Social Victorians/People/Robert Felkin

Also Known As

• Family name: Felkin

Robert W. Felkin

• Dr. Robert William Felkin
• Golden Dawn Outer-Order motto: Finem Respice (F.R.) (Alastor) — "Look to the end"
• Golden Dawn Inner-Order motto: Aur Mem Mearab — "Light-Water-West" (Küntz 189)

Mary Jane née Mander Felkin

• Mrs. Mary Jane Felkin, nèe Mander
• Polly Felkin
• Golden Dawn Inner-Order motto: Per Aspera Ad Astra (P.A.A.A.) — "Through perils to the stars" (Alastor; Küntz 189)

Ethel Felkin

• Miss Nora Ethelwyn Mary Felkin
• Ethelwyn Felkin
• Miss Ethel Felkin
• Golden Dawn Inner-Order motto: Maria Poimandres — "Mary, the divine intellect" (Küntz 189)
• Stella Matutina Outer-Order motto: Quaero Altissima (Q.A.) — "I seek the highest things" (Alastor; Küntz 189)

Harriet Davidson Felkin

• Miss H. M. Davidson (Küntz 189)
• Mrs. Robert W. Felkin
• Golden Dawn Inner-Order motto: Quaero Lucem (Q.L.) (Alastor) — "Seeker of Light"

Demographics

• Nationality: Scots

Residences

• Havelock North, New Zealand, where Robert Felkin died.

Family

• Robert William Felkin (13 March 1853 - 28 December 1928)
• ("Polly") Mary Mander ( - 1903)

1. ("Ethel") Ethelwyn Mary Felkin (1883-1962)
2. Samuel Denys Felkin ()

• Harriet Felkin

1. Laurence Felkin

Acquaintances, Friends and Enemies

Acquaintances

Robert Felkin

• David Livingstone, met when Felkin was at the Wolverhampton Grammar School
• Charles George Gordon, whom Felkin met in Khartoum in 1878
• King M'tesa (Uganda?), circa 1879–1881
• Mehmet Emin Pasha, met and edited and published Pasha's journals and letters in 1888 (Mary translated)
• Arthur Conan Doyle
• Rudolph Steiner, met in 1906, 1911, or 1916

Mary Felkin

• Mehmet Emin Pasha, met and edited and published Pasha's journals and letters in 1888 (Mary translated)

Ethel Felkin

• The Stella Matutina, both the Outer Order and the Inner Order (Küntz 189)

Friends

• John Brodie-Innes
• W. B. Yeats
• W. Wynn Westcott

Organizations

• University of Edinburgh, medical school, 1876–1878 (left before he was licensed); 1881–1884, LRCP, LRCS, Ed.
• Fellow, Royal Society of Edinburgh, joined circa 1881–1884
• Fellow, Royal Geographical Society, joined circa 1881–1884
• Member, Anthropological Institute of Great Britain, joined circa 1881–1884
• Marburg, earned MD in 1885
• Theosophical Society in Edinburgh, both Mary and Robert joined 1886
• Golden Dawn, Amen-Ra Temple in Edinburgh, both Mary and Robert joined 12 March 1894
• Golden Dawn, Isis-Urania Temple, in 1897
• Freemasons, from 1907
• Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia, from 1907

Timeline

1882, Robert Felkin and Mary Mander married.

1894 March 12, Robert Felkin joined the Amen-Ra Temple in Edinburgh, with Mary Felkin.

1896 January 27, MacGregor Mathers wrote "a long letter" to Florence Farr, as she put it, "in reply to a letter of mine sending a charged drawing of the Egyptian and asking him if I were not grossly deceived by her claiming to be equal in rank to an 8-3 of our Order at the same time giving me numbers which I afterwards calculated to be correct for that grade. I still [on 17 January 1901] possess his letter approving altogether of my working with her, and saying it was necessary to make offerings & then all would be well -- &c &c" (Harper 74 221).

1896, Robert and Mary Felkin moved to London with their family.

1896 November 8, Mary Felkin was initiated into the Inner-Order of the Golden Dawn (Küntz 189).

1896 November 23, Annie Horniman wrote Frederick Gardner: "Care 'Daffodil'" -- "What a time of it you must give S.S.D.D. [Farr]. She wants me to study Egyptian too, but I find one new language enough at a time and am hard at work at Italian" (Harper 74 225).

1896 December 1, Felkin was initiated into the Inner Order of the Golden Dawn (Küntz 189).

1897 December 21 or 22, circa, , Mary Felkin signed Frederick Gardner's petition in support of Annie Horniman as a member of Isis-Urania (Howe 143). Robert Felkin was "on the fence" about whether or not to sign Gardner's petition (Howe 143).

1898, Henry Pullen Burry met twice with Arthur Conan Doyle, the second time bringing Robert Felkin, to talk about spiritual matters and to try to convince him to join the Golden Dawn.

1901 January 17, Farr wrote to John Brodie-Innes, who was in the country (as opposed to being in the city) where she couldn't speak with him, to justify the Sphere Group:

• On Jan 27th 1896 I received a long letter from DDCF. [MacGregor Mathers] in reply to a letter of mine sending a charged drawing of the Egyptian and asking him if I were not grossly deceived by her claiming to be equal in rank to an 8-3 of our Order at the same time giving me numbers which I afterwards calculated to be correct for that grade. I still possess his letter approving altogether of my working with her, and saying it was necessary to make offerings & then all would be well - &c &c. I soon found there was a considerable prejudice against Egyptian Symbolism amongst the members of the Order and I began to hold my tongue after having recommended the various clearly marked groups of thinkers (such as Indian, Christian and so on) to work steadily and regularly by themselves each under some more advanced person. To you and to those who were not antipathetic I spoke more freely. When the splits in the Order itself became more and more pronounced my work with 3 others having become extremely interesting we resolved to carry out a plan suggested by an Egyptian for the holding together of a strong nucleus on purely Order lines. (Harper 74 221)
• One of the prejudiced ones was Frederick Gardner? In the 23 November 1896 "Care 'Daffodil'" letter, Horniman says, "What a time of it you must give S.S.D.D. [Farr]. She wants me to study Egyptian too, but I find one new language enough at a time and am hard at work at Italian" (Harper 74 225).
• One of the "3 others" was Robert Felkin, I think. Another was "Volo"? (Florence Kennedy).

1903, Robert Felkin broke from MacGregor Mathers and A. E. Waite and with John Brodie-Innes founded the Stella Matutina. Did Ethel Felkin follow her father?

1904, Ethel Felkin joined the Stella Matutina for 0=0? (Küntz 189)

1904 May 30, Harriet Davidson, as she was known at that time, was initiated into the Golden Dawn (Küntz 185).

1907 January 8, Robert Felkin was initiated as a Freemason, Mary Chapel Lodge, Edinburgh.

1907 April 11, Robert Felkin admitted to Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia, W. Wynn Westcott celebrant

By 1908, Robert Felkin and Harriet Felkin were married.

1919 November 1, Felkin wrote to the Chiefs of the Golden Dawn, speaking of where Florence Farr had gone in 1912: "Ramanathan is an Indian and has a native girls' school in Ceylon. He does not belong to our Order. He comes from a family of hereditary Eastern Mystic Teachers" (Harper 74 175 n. 17).

Questions and Notes

1. Küntz says 1858 for his birth.

Bibliography

• Alastor
• Harper 74
• Howe
• Küntz

Felkin's Works

• Felkin, Robert W. Egypt Present and To Come. 1885.
• Felkin, Robert W. Hypnotism, or Psycho-Therapeutics. 1890.
• Felkin, Robert W., et al. Journals and letters, by Pasha, Mehmet Emin. Mary Felkin, translator. 1888.
• Felkin, Robert W. Uganda. 1886.
• Felkin, Robert W., and Rev. C. T. Wilson. Uganda and the Egyptian Soudan. 1882.