The_Info_Web/10 - PEOPLE/(H-M)/Sybil Leek.md

aliases	created	updated	category	tags	summary	born	died	location	relations
Sybil Leek	2025-08-05	2026-10-15	Occult & Esoteric	Person Soviet Astrology Witchcraft	Sybil Leek, known as 'Britain's most famous witch,' was an astrologer and author who was reportedly recruited by British Intelligence during World War II.	1917-02-22	1982-10-26	Normacot, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England	type with role start fn relative_of Julian Leek mother 1982-10-27 7

Sybil Leek, known as "Britain's most famous witch," was an astrologer and author who was reportedly recruited by British Intelligence during World War II. She was involved in a black propaganda effort, where she provided phony horoscopes for the Germans who believed in astrology¹. Her work allegedly included writing a chart that convinced Rudolf Hess, the Deputy Führer of Nazi Germany, to fly to England, leading to his capture¹. Jacobsen quotes her son, Julian Leek, as saying, "Mum stayed silent about the Hess affair all her life," and, of the affair, "It's still officially classified."²

After the war, Leek moved to America. The New York Times obituary gave the year as 1964, after a dispute with the Witchcraft Research Association, of which she had been president, and listed her residences as New York City, Houston, Las Vegas and, for 15 years, Indialantic, Florida.³ She was quoted in a classified Department of Defense monograph on Extrasensory Perception (ESP) as a noted astrologer and author.⁴

In July 1972, John LaMothe's report, Controlled Offensive Behavior - USSR, identified Sybil Leek as a "noted astrologer and author." The report states that "there is great danger that within the next ten years the Soviets will be able to steal our top secrets by using out-of-the-body spies."⁴ Jacobsen wrote that Leek advised the Central Intelligence Agency on witchcraft and the supernatural⁵, and that "the CIA hired magicians, hypnotists, and even Sybil Leek, Britain's famous white witch."⁶ While her sources were sometimes considered biased in favor of ESP research programs, her insights were noted within the intelligence community¹.

Writings

The New York Times obituary credited her with more than 60 books, among them The Diary of a Witch (1968), The Assassination Chain with Bert Sugar (Corwin, 1976), Astrological Guide to the Presidential Candidates (Abelard-Schuman, 1972), and Numerology, Fortune Telling, Phrenology, Guide to Telepathy and The Story of Faith Healing (all Macmillan). She wrote on the Burgess-Maclean case and the Algerian War as a journalist and columnist. She told an interviewer in 1969, "We are entering the age of Aquarius, and people are searching," and once said she was "a Druid, not a mere witch."³ Her son Julian illustrated the 1969 Macmillan Book of Fortune Telling, Phrenology, Numerology and, with Stephen Leek and Gerda Davis, the 1973 Book of Herbs.⁷

Death

Leek died on October 26, 1982, in Melbourne, Florida, at Holmes Regional Medical Center, after a nine-month battle with cancer. The United Press International report of October 27, 1982, quoted her son Julian Leek: he said that most people had misunderstood what his mother meant by witchcraft, rejected any association of the practice with devil worship or ritual sacrifice, and described it as a scientific religion. The report recorded that she had written 64 books and claimed that her family had practiced witchcraft since 1134.⁸ Her husband Brian Leek had died in England in 1974; two sons survived her, and her ashes were to be taken to England for burial.³

The New York Times obituary gave her birth date as February 22, 1917, and her age as 65; a 2002 BBC Inside Out page gave her birth year as 1923.³⁹

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Footnotes

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1. Jacobsen, Annie. Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government's Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis. Little, Brown and Company, 2017. ↩︎

2. Jacobsen, Phenomena (2017), p. 15. ↩︎

3. The New York Times, "Sybil Leek, 'Ordinary Witch from New Forest,' Dies at 65," October 29, 1982, section B, p. 8. https://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/29/obituaries/sybil-leek-ordinary-witch-from-new-forest-dies-at-65.html ↩︎

4. LaMothe, John D., Captain, Medical Service Corps, "Controlled Offensive Behavior - USSR," ST-CS-01-169-72, Medical Intelligence Office, Office of the Surgeon General, Department of the Army, July 1972, approved by the Directorate for Scientific and Technical Intelligence, Defense Intelligence Agency. CIA-RDP96-00788R001300010001-7. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp96-00788r001300010001-7 ↩︎

5. Jacobsen, Phenomena (2017), p. 112. ↩︎

6. Jacobsen, Phenomena (2017), p. 27. ↩︎

7. Library of Congress catalogue record (MARC), The Sybil Leek Book of Fortune Telling (Macmillan, 1969), statement "Illus. by Julian Leek.", as transcribed at https://openlibrary.org/books/OL5694243M.json ; Open Library edition records for Phrenology (OL4728899M, OL5218669M), Numerology (OL5681613M) and Sybil Leek's Book of Herbs, T. Nelson 1973 (OL5417918M, contributors Julian Leek, Stephen Leek, Gerda Davis). ↩︎

8. United Press International, "Self-proclaimed witch, psychic, author and lecturer Sybil Leek died," October 27, 1982. https://www.upi.com/Archives/1982/10/27/Self-proclaimed-witch-psychic-author-and-lecturer-Sybil-Leek-died/7758404539200/ ↩︎

9. BBC Inside Out South, "Sybil Leek, The South's White Witch," broadcast October 28, 2002. https://web.archive.org/web/20041230083428/http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/south/series1/sybil-leek.shtml ↩︎