'The Magical Battle for Britain' during WW2 and how the witches of Britain fought the Nazis.

And on Michael Bentine (Who was famous for being a comedian in 'The Goons', but during WWII served with RAF Intelligence and was seconded to MI9- His immediate superior was the Colditz escapee Airey Neave.):

Born in Watford, to a Peruvian father and an English mother, Bentine was party at an early age to his parents’ interest in seances, clairaudience, “table turning” and the paranormal. Such an introduction inspired his own life-long interest into spiritualism and the Occult.

In his autobiography, The Long Banana Skin, Bentine claimed whilst in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War he had visions through which he was able to tell whether his comrades would live or die. If he saw a skull super-imposed over their faces, he then knew they would not return from their next mission. Not the kind of talent to win friends and influence people, but certainly one to impress others with in later years, as he did when he recounted such tales on chat shows.

If it was all true, then it was most certainly a curse, as Bentine foresaw the death of his son, who was killed in a plane crash; and foresaw the death of his friend, the Tory politician, Airey Neave, who was blown-up by the IRA. Bentine was also a member of a Wiccan coven, and indulged in various rituals. Nothing wrong with that, but when tied to the fact Bentine was very close to the Royal Family it’s enough to give David Icke something to fantasize about.

Bentine was also involved in paranormal investigation, on one occasion he helped a family whose child suffered from recurrent illness. As the child grew weaker, Bentine was convinced evil forces were at work. His hunch proved correct when it was uncovered the family’s neighbors, an elderly couple, were using magical rites to drain the child of its life-force.

Towards the end of his military service, Bentine was involved in the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, which had such a traumatic affect on him he was never able to describe what he had seen, other than to call it “the ultimate blasphemy”.

Bentine was a crack pistol shot and helped to start the idea of a counter-terrorist wing within 22 SAS Regiment. In doing so, he became the first non-SAS person ever to fire a gun inside the close-quarters battle training house at Hereford.

His interests included parapsychology. This was as a result of his and his family's extensive research into the paranormal, which resulted in his writing The Door Marked Summer and The Doors of the Mind. He was, for the final years of his life, president of the Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena.

Originally posted by neformore
We'll be discussing this thread on ATS Live tonight - more info here

absolutely loved the ATS live discussion on this subject - it was really really interesting. Especially the myths about the mystical archers during WW1 and visions of boudicca fighting the Germans - fantastic. You guys were really good.

No wonder britain kicked ass.

A late follow on from mentions of Michael Bentine, on radio 4 extra, today and available as a "play again" for the next 6 days, is the episode which includes the history of the WAAF or Witches air force!

A comical, albeit dated (the programe was made in the 80's), take on the witches involved in the Battle of Britain.

No idea if this link will work. It is about the 15 minute mark of the broadcast. www.bbc.co.uk...

He created this series of programes, single handedly, something of a tour de force with only "reel to reel" tape machines and basic editing tools.

Listening again, and having read the earlier potted history of the man, shows how creative a mind he had.

reply to post by dowot


oooow I will have to listen to that. Thank you

reply to post by HelenConway


My pleasure.

Just hope you are old enough to enjoy. These days humour is much more complicated. The 80's were innocent times!

reply to post by dowot


Oh ... completely off topic - but NO WAY is that true.
People are devolving ie becoming thicker.
People in the 1980s and earlier were much brighter ..