A tribute to Kitty Henderson and early links to anthroposophy and biodynamics ‘Kitty (Christiane Maria) Henderson
___
3rd November 1929 - 26th August 2021
Last night at 8.35 pm, surrounded by family, Kitty peacefully crossed the threshold in Scarborough Hospital. She had received the last anointing the day before and was ready to let go and continue on her spiritual journey.
Kitty and Hendy arrived in Botton on the 24th August 1955 and were instrumental in helping to found the new Camphill Village initiative brought about by Karl König, and the families of the special needs children of the Camphill Schools in Scotland. Having agreed to initially come for a year Kitty and Hendy remained in Botton right up until 2019 when they moved to a retirement Village in Pickering to be nearer to family.
The Christian Community, Camphill and Anthroposophy were all very dear to Kitty and she quietly worked within their ideals throughout her long and meaningful life.
The family wishes to acknowledge all the lovely messages sent to Kitty as she prepared for
her passing.’
___
By Paul Martin
I open this article with the notice of Kitty’s demise that was circulated on The Camphill Ring recently. This article will not be so much about Kitty, but it was the notice of her crossing the threshold that inspired me to share aspects of Kitty’s life with you. This article will be a bit rambling, through time and other personalities, but the characters we will meet I feel are important for us Australians to get to know.
I only know of a few people in Australia who knew Kitty, and all those people will have met Kitty at Botton Village. Botton Village is a Camphill Village (the first Camphill Village) situated on the North Yorkshire Moors, in England. Botton is at the head of Danby Dale, a north-facing dale, pointing straight towards the North Sea and the Arctic. When Kitty and Hendy moved there in 1955 it would have been a very bleak place, no electricity, very severe winters, very short summers, always wet, cold and damp, but also at times dramatically beautiful.
Even fewer Australians will have met Kitty’s mother, Gertrude Mier. I was fortunate enough to meet her in the early 1980s, and by then she was an elderly lady and very deaf, but still a strong-willed character. Gertrude was the first person I sat with after she had died. (It probably rarely happens these days, but back then whenever anyone died in the community, a roster was created and community members took it in turns to sit with the deceased per-son 24 hours a day, for three days prior to the funeral, quietly reading anthroposophy, saying prayers, reading verses and poetry by candlelight. I probably nodded off!) I have never forgotten that time sitting alone with Gertrude in the evening, a very moving experience. You maybe can imagine, as a young, enthusiastic and very green biodynamic farmer sitting alongside the person who was instrumental in the organising of the Agriculture Course, having daily discourses with Rudolf Steiner and Count Keyserlingk, and Marie Steiner, and the eurythmists and the early priests and teachers; it was a very powerfully enriching experience that I have never forgotten.
Kitty’s father was Carl Alexander Mier.
When Carl Alexander and Gertrude moved to England from Germany in 1929, they changed their name from Mirbt to Mier. [George Adams and his half-brother, William Mann, also changed their sur-name when they moved to England from Germany, from Kauffmann to Adams and Mann respectively.] I can only imagine that this happened because of the rise of the National Socialist movement (the Nazis) in Germany and people with Jewish sounding surnames were at risk.
Gertrude Mier was Count Keyserlingk’s secretary. Count Carl von Otto Keyserlingk was the host for Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course at Whitsun 1924, at his estate at Koberwitz, Silesia. As his secretary, Gertrude must have been very instrumental in organising this festival. Steiner once said the “fires of Whitsun were burning at Koberwitz” because at the Agriculture Course were farmers and gardeners of course, but also doctors, eurythmists, Christian Community priests, as well as other followers of Rudolf Steiner; there were at least 100 guests. It was during a very intense period of Steiner’s life, but he was well cared for at Koberwitz.
Figure 1 The Keyserlingk estate at Koberwitz, 1924.
Organising such a fruitful and successful event in 1924 in rural Silesia must have been a huge undertaking, maybe that is why 60 years later when I met her, Gertrude still was a strong character. The book entitled “The Birth of a New Agriculture, Koberwitz 1924”, by Adalbert Graf van Keyserlingk, gives a full appreciation of this world-changing event.
Count Keyserlingk evidently always wanted to visit England and introduce biodynamics there, but he was unable to achieve this goal. Instead, he sent Carl Alexander and Gertrude to the World Conference in London in 1928. [This World Conference must have followed the one in 1924 in London, where Rudolf Steiner gave several lectures and travelled to Tintagel and Penmaenmawr.] It was at this World Conference that Daniel Dunlop persuaded Carl Alexander and Gertrude to move to England. They accepted Dunlop’s proposal and moved to England in 1929, bringing a wealth of anthroposophical knowledge, enthusiasm and inspiration with them.
Kitty was born at Bray in 1929. The family were staying with Marna Pease, at the Old Mill House at Bray on the Thames; Marna was the sister of Eleanor Merry, the author of the well-known book, “The Flaming Door” about Celtic Christianity. In fact, Eleanor became Kitty’s godmother.
Gertrude and Carl Alexander were inspiring intellectuals and anthroposophical pioneers and researchers. Carl Alexander published several books; he had a particular interest in astronomy. Marna Pease had a little bungalow constructed next door, where Carl Alexander could pursue his anthroposophical and biodynamic research. A biodynamic garden was very soon established, the preparations made, and the Anthroposophical Agricultural Foundation Office was established. It was here that the Rudolf Steiner’s Nine Lectures on Bees was translated. [The Agriculture Course had been translated but was not publicly available, only numbered copies existed. I believe this remained the case until it was first published in 1958, although it did not become available in Australia until the 1960s.] Marna Pease, Carl and Gertrude hosted the Experimental Circle Meetings at Bray. [The Experimental Circle was founded after the Agriculture Course to pursue research into the preparations and anthroposophical agriculture. It was the Experimental Circle that coined the word “Biodynamics”.] Eugene and Lilly Kolisko stayed at Bray when they moved from Germany to England, along with many others fleeing Hitler’s Germany. I believe the Koliskos settled in Bournemouth.
Kitty had two siblings, an older brother John, and a younger sister Dorothea. [Dorothea went on to be-come a world renowned eurythmist and is still teaching eurythmy in Spring Valley, USA.] Imagine the guests these young children must have met as they played in the garden and conversed with these anthroposophical founders over the dinner table. Imagine what stories, songs and prayers they would have experienced at bedtime, and what conversations they would have overheard in the sitting room.
The family moved to Wiltshire, then Birmingham and eventually settled in Clent (West Mid-lands), where Carl was on the staff of the Sunfield Agricultural Centre. Carl became the first secretary of the newly founded Biodynamic Agricultural As-sociation (BDAA). Kitty attended a small Steiner School for the children of staff at the Sunfield Children’s Home. This small school initiative was run by Eileen Hutchins and later became The Elmfield Steiner School in Stourbridge.
Sunfield Children’s Home was founded in 1930 by Friedrich Geuter and Michael Wilson. I believe Sunfield was named after the Sonnenhof (‘Sunfarm’), Ita Wegman’s clinic in Arlesheim, Switzerland; it certainly had Ita Wegman’s blessing – she visited several times. Kitty’s early life would have been immersed in and embraced by anthroposophical activity, meetings, celebration of festivals, music, welcoming guests from abroad, among them Ita Wegman and Karl König. Kitty’s parents, with David Clement, would have been instrumental in establishing Broome Farm (in the Clent Hills) as England’s first biodynamic farm. Emerson College was started at Sunfield, by founders Francis and Elizabeth Edmunds, and William Mann, and others. George Adams, Michael Wilson and Oliver Whicher founded the Goethean Science Institute at Sunfield. Later Park Attwood was started out of this anthroposophical endeavour. Liane Collot D’Herbois also lived at Sunfield during these early years, bringing her unique understanding of colour and, using this understanding as an impulse of healing for the children, Painting Therapy was established. Liane would certainly have painted many of her strikingly outstanding dynamic artworks while at Sunfield.
All this inspired activity, being surrounded by all these inspired people with inspired thoughts being shared across the dinner table, must have had an enlightening influence on Kitty’s childhood. One obvious influence would have been music – as an adult Kitty was an excel-lent, but humble, musician, playing the piano, the lyre and later in her life the harp. Kitty was always playing music for the Botton community, also for the Eurythmy School and the Botton Village Steiner School. Was she influenced (and possibly taught) as a young child by Michael Wilson, who was a violinist, a composer, and a conductor of the British National Opera Orchestra?
Figure 2 Kitty and her father Carl Alexander Mier with three of Kitty’s children, on Botton Hall drive, obviously taken on one of those rare sunny days on the North Yorkshire Moors.
During the Second World War the London Steiner School, at Streatham, moved into the country to Minehead (Devon); after the war it moved to Kidbrooke Park, Forest Row (Sussex) and became Michael Hall Steiner School. Kitty with her brother and sister moved to Minehead during the war to continue their schooling; they must have been boarders. Hendy (Alan, but always known as Hendy) moved from London to Minehead at the same time. It was at Minehead that Kitty and Hendy met, fell in love and never parted, still very much in love! Hendy, be-loved husband, fellow house-parent, colleague, dearest friend and pioneering community builder.
After the war Kitty (and Hendy) moved to Forest Row and continued her education at Michael Hall. At Michael Hall Kitty would have been taught by inspiring teachers like Jesse Darrel, William Mann (art history) and Brian Masters (music). She may have been taught eurythmy by Liselotte Mann; Liselotte knew Rudolf Steiner and was taught eurythmy by Marie Steiner. [Liselotte and William’s daughter, Roswitha, married Michael Spencer, former long-time Bursar of Emerson College, now living in Wagga Wagga, NSW, Australia; so even in Australia we now have a direct link to these anthroposophical pioneers!] Kitty would have also attended the Christian Community services (at the Barn in Forest Row) with priests like Adam and Kamila Bittlestone. But, I suppose, without a doubt the most important person she met and stood along-side was Hendy!
The other teacher who had an inspiring influence on Kitty was Kate Elderton. Later, in the mid-1950s, Kate and Kitty developed a strong lasting friendship as pioneers of Botton Village. Kate joined the Camphill Schools in the ’40s, she married Peter Roth. Peter was one of the founders of Camphill who fled, from the Nazis, from Vienna along with Karl König and a small group of others. Peter became an early Christian Community priest, trained by Alfred Heidenreich with walks through Hyde Park during the war. Peter and Kate were the founders of Botton Village in 1952.
After school, Kitty trained as a nurse at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital (London). Hendy had a love of farming but trained as a bank clerk in Barclays Bank. Kitty and Hendy married in 1953. In 1955 Kitty and Hendy moved to Botton Village, with their young children, for a year, and stayed 65 years!
[It took more than 30 years for the Macmillan Estate and hunting lodge to be slowly bought up and re-established as Botton Village, a thriving anthroposophical community based on Steiner’s principles of the Three-fold Social Order. The original estate had been previously sold off over earlier decades. The brother of Harold Macmillan, a publisher and one-time British Prime Minister, had a son with an Intellectual disability, who had attended the Camphill School in Aberdeen. It was the growing up of these initial children during the ’40s and ’50s that inspired the founding of a village; it was the friendship that the Macmillan family had with Dr König that paved the way for Botton Village to become the first of many similar villages around the world.]
Figure 3 The photo above, taken outside Botton Hall, is of Kitty and Hendy with baby Johnny meeting Karl König and others. Beside Karl König is Peter Roth. In the middle is John Stevenson as a young man, and behind John is Angus Elliot. Both John and Angus were villagers who moved to Botton from the Camphill Schools in the 1950s. Angus, many years later, was honoured by the Queen, with either an OBE or an MBE. It was while John Stevenson was having a holiday at Old Plaw Hatch Farm (Sussex) with his friend John Chadderton, in 1978, that he inspired me to change my vocation from biodynamic farmer to biodynamic farmer living in community with people with a disability. John lived to be 100 years old, and I will be forever grateful for the change he brought to my life.
- Paul Martin
In 1955 Hendy became the first Camphill/Biodynamic farmer of Botton Farm, fulfilling his passion; he continued farming for at least 20 years until the growth of Botton brought about change. In the 1970s Botton was a thriving community, 500 acres of biodynamic-managed land and with many young farmers and gardeners from around the world eager to learn, Hendy hung up his wellingtons and handed his muck fork over to a younger, eager-to-learn farmer; Hendy dusted off his old Barclays Bank accounting textbooks and moved behind a desk in the office where there was a tremendous need for his expertise.
It was in 1955 that Kitty and Kate Roth re-established their relationship, no longer as teacher and student, but now as community-building pioneers. Kitty became a mother, having five children, the Housemother of Botton Farm, the Village Nurse, and many, many other roles. Being a housemother of Botton Farm was no easy task. As well as her own family, the family home also became the home of at least seven “Villagers” (adults with intellectual disabilities), mostly men because it was a farm. With all due respect, because I also knew them and worked with them, these men were at times “wild” but under Kitty’s and Hendy’s loving guidance and understanding they were “tamed” and became, like Kitty and Hendy, pioneering community members, but they always retained some of their “wildness” that would occasionally come to the surface while working outside on the farm, which made life very interesting for us young “greenhorns”.
In about 1955 Carl Alexander and Gertrude also moved to Botton Village, Carl Alexander retaining his role as the Secretariat of the Experimental Circle. This led to many inspiring Biodynamic Agricultural Conferences taking place in Botton, with many inspiring biodynamic pioneers visiting, farmers like Maurice Wood, George Corrin, John Soper, David Clement, just to name a few. In the 1950s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s Botton was an inspired place of learning for young biodynamic farmers, gardeners, foresters and orchardist; Camphill was becoming an International Community and as a new centre started in the world some of these beginners in biodynamics would move to the new developing centre, hone their skills, gain experience and pass their knowledge on to others equally eager to learn.
During the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s Kitty would have continued to meet inspiring people; the Camphill Pioneers would have been regular visitors to Botton and to Peter and Kate Roth. After the war the Camphill impulse spread very quickly throughout the western world, and many international guests would visit. People like Karl and Tilla König, Thomas and Anke Wiess, Carlo Pietzner, Barbara Lipsker, Alix Roth, Alex Baum, Trude Amann and many, many others. Botton also hosted the Christian Community Synod Meetings, which priests from all over Britain would attend.
So how did having such parents and having such an interestingly stimulating biography form Kitty? Each of us who knew Kitty would probably answer this question differently, so I will give my answer. I knew Kitty (and Hendy) from 1981 to 1993 during the time that Sally and I lived in Botton (Honey Bee Nest Farm mostly). I would have also met Kitty (and Hendy) on several occasions from 1993 to 2001 when we lived in Delrow Camphill Community, prior to moving to Australia.
To me Kitty was the archetypal Servant Leader! Kitty was rarely in the foreground like the other Camphill greats, like Peter Roth, Karl König, Thom-as and Anke Wiess, etc, but Kitty was always there, always present but usually in the background, and often for different peoples. During the celebration of festivals Kitty would organise a lyre choir, up to 12 lyres playing together. Kitty as organiser, leader and as knowledgeable musician would be quietly leading from the backrow. The same would happen with choral choir, Kitty would be there, you could certainly hear her voice, but a little hidden behind the others. These are images of how Kitty was in the Botton community, leading from behind, inspiring and supporting others from behind.
Kitty could be stern and strict but always warm, welcoming and understanding. Over the decades Kitty would have been friend, mentor and adviser to hundreds of young mothers, hundreds of house-parents, hundreds of co-workers needing a quiet conversation on no-matter-what subject. Kitty’s compassion and availability for the other was end-less, but the other always had to go and ask and would be compassionately and empathetically received; Kitty would rarely make the first move.
Kitty was a mother; Kitty (and Hendy) suffered the trauma of the death their first child, Johnny, as a young man. Kitty was a housemother, and she and Hendy suffered the trauma of watching the Botton Farmhouse, their home, and the home of many others, burn down, only managing to save a basket of wet washing. Kitty knew about trauma, despair, suffering, but she also knew how to get back up and carry on. Kitty had humility. The loss of her beloved son did not stop her fostering another daughter who was in need of loving parents and a loving home.
Kitty was a nurse and was always there to provide nursing care to whoever needed it, such as a newly born baby to burly great farmers and foresters, and over the decades there were many, many who need-ed her care. Kitty would have sat at the side and lovingly cared for many dying villagers and co-workers, many of them close colleagues, friends, and family members. At Botton there was a Health Centre, founded by Kitty but run by others. Kitty was always in the background, where many of the villagers would go each week to be bathed and shampooed, nails clipped, hair cut, shaved, but more importantly also to be checked, assessed, chatted to, and given the space for them to communicate to Kit-ty or one of the other nurses any concerns they may have had. Kitty had time for all to have a quiet moment, not just to listen but also to act if necessary.
Kitty could listen for the answer to “What ails thee brother?” although she may not have always asked the question, but she certainly created the space for the answer to be given. Many “Villagers” were non-verbal, but Kitty could silently ask the question and equally silently “hear” the answer.
At the time Dr König founded the Anthroposophical Nurses Training in the Camphill Schools in Aberdeen, Kitty would have been far too busy being a mother, housemother, nurse and community builder to participate. Later in her life she would have participated in Anthroposophical Nursing Conferences, sharing her knowledge, experiences and skills with dedicated colleagues.
Kitty quietly, consciously and mindfully got on with the job, the job of community building along-side Kate, Peter, Hendy and hundreds of others. I have this picture memory in my mind of Kitty hanging out the washing, in the little field behind the Botton Farmhouse in a howling northerly gale straight off the Arctic, Kitty’s headscarf, skirts and coat billowing out like the sheets, but no Arctic gale was going to stop Kitty getting the washing dry. To me this image typifies Kitty, quietly, determinedly get-ting the task done, no matter what the task, no matter what the challenge.
Kitty loved; obviously Hendy, her children, her household, her community, and she selflessly loved and served all those who came within her presence. Kitty’s love extended beyond the individual, Kitty saw, recognised, and acknowledged the higher being that lived behind and within each individual. But Kitty’s love extended further than this. Her love for anthroposophy, the Christian Community, Camphill was a love not only for humanity but the higher beings that stand behind humanity, St Michael, the Christ, the heavenly hierarchy, the beings of the spiritual world and those who had died.
Kitty was a Servant Leader. I don’t know if she learnt this skill as part of her upbringing, her education, or whether it rubbed off from the many amazing people present in her life, or whether it was a skill inherent within her, but through my eyes she upheld this servant leadership role to a very high standard. Kitty’s servant leadership was not only demonstrated in the Botton Community, but also to anthroposophy in general, the Christian Community, the Camphill Movement, the Camphill Community, and the First Class of the School of Spiritual Science. All these institutions were very dear to Kitty. What Carl Alexander and Gertrude brought with them in 1928, with their direct connection to Rudolf Steiner, Kitty continued to carry throughout her life and pass on to many others.
I believe Dr König once said the purpose of Camphill was “To Uphold the Being of Man!” Kitty was certainly one of Dr König’s servants in achieving this task.
— Paul Martin, Sunshine Coast, Queensland
Post Scripts:
[Carl Alexander Mier died in the summer of 1975 while on a tour of Eastern Europe. He was staying with his friend Freiherr Karl Ludwig von Kuenssberg at Schloss Wernstein near Kulmbach in northern Bavaria. He is buried there in the family's private burial ground.]
[Gertrude died in Botton in 1984 or 1985 and is buried there.]
[Another interesting side point, for some, may be: It must have been in the late ’80s or early ’90s, that the call came from Dornach: “Did we know the whereabouts of Count Keyserlingk’s death-mask?” Botton Farm office was thoroughly tidied that day, but no death mask was found. I imagine many desks, offices, drawers, and cupboards were tidied in various parts of England at that time. Eventually Count Keyserlingk’s death-mask was found at the back of a forgotten cupboard in Sunfield Children’s Home. I can only imagine that Carl Alexander must have brought it with him from one of his many trips abroad.]
NB: There may be errors in this article, I hope not, I may have also inadvertently misrepresented someone or got some timing wrong, again I hope not, but if so, I would really appreciate readers with greater knowledge than I, correcting them in subsequent Newsletters.
It is important at this time in the early 2020s that we remember, share and bring to our consciousness what went before, 100 years ago in the 1920s, brought by Rudolf Steiner and his colleagues, and build upon this inspired knowledge.