Posted on 03/02/2008 10:55:54 AM PST by BGHater
When the battleship Barham was torpedoed by the Germans in November 1941, with the loss of over 800 lives, the Admiralty delayed announcing the news to maintain morale.
But the secrecy was ended within a few days when medium Helen Duncan told a couple during a seance that their son, a sailor on the ship, had appeared from the spirit world to tell them it had sunk.
Witch? Helen Duncan, pictured in a portrait from 1931, was jailed for nine months in 1944 under the Witchcraft Act of 1735
In one of the most bizarre acts of the Second World War, Mrs Duncan was accused of leaking military secrets - and became the last woman jailed as a witch in the UK.
Now campaigners want an official pardon for the Scots-born mother of six, who spent nine months in Holloway Prison, north London.
Helen Duncan had a vision the HMS Barham would be involved in a wartime tragedy
A group of mediums have handed a petition to the Scottish Parliament, calling on it to lobby Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.
Campaigner Roberta Gordon, from Gullane, East Lothian, said: "At the time the country was paranoid about security and the evidence used against her wasn't accurate.
"It would take away the stigma from her granddaughters and the great-grandsons."
Mrs Duncan was one of Britain's best-known mediums. During her seances she produced "ectoplasm" - a stringy white substance that is supposed to give form to spirits and allow them to communicate.
Paranormal investigators denounced her as a fraud who used cheesecloth and egg whites, but her family insist she was genuine, "an ordinary woman with a gift".
Helen Duncan, here with husband Henry, after the war, was the last person in Britain to be jailed under the Witchcraft Act
Despite the controversy, Mrs Duncan reputedly numbered Winston Churchill and George VI among her clients.
Churchill denounced the case against her as "obsolete tomfoolery" and visited her in prison.
The Barham, a 29,000-ton battleship, was hit by three German torpedoes in the Mediterranean on November 25, 1941.
Stigma: Helen Duncan's granddaughter Mary Martin
The ship went down within minutes, with the loss of 861 lives. Already reeling from the Blitz, the British government decided not to make the news public, not least to keep the Germans guessing.
But Duncan, who was living in Portsmouth at the time, held a seance just days later and told how she saw a sailor with the words HMS Barham on his hatband.
He told her: "My ship is sunk". News of the revelation reached the Admiralty and she was placed under observation. But she was not arrested until January 1944.
The trial in March 1944 caused a media sensation as Mrs Duncan was accused of being a traitor.
But the prosecution struggled to back the claim and she was convicted instead under the 1735 Witchcraft Act, which had declared there could be no such thing as a medium.
She was the last person in Britain jailed under the act, which was repealed in 1951. The last person convicted, East Londoner Jane Yorke, 72, escaped with a fine in October 1944 due to her age.
Mrs Duncan died in 1956, soon after being arrested again in a police raid on a seance.
Last year the Criminal Cases Review Commission rejected a petition for her to be pardoned, saying it would not be in the public interest.
There’s some famous footage of the Barham capsizing and blowing up. It appears on The History Channel every time the show involves a ship exploding, but is never identified as the Barham.
Great story.
What do they mean “leaked?” This sort of reminds me of the claim that Rove “leaked” Plame’s secret identity, which just like this situation, was impossible since he did not even know Plame’s identity.
GRAB YOUR TORCH AND PITCHFORKS EVERYBODY!
“leaking military secrets”
Maybe Drudge told her. :)
But she was heavier than the goose, and the goose floated.
My ex-wife is glad that she doesn't live in Great Britian.
Leading up to D-Day, he was using the code names of various projects, including "OVERLORD".
I don't have a problem with a Fraudulent Mediums Act, and this woman was definitely a fraud. What seems to have drawn special attention to her is that some of her clients were privy to state secrets which she ended up leaking in order to establish her bonafides.
This is similar to the case in the US during WWII (1944) when ‘Astounding’ science fiction magazing (today ‘Analog’) published a story anticipating the atomic bomb. The publisher, John W. Campbell, was visited by the FBI and accused of publishing secret material and demanding the issue be removed from newsstands. Reportedly, Campbell managed to convince the FBI that would draw more attention to the US atomic bomb program than just ignoring it. And that’s what they did.
Agreed.
The state could not prove who told her the secret and therefore could not secure a conviction within the normal statute, so they dusted off an older one which could be used to punish her.
The outdated law is now abolished and cannot threaten con artists anymore, she got what she deserved and there is no need to exonerate her since she did something pretty evil and disgusting.
Wonder if we could get Hitlery to go to England for an extended stay? Hmmm.
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