Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2015
In the early winter of 1953, just after the debunking of the Piltdown fossil forgery perpetrated in the early part of this century near Uckfield, Sussex, a blizzard of correspondence descended on the British Museum (Natural History). Among the letters was a fairly ominous one addressed to Kenneth Oakley. Purporting to be a message from one 'Elihu Progwhistle', a professional medium whose seances were being monopolized by a spirit 'identifying itself as the solicitor Charles Dawson', the note angrily denounced the whole investigation. It relayed the ghost's warning that it would take violent extra-legal action against the Piltdown detectives unless they gave up the search.