Corrections to the Anna Kingsford entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
The entry on Anna Kingsford (1846-1888) is based on her biography written by her co-worker Edward Maitland (1824-1897). In Red Cactus: the Life of Anna Kingsford I explain how Maitland turned against her and wrote many lies about her. My intention here is to correct the errors from Maitland that are continued in the Oxford DNB.
- Anna was not a spiritualist. A spiritualist is a person who contacts astral shells and other low level entities on the astral plane, directly or through mediums and séances. In 1882 Anna gave a lecture to the British National Association of Spiritualists, urging them to forsake the mere ghosts of the séance room and pursue a truly spiritual life. Maitland gave mixed messages about his own attitude to spiritualism. At times he criticised it, but he also recounts many visits he paid to mediums and séances. In her writings Anna makes no mention of any visits by her to séances or mediums. It is only Maitland’s unreliable word that says she did.
- Anna was a “sickly” child. Anna suffered from asthma all her life, but Maitland exaggerates her ill health. He did write that she had fainting episodes, but he didn’t say she had epilepsy. A person so ill as that painted by Maitland could not do a fraction of the things Anna accomplished.
- That Anna was Maitland’s “soulmate” is never stated by her, only by Maitland. He was obsessed with the fantasy of a “oneness” between them. Needless to say, Anna never mentioned this.
- Anna’s “ancestors” listed by Maitland have not been confirmed by anyone else. She claimed her spiritual insights came from her own spiritual development. There is no mention of inheriting them from an ancestor.
- She specifically stated she had no clairvoyant or occult talents. Her mystical insights were the result of her advanced spiritual state.
- That she came from the fairies is purely a Maitland assertion.
- Maitland claimed Anna was a number of women in past lives, including Anne Boleyn and Joan of Arc. Again, Anna does not make these claims in her own writings.
Maitland was fixated by past lives. He claimed that in past lives he was: Daniel, John the Evangelist, Marcus Aurelius, a mahatma in Tibet, Pico della Mirandola, and Emmanuel Swedenborg
- Anna had her first poem published at nine years of age.
- Anna’s husband, Algernon Kingsford, was not her cousin. Henry Bonus, one of her brothers, was married to Emily Kingsford, a cousin of Algernon’s father, the Rev Godfrey Kingsford. Algernon was a theology student when he married Anna.
- Florence Fenwick Miller, a friend of Anna, wrote in her unpublished autobiography that Anna told her she became a Roman Catholic to avoid the duties of a vicar’s wife. Anna was an unconventional woman: she even wrote some of her husband’s sermons!
- The claim Anna was tormented by life comes solely from Maitland.
- Anna was enrolled in the Paris Medical School 1874-1880, but also did recognised study in London. Her husband and Eadith her daughter sometimes accompanied her in France.
- In the light of Maitland’s unreliability, we have to question his claim that she suffered a stroke in France. Anna was always able to keep up a very busy schedule.
- A spirit visitation by Sir William Fergusson has all the hallmarks of a Maitland
invention. It is not mentioned by Anna.
- Maitland soured their relationship with the International Society because he published his pamphlet under the name of the committee of the Society, not under his own name.
- On invitation, Anna became president of the British Theosophical Society in 1883. She changed its name to the London Lodge (of the Society.) Due to her non acceptance of the Theosophical mahatmas or masters of Madam Blavatsky and Alfred Sinnett, friction arose between them. She was offered an Hermetic Lodge within the Society in April 1884, but this did not placate the opposition. Anna and Maitland then formed their own Hermetic Society outside Theosophy.
Anna Kingsford aged 11 with her mother (Courtesy of R.H. Bonus, Canada)
