Greetings;

Thank you very much for your recent efforts "above and beyond" the call of duty. I sincerely appreciate your excellent cooperation. I hope nothing has interfered to harm our working relationship. I certainly have no hard feelings toward Pen Press or anyone else involved in the discussion. It would have been wonderful if we had known about each other before the Mayerling book was published so these issues could have been addressed in advance.

You probably received a copy of Mayerling's December 6 letter to me. Much is personal and not for public consumption, but we should all be playing from the same sheet of music, so I have taken the time to post all 10 pages on the Internet for your private perusal, at http://www.borleyrectory.com/mayerling/6dec00.htm (Lots of pages, so refresh if it stalls.) Note the skill required to cut and paste strips of paper in order to make edits on pages 3 and 4. This is a process repeated in previous letters. . . In that document, he admits to certain mistakes which are critical to your review of his request to re-issue his book.

Louis has asked me what I want, and the simple answer is "the truth." Because he has admitted to certain mistakes in creating the first document, I am very skeptical that a subsequent re-issue can address all the challenges. The feathers having been thrown to the wind, the damage has already been done, and it is impossible to retrieve them. The integrity of the whole is blemished by those admissions already made. Money is not a consideration.

What is really at stake here is the presentation of photographs, relationships and questionable stories as fact. I do not see how any doctoring of the current text can address all the challenges it has presented. Until ALL challenges are addressed, the printing and distribution of this work should be carefully considered.

The burden of proof lies with Louis. Making the contacts indicate below, and reading the original source material should only take a couple of days. A one hour visit to Thetford will either produce the originals Louis used, or will create an irreparable hole to his presentation. If the photos and "Marianne's" watch are not as he claims, then his text must also be rejected. The photos must have the appropriate age - not recently made copies from a Foto-Mat on modern backing paper. He has explained he will be going for various doctor's appointments, but I am sure he can afford you one hour, as he did recently for John Cranston of "Look East," the BBC's regional television programme for East Anglia. It must have taken more than an hour to pose for Keith Mindham of the Eat Anglian Daily Times for the October 31 article by Patrick Lowman.

By the way, I assure all concerned there is no conspiracy between any of those gathering facts about Louis.
*Alan Roper acted independently, as he has done on the Borley research trail for decades - long before I met him in 1997.
*I have never met Edward Babbs, and he is not an associate of the Borley Ghost Society. It appears from his article in the Suffolk Free Press of November 11 that "A member of the Genealogical Society has ascertained that a George Carter was born at this address and on the same date that Mayerling says he was born in Vienna - an astonishing coincidence!"
*Andrew Clarke reviewed the book for the Suffolk Free Press November 2 as a resident of Essex, and as someone who has gathered Borley history for many years.
*I have never met or corresponded with Molly Alcock who wrote to the Suffolk Free Press November 2 to support Louis, but also to challenge the description of "the photograph entitled the 'small and gloomy' dining room, was in fact a photograph of the drawing room at Borley Rectory, which measured some 16 feet by 22 feet and had a large, full length, bay window - neither small or gloomy!"

I only ask that before proceeding, you consider very carefully each of the points presented. You may be satisfied with a rebuttal from Louis here, or a minor change there, but I ask you to consider the challenges in toto. These questions are summarized at http://www.borleyrectory.com/mayerling/pickacard.htm

A more thorough list of the Mayerling material is available at the following URL. http://www.borleyrectory.com/mayerling/mayerling.htm It includes a fascinating array of documents from "Lee Lennox," describing making outfits for the Queen Mother, and holding "paranormal and psychical demonstrations which were sometimes sensational and attended by many scientists and others who tested under controlled conditions (not like, say, Uri Geller). They proved Kinesis!" This last was excluded from a second copy of the deRachell & Lennox letterhead he sent me December 6, which is interesting in and of itself. Such good attendance at his demonstrations is surely documented elsewhere?

My first and most sincere request is that you review the original documents - mine and others. Nick Rowland of Stowmarket (phone number upon request) is willing to loan you a copy of my 1995 copyrighted book, Who Am I?. It may be quicker to borrow the copy from the Harry Price Library at the University of London. Short of that, I will send you my own personal copy (only 75 exist) if you will promise to return it. Likewise, I also have copies of The Most Haunted House by Harry Price and The Enigma of Borley by Ivan Banks - which I am willing to post, but which should be more readily available in London. I earnestly urge you to not make any decisions regarding future distribution of "Faked" until you can witness the original inspirations.

Ivan Banks should be contacted in Detling and asked about the source of the photos in Enigma, which Mayerling claims are his; "I was surprised to see the photos [in Enigma] as I think most of them must have come from my own collection dispersed at some time - lost and not wanted."

In addition, I am hereby authorizing you to examine the pages of my manuscript - which has been posted on the Internet since August of 1998, and which was sent to Iris Owen, Nick Rowland, Alan Wesencraft, and others - including Louis Mayerling - when it was written as a Word Perfect document in 1995. For security reasons, the manuscript now requires a password - case sensitive. After accessing the following URL, type in username: xxxxxxxx - type in password: xxxxxxxx
http://www.borleyrectory.com/secure_books/marianne/momcontents.htm

Some of the charter associates of the Borley Ghost Society (such as Stewart Evans, Pat Cody, Sue-Ellen Welfonder, John Robert Colombo, Colin Wilson, et. al.) can also verify the length of time this manuscript has been posted on the Internet. Their names are available at http://www.borleyrectory.com/profiles/profiles.htm

Should you agree with me that not only is a re-issue ill advised, but that the remaining stock should be pulled from the shelves, what will be the disposition of those copies? Will you send a brief note letter explaining your action to the same media used to promote the book?

There is more than I have addressed here, but there is already sufficient to cause deep concern. I ask you to not rely on just my information - there are other resources available. If you have any further questions, or if I can be of help in any way, I will be most happy to cooperate. I believe you have my phone number, but just in case, it is xxx-xxx-xxxx

Please accept my very best for a happy and prosperous new year, and extend the same to Louis.

Vincent O'Neil