Email from: Christopher Reiss
Sent: Tuesday, 25 March 2014
 
If anyone looks up the history of the Church of the Good Shepherd in Iping Marsh, the following is discovered- 'This tiny brick church was demolished after vandalism around 1977 or 1978' - no other explanation is given.
 
However, here is a different picture altogether:
 
In 1951, when I was 10, my recently retired father, the Rev. Horace Baggallay Reiss, died and was buried in the Iping Marsh churchyard. Shortly after his burial disciples of Aleister Crowley [1875-1947, Britain's chief satanist, one really nasty individual] held a ritualistic celebration at the Iping Marsh churchyard. They dug up graves and scattered bones, including my dad's.
 
My distraught mother was unable to cope, so my Uncle Dick [Richard Leopold Reiss] came down to sort things out for the family. He died in September, 1959. My best guess therefore, is that the churchyard and church were desecrated on 1 December 1957, the tenth anniversary of Crowley's death.
 
I have tried in vain to get any confirmation of these events, though a local churchwarden admitted to me and my wife in the late 1960s that the story was true. Officially, however, it did not take place. It seems it was decided by the police and the church authorities, that any publicity would be bad and likely to promote the group of satanists.