 Howard's son later admitted that his father had carved the statue himself.In March 1961, a musing article entitled "Witchcraft in the Woods" by William Hall was published in the "London Evening News".In it, Hall claimed to have witnessed a ritual by twelve witches in the woods, involving Mary Cardell, playing the part of a Witch Maiden and dressed in a red cloak, sitting in a five-pronged tree with Charles Cardell, dressed in a black cloak adorned with a pentagram, casting a circle with a sword, blowing a horn and shooting a longbow.