Listen to the episode here.

What a week where Angie and Theresa do exactly what they do best.

Convinced she might run out of spies to cover, Theresa shares the story of Krystyna Skarbek, also known as Christine Granville. Born a literal Polish countess, Krystyna cycles through husbands and lovers before seeing her country invaded by Nazi Germany. Convinced she can fight for her homeland, she becomes the first female spy for MI6 during the war and serves Britain for six years, fighting on three different fronts.

Angie pivots sharply from WWII, as she shares the quaint and whimsical story of the Cottingley Fairies. Journey with us to a simpler time as two girls, Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths, stage photos of themselves with fairies, just to get out of trouble and accidentally kick off belief in the little folk, fooling even Sir Author Conan Doyle.

This story pairs well with:
The Night Witches
The Fox Sisters

Transcript

Theresa: Hi, and welcome to the Unhinged History Podcast. The podcast where two absolute knuckleheads are going to read history stories every single week. We are going to not motorboat, info dump, our spouses, partners with these stories we’ve only recently learned, and then come to each other and tell the other host the story we’ve only recently learned. I’m host one. I’m Teresa. And that is host two. 

Angie: I will be motorboating. 

Theresa: And if you would like to stand in line. Anyway. Yeah, I’m Angie. I realized I said that word. I was like, that is not the word I meant. I’m just going to keep going. 

Angie: I started doing that when I turned like 30 is when I really remember doing it. And I’m so bad about it now that most of the time my husband and both of my sons just continue with life. Like they don’t even know. 

Theresa: Yeah, they’re like, of course she said it. 

Angie: Yeah, she means vacuum. But like I told, we were talking to my oldest about something recently, like about a year ago. And I was trying to say lawn mower, but it was the outside vacuum. 

Theresa: The one that I don’t that hub springs up regularly is the time that I and in hindsight, I don’t know if it was a hot flash. I don’t know what was happening. But I was like, we need to adjust the thermostat. It’s too temperature. Fair dude. I was like, whatever is happening is too. Yeah, it’s too extreme. Yeah, I am. I’m overstimulated. 

Angie: Okay, my very regular phrase is can we turn the volume down on the sun? Hmm. And everybody gets it. They’re like, it’s too loud today, mom. I’m like, yeah, it’s too loud. 

And on we’ll try to like correct it to like find a way to say what I’ve tried to say. Is it too bright? Do you want to turn the brightness down? 

No, volume. Thank you. To which, and I think this is so cute. He says things like this all the time. 

My oldest son, yes, well, my oldest son is going to be 18 and two weeks, but these are the types of things that come out of his mouth. It’s many hots outside. You’re so cute. It is many hot here, right? 

Theresa: Yeah, I realize since we had Jenny Chan, the very first interview we had last week, that I don’t get to count that. And it’s technically my turn to go first. 

Angie: Yeah, it is. Nice try. I know you’re trying to do a great reboot. Weren’t you? 

Theresa: I really was. I was just, okay. And, you know, I am obviously just bound to try to do more embroidery immediately. But, okay, so I’m going to tell you an incredible story. This story, I believe, was referred to me by listener Ryan on TikTok. So Ryan, this one’s for you. It’s taken me forever. 

Thank you for your patience. My sources, BBC, Christine Granville, the Polish aristocrat who is Church Hill’s favorite spy by Tim Stokes. Okay. So if you have your bingo card out, I am doing a spy. 

Go ahead and mark that square. HistoricUK.com, Christina Starbeck dash Christine Granville by Jessica Brain. It wasn’t historic places. 

Yeah, it was just historic. Got it. Go. 

And then there was a multiple part podcast series, the other half, or the other half did their career and made it a multi-part series on Christine Granville. Okay. Are you ready? 

Let’s go. So May 1908, Maria Christina Janina Skarbeck, or Skarbeck is born. She is the daughter of a… That is a name. 

It is. Well, I mean, okay, Polish Count. So you’re going to have the multiple names that have this baby. 

So she’s the daughter of a Polish Count and her mom is the heir to a Jewish banking family. Wow. Now, okay. A backstory. 

Right. Now, the reason why you have this pairing is because the Polish Count does the typical thing where he comes from a long line of people who are really good at spending money and eventually kind of goes, ooh, snap. I need a wife and because of my financial situation, this wife ought to have quite the dowry. 

Angie: This so down nabby. It is very down nabby. We were just discussing this. Yeah. Okay. 

Theresa: And so he does not, it’s not a love match, but he does marry well. And they, so our girl Christina, who’s how she’ll be known in her early life, she would spend her early years running free on the Grand Country estate. Oh, living the dream. 

Living the absolute dream. She’s brought up according to a historian named Claire Molly. She has a childhood that is full of freedom and adoration. She’s taught to ride a horse. She’d a shotgun, all of that. 

Angie: So she’s like the little, little Andrew’s laughing. Well, yeah. 

Theresa: Okay. So she is the noble son her dad never had. Yeah. Okay. So that, that kind of thing. She would also apparently exhibit great beauty from a young age. Good for her. But things aren’t always what they seem or start us because the money would dry up and dad would end up piecing out and moving in with his mistress and leaving Christina and her mother and Christina and her mother to make his meet would move into an apartment. Now Christina still have noble blood. She still invited to all the great parties, but she doesn’t have the finances that she would once have to make this really work for her. 

Right. So this kind of puts a stain or a blot on her spot in society and she ends up needing to get a job. Oh, she still ends up going to all these great things with all the whispers in the background, but she ends up working around cars so much. 

So like, and not like add a lot, like add a mechanics pleasure. I couldn’t quite figure out exactly what she was doing. But she’s around exhaust quite a bit and this gives her a lifelong cough. Oh, okay. 

Angie: Now, prop 65 warning. 

Theresa: No kidding. Now she enters into a short-lived marriage before embarking on the guy she marries this first time. He she’s doing it. She is trying to do what her dad did and just find money, get out. Okay. I mean, it worked for him. It did. Well, and yeah, it did work for him. He he chose to leave. So she’s in the short-lived marriage and for everything I read and learned this marriage bores this woman to tears. 

Angie: This is not your first story where the marriage boards the woman to tears. 

Theresa: It’s not. Like we’re talking and I love that a curtain salesman. 

Angie: That’s we leave working at work, I guess. Yeah. 

Theresa: When we’re out to dinner, don’t talk me about the thread count on the curtains. I don’t want to be sat by the window next time. 

Angie: Now, I know you sold this restaurant there curtains. Thank you, honey. 

Theresa: Yeah. Yeah. How’s your steak? But she ends up embarking on a different relationship with a man named Jersey Glitsky. And he’s a diplomat and she’s going to end up marrying him in November of 1938. 

Angie: Okay. So she’s 20. You said she’s born in 1908, right? Yeah. 

Theresa: So she’d be 30 at this point when she married number two. Now this second husband. 

Theresa: Oh, 38. Sorry. Yeah. I thought, okay, got it. 

Theresa: This second husband is described as massive and athletic. He’s older than her. I think by a couple of years, like by 20 years or so. But anyhow, she from again, like I didn’t put this in my notes. 

So I’m just trying to go from memory. She is skiing and she is more careening down the mountain than really going with form or grace. And she’s about to hit a tree and this dude just kind of snatches her out of harm’s way. Love that. And I’m cute. Then she’s like, you know what? This adrenaline lift has got to be loved. So let’s check. 

Angie: Let’s get married. Okay. Let’s go. 

Theresa: Now, September of 39, they are traveling to, uh, or they’ve been traveling in Southern Africa and this is where they hear that their homeland’s been invaded by Nazi Germany, homeland being Poland. Right. 

Okay. And he’s Polish. He’s Polish and a different. Good for her. All right. Poland is a brand new country at this point. Right. And the brand new country has just fallen. Right. And so they both had straight to Britain to join the war effort. As you do. 

Which I absolutely love. Now, husband wants to go to France to join the Allied Air Forces, but she has a different plan on how she can make a difference. Now, according to Claire Molly, who ends up writing a book about her, she storms off to what’s meant to be the secret headquarters of MI6. 

She doesn’t so much as volunteer as actually demand to get taken on. I love that. And you’re going to hear a couple of continuing things. One, our girl is just sheer force of will. And two, able to talk her way into anything and also addicted to the adrenaline rush. Good for her. So she ends up when she demands to be taken on. She’s talking to George Taylor, the head of MI6. 

Angie: I would like a meeting with your CEO. Thank you so much. Nope, your CEO. I’ll wait. 

Theresa: I have a feeling she just kind of stormed through the office of this secret. Sort of what I’m imagining. Yeah. Yeah. And then she ends up convincing him of her usefulness before she divulges a plan, which she’d concocted and she wants to travel to Hungary. 

Okay. Now, part of her proposed mission, she’s talking about how she’s going to travel to Budapest. This at the time is technically neutral and she’s going to produce propaganda to disseminate before skiing across the Tantra Mountain Range to enter Poland so she can set up lines of communication. 

Angie: She is aware skiing is not her strong suit, right? 

Theresa: Actually, skiing is her strong suit. Great. Husband number two did snatch her from the jaws of death. She’s quite proficient. Oh, okay. And though she isn’t accomplished gear, she planned to use her friends in the local area to assist her undertaking missions to help the resistance fighters in Poland. Because the resistance is just a conglomerate, a decentralized setup. 

And so they don’t talk very well with each other, let alone anybody outside. And so we’ve got a really set up line. George Taylor and the rest of MI6, they hear this elaborate plan and they have a little bit of skepticism. But there’s also, they’re also intrigued, right? Like the fact that this literal account is who speaks multiple languages comes in and just has this silver tongue where she’s trying to bend the ear. 

Angie: And it works, obviously, because she’s sitting there. 

Theresa: Yeah. And so they’re like, huh, okay. I mean, she’s patriotic, she’s adventurous. And if she dies, well, she’s not a British subject. So she’s not our problem. Right. We have nothing to lose. So she becomes the very first female spy from MI6. 

That’s awesome. Now, December 1939, Scarbeck is embarking on this mission to Budapest. And here’s where she goes to meet Andrzej Kowski. And he’s a Polish war hero and he’s lost his leg. Get your bigger card out. So now, I think he lost in a hunting thing too. 

But that’s neither here nor there. Now they instantly kick it off. Now she’s still married. Of course. Now, so they have this love affair that goes on for many years. 

It’s on and off. And ultimately, this would end up being what dissolves marriage with husband number two. Shocking. But like, again, our girl is addicted to the hunt. So this is kind of par for the course. Yeah. 

Okay. So she ends up making it across the border into Poland and there she’s able to locate her mom and she’s trying to tell her mom, Hey, look, here’s the way of the world. You are a Jewish aristocrat in a Nazi occupied country. This isn’t going to go well for you. You need to leave. Yeah. 

Like now is the time. Um, her mom refuses to give up teaching at this secret school. And, okay. That’s the last we know of her mom. 

So, oh, dang it. She ends up getting seized by the Nazis and she’s never heard of again. And this ends up being one of the saddest things because again, our girl had caught her way into anything. 

And the one person that that she was closest to that she would have loved to have convinced didn’t get convinced. Yeah. Gotcha. 

Okay. And then, so over the following years, you’re going to hear the Polish exile become and she, because she is exiled from Poland at this point, she’s going to become the stuff of legends because she has this countess. She’s got all of these connections and everybody knows her. 

Angie: I love when everybody knows and it’s just like this ginormous open secret yet here we are. Yeah. Still going about life. 

Theresa: And Claire Molly would describe her as knowing all the right languages and describe how she knew how to get under the radar because she’d been rather bored as a countess and she’s a high adrenaline loving woman and so much so she ends up smuggling cigarettes across the border skiing just for kicks and she doesn’t even smoke. 

Angie: She did it cause I can’t. Exactly. This girl is doing it for the plot. Yeah. Love that. 

Theresa: So she ends up as she’s doing all these missions. Sometimes she ends up having to travel hidden in the trunk of a car while fling machine gunfire, maybe alongside one of multiple lovers. Like anything like she’s just rolling for initiative at every turn. 

Angie: I just want to see the scene like I want there to be a movie or I want a series and I want to see the scene where she is with one lover and two more walk-in. 

Theresa: There in the podcast series she talked or that the host talks about how she is having many dinners with two different men that she is actively engaged in affairs with and neither of them are her husband and they both know that the other one is sleeping with her and just needing to deal with it. You know what good for her. 

Yeah. Now this was one thing I absolutely loved at one point she gets microfilm that showed the German forces lining up along the Soviet border in what looked like an imminent attack. This attack is going to be Operation Barbarossa which we covered in episode 87 on the Night Witches. It’s because of her and her smuggling this microfilm out in her glove that gets passed to Winston Churchill and then according to his daughter Sarah it would be our girl Christina who’s declared his favorite secret agent. Love that. So when I talked about the Night Witches Churchill learns about the imminent attack. 

They don’t care about your nonaggression pack. They’re about the storm and so I was like no, not me. Hitler and I were besties. We go way back and apparently according to you he’s also smuggling the amber room away as opposed to wearing a plane. 

Angie: Well he is also packing up the amber room. Yeah. 

Theresa: He wasn’t an idiot. He was girding his loins but not his plane. Do you know what he’s going to do? Yeah. He only got enough manpower for one thing and apparently winning the war wasn’t one of them. But okay. Sorry Stalin. Yeah I look. I mean you have options right? You can only do one thing. You choose a historical treasure. 

Angie: He rolled for initiative and may or may not have won. Yeah. Yeah. 

Theresa: But January 1941 Christina and one lover Andres they are captured by the discoverer by the Gestapo. 

Angie: Now. Because she’s going to charm the Gestapo and she gets to leave. 

Theresa: I like this idea. Hold that thought. There’s one instance. I didn’t put this in my notes where she has evidence that would out her as a spy. Okay. And the Gestapo have her. And her lover ends up pitching the package of these photographs that she ought not have over the bridge. And the Gestapo are going through her bags trying to get the package from the water. 

They’re struggling with that. And she has this necklace on that was a gift from another lover. It was a cheap necklace. 

It looked kind of like diamonds but they were glass beads. And she ends up in a struggle with one of the Gestapo guards. The necklace rips off. She goes full drama queen. 

Start screaming my diamonds knowing that they’re cheap. And the guards are like trying to get the beads out of the grass before they are lost to them. And that was one of her moves. But this one, this one’s incredible. 

This is why Ryan centered to me. During her interrogation, she realizes that she, this could be the end of the road. So she bites her tongue so bad that she gets a lot of blood in her mouth. And then she starts coughing. So she’s spraying blood as she’s coughing so that it looks like she’s suffering from TB. So then they go and they give her an x-ray. And the doctor sees all of these dark scarring on her chest. Not knowing that it’s scarring, he thinks that it’s the late stages of TB, not the scarring produced from exhaling or inhaling all of those fumes from her job that she had growing up. 

And so the Nazis are like, well, shoot, the only thing worse than like, basically the only thing that scares us more than a spy is tuberculosis. And if she’s in late stage, she’s dead anyhow. We don’t have to do it. But let’s not be near her so we don’t contract this disease. 

And if her lover’s been beside her this whole time, he’s already got it. So we might as well just let them go off into the ether and not pollute ourselves. 

Angie: Even though they’re not going to be a problem much longer. 

Theresa: Yeah, they’re going to be dead anyhow. And let’s not offer ourselves up to the Jaws of Fate. Good for her. So she convinced them that she had DV, which is just the feel of Arians on this woman. But anyhow, they end up getting released, right? And then because they get ahold of their handlers, they get British passports with new identities. And here’s where she gets the alias Christine Granville. 

Okay. And so that’s why some of my sources had varying names. And so she ends up using the name Christine Granville for most of her life. 

Okay, that makes sense. Now I’m going to transition to calling her Christine and Granville. So meanwhile, her lover, Andres, he adopted a name Andrew Kennedy. Oh. Which I’m sure somebody with a thick Polish accent could really pull off. 

But that’s new to here and there. Now I’m sure you can pick this up, but Claire Molly will end up describing her greatest tool as her brain, saying that she’s quick thinking and talk her way out of anything. Yeah, I had that sorted out. Yeah. There’s even an instance where apparently animals are unable to resist her charms, because there’s a couple of occasions where Granville is like a security guard snarling, is released to kill her by border guards. And she’s able to, as the dog is coming at her, convince it to stop, leave its owners for good and always and just follow her. She gives it to somebody else. You know, sometimes you wake up a Disney princess. And this is a Disney princess who’s a spy. 

Angie: Love that. Where’s that movie? 

Theresa: Now, 1944, she climbed up to a German garrison that’s based at a strategic pass in the Alps. And here’s the crazy thing. This strategic German base is being manned by Nazis, right? But it’s primarily held and basically only held by Polish people who’ve been prescaned into the war effort. Okay. So it’s super important that they’re there, but they don’t want to be there. Right. This makes sense. And she basically just walks up with a bandana around her hair, like holding a neckerchief, holding her hair back that’s in Polish colors, and is able to talk to all the Polish officers there and just kind of chat with them and convince them to sabotage the military installations and desert. And this causes the entire garrison to surrender without firing a single shot. 

Get it, girl? And this is just bananas. So that same day, she discovers that her SOE commander and lover has been arrested in Dean and is being held in Southeast France by the Costapo along with a couple other agents, and they’re about to be executed by the firing squad. Oh my. The same day. Like, so this is just her diary for today. 

Angie: And she’s in the Polish, excuse me, she’s in the Swiss Alps at a Polish Alps base. 

Theresa: Well, she’s in the Alps, but she apparently is close enough to get there. So she somehow manages to get all the way to Dean prison and she storms in demanding to speak to the head guy in charge and she’s claiming that she’s the niece of Field Marshal Montgomery. And she’s informing. Yeah, she’s informing this officer that an American attack is imminent. Like, she goes in there and says, I’m the niece of the Field Marshal. 

I’m a spy, which should got her shot on spot. And things are about to go very badly for you and all of yours. And the only way that this is going to get worse is if you execute these people. But if you do exactly as I say, you’ll get out of this, at least alive. 

Angie: And like, now mind you, Montgomery is probably in Northern Africa. Mine in his own damn business and is delighted to fight out. He’s just got a niece. 

Theresa: Right. You know, welcome to the family, darling. Now, she knew that there were likely going to be American attacks. Were they going to be nearby? Maybe she didn’t know. Hey, whatever works. 

Shoot your shot. By the end of the hour, she’s terrified this man. And she goes on to say, you know, if you go ahead with this execution, I’ll make sure that you’re strung up and anything you do to me, you’re going to be hanging from a lamppost. If you help me, I will speak out for you. Okay. The conversation ends at 7 p.m. Her men are due to die at 9. Okay. 

This has been a full day. Now, they’re able to, like the men are, like the guard goes into their room, pulls them out. They’re thinking, gosh, it feels a little early, but maybe they’re just pulling us into the quad to set things up. And they’re just put into a car driven by German officers. And one of the guys says, gosh, you’re, you’ve got a really astounding woman. And the guy about to die is kind of like, okay, and like what? And then they drive out of the prison and she gets into the vehicle. The Germans get out and they just skid out. 

Like it is bananas. Now, despite all of her heroism at the end of the war, in Britain, Granville could not find the country that would support her. Britain abandons her. Oh, so the last entry in the British files that is about her, there’s just this quote that basically says she’s no longer wanted. What did she do? 

Angie: How do you go from being Churchill’s favorite spy to no longer wanted? 

Theresa: Well, I have a feeling Churchill wasn’t involved in that conversation and the rest people are just kind of like, yeah, she’s outlifting her usefulness. 

Angie: Well, I mean, that seems fair given, given Churchill’s set after the war also. 

Theresa: That’s true. And I mean, I have a feeling that, I mean, because this isn’t before the war is officially over, right? So they’re kind of like going through it. But I have a feeling he wasn’t involved in every single decision. So she probably got lost in the paperwork. 

Angie: Well, no, he wasn’t. And then there’s also, right, like, I don’t want to say his fall from grace, because that’s not what it is. But by the end of the war, there’s a huge portion of the upper echelon that are sick of his. 

Theresa: His un-gently warfare. They haven’t liked it from day one. And so I think any chance they have to push the spies out. 

Angie: And undermine any of his operations, right? 

Theresa: So she’s in a tough spot because she’s not able to return to communist-controlled Poland because they know who she is. Okay. Her face is everywhere. I mean, at one point, when she gets away from Germans, she has to leave some of her forged identity paperwork that has her picture on it. So they have her face. That’s inconvenient. That’s very inconvenient. But she’s going through a bunch of issues because she’s got this temporary UK paperwork. They’re not renewed. And so she’s got to leave Britain. Now there’s small problems here. 

Angie: I feel like now’s the time you pick a tropical island and just go retire. Our girl could never. 

Theresa: Did I mention she’s here for the adrenaline? That’s true. Now, she ends up returning to the UK, but she refuses to accept a George Medal and an OBE that’s awarded to her for her war efforts. Because she’s like, if you’re not going to renew my citizenship, temporary though it may be, why are you giving me these papers? Why are you giving me these awards? Fair. Like I served you diligently. Legit. Like her life expectancy working for the British was three weeks. She’s fought for six years. 

Angie: I feel like you owe her something. Yeah. 

Theresa: So this shames the government into offering her citizenship. And she applies to this. She ends up accepting the citizenship and taking the awards. Now, after the war, she’s living in the Shelbourne Hotel and she’s taking on incredibly different roles from what she did during war. She’s waitressing in cafes. She’s selling frogs and herrids. And she even takes a job as a cleaner on a passenger ship. She is just trying to make ends meet. Yeah. 

And she’s a countess. Yes. Okay. Now, Claire Molly, who I’ve been quoting this whole thing, says, you have to remember that she came to Britain to serve. And she was with her diplomat husband at the start of the war. 

And they arrived in a first class passenger ship. While at the end of the war, she’s having to become a bathroom stewardess on liners. But at least it gives her some sort of feeling of freedom. 

Angie: Yeah. You know, peace and freedom, I guess. 

Theresa: So as she’s going through this, she is experiencing incredible discrimination on the ship because the ship’s captain at one point tells his staff that they can wear any metals that they accumulated during the war. Now, she’s served on three different fronts. And so she’s got a ton of accolades. So she comes out wearing a chest full of metal. And everyone on board is looking at this woman with a thick accent and a chest full of metal and saying, right, stolen valor. 

Oh, I’d be so mad. So it didn’t quite work well because they’re also saying, gosh, she looks Jewish as well. So now we’re getting the anti-Semitism in there as well. 

It is a perfect storm of every ism you can come up with. Now, with everything stacked against her, of course, she’s having a tough go. Now, here is where she meets George or Dennis George Muldowney. He’s a fellow steward. He stands up for her. 

Okay. They start a relationship, but Granville becomes bored with him. And so she drops him. And now that he’s been kind of kicked off the kicked out of her bed, he becomes obsessive and he starts harassing her and stalking her. He ends up murdering her. 

Angie: I did not survive the Gestapo for you. Multiple times. 

Theresa: So she comes downstairs because she’s told that there’s somebody there that has something for her. Right. Like so she comes down on this roof and he lunges at her stabbing her and she cries out. She’s dead in seconds from the impact because the blade that he has in his hand goes right through her heart. Now, what’s really, okay. So it would be 10 weeks later Muldowney is going to be hanged and the murder is front page news. Even though it’s front page news, her story alone has been kind of just lost in history. That’s wild. Get out of your bingo card. I have pictures. Oh, yay. 

Angie: Okay. I don’t know why that’s not what I was picturing. She is so cute. 

Theresa: She has kind of a Jackie Kennedy kind of vibe. 

Angie: Yeah. I was going to say she’s giving American Girl next door. Like she’s got, so the first photo is a color photo and she or you know, color photo of the time. It’s she’s sitting in like a poolside chair with short bobbed hair, probably red lipstick, sweet smile, wearing what looks to be like a black t-shirt, but it’s probably addressed. 

Theresa: Probably like a dress. Yeah. And then this is when she was in a Miss Poland competition. 

Angie: Of course, because of course that makes sense. Finger waves, charmingly photo. The perfect eyebrows. Oh, she is gorgeous. 

Theresa: And then this is her with a group of SOE and I believe that woman or that is the only woman in the photo. That’s awesome. Not only when she was with the SOE or anybody and they’re going through the Alps is she, keeping up, she’s setting the pace. So she was quite athletic. 

Angie: Good for her. 

Theresa: Get it sis. But that is the story of Christina Scarbeck or Christine Granville depending on when you’re getting into her story. I love that. 

Angie: I haven’t taken a wildly different turn because I wasn’t done with April Fool’s I guess and needed to bring you one more April Fool’s story I suppose. So I thought I’d bring you a sweet little bitty that I’m going to be honest, I’m going to be really shocked if you don’t already know about it but I’m going to tell you the story of the Coddingley fairies. Are you familiar with this? Yes. 

Theresa: The two little girls who forged the fairy photos? Yes. 

Angie: I think the story is so cute. It’s actually one of my favorites because it seems even though they unwittingly fool like everybody it seems wholesome. 

Theresa: Well it’s little curls right? Like they’re not. 

Angie: They’re not said they didn’t set out to fool a nation. They set out to get out of trouble. 

Theresa: They were having fun at first I’m assuming. Right? 

Angie: Yes. Yes they were. I’m going to tell you the story. Yes. Go for it. Okay so I’m going to start with a quote from the December issue of the Strand magazine. The headline reads, fairy’s photographed an epic making event. This article goes on to say the recognition of their existence will jolt the material 20th century mind out of its heavy ruts in the mud and will make it admit that there is a glamour and mystery to life. Having discovered this the world will not find it so difficult to accept that spiritual messages supported by physical facts which have already been put before it. This delightful headline and quote belong to none other than Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. 

Theresa: Can I start off and interrupt you one more time? It was learning about this story when I was a little girl not knowing it was a hoax that made me believe in fairies. Right? Okay. 

Angie: I think for me I first learned about the story while I was in my photography classes. So it wasn’t from the aspect of learning like that they that it could have been a hoax or that the fairies were real. It was from the aspect of like look at what photography can do. So I hadn’t thought about it in any other sense than it was photography. And so to like learn the ins and outs for me was like oh okay that’s really okay that makes sense. So it’s cute. Yeah I hadn’t thought about that before. Do I believe in fairies? I don’t know. So it was fun. My sources are the Coddingly fairies historic UK. 

Theresa: Because we have the same source this week? 

Theresa: Yes. Okay. The Coddingly fairies hoaxes.org. The public domain review has a blurb on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the fairies. And then also you can go to I believe it’s from the internet archives but you can yeah archives.org you can go and read Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Coming of the Fairies which is like super fun. 

So I kept it as a source just to share that if anybody wanted to if so and find a thought. Yeah and then there is an article by Richard Moss from 720 on a website called Museum Crush called Arthur Conan Doyle and The Coming of the Fairies. And a fabulous Wikipedia article that actually made it all make sense. I was like wow thanks Wikipedia. 

Appreciate you because the other articles were very the timelines were very back and forth and it not any article explained to anyone thing in depth. So it was like dude what are we doing here? Like there’s a whole story. Why is there not so Wikipedia sort of filled in the blanks and made some of this stuff that didn’t make sense make sense. 

So here we are. So picture it it’s the most idyllic little English countryside it’s 1917 you’re a young lady you’re looking for a way to pass the time. To not get too deep into the lore I just want to remind you to like keep in mind right you’re positioned in a place and a time in the world that has this really strong relationship with what we would call the supernatural, ghost, changeling spirits, fairies, things like that. They’re commonplace right like they’re in everyday conversation and also World War One and also you are living in a time where there’s this spiritualist movement afoot that we’ve talked about in previous episodes the bill paper and I’m so glad you didn’t ask the Fox Six Fox sisters episode which I think is 116. So sure sort of all in that world but also on top of this for lack of a better word on top of growing up in this superstition and on top of living in this world of the spiritual movement you are also feeling with a world that is currently in the worst war it’s ever seen. 

Theresa: Right now we’re looking for escapism. 

Angie: Right so it’s mid-1917 a young girl called Francis Griffith and her mother relocate from South Africa to Coddingley near Bradford which is in the West Yorkshire area of England. They are at the time staying with Francis’s aunt Pauly and uncle Arthur their last name is Wright. They have a daughter she’s about 16 she’s called Elsie and this lovely young lady of course Francis’s cousin and the two love playing in the countryside together and they often go down to the Coddingley Beck and they play in the water and they are I think they have a very sweet relationship. Elsie is obviously several years older than Francis but I think it’s just that like older sister I’m so excited to have a mate yeah to live life with right now sort of thing and so they just have all kinds of fun together but they are forever coming home with dirty dresses and wet shoes and moms are not happy about dirty dresses and wet shoes so Elsie the older one is sort of called out by mom in fact historic UK says quote when told off for getting wet they said they went there to quote see the fairies their families undoubtedly scoffed at this as an excuse that was as thin as the dog ate my homework yeah and Elsie’s like but I’m sure that’s what teenage girls said at the time and she asked to borrow dad’s camera which is a midge a midge quadruple he is himself something of an amateur photographer and he possesses all the needed accoutrements like from Stark’s finish he’s got the dark room he’s got all this stuff so he hands her the camera and the girls go back out into the woods and go to the river they’re back in less than an hour I just want to point out I think this is so cool because I didn’t know this part before Elsie like her dear old papa has an interest in photography she possesses the talent for not only the art of photography but she has experience in retouching photographs so she comes into this with like I know what I’m doing like I’m not new here right right so they’re only down at the river for like an hour and they return with this now very famous image of Francis she sort of has her head she’s so cute she sort of has her head tilted slightly sort of gazing to the right and in front of her are several winged fairy folk dressed in these really ethereal the sources say Daphneus clothes and they appear to be dancing Francis for her part looks like she’s trying really hard not to laugh and uncle Arthur is immediately like he knows they are up to something he just cannot figure out how they are up to something so they come back with this image in July of 1917 in September they come back with this other image of Elsie she’s sitting on the grass and she’s holding her hand out to this winged gnome little fella he’s very cute the photo itself is actually called Elsie in the gnome and which one of the things that I think is really cute is later when this like hits the world stage and stuff starts going out in magazines and things they change the name of the girls for their privacy so it’s iris and Alice which I think is like thanks guys you are actually being considerate appreciate 

Theresa: you well you realize is that this time if you were in the newspaper it’d be Angie Craig of exact address Jamestown California 

Angie: right so I was like wow okay that’s cool so I mean but we’ll get into that later so again dad or uncle Arthur knows that something’s afoot but he just can’t figure it out and he starts thinking maybe they’re using these like drawn cut out figures I’m thinking maybe something similar to paper dolls that sort of what came into my mind right but either way he just can’t put a finger on it and he evidently at this time does not allow his camera out of his side again because he’s like y’all are up to something I just don’t know but in a really cute turn of events somewhere near the end of 1818 Francis writes a letter to a friend of hers in Cape Town South Africa right this is where she was from she’d grown up there till age nine and this little girl’s name and I love that we have this little girl’s name is Joanna Parvin and she writes a letter to Joanna and she includes a photo of her on the ferry and the ferries and on the back she writes quote it’s funny I never used to see them in Africa it must be too hot for them there which like she’s trying to roll her friend right like hoax or not the imagery of her doing that is so cute to me because I can just imagine little Joanna Parvin getting this photo of her friend in the mail which is exciting when you get mail from your friend especially as a kid right getting this picture of your friend and going ferries and then her having this little included note on the back about it being too hot in Africa for there to be ferries like that is so cute to me I can only imagine what Joanna Parvin’s mom is thinking and I’m here for it um the timeline gets a little confusing after here but sometime around 1919 Elsie’s mother who is into the whole theosophical movement which is part of the spiritual movement she ends up taking the photos to a meeting of her local society in Bradford the subject of the evening’s lecture just happens to be ferries what a coincidence so good job mom um now I can imagine because in this particular situation mom is the true believer and dad has been sus the whole time I can only imagine he’s like watching her walk out the door to attend her fellowship meeting and being like you’re insane 

Theresa: yeah honey we talked about this yeah 

Angie: um so the images they obviously catch the attention and the imagination of the society and one of its leaders a man called Edward Edward Gardner he sees this as the perfect opportunity to promote quote the important spiritual message which is according to historic uk that humankind was undergoing a process of transformation that would lead eventually to the perfection of the species we’re still working on it by the way right yeah I laughed when I read that Gardner claims that these images are proof that this great like met metaphysical change is happening and also like I said earlier it’s world war one or was world war one and people are going through it like emotionally with loss and things like that so just keep that there the photographs because Edward Gardner just cannot with these photographs they are examined by a man called Harold Snelling and he is a photographic expert he confirms the images to quote the historic uk again he confirms as authentic what was in front of the camera stating it this way clearly alleviates him having to actually confirm what’s in the image but confirm that the images are real which I think is really interesting the image isn’t real he’s saying the image no that he’s basically saying the images aren’t fakes they’re literal photographs there yeah nothing was done to fake these but um he’s doing it in a way that doesn’t make him have to confirm the existence of fairies 

Theresa: so he’s saying the image of the screenshot at Lord of the Rings where you have hobbits and whatnot that that that happened now is a trick of the camera do we have young bilbo bag and standing 30 feet in front of Gandalf to give the illusion of scale 

Angie: maybe I don’t know right like he is basically saying what’s in front of the kid like yes the image is real the photographs were real it hasn’t been tampered with but he never confirms that the fairies are real which I find to be a little bit interesting because the website hoaxes.org if it’s to be believed Snelling said quote genuine unfaked photographs of single exposure open air work show movement in all the fairy figures and there’s no trace whatever of studio work involving card or paper models dark backgrounds painted figures etc so I’m not sure which stores you want to believe here but either way to me it sounds like he’s just trying to find a way to say yep the photos are real without saying yep the fairies are real 

Theresa: I mean honestly that’s the best way to go about it 

Angie: right now from here Gardner he starts to use these images in his lecture and prints are made to be like sold afterwards which is probably why this story is so famous because these prints have been like roaming around the planet ever since and then these images they appear in a spiritualist magazine called light it’s at this point they catch the attention of none other than the literary sire of Sherlock Holmes Sir Arthur Cronin Doyle who is heavily into spiritualism having lost his son and brother to world or 

Theresa: one and he’s actually in a thing called the ghost club 

Angie: right and this for him is simply the most wonderful timing to come across these photos because he is getting ready to write a piece on fairies for the Christmas edition of the strand magazine which is what I read a little bit from at the beginning so he reaches out to Arthur and Elsie so Arthur right the uncle or dad and Elsie and he asks for permission to use the images like the gentleman he is Mr. Wright is super impressed that Doyle’s involved so of course permission for publication is given but Wright refuses payment on any grounds that if the images are in fact genuine they should not be sold for money like I can’t take you can use them you can do whatever you want them but I cannot take your money because if they are real that feels like we’re soiling them but remember he thought it’s us from the beginning so he’s probably like I cannot take 

Theresa: your money in good faith I can’t rip off the sir Conan Doyle 

Angie: right um after snelling the photographic expert does his inspection Gardner and Doyle get a second opinion from Kodak several of the companies technicians they examine the photos and they agree that the photos show no signs of being fakes they decide that quote this could be taken as conclusive evidence but they declined to issue any sort of certificate of authenticity because again what do you do here Gardner thinks that some of the texts aren’t entirely objective on the case so he takes the prints to Eauford which is another big photography company at the time and they say that there is some evidence of faking but because both Gardner and Doyle are very optimistic about this they take Eauford’s nay and the two other yays and um they just say yes it’s real because they’re so excited like they are taking these two yays I’m saying that with air quotes as they’re definitely authentic 

Theresa: nine at a time didn’t disagree this toothpaste is the best 

Angie: yes and that makes me laugh so hard come on anyway there is of course at skeptics at the time um at one point Doyle shows them to a physicist and physical researcher called um he’s a man called Sir Arthur excuse me Sir Oliver Lodge and he says they’re fakes in fact he suggests they’re a troupe of dancers that are masquerading his fairies and points out the distinctly distinctly Parisian hairstyles of the fairies which I think is so funny to be like that’s it the hair they can’t be real they’re friends um yeah of course the French by July of 1920 um so mind you this started in 2000 or in 1917 right okay so it’s been a few years and they’re still at it by July of 1920 Doyle is preoccupied with organizing a lecture tour of Australia and he sends Gardner to meet the right family Francis is about 12 and her parents are living in Scarborough now um at this point Wright tells Gardner that he has been suspicious the whole time and was certain that the photos were fake and that while the girls were away he searched their room so like back in the day and the area around the stream looking for scraps of paper bits of cutouts anything really and he finds nothing incriminating they 

Theresa: burned all that in the fire good girls right Gardner believes this family to be both honest and respectable after all they really have no reason to lie there’s like no monetary gain for them right like they have no reason to lie they even lied about the girls 

Angie: identity right so to put the whole thing to bed Gardner comes back to the house around the end of July he brings two um Butcher and Sun’s cameo folding plate cameras and 24 plates that he has secretly marked and no one really clarifies to me what the secret mark means but like he has marked the plates I’m assuming because if they were tampered with then he would know this is sort of what I’m thinking but I don’t know a lot about plate photography so I’m I’m a little confused there but anyway Brances the younger is then invited to stay with the rights again for holiday this time so the girls can actually go and find fairies 

Theresa: in his rather insistent that I go do this I I I wonder I got a new book we got a puppy well I’ll go play with the puppy 

Angie: right exactly in 19 in his 1945 book fairies a book of real fairies Gardner describes his instructions at this time saying quote I went off to Cottingly again taking the two cameras and plates from London and met the family and explained to the two girls the simple working of the cameras giving one each to keep the cameras were loaded and my final advice was that they need to go up to the Glen only on fine days as they had done a custom to do before and tice the fairies that’s what the girls call getting the fairies out we would tice them as they called their way of attracting them and see what they could get I suggested only the most obvious and easy precautions about lighting and distance for I knew it was essential they should feel free and then hampered and have no burden of responsibility if nothing came of all that I told them they were to not mind a bit okay well the weather is garbage for photography until like August and because the girls tell everyone the fairies won’t come out if they know everyone’s watching them this convinces I love this this statement like the fairies aren’t going to come out mom can they use that to convince el see’s mom Polly the one who’s like way into it she needs to leave so she goes to have tea with her sister yeah 

Theresa: quit hiding the bushes mother they can hear you 

Angie: pretty much and I think that’s so funny so she leaves and the girls go and they take their photos to show fairies in the first one called Francis and the leaving fairy Francis is shown in profile and there’s this little winged fairy close by her nose the second one which is my favorite of the group is called fairy offering a pose of hair bills to elsey and it shows this adorable little fairy tiptoeing on a branch and offering elcia flower two days later the girls take the last picture the picture is called fairies and their son back the plates are then packed in cotton wool and they’re sent to Gardner who is in London by this time and he proceeds to send Doyle like the most exciting telegram ever like he is so excited about what he’s found and and the results and blah blah blah Doyle who is in Melbourne writes back quote my heart was gladdened when out here in far Australia I had your note and three wonderful pictures which are confirmatory of our published results when our fairies are admitted other psychic phenomenon we’ll find a more ready acceptance we have had continued messages at seances for some time that a visible sign was coming through 

Theresa: Doyle I love you confirmation bias that it’s best 

Angie: oh my gosh the article in the strand magazine is released in December of 1920 it features two of the photos in the highest resolution of the day and the magazine sells out within days like mere days of course right I mean it’s phenomenal photography even today like of course it’s going to sell now there are believers and skeptics from all walks of life and and disciplines from the gate go Gardner makes one final visit to the girls in August of 1921 and again he brings cameras and plates for them but he also brings an occultist called Jeffrey Hodson the girls don’t see any fairies out and about and there are no more photos Hodson however says he saw fairies everywhere and he writes copious notes on them but the girls are over it by now and they only played along with Hodson quote out of mischief they thought him to be a fake from the get-go they want to get 

Theresa: into boys they’re this is their childish 

Angie: I mean it else he’s like 20 by this point she’s like I already have children children but and it’s so funny to me that like they took him to be like they call him out as a fake from the get-go and all of the adults decides their dad in this world thought everything they did was real like I guess like these games these games yeah so after 1921 all the same sort of dies down and people basically move on and kind of go about their lives and the whole fairy situation sort of just gets brushed under the rug. Elsie and Francis grew up get married they both live abroad for stretches of time and in 1966 a reporter from the Daily Express tracks down Elsie and she gives this kind of wishy washy answer saying that the fairies might have been segments of her imagination but also starts floating this wild idea that she may have somehow photographed her own thoughts. 

Theresa: Okay but spiritualism just got weirder right 

Angie: this is enough to reignite media interest the BBC’s nationwide show they look into it 1971 but Elsie basically stonewalls again with the same line about imagination and refuses to budge quote I told you that the photographs are segments of our imagination and that’s what I’m sticking to then in 1976 both women sit down for a Yorkshire television interview and when they’re pushed they admitted that a rational person doesn’t see fairies but still wouldn’t cop to faking the photos 

Theresa: I love these girls I mean and for a penny and for a pound 

Angie: right by 1978 noted skeptic and magician James Randi and his team they run the photos through a computer enhancement process and we’re like yeah no these are fake you can literally see the strings that are holding the fairies up which is not exactly subtle and then a photography journal editor named Jeffrey Crowley he does a deep dive investigation that’s published between 80 to an 83 and this is like the first serious post war analysis of the whole thing and he also concludes the photos are fake basically every one of the scientific backgrounds call on it but the girls they are not going to admit it by 1983 so 60 years later Elsie and Francis finally come clean in the magazine article and admit yeah the photos are fake but in true chaotic fashion they both still insist they had actually seen real fairies because of course now the method that they use is actually it’s pretty easy and it’s awesome especially for something that fooled like the entire world Elsie had copied fairy illustrations out of a book of francises that was brought back from South Africa called princess Mary’s gift book they tweaked them slightly they added wings they cut them out of the cardboard and propped them up with hat pins once the photos were taken they then chucked the cutouts into the stream out of girl the the one point of drama between them was the fifth and final photo Elsie said it was a fake like all the others but Francis died on the hill that it was real claiming she just spontaneously spotted fairies in the grass on a rainy Saturday and snapped it a photography expert suggested it was probably just an accidental double exposure which kind of makes sense and is probably why they both genuinely believe they each took the photo and the reason they never and i think this is so funny the reason they never confessed sooner and honestly relatable they were embarrassed they’d accidentally fooled Sir Arthur Conan Doyle the literal creator of Sherlock Holmes and they felt like they couldn’t backtrack as Elsie put it two village kids and a brilliant man like Arthur Conan Doyle well we could only keep quiet yeah Francis’s take is even funnier she said that it was never meant to be a fraud to it was just two girls having a laugh and she never understood why anyone fell for it anyway they wanted to be taken in she said and honestly she wasn’t wrong so she says that dad was right all along and Doyle went to his death believing in them which I think is phenomenal 

Theresa: I mean and I’m leaving and everything else at the time 

Angie: so why not them right like honestly I love it here is some photos if they will look this image I’m just going to tell you I wrote a little caption on the bottom but this is a photo of Arthur Conan Doyle by the spirit photographer okay 

Theresa: so she’s showing me a picture of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle he has his he seated hands in his lap massive dinner plate size hands and a Sam Elliott-esque white handlebar mustache and clear double exposure of a woman with a white head wrapping behind him slashed overlaid on top of him when you look at it 

Angie: it’s delightful that photo was taken in 1922 this is a copy of the magazine that released the the news that’s very said been photographed which I think is so 

Theresa: fun it is strand magazine it shows an illustration of a wintery town scene and then the headline is fairy’s photographed 

Angie: it’s so cute and then these are the photos this is my favorite one I love Elsie in the flower giving the flower I think they’re so sinking cute 

Theresa: they are the iconic black and white photographs of these two young ladies in nature surrounded by fairies in the ways that you wanted to have happened when you were young 

Angie: oh hundred percent right and then so this image on the second image on this page is when Francis was nine this is the first image they did 

Theresa: with all of the fairies dancing around mm-hmm I mean these are the quintessential photos right 

Angie: aren’t they fun I love them so much 

Theresa: well it just goes to show that like once you commit to saying something out loud you double down on it that’s just human nature I 

Angie: think so and I mean honestly they’re not wrong like when you fool Sir Arthur cotton Doyle like what do you do thank I’m sure they were just hoping to like fall into obscurity and never be mentioned again 

Theresa: oh yeah you’re just like you just let it go like I can’t tell you that we fooled you all because I’ll break hearts and my children are watching this right 

Angie: so yeah that’s that’s the story of the Coddingley fairies 

Theresa: I adore them and I don’t think I ever would have thought to cover them so I love 

Angie: this I I don’t think that I would have originally thought to cover it and then it crossed my mind a few weeks ago and I was like you know what that would actually be a really fun like wholesome story not entirely unhinged but not um I guess that palette cleanser for for hard 

Theresa: episodes I guess yeah and you you have no idea when I’m going to do these things to you so that’s on unprepared well if you have enjoyed this incredible romp through history where we both defaulted to what we do best somebody did something wholesome somebody told about a spy um rate review subscribe and send this to somebody who just needs to hear this in their life today because I don’t know if you’ve looked outside but everything is on fire and yeah honestly do a couple of things for us if you can um rate review subscribe because we are a part of this we are on our own in this you know scheme of podcast and when you rate and review us you do this thing where you allow others to find us and it just helps the pod and it helps us do this we’ve been doing this gosh over three years now and we like doing it so helps help some girls out and on that note goodbye 

Theresa: bye