Dozens of examples of dreams or visions or mysterious voices that seemed to foretell a death are discussed in my posts here, here and here. Let us look at some more examples of dreams, visions or voices that seemed to foretell a death.
In the book Glimpses of the Unseen, we have this account:
"My eldest brother, Levi, was drowned about midnight on Saturday, Sept. 10th, 1881, when the steamer Columbia foundered on Lake Michigan. That night my sister, while sleeping, saw him drowning. The awful sight aroused her from slumber, and she sprang out of bed screaming with fright ; and as Mr. Parkhill, awakened by her cries, anxiously asked, ' What is the matter?' she told him that she had seen Levi drowning and felt sure that she would never behold him alive again. He tried to dissuade her from the impression ; but she never wavered in her belief that Levi was drowned at the time of her dream. On Monday the following telegram was received : 'The Columbia foundered Saturday night and your brother Levi is drowned.' My sister was living at Randwick, Ont., and my brother was drowned near Frankfort, Mich., some hundreds of miles away."
In the same book we have an account by this same sister of another paranormal incident occurring about a year later. This incident was apparently not a dream, but a case of a spontaneous clairvoyant vision while awake. We read this:
"On September 14th, 1882, between eleven and twelve o'clock in the day, as I was in the kitchen helping with the dinner a peculiar sensation passed over me, and...I exclaimed : 'Oh. I feel so strange'...As I stood there I seemed to lose sight of the mill, lawn, and everything before me, and I distinctly saw William tossing on great waves. I do not know whether I stood there one minute or ten, hut this I know that I saw William as plainly as I ever saw him. ... As I beheld him struggling in the waves, I seemed to be quite near and gazed horror-stricken at the awful sight. At length I saw him throw up his hands and sink beneath the waters."
The sister asserted to others that she had seen William drowning, but they told her this couldn't be right. Later the sister soon learned William had indeed died at the time she had the vision:
"When the body of William was found, his watch was stopped at the hour I saw him drowning ; and Mr. Tinkiss and Miss Morrison, the only two surviving passengers ot the ill-fated steamer, stated that it was on Thursday at the hour I have named when the steamer was wrecked on the Georgian Bay. I never could understand or explain the phenomenon ; but this I know, that I never saw anything more distinctly in my life than the scene I have faintly described to you."
In the same book, we have on page 115 an account of a man who heard a mysterious voice which could not be connected to any person or apparition, one which simply announced that the man's grandmother had died:
"I am his oldest child, and I well remember one Sunday morning hearing him relate the following experience to my mother : 'I was awakened about three o'clock by a loud rapping at the door of my bedroom. I sat up in bed, and asked, ' Who's there ? ' I heard the answer distinctly and very definitely : ' Your grandmother is dead.' I got up and opened the door, but could find no one ; and I heard no more.'
He aroused my mother and told her at once the strange story I heard him repeating in the morning. He told the story to his brother and other neighbors after church the same day. Some of these neighbors had known his grandmother in Ireland. In due time a letter came announcing the old lady's death. Making the necessary allowance for the difference in time in Ireland and in Canada, she died at the exact time the announcement was made to him."
We read the following account in an 1889 book, describing a doctor who had a dream that seemed to allegorically indicate he might soon die, a dream occurring within a few days of his death:
"Dr. A. M. Blackburn, of Cresco, Iowa, a well-known physician of that town, dreamed that he was called to visit a little girl in the neighboring town of Ridgeway. On his return he came to a broad river which it was impossible to cross. While waiting on the banks, an old friend, long since dead, appeared and assisted him in crossing. When the doctor arose in the morning he related his dream, and so strongly was he impressed with its prophetic meaning that he secured a policy on his life, talked over and arranged his business, and having adjusted all his affairs, he awaited the fatality he said was sure to overtake him. A day or two after, he was called to Ridgeway to visit a little girl, and on his return his horse ran away and he was killed. There is an allegorical element in this dream, and the presence of a departed friend who assists him over the stream, gives it a poetic cast. Yet who can say that it was not realized ?"
In the same book we read the following account quoted from a newspaper story, describing a sister who had a dream matching the details of her brother's accidental death:
"Yesterday morning W. S. Read, of Oakland, with a companion named Stein, started out from Long Wharf to reach a yacht upon which they were going on a fishing excursion. When about two hundred yards from the wharf the boat was capsized and Read was drowned. He started to swim to the wharf, but when within fifty feet of it he sank and did not rise again. Connected with this sad event is a dream : last Friday night the sister of the deceased dreamed that her brother had gone out in a boat on Sunday, that the boat had been upset and he drowned. So vivid was the impression of the dream, that on Saturday morning she went to her brother's office, told him of it, and implored him not to go out, but he laughed at her fears as the result of a disordered mind."
As you can see using the link here, George K. Cherrie was a very down-to-earth naturalist mainly interested in describing birds. He describes a dream he had three times on October 10th:
“I was back at my boyhood home, standing in the shadow of the great elms that surrounded it. I was being greeted by my old dog with tumultuous joy. The front door was open. As I entered, the figure of a woman rose before me and I felt the grasp of her hand in mine. No word was spoken while I was led unresisting to my mother’s bedroom, a sanctuary of peace and quiet, dimly lighted as of old when she had led me there to soothe and calm me after some childish tragedy. There my mother lay, her bed between the two windows, her face still and white, reflecting utter peace. Instantly I knew that she was dead. I felt no sense of overwhelming grief — rather a feeling of infinite peace. No one seemed to be present; even the shadowy form of the woman who had led me to the bedside seemed to fade away and I was alone. I awakened and remained awake a short time only. Three times during that night the selfsame dream was repeated, and each time the scene was the same.”
"Ten weeks later a letter from his sister told of the death of their mother on the night of October 10th. Every detail that he saw in his dream was confirmed, even to the circumstance of his mother’s bed having been placed between the two windows."
In the very interesting book Man's Survival After Death by Charles Tweedale, we have on pages 250-254 an account of a man who had signed on to be a crew member of a ship, but who was reluctant to assume the job because of a dream he had about dying in a storm while at such a job. The man took the job, and shortly thereafter died in a manner closely resembling the dream. Pages 255-257 give a similar case of a dream matching a death that soon occurred.
On page 339 of the document here, we read the following about a dream that seemed to foretell the precise time of a death:
"The following curious dream-story is related by Mr. A. MacHardy, Chief Constable of Inverness :— 'On Thursday, September 22, 1892 (the first of the two days of the Northern Meeting at Inverness), I got home to my house about 11 p.m...Went to bed about 12 o'clock, and I was not long in going to sleep, and dreamt that I was in the Northern Meeting park and saw the Marquis and Marchioness of Stafford in the grand stand, she having a child by the hand. I felt that I was immediately commanded to go and tell the Marquis that his father, the Duke of Sutherland, died at half-past 10 o’clock last night....I then awoke and felt excited and much agitated, and began thinking over my dream. Within a few minutes my telephone bell rang loudly, and thinking it was a fire alarm, I got out of bed, looked out of each of the two windows of my room, but could see no fire. The bell continued ringing till I got downstairs to the telephone, in the lobby. I spoke, saying, 'Well, who is there ? ’ The answer was, 'I’m MacAulay' (who was my deputy, and was on duty at the Northern Meeting ball). ‘ I am very sorry to trouble you, but I am sure you will be sorry to hear that the Duke of Sutherland died at half-past ten last night.' "
On page 43 of the document here, Maxwell Knight describes how he heard a Mrs. Wilde tell of a prophetic dream. In the dream Mrs. Wilde dreamed of a mother who had a child two weeks previously. After describing seeing a tombstone in the dream, she stated this:
"Hardly had I spoken, when I beheld with horror the tombstone slowly falling forward. I watched it, fascinated, I could not move, or even cry out. Slowly and deliberately the stone fell; crushing J— ’s head beneath it. Then I heard my friend’s voice, and felt her pulling at my arm as though to drag me from the ill-omened spot. ' Come away, dear,’ she said, ' it’s only her head.’ "
Mrs. Wilde then described the tragic aftermath:
"The postman arrived and a letter was handed to me which I saw with a start of apprehension was from Mrs. R — . I opened it ; it merely said that ' Poor J— had had a relapse, that two nurses and a specialist were in attendance.’ It concluded with the sentence: ' Of course we are all very worried, but you will quite understand, it’s only her head ’ ! With a sudden shock, the words spoken in my dream flashed into my thoughts. ....Three days later I heard that poor J— was dead."
Page 329 of the document here tells of a dreamed that seemed to foretell a death:
"Another remarkable dream was recounted to me by a lady who quoted it as the one psychic experience of her life. Her parents had been sent for to go and see a married brother who was very ill. They drove over in the evening, and as they did not intend to return that night, she retired early and was soon asleep. In her sleep she saw her brother’s sick-room, and her parents in it. She noticed each little detail, who came in and out, and she heard the few words muttered by the sick man and the parents’ replies. With them she watched through the night, hearing and seeing what went on, and finally just before dawn her brother said in a loud clear voice : ' I shall never go in the cart again, but into my coffin,' and with that he relapsed into insensibility and died, and her dream ended. An hour or two later she heard her parents return, and getting up and throwing on a dressing-gown she went to meet them. Before they could speak she said hurriedly, ' Don’t say a word ! Wait, and I will tell you my dream,' and to their astonishment she related what had passed in her brother’s room, and they confirmed the accuracy of every word and detail."
On page 145 of the document here, Elizabeth Keith Morris gives this account:
"It was during my next term at school that I spent an unforgettable night, tossing in bed and unable to get any sleep. Two other girls shared my room and one of them inquired what was the matter. 'Some dreadful thing has happened in my family to-night,' I exclaimed. ' One of them has been killed. I don’t know which one it is, but I shall hear in the morning.' The girls good-naturedly tried to persuade me that for once my feeling must be wrong. But I refused to be comforted and lay awake until the rising bell rang. During the morning a cable arrived at my home, informing my father that my eldest brother had been killed the evening before. His death had been instantaneous."
On page 387 of the document here, we read two other accounts of dreams that seemed to foretell a death:
"The town of Cardiff, in January, 1912, was startled by the publication of details of a stränge dream in which a well-known citizen’s death was foretold. At the Offices of the Powell-Duffryn Steam Coal Company, Cardiff Docks, one Saturday morning, the accountants’ staff were getting out the books for the day’s work, when one— a Mr. Francis — said in a casual way, ' What do you think ? I had a strange dream last night. I dreamt that Mr. Gedrych [the chief cashier] is dead.' The remark raised a laugh of incredulity, particularly because Mr. Gedrych was one of the most regulär members of the office staff for over thirty-five years. But within five minutes a telephone message came to the office from Mrs. Gedrych to the effect that her husband was dangerously ill, and asking if Mr. Lloyd, the chief accountant, would kindly go to see him. The message was passed on by a subordinate to Mr. Lloyd, who had not yet heard of Mr. Francis’ dream. He hurried to the house of Mr. Gedrych and learned that that gentleman had expired suddenly. At the time the late William Terriss, the actor, was assassinated at the Adelphi stage-door, the fact was duly recorded that a member of the ill-fated actor’s Company dreamed an exact replica of the whole tragedy the previous night !"
On page 387 of the document here, we are given an account by A. B. Tapping of a dream he had. The dream seemed to depict the death of the noted British stage actor Sir Henry Irving, whose son was Laurence Irving. But the dream took place long after Irving died. Tapping recalls part of the dream like this:
"I looked round again and saw Mr. Laurence Irving, whom I had not noticed particularly during the moumful procession before his father. He was standing alone at the far end of the room. I went towards him and, stretching out my hand appealingly, exclaimed, 'Don’t you see what is happening ? Your father is dying. He has left us for ever.' The son looked past me with amazement in his eyes, and seemed for a moment as if he would collapse ; but suddenly drawing himself up and with a resolute expression on his face, he followed his father with unfaltering steps."
Tapping then soon learned of sinking of the large ship Empress of Ireland. He narrates this:
"On the same morning came the news of the disaster to the Empress of Ireland, but at that time I had no reason to suppose that Mr. Laurence Irving was on the boat. As soon as I heard the news, however, I recollected my dream and told it to the members of my Company, and also to my wife, remarking that I hoped Laurence Irving and his wife were not on board. The dream haunted me all the day, and when it became known that they had actually sailed on the Empress, the news quite unnerved me, as I felt certain it was a message that the young actor and his wife had perished."
Tapping later learned that Laurence Irving was one of roughly 1000 who died in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland, in what was the worst disaster in peacetime Canadian shipping history. An article on www.wikipedia.org confirms this, saying, "He died along with his wife, Mabel, in the RMS Empress of Ireland disaster."
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