I have never met anyone who had a good word to say for [Trevor Hall]. I enclose a copy of the memorandum that proves conclusively that Hall obtained possession of the "Locked Book" by a disgraceful and outrageous trick, i.e. he stole it.
Mr. J.H.P. Pafford, M.A. D.Litt., F.L.A., F.S.A., was the University [of London] Librarian from 1945 to 1967. Previously he had been a major in the Army Education Corps where I first met him in 1944. He was a man of absolute integrity, profound scholarship, and unquestionable reliability.
Sidney Glanville, a sincere and dedicated psychical researcher, was devastated by the attack of the three members of the S.P.R. (Trevor Hall, Eric Dingwall, Mollie Goldney, The Haunting of Borley Rectory - A Critical Survey of the Evidence. ). The work he had put so much of his time and energy into and which he believed to be of great and lasting value, was now to be regarded as a futile waste of time, productive of nothing. This blow, falling on a man already in very bad health, made it impossible for him to think clearly, or to know to whom he could turn for help. He fell an easy prey to Hall's bulldog tactics and, unable to think clearly under Hall's insistent brow-beating, let him have the "Locked Book." Hall even forced him to write the pathetic inscription thereon.
Glanville and Price were very great friends. They worked together as a team. Glanville would undoubtedly have regarded the Locked Book as his contribution to the great Borley collection that Price was building up for permanent deposit in the Harry Price Library. There is not the slightest possibility that he would have wanted to keep it as his own. He would have been delighted to have given it place in the unique Borley collection. As Dr. Pafford says, [Glanville] actually asked "if he could borrow it."
Hall subsequently sold the L.B. to someone in the U.S.A. The bookseller at Folkstore was not prepared to give me the name of the purchaser. I suppose they were in their rights there.
This is the correct account of how Hall stole the L.B. from the H.P.L.
Poor Mr. Glanville died soon after the attack on Borley. I suspect he died of a broken heart. His family have certainly never forgiven the S.P.R. for what they did. I believe that Mrs. Goldney lived to regret her part in the so-called exposure.
I stayed several times with Hall at his house in Selby, York. I soon realized he was a man who would stop at absolutely nothing to get his own way. [He] is unreliable as a researcher and his savage attack on Harry Price is full of errors of fact and errors of judgement. He even claimed to be an M.A. of Cambridge, which he never was
Here is another dreadful story about that dreadful man. About [1979] Hall wrote to me saying he had contacted Mrs. Foyster and she would like the original MS of Fifteen Months in a Haunted House, which of course obviously belonged to her. Hall promised to send it to her, and I foolishly trusted him and let him have it. Of course he never sent it [to your mother] but sold it to [someone in ] America for £500. I have no doubt he bullied [your mother] into letting him keep the MS. What a rat!
[At one time I saw] a copy of the book-sellers catalogue with these two items, but it did not divulge the name of the American buyer.
I can assure you that [Hall] behaved far worse than Marianne. Hall made himself an expert in what American's call "trash biography." That is to say, you throw all the mud you can find and then hope that some of it will stick. Hall was a bad researcher, always twisting facts to suit his theories. His savage attack on Price called Search for Harry Price, should really be called The Hounding of Harry Price. It is full of venomous half-truths an insinuations. The critics saw through it. One said, "The author leaves no stone unturned that might reveal a dirty secret." In brief, it is the case for the prosecution presented with all the skill and cunning of a devious and crooked attorney.
He was very good at obtaining facts, or rather getting other people to obtain facts for him, but his inferences were nearly always totally wrong. For example, he found some books in the H.P.L. which contained the bookplate of the Society for Psychical Research. He then concluded that Price had stolen them and hence branded him as a thief. Quite wrong. At one time, the H.P.L. and the library of the S.P.R. shared the same building and books sometimes got back onto the wrong shelves. The S.P.R. knew this, and when I offered to return the books (only about five) they said, "No. You might as well keep them. They are not very important and might be more useful to you rather than to us." Hall always tried to draw conclusions which would be damaging to the character of the person involved. In short, he was the greatest mud-slinger of all time. You will, of course be furious with Hall [for his attack on your mother] just as I was when he wrote that savage and entirely inaccurate book about Price. I had to part with him then, just as [co-author Eric] Dingwall did. I sold all the books he gave me in disgust.
I don't know why [he] behaved so badly. He was a supreme egotist, inflated to the breaking point with self-importance and a determination to get his name and exploits at all costs before the public. An American collector of conjuring books summed him up in 1993 saying, "Trevor Hall had two reputations: one as a scholar, the other as a scoundrel." Hall never met Marianne nor Price. He attacked them out of vicious malice hoping to further his own glory. As soon as they found out his real nature, his friends left him at once and he died a lonely and unhappy old man.
* Trevor Hall would not have left any papers, notes, or MSS which might incriminate him. I am certain everything would have been destroyed. There is no Hall material in the Harry Price Library. The file drawer outside contains only Dr. Dingwall's material and index cards.
* The Trevor Hall who writes about the royals is not a relative.
* [Researchers] can read as much of Hall's books and articles as can be found together with all the reviews of these books, especially those written for the Times Literary Supplement, and for the better class of daily papers, e.g. Daily Telegraph, Observer, Independant, etc. Reviews of Hall's Search for Harry Price are of great importance.
* Secondly, [the researcher] must try to find and communicate with as many people as possible who had dealings with Hall and may have formed an opinion about him. This will be difficult, but an open letter to the editor of the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research might elicit some information.
* My own views on Hall can be found by scanning the pages of the BORLEY GHOST SOCIETY newsletters, [or other pages on www.borleyrectory.com]. I know Peter Underwood has very strong views on Hall.
* There are no illustrations of any kind in Foyster's Fifteen Months. This is just another of Hall's inaccuracies, as for example his false claims to be an MA of Cambridge University.
* Apart from his entry in Who Was Who, there is, as far as I know, no bibliography of Hall's work, and no-one has commenced such an undertaking [other than Harry Brown].
* Dingwall and Hall were on friendly terms for about 20 years. After Hall's shameful attack on Price in Search for Harry Price, Dingwall was furious and never spoke to Hall again.
* Hal's exposure from The Spiritualists caused great distress and anger among the Spiritualist fraternity, of whom Cooke was a father figure. I don't think it caused ill feelings on the part of Dingwall and Mrs. Goldney. They did not care much for Hall and wrote about it to the Journal of the S.P.R.
* I am sure Hall was a genuine Justice of the Peace, and sat on the bench in some magistrate's court. He could not have wrongly used the title without being found out.
* He was awarded the degrees of M.A. and Ph.D. at the University of Leeds. He tried for a D. Litt at the same university but failed the exam. He told me that Dingwall was one of the examiners and was largely responsible for his failing to get the degree. I don't have any way of finding out if this is true, but if Dingall did have the chance, he would certainly have made every effort to achieve this end since he had now come to dislike Hall very much, chiefly as a result of Hall's vicious attack on Price.