Local Dowsing Group News:  No. 68
Local Dowsing Groups :
Corrections & updates to No 67

If you would like a copy of the map of the location of Local Dowsing Groups, please email Info@CedJackson.org

We would appreciate information which brings this map and contact information up to date.

Cardiff Dowsers
Flag 2 : cardiffdowsers.com ( Cardiff Holistic and Dowsing Group )
Contact : grace.edgar@hotmail.com : Telephone 02920 521574
Updated : 5.5.2021


International Association of Health Dowsers
Not shown on map :
Contact : Jane Court : healthdowsers@fastmail.fm
Updated : 3.4.2015

London Dowsers
Flag 12 : LondonDowsers.org (meets Mile End)
Contact : j.baker864@btinternet.com
Updated : 1.5.2021

Flag 13 : (Meets Richmond)
Contact : Sandy Lawrence : reilawsana@virginmedia.com
Updated : 1.5.2021


Slimbridge Dowsing Group
Flag 17 : Slimbridgedowsers.org.uk
Contact : Paul Syrett : paul.syrett@icloud.com
Updated : 15.7.2018


South Herefordshire Dowsers
Flag 19 : shd.btck.co.uk
Contact : David Excell : tdexell@btinternet.com
Updated : 3.4.2015


Thames Valley Dowsers
Flag 22 : ThamesValleyDowers.org.uk
Contact : Sue Scott Powell : chair@thamesvalleydowsers.org.uk
Updated : 3.4.2015


Waverley Dowsers
Flag 25 : Waverleydowsers.co.uk
Contact : geoff@geoffmitchell.co.uk
Updated : 4.5.2021 :
Meets : Unitarian Hall, Godalming, every second Friday, except August

New Group - Mid Wales Dowsers

Mid Wales Dowsers is a new group being set up by Mike Mason (musician and artist) near Rhayader.

The group is initially for beginners to take their first steps into dowsing.

This is a callout to any practising dowsers in the area to make contact, as the new group will hold its first meeting in the historic Welsh Longhouse, Nannerth Ganol, which was built in 1555. The site backs onto The Elan Valley and Aberystwyth Mountain Rd, an area that has many interesting ancient sites.

Mike Mason aims to make serious research in the practice of dowsing and had experience as a child of the work of Herbert Weaver who wrote the book “Divining The Primary Sense”. He is now forming a new local group of like minded open hearted people who want to learn about dowsing and a date for the first meet-up will be announced when enough new members and tutors can be brought together.
 
Please contact Mike if you are interested and can help him out in anyway.
 

The editor regrets the absence of photos in this edition, especially the wondrous snap of Mike's cottage, due to an incompatibility twixt some photo formats.
Letters to the Editor
The problem in our subject is that, as I have mentioned before, “nobody is wrong”, but we can’t also say we are right either (since “nobody knows”!). So I prefer to describe my writing as pictures which contain truths, but also an artistic license. E.g. the “cottage” in this view is correct (as a snap-shot can be), but the sea was a lot further away and the characters and artefacts were placed for artistic composition rather than a truly observed incidence.  Meaning that, a picture is both white-truth and white-lies, but in essence gives off or imparts a truthful flavour of a meaning, as far as any individual can understand it. Ultimately it is the viewer who has to stitch it all together and make useful sense from it, i.e. do the hard work!
 
My game is to rationalise the un-rationalise-able. This is, of course, a paradox, but my feeling is that “it’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it” and I’m probably not alone in this.  I’m working on a piece for the BSD Magazine that tries to explain what this “picturing” is about; using common experience examples from the World around our ordinary lives.
 
All knowledge is available, without the restrictions of time and space, but just how much of that can we actually understand? There is the stuff that just passes us by to the extent that we don’t or hardly recognise it, then there is the stuff that we know exists in some form, but we are not party to that, so we can’t take an interest… apart from what I might describe as “the big-picture”. Then there is the stuff which we understand a little, and would like to get involved in, if it ever tickles our agenda. Finally there is stuff which we know about and can comment on, because of our experiences, but deep down we get that feeling that the more we find out; the more we know that we don’t know!
 
I’ve been in electronics for 60 years and I can safely say that the subject has stayed many years ahead of me throughout.  I can read about new innovations and theories, but I’ve stopped chasing them since that is someone else’s job now. If the **** hits the fan and we had to rebuild our World then I could re-invent the valve ok, but with the transistor… I could only point at possibilities.
 
Yet when it comes to Dowsing I’m back to being a kid again and am raring to learn and show.  In fact I’m now learning to channel my knowledge based on what Spirit is feeding me to mention.  Everything becomes a “picture” as I don’t intend to be dogmatic.  Once we have the ability to ask just simple yes-no questions then we do not need to be pedantically correct; as long as Spirit agrees that the picture presented is adequate for the now. It is us, individually, that has to create the concepts that Spirit can agree or disagree with. No hard work in = no results out!
 
Now, if I care to, I can dowse for “energies” and “entities” on the Moon, but for what practical reason should I seek to do such? Especially when much of the dowsing on Earth results in the same frustration?  Can I point out where the best place to build the first Cathedral on the Moon should be located… to “achieve the best effects?"  Excellently weird… what do we expect?
 
Essentially “access to all knowledge” is still the “elephant in the room” that keeps the “unsure”, quiet.  How do we get across that “everything is correct” if it does actually achieve the manifested results? In fact, it is because of this, that the subject remains in confusion.  Once you get beyond this you are led to a fundamental fact; that is so astounding, that it cannot be mentioned.  The main reason for this is that it is too simple to be understood and, if announced, would be ignored anyway! Hey-ho; the suspension of disbelief continues to struggle!  In essence I’m conscious of what I’m writing, but sometimes I’m also conscious that I’m writing for and to “someone else” as well.  
 
BTW… I think that Covid has done us some good since I can’t think of any other way we would be invited to commune together and share experiences like our Groups are currently doing on Zoom.  I note that there is still a lot of reticence to speak up, and be provocative, but no surprise; for a subject that has no known mechanism in scientific terms?
 
All good fun!  

Geoff at Waverley  
Geoff@geoffcmitchell.co.uk
 
Take a Leek -
The Three Dimensionality of Energy Lines

We often see energy lines, in books, drawn in ‘plan’ view. It’s definitely easier to depict them in 2D rather than 3D, but in my limited experience they are definitely 3 dimensional.

The 3D aspect explains why they are dowsed to be an odd number of lines as there is one central line and concentric bands, around that central line; so in section view there will always be an odd number! Billy Gawn described them as ‘mirror images’ (i)  – indeed they are, as I believe that they are actually the other side of the same concentric ring, around the central line – think of the various layers that make a leek? I’d be interested to hear what other Dowsers think/ have found… lindafentum@gmail.com

(i) Beyond The Far Horizon p 147 - 8
ground level...

Longtown : A long story

Carly Tinkler BA CMLI FRSA MIALE
May 2021

This article is in two parts. It’s about a project I’m currently working on, but there are still many unanswered questions, so if any dowsers, historians or interested others reading it think they can help, please let me know!

Related photos can be obtained by writing to Info@CedJackson.org

Part 1.

I do love my job! I specialise in landscape planning. People ask me for advice about whether a development would be appropriate in a certain location, in terms of the effects it would have on the landscape and peoples’ experiences of that landscape. The work involves carrying out landscape character and visual assessments, with half the time (when the weather’s dry) spent outdoors taking photos, writing notes and talking to people, and the other half (when it’s wet) spent in the office doing desktop research, analysis, and writing up the findings (fortunately I enjoy writing - some of the reports are over 100,000 words long…).

Often, the assessments are used to inform and guide the siting and design of proposed developments, to ensure they respect and integrate as best they can into their surroundings, taking cues and clues directly from them. 
“Landscape” and “landscape character” are complex but fascinating subjects. In a nutshell, landscape is a combination of natural factors (eg geology, hydrology, land cover); sociocultural factors (eg time-depth, settlement, land use); and aesthetic and perceptual qualities (visual eg colour and texture, and sensory eg sounds, smells and memories). Landscape character is derived from the combination of elements, features and qualities that are present in a particular place. Landscape architects have to learn ‘the language of landscape’.

The assessment process involves asking and answering a lot of questions. What is there? How important is what is there, and to whom? Why? Who sees it? How would development affect what is there and those who see it?

My favourite part is finding out what’s there, because it involves proper detective work, and you never know what you’re going to find.
Earlier this year I was commissioned to advise on proposals for a community-based project in Longtown, a small village on the south-western edges of Herefordshire. The Wales - England border and eastern boundary of the Brecon Beacons National Park lie about 2km west of the village, following the line of Offa’s Dyke (now a National Trail). The Dyke runs along the top of Hatterrall Ridge, a dramatic landform which rises abruptly out of the lowlands to form the eastern edge of the Black Mountains. The scenery is absolutely stunning.

PHOTO 1 goes here. Hatterrall Ridge looking north west along approach from east

Longtown is of historic significance, boasting the remains of a Norman motte and bailey castle and an associated medieval settlement, both of which are now designated Scheduled Monuments. I had visited the area a few years ago, but was looking forward to getting to know it more intimately. I always approach assessments as though I’m going to interview an eminent personality - first, I do my homework to find out as much about them as I can. For me, judgements based solely on ‘first sight’ and ‘looks’ aren’t as insightful as those based on good knowledge of the person’s character, and particularly, their past.

PHOTO 2: Longtown Castle

I began by reading up on the castle’s history. Why on earth would you build a castle there? I wondered. It’s not in a dominant or prominent position, and the area is remote. There was a rumour it had been built on the site of a Roman fort (noted as such on late 19th century maps), but until fairly recently, no firm evidence had been found to back it up. Then, I found information - indeed, evidence - which indicated that not only was the rumour correct, but also, that there could have been an Iron Age or even earlier settlement of some type on the site. 

I realised I would have to go much further back in time than anticipated, and slowly work my way forwards, picking up whatever clues I could find along the way. I had such a strong feeling there was an interesting story to be told.

What a journey it was! In fact, I’m still on it, although things are much clearer now.

In order to understand why Longtown is where it is, one has to imagine what is now south-western Herefordshire, but as it was 12,000 years ago at the end of the last Ice Age, when slowly-rising temperatures caused the vast ice sheets to the north - which by then had reached as far as the Severn Estuary - to station for a while, then melt and retreat.

Having said that, I did look at the situation as it was before the last Ice Age, and discovered that there is evidence of pre-modern human activity in this area dating from at least 60,000 years ago. Creatures such as woolly rhinos and mammoths would also have been roaming these landscapes. Sporadic activity continued for over 20,000 years until the onset of successive ice ages which precluded use or habitation. Finds at King Arthur’s Cave near The Doward Hill, Whitchurch (26km south east of Longtown) date from the Upper Palaeolithic period (around 36,000 years ago).

Perhaps 20,000 years or so after that, human activity resumed, although another cold spell meant there was little or no habitation in the region until around 10,000 years ago, when warmer conditions prevailed. The last woolly mammoth had died around 1,000 years previously.

The ice meltwater left lower-lying areas flooded, but as time went by, marshes and bogs developed. Over the next 3000 - 4000 years, the landscapes settled and began to develop the characteristics with which we are familiar today. There is evidence that human impact on the landscape increased from relatively minor woodland and soil intervention during the early part of the Mesolithic to more widespread woodland and soil management and settlement towards the end.

Here as is often the case in other parts of the country, the vast majority of early occupied sites (and those used for worship / burial / defence) are on higher ground. According to some sources, an elevation of just over c. 120m AOD, ie well above the then water level, may be significant in terms of having influenced early settlement locations. However, nearby lakes and marshes would have offered good opportunities for hunting, grazing, and resources such as reeds.

A significant extant landscape feature dating from the Neolithic period is ‘Arthur's Stone’, a chamber tomb which lies on an elevated ridge above Dorstone in the Golden Valley, 14km due north of Longtown. It was built at some point between c. 5,700 and c. 4,700 years ago, and is believed to be Herefordshire's oldest man-made structure. According to historian Keith Ray, it is ‘a member of a distinctive group of early Neolithic long-cairns whose distribution stretches around the northern flanks of the Black Mountains’. The ‘ancestral halls’ were found to be identical to those at a similar feature at Gwernvale near Crickhowell, and were thus ‘an integral part of the earliest fully Neolithic cultural development of the whole region’. It seems likely that there are other extant features dating from this period yet to be discovered.

PHOTO 3: Arthur’s Stone, Dorstone


Early farmers began clearing established woodlands for hunting, settlement, keeping animals and growing crops, and using felled timber to build permanent structures and enclosures (some of England’s hedgerows date from this time). Evidence suggests that during the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, and possibly into the Iron Age, the valleys and ridges east of the Black Mountains were the most densely-populated part of what is now Herefordshire.    

The Mountains dominate the landscapes to the east, looming and ever-present except when hidden by cloud or in the dark. Even then, one can sense them, as they affect local weather patterns, influencing where and how the wind blows, and how much rain falls. In the Longtown area, Hatterrall Ridge forms the eastern edge of the Mountains. Its vertiginous upper slopes are a formidable barrier, physically and visually (sometimes culturally too) - no public roads cross them. However, the experience that is gained on reaching the ridgeline is well worth the effort

PHOTO 4: Hatterrall Ridge at The Darens

The Ridge comprises a series of plateaux and summits running north from Hatterrall Hill; Offa’s Dyke and the Wales - England border run along it. There are exceptional views in all directions, especially westwards towards the Brecon Beacons. Iconic Ysgyrid Fawr (The Skirrid) is visible 11km south / south east of Longtown. The Ridge is intervisible with the Malvern Hills to the east, and with the Shropshire Hills to the north; in clear weather, Snowdonia’s mountain peaks are just visible. The mountains are vast, dramatic, ancient, rugged, rough, open, exposed, bleak, and challenging, with elemental beauty that excites the senses.

Early travellers and settlers must have been drawn to Hatterrall Hill and Ridge for these reasons, and chose them as the location for sites of significance, for example ceremony and burial. There are standing stones which may date from the late Neolithic, and several Early and Middle Bronze Age features some of which (in Wales) are Scheduled Monuments. They include cairns, earthwork / stone-built enclosures, and a cross ridge dyke. 
Throughout the Bronze Age, long-distance networks were established along which goods and trades were exchanged. People were travelling further north, wherever possible following land lying higher than the marshes but below exposed and inhospitable ridges and peaks. River-crossings were established where stepping-stones could be placed / rough bridges built - many of the crossing points are still used today. And, northbound travellers returned, often having identified sources of important commodities such as salt. Soon, a network of well-used routeways developed in the Longtown area, usually aligned north - south as dictated by the area’s geology / topography.

And thus, it seems quite likely that Longtown was found to be a naturally good place at which to pause en route, and ultimately, to settle. It was above the wetlands but below the top of Hatterrall Ridge. Access to abundant fresh water is known to have been a factor in the siting of early settlements: the slopes of Hatterrall Ridge are peppered with springs. Other factors would have been a wide variety of habitats available for foraging, hunting and building (marshes / open grassland / dense woodland); fertile soils; sheltered valleys; and good visibility from the prominent hills which now characterised the lowlands (perhaps drumlins?). All would have been readily available here. The ceremonial / burial sites on Hatterrall Ridge may already have been established, another reason to settle in this place; or, they were chosen and created by the new communities.

Could the first settlement in Longtown be on the site of what is now Longtown Castle? I wondered. There is a documented well and/or spring there. Or, could it have been a little further north, at what is now a small cluster of houses at Pen-pwll-sond, also with a nearby spring? The Historic Environment Record (HER) lists a possible medieval ‘holy’ well in the vicinity, saying, ‘The name may mean that it was the site of a Dark Age holy well, as found in parts of Wales and Ireland. The Welsh name for the group of houses nearby is Pen-pwll-sond, meaning the head or end of a sacred pool’. Notably, several probably ancient routes converge there, one being the road which now runs through Longtown, and which could possibly be along a salt way between Nantwich and Abergavenny. 

According to Alfred Watkins (famous for his book The Old Straight Track and the concept of ley lines), in a lecture to the Woolhope Naturalists’ Field Club in 1921 (about early British trackways), saltways ran along ley lines, and ‘The salt ley for Hereford came from Droitwich through the White House, Suckley… [and] Hogg’s Mount, Hereford, and on to its terminal on Mynydd Ferddin Hill through Whitfield Mansion’ (NB the Wyche Cutting through the Malvern Hills is also supposed to have been the - or a - Droitwich saltway route).  

Mynydd Ferddin is an elongated rounded hill which dominates the landscape south west of Longtown village, and it occupies a significant part of Longtown parish. It has an extraordinary, very solid, brooding presence, and although there don’t appear to be any records of features of historic interest on the hill, I do feel there must have been something there once, looking down over Longtown and up towards the sacred sites on Hatterrall Ridge. Perhaps dowsers can enlighten me!

PHOTO 6: Mynydd Ferddin 

In fact, Watkins’ lecture notes mention several features associated with ley lines in and around Longtown (the very mention of ley lines and sighting notches causes the project archaeologists to splutter loudly!!). They include causeways across rivers and eight ‘sighting notches’ (used for long-distance orientation) cut into the mountain ridges between Longtown and Llanvihangel Crucorney (including at Black Darren, above which are the cairns and enclosures). I have identified two possible candidates so far. 

PHOTO 7: Possible sighting-notches on Hatterrall Ridge

As the Bronze Age transitioned into the Iron Age, some 2,800 years ago, hillforts became a common feature in the area’s landscapes - there are at least eight known sites within 10km of Longtown village, and no doubt many more yet to be identified (dowsers / historians?!). 

The main criteria for their location appear to be high elevation and prominence, although proximity to productive lowland landscapes may have been a factor. Also, intervisibility with other hillforts could have been important in certain cases, and some hillforts may have been constructed on sites created / used by Bronze Age / earlier communities. However, for some reason which appears to be as yet unknown (more questions…), a few hillforts in the region appear to have been abruptly abandoned at some point not long before 100 BCE.

The warmer and drier conditions of the Bronze Age gave way to a cooler and wetter climate. Large swathes of the open grasslands and wetlands were probably retained for grazing, hunting and foraging, but woodland regeneration may have been encouraged, along with hedgerow planting. There were fewer unenclosed settlements and a transition to enclosed farmland, the layout of which appears to have been carefully considered by the landowner. There are no known Iron Age cemeteries in Herefordshire (in fact, only a few in the country), although ritualised burials took place; it is possible that existing burial sites continued to be used, or waterbodies.

In the Black Mountains area, long sections of trackway have been discovered with stone surfacing dating from this period. Some tracks would already have become the holloways which are now highly characteristic of Longtown and the lower slopes of Hatterrall Ridge. It is possible that some followed Bronze Age processional routes, saltways, or visual / other links between important sites and features; many of the tracks are now lanes and roads.

PHOTO 8: Holloway on slopes of Hatterrall Ridge

In the second half of the first century CE, what is now Herefordshire became part of the Roman province of Britannia. A fort at Abbey Dore in the Golden Valley was probably built and occupied at some point before 85 CE; the Romans arrived in Wales in c. 75 CE. Once the violence of invasion had subsided, a ‘relatively peaceful’ ‘Romano-British’ period began. However, the area which was later called the Marches became the base from which the Romans sought to control the Welsh tribes which were rising in the west.

There have been very few Roman finds in the Longtown area to date; however, according to a recent report, Roman remains were found during the building of Longtown School in 1869. Furthermore, the report sets out the findings of a survey carried out during 2016-17 which confirmed a long-held but unevidenced view that a Roman auxiliary fort had been built on the site of what is now Longtown Castle. That led me to the HER entry for the castle (SMR 1036), which states: ‘A pre Roman date from a charcoal sample recovered from immediately above the natural (along with the recovery of a flint blade and two flint flakes) suggests that there may have been an Iron Age or earlier settlement of some type on the site’ (my emphasis).

At last, the reasons for the Normans building a castle at Longtown were becoming clearer…. 

PHOTO 9: Longtown Castle viewed from Mynydd Ferddin looking west

TO BE CONTINUED….


Spirituality Special Interest Group
From Dragons to Revelation
A talk by Chris Tonge

A big thank you to Chris Tonge for his personal insights into his own spiritual and dowsing journey. 

Chris talked about the local energetic framework and significant 'dragon' or 'emperor' lines that he and local dowsers had experienced moving and oscillating in the landscape, as if searching for the best earthing/anchoring points. 

This progressed into exploring a recently energetically refocused healing sanctuary at Langho where Gary Biltcliffe, Caroline Hoare and Adrian Incledon Webber have been working with Tony Clarkson to create the most harmonious environment for healing.   Thank you to Mave Calvert for sharing her own experiences of some of the energies that she has encountered whilst working on this dowsing project. 

Next time…
Sue Watts-Cutler will be giving us a virtual tour of Hereford Cathedral Garden on Wednesday June 2nd at 10.00. 

Hereford Cathedral’s gardens lie mostly hidden from view beside the River Wye, upon one of the earliest occupied areas of the city, adjacent to an ancient hill guarding two strategic ford crossings. This area has been inhabited for well over 2,000 years and has many layers to it. Today it's
mediaeval period has left the biggest visible legacy. 

 This ‘virtual tour‘ will provide some insight into the life of the clergy and the workings of the mediaeval Catholic Church along with legends, saints, healing shrines, colourful ecclesiastical characters, murders and plotting..... oh, and we will also look at some very lovely plants and trees! 
Sue Watts-Cutler is an experienced horticulturist who now works voluntarily as a tour guide to the Cathedral and its gardens. 

Please join us
Kate is happy to welcome you to the SSIG. We meet on the first Wednesday of the month during the day. For further details please get in touch kate.tudorhall@gmail.com

American Society of Dowsers
Join with the wider Dowsing Community at the virtual ASD convention. Expand your dowsing knowledge and experiences. 35 speakers and workshops. (You can pay with paypal.) Annual Convention & Metaphysical Virtual Expo, RIDING THE CREST OF CHANGE , June 9-13, 2021

Sandy McKenzie (ASD Speaker committee and Sussex Dowsers Chairman) 
ASD : www.Dowsers.org


The public understanding of dowsing
 
The website:
 
... has been expanded somewhat, focussing on content retrieved from the journal of the British Society of Dowsers (BSD).
 
Amongst other items, it now includes the following additional content:

  • Some early editions of the BSD journals,

  • Several YouTube videos, in which printed articles have been brought back to life using text to speech conversion.

  • A dowsing related blog, in which a selected article from the journal is focussed on in each post.
 
The site is intended to help improve the public's understanding of dowsing, using the many published accounts of dowsing practice and experiences by BSD members over the years. It may also be of interest to dowsers themselves. The work is ongoing, but updates are not always as continuous as the author would like, so some patience is necessary


Book Review
Heal your Home 2
by Adrian Incledon-Webber

In his first book on house healing - ‘Heal Your Home’ - dowser and
healer Adrian Incledon-Webber introduced his very workable system for diagnosing and treating various sources of detrimental energies and geopathic stress inside the home or workplace, plus laying out
effective methods of rectifying each issue.

In this long awaited follow-on volume, ‘Heal Your Home II’, that
the same structured, easy to follow ‘workbook’ style can be found
again as he adds to, and updates, various sources of energetic stress,
listing over fifty of them and adding very readable accounts of his own
personal case studies to illustrate some of the points he makes.

Since dowsing is used to diagnose problems, the book also
gives important dowsers’ lists of the questions needed to arrive
speedily at the root causes. A complimentary free workbook is
also available to download to purchasers of this book.

What does become clear is that underground earth and water
generated geopathic stress is but one aspect of the modern sick
home. This book thus also looks at other sources of imbalance which
may involve the occupants themselves, plus man made technopathic
stress resulting from items such as ‘smart’ technology, mobile
phones and wifi.

This second volume has also gone further than its predecessor in
examining some of the more esoteric (but equally important) aspects
of house healing, such as rescuing earthbound spirits, dealing with
off-world beings, and spirit attachments to the home’s occupants.

Although it does offer sound procedures for protection protocols in
this type of healing work and refers novice dowsers to online dowsing tuition, Heal Your Home II is not really a stand-alone work.

It will thus probably appeal most to the competent dowser with some previous experience of Adrian Incledon-Webber’s house healing
methods as a valuable extension of ‘Heal Your Home’.

Sue Watts-Cutler

Heal Your Home 2 is published by Dowsing Spirits and is available
from www.dowsingspirits.co.uk as well as from standard online sources.