Bricket Wood Coven

The Bricket Wood coven, or Hertfordshire coven Page 289 is a coven of Gardnerian witches founded in the 1940s by Gerald Gardner. It is notable for being the first coven in the Gardnerian line, though having its supposed origins in the pre-Gardnerian New Forest coven. The coven formed after Gardner bought the Fiveacres Country Club, a naturist club in the village of Bricket Wood, Hertfordshire, southern England, and met within the club's grounds. It played a significant part in the history of the neopagan religion of Wicca.

Many important and influential figures in Wicca were once members of the coven, including Dafo, Doreen Valiente, Jack Bracelin, Fred Lamond, Dayonis and Lois Bourne. The coven is still active today, though it maintains secrecy and its history was only known up until the 1970s. Chapter 11 and 12

There have been misleading and fraudulent online claims by people claiming to be running (and thus admitting new members to) the Bricket Wood coven. Concern amongst the wiccan initiate community grew. In 2021 the High Priest and High Priestess of the Bricket Wood coven set up a website to display accurate information, and provide a way of direct communication with the coven. The website provides an overview of the coven's history up to the present day.

History

1940s

Gardner founded the coven around 1946 after moving to London from Highcliffe on the Sth Coast near the New Forest with his wife Donna. Gardner claimed to have been initiated into the New Forest coven, where he learned the mysteries and practices of the witchcraft religion. Gardner, fearing that the "Old Religion", as he called it, would die out, decided to form a new coven near to his new home, where he could initiate more people into the craft and keep it alive.

Gardner acted as the coven's High Priest, with Dafo acting as High Priestess. She had also been a member of the New Forest coven. Dafo remained a member of the coven until she left it by late 1952, annoyed at Gardner for seeking publicity.

Gardner gained several members to the coven, all of whom were either members of the Fiveacres naturist club or were already witches, Page 60 although Donna, Gardner's wife, never got involved, having no interest in witchcraft. They held their meetings on the grounds of the local wooded Fiveacres nudist club, which Gardner had purchased a small plot at in 1945. He was himself not interested in running the club, and as such appointed an administrator to take on the job.

Gardner re-assembled what he called "The Witches' Cottage" on a plot of land which he owned in the club grounds. The small cottage was decorated with magical sigils on the inside. He had purchased this building from a friend, the Freemason John S.M. Ward, who was a pioneer of the restoration of historical buildings. It was within this 16th-century cottage that Ward had found near to Ledbury, Herefordshire that the coven assembled to perform their rituals.

1950s

Doreen Valiente, 1953–1957

Doreen Valiente, whom Gardner had initiated into the craft at Midsummer 1953 at the home of Dafo in the New Forest, joined the coven, and rose to become High Priestess.

In 1956, Jack Bracelin was initiated into the coven. He became a favourite of Gardner, who gave him the job of running the Fiveacres club after sacking the previous administrator, who "had deliberately run the club at a loss by setting unrealistically high requirements for membership, hoping thereby to persuade Gerald to eventually sell him the club at a low price". The sacked administrator had felt scorned, and convinced the president of the Central Council of British Naturism, Ernest Stanley, that the club was a cover for witchcraft, and that they should not be allowed membership to the CCOBN. Hoping to help Jack and Gardner's club out, the coven performed a ritual, and the situation was resolved.

In the mid-1950s, Gardner began to encourage more publicity, something which annoyed many coven members. In 1957, Valiente and several other coven members confronted Gardner over this, claiming that they should have a set of rules to regulate such a thing. Gardner, in response, brought about the Wiccan Laws (not to be confused with the Wiccan Rede), which offended Valiente, and in 1957 she and many of the group's older members left to form their own coven.

The split-off coven asked if they could continue to use the Witches' Cottage for their rituals, but in a letter Gardner replied that:

Gardner was left with a much younger coven, composed of Dayonis, her then partner Jack Bracelin, Fred Lamond, a hospital anaesthetist, and a new initiate.

Dayonis, 1958–1959

With Valiente gone, Dayonis took over as the high priestess of the coven in January 1958. With Dayonis in charge, Gardner asked her to immediately initiate anyone who asked into the craft, in contrast with his former belief that prospective candidates should wait for a year and a day before initiation. One such of these new fast-tracked initiates was Fred Lamond, who was initiated only four months after meeting the coven for the first time. Gardner also insisted on the initiation of Eleanor Bone, despite the fact that the coven members felt that they "simply couldn't circle with her" because of differences in exuberance. Within a month, Gardner had brought about her 2nd and 3rd initiations, and set her up as the High Priestess of a new coven, independent of the Bricket Wood one.

In spring 1958, whilst Gardner was away from the coven staying at his museum on the Isle of Man, the other members decided that they did not want to continue using only binding and scourging to raise energies, and so they tried to do so by the circle dance method, which most found to be more effective than Gardner's preferred methods. At the same time, the group decided that they wanted to celebrate the solstices and the equinoxes as well as the cross-quarter days (the coven at the time called them Halloween, Candlemass, Beltane and Lammas). Gardner gave his written permission for this, and it was adopted by other practitioners of the craft, such as Doreen Valiente. This was the beginning of the belief in the Wiccan Wheel of the Year.

Dayonis moved to Canada in October 1959, and Lois Bourne became the coven's high priestess.

1960s

After Gardner's death in 1964, Jack Bracelin, who had remained loyal to Gardner throughout, took over the group as high priest. At the same time he inherited the Fiveacres club from Gardner. However, he soon left the coven and abandoned the craft; this, according to coven member Fred Lamond, was because "he asked himself whether the Book of Shadows' simplified ceremonial magic rituals expressed his own religious feelings, and concluded they did not".

The coven continued to assemble at the Witches' Cottage, which Bracelin allowed them to use as long as they paid rent on it. Many coven members were not happy with this, as they were not members of the nudist club, though they did so anyway.

1970s

In 1972, the group stopped using the Witches' Cottage all year round. Lois Borne continued as High Priestess, the group adapting their practice from Wicca to Traditional Witchcraft. This group remained practising in secrecy until Lois's death.
Whilst Lois Bourne was High Priestess it is said that the coven instead started meeting at a bungalow in Oakwood Rd, Bricket Wood and on Bricket wood common, where it meets until today.

In 1975, Bracelin tried to get the group to pay for the nudist club's electricity as well as paying rent; the coven members were unwilling to do this, and so they sold their plot to another club member.''Fifty Years of Wicca'', Frederic Lamond, 2004, page 38

External links

The Bricket Wood Coven

References

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Gardnerian Wicca
Modern pagan buildings
Modern pagan organisations based in the United Kingdom
Religious buildings and structures in England
Wicca in the United Kingdom
Wiccan covens
Modern pagan organizations established in the 1940s