THE WITCH

The late nineteenth century, in which period Black Hearts And Blue Devils is set, a time rapidly becoming devoid of mystery, saw advances in science and changes to the fabric of society which led many to question orthodox religious teachings. In America, the new doctrines of spiritualism had taken hold from the mid 1800s and in the UK there was an increased interest, at least amongst intellectuals, in arcane knowledge and the occult. Our story in Black Hearts is set in 1887 going into 1888. And it is in early 1888 that one of the most famous and influential of occult societies – The Hermetic Order Of The Golden Dawn – opened its first temple, the Isis-Urania temple in London. The three founders (Dr. William Robert Woodman, Dr. William Wynn Westcott and Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers) were all masons with interests in diverse hermetic subjects such as the Qabalah, astrology, alchemy, ceremonial magic and the tarot (this last fused into a system linking directly to the Qabalah by the great contemporary French magician, Eliphas Levi). Also during the second half of the nineteenth century Madame Blavatsky who was working as a medium in New York, set up the Theosophical Society in 1875 and opened a London Branch in 1878. Blavatsky’s theosophy was based on a system of religious and mystical thought that was largely opposed to conventional Christian belief. She mixed Western Hermeticism with Buddhist and Hindu elements and her own interpretation of Eastern religion (see her work, Isis Unveiled). Later, she leaned toward the eastern philosophies more and this caused something of a rift between theosophists and the hermeticists of the Golden Dawn. All the same, the period thrummed with new ideas about philosophy and religion, science and magic.

In Black Hearts And Blue Devils some of these influences can be detected. Most obviously of course in the “witch” whom Abe Lively visits to seek help. In the light of the above, it is perhaps fitting that she is an American, and from New York too! There are also the musings of Francis Thompson, the poet, and his conversation with a visiting businessman in the Royal Oak to stir our imagination. Incidentally, the persona which the witch adopts, that of “old Mollie Mogg” is based on records of a real character from the very area of our story and who, according to legend, promised that she would return from death.

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