Dartington Hall Click on the images to enlarge

A selection of the Conventioneers (left to right): Jean, Franklin, Anna, Steve, Mary, Keith, Nat, Mark, Darren, Ken, Susie and Charles. Click on the image to enlarge

The eighteenth Dennis Wheatley Convention took place on 31st October - 2nd November at Dartington Hall, near Totnes in Devon. This was our fourth year at this venue, the inspiration for 'Weylands School' in 'The Haunting of Toby Jugg'.

This report is not aimed to be comprehensive, but to give a flavour of what took place as a memento for those who were there, and perhaps also to encourage others with similar interests to attend in the future.

A small number arrived on Thursday so as to have a rest before the Friday and explore the locality, with the rest joining them for a catch-up and a pre-Convention dinner on the Friday evening.

The Convention began as usual on the Saturday morning with the arrival of the programme packs - this year once again created by Darren - in DW's briefcase. Twenty pages long and a collector's item in its own right, the programme contained among other things a personal message to the Convention from Rosalyn Landor, 'Peggy' in the film of 'The Devil Rides Out'.

Mark began the day's talks with a discussion of Montague Summers, who along with Aleister Crowley and Rollo Ahmed was one of the occultists that DW consulted when he was researching before writing 'The Devil Rides Out'.

A controversial and complex figure, Summers was the basis for Canon Copley Syle in 'To the Devil - a Daughter', where DW described him graphically - and rather unpleasantly - in Chapter 14:

“He was shortish and plump both in face and figure. His cheeks were rosy but tended to sag a little; the rest of his skin had such a childlike pinkness that it was difficult to visualise him ever having the need to shave. His forehead was broad and smooth; his long silver hair swept back from it to fall in curls on the nape of his neck, but gave no impression of untidiness, suggesting rather the elegance of a Georgian parson. His eyes were hazel, but very pale, and his expression benign. His features were well cut, the only thing unpleasant about them being an exceptionally thick and out-jutting lower lip. He was dressed in a black frock coat, ribbed satin vest, clerical collar, breeches, gaiters and black shoes with silver buckles; all of which added to the impression that he was a divine of a past generation'.

DW's character added:

“His smile detracted from the pleasantness of his expression, as it revealed a lower row of blackened, uneven teeth. His hand was slightly damp and so soft as to seem almost boneless. C.B. found its touch so repulsive that he had to restrain himself from withdrawing his hand unduly quickly...'

Whoever said DW can't describe his characters -?

In his memoirs, DW also described the story of his and his wife's visit to stay with Montague Summers in the 1930s, and how they had to flee the house on pretext of a family illness when he refused to buy an apparently rare book from Summers at a vastly inflated price, and how Summers's demeanour changed in an instant following this. The book was 'Varney the Vampire', and Mark confirmed it would then have been a relatively inexpensive book as it had been quite a bestseller in its day.

Mark agreed with Phil Baker than MS had an important influence on DW's writing - not least in his conflation of Black Magic with political movements such as Communism, Black Power, World take-over etc. Indeed, MS's views were so well-known that in his essay 'Communism and Witchcraft in his book 'The Way the World is Going,' H.G. Wells wrote 'I have recently been reading the “History of Witchcraft and Demonology”, by Mr. Montague Summers, and various utterances upon the Soviet Government of Russia by supporters of the present enlightened Government of the British Empire, and I find a curious confusion in my mind between the two. Mr. Summers, like all good Catholics, is a believer in witchcraft...”.

As this demonstrates, Summers was a well-known and prolific author in his day, writing a large number of books on vampires, werewolves etc, and seemingly believing it all. Timothy D'Arch Smith's has written various books on MS, including a bibliography and 'The Books of the Beast'.

MS was far from being interested only in the Occult. He was an authority on the Restoration Theatre, publishing multi-volume editions of various works, and being involved in theatrical productions as well. MS also wrote a history of the Gothic Novel, and a series of quite respectable ghost stories, which are still in print.

Whether he was an ordained priest remains unclear, but he served as a private chaplain to a Mrs Ermengarde Greville-Nugent at one time. He also had, deservedly or not, an unsavoury reputation in various areas that I won't go into in this review.

Mark's talk was followed by Anna's, who discussed Social Survival in the World of Dennis Wheatley.

Anna began her talk by quoting several authors, including Margaret Atwood, who said “All writing is social, whether it wants to be or not. All fiction is, to some degree, an inquiry into society - even if it claims to be about a private world.”

DW had enthralled Anna since an early age, and one of the many things she found fascinating was the window that DW opened on to the social habits of a world now largely forgotten.

Anna explored among other examples the following themes in the Gregory Sallust wartime novels:

Hats: Hats figure frequently in the books, both for ladies and for men. The wearing of hats by men in the 1940s was ubiquitous, and even gangsters wore hats. When Gregory lost his hat, he felt exposed - particularly when he was in uniform.

Dressing gowns: Now a thing of the past or the very expensive present, they were then an essential piece of apparel, and when Gregory had to buy fresh clothing in an emergency, a dressing gown was always near the top of the list. Anna suggested they probably became less necessary when hotels started to provide en suite bathrooms for their guests.

Social bearing: Hard to define, but all-important in the novels. You either had it or you hadn't, and if you had it, it gave you a magic entrée into the social circles of the elite. On one occasion in 'The Black Baroness', Erica, Gregory and Kuporovitch arrive at a grill-room in a completely dishevelled state, but the head waiter, having nearly been guilty of raising an eyebrow when he saw them approaching, on noticing Erica's beauty and that 'both her escorts had the air of men who were used to being obeyed', swiftly (and wisely) led them to a table.

Letters of Introduction: A tradition long gone. Gregory could see pretty much anyone he wanted if he had sent in to them a Letter of Introduction from someone that person knew; and if Gregory didn't know any such person, he was not above forging such a letter, on one occasion forging the signature of Hermann Goering.

Alcohol: Figures largely and in great variety, and it was essential to know how to serve, and how to drink, each beverage. As Sir Pellinore lectures Gregory in The Scarlet Impostor, “Every drink has a vessel that brings out its best qualities. The finest Hock or Burgundy is hardly fit to drink out of a teacup, while for China tea nothing can beat the finest porcelain...”, and elsewhere, Gregory shows Kuporovitch that he knows how to consume his beverages when in 'Faked Passports' he 'downs his vodka in one gulp, as he knew he was expected to do'.

Hotel Rooms: In DW's day, before the days of lifts and in the days of heavy trunks and porters, the most prestigious floor to stay on was the first floor, which typically had the highest ceilings. Anna showed us an example. These days, the most prestigious rooms have moved to being on the top floor/the penthouse.

In all of these things, Anna was struck by the scrupulous accuracy of DW's descriptions. She showed us as an example an old photo of the Regina Palast Hotel in Munich (still standing, but now no longer a hotel), where Gregory stayed in The Scarlet Impostor, and of its sunken ballroom. The description of the ballroom at the beginning of Chapter 28 was entirely accurate.

Next followed Charles's talk. Charles talked through the Special Exhibition he had recently put on the website about DW's writing technique, illustrating it with examples from the manuscript and working papers of The Ka of Gifford Hillary, which was to be reviewed after his talk.

Several things distinguished DW's approach to writing from many of his contemporaries. First of all, having selected a topic, he went to the most enormous lengths to research whatever he was writing on, and to preserve factual accuracy. This meant not only where necessary doing voluminous reading, but sometimes consulting externally so as to achieve factual accuracy on even the smallest of items - for example, when researching Codeword Golden Fleece, he sent a friend a questionnaire asking among other things whether there were steps up to the front door of the British Legation in Budapest. On other occasions, DW wrote to the likes of Cunard and BOAC requesting information, which was promptly provided. Anna commented on how different this was from current times and emails. They are infinitely easier to send (and the information is infinitely easier to access), but when replies to enquiries are infinitely less forthcoming.

Having done this research, DW then wrote pencil 'synopses' in which over several drafts he planned out exactly what he was going to put in the novel, so it was all laid out in minute detail before he began to write. The writing itself pre-WWII took the form of a novel written completely in longhand in pencil, followed by a full iteration in ink, after which it was typed up. After WWII, the ink iteration was dispensed with, so the manuscript pack only contained the pencil synopses and the pencil manuscript. From just before WWII until the end of the war, the pencil synopses were followed by a dictated novel - something which was not known until recently, and the reasons for which were unclear - but DW reverted to write his manuscripts in longhand in pencil once the war was over, but without the iteration in ink.

The three things which particularly stood out for Charles in all this were the vast amount of research DW did, the amazing extent to which he pre-planned his novels (which must have required him to hold the entire novel in his head before he set pencil to paper) and the fact that unlike many of his famous contemporaries, he never sat down to a typewriter to write.

There then followed a group book review of 'The Ka of Gifford Hillary'.

The book was enjoyed by all in the group, and this was consistent with the questionnaire of Darren's that he discussed at the 2024 Convention, and which put 'The Ka' in twelfth position with a score of 22 points.

The only criticism voiced by several, was that the ending was too abrupt. Several would have liked to have heard what happen to Sir Gifford afterwards. Charles said this was a bit ironic, because DW had originally included at the end of the book a short passage saying that after his ordeals, Sir Gifford gave a significant proportion of shares in Hillary-Compton to Johnny Norton and became an itinerant knife grinder (a job long gone), giving secret financial assistance to the poor and needy. This would not, it was generally agreed, have been one of his best endings.

Elsewhere, a couple commented that they found the device of using a death ray as the means of separating Sir Gifford's Ka from his body a little contrived, and wondered why DW didn't use a less far- fetched mechanism (a bump on the head?). Franklin observed that death rays were fairly commonly talked about in fact and fiction at the time. The same could perhaps be said for Ankaret's rather convenient expertise as a forger. These were minor things however in the context of what all agreed was a very good - and a very unusual - book.

Elsewhere again, several had noticed the passing reference to the USA and Tariffs. It seems few things are new!

After the book review, a lunch of sandwiches and bites was eaten in the Solar Room.

Following lunch, the group took a conducted tour of the recently opened Elmshirst Heritage Centre to see what was once the private residence of the school's founders Dorothy and Leonard Elmhirst, and to get a sense of how the buildings looked in the 1960s. A few of the party had taken a tour of the Grade II* listed gardens on the Friday morning, and that was equally informative.

After the tour, the group had their traditional group photo taken in the Great Hall, and there was an impromptu performance by the DW Ladies Mime Dance Group, no doubt inspired by the Mime Dance productions of the Elmhirsts', about which they had just been hearing.

Charles put on as this year's Travelling Museum a series of exhibits from DW's manuscript pack for The Ka of Gifford Hillary, including pages from his preliminary synopsis, the table of contents showing one of the book's working titles ('The Man Who Came Back') and several pages of the pencil manuscript.

After lunch, Keith gave a talk on 'Cardinal's Folly revisited'. Cardinal's Folly was the Eatons' family home in the Duke de Richleau novels, and whether it had been inspired by a real house or not had long been debated.

Keith took the group through the various reference to the house in DW's novels (Click here for details) and summarised the various suggestions proffered to date about the real houses on which it might have been based.

The search had generally been conducted as a search for one or both of two key locations - a search of Cardinal's Folly itself, and/or a search for the nearby inn, 'The Pride of Peacocks'.

It seemed to Keith that DW's one reference to Cardinal's Folly being in Warwickshire (in 'Three Inquisitive People') was probably a mistake, and that one was therefore looking for an old and substantial house with an octagonal room located near Kidderminster in Worcestershire (which was the county in which Kidderminster lay) - possibly near an inn with a name something like 'The Pride of Peacocks' - if indeed the house in the novels was grounded in fact.

Perhaps the best known suggestion as to the house Cardinal's Folly was based on was the one made by Phil Baker in 'The Devil Is A Gentleman' - where he had suggested that if Cardinal's Folly was based on a real house, it might have been Wytham Abbey, a Grade 1 listed manor house in Oxfordshire, on the grounds that DW had visited its owner there, a man called Keld Fenwick, and had been impressed by it.

This was not however a viable solution in Keith's view, not only because Wytham Abbey was in Oxfordshire and nowhere near Kidderminster, but more importantly because according to 'Drink and Ink', the house in which DW stayed with Keld Fenwick was 'Wickham Abbey' and not 'Wytham Abbey'. Keith couldn't find any 'Wickham Abbey'. The nearest he could find was a Wycombe Abbey in Buckinghamshire which seemed to have nothing in common with Cardinal's Folly, to be in the wrong place, and to have been a girls' school since 1896. As for Keld Fenwick's home, that was in fact Witham Hall in Lincolnshire, which was built in 1752, and lacks any similarity to Cardinal's Folly.

Searches had been made by others (discussed most notably by Steve Patton in the DW website's Old Library and at the second DW Convention) for the 'Pride of Peacocks' pub. The closest Steve could find was a rather run down pub in Kidderminster called 'The Old Peacock' which had started out in the early 1800s, but which seemed to have little to recommend it except the name. Keith and Marion had paid it a visit during their comprehensive research, but had not sampled their lunch.

Steve had found another pub called the 'Peacock Inn' in Tenbury Wells, but this was some 18 miles west of Kidderminster and there was no house near it of any relevant interest. He had also looked at the Crown at Hopton, which was also some distance from Kidderminster, but although there was a nice house nearby, it had no similarity to Cardinal's Folly, so the mystery had remained.

Keith went through the history of Kidderminster, and he was of the opinion that although it would still have been a significant carpet manufacturing town in DW's day, it was a rather unusual and out of the way place to specify as a location for a house in a novel. He felt that the mention of Kidderminster might therefore have been quite deliberate, and he and Marion had decided to take a further look; and they had found a place in Kidderminster not very far from 'The Old Peacock' pub which seemed a good match.

The place in question, now called 'Caldwall Tower' but originally called 'Caldwall Castle', is situated within Kidderminster and not far from 'The Old Peacock' pub. All that remains is an octagonal tower behind a high wall with a blue plaque on it stating 'Caldwall Tower, 14th Century. Kidderminster's oldest secular building.'

Keith ran through its history. Situated in a bend of the river Stour, it may have been built on the site of a monastery dating from 736 AD and it was mentioned in the Domesday Book, with an arcaded hall being built-on in the twelfth century. An octagonal tower - which is all that now remains of the castle - was added in in the second half of the fourteenth century, and in the seventeenth/eighteenth centuries a three-storey brick building was added to the north-west. In 1897 the Corporation of Kidderminster bought the property, and following that the buildings were used for many purposes, including as a school of domestic science and as government offices. In DW's day the seventeenth/eighteenth century extension would still have been standing, but in the 1960s everything except the tower was demolished. The tower is now the private property of Richard and Nely Davies.

Keith had contacted Mr Davies, and he had very kindly taken him and Marion on a tour of the building.

Keith showed us various photos of the interior, and he considered it a reasonable approximation of what is to be found in DW's books. In particular, the lowest floor, the octagonal under croft, was once a chapel, and with its stairs up to the garden it could well have served as DW's library, and there was a staircase within the walls, which would also be consistent with Cardinal's Folly. Furthermore, the gardens, which are described in some detail in Chapter XXI of 'The Devil Rides Out', and which included a swimming pool and a pond full of lotuses and water lilies in the book, also seemed to be a good fit.

It was not clear if DW had ever been past the Tower, but Keith suggested that he might well have visited Worcestershire when researching Old Rowley, his biography of Charles II, given that that region figured prominently in his story; the battle of Worcester in 1651 marking the end of Charles' campaign to regain the English throne. It is also worth noting that Old Rowley was published in 1933, the year before TDRO. Charles added that DW might have visited Kidderminster around the right time in connection with the business he and Joan had in their early days together supplying restaurants with items such as china, cutlery and - more importantly here - carpets.

If DW had indeed been aware of the Tower, Keith felt, and all present agreed, that this was surely a very good contender to have been the basis for Cardinal's Folly.

Next up, Darren chaired a discussion on future events - covering not just 2026, but also 2027, which would be our twentieth, and also the 50th anniversary of DW's death.

There was general agreement that the group would be happy to return to Dartington Hall next year. There was also general agreement that it would be nice to meet up more often than once a year. With this in mind, it was agreed it would be great if we could arrange some more Field Trips - Holkham Hall (a Roger brook connection - see last year's report) and Deauville (which features in several of the Gregory Sallust and Duke de Richleau books) in France being mentioned.

The group will be kept up to date via WhatsApp and the website.

Ken and Mary hosted their customary cocktail party later in the evening, and this was followed by dinner in the Solar Room. Toasts were given by Mary (absent friends), Steve (DW), and Franklin ('Us').

We said our farewells on the Sunday morning before we departed for our various destinations. We all agreed it had been a marvellous weekend.

Many thanks to all who attended for their contributions to making it another great event.

C.B.
November 2025

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