Victor Henry Anderson


Victor Henry Anderson was an American priest and poet. He was co-founder of the Feri Tradition, a modern Pagan new religious movement established in California during the 1960s. Much of his poetry was religious in nature, being devoted to Feri deities.
Born in Clayton, New Mexico, to a working-class family, Anderson was left visually impaired during childhood. His family regularly moved around within the United States during his early years, with Anderson claiming that encounters with Mexican, Hawaiian, and Haitian migrants led to him gaining an early understanding of these various cultures' magical practices. The family eventually settled in Oregon, and Anderson later claimed that it was here that he was initiated into a tradition of witchcraft by an African woman. He later claimed that, in 1932, he joined a magico-religious group known as the Harpy Coven which was based in Ashland and which dissolved in the 1940s. According to his description, the group was devoted to a god and goddess, Setan and Lilith, and were influenced by both American folk magic and Huna.
In 1944, he married Cora Cremeans in Bend, Oregon, and, inspired by the writings of English Wiccan Gerald Gardner, they founded the Mahaelani Coven, gaining followers of what became known as the Feri tradition. One of their first initiates was Gwydion Pendderwen, who was a significant influence on the development of the tradition, and who introduced elements from Alexandrian Wicca in to it. Anderson was a professional accordion player and wrote poetry for various American Pagan magazines. In 1970, he published his first book of poetry, Thorns of the Blood Rose, which contained devotional religious poetry dedicated to the Goddess; it won the Clover International Poetry Competition Award in 1975. Anderson continued to promote the Feri tradition until his death, at which point April Niino was appointed as the new Grandmaster of the tradition.

Early life

Childhood: 1917–1931

Anderson was born on May 21, 1917, at the Buffalo Horn Ranch in Clayton, New Mexico. His parents were Hilbart Alexander Anderson and Mary Frances Anderson. Regarding his ethnic ancestry, he later stated that "I am mostly Irish and Spanish with some Native American, including Polynesian". He also claimed that his maternal great-grandmother had been one of the Blue Fugates, a community living in Appalachia whose skin had a blueish coloration due to methemoglobinemia. Anderson became almost completely blind when he was two years old, either because of an accident or untreated diabetes. By 1920, the family were living in Burkburnett, Wichita County, Texas, where a sister, Elsie Glenan Anderson, was born in February. Here, Hilbart worked as a floor worker on some of the many oil rigs in the town. From there they moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico, where they were recorded as living in the 1923-24 directory, and where Anderson later claimed that he had made many friends among Mexican migrant children. Anderson's later wife claimed that he was also instructed in how to use his etheric vision by "Mexican Witches" during childhood. The family next moved to Olustee, Oklahoma, where Hilbart's brother resided.
After several months in Oklahoma they proceeded to the area around Ashland, Oregon, where Anderson claimed to have befriended Hawaiian and Haitian migrant families who were working as fruit pickers. Anderson often claimed that he had been instructed in the magical practices of Hawaiian Kahuna and Haitian Vodou, with his later wife referring to him as both "one of the last Kahuna" and "a priest of Voudou". He claimed to have been instructed in Vodou by Haitians who were working in southern Oregon. While living in that state he attended a school for the blind, although despite this was largely self-educated. The family moved around the state in the coming years; in August 1928 they were living in Pinehurst, where Hilbert was recorded as working as an engineer at a lumber mill in the 1930 census. By the 1940 census, the family were recorded as living in East Phoenix, Jackson county, Oregon, with Higbert adding that he had also been living there in 1935. At this point, Hilbert was working as a millwright and Mary as a trained nurse. In 1942 they were recorded as living in Ashland, and it was here that they attended the First Baptist Church, before relocating to Bend prior to 1944.
Anderson claimed to be initiated into a tradition of witchcraft in 1926 by a woman "of the Fairy race", whom he elsewhere referred to as "a priestess from Africa".
Anderson informed the journalist Margot Adler that when he was nine years old he encountered a small old woman sitting in the centre of a circle containing brass bowls of herbs. He alleged that he instinctively stripped naked and that she then sexually initiated him into a witchcraft tradition, during which he had a vision of a goddess and a horned god. After the vision, he claimed that they sat in the circle and she instructed him in the magical use of the various herbs, after which he was washed in butter, oil, and salt, before putting his clothes on and returning home. The Pagan studies scholar Ethan Doyle White described this as being "difficult to accept as a literal account", but suggested that Anderson may have undergone a significant spiritual experience with an older woman in 1926, which was subsequently "embellished into the later tale" that he told Adler. A woman who knew Anderson, Cornelia Benavidez, later stated that "He says that he became friends with a woman in the circus who was a fire dancer and when she got older worked the stands. She somehow joined the circus in South Africa and made her way to the US. When he first met her she was 60 years old and he was a nine-year-old boy. He knew her for 15 years". Researcher William Wallworth provided potential supporting evidence for this claim when he noted that a number of the circuses that performed in Oregon during the 1920s and 1930s had Africans in their travelling retinues.

The Harpy Coven: 1932–1943

Anderson claimed that in 1932 he was initiated into a witchcraft group in Ashland that he called the Harpy Coven, although remains the only source testifying to the group's existence. Research into the coven was later conducted by Valerie Voigt, the coordinator of the Pagan, Occult, and Witchcraft Special Interest Group of the United States branch of Mensa, who was also one of Anderson's students and who asked him about the group. According to her claims, the group were led by two figures, known as Maybelle "Cardea" Warren and Jerome Warren, with other members being Jim Murdoch, Patricia Fern, Tom C., and Ruth D., the latter of whom was a preacher's wife. As related by Voigt, most of them had been immigrants from the Southern states, mainly from Alabama.
According to Voigt, the coven placed an emphasis on practical magic rather than worship, theology, ethics, or ritual, and were eclectic in their practices, mixing Huna with forms of American folk magic. She noted that they did not worship a goddess but held to a belief in a god who was opposed to the God of Christianity. Moreover, she claimed that they met together for both outdoor and indoor meetings, according to the phases of the moon. According to Voigt's account, Anderson also claimed that on occasion, the coven used a naked woman as their altar, and that the group disbanded after World War II broke out.
After the Pagan studies scholar Aidan A. Kelly published a summary of Voigt's research, Anderson released an open letter dated to August 21, 1991, refuting many of Kelly's claims and referring to it as "the stupid drivel of those who have only a shallow grasp of their alleged research." He stated that contrary to Kelly's assertions, the Harpy Coven had worshiped a goddess, who was known as Lilith, and that "we did not think of her as merely the Goddess, but as God Herself".
He added that the coven also venerated a consort of the Goddess, who was known as Setan, but "although the Goddess tells us that away from the sweet influence of her love, he is the most terrible of all spirits, he is not the fallen angel or 'Satan' of Christianity or Islam". Kelly later stated that the Harpy Coven might "have been self-trained or may have descended from an earlier person or group".

Later life: 1944–2001

Anderson met Cora Ann Cremeans in Bend, Oregon, in 1944; they married three days later, on May 3, claiming that they had encountered each other before in the astral realm. Born in Nyota, Alabama, in January 1915, Cora had been exposed to folk magical practices from childhood; reputedly, her Irish grandfather was a "root doctor" who was known among locals as the "druid". The Andersons claimed that one of their first acts after their marriage was the erection of an altar. The following year, a son was born, and they named him Victor Elon, with the latter being the Hebrew word for oak; Cora claimed that she had received the name in a dream. After the birth, a ritual was held to dedicate the infant to the Goddess. In 1948, the family moved to Niles, California, later that year purchasing a home in San Leandro. There, Anderson became a member of the Alameda Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Eagles, and he subsequently remained so for forty years. Victor earned his living as a musician, playing the accordion at events, while Cora worked as a hospital cook. It has been claimed that Anderson could speak Hawaiian, Spanish, Creole, Greek, Italian, and Gothic.
In the mid-1950s Victor and Cora read Witchcraft Today, a 1954 book by English Wiccan Gerald Gardner, with Cora claiming that Victor corresponded with Gardner for a time. The Pagan studies scholar Chas S. Clifton has suggested that the Andersons used Gardner's work as a "style guide" for the development of their own tradition of modern Pagan witchcraft. Similarly, Kelly stated that the Andersons' tradition "began to more and more resemble that of the Gardnerians" as the couple learned more about the latter, adopting elements from it.
Anderson was in correspondence with the Italian-American Wiccan Leo Martello, who encouraged Anderson to found his own coven. Circa 1960, the Andersons founded a coven, naming it Mahaelani, after the Hawaiian word for the full moon. Throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Andersons initiated a number of individuals into the coven. One of these was Gwydion Pendderwen, a friend of their son who shared their interest in the esoteric. Pendderwen contributed to the development of what came to be known as the Feri tradition, with some members of the lineage viewing him as its co-founder. Pendderwen noted that he had first met the family when, aged thirteen, he got into a fight with Victor Elon, although the two later became friends. Pendderwen was particularly influenced by Welsh mythology, and on a visit to Britain he spent time with the Alexandrian Wiccans Alex Sanders and Stewart Farrar, subsequently introducing various Alexandrian elements into Feri Wicca. In the early 1970s, the Andersons established a new coven with Pendderwen and his initiate, Alison Harlow. After Pendderwen married, his wife also joined this coven, although it disbanded in 1974.