TheRosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship was aRosicrucian group founded byGeorge Alexander Sullivan in about 1924. It may have existed under the name The Order of Twelve from 1911 to 1914 and again from 1920. The ROCF operated first from theLiverpool area ofEngland and then after the mid-1930s from theChristchurch area. Its members studiedesoteric subjects from lectures, plays and correspondence material prepared byGeorge Alexander Sullivan.[1]
In 1930, a group of members of the order local to the Christchurch area began to meet regularly at apub in Christchurch, and at about the same time the annual 'conclave' was held in nearbyBournemouth. Some time later the group decided that a more permanent venue was required.[2]
The group's headquarters near Christchurch was a wooden building named theAshrama Hall, completed in 1936 in the garden of a house owned by Catherine Emily Chalk, who probably also started the original meetings in the pub.[2] In 1938, on the same land, the group built theChristchurch Garden Theatre, which called itself 'The First Rosicrucian Theatre in England'. From June–September 1938 it presented mystically themed plays, written by Sullivan under his journalistic pen-name Alex Matthews.
Sabina Magliocco,[3] in her examination of the influences of the study of folklore on the development ofWicca, considers it possible that by the late 1930s some members of the Crotona Fellowship were performing Wicca-like rituals based onCo-Masonry, and that this was the group referred to byGerald Gardner as the 'New Forest Coven'.
The numbers attending Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship events always were small, and the group is best known today for its association withGerald Gardner andPeter Caddy. Following the death ofGeorge Alexander Sullivan in 1942, the group's activities and membership diminished. By the early 1950s their focus had moved to Southampton.[2] Correspondence between former members suggests the Order 'existed in memory only' by the early 1970s.[1] The Order's library was deposited at theUniversity of Southampton in 1977.[4]
A significant minority among students ofAlice Bailey's Arcane School were members of the Crotona Fellowship.[1]