DARK TOURISM UK…. WHERE FANTASY MEETS REALITY HERE AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION, LITTLEDEAN JAIL. BELOW IS A BRIEF LOOK AT OUR EXHIBITION ON WITCHFINDER GENERAL- MATTHEW HOPKINS, WHICH EMBRACES BOTH THE ORIGINAL HISTORY ON THIS BRUTAL AND SADISTIC WITCH HUNTER BETWEEN 1644 – 1646. THIS WAS LATER TO BE THE SUBJECT OF THE 1968 BRITISH CULT HORROR FILM … “WITCHFINDER GENERAL”, STARRING VINCENT PRICE

ABOVE: A unique and certainly very rare, excessively large  French Witchfinder General promotional film poster here on display at Littledean Jail

Matthew Hopkins (c. 1620 – 12 August 1647) was an English witch-hunter whose career flourished during the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament. His witch-hunts mainly took place in East Anglia.

ABOVE : A rare adapted, hand painted, fantastic resin model figure based on one of the scenes from the iconic 1968 British Cult Horror Film  “Witchfinder General”. Matthew Hopkins played by Vincent Price and Hilary Dwyer as Sara…. (you try and find one  as very few in circulation ??) . This believed to be the only one on public display as can be seen here at the jail .

BELOW:  A model of the head of Vincent Price who starred as The Witchfinder General in the 1968 film with the same name

Hopkins’ witch-finding career began in March 1644 and lasted until his retirement in 1647. He and his associates were responsible for more people being hanged for witchcraft than in the previous 100 years, and were solely responsible for the increase in witch trials during those years. He is believed to have been responsible for the deaths of 300 women between the years 1644 and 1646. It has been estimated that all of the English witch trials between the early 15th and late 18th centuries resulted in fewer than 500 executions for witchcraft. Therefore, presuming the number executed as a result of “investigations” by Hopkins and his colleague John Stearne is at the lower end of the various estimates, their efforts accounted for about 60 per cent of the total; in the 14 months of their crusade Hopkins and Stearne sent to the gallows more people than all the other witch-hunters in England of the previous 160 years

Above and Below : Portrayal of Matthew Hopkins – Witchfinder General and his first known victim, Elizabeth Clarke.  She was was accused of witchcraft  and hanged to death. This loosely based on Vincent Price’s adaptation of him in the 1968 film “Witchfinder General ” directed by Michael Reeves . This being part of a historically informative insight into the 17th Century well documented infamous Witch Hunts .

 

A disturbing tale of evil set during the English Civil War. When Matthew Hopkins is appointed Witchfinder General by the Puritans under Cromwell, he is empowered to travel the countryside with his henchmen and collect a fee for each witch from whom he extracts a confession – a policy which is exploited to the full.Above : One of the many informative exhibition pieces on display in and amongst out “WHERE FANTASY MEETS REALITY ” feature on the true story of the infamous Witch hunter  Matthew Hopkins , known as The Witchfinder General. Subsequently played by Vincent Price in the 1968 film “The Witchfinder General ” …. which was also retitled “The Conqueror Worm ” for release in the USA.

Above : An image of an original 1968 film poster for Witchfinder General  on display at The Crime Through Time Collection, in and amongst The Witchcraft, Satanism, The Occult , The illuminati, The Paranormal and Beyond Exhibition .

ABOVE: A unique and certainly very rare, excessively large  French Witchfinder General promotional film poster here on display at Littledean Jail 

Original film poster entitled ” The Conqueror Worm ” for the release of the original British made  “Witchfinder General” film  in the USA

 

Below: A brief video clip from the 1968 film – Witchfinder General…. based on a true story in the fact that this was the first execution of an alleged witch Elizabeth Clarke in 1645 ….One of a great many women who were subsequently sadistically executed on the orders of Matthew Hopkins , for  allegedly being witches .

An original 1968 magazine advert for the film .

 

Below: An original oil painting by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman depicting Vincent Price as The Witchfinder General – Matthew Hopkins  in the 1968 British Horror cult film .

 

Below:  Documentary insight into the real Witchfinder General, Matthew Hopkins

Below Original oil painting by Paul Bridgman depicting what was claimed to be an early woodcutting image of the original Witchfinder General Matthew Hopkins in the presence of two seated witches and their imps

  

An original 1968 magazine advert for the film .

 

Above : Another short clip from the 1968 film

Above and below: Original oil paintings by Paul Bridgman depicting various scenes from the film, on display at the jail.

GERALD GARDNER (1884 -1964) FATHER OF MODERN WITCHCRAFT . FEATURED HERE IN AND AMONGST THE WITCHCRAFT, PAGANISM, WICCAN, THE OCCULT, SATANISM, THE ILLUMINATI AND SECRET SOCIETIES EXHIBITION AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL , FOREST OF DEAN, GLOUCESTERSHIRE,UK.

Gerald Gardner in one of his many naked ceremonial initiations and Wiccan gatherings.

Above: Original painting of Gerald Gardner on display at The Crime Through Time Collection, Littledean Jail , UK , in and amongst the Witchcraft, Paganism, Occult, The illuminati and Secret Societies Exhibition areas .

Gerald Brosseau Gardner (1884–1964), also known by the craft name Scire, was an English Wiccan, as well as an author and an amateur anthropologist and archaeologist. He was instrumental in bringing the Contemporary Pagan religion of Wicca to public attention, writing some of its definitive religious texts and founding the tradition of Gardnerian Wicca.

Original painting of Gerald Gardner along with High Priestess’s Patricia Crowther and Monique Wilson , by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman. Here on display in and amongst the Witchcraft and Occult Collection at The Crime Through Time Museum , Littledean Jail , Gloucestershire , UK .

Born into an upper-middle-class family in Blundellsands, Lancashire, Gardner spent much of his childhood abroad in Madeira. In 1900, he moved to colonial Ceylon, and then in 1911 to Malaya, where he worked as a civil servant, independently developing an interest in the native peoples and writing papers and a book about their magical practices. After his retirement in 1936, he travelled to Cyprus, penning the novel A Goddess Arrives before returning to England. Settling down near the New Forest, he joined an occult group, the Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship, through which he claimed to have encountered the New Forest coven into which he was initiated in 1939. Believing the coven to be a survival of the pre-Christian Witch-Cult discussed in the works of Margaret Murray, he decided to revive the faith, supplementing the coven’s rituals with ideas borrowed from Freemasonry, ceremonial magic and the writings of Aleister Crowley to form the Gardnerian tradition of Wicca.

Moving to London in 1945, following the repeal of the Witchcraft Act of 1736 he became intent on propagating this religion, attracting media attention and writing about it in High Magic’s Aid (1949), Witchcraft Today (1954) and The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959). Founding a Wiccan group known as the Bricket Wood coven, he introduced a string of High Priestesses into the religion, including Doreen Valiente, Lois Bourne, Patricia Crowther and Eleanor Bone, through which the Gardnerian community spread throughout Britain and subsequently into Australia and the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Involved for a time with Cecil Williamson, Gardner also became director of the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft on the Isle of Man, which he ran until his death.

Gardner is internationally recognised as the “Father of Wicca” among the Pagan and occult communities. His claims regarding the New Forest coven have been widely scrutinised, with Gardner being the subject of investigation for historians and biographers such as Aidan Kelly, Ronald Hutton and Philip Heselton

A brief video introduction into the life and times of Gerald Gardner

Below : Various images of Gerald Gardner at his Witches Mill , Isle of Man

Above and Below: Various insight into some of the many collage displays here at Littledean Jail.

SATANIC DECORATED RAMS HEAD SKULL ON DISPLAY ALONG WITH A GREAT MANY  OTHER INTRIGUING ITEMS  WITHIN THE WITCHCRAFT AND OCCULT EXHIBITION  AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL , FOREST OF DEAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK .

Above and below : Various paintings on display in and amongst The Witchcraft and Occult Collection here at Littledean Jail .

Above & Below : Pictured here are our Alexandrian Wiccan Casting Circles, Stone Altar and Stone Baptisim Font  on display at the Jail .

 

Above and Below … Various original paintings here on display at Littledean Jail featuring some of the most so say controversial though world famous High Priests and High Priestess’s  …. to include Alex and Maxine Sanders and Stewart Farrar with his wife Janet .

Below: Various images and a brief insight into an Alexandrian Casting Circle, Baphomet Horned God, Witchcraft Altar etc , here on display at Littledean Jail, Forest of Dean , Gloucestershire, UK .

Above and Below : Original oil paintings by local artist Paul Bridgman depicting our Alexandrian Baphomet “Horned God” on display in and amongst our exhibition areas