Spiritualism reports from the past

Distinguished British Scientist Asserts He Has Made Successful Psychic Tests.

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HAS TALKED WITH HODGSON

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Prof. Hyslop Says He Conversed with F. W. H. Meyer's Spirit Yesterday -- Demonstrations Promised.

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Special Cable to THE NEW YORK TIMES.

London, Jan. 30 1908. -- That he has succeeded in obtaining communications from the spirits of persons formerly well known in London as the result of secret and exhaustive tests recently conducted in connection with spiritualism is the astonishing statement just made by Sir Oliver Lodge, Principal of the Birmingham University and holder of a long list of distinguished degrees in science and scholarship to the members of the Psychical Research Society here.

Three well-known persons are named by Sir Oliver as having sent messages to him through mediums from beyond the grave. They are the late Edmund Gurney, the late Richard Hodgson, and the late F. W. H. Meyers.

The latter was a brilliant writer of English prose and a leading member of the Psychical Research Society. He died in 1901 at Rome and declared just before his death that he intended to attempt to communicate with the members of the society after his death.

Sir Oliver said in part:

"On the question of the life hereafter the excavators are engaged in boring a tunnel from the opposite ends. Amid the roar of the water and the other noises we are beginning to hear the strokes of the pickaxes of our comrades on the other side. We have received what an investigation has proved to be messages from the dead through the mediums, Mrs. Piper and Mrs. Verrall." 

"The latter is endowed to a remarkable degree with the power to act as a translator or interpreter of the psychical and the physical worlds. We have discovered that there is a new human faculty for communicating with the dead. The most important set of phenomena are those of astomatic(sic) writing and talking. Well-known persons, including those I have named, are constantly purporting to communicate with us with the express purpose of patently proving their known personalities, and giving evidence of knowledge appropriate to them." 

 

"Not easily or early do we make this admission, in spite of long conversations with what purports to be the surviving intelligence of those friends and investigators. We were by no means convinced of their identity until crucial proof, difficult even to imagine, had, according to some of our beliefs, been supplied."

Sir Oliver Lodge will give out later definite illustrations of his surprising spiritualistic tests.

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Prof. James H. Hyslop, formerly Professor of Logic and Ethics at Columbia University, a member of the Psychical Research Society, at his home, 519 West 149th Street, said last night that Prof. Lodge was one of the best-known and most distinguished scientists in England.

"What he says is quite true," went on Prof. Hyslop. "I have taken messages from Mrs. Piper myself. Only ignorant people now doubt that Mrs. Piper and such as she is can communicate with the spirit world. Richard Hodgson established his identity several years ago through the mediums. Edmund Gurney made himself known through the mediums as far back as 1889. I have talked with Hodgson myself."

Just as THE TIMES reporter was walking out of the door Prof. Hyslop said:

"And as for this man Frederick Myers, why, I talked with him myself today.:

Prof. Hyslop has been Secretary of the American Society for Psychical Research, and has published a great deal of matter in the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research

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Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge (pictured left) who has given the weight of his opinion to the theory of spirit manifestations, has been often honored for work in scientific research. He is about 57 years old, is a Fellow of the Royal Society, and has degrees from Oxford, St. Andrew's, Glasgow and other great British universities. He is the author of numerous scientific works and is one of the widest known of living English scientists.

Mrs. Piper was for eighteen years a coworker of Dr. Hodgson's and for that reasons Prof. Hyslop did not consider the messages received at her seances of as much values as the ones received through "a young girl." Before his death, Dr. Hodgson and Prof. Hyslop experimented with the girl, and the Hodgson spirit always referred to her as the "young light," among other things saying that she is all right."

Spiritualism and the ouija board-a warning

We thank the excellent website Spiritualism.com.au for this article on the dangers of using the ouija board. It's a popular belief by those who are not experienced in Spiritualism that ouija boards are used to communicate with spirit. Spiritualists do not endorse them or promote them. Even  people who have no connection to Spiritualism should avoid ouija boards at all costs.

Recently a 'digital' version of a board was released and it was sad to read a purported spiritualist discussion board endorsing it.
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The Dangers of the Ouija Board


Do they work? Absolutely. How? Whether using a planchette or a glass, the participants are focusing their energies onto a very small space. They are giving power to these tools. It is this power and the open invitation for anyone to communicate that opens doorways. The difficulty is once these doorways are opened you cannot always close them and the experience can last long after the game has ended. A planchette or glass is like a shining beacon; unfortunately the communicators they usually attract are the occupants of the astral world. This is plane where entities reside who have departed from this world, but not transcended to the other world. It is also where entities or beasts not of this world live. If you are lucky a loved one or guide will come through, but most people are unlucky. It is also nearly impossible to tell the difference between someone of the light and someone pretending to be. Why? Because the game removes the safety features associated with spiritual communication. When a Medium/Clairvoyant communicates they do so through their own energy field, so they can feel and sense the link. With or without protection they will know immediately if the link is of the light or merely feigning to be. But if they were using a glass or a planchette they lose the closeness of the connection and their ability to be able sense the energy of the communicator.

Participants of the game have given away their right to be protected from the dwellers of the lower planes. They have invited them. Once they are here they have no intentions of going back. So long after the fun has gone they can live on, in the space where the activity took place. With the added advantage of being invisible they can wreak havoc in peoples’ lives, by creating fear, anger and dis-harmony. For those foolhardy enough to try out this type of communication the affects can be disastrous. If you are still not convinced I suggest you read my own book ‘Spheres of an Unseen World’ where I tell story after story of people whose lives have been affected by disincarnate entities. From mild disturbances around the house, knocking, banging, through to physical assaults on people. Not all but many of these events start with the use of these boards. Even after the culprits have long moved on, unable to cope with the unearthly disturbances the chaos lives on.

If you have used a board and believe it has caused a problem in your home seek out a local spiritualist church, they will offer you advice and assistance. For ‘would be communicators’, remember there are no short cuts to developing your ability to communicate with the other side. If you are interested again visit your local spiritualist church or spiritual/psychic centres. Most will offer development courses, where you can learn to communicate properly and safely, without the dangers of attracting unsavoury entities into your home.

Victor Hugo and Spiritualism

Victor-Marie Hugo, novelist, poet, playwright, dramatist, essayist and statesman, (February 26, 1802 – May 22, 1885) is recognized as one of the most influential Romantic writers of the nineteenth century. Born and raised in a royalist Catholic family, Hugo would—like so many of the Romantics—rebel against the conservative political and religious establishment in favor of liberal republicanism and the revolutionary cause. Hugo, like Gustave Flaubert, was disgusted with what he saw as the corruption of imperial France and with the Church's complicity in social injustices, and he devoted much of his energies (both in fiction and in essays) to overthrowing the monarchy.

While he made significant contributions to the revolutionary cause, Hugo was much more than a political activist. He was one of the most gifted writers of his times. Like Charles Dickens in England, Hugo became immensely popular among the working classes, viewed as a hero who exposed the underbelly of French society.

Less known about this great writer is that he was also a Spritualist. Many books have been written about Hugo's involvement with Spiritualism and make fascinating reading. Visit our friends at the Adyar Bookshop in Sydney ( they also do mail order) where you will find many titles about Victor Hugo or you can always go to Amazon.

The amazing tale of Helen Duncan & Winston Churchill

In November 1941 HMS Barham, a British battleship, was travelling off the coast of Egypt, as part of a Mediterranean WWII convoy. What Royal Navy sonar operators mistook a signal  to be a school of fish, was in reality a lurking German U-boat. 

HMS Barham suffered three torpedo hits which led to 861 British seamen losing their lives. A total of 395 were rescued while the U-boat escaped without knowing the result of their stealth attack. Some time later it became apparent to the Admiralty that the Germans had no idea that they had in fact sunk HMS Barham. Sir Winston Churchill decided not to announce the sinking of the battleship in order to deceive the Germans, and an elaborate cover up followed, designed so that initially not even the relatives of the crew would be informed of the battleship's sinking.

Days later at a séance in Portsmouth England, a Spiritualist medium from Callander in Scotland called 

Helen Duncan, told of a spirit presence who claimed that he had been a sailor on HMS Barham and that his ship was now sunk. Due to the suppression of this information by the British Admiralty, it came as a shock to the sailor's mother who was present at the séance.

Maurice Barbanel, who was the editor of Psychic News at the time, contacted the Admiralty to ask if the sinking of the Barham was true. Military intelligence were not too happy that this "top secret" information had leaked into the public domain so soon after the event. 

Helen Duncan continued to work as a medium until January 1944 when she was arrested on a charge of vagrancy. She was convicted of "fraudulent mediumship" under the Witchcraft Act of 1735 and after a eight day trial was sentenced to ten months (less remission) in prison. Many believe that her arrest had more to do with national security than enforcing a law dating back over two centuries. With the D-Day landings planned only five months ahead of her arrest, perhaps British intelligence were seeking to tie up any loose ends prior to the Normandy invasions? 

The Witchcraft Act, 1735 was repealed seven years later and was replaced by the Fraudulent Mediums Act, 1951, which many people believe was a direct result of Helen Duncan's conviction. During her trial the Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill sent the following memo to Herbert Morrison, the wartime Home Secretary. 

"HOME SECRETARY

Let me have a report on why the Witchcraft Act, 1735 was used in a modern Court of Justice.

What was the cost of this trial to the State, observing that witnesses were brought from Portsmouth and maintained here in this crowded London for a fortnight, and the Recorder kept busy with all this obsolete tomfoolery, to the detriment of necessary work in the Courts.

Winston Churchill (3rd April 1944). "

Although there is no official record, it's believed that Winston Churhill was a firm believer in Spiritualism and visited Helen Duncan in prison 3 times to offer his sympathy for her plight.

Helen Duncan was released from prison in 1945 and although she had promised not to conduct any more séances, twelve years later in November 1956, she was arrested in Nottingham when police raided a séance she was conducting.

Spiritualists have always maintained that a trance medium should never be touched when they are in a trance state, but unfortunately as the police grabbed Helen, the ectoplasm returned into her body too quickly causing severe burns to her stomach. She was later rushed into hospital and died five weeks later. 

There is an ongoing Spiritualist campaign to clear Helen Duncan's name which so far has not been successful. A posthumous pardon was denied in 2006 and most recently a petition calling for Home Secretary Jacqui Smith to reconsider this decision was submitted to the Scottish Parliament for consideration by their Petitions Committee. On the 4th March 2008 the petition was closed (rejected) as the committee considered the whole issue to be not worth their time.

In April 2008, the Fraudulent Mediums Act, 1951 was repealed and replaced by the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2007 (CPRs) which implement the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD).

Robert Hartley's excellent book on the life of Helen Duncan be obtained from the

Greater World Book Shop

The real life 'MEDIUM' TV character

Allison DuBois, pictured left, (born January 24, 1972) is an American author and medium. DuBois uses her psychic abilities to help law enforcement agencies across the United States solve crimes, which formed the basis of the TV series Medium.


Her  powers as a medium were tested by Gary Schwartz of The University of Arizona and Schwartz claims that his research supports DuBois' psychic abilities.

Allison was born in Phoenix, Arizona, and graduated from Corona del Sol High School in Tempe in 1990. In college, she worked as an intern at the district attorney's office in Phoenix. She received her B.A. in political science with a minor in history from Arizona State University. Allison is married to Joe DuBois and they have three daughters together Sophia, Fallon and Aurora


DuBois refers to herself as a medium and profiler, rather than a psychic, because of the negative connotation she feels is associated with the term psychic. She says that she became aware that she had the ability to communicate with departed souls when she was 6 years old. DuBois uses this ability to connect deceased loved ones to the living, and also to help law enforcement agencies solve crimes, such as the Texas Rangers and the Glendale, Arizona police department, and that she used these abilities as a jury consultant.

According to the TV Guide, Allison DuBois spent four years participating in various tests at the University of Arizona to assist with their studies of mediums and psychic phenomena. Gary Schwartz, Director of The VERITAS Research Project, claims that DuBois has psychic abilities, arguing in the March 6, 2005 TV Guide, "Anyone who's looked closely at the evidence can't help but come to the conclusion that there is something very real going on here." At their first meeting, Schwartz says DuBois accurately described a friend of Schwartz's who had just died. Impressed, Schwartz conducted a series of interviews, including one in which DuBois stated she contacted the late husband of a woman in England.

The TV series Medium:
The television drama Medium, originally airing on NBC and as of 2009 moving to CBS is based on Allison DuBois's book, Don't Kiss Them Good-Bye. The show was created by Glenn Gordon Caron, creator of Moonlighting and other television shows, who is also one of the writers for the series. It is produced by Paramount Pictures and Grammnet, the production company owned by Cheers and Frasier alumnus Kelsey Grammer. Patricia Arquette (pictured) was cast to play the role of DuBois, at the suggestion of Caron's girlfriend. DuBois stated in the January 9, 2005 TV Guide that she initially thought Arquette was too far to the left to play her, remarking, "I mean, I have a gun, I have put people on death row. I wanted to make sure that was something that didn't bother her. But she assured me that she believed some people may have that coming."
"Every episode is not a biography of my life, it is simply based on my life experiences. It is an accurate portrayal of my life and the people who share it with a little Hollywood magic thrown in," DuBois has said. 

She does state in both her book and in the January 3, 2005 edition of Sci Fi Weekly that the program closely resembles the truth of her own life. Several details of Arquette's character match DuBois's life, such as the name of her husband on the show (Joe) and the fact that he is an aerospace engineer. Both the character and the real-life Dubois have three daughters, and the first case the character "consults" on in the show's pilot is with the Texas Rangers, the law enforcement agency with whom the real-life DuBois alleges she first worked.