On his deathbed, Anton LaVey, the founding father of the Church of Devil, mentioned: “Oh my, oh my, what have I accomplished! There’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious!”
In October 2024, numerous (archived) Fb users (archived) recirculated (archived) a submit from Could 2024 that claimed that Anton LaVey, the founding father of the Church of Devil, expressed remorse over his life selections whereas on his deathbed.
The Could 2024 post (archived), which had acquired round 63,000 shares on the time of this writing and reused particular language that had appeared in comparable posts since no less than 2022 (archived), included a picture of LaVey holding a chalice. The submit started:
Founding father of the Church Of Devil, the well-known satanist, Anton Szandor LaVey’s final demise mattress phrases had been, “Oh my, oh my, what have I accomplished! There’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious!”
(Fb person Garnell Wooden)
Nonetheless, there was no convincing proof that LaVey, who founded the Church of Devil in 1966, ever mentioned these phrases. Because of this, now we have rated the declare as unfounded, that means we discovered no credible proof to help it.
Peter H. Gilmore, the current excessive priest of the Church of Devil, advised us over e-mail that the alleged quote was “completely fictional” and didn’t emerge till “fairly some time after” LaVey died from pulmonary edema in 1997.
Blanche Barton, LaVey’s romantic accomplice on the time of his demise and the mom of his son, Xerxes, additionally confirmed that, to her data, LaVey by no means mentioned the alleged closing phrases.
In an e-mail to Snopes, Barton defined that she was with LaVey for a lot of the final day of his life. Based on Barton, on the night time main as much as his demise LaVey, who had suffered from cardiac issues for years, complained of chest tightness earlier than shedding consciousness on the Black House, his dwelling in San Francisco, round or shortly after midnight on Oct. 29, 1997.
Barton and Karla LaVey, LaVey’s eldest daughter, then referred to as an ambulance, which transported LaVey to San Francisco’s St. Mary’s Hospital. Barton mentioned she agreed to have LaVey taken to that particular hospital, regardless of its Catholic affiliation, due to its popularity for treating coronary issues. On the hospital, Barton stayed within the hospital’s ready room whereas physicians tried, and finally failed, to save lots of LaVey’s life.
Barton mentioned that though she was not allowed at LaVey’s bedside on the hospital, to her data LaVey didn’t converse in any respect throughout his time there as a result of he was unconscious:
So far as I do know and I used to be advised, Anton LaVey by no means regained consciousness after he collapsed within the Black Home. … There have been no final phrases, and no deathbed conversions.
Historical past of the Declare
The declare about LaVey’s closing phrases has circulated in social media posts since no less than 2011, when it appeared in an X post (archived). Over the next years, the alleged quote was repeated (archived) in numerous (archived) different posts on X (archived) and on Facebook (archived). The quote has additionally been the topic of a number of videos posted on YouTube and on TikTok.
To help the declare, some of the videos included excerpts of a video clip that has circulated on-line in varied types since no less than 2008, the yr it appeared to have been first uploaded (archived) to YouTube. The clip depicted a blond lady saying:
I heard that, and I will not point out his title, however it was a giant chief and founding father of an enormous Satanic group, and he was on his deathbed. For a Satanist, on the time of demise, it is an important victory for them as a result of demise is a large factor that they have fun, and he was on the brink of die and move on his powers, and on his deathbed he should have bought some revelation or an angelic look or one thing, and he went into shock and he mentioned: “Oh my, oh my, what have I accomplished?” He mentioned, “There’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious.”
The lady within the clip was the nondenominational Christian minister Patricia King, as Robert Hotchkin, an associate of King, confirmed to Snopes over e-mail. Hotchkin mentioned that though King advised him she couldn’t recall its actual date, the clip was filmed someday within the early 2000s for King’s tv present “Excessive Prophetic.”
Hotchkin additionally reported that King advised him she “does bear in mind listening to from somebody again within the day about Anton LaVey’s final phrases, however all these years (and a whole lot of packages, visitors, subjects, information, and so forth.) later she doesn’t bear in mind who advised her that story.”
The Church of Devil has beforehand addressed comparable claims about LaVey’s closing moments. For instance, in response to a 2019 X post (archived) claiming LaVey’s final phrases had been “I used to be fallacious with what I did on this life,” the Church of Devil’s official X account posted (archived):
This can be a rumor began nearly a decade after his demise by a Christian on YouTube. The very fact is that he died in a hospital of pulmonary edema, which implies his lungs had been stuffed with fluid, rendering him unable to talk.
Hilariously, this makes morons spreading nonsense apparent.
Equally, in a bit of the Church of Devil’s web site dedicated to debunking widespread misinformation about LaVey, an entry addressed claims that “Anton LaVey had a deathbed conversion to Christianity.” That entry stated:
Whereas Anton Szandor LaVey died in a Roman Catholic hospital, to which he had been taken because it was close to his Black Home, he handed away with out in any means denying his philosophy as a Satanist. Jesus was all the time a repulsive fantasy to him. This falsehood was begun and is presently unfold by evangelical Christians, none of whom knew him nor had been they current for his passing. As per his needs, he was given a Satanic funeral and his stays had been then cremated. Anton LaVey died as he lived, as a Satanist.
In abstract, Gilmore, the present excessive priest of the Church of Devil, described the alleged quote as “completely fictional,” which Barton, LaVey’s romantic accomplice, confirmed based mostly on her expertise of the hours main as much as LaVey’s demise. A consultant for King, the Christian minister who popularized the quote in a clip from considered one of her tv reveals, advised us she was unable to establish a reputable supply for the quote.
Due to this fact, now we have rated the declare that LaVey’s closing phrases had been “Oh my, oh my, what have I accomplished! There’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious, there’s one thing very fallacious!” as unfounded, that means we investigated the declare and located no credible proof to help it.
Beforehand, Snopes investigated the alleged closing phrases of Leonardo da Vinci and Abraham Lincoln.
