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Most of us are familiar with Sanctuary Spa products available in many retail outlets, and the Sanctuary Spa wellness centre that stood in Covent Garden1 which inspired them, but a somewhat lesser known Sanctuary is the one set up by a young woman over 100 years ago in Sussex, as a refuge for the homeless. But not everyone was keen on The Sanctuary’s existence and they set about ensuring it’s demise as swiftly as possible. And eventually they succeeded. This, is the story of Vera Pragnell and The Sanctuary.
Worthing
Recently, I met up with some cousins of mine in Worthing, West Sussex, to visit our Uncle Geoff, who is now in his 90’s and is the last of his siblings on my Dad’s side of the family.
Cigarettes and Alcohol
Some of us have been visiting Geoff for the last few years. It’s an excuse to see family and have a weekend away near the sea, but some of the things we’d noticed about Worthing hotels were, a.) there didn’t appear to be very many, b.) they didn’t appear to be particularly pleasant, c.) they were overpriced, and d.) there were never many rooms available (hence the “Oasis-style” dynamic pricing strategy).
The Sanctuary
As a result of this, Vikki and I decided to take a different, more circuitous route and book an Air B&B outside of Worthing, in a place called Storrington. Or at least that’s what we thought. As it transpired, Storrington was a couple of miles away. We were in fact staying in a place called Heath Common. And Heath Common was, a hundred years ago, the location of something that became known as The Sanctuary, a ‘back-to-the-land-escape-from-society’ utopian settlement, set up by 25 year-old Vera Pragnell.
Confusion
Of course, we knew nothing of this when we arrived, after dark on a friday evening in July. It had been raining during the day and we had some confusing information on how to locate the property. The reason it was confusing will all become clear very soon.
Hampers Lane
After a couple of hours driving from Maldon, we pulled off the A283 to Storrington, a little while after 8pm and drove slowly along a road called Hampers Lane. As with most lanes, there was no lighting but the difference here was the lane was very narrow and was also boxed in on both sides by thick, verdant hedges, overgrown bushes and also tall, leafy trees which cut out any natural light from the fading sun.
Twittern
After driving past our designated parking spot, because it was hidden in darkness, we drove further on, realised our mistake, turned around at a small junction and retraced our steps, finally recognising the parking space for the Air B&B, beside an old, disused barn. Since we still didn’t know exactly where the cottage was, I decided to go on a search and destroy mission. All we knew was it was through a gate and up a “twittern” which is a Sussex term for a footpath, a cut-through, or a back alley, usually between properties.
Rock Follies
These cut-throughs have different names in different parts of the country it seems. In Colchester for example, they are called “follies”.
Witch Trials
The gate was easy to locate since it was next to the parking space. We went through and discovered the twittern was even more overgrown than the lane, since it was in complete darkness. We walked slowly with phone torches weakly illuminating about a metre of the enveloping blackness in front of us. The last time I’d witnessed anything like this, i.e. directionless people stumbling about in total darkness, was when I watched the Blair Witch Project some years ago. And that didn’t end very well for anyone.
Cottage
About 60 metres along the path, the hedges and garden fences suddenly gave way into open ground, and set back about 20 metres from the path was an old, recently painted, white cottage. We located the key and went in.
Clean
“This is nice and clean,” said Victoria as we walked around the recently refurbished building. It was clean because it had just been painted throughout but a complex aroma of white spirit, turpentine and fresh paint was causing my senses some unpleasantness.
Lounge
But I also had a strange sense of unease about the place, something that thankfully, doesn’t happen very often. When I feel a chill even in July, and the hair stands up on the back of my neck. I had no idea why and keen to ignore it, I went into the lounge. I switched on the light and there I found the walls adorned with odd black and white pictures of a place long since forgotten, but also pictures of strange looking people, staring obliquely into the camera.
And at the bottom was the picture of what I thought was an occultist.
Books
Other pictures of odd faces stared out at us, and along with the ghost books on the shelf, I thought I understood my concern over the location. But we were here and this was where we were staying for the next couple of nights.
The Magic Cottage
However, I noted a similarity with a book I’d read back in the 80’s called The Magic Cottage by James Herbert. At the time, Herbert was considered to be the English Stephen King, certainly by me, and his book was set in Hampshire, not far from Sussex, in an old cottage, in the woods, where supernatural occurrences began when some new people moved in.
Supernatural
Not that I’m purposely drawing unnecessary parallels, but well, you know…
Spirits
“Are you ok?” asked Vikki. “Not really,” I said. “This place is giving me the creeps.” Her brow furrowed. “Why?” she asked. “Is it the White Spirit?” “Yes,” I said. “It’s that lethal combination of White Spirits and Dead Spirits.”
Research
We went back down the twittern, retrieved our bags and unpacked, sat down and started looking into what this place was and why there were so many old black and white pictures of a place called The Sanctuary.
Vera
We soon discovered this. A young woman called Vera Pragnell (1897-1968), set up a place nearby called The Sanctuary, in 1923 as a refuge for people who wanted to escape the ravages of modern life.
Father
Her father, George Pragnell was born in Sherborne, Dorset, in 1863, and was the son of a gardener. After leaving school, he found work in the textile industry where he eventually became Managing Director of a textile company called Cook & Sons. He was knighted in 1912 but died of heart disease in 1916, aged 52.
Ypres
He had two children, George Frederick and Vera Gwendolyn. George Frederick died on the battlefields of Ypres in 1917 aged 26. Vera was left a considerable sum of money and tiring of society life she volunteered for work in London’s East End, helping the poor and to paraphrase her words she was, “doling out medicine to those spat out by factories and industry, to keep them going until they were spat out again.”
50 Acres
Vera bought 50 acres of land at Heath Common, West Sussex for £850. She moved into a house there and made it be known that anyone who wanted to come and live there, could do so, free of charge. And, after a while she offered people half an acre of land on which to build a house or shack, park a caravan or pitch a tent. She also kept part of her house open to any passing strangers who had nowhere to sleep for the night.
Services
And people began to arrive in dribs and drabs. There was no electricity or running water. No heating or lighting. It really was back to the land, and so people began growing their own fruit and vegetables as they had little or no income.
Community
Slowly, a small community began to come together under the auspices of Vera. She wanted to create a utopian society, free from the ravages and control of modern Britain but of course people without rules have a tendency to create their own.
Political Activists
Furthermore, the Sanctuary became a hotspot for anyone who needed a hiding place from the authorities. And as such it was a magnet to people down on their luck but also to artists and other creative types, plus anarchists and communists began to arrive and live there.
General Strike
The young communists though, rather than attempting to destroy English society from within, like some Fifth Columnists (as people were led to believe was the case) were arranging camping trips to The Sanctuary for under-privileged children and for the families of Welsh Miners during the miners strike of 1926.
More on the 1926 General Strike can be found here.
Friends of The Sanctuary
Laurie Lee, author of Cider With Rosie lived at The Sanctuary. H.G. Wells, author of War of the Worlds was a friend of Vera’s but on the flipside, so was the occultist Alistair Crowley. A few years ago I’d read a book about Led Zeppelin, but specifically guitarist Jimmy Page, who’d spent time studying occultism and the works of Crowley, and this was why I recognised the picture of the occultist earlier, when we arrived.
Black
After a while we went to bed but I was awoken at 3am by something tickling my nose. I scratched my nose and went back to sleep. Then, it happened again. This time I woke up but, in the inky blackness of a house some distance from any light source, I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face. Eventually I had to put a light on.
Smock
I was fully expecting to see a pale looking child in a Victorian smock, with strange lifeless eyes and a feather in her hand, silently staring at me, but of course the room was empty, save for the minimal furniture.
Chucky
We went back to sleep and weren’t disturbed by any dead children this time, which was comforting.
Steyning
We spent the morning looking around a village called Steyning, which was nearby. It’s a lovely little town with a bustling high street. It consisted of what is commonly referred to (by me at least) as the Holy Trinity in British high streets; that is a coffee shop, a book shop and a record shop. I tested all three.
To Worthing
After that, we met up with my uncle and cousins in Worthing and came back to the bungalow and learned more about Vera and The Sanctuary.
West Ham
After a few years many of the plots of land were gone and the community had set up a little shop to trade fruit and vegetables. The last plot was given to a 16 year old boy from West Ham called Fred Vickery, whose sister Rose had met Vera at speakers corner in Hyde Park, arguing against the travesty of the rich using the poor to make greater profits.
Builder
Fred found himself a job with a nearby builder and began learning the trade, soon discovering that he was quite talented in this line of work. And so, as the years rolled on, he began building small dwellings for the people of the Sanctuary.
Scandal
But, it wasn’t long before stories about the apparently unpleasant people who were staying there, began appearing in national newspapers. And soon it was turning into a scandal. People believed whatever was written in the press, under the misguided belief that if the press had gone to the trouble of printing it, it must be true. And of course, as it is today, the trick was to mix some truth in with the lies, so after a while, it was almost impossible to tell one from the other.
Neuburg
One person who visited quite frequently was a ‘mystical anarchist’ by the name of Victor Neuburg who had spent time with occultist, Alistair Crowley and had participated in “sex-magick” rituals. Neuburg lived in nearby Steyning, which we had visited earlier, and so people who didn’t much approve of his activities were more than willing to speak to the press to air their grievances. Neuburg was also a writer, poet and publisher and it was his publishing company Vine Press, that in 1928 published Vera Pragnell’s own book on the Sanctuary.
John Bull
However, a “populist” magazine called John Bull, whose editorials ran from 1820 to 1964, was to play a pivotal role in bringing the Sanctuary to an untimely end. It used the standard, simplistic tabloid reasoning for its attitude towards The Sanctuary as “giving our readers what they want” and “only telling the truth” whilst in reality doing nothing of the sort.
Events
What they were doing, and I can’t corroborate this but it appears to be in keeping with their general approach, was to ‘interview’ anyone who had a grudge with Vera or anyone who lived at The Sanctuary, take this information as wholly truthful, rather than merely a distorted opinion, and write and publish these salacious stories as factual events.
Free Love
One of the stories that appeared on more than one occasion was the “free-love” story, where everyone at the sanctuary was apparently running around naked and “copping off” with each other at every available opportunity. There were accusations of other nefarious activities too, such as sex rituals and black magic.
Shock
However, Vera was a devout Christian and whilst she didn’t openly oppose free-love, she didn’t approve of it either. On one occasion a young man asked her if a girl he had befriended could come and live with him. “Goodness gracious, no!” she replied and that was then end of the matter.
But relationships did develop, and some couples married and some did not. It was the ones who did not that found their way into the ‘scandal sheets’ and national press.
Folk Dancing
By 1927, The Sanctuary boasted a general store, a school, a theatre, and a chapel. Days were spent working the fields, with evenings around a fire, where folk dancing took place, as well as music, singing, along with theological and political discussions.
Kensington
In 1929 a girl from Kensington ran away from home and came to stay for a night with a friend at The Sanctuary. She left though, and found a job in nearby Worthing but was soon accused of petty theft. Magistrates found her guilty and banned her from returning to The Sanctuary. The implication being it was The Sanctuary that had caused her to go off the rails.
Cranks
John Bull took up the story and reported with the headline,
“Young girl wrecked by crooked moral cranks.”
John Bull
And stated of Vera, “What type of woman is this, to be in charge of this unique community…with an avowed disregard of all moral convention?” And then went on, “Clearly a settlement of this kind constitutes a grave menace and it now remains for the authorities to take action.”
Nudism
Another article in a Sunday Newspaper concentrated on the idea the community was really nothing more than a nudist colony. In the 2000 book, The Washington Story by Chris Hare, which is a history of Washington Parish and from which many of these quotes are taken, the author states that many of its current residents, still believe the nudist colony story to be true. And therein lies the power of the national press.
The End of The Sanctuary
But now Vera had tired of the constant negative scrutiny and she was also now married with a child. She and her family left Heath Common for Montpellier in France to set up a school but the venture was not a success and she returned sometime later. On her return she gave over the deeds to the land to its occupants, and lived out her life in nearby Sleepy Hollow. The Sanctuary dream was no more. The bigoted press finally won. Vera lived in the area until her death in 1968.
Full Circle
And Fred Vickery, the builder who came to the Sanctuary as a 16 year-old, died in 1992. Some of the dwellings he built are still in Heath Common today. The picture below is of one of his houses.
Yes, it’s the cottage we were staying in. It belonged to the Gunton family and Joy Gunton lived in it until the 2000’s (Joy is the young girl in the earlier picture of the family making hay).
Hut
On Sunday, we were leaving to return home but we took a short walk further along Hampers Lane, to Sanctuary Lane and then to Vera’s Walk. This is the location of Vera’s house, and is also where a small hut, erected by her husband, is dedicated to the Sanctuary. This was the location where the Folk Dances used to take place (in between all the gratuitous bonking and sex-magick rituals).
Nearby is Sleepy Hollow where Vera also lived.
It truly was a fascinating trip, meeting my extended family and discovering a place in time that most never even knew existed. And then, being able to learn about the wonderful people who lived there.
Rambling
Perhaps then, the house wasn’t haunted after all. Perhaps it was nothing more than the ramblings of an over-active imagination. But of course, until it gets dark, you never can tell.
I’ll leave you with a poem about darkness.
Things that go bump in the night
Spike Milligan
Should not really give one a fright
It’s the hole in each ear
That lets in the fear
That, and the absence of light
Thank you for your time.
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