Skip to main contentSkip to navigationSkip to navigation
hamish
A near-death experience led Hamish Miller to abandon the world of commerce and become a dowser.
A near-death experience led Hamish Miller to abandon the world of commerce and become a dowser.

Hamish Miller obituary

This article is more than 14 years old

Hamish Miller was a successful ­businessman when, in 1982, he ­suffered complications during a major abdominal operation. His near-death experience changed the course of his life. Hamish decided to leave behind the world of commerce and went on to become one of Britain's best known and most highly respected dowsers. During the 1980s and 90s, he undertook journeys across England and New Zealand, and from Ireland to Israel, tracking down ancient ley lines and sacred sites. These are described in his books, The Sun and the Serpent (1989), The Dance of the Dragon (2000) and In Search of the Southern Serpent (2006).

These works captured the imagination of a new generation of ­practitioners. Hamish was instrumental in bringing the arcane art of dowsing out of its relative obscurity as a tool for finding water and presenting it to a wider, younger audience, hungry for both a practical and an intuitive ­understanding of the emerging field of earth energy investigation.

Born in Bo'ness, Falkirk, the son of a dentist, Hamish attended St Andrews and Edinburgh universities before starting his own company ­manufacturing furniture in Sussex. He used the practical methods of his background in engineering in subsequent dowsing inquiries. Perhaps the best known of his findings were the rediscovery of the Michael and Mary long-distance earth energy lines which traverse southern England, and the Athena and Apollo lines from Ireland to Israel.

Hamish engendered the formation, in 2006, of the Parallel Community, an organisation dedicated to linking together diverse groups in a number of countries that are seeking to build a more caring and positive future for mankind. He also realised his boyhood desire to become a blacksmith. He made both functional and sculptural ironwork to an exceptional standard, one example of which was presented to the Russian Orthodox cathedral, in Kiev.

Hamish published an autobiography, It's Not Too Late, in 1998, but many of his more important revelations are still to come, in a second volume, A Life Divined, due out later this year.

Hamish leaves his wife, Ba, two sons by previous marriages, and four grandchildren.

Most viewed

Most viewed