MURDER BY MAGICK
The Mystery of Netta Fornario:
Iona's Occult Enigma
It could be the first page of a disturbing screenplay. We’re on a bleak, windswept remote Scottish island. At a spot known as the Fairy Mound, a crude cross has been carved out of the boggy peat. Upon this earthen crucifix, covered only with a strange cloak, lies the naked lifeless body of a young woman. A blackened silver chain with a cross hangs around her neck. She holds a knife in her dead hand. Her frozen expression is one of sheer terror, and both her hands and her feet are swollen and bloody. But this is no screenplay. The year is 1929, and this is the opening scene of a bizarre and enduring mystery.
The year 1931 saw the publication of a book with the astonishingly cumbersome title; take a deep breath … A Last Voyage to St. Kilda. Being the Observations and Adventures of an Egotistic Private Secretary who was alleged to have been 'warned off' That Island by Admiralty Officials when attempting to emulate Robinson Crusoe at the Time of Its Evacuation. It was written by the Private Secretary to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster,Alasdair Alpin MacGregor(1899 - 1970).McGregor was a travel writer, poet and expert on Scottish folklore. Unfortunately, like the ‘worst poet in British history’ William Topaz McGonagall, although McGregor was a decent writer with an elegant, ornate style, he was frequently parodied, especially by prominent Scottish writer Sir Compton Mackenzie, one of the founders of the Scottish National Party.
Yet due to Alasdair McGregor’s total immersion in the more esoteric and mystical aspects of Scottish history we are able to thank him, and subsequent researchers, for his detailed descriptive account of one of the strangest of all Caledonian conundrums, a bizarre, unsolved occult murder in 1929 on the isolated, ancient island of Iona. If this had been a screenplay, it would have made a memorable companion to The Wicker Man. But let’s get back to the body on the fairy mound.
She was the 33 year old Norah Emily Editha Fornario (known as Netta Fornario). Her mother was English and her father was an Italian medical practitioner, with whom Netta did not get along. This estrangement may have been due to the variance of opinion between a qualified doctor and a daughter whose idea of curative physiological efficacy was firmly rooted in the world of the psychic and the occult. Earlier in life she had joined the famous circle of practitioners in ‘magick’, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, there to become a close friend of British occultist and author Violet Mary Firth Evans, better known as Dion Fortune (1890-1946).
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| Violet Mary Firth Evans, a.k.a. Dion Fortune |
Born inBryn-y-Bia, Llandudno, North Wales, Fortune’s nom de plume was inspired by her family motto Deo, non fortuna, Latin: "by God, not fate". Two of her novels, The Sea Priestess and Moon Magic, became highly influential to the faithful of the Wiccan religion, especially upon leading Witch Doreen Valiente[1]. Yet the work which has the most relevance in Netta Fornario’s struggles (Fortune referred to Netta as ‘Mac Tyler’) with the spirit world would be Fortune’s Psychic Self Defence[2],a manual on how to protect oneself from psychic attacks which would be published the year after Netta’s death.
A serious student of the occult, Netta was a member of the Alpha et Omega Temple. This had its origins in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, co-founded as an intended ‘elementary branch of the Rosicrucian Order[3]’ in London in 1888 by Dr. William Wynn Westcott, a London coroner and Freemason, and Samuel Liddell Mathers (1854-1918). Mathers' research had one ultimate aim; the ‘Great Work’ of self-realization. It was all-embracing, including the Tarot, Enochian magic, alchemy, ceremonial Magic, Kabbalah, astrology, Egyptian Magic and divination. Mathers, who had married Mina Bergson, sister of the French philosopher Henri Bergson, moved to Paris, and considered himself as the undisputed chief and leader of Golden Dawn. To be a member, one had to swear an oath to Mathers, but not everyone went for the idea. Mathers eventually forced Westcott in London to resign after accusing him of faking a document.
The Golden Dawn attracted some bizarre hangers-on, (as well as intellectuals such as the poet William Butler Yeats) and one of Mathers’ young protégés was given the mission of retrieving the Order’s archives from Westcott. The ex-communicated Golden Dawners must have had a nasty shock when the loud, demanding emissary arrived at the London temple at 336 Blythe Road, because it was none other than ‘the Beast’ himself, Aleister Crowley, dubbed by Yeats, who had also fallen foul of Mathers, as a "mad person whom we had refused to initiate". Crowley, in full Highland dress, brandishing a sword and wearing a mask, was met by Yeats on the doorstep and hostilities ensued. The Police were duly summoned to invigilate in a desperate confrontation which saw Yeats demanding Crowley’s arrest as an intruder, whilst Crowley waved his Claymore around insisting that Golden Dawn’s London adherents be evicted from the building. Eventually, Mathers went on to establish his own magical order, the Alpha et Omega, and in order add a dash of Celtic flavour to his background, augmented his surname with ‘MacGregor’. Although he finally departed for the spirit world in 1918, Alpha et Omega’s membership carried on the ‘Great Work’ regardless, led by Mathers’ widow, Mina, now to be known as Moina Mathers.
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| McGregor Mathers |
Netta Fornario’s good friend and fellow Temple initiate Dion Fortune had serious issues with Moina Mathers, claiming she was the victim of a magical attack. Fortune left Alpha et Omega and formed her own offshoot organisation which eventually became known as The Society of the Inner Light. Like Fortune, Netta believed telepathy was a defensive method by which people could be cured. Shortly before her death on Iona she sent a message to her housekeeper at her home on Mortlake Road, Kew, London, asking her not to expect to hear from her for some time as she had "a terrible case of healing on". Whether or not the healing was for herself or some other psychic victim seems unclear.
Looking at the voluminous and arcane spiritual history of the Island of Iona, it is little wonder that this is where Netta would be drawn in order to embark on a psychic struggle with dark forces. The ‘dark force’ in question has been suggested by some researchers to have been Moina Mathers. If so, she was projecting her evil scheme from beyond the grave, because when Netta arrived on Iona, Moina had been dead for 16 months.
Off the West coast of Scotland, 3.5 miles long and one mile wide, the island of Iona is famous as the place where, in 563AD, the grandson of the Irish King Niall, St Columba, landed with 12 followers to found a monastic community and build their first Celtic
Church. With the usual zeal of unwelcome Christians, Columba set about converting the Scottish Pagans, and anyone else within missionary distance. He seems to have enjoyed much success. According to a survey in 1549 it became clear that Iona’s graveyard was the place to be for local leaders, because its graves include those of 48 Scottish Kings, 8 Norwegian and 4 Irish, including King Kenneth I, Donald II, Malcolm I, Duncan I, Macbeth and Donald III.
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| Moina Mathers |
Columba had some odd ideas about the opposite sex. Like most patriarchal religionists, he was no champion of equal rights. For example, he banished cows from the island, claiming "where there is a cow there is a woman, and where there is a woman there is mischief".
When his work force arrived to start building his Abbey, the stonemasons’ and carpenters’ wives were kept apart with the cattle on the nearby long rocky island of Eilean-nam-Ban, ‘the Women's Island’, where they were billeted in in huts, the ruins of which are still visible today. Columba liked to spend time meditating on the Hill of the Angels - Cnoc nan Aingeal. The Hill of Angels is adjacent to the Sithean, the Fairy Mound, where Netta Fornario would meet her death. It has become known as Iona’s paranormal hotspot, and in the Bronze and Iron Ages the surrounding hills had been the centre of pagan rituals.
For a pioneering Christian, Columba certainly seems to have had a cruel streak. Legend has it that he insisted that he needed to bury a living person in the foundations of the chapel. This is not a vacancy everyone would apply for, but Columba’s close friend, Oran, volunteered to be buried alive. During the burial ceremony, however, Columba asked for Oran’s face to be uncovered so that he could say a last ‘goodbye’ to his friend. By this time, and hardly unexpected, Oran, who was still alive, had gone off the idea of his cadaver propping up the foundations. In no uncertain terms, feeling rather upset down there in the pit, he’d changed his mind. So much so that his Christianity took leave of him and he began blaspheming, so Columba had him covered up again, and, apparently, poor Oran’s bones are still down there. St Oran’s Abbey was duly built and was restored in the 20thcentury, so mind where you tread.
Iona is indeed a mysterious place packed with spiritual and religious significance, with Templar knight gravestones, Megalithic remains and prehistoric burial sites. The island has been referred to by many as a boundary between life and death. It was a place where the living often arrived to prepare for their final journey. Perhaps this strange aspect of its history is what attracted Netta Fornario.
A JOURNEY INTO DARKNESS
The newspaper The Scotsman, of 27 November 1929 described Netta as ‘This alien woman, who dressed in the fashion of the Arts and Crafts movement - with long cape and hand-woven tunic …’ As being a ‘magician’ wasn’t what we’d call a ‘proper job’ back then, one has to wonder where wizards found the time, and indeed the money, to follow their craft and set up temples in such expensive locations as London. Undoubtedly most of them had private incomes and came from well-heeled families. As to Netta’s means of support, although she was a writer and journalist[6] of sorts, there is a very interesting snippet of information which can still be accessed on line[7]from the New Zealand newspaper The Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 214, 8 June 1909, Page 7. It reads:
‘The will has just been proved of Mr. Thomas Pratt Ling, of Bracondale, Dorking, tea merchant, in which he left £12,000 upon trust for his granddaughter, Marie Nora Emily Edith Fornario, provided that she shall remain under the guardianship of his son George or other person approved by his trustees and shall not forsake the English Protestant Faith, or marry a person not of that Faith, or marry a first cousin on either her father’s or her mother’s side, under penalty of losing one-half of her interest in this sum, and he also provided that the income should be paid to her in the United Kingdom, unless for a cause to be certified by medical certificate, or other cause to be approved by his trustees, she shall not be in the United Kingdom.’
Whether or not Netta had access to what was then a substantial fortune (considering the demand to remain a Protestant) is unclear. According to Netta’s Kew housekeeper, Mrs. Varney, her tenant always seemed a bit unorthodox, yet cheerful, but stated she had no faith in doctors. Mrs. Varney also said that 'she was always curing people by telepathy'. When Netta announced to her housekeeper that she was about to embark on a 90 day fast, after a fortnight Mrs. Varney talked her out of it.
She knew from Netta that because of her interest in the occult, she had planned to go to Iona. She left Kew at some time in September 1929 accompanied by a lot of luggage, as well as furniture in packing cases. Mrs. Varney suggested that there was enough to furnish a house. When she finally arrived on Iona, she went into lodgings with a Mrs MacRae in Traymore. Mrs. Macrae told Netta tales of Iona’s mysterious happenings and in return the lodger impressed her with her knowledge of the occult, referred to by Mrs. McRae as 'mystical practices'. Apparently Netta walked across the Island’s beaches and moorland each day, and at night went into trances, trying to make contact Iona’s 'spirits'.
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| The Abbey Cloisters |
According to the version told of her death by Alasdair Alpin MacGregor[8] in 1955, his information came from friends Lucy Bruce and Iona Cammell, who lived on Iona. The Cammells were part of shipbuilding family, Cammell-Laird. It lacks some of the more sensational aspects of other accounts, and, rather oddly, landlady Mrs. McRae seems to have been replaced by a Mrs. Cameron. On Sunday 17th November 1929 Netta started to act more strangely.
“Before long she was installed with the Cameron family, at Traigh Mhor, their little farm situated lonesomely at some distance from the island’s village and the customary ferrying-place … Time passed: and the strange lady with the strange look in her eyes and the strange ways seemed to be getting stranger. Mrs Cameron became positively alarmed when she mentioned that, if she went into a trance, she might remain in it for a week or more, and that, in such an event, nothing in the nature of medical aid was to be summoned. Her face now showed nothing of the repose the islanders had noted when she first arrived in their midst. That expression had given way to one of dire distress; and she now spoke hurriedly, if not indeed a little incoherently. At length she told Mrs Cameron that she must quit the island immediately. She had no time to lose; and she must pack at once. Whence came this urgent call, they could not understand. No postman had brought her any letter; and nobody could remember her having received a telegram. Recognising her piteous plight, the kindly Camerons assisted her with packing, though it happened to be a Sunday, and they felt themselves contravening the Fourth Commandment. By late afternoon all her belongings were ready to be transported to the pier. As she knew there was no way of leaving the island on the Sabbath, she retired to her room to rest. The hours went by; and towards evening she quietly opened the door to tell Mrs Cameron that her hurried departure no longer seemed necessary. The household noticed that her face, now weirdly pallid, bore an expression of resignation rather than of distress, as though she had just emerged from some stupendous ordeal. She had become quite old in a few hours. The Camerons helped her to unpack, and to settle in once more. Early that night, after chatting pleasantly and rationally with them, she retired to bed.”
There was further concern when Netta’s landlady noticed that the silver jewellery her guest had been wearing had turned black. Another report states that she ‘had to leave for London immediately’, adding that 'certain people' were disturbing her telepathically, and went on talking incoherently about a 'rudderless boat that went across the sky' and 'messages she had received from other worlds'’.
When her landlady knocked on Netta’s door on Monday morning there was no reply. She was missing. Her body was found a day later close to an ancient village ruined village. Later, stories began to circulate about sightings of strange blue lights near to where she was found, with further reports of a mysterious man wearing a cloak.
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| The Fairy Mound |
She was found on the Fairy Mound to the south of Loch Staonaig. Apart from a black cloak she was naked, lying on a large cross cut from the turf with a knife which was nearby, but some reports say she was holding a knife, or, alternatively, a large steel knife or ritual dagger was found close by. Aspin MacGregor tells us: “Not until the afternoon did Hector MacLean, of Sligneach, and Hector MacNiven, of Maol Farm, find her. She lay between the Machar and Loch Staonaig, in a hollow in the chilly moor”. Around her neck was a blackened silver chain with a cross and there were scratch marks on her body and her feet and hands were bloody. Her death certificate indicates she died between 10.00pm on 17th and 1.30pm on 19th November 1929. Many versions of the story say her death came through heart failure, but given the wild, raw weather of the location exposure and hypothermia seem more likely causes. She was buried by the islanders on the following Friday.
What really happened has never been established. Some suggest she was schizophrenic and had imagined she was being psychically attacked. Perhaps it was some form of suicide. However, her good friend Dion Fortune wrote of her in Psychic Self Defence;
“ … it appeared to me that ‘Mac’, as we called her, was going into very deep waters, even when I knew her, and that there was certain to be trouble sooner or later. She had evidently been on an astral expedition from which she never returned. She was not a good subject for such experiments, for she suffered from some defect of the pituitary body. Whether she was the victim of a psychic attack, whether she merely stopped out on the astral too long and her body, of poor vitality in any case, became chilled lying thus exposed in mid-winter, or whether she slipped into one of the elemental kingdoms that she loved … who shall say? The information at our disposal is insufficient for an opinion to be formed. The facts, however, cannot be questioned, and remain to give sceptics food for thought.”
In 2001 author Dr. Ron Halliday, a leading investigator into the paranormal who has written about the case in his book Paranormal Scotland re-examined the case of Netta Fornario and believed she may have been 'killed by black magic'. He came to a similar conclusion to Dion Fortune’s, that she may have been ‘out of her depth.’
As in all cases like this, cold logic and common sense can often provide a less than mystical solution. But death by telepathy? Death by psychic attack? Could it be possible? The CIA thought so and invested in such a project. Does telepathy work? As forteans we keep an open mind, but there is a coda to Netta Fornario’s sad tale. It came from Netta’s father in Italy. On December 5 1929, The Scotsman reported: "He was unable to account for his fears, yet could not shake off the feeling that something was wrong. Two days later a telegram arrived announcing that the dead body of his daughter had just been discovered."
We shall never know what really happened. But as Lord Byron said; “Where there is mystery, it is generally suspected there must also be evil.”
FURTHER READING:
Geoff Holder’s Guide to Mysterious Iona The History Press; 2007
In British Library there is Memories of the Deep: Four sea idyllswritten by M. Fornario, author Gertrude Bracey, London: Boosey & Co, 1917.
NOTES:
[1]Unusual for a Witch, according to www.doreenvaliente.org “Doreen made posthumous history in June 2013 when the city of Brighton and Hove awarded her a blue plaque to commemorate her life and honour her achievements. The plaque is the first in the world awarded to a Witch and the building upon which it has been placed, where she lived for many years in Brighton, is thought to be the first council block in the UK to have a blue plaque as well, making double history. “
[2]Fortune, Dion:Psychic Self Defence Red Wheel/Weiser; Revised edition edition (2001)
[3]Still going strong today, you can join The Rosicrucian Order, AMORC, which is a community of Seekers who study and practice the metaphysical laws governing the universe www.rosicrucian.org
[4]The Book of Kells (Irish: Leabhar Cheanannais) sometimes known as the Book of Columba, is an illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New Testament together with various prefatory texts and tables.
[5] Iona was one of only two Augustinian nunneries established in Scotland. The other was at Perth. The nuns wore black habits; the Gaelic word for nun is cailleach-dhubh, ‘the veiled and black-robed woman’. The locals on Iona called their nunnery an eaglais dhubh, ‘the black church’.
[6] A good example of Netta’s writing, her review of an opera, The Immortal Hour - by Rutland Boughton (1878-1960)can be found at www.servantsofthelight.org/knowledge/fornario-immortal.htmlShe also appeared in the Occult Reviewin 1928 where she published ‘The Use of Imagination in Art, Science and Business’
[8]MacGregor, Alasdair Alpin see his The Ghost Book: Strange Hauntings in Britain, Robert Hale, London 1955.
Published in the UK by Constable & Robinson, USA by the Running Press Inc. 600 pages of bizarre mystery.
