Oliver Haddo was educated at Eton and left Oxford University in 1896, where he had been an intimate friend of Dr. Frank Hurrell. After studying medicine in Paris, Oliver eventually became disillusioned with the limitations of science, and became obsessed with the mastery of magic. His goal was to create life, using ancient and occult secrets. He began experimenting with magic in the castle Skene, his ancestral home, about three miles from the village of Venning in Staffordshire, England. Haddo had blue eyes, a heavy face, large hands and smoked cigars. Haddo describes his family history thus: