not SUNDS is a supernatural or medical condition is actually irrelevant as is the existence of Shadow People, instead it is the power of the mind which is the dangerous factor.

The film’s theme which brings together the two separate strands of medical versus supernatural is summoned up neatly by Jeff who asks the chilling question:

“how do you stop thinking about something?”

True story or clever fabrication?

The movie itself claims to be based on true events and in order to give the story credibility it begins with interviews of people (some of whom believe in the existence of Shadow People whilst others are sceptical) talking about having watched the clip of the 1970s experiment on Youtube.

The film also presents itself as a docudrama as it intersperses the dramatization with ‘real life’ footage of the actual events and people as well as interviews with a number of experts on the phenomenon. The director, Matthew Arnold asserted in an interview that the film is based on his own experience and subsequent research,

The Nightmare by Henry Fuseli, 1781

“I woke up one night, and my body was totally paralyzed. I felt like my body was asleep, but I was awake, and could see a shadowy person standing over me. I finally yelled and willed my body to get up, and the figure shot through the wall. What the hell just happened?”*

I personally could not find the film of the experiments on Youtube but this may be due to my own incompetence rather than to its non-existence. Some comments that I have read of people who have watched the clip have stated that it was published on Youtube at roughly the same time as the release of the film and that the number of viewers recorded was way down on the figure shown at the beginning of the film.

Real footage or a clever marketing tool?

The Great Beast himself

One of the many things that did not ring true was the depiction of the doctor, Professor Aleister Ravenscroft. I mean could you ever imagine a more sinister name and any name more suited to a gothic novel. Not to mention his first name ‘Aleister’ immediately makes me think of Aleister Crowley the British occultist and for many one of the most menacing characters of the 20^th century. Add to this a strong German accent and you have a prime candidate for either a Hammer Horror film or a part in the Rocky Horror Show! Turning to the ‘real’ footage and interviews, I have to admit that I was confused. I personally think it is fake as I felt that some of the sub plot themes were just too clichéd. In particular Crowe’s depiction as a loser with a failed marriage and a son he can’t relate to i.e. loser in life has a chance to do something to impress his son and prove his worth but instead sacrifices his own happiness for the good of all!

Even though I have a hard time believing it, I have to admit that it was cleverly done. Using less attractive unknown ‘actors’ to convincingly play the roles and the slight differences between the ‘real’ and dramatized scenes definitely gives the documentary side a more realistic feel. The end obituary note which shows a photograph of the ‘real’ Crowe is for me a step too far as it then gets you thinking, if others who just listened to his show were targeted how did Crowe who was obsessed with them survive and what did he really die of?

After scouring the internet for photos or information about the ‘real’ Crowe, I wound up empty handed. I did find a Charlie Crowe, footballer and a Charlie Crow, DJ but neither bear any resemblance to the guy in the film. If he really existed surely after the film’s release there would be something on the internet about him!

An effective horror film…

Despite everything I have said above, I do actually believe the film is a good horror story. I mean I went to bed reluctant to turn off the lights and the film did play on my imagination for a while afterwards (but as I said in the beginning I am easily frightened, just ask Leonora!). I also find the tagline of “how do you stop thinking about something?” very effective and thought provoking.

On the other hand I found the ‘documentary footage’ which constantly cuts into the film jarring. Other people have enjoyed this device but personally I found it interrupted the building tension as every time I started to immerse myself into the story I was immediately shaken out of it. For me I would have preferred the ‘real’ footage to have come at the end of the film. I would still recommend the film as it deserves credit for tackling a relatively obscure and unexplored topic. I would love to know what other people think!

The Cambodian connection

The Krasue or Ap spirit. source Nerdygaga

One big issue I have with the film, is the opening scene set in Cambodia. I get the feeling that whoever was responsible for this, just thought ‘what is an exotic country that we can start off in?’ and sticking a pin on a map randomly chose Cambodia. The whole scene show a complete ignorance of Khmer (Cambodian) people and culture as well as being an illogical choice. Khmer culture has a deeply rooted traditional belief in ghosts and the supernatural. Entities range from the Ap, a bodiless creature with the head of a beautiful woman whose internal organs hang down from her trachea and who is believed (vampire-like) to drink human blood to the banana tree ghost, a beautiful woman who made her home up a banana tree and died giving birth to the child of her unfaithful lover** to traditional ancestral ghosts.

Even today these beliefs are still strong and nearly all Cambodian children and adults I have spoken to claim to have seen a ghost or know of a place that is haunted. I was even told of a ghost up a coconut tree near where I work and live but the child told me that as I haven’t done anything bad I have nothing to fear. The same child also tried to reassure me with the words ‘Don’t worry teacher, one day you will be a ghost’, not sure how comforting those words were but he was being so sweet that it was hard to argue.

As in all Asian cultures, honouring ancestors is an important part of life, music is played at weddings and funerals to keep ghosts away and some families still all sleep in one bed as protection against ghosts. As a result I find it really hard to believe that over thirty years ago, just after the downfall of the Khmer Rouge when millions of Cambodians were killed and died in horrific circumstances that a mother would tell a child that he had nothing to worry about and not to pay attention to his elders.

The other question is why depict Cambodians when it is well known that it is the Hmong people and those of Filipino ethnicity whose traditional belief system ascribes the sudden death of otherwise normal healthy young men to the actions of a malignant shadow.

SUNDS: A medical condition

The medical condition SUNDS first came to the world’s attention in 1977 when a number of Hmong refugees died in the United States. The Hmong people are a particular ethnic hill tribe who are found mainly in Laos and Northern Thailand.

Another outbreak in Singapore between 1982 and 1990 saw 230 previously healthy Thai men die suddenly in their sleep (it was noted that the Thai men were of Laotian descent). In the Philippines the condition is known as “bangungot” and it is known to affect 43 out of 100,000 people. Although the condition doesn’t exclusively affect only those of South East Asian ethnicity it is more prevalent, especially amongst adolescent or young men.

Understanding of the causes of SUNDS is still at an early stage. Medical investigations on the bodies of people who have died of SUNDS have not discovered any heart abnormalities but cardiac studies conducted whilst patients were experiencing sleep paralysis before the onset of SUNDS indicates that the patients suffer from ventricular fibrillation and irregular heartbeats. Those who survive the paralysis find that their heart rhythm returns to normal on waking.

Some Filipino doctors also believe that the paralysis is due to acute haemorrhage pancreatitis (although this has yet to be accepted by the medical world). It is believed that it is during the sleep paralysis that people seem to experience shadow beings, this is before they die of SUNDS. It is funny how many people on internet forums seem to believe they have suffered from SUNDS. Surely the clue is in the name “death syndrome”, it is highly unlikely that they could have suffered from SUNDS and continue to post on the internet!

SUNDS and Superstition

For both the Hmong and Filipinos the death of healthy young men in their sleep has long been cloaked in superstition. The Hmong people of Laos ascribe the deaths to the action of a malign spirit “dab tsuam” who appears in the form of a jealous woman. In order to protect themselves against the spirit and avoid her attentions, some Hmong men will sleep dressed as a woman.

Dab Tsuam spirit, source unknown

In the Philippines these deaths are believed to be brought about by a spirit called a Batibat. These fat hag like creatures immobilise their victims by sitting on their chest or face and suffocating them. The vengeful spirit enters the home when the tree in which it reside in is cut down and made into support posts for a house. The demon migrates through holes in the pole. One way to protect a household from an attack is to forbid anyone from sleeping near a post. It is interesting that the Filipino word for SUNDS is bangungot which in the Tagalog language means both a nightmare and ‘to rise and moan in sleep’.

Many older Filipinos recommend wiggling the big toe to snap the heart back to normal (in the film, Crowe is seen to wiggle his big toe to release himself from the paralysis when under attack from a Shadow Person). Many other countries have their own names for this phenomenon for instance in Laos it is called Dab tsog and in Thailand ‘Lai Tai’ meaning to sleep and die.

The rise of the modern day mythology of the Shadow People

Nowadays, increasingly more and more people are reporting having seen Shadow People or black masses during episodes of sleep paralysis. You only have to do a google search or look at Youtube to find numerous ‘first hand’ accounts or clips claiming to have caught them on film. I am not going to go into the causes of sleep paralysis and the associated ‘Old Hag Syndrome’ as Leonora did a great analysis in her post Hikes, Hostels and the Old Hag… except to say that most medical views reiterate that shadow people are a hallucination caused by a number of factors alone or in combination including sleep paralysis, drug abuse, reactions to certain medicines, psychological trauma and sleep deprivation. A number of ‘experts’ on Shadow People have emerged, most noticeably Heidi Hollis whose appearance on the late night radio show ‘Coast to Coast AM’ has done much to popularise the subject. She spoke about dark masses with human shapes who just flicker on the edges of peripheral vision and jump on the chest of victims to choke them. Hollis’s views are based on a strong Christian belief as she asserts that they are enemies of god and can only be repelled by calling out the name of Jesus. Her view is an extremely negative one but amongst other investigators there is no consensus on whether they are evil, good or neutral.

Alliens from Plan 9 from Outerspace, Dir.Ed Wood, 1959

Other theories put forward suggest that they could be aliens, inhabitants of parallel dimensions or even time travellers. One thing which remains constant is the description of them. They are usually depicted as either wearing a long cloak or wide brimmed hat with piercing red eyes. It is not surprising that Wes Craven was so inspired by a story in the LA Times about a series of mysterious death that occurred during sleep that he used the idea of Shadow People to create his most famous character, Freddy Krueger.

And finally-a warning to the curious….

If Shadow People exist (and I am the last person to say categorically that they do not) and they feed of delta waves from people when they think about them, then to everyone who is reading this article….

Sleep and his half brother death by John William Waterhouse 1874

Good Night, Sleep Well!

 Bibliography and Notes

*Exclusive Interview with Shadow People’s Matthew Arnold and Dallas Roberts, http://dailydead.com/exclusive-interview-with-shadow-peoples-matthew-arnold-and-dallas-roberts ** Banana Tree Ghost, http://www.everythingscary.com/story/banana-tree-ghost.html Krasue, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasue Heidi Hollis, http://www.jerrypippin.com/UFO_Files_heidi_hollis.htm Actual Sleep Deaths Inspired ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’, http://www.stufftoblowyourmind.com//blog/actual-sleep-deaths-inspired-a-nightmare-on-elm-street Sudden unexpected death syndrome, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_unexpected_death_syndrome Batibat, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batibat The Shadow People (2012), http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3rLdVy_5TA

The Beast of Gevaudan: the Napoleon Bonaparte of Wolves*

Tags

Beast of Chazes, Beast of Gévaudan, eighteenth century, france, Jean Chastel, Louis XV, Loup Garou, werewolves, Wolf Hunters, wolves

The Beast of Gévaudan

Max Von Sydow in The Wolfman, 2010, Copyright Universal Pictures

I first came across the legend of the Beast of Gévaudan in The Wolfman, Joe Johnson’s 2010 version of the 1941 film.  Despite the criticism the film garnered I thought it was a very atmospheric take on the  ‘classic’ horror film oeuvre and had some beautifully crafted scenes and wonderful settings.

One of my favourite scenes (which was cut from the theatrical edit but is in the extended version) finds the hero Lawrence Talbot travelling by train to his ancestral home Blackmoor on the wild Yorkshire moors.  He awakes to find a mysterious old gentleman in his compartment (played by the patrician and always slightly menacing Max Von Sydow).

Engaging in conversation Von Sydow offers Talbot his walking cane, a fine stick with an ornate Wolf’s Head handle.  He explains that he obtained the stick in Gévaudan, many years ago.  His character has few words, but what he says holds much significance.  Although Talbot refuses the offer, he wakes later to find the old man gone, and the stick remaining.

Even if you refuse your destiny it has a way of claiming you anyway the scene seems to say.

The History of the Beast

But what was behind this casual but loaded reference to the Beast of Gévaudan – what was the beast?  Was the big bad wolf simply a fairy tale or was it based on real events?  As it turns out, the beast was real, and even came to the attention of a King.

Woman fighting off the Beast of Gevaudan, Public Domain, via Wikimedia

The Beast’s reign of tooth and claw lasted from the early Summer of 1764 to midsummer 1767, it ranged over an area 50miles Sq in the Gévaudan province, in the mountainous South Central region of France.  The beast is said to have attacked over 200 people over 100 of whom died, many of those were partially eaten. Others were injured, and the lucky few escaped unscathed but with one hell of a tale to tell.

Descriptions from survivors had common features – the creature was large and wolf-like, it had sharp fangs, shaggy red fur, a hugely long tail and a foul stink.  It was also noticed that the beast had a marked preference for human prey.   The first sighting was by a woman walking with her cattle, she spotted a fanged beast hurtling out of the treeline towards her and was only saved when the bull of the herd chased the creature away.  That was at the beginning of June 1764.

Later that month teenager Jan Boulet was not so lucky.  She was savaged and killed by the beast.  It had made its first kill and from then on had a taste for blood, human blood.

Another documented attack occurred in January the following year.  A group of friends, both male and female, were attacked en masse by the beast.  They only survived because of the particular bravery of one of their number, Jacques Portefaix, and through sticking together.

By now the gruesome events in the South of France had come to the attention of non other than King Louis XV himself.  Louis made a special award to Jacques, and to his friends for their bravery.   As a keen huntsman himself the beast piqued his interest and he despatched a crack father/son team of huntsmen.  Jean Charles Mare Antoine and Jean-Francoise Vaumesle D’Enneval packed up their guns and their specially trained hounds and set off for Gévaudan.  Despite spending months tracking the beast through forest and field their search was fruitless and the beast’s predation continued.

Undaunted by the failure of his first team of hunters, the King then despatched his own personal harquebus bearer and Lieutenant of the Hunt, Francois Antoine to bring down the Beast of Gévaudan.  He arrived on 22 June 1765 perhaps with as much trepidation as exhilaration; after all his rivals had failed spectacularly so he may have had a general fear of losing the king’s favour and of damaging his reputation as a hunter should the beast elude him as well.

Louis XV meets the king of the Wolves, 1765. Public domain via Wikipedia

Within three months Antoine was proclaiming his triumph over the terrible beast.  On 21 September 1765 he killed a huge grey wolf, which became know as Le Loup de Chazes after the area is was found in.  Despite the fact previous reports had said the wolf-like creature had red fur, a number of survivors identified the lupine corpse as their attacker by various scars on its body.

The carcass of the huge wolf was swiftly transported to Versailles for the edification and entertainment of the King and court.  Antoine was loaded with money and honours for his success.

There was only one small fly in the ointment….the attacks did not end with the death of Le Loup de Chazes.  In December 1765 two children were badly injured in another attack at La Besseyre Saint Mary.  Bringing Antoine’s success into question.

Typical French village viewed from woodland.

Eventually, on 19 June 1767, a pious local hunter called Jean Chastel finally ended the beast of Gévaudan’s reign of blood  – some say with a silver bullet.

Local legend has it that Jean had been hunting the beast but paused to read a prayer from his Bible when the beast appeared.  Instead of following its usual pattern of immediate and devastating attack, the beast patiently waited until Jean finished his prayer and meekly took the bullet when he fired.  This can only have added to the supernatural interpretation of the beast as either a punishment from God or a Loup Garou/werewolf.

Theories about the Beast….

There are many theories about the nature of the beast.  Was it, as some villagers believed, a punishment from God? Was it just an unusually large wolf or a pack of wolves? Or some sort of wolf-domestic dog cross-breed? Or was it a were-wolf?

The Beast of Gevaudan – was it a cross-breed? Public Domain via Wikipedia

When I first read about the wolf, particularly the colour, the savagery of its attacks and the smell, I thought perhaps it had been a Hyena or some other exotic animal collected and released by some local grandee.  But this theory has been dispelled by Michel Louis who referred to the fact that the beast had 42 teeth a lupine characteristic, whereas Hyenas have only 34. He favored the idea of a cross-breed which he felt could account for the strange colouring of the wolf.

In fact the colouring of the wolf killed by Antoine struck me as problematic.  Many witnesses commented on its distinctive red colouring, yet he killed a grey wolf.  Did the King’s huntsman, drop a few coins into the hands of the locals to get them to confirm his kill and enhance his reputation?  Human remains were found in the stomach of the second beast killed – were they also found in Antoine’s kill? Or was there simply more than one beast?

Jean Chastel also comes out as an ambiguous figure.  He is said to have been known for having a large red hound, which made some people think perhaps he had more connection with the beast than he admitted too.  The fact that the beast did not attack him while he was reading also made people suspicious of his part in the tragedy.  But would someone really intentionally release such a beast – after all it killed upwards of 200 people many of whom Chastel would have known.  Was it an accidental breeding from his dog?  Or was he a genuine accidental hero?

The truth is we will probably never know for sure.  It could have been a Wolf, but perhaps a cross-breed might be a more likely explanation.  Except in very harsh winters, or when sick, I have not heard of wolves targeting people over say, cattle or other prey.  A cross-breed might have less fear of humans and be more inclined to attack them.

Oh, and as for the silver bullets, I was devastated to find out they were added into the tale as late as the 1930’s by the novelist Chevalley and are not part of the contemporary tale.

Perhaps the saddest thing is that the huge bounty placed on the beast by the King encouraged masses of hunters to descend on the region and engage in a killing spree. Hundreds of innocent wolves were killed, all of which helped to reinforce the deep rooted mistrust of humans for their lupine neigbours and to ultimately to lead to the point where wolves were nearly wiped out in much of Europe.

Contemporary Wanted Poster for the Beast, Public domain, via Wikipedia.

 Sources

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beast_of_G%C3%A9vaudan

http://www.unmuseum.org/werewolf.htm

*Stevenson, Robert Louis, Travels with a Donkey (Quote: “the Napoleon Bonaparte of Wolves.”)

Sawney Bean: Cannibal, Progaganda or Bogeyman?

Tags

Cannibal Clan, cannibals, Christie Cleek, eighteenth century, Hills have eyes, history, James I, James VI, Progaganda, Sawney Bean, scottish folklore, Scottish history, seventeenth century

By Levi L. Hill [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons, image adapted by Lenora

“A man and his wife behind him on the same horse, coming one evening home from a fair, and falling into the ambuscade of these merciless wretches, they fell upon them in a furious manner…..in the conflict the poor woman fell from behind him, and was instantly murdered before her husbands face; for the female cannibals cut her throat, and fell to sucking her blood with as great a gust, as if it had been wine.  This done, they ript up her belly and pulled out her entrails….It pleased providence…that twenty or thirty from the same fair came together as a body; upon which Sawney Bean and his blood thirsty clan withdrew and made the best of their way through thick wood to their den.” Captain Charles Johnson in 1742.

The legend of Sawney Bean and his incestuous clan of cannibals is famous in Scotland and a whole heritage industry has grown up around the infamous Sawney. The grisly tale has spawned horror films such as The Hills Have Eyes, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Ravenous, as well as films dealing directly with Sawney himself.

The Legend

There are a number of versions of the legend, but most agree that Alexander ‘Sawney’ Bean was born in a village in East Lothian a few miles outside Edinburgh and that he began life as a hedger and ditcher.  Not keen on honest graft Sawney ran away from his parents in the company of a like-minded woman who may or may not have been called Black Agnes Douglas. It seems the couple tried to settle in Ballantrae but Black Agnes was accused of witchcraft and the pair decamped to the hidden cave of Bennane Head.  They soon took up a more sinister occupation suited to their vicious natures namely highway robbery with a cannibalistic twist.

Sawney Bean and wife [Pulbic domain] via Wikimedia

It is said that their reign of terror lasted for 25 years during which time they bred an incestuous clan of children and grandchildren numbering nearly 50 at the time they were caught.  They were remarkably good at evading notice, despite the high numbers of victims attributed to them – some say up to 1000 were murdered by the clan.  In part this was due to their hideout – their cave lair extended a mile under ground and its entrance was covered by the sea when the tide was in.   The other element in keeping their bloody lifestyle a secret was leaving no survivors.

The size of the clan enabled them to attack groups of travellers and it is said that they often had a surplus of food.  Discarded arms and legs were tossed into the sea miles from the cave and caused alarm amongst coastal villages when they washed up on the shore.

As the surrounding area became depopulated, and the local villagers became more fearful, accusations were levelled against innocent individuals, particularly innkeepers, and many were hanged for the crimes of Sawney Bean and his family.

Eventually the Bean Clan’s luck ran out.  They were interrupted in attacking a couple returning from a fair and their crimes were exposed.  The husband had survived the attack and took his wife’s mutilated body to the magistrate at Glasgow and the matter came to the attention of the king.

Sawney Bean’s Cave, Image by Tony Page via Wikimedia

A party of 400 men led by King James VI set out to catch the culprits.  Riding up and down the coastline it is said that they overlooked the cave because nobody could conceive of human beings living in such conditions.  But the bloodhounds they had brought with them were drawn towards the cave and the smell of rotting meat issuing from it.  Entering the cave the king and his men found Sawney Bean and his clan.  Captain Charles Johnson writing in 1742 describes what they found in the cave:

“Legs, arms, thighs, hands and feet of men, women and children, were hung up in rows like dried beef.  A great many limbs lay in pickle, and a great mass of money, both gold and silver, with watches, rings and swords, pistols, and a large quantity of clothes, both linnen and woollen, and an infinite number of other things, which they had taken from those they had murder’d, were thrown together in heaps, or hung up against the sides of the den.”

The murderous troupe was taken to Edinburgh Tollbooth, then to Leith were they were executed in suitably Grisly fashion:

“The men had their privy members cut off, and thrown into the fire before their faces, then their hands and legs were severed from their bodies; by which amputation they bled to death in some hours.  The wife, daughters and grand children…were afterwards burned to death in three several fires.”

All died cursing and unrepentant.  One daughter was said to have left the clan and married, but when the horrible deeds of her family were uncovered she was lynched by the villagers and hanged from the ‘hairy tree’.

What lies beyond the legend?

Like many legends concrete evidence is hard to locate.  One of the biggest stumbling blocks to proving Sawney Bean ever existed is that the records simply are not there.  If a thousand people had disappeared over a generation, and the culprits had been found by the King himself and executed in such a gory fashion, then surely someone somewhere would have recorded it?  Sean Thomas sees this as one of the biggest proofs that Sawney is simply a legend.

No official records, no royal records, no letters, no journals no contemporary evidence of these extraordinary crimes exists.  Even allowing for the sparsity of records in early seventeenth century Scotland Dr Louise Yeoman, in an interview with the BBC,  has pointed out that if a king such as James VI of Scotland/I of England had been involved in such a perilous and successful venture against a group of blood-thirsty cannibals he would surely have publicised it.  After all this was a king with a strong sense of paranoia and a hands on interest in demonology and witchcraft.

Frontispiece of Captain Charles Johnson’s 1742 book

In fact the earliest references to Sawney Bean and his family occur in eighteenth century English broadsheets and chap-books.  Publications that were designed to amaze and horrify their audiences with tales of terrible deeds.  Dr Yeoman in her BBC interview and Fiona Black writing in ‘The Polar Twins’ support the idea that Sawney Bean was actually a piece of English Propaganda.  It is to be noted that the earliest versions of the story appear in English publications not Scottish.  Perhaps it was a colonial view of the barbarous Scots designed to show the superiority of the English at a time when suspicion of the Scots was rife.  The Sawney Bean tale surfaces just after the Union of England and Scotland, and at a time when Anti-Jacobite feelings were running high.   Dr Yeoman further supports this interpretation with the fact that ‘Sawney’ was a derogatory name often given to Scotsmen in English cartoons at the time.

Against this view, Sean Thomas points out that these same periodicals also contain a plethora of horrible deeds perpetrated by English criminals.  However, it would seem to me that Sawney’s deeds stand out from the rest.

Neverthless there seems to be some consensus in the view that one of the biggest anomalies in the various tellings of the story relates to when the events took place.  The most common time-period is the reign of James VI/I, but versions exist that take place in the reign of James I in the 1400’s and some set in earlier periods.  Could the legend be based on earlier tales of real cannibalism?

During Scotland’s turbulent history and its many conflicts with England, there were many periods of famine.  During such times of starvation there were tales of cannibalism occurring.  One such documented case is that of Christie Cleek who lived in the reign of David II.  Christie was a butcher from Perth, and in a period of famine, he and a band of friends lived a life of scavenging to survive.  When one of the party died, Christie used his butchers skills and the group ate their comrade.  Eventually Christie took to attacking travellers and robbing them and when necessary eating them to ward of starvation.  This story is documented in the 1400’s when it was alleged to have occurred so appears to be historically plausible.

Goya [public domain] via Wikimedia

It may be that the story simply fulfills the psychological need for a good scare story and it certainly contains many of the staple ingredients of the macabre that seem to crop up time and time again whatever the century. Sean Thomas certainly draws this conclusion. Sawney Bean has never lost his gory appeal – from the broadsheets, to John Nicholson’s 1843 version of the tale, the Newgate Calendar, numerous film versions, and even the Edinburgh Dungeon’s Sawney Bean experience, shock horror endures because it appeals to something dark within the human psyche.

At the end of the day it may be that Sawney Bean is the archetypal Bogeyman, a tale to tell children at bed-time; a half-remembered folk-memory of times when famine drove people to commit terrible deeds to survive and that was then co-opted by anti-Jacobite propagandists.  We may never know for sure.

Sources

Brocklehurst, Steven, Who was Sawney Bean? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-21506077
Johnson, Charles, A General and True History of the lives and actions of the most famous highwaymen, murderers, street-robbers, &c, 1742 http://archive.org/stream/generaltruehisto00defo#page/n49/mode/2up
Sawney Bean: Scotland’s Hannibal Lector,http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/myths_legends/scotland/s_sw/article_1.shtml
The Legend of Sawney Bean, http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/scotland/dumfriesshire/legends/the-legend-of-sawney-bean.html
The Newgate Calendar – Sawney Bean, http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/scotland/dumfriesshire/legends/the-newgate-calendar-part-1-sawney-bean.html
Thomas, Sean, In Search of Sawney Bean, http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/129/in_search_of_sawney_bean.html
Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sawney_Bean; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christie-Cleek

The Wicked Lady: folklore, fiction – fact?

Tags

civil war, English history, folk lore, Hertfordshire, highway women, highwaymen, history, Katherine Fanshawe, Lady Katherine Ferrers, legends, Markyate Cells, seventeenth century, The wicked lady

The Gentleman’s Magazine, Monday, 24 November 1735:

Margaret Lockwood as the Wicked Lady, 1945 Gainsborough Pictures.

“A Butcher was Robb’d in a very Gallant Manner by a Woman well mounted on a Side Saddle, &c. near Rumford in Essex. She presented a Pistol to him, and demanded his Money; he being amaz’d at her Behaviour told her, he did not know what she meant; when a Gentleman coming up, told him he was a Brute to deny the Lady’s request, and if he did not gratify her Desire immediately, he wou’d Shoot him thro’ the Head; so he gave her his Watch and 6 Guineas.”†

The term Highway Man entered the English Language in 1617, courtesy of one William Fennor in his work ‘The Counter’s Commonwealth’ and it did not take long for the female highway man to follow.

One of the most colourful and persistent legends of the female highwayman is that of The Wicked Lady.  Her tale has entered both the local folk-lore of the Hertfordshire area and become well-known to the public at large through the 1944 novel by Magdalen King Hall and the 1945 Gainsborough film starring Margaret Lockwood and James Mason.  A later more frolicsome version was also produced by Michael Winner in 1983 and starring Faye Dunaway (although it is not to be forgotten that the 1945 version was considered extremely daring in its day because of the low decolletage of the ladies gowns).

The legend of the Wicked Lady

Both book and film contain most of the salient points of the legend, although they clearly embellish the account.  King Hall names her protagonist Lady Barbara Skelton of Maryiott Cells (rather than Markyate Cell), her lover the notorious highwayman Captain Jackson.    These versions of the tale have taken on an authority of their own in imparting the legend to a contemporary audience.

The main elements of the traditional tale are that a beautiful, young and bored noblewoman takes to dressing as a man and riding the countryside between Markyate Cells, Watling Street, Nomansland Common and Gustard Wood holding up travellers at gun point and stealing their goods.  Her antics are unknown to her husband and retainers as she is able to exit Markyate Cells via a secret passageway.

She falls in love with a local farmer Ralph Chaplin and together they continue their reign of terror.  Eventually Chaplin is hanged during a failed robbery on Finchley Common and in her grief the wicked lady terrorises the villagers around  Markyate Cells burning their cottages as they sleep, killing livestock and even going as far as to kill the Constable of Caddington.

Faye Dunaway – the death of the Wicked Lady, from the Michael Winner film 1983

Despite her grief she continues to rob and plunder travellers until one night she attacks a lone waggoner on the remote and chillingly named Nomansland Common.  Unbeknownst to her, he has comrades hidden in the waggon and she is shot and fatally wounded.  Riding back to Markyate Cells she dies before she can reach her home and is found, in her highwayman’s garb, in the grounds by servants who under the cover of darkness convey her body for burial.

Spectral Sightings

It might be supposed that the death of The Wicked Lady would see the end of her antics.  However, there was more to come, as Magdalen King Hall well knew.  At least one-third of her novel deals with a fictionalised history of the sightings of the female highwayman’s ghost particularly in and around ‘Maryiott Cells’.

“Slow dragging footsteps could be heard across the floors and lights seen in windows of unoccupied rooms; where mysterious rappings, sighs and whispering disturbed the stillness of the night house.”

A trembling bishop at a garden party describes seeing a comely female form in male attire that chilled him to the bone:

“The expression on the face was malign, predatory, doleful and all together most disquieting”

Nomansland Common, image by Hogweard

Not so fanciful it would seem, as there are many real life accounts of the spectre of the Wicked Lady.  The accounts seem to begin in the nineteenth century and include the somewhat surprising manifestation of the lady swinging from the branches of an old Sycamore tree in the grounds of Markyate Cell, terrifying a gang of workmen away from the location of her hidden treasure.

In 1840 Markyate Cell burned down and this was said to have been caused by the wicked lady – those fighting the fire are said to have felt very uneasy and many thought that their efforts were being watched from the woods by her baleful spirit.

In the late 19th Century the journal of August Hare records her presence at Markyate Cell – he apparently was not phased by sharing his home with a phantom and often bid her good night when he passed her on the staircase.  One comical entry states he found her shade standing in a doorway. Calling to his wife, who was on the other side, they both ran forward arms outstretched to capture her but – of course – she was not there. I don’t believe Mr Hare’s journal notes whether he and his wife bumped noses as a result of this encounter!

In the early twentieth century one George Wood was travelling the road from Markyate to Kensworth and saw a female figure dressed as a man about half a mile away.  The figure jumped into a ditch and when he reached the spot she was gone.  Mr Wood was unaware of the legend, but a local woman interpreted his vision for him and decided it was clearly the famous highway woman herself.

In 1970, Doug Payne, owner of The Wicked Lady Pub in Wheathampstead, claimed that whilst dog walking on Nomansland Common one night he was startled by the sounds of hoof-beats fast approaching him – yet he saw no rider.  The Wicked Lady pub was an inn in the seventeenth century and was thought to be one of her haunts.

More recently still, a woman returning to St Alban’s and stuck in a traffic jam was amazed to see a rider galloping in front of her car, pursued by a figure on foot who leaned on the car bonnet!  The vision dissolved in front of her eyes.

Local legend has it that horses left out in the fields near Markyate Cell at night, have been found in the mornings foam-flecked and exhausted, as thought they had been ridden hard all night….

Who was the Wicked Lady?

Katherine Fanshawe – the wicked lady? Portrait currently in Valence House Museum

Such a rich legend has to be true, doesn’t it?  There has to be a real woman behind this legend – right?  Well many people have tried to identify the real historical woman behind the legend and by far the most popular candidate is Lady Katherine Ferrers (1634 – 1660).

Katherine Ferrers (sometimes spelled Catherine) was the daughter of Knighton Ferrers and his wife.  Early in life she suffered the tragedy of losing her father and grandfather and brother which meant that by the age of 6 she was heiress to a vast fortune and extensive property and land.  Her mother remarried in 1640 Simon Fanshawe (later Sir Simon) but died only two years later leaving the young Katherine to the mercenary mercies of her step-father.

The Fanshawes were another wealthy landowning family, and a match between the Ferrers and the Fanshawes would seem practical – both families needed to ensure an heir or die out, their lands were adjoining and both were of the same religion.  Katherine was betrothed to Simon Fanshawe’s nephew Thomas.  In 1648 when she was 14 and he was 16 they were married and their fortunes were united.

One cloud on the horizon for the young couple was the Civil War.  It is likely that both families were royalist, but the Fanshawe’s were very actively so, and had suffered as a consequence.  The Sequestration Act took one of their properties and unlike parliamentarians, royalists had to obtain funds for their cause through contributions (from willing contributors such as the Fanshawe’s and less willing contributors who were looted or taxed unfairly).  Many of the Fanshawe’s fled abroad and others were often away fighting or in prison.  All of this made the family short of ready money.  Katherine’s inheritance was fair game and bit by bit her lands and properties were sold off for the cause.  Even Markyate Cell, so integral to the legend was sold by her husband in 1655 to ‘3 Londoners’ then again in 1657 to Mr Coppins.

Did this sudden pressure on the Ferrers/Fanshawe coffers lead Katherine to a life of highway robbery?  It was not unheard of – the Civil War left may noble and dashing young royalist without funds and a number of noble men (and even some noble women) were credited with taking to the highways and byways to replenish their wealth.  Did the bored and beautiful young wife, neglected by her husband take up with the handsome Ralph Chaplin and seek a life of adventure and peril on the open road?

She certainly died young – only 26 years of age.  She was not recorded as having any issue and was buried by night not in the Fanshawe family vault as might be expected, but at St Mary’s Church, Ware.  With her early death, the Ferrers line died out.

Katherine Ferrers – Guilty or Innocent?

Putting aside any thought for what the real Katherine may have thought about her posthumous fame/infamy, I would love her to be the prototype for the Wicked Lady.  A modern minx or proto feminist who just wouldn’t sit back and be the passive wife while her inheritance was frittered away by her neglectful husband, someone who took destiny by the throat, and even though she eventually lost, someone who died trying!  I would like to think she had an exciting, if short, life.  But I just don’t think the evidence holds up.

Markyate Cell, from The Gentleman’s Magazine, 1805

Yes, she was in the right place at the right time, and circumstances could have led her to seek her fortune on the road and her early death may hint at some violent end….but.

The legend sets her base as Markyate Cell, her ancestral home, yet it has never been proven that she actually lived there and in any-case the manor was sold well before her death.  In addition to this, Markyate Cell would seem too far away from her alleged stomping ground on Nomansland Common to be practical (although Gustards Wood has been mooted as an alternative HQ).

The handsome Ralph Chaplin, who swept the bored young girl off her feet, appears no where in local records and seems as much a phantom as the unseen rider.  Finchley Common, the site of his death, is also just a bit too far away to be likely.

Her early death, and burial by night can hardly be seen as uncommon in the seventeenth century.  Insanitary conditions, even for the wealthy, and poor understanding of medicine would have led to many an untimely death.  Burial in the evening was also a common practice at that time.  Her choice to be buried in the Church at Ware may have been out of respect to her Ferrers heritage rather than a sign of disgrace.

A case of mistaken identity or folk-lore gone wild?

The female highwayman/soldier/sailor is a common folk motif in English tradition. And treasure – what good folk-tale or legend is repleat without lost treasure to keep the story alive!

“Near the Cell, there is a wellNear the well there is a tree
And under the tree the treasure be”

Ballads and folktales abound on this subject of cross-dressing highwaymen and lost treasure; and perhaps at a time of civil war when there was so much turmoil and unrest a female highwayman entering the local cannon of folk-lore might be expected.  That Katherine Ferrers name has become associated with this local legend may be down to misidentification and coincidence.

In the 1820’s builders discovered a secret passage way at Markyate Cell.  It ran from the Kitchen to a chamber above.  The discovery excited local gossip about the legendary highway woman.  In 1833 a poem called ‘Maude of Allinghame’ told of the exploits of a female highwayman.  Coincidentally Katherine’s mother was related to a family called Allinghame.

Add to this the muddled memory of the Wicked Lord Ferrers, hanged at Tyburn in 1760 for murdering a faithful servant and it’s not to big a step to create a Wicked Lady Ferrers – the film versions have the wicked lady murdering a faithful old retainer so incorporate this element.

Overall, I am with John Barber and Marianne Gilchrist on this one and I believe that on balance, Katherine Ferrers probably wasn’t the Wicked Lady of folk legend; but that the strength of this legend in the popular consciousness was such that it appropriated a real person to validate it.

Certainly Anne Fanshawe writing the family history in the 1920’s had little to say of Katherine, and gossip at the time of her death did not attribute any scandal to her name.

She was, perhaps best described thus (despite the unfortunate emphasis on her fortune):

“A very great fortune and most excellent woman”§

Katherine Fanshawe

Notes

† Quote taken from http://www.outlawsandhighwaymen.com, http://www.outlawsandhighwaymen.com/gentmag.htm

§ Quote from ‘Dictionary of National Biography’,  http://www.hertfordshire-genealogy.co.uk/data/answers/answers-2001/ans-0021-wickedlady.htm

Sources

http://www.dunstablehistory.co.uk, http://www.dunstablehistory.co.uk/archives/VWX/Wicked_Lady.htm
http://www.hemelonline.com, http://www.hemelonline.com/history
http://www.hertfordshire-geneaology.co.uk, http://www.hertfordshire-genealogy.co.uk/data/answers/answers-2001/ans-0021-wickedlady.htm
http://www.johnbarber.com, http://www.johnbarber.com/wickedlady.html part 1-4
/the_wicked_lady_of_markyate.html
King-Hall, Magdalen, ‘The Wicked Lady’, 1944, reprinted 1976.
http://www.lutonparanormal.com, http://lutonparanormal.com/hertfordshire/popups/markyate.html
http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk, http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/nostalgia/crimelibrary/katherineferrers/
Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Katherine_Ferrers
http://fadedvideolabels.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/the-wicked-lady-1945.html

Phantasmagoria – The Eighteenth Century Horror Show

Tags

early cinema, eighteenth century, Etienne Gaspard Robertson, Gothic novels, history, horror, illusion, Magic Lantern, Phantasmagoria, pre-cinema

The thrill of the supernatural

Artist: Govard Bidloo.

In the past we were not so protected from death as we are now.  Death was not safely stowed away in clinical environments such as hospitals and care homes. Oh no – it was stalking you on the streets, it was in your home, in your bed and in your face.  Perhaps that is why human beings have always sought answers to the question of what awaits us when we finally shuffle off our mortal coil.  And while theologians and thinkers provided comfort and tried to provide answers in the form of religion or philosophy, the ordinary folk came up with folk tales and superstitions to explain the unexplainable.  And the byproduct of this was the delight in a good scare!

When beautifully horrid became horribly beautiful¹…

The eighteenth century saw the rise of the horror genre in the form of the ghost story and the Gothic Novel: The Castle of Otranto, by Horace Walpole 1765; Vathek, by William Beckford 1786; The Mysteries of Udolpho by Anne Radcliffe 1794; to name but a few.  As well as the quietly chilling pass-time of reading about supernatural events, the eighteenth century also offered a more interactive experience in the form of the wildly popular phantasmagoria magic lantern shows developed from the 1760’s onwards.

The Magic Lantern:  from science to fantasy…

Magic Lantern, English c1818. Photo by By Edal Anton Lefterov

 The invention of the magic lantern is credited to Christiaan Huygens and Athanasius Kirchner in the 17th Century.  Kirchner’s early magic lantern was made up of a lantern with a concave mirror and a candle, with a tube at the side housing convex lenses at each end.  The hand-painted glass slide was placed between them.  These early magic lanterns were simple fore-runners of the slide projector and later film projector.

Initially they were used for scientific purposes, however their entertainment value was soon recognised and their purpose became less high-brow with shows featuring pastoral and mythological scenes.  However con-men and charlatans soon saw the potential of this new technology – claiming to be able to resurrect the dead (using magic lanterns as tools). In a world where most people were generally ignorant of science it was easy to prey on superstitious folk by claiming supernatural powers.

During the 18th Century magic lantern shows began to begin the transformation into Phantasmagoria.  JG Shroepfer who ran a coffee shop in Leipzig had an unusual side line in teaching the occult and performing seance’s.  By incorporating the visual effects of the Magic Lantern Shroepfer was able to create a truly memorable séance.  He was a victim of his own success, by the 1760’s his shows were so popular he became a full-time showman but came to believe the spectral images he created were real and eventually became delusional and committed suicide.

Science and Showmanship – Etienne Gaspard Robert aka ‘Robertson’

18th Century Phantasmagoria showing pastoral scenes by Arthur Pougin

Although there were further developments towards phantasmagoria during the 18th century , particularly in Versailles (Francois Dominique Seraphin with his popular Chinese shadow-play and Edme-Gilles Guyot who experimented with projecting ghostly images onto smoke) it was Etienne Gaspard Robert (1763 – 1837) usually known by his stage name ‘Robertson’ who truly made the Phantasmagoria into the phenomena it became.

Robertson was not the first to combine the popular elements of the séance with magic lantern technology – Paul Philador staged the first true Phantasmagoria show in 1793 in Berlin, Vienna and Paris, however Robertson was the best.

18th Century magic lantern, artist unknown (Dorotheum)

Robertson had a childhood interest in folklore and the occult, and in his memoirs he recalls going so far as to try and raise the devil by killing a cockerel.  As a young man he studied science and art and became particularly interested in optics.  Eventually his interests combined and on 23 January 1798 he staged his first Phantasmagoria.

Robertson’s shows were so popular because of his combination of science and showmanship.  He made significant developments in the use of magic lanterns – developing the ‘Fantoscope’ with improved optics and wheels.  The use of wheels may seem a simple innovation, but it was an important one as it allowed him to create the illusion of images moving or seeming to approach and recede from the audience by adjusting the position of the Fantoscope (an early form of zoom) much to the horror and delight of his patrons – he used this to great effect with his ‘Bleeding nun’ image (an image taken from Lewis’ Gothic Novel ‘The Monk’).

Being an artist he painted his own glass plates and used black backgrounds for his figures.  This coupled with projection on to smoke or transparent screens created the illusion that the images were floating free.  This effect that the images were all around the audience was heightened by the use of multiple moving Fantoscopes and multiple slides allowing images to dissolve into one another (Louis XVI transforming into a skeleton).  He also made good use of darkness and sound to disorient his audience even making use of the eerie glass harmonica to create Mesmer-esque ‘Celestial Harmonies’.  The mechanics of the illusion were also hidden from the audience further causing them to suspend disbelief.

The Phantasmagoria Phenomena

What made these shows so popular?  Timing has to be considered here, Gunning

points out that their popularity coincides with the aftermath of the French Revolution.  The Age of Enlightenment has created a ‘disenchanted’ universe, where science and reason replace superstition and the old religion.  In France this was epitomised by the Revolution.  Rising Gothic Romanticism also increased the popularity of the macabre, mysterious and the psychology of terror.

By time Robertson was putting on his shows in Paris, his audience had lived through the Terror that the Revolution descended into.  The shows began with Robertson explaining the science of the show, the rational explanation behind it all, then seeming to blow all of this out of the water by putting his audience through a terrifyingly real experience.

He didn’t claim that his phantoms were real, and in fact did much to popularise science, yet his audience were prepared to suspend disbelief and for the duration of the show at least, reacted as though what they viewed was real.  Gunning argues that:

“The effect of the phantasmagoria derives from a dialectic – not only between what we sense and what we know – but between what we know and what we fear we might actually believe.”

Robertson’s Phantasmagoria in the Capuchin Crypt, Paris

Beyond Robertson

Robertson kept his tricks as secret as possible, but eventually other rival shows took off and for a time Phantasmagoria shows were wildly popular – particularly in England but even being shown as far away as New York.

Photographic slides eventually replaced painted ones, and eventually developments in photography and later cinematography meant the Phantasmagoria became obsolete.  However, many of the techniques pioneered by these early shows influenced early cinema and later on, horror movies.  Both using zoom, dissolving images, stop-motion techniques to create their effects.

It is still sometimes possible to see a Phantasmagoria show – usually around Halloween – and as recently as 2006 Tate Modern featured a Phantasmagoria show as part of their ‘Nighmares of the Gothic: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination‘.

Although I have never seen a Phantasmagoria show myself, a couple of years ago in Whitby I experienced a modern version of the genre when I came across a ‘Live’ horror event in the back room of a pub!  A friend and I paid our £5 and stepped into the darkness beyond – not sure what to expect.  We found ourselves thrust head first into a lunatic asylum from a horror film. We were soon screaming and running from axe wielding maniacs and scar-faced Satanists!  When we finally exited, we were both on a total adrenalin high exhilarated by the unexpectedly ‘real’ unreality we had just experienced – it seems not much has changed in the past 200 years!

Sources & notes

1. Fairclough, P (Ed); Three Gothic Novels, Penguin

Gunning, Tom: http://www.mediaarthistory.org/refresh/Programmatic%20key%20texts/pdfs/Gunning.pdf
Marion F, The Wonder of Optics, New York, 1871http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=RKQIAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA183&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=4#v=onepage&q&f=false
Mead, Derek: http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/phantasmagoria-were-the-18th-century-suicide-scary-theaters-that-gave-us-movies–2
Skulls in the Stars: http://skullsinthestars.com/2013/02/11/phantasmagoria-how-etienne-gaspard-robert-terrified-paris-for-science/
The Magic Lantern Society: http://www.magiclantern.org.uk/history/history6.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasmagoria

Image Sources

Guilty Pleasures: Carry on Screaming

Tags

Carry on films, carry on screaming, hammer films, horror films, kenneth williams

Carry on Films are my Guilty Pleasure….

Sergeant Bung: ‘A young lady has disappeared and we’re anxious to trace her whereabouts’
Dr Watt: ‘Oh, whereabouts?’
Bung: ‘Hereabouts’
Mr Potter: ‘At 10 o’clock’
Bung: ‘Or thereabouts’
Constable Slobottom: ‘In this vicinity’
Bung: ‘Or roundabouts – we’re police officers’
Potter: [exasperated] ‘-or lay-abouts!‘

This is one of the classic scenes from Carry on Screaming – with a mix of carry on regulars such as Jimmy Dale and Kenneth Williams along side Harry H Corbett (standing in for Sid James as Sergeant Bung) – delivering the quick fire wit and word play of classic carry on films.

Studio Canal DVD

I have always loved the carry on films – especially the ‘historic’ or ‘literary’ parodies:  Carry on Henry with costumes better than some Hollywood Epics; Carry on Cleo sending up Julius Caesar, Anthony and Cleopatra with such verve; and one of my all time favorites Carry on don’t lose your head a less than decorous take on the Scarlet Pimpernel.

However, possibly the best Carry on Film ever made (in my opinion at least) is the fabulously creepy Carry on Screaming.  Directed by Gerald Thomas with and written by Talbot Rothwell it premiered in 1966 and lovingly parodied both the Universal Horror films of the 1930’s and the Hammer Horror films that were so popular at the time.  It deals in typical Carry on fashion with several of the staples of the horror genre:  Dracula (Dr Watt’s catch-phrase ‘Frying tonight’ is supposed to be a reference to Dracula ‘Flying tonight’); Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde; Mad scientists; homicidal Egyptian Mummies; wolf-men; the vampire temptress; the virginal heroine/victims (with varying degrees of allure:  see Sergeant Slobottom in a frock for reference!) Even the title song was memorable and had its own legend attached to it – for many years fans thought Carry on regular Jimmy Dale was the singer (he wasn’t – it was actually Ray Pilgrim).

Jimmy Dale as Wolfman

One of the distinctive things about the film is the look of it – it really feels like a classic hammer horror from its dark sinister woods to the OTT cobwebbed Victorian mansion ‘Bide-a-wee’ with its crazy scientific paraphernalia in the basement.  This may be due to the influence of photographer, Alan Hume, who also worked on Hammer and Amicus horror films in the 1960’s.

The performances as well were wonderfully hammy – with Kenneth Williams playing the arch villan Dr Watt, Fenella Fielding oozing Hammer-horror sultriness as Valeria his sister.  The forces for good included Harry H Corbett playing Sergeant Bung, Peter Butterworth as his bumbling side-kick Slobottom and the gorgeously goofy Jimmy Dale as Mr Potter the window cleaner whose lady friend (played by Angela Douglas) had been abducted in Hokum woods (Hokum woods – love it!).

Smoking indoors was allowed back then..

Nutty slack

Other Carry on regulars also feature as bit players – Joan Simms as Bung’s shrewish, telephone-phobic wife; Charles Hawtrey (written in at the last-minute for the American market) does a very camp turn as a toilet attendant known as Dan Dan the —- Man. Even future Dr Who, Jon Pertwee,  has a cameo role as the police’s own mad scientist Dr Fettle.

I would like to end with a transcript of my favorite scene from Carry on Screaming, a scene between Sergeant Bung, Constable Slobottam and Dr Watt…the scene owes a lot to Abbott and Costello’s ‘Who’s on first’ sketch but is done with the Carry on teams inimitable style:

Bung: ‘Are you prepared to make a statement?’
Watt: ‘I did didn’t I?’
Bung: ‘I’d like my assistant to get it on the record sir.  Now, if I could have your name please.’
Watt: ‘Dr Watt’
Slobottom: ‘Dr-Who- sir?’
Watt: ‘Watt – Who was my uncle or was, I haven’t seen him for ages.’
Slobottom: ‘We appear to be at Loggerheads sir’
Watt: ‘No, this is Bide-A-Wee, Loggerheads is about 5 miles down the road.’
Slobottom: ‘No, no, about your name.’
Watt: [irritated] ‘Watt’
Slobottom: ‘What’s your name?’
Bung: [shouting] ‘Watt’s his name!’
Slobottom: ‘Thats what I’m trying to find out sir’
Bung: ‘Excuses, excuses, nothing but excuses.  Just get the statement down ‘I haven’t see or heard anything suspicious in the vicinity this evening.’
Watt: ‘You too ey?  So glad it wasn’t just me who didn’t…’

‘Frying Tonight!’

Sources

Images and quotes taken from the DVD version of the film:  Programme Content Copyright 1966 Canal+ Image UK Ltd; Script written by Talbot Rothwell.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry_On_Screaming
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Hume
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060214/
http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/466443/index.html