British psychic Helen Duncan, known as Hell's Nell, claimed that she communicated with ghosts due to the fact that her body secreted ectoplasm. The National Laboratory for Physical Research has figured out what ectoplasm is. But Nell was arrested in 1944, not for fraud, but out of fear that she would betray the "secrets of ghosts" to the Reich.
Infernal Nell was imprisoned under the curious "Law on Witchcraft" of the 18th century, because the British intelligence services believed that the information she divulged could reach the ears of the Abwehr.
Winston Churchill, red-faced and corpulent, turned purple with rage as he sat down to write to the Home Secretary. The message from the Prime Minister of Great Britain on April 3, 1944 contained neither a traditional address nor a greeting and was signed in light red ink. “How much did this process cost the state? - asked the British prime minister and ordered, - tell me why a modern court could refer to the 1735 witchcraft law."
On April 3, 1944, the Old Bailey Central Criminal Court in London sentenced Scottish Helen Duncan to nine months in prison on charges of witchcraft. Churchill was infuriated by the absurd by the standards of the twentieth century, which he described as "obsolete insanity."
During the war, when the Hitlerite Air Force continued to bomb the cities and towns of the metropolis, the British justice pulled out into the light of day an almost forgotten paragraph of the "Law on Witchcraft". In accordance with the Witchcraft Act of 1735 adopted by the Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain, the maximum sentence for which was a year in prison, the 46-year-old mother of six children was sent to jail.
After the verdict was announced, the plump, sickly-looking women lost their nerves: “Never in my life have I heard a greater lie. Why do I need all this? she cried, and then burst into tears. In the UK, campaigns for the posthumous rehabilitation of Helen Duncan are still periodically launched.
Victoria Helen McCrae Duncan (Victoria Helen McCrae Duncan), a native of the small Scottish town of Callander (Callander) in Perth, was born on November 25, 1897 in the family of a roofer. At the age of seven, she saw the spirit of the long-dead soldier Johnny in the kitchen. As her daughter Gena Brealey later recalled, her mother could predict accidents. At school, the girl successfully answered the teachers' questions, as if someone was prompting her the right answers.
To the displeasure of her mother, a member of the Presbyterian Church, she frightened her classmates with terrible prophecies and hysterical behavior. For which she was awarded the nickname Hellish Nell - Hellish Nell. "Don't tell anyone about your gift," her mother warned Helen, "otherwise they'll think you're a witch." For the time being, her paranormal talents were kept secret.
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But when Duncan had six children in her arms and her husband, who had returned wounded from the front, she decided to work as a medium. Helen toured the country and claimed that she could summon the spirit of the dead. To this end, she fell into a trance and a certain white fluid supposedly emitted from her, the so-called ectoplasm, which took the form of the deceased and answered questions. Money flowed to the clairvoyant and the medium. First in a thin stream, then in an extensive stream.
However, British explorer and "ghost hunter" Harry Price exposed the deception. In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which he had created five years earlier, confirmed that the "ectoplasm" Duncan was asking consisted of gauze, toilet paper, and hard-boiled protein. According to Pris, before each session, Duncan swallowed all this cocktail in order to pluck it out of herself at the right time. Pris unmasked almost all of Duncan's props: dolls, rubber gloves and handkerchiefs, on which photos of the summoned "spirits" were pasted.
However, no tearing of the masks did not affect the popularity of the clairvoyant, nor did the incident that happened in 1933. At the very beginning of the year, namely on January 6, Scot Esson Maule, who was present during the session of invoking the spirits, suddenly jumped up, turned on the light and grabbed the spirit of little Peggy, who turned out to be made of … shabby ladies' panties. "I'll smash your head off, you disgusting rubbish!" Duncan hissed, angry. She had to pay a £ 10 fine and again began to fool simple-minded people.
The Second World War only increased the number of people attending Duncan's sessions. On November 25, 1941, the British battleship HMS Barham was sunk by the German submarine U-331 in the Mediterranean Sea. The powerful explosion claimed the lives of 861 crew members, and the War Department kept the secret until the end of January 1942. To their great surprise, Duncan summoned the spirit of one of the dead sailors back in November 1941. Since then, the medium has been under the hood of the British secret services.
How could Duncan find out about the tragedy two months before the official announcement of the sinking of the battleship Barem? Either from his two sons, who served in the navy, or from one of the family members of the crew - despite the secrecy, funerals began to come to relatives immediately after the death of the sailors.
Her Majesty's Secret Service drew attention to another "joint" Duncan. She described the deaths of more than 1,400 people from the British Navy battle cruiser HMS Hood, which sank on May 24, 1941 after a battle with the German battleship Bismarck. This was also done before the official announcement of the death of the cruiser.
On January 19, 1944, disguised police arrested Hell's Nell in Portsmouth, right during an ectoplasm isolation session. According to the British historian Malcolm Gaskill, at this time, Operation D-Day, the Allied landing in Normandy, which was to take place on June 6, 1944, was being prepared in the strictest confidence. Every effort was made to ensure that no information was leaked, and Duncan could prematurely disclose this information. For this reason, MI5 was forced to take extreme measures.
This unusual trial lasted a whole week. Despite the best efforts of Helena's lawyer, who was himself a staunch spiritualist and who attracted 46 witnesses to speak out in favor of his ward, the court sent Hell's Nell to the notorious Holloway Prison for women. She was pardoned only in September 1944, when Operation Overlord had already ended. Duncan made a promise to abandon the magic sessions in the future, but she continued to do this.
The "Witchcraft Act" was abolished at the insistence of Winston Churchill only in 1951. Earlier, another "witch" fell into the clutches of the British Themis. 72-year-old Jane Rebecca Yorke was detained in July 1944, but not arrested, but fined five pounds on the basis of the notorious Witchcraft Act.
Helen Duncan to this day remains in memory as the "last witch" of Europe. She passed away on December 6, 1956, shortly after her next arrest, this time on charges of fraud.