Reports of Dramatic Paranormal Activity in the House of the Physicist Dolbear

 The book Forty Years of Psychic Research by Hamlin Garland is an astonishing account of observation of the paranormal. At its beginning Garland says that he was living in Boston in 1891, a young novelist who was an agnostic evolutionist who enjoyed the Darwinist writings of Herbert Spencer. He was asked to join a new research society that would research paranormal phenomena, one called the American Psychical Society. Although inclined to disbelieve in the type of things that might be investigated, Garland was attracted to the idea that a physicist (Professor Amos E. Dolbear) would be one of the investigators, so he agreed to serve on the board of directors of the new society. Journals published by this society (which included some articles by Garland) can be read here. 

On page 10 Garland reports observing the phenomenon of slate writing, the mysterious appearance of writing on slates either untouched by human hands or tied together. Usually when this would occur a piece of chalk would be put between two bound slates observed to be blank before the tying; and the bound slates looked rather like this:

Here is Garland's account:

On pages 13-14 Garland reports a favorable experience with another slate-writing medium:

On page 16 Garland gets an amazing account from the physics professor Dolbear:

On pages 19 to 20 we have a narrative from Garland that is one of countless narratives by respectable reliable witnesses testifying to the paranormal movement of a table. Garland is introduced to a young medium, and he and the medium merely touch the top of a table with their fingertips. He says, "With both of us standing and only the tips of our fingers touching its top, the table rose completely from the floor and hung about twenty inches from the carpet." In full light he asked the young medium to stand away from the table, and the table continued to levitate, even though he could see there was no contact between the medium and the table. Garland says, "The table was being lifted by an unknown force, and was held suspended in the air for a minute, possibly longer." See my six posts with a tag of "table turning" to read many similar accounts. 

On page 25 Garland reports a variation of the phenomenon of slate writing, one in which writing mysteriously appears under the base of goblet filled with water. He says this:

Garland requests that a specific name be written underneath the base of the goblet, the name William Dean Howells. He reports the name was mysteriously written under the round base of the water-filled goblet. On page 27 Garland says he was extremely satisfied with the result of this test, and convinced it was evidence of something supernormal:

On page 28 Garland is involved in another test of slate writing, one involving a medium identified as Mrs. Flower. Garland requests that the word "Constantinople" be written on the slate, but is told that "they" don't know the spelling. Garland then requests that there be written something like a lightning bold, in yellow, within a circle. On the next page he reports that this request succeeded:

No one who has read my two previous posts with the tag of "slate writing" should be surprised by this account. Successes in very strict tests of paranormal slate writing were very widely reported in the years before Garland's tests. 

Garland states this:

About page 34 Garland begins to discuss some tests he made with what is called a trumpet medium, a type of medium who may be involved in seances in which there seems to occur mysterious voices, sometimes identified with spirits of the dead. On page 36 Garland asks the medium a good question, and gets a response that will "ring a bell" with any serious scholar of out-of-body experiences. We read this:

When Garland first got this report, he probably thought to himself something like:  well, that's a weird claim --no one else has reported something like that. At the time almost no one had reported out-of-body experiences. But anyone today who has studied this topic will recognize these claims. They are two of the most common features in reports of out-of-body experiences.  You can read many other cases of people reporting both of these things in my post here. 

Pages 38 to 45 discuss various tests with the same medium, which Garland says were highly successful. Garland tied up the medium with silk threads (which he says are impossible to untie once they are knotted). Then in a state of darkness various objects seemed to be levitated mysteriously, and also mysterious voices were heard.  Garland says this all occurred in front of several seated witnesses. The account is less convincing as evidence than some other accounts of similar phenomena, because (1) no exact observation date is given; (2) the real name of the medium is not given, only a pseudonym of "Mrs. Smiley"; (3) we lack an observation report that was published soon after the phenomena were observed; (4) the only person writing an account of these events is Garland. 

Garland said he arranged for the same medium to travel to Boston, so that tests could be done to some members of the American Psychical Society. The first of these were failures. But still remembering the previous successful test, Garland arranged for a test at the home of the physicist Dolbear. The test was very successful. The date of the test is given: November 10, 1893.  The only people present besides the  medium were Garland, Dolbear and his wife. 

On pages 56 to 57 we read of how the medium was elaborately tied up to a chair with silk threads that are supposedly impossible to untie. Also a newspaper was placed on her knees, to cause a sound alert if she tried to move. On page 60 we read that something like two dozen books started flying mysteriously from bookshelves in the room. We also read that when Mrs. Dolbear (the physicist's wife) requested that a candy box be brought, the candy box was retrieved from part of the room and "shoved down upon Mrs. Dolbear's hand," as if by some invisible hands. We read this:

We read on pages 61-63 of disembodied voices speaking and performing various wonders. A personality of "Mitchel" identifies himself as a deceased soldier who fought in the American Civil War. This is the strange phenomenon called "direct voice phenomenon," discussed in my post here. On page 64 we read this: 

"The table was grasped and shaken violently from side to side as if by a powerful impatient man; and yet the newspaper on the psychic's knees uttered no sound and the threads tied to the chair legs remained unbroken! Such violent side-to-side motion requires two hands."

On page 66 Garland reports that when the lights were turned on, the medium was found just as she had been set up, tied up in the chair, her legs still tightly tied to the table legs. She was found with a weak pulse and cold skin. She had apparently been in a deep trance as all the strange phenomena were occurring.

On page 68 we have Garland confronting the skeptical physicist Dolbear with the results they have just observed, such as something like two dozen books inexplicably flying out of Dolbear's own bookcase:

Page 69 of the book is rich in the psychology of stubbornness. We have a portrait of a physicist who simply won't give up his belief dogmas, no matter what he has observed. 

Showing excellent psychological insight, Garland predicts on the next page that if the physicist Dolbear meets one of his colleagues, he will not mention a word of what he saw during this seance in which so many inexplicable things happened such as dozens of books flying out of a bookcase. Sure enough, Dolbear wrote in 1897 a long book First Principles of Natural Philosophy which talked for hundreds of pages about scientific investigation, but which failed to make any mention of Garland, mediums or the paranormal phenomena Dolbear had seen. It was just as if Dolbear's rule was "I will banish from my memory everything I see or read about that contradicts my belief dogmas." And that seems to be the rule of the great majority of scientists today. 

There follows in Garland's book a description of quite a few experiments in which many equally strange things happened in seances of the same medium, although results on any one day seemed to be unpredictable, with quite a few days producing unimpressive results. Conversely, on other days, under the strictest test conditions in which the medium was all tied up to a chair, there reportedly occurred results such as writing on sheets of paper that were blank at the beginning of the test, with all witnesses present denying they did anything to produce such writing. 

Around page 112 and the following pages, Garland gives more reports of dramatic successes doing experiments with slate-writing.  On page 118 he reports a dramatic success when testing an unnamed medium in Chicago. While he held the medium's hands and also controlled the medium's feet, a metal cone was seen rising up from the floor and flying around the room mysteriously:

On page 187 Garland quotes a later letter from Dolbear, in which Dolbear states this:

"I didn't make out how some of the things were done. For instance, how the books, 24 of them, got off of the shelves, without Mrs. Smiley's hands being free, she was tied good." 

I will in a later post discuss many other equally striking claims made in Garland's book. If the topic of this post interested you, check out my free 292-page book "Eeriest Events," now available on www.archive.org using the link here. The book discusses phenomena such as near-death experiences, out-of-body experiences, apparition sightings, deathbed visions and precognitive visions.  Using the native www.archive.org file viewer in single-page mode,  you can conveniently read the whole book by finger swiping. Scholars who are interested in following the links may prefer to download the book as a PDF file, which will allow opening links by right-clicking on a link. 

Mediums Who Reported Out-of-Body Experiences

 Following the beginning of the mysterious rap phenomena that began in 1848, there arose different types of persons calling themselves mediums.  There were mediums such as Daniel Dunglas Home, who were classified as physical mediums, because the mysterious effects reported around them were mainly physical effects such as musical instruments playing by themselves, and levitations of tables (or perhaps even a levitation of the medium himself). There were also mediums classified as mental mediums, who were involved with mysterious mental effects. A mental medium might claim to be able to contact the deceased by means of mental techniques long practiced by the medium, or by means of entering into a trance. Many of the mental mediums have used methods similar to methods that have been called "channeling" in recent decades. 

Some mental mediums held up very well to prolonged examination by scientists. Perhaps the most successful mental medium was the American medium Leonora Piper. A long account of her case is given in my post here. Leonora Piper held up very well to many years of very close and careful examination by members of the Society for Psychical Research. The main person examining her case was a person (Richard Hodgson) who was very skeptical at first, but later became convinced that Piper was actually communicating with the deceased.  

Innumerable times Leonora Piper seemed to display detailed knowledge of things that were known to her visitors, but should have been unknown to her, with the most impressive cases coming when Leonora did not even know the identity of her visitor.  Such knowledge often seemed to include knowing about obscure events or little-known persons known to her visitors, which she should have known nothing about.  This occurred around years such as 1897, where it was impossible to easily gather obscure information by techniques such as using the Internet. 

A British medium of the early twentieth century (Gladys Osborne Leonard) seemed to produce equally impressive results, results so impressive she was often called "the British Leonora Piper." The most impressive existing record of the results of Gladys Osborne Leonard is the 1916 book Raymond, or Life After Death by Sir Oliver Lodge, which can be read online for free here. The book is a meticulous account of interactions Lodge had with mediums after the death of his son Raymond, which occurred on September 14, 1915. The book has transcripts of quite a few sessions Lodge had with mediums such as Leonard.  

Summarizing these cases would be quite a chore, so instead I'll try to tackle the much easier task of describing out-of-body experiences reported by mediums such as Leonard. An account of such an experience appeared on page 149 of the July 1926 edition of The International Psychic Gazette, and is entitled "Travelling in the Astral: Remarkable Experiences." At the time the report was published, the term "out-of-body experience" was not in common use, and almost no one had heard of such experiences. There had developed the idea, however, that each human has a soul-like or immaterial "astral body" that might leave the physical body. It was sometimes said that such an astral body was made of "finer matter" or energy or matter that moved at a higher rate of vibration than ordinary matter. 

Gladys stated this:

"Then I felt a tingling sort of thrill as if a slight current of electricity were passing through my body, and I again had a sensation of not resting on the bed. I could think quite clearly, but taking a lesson from my previous disappointment I held my mind under quiet control, saying to myself that I would notice anything that happened but would not anticipate or wonder. What happened I shall never forget; it was wonderful ! I did not move consciously in any way, either limb or muscle, and my eyes were closed. I wondered how far my body might be above the bed, and by a little mental effort I opened my eyes and looked down and saw my physical body resting on the bed, while I in my astral body seemed to be resting above my physical body. To show you how clear my thoughts were, I noticed that the head of my physical body was lying on a particular nightdress case with an embroidered corner. I was surprised at seeing it there, because I was not aware of its having been changed that morning for the one I had been using. I thought, too, how funny it was that my head was resting on it, because I don’t usually do that. I was pleased at myself for noticing these things." 

"The next thing I felt was that my astral body was getting farther away from my physical body, and I seemed to be hovering over the edge of the bed for a few seconds. Then I began to feel just a little nervous, and the thought flashed across my mind—' Shall I be able to get back easily ? ' That question and slight fear drew me back about a foot towards my physical body. But my interest got the better of my fear, and I thought—' Whatever happens, let me go through with it !' "

"The moment I so determined I became aware of my husband opening our flat door, which makes a slight noise on being opened, and speaking to someone in the hall outside. He was speaking in a low voice, so as not to disturb me. I thought—' I should like to go and see to whom he is speaking,' and I don’t know how it happened, but I found myself at once standing at my husband’s elbow at the flat door. I was not aware of passing through the bedroom door, which is kept closed, but here I was. I looked through the open door, and saw that the man he was speaking to was from the Gas Company. What they were speaking about I did not notice, because just after I joined them (in my astral body) a maid from one of the upstairs flats passed them, and I saw my husband, without speaking to her, take a coin from his pocket and hand it to her. I thought—' That’s funny!  Why did he give that servant a coin ? ' I thought also— ' I will remember that and ask him.'  I arranged all this methodically thus—Two things to remember: (i) the gasman, and (2) the upstairs servant." 

"Then I found myself again back in the bedroom without knowing how. I noticed my clarity of thinking was leaving me, making me less conscious, and I thought that was possibly because I was about to return into my physical body. So I gave myself up to it, and ceased thinking, so as to make the return easier. In a moment or two I was surprised to find my mind begin to work again, but on looking around I saw at once that I was not on my bed, nor even in my bedroom, but in some other room I had never seen before. What interested me most was, I saw that the lady and gentleman I was expecting that afternoon were in this room, talking to a gentleman I had never seen before. I heard my own name mentioned by the lady. There was quite a conversation which I could not wholly catch, but I gathered that my sitters were inviting the stranger to share their sitting that afternoon. I pulled myself up at this and thought—' I must be dreaming, because these two people would never allow anyone to join them in what they regard as a very private and sacred matter.'  I looked at the stranger and saw he was a man of striking personality, not of an ordinary type at all. I got the impression of his appearance well in my mind, to carry it back with me into my physical body. I thought— ' I will hurry back and tell my husband at once, for it will be a good test if this gentleman should after all come with them.' " 

The out-of-body experience continues, and Gladys reports hearing of a Gertrude she had not met. Later Gladys told her husband about the experience. He confirmed that he had been talking to a man from the Gas Company, and that he had then paid a woman a coin for some favor done a few days before, doing this while not seeing Gladys nearby. Later the other part of the "astral body observation" was also apparently confirmed. Gladys says, "When I went into the room and saw the stranger he was so identically the same man as I had seen when in my astral body that I scarcely knew how to pull myself together and speak in an ordinary way to my sitters." Gladys also reports getting a confirmation about the reality of the Gertrude seen in her out-of-body experience. The account is too long and complicated for me to directly quote the whole account. 

We seem to have here a "veridical out-of-body experience" like the "veridical near-death experiences" described in my widely-read post here, both involving people seemingly having trips out of their body, and observing things they never should have seen while in their body, with the details later being confirmed by regular in-the-body observations. 

Another case of a female medium reporting an out-of-body experience can be read in the 1936 book 'Twixt Earth and Heaven by Annie Britain, which you can read here. On page 50 she states this:

"When I leave my body my mental volition is not entirely suspended, although my consciousness is directed towards certain things, and away from others. I am sometimes aware of my 'spirit body' and sometimes not. On one occasion I had sufficient volition to try an experiment. I tried to grasp and move some cups and saucers in the room, but my fingers passed through them as if they were shadows. On the same occasion I tried to slap and pinch the faces of the people in the room but could make no impression on them, and they did not take the least notice of me. I walked through a table as though it were an optical illusion. I remember feeling amused to think that I was so superior to flesh and blood, which usually comes off second best in encounter with wood, stone or steel. Tables, chairs, walls, the bodies of humans, seem as unsubstantial as shadows when one is out of the body. Yet whenever my attention is directed to my own spirit body, it seems solid and real, and as far as I have been able to observe, an exact replica of my earthly body."

Although the account above may seem too fantastic to believe,  there are actually quite a few other people who claim to have had similar experiences during out-of-body experiences: experiences recorded as being able to pass through solid matter. I list five other  such experiences in the third section of my long post here, which is one of the most extensive discussions ever published of the phenomenology of out-of-body experiences, and all of the strange types of things that people report when having such experiences. 

Annie states this about how her out-of-body experiences begin and end:

"I should mention in passing that I am seldom conscious of leaving the body. I simply find myself standing beside my sleeping form. The sensation on returning is always distinct; it is a sort of shock-the kind of physical shock one experiences when one wakes from sleep with a  start. How I really enter I cannot explain; we seem to fuse into each other with a sort of snap."

Annie then states on page 52 this very interesting passage in which she seems to describe out-of-body experiences that take her beyond this earthly realm of existence:

"In my spirit travels I am not always moving among earthly scenes, but sometimes I have the sensation of being propelled upwards through a bright atmosphere into a more ethereal world. It is a world in which I see trees and flowers, houses and people. And yet I am aware that I see other things that no earthly eye will ever see; but they do not seem strange to me, it is as if I had always known them, or had known them long ago, and had forgotten them. When I wake I can recall the trees, the flowers, the houses, but these other things elude me. It is, I think, the effects of light and colour that linger with me longest when I return. How shall I ever forget that radiant, light-drenched atmosphere! The sky is blue, but it is like blue fire. In some landscapes the colours are bright, in some they are of the softest shades, the most attenuated hues, but they blend and fade into others as they do in no earthly landscape. I have seen green forests rise up tier above tier, and fade away into blue night. I have seen the most vivid colours; meadows of a richer deeper green than those in which our lakeland cattle wade; valleys so verdant as to assuage all sorrow; blues that are soul searching; reds that are deeper than sunset or blood. In those happy regions an indescribable spell lies upon every flower and hedgerow and tree; it is like a sixth sense, and I seem to recapture the first fresh glory of earliest childhood."

The language reminds me of language that often appears in accounts of near-death experiences, in which people will often report seeing some strange ethereal realm that is very unworldly but also something that causes a person to have a feeling that he is "coming back home," as if he once lived in such a place. I discuss such accounts in my post here. 

On page 54 Annie makes these claims regarding a missing person. The reference to "the mesmeric sleep" is a reference to being hypnotized:

"My husband put me into mesmeric sleep, and suggested that I should trace the young woman if alive, or find her body if dead. I left the body, and found myself walking by a canal or river. It was dark and I could not see beyond the path and the water. I walked along till I came to a spot where the water was wider and there were rushes. I felt immediately that this was the spot, and saw in the distance an inky-blue coppice of trees and the shadowy outlines of a colliery. I did not see the body; I knew the experience would be gruesome and shrank from it. Soon afterwards I awoke and described my adventure. A few days later the body came to the surface in the very spot amongst the rushes that I had seen in my vision."

On page 56 we hear an astonishing tale which begins like this:

"I woke to find myself standing outside my body, gazing at the sleeping form in the chair. My cousin was by my side, a young man who had died some years before, and to whom I had been deeply attached. I was not greatly surprised to see him, as he had often escorted me on my spirit travels. Now he offered to take me out for the afternoon and see some of the spirit people. We passed out through the walls of the room, seeming to glide rather than to walk, with no more sense of motion than if we had been in a balloon."

Annie's accounts of her travels out of the body go and on, with many a fantastic adventure reported. I'm sure many of her 1936 readers must have thought that mere runaway imagination was involved. But about 1975 and thereafter many reports started to be published of near-death experiences, with people often reporting floating out of their bodies, and finding themselves traveling to unearthly mystical realms sounding like the one described by Annie. And such reports often involved claims of encountering the deceased,  claims similar to those Annie made. In the light of such near-death experience reports occurring so frequently, the accounts in Annie's books may not seem as hard-to-believe as they might have seemed to readers in 1936. 

A wide variety of mysterious psychic phenomena were reported in connection with Frederica Hauffe, a visionary (dubbed the Seeress of Provost) born in 1801. In an 1845 work by the physician Justinus Kerner, we read about such phenomena. Hauffe reportedly did quite a lot of spirit seeing, so we can classify her as a medium. On the page here and the next one we read that she had out-of-body experiences (like many others):

"She was frequently in that state in which persons, who, like her, have had the faculty of ghost-seeing, perceive their own spirit out of their body, which only enfolds it as a thin gauze. She often saw herself out of her body, and sometimes double. She said, ' It often appears to me that I am out of my body, and then I hover over it, and think of it ; but this is not a pleasant feeling, because I recognize my body.' "

In the same post in which I describe many stunning phenomena involving Frederica Hauffe,  I also describe many equally stunning phenomena involving the nineteenth century medium Adele Magnot, who seemed to be one of history's most successful mediums, although her name is all but forgotten today. As I report in that post, Adele Magnot seemed to be remarkably successful in describing deceased figures she could not have known about by normal means, when only given the names of such persons. 

If the topic of this post interested you, check out my free 292-page book "Eeriest Events," now available on www.archive.org using the link here. The book discusses phenomena such as near-death experiences, out-of-body experiences, apparition sightings, deathbed visions and precognitive visions.  Using the native www.archive.org file viewer in single-page mode,  you can conveniently read the whole book by finger swiping. Scholars who are interested in following the links may prefer to download the book as a PDF file, which will allow opening links by right-clicking on a link. Those interested in whether modern scientists are able to explain accounts such as those discussed above may enjoy my recently uploaded 160-page  free online book "Near-Death Experiences and Out-of-Body Experiences," which can be read at www.archive.org using the link here. 

When Newspaper Accounts Said an Apparition, Levitation or Teleportation Was Seen by More Than One

 Let us look at some old newspaper accounts describing an apparition seen by multiple witnesses. The first dates from 1910. We hear of two seeing the ghost of a miner who died, with them reporting that the ghost vanished into a wall:

You can read the account here:

https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88085947/1910-03-27/ed-1/seq-12/

The newspaper account below tells one of the most startling ghost accounts you will ever hear. We read of a justice of the peace (one often marrying couples) who reports encountering a pair of spirits who requested to be married, with the justice's wife seeing the same pair. 

You can read the full account by using the link below:

https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn99021999/1887-12-30/ed-1/seq-6/

The 1860 account below is one of very many accounts describing great paranormal wonders occurring in the presence of the medium Daniel Dunglas Home, who was investigated at length by the leading physicist Sir William Crookes, who asserted in print that several dramatic types of paranormal occurrences really did occur around Home (as discussed here).  We have an account of multiple witnesses seeing an apparition of a hand, one that reportedly picked up a pen and signed the name "Napoleon." The emperor mentioned was Napoleon III. 

The world-class physicist William Crookes stated in writing that he had seen levitations of the medium Daniel Dunglas Home. The newspaper account below summarizes part of a paper Crookes published with a title of "Human Levitation."

You can read the full article below, which cites many additional reports of human levitation:

https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=SCR18600714.2.3&srpos=355&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------

The article above is summarizing the paper "Human Levitation" by William Crookes, which can be read here:

https://archive.org/details/per_the-quarterly-journal-of-science_the-quarterly-journal-of-science_1875-01_5/page/31/mode/1up

On the page here of the 1875 paper, Crookes speaks of recent reports of levitations and teleportation:

"As Newton is held to have proved that gravitation and inertia in every mass are proportional, we might expect that whatever overbears the former would be equally capable of neutralising the latter; and, in fact, the elder records hardly speak of visible suspensions like those of Mr. Home, but mainly of sudden unseen transfers of the person to a distance; like that alleged of Dr. Monck last year, from his own residence at Bristol to the garden of his friend, Mr. Young, at Swindon ; or the earlier but better attested one of Mrs. Guppy, from her house at Holloway to a circle of her friends assembled at No. 61, Lamb’s Conduit Street; or, a few months ago, that of Mr. Henderson, a well-known photographer of London, for a smaller distance, but attested by eighteen persons besides himself—the nine assembled with him at Mr. Guppy’s, and the whole Stokes family, at Highbury, where he was unexpectedly found."

On one page of the paper, Crookes this list of forty saints who were supposedly levitated:

The references are to volumes and pages of the Acta Sanctorum series of volumes, which can be found on www.archive.org.  Referring to the people in the list above, we read this in the article by Crookes:

"Many were levitated only in these unconscious states; others, as Joseph of Cupertino (the greatest aerobat in all history), both in the trance and ordinary state, and (like Mr. Home) most frequently in the latter; while a very few, as Theresa, seem to have been always conscious when in the air. Several were, in certain states, fire 

handlers, like Mr. Home. The Princess Margaret was so  from the age of ten. ..The great majority of them, though often seen suspended, were at heights from the ground described only as ‘a palm’ half a cubit, a cubit, and thence up to five or six cubits, of,  in a few cases, ells. But the Princess Agnes and the Abbess Coleta were, like Elijah, carried out of sight, or into the clouds ; and Peter of Alcantara and Joseph of Cupertino others were watched off the ground often exceeded an hour; and the Archbishop of Valencia (1555) was suspended in trance twelve hours, so that not only all the inmates of his palace, and clergy, but 'innumerable' lay citizens, went to see the marvel."

On another page, referring to accounts of teleportation by saints, Crookes states this:  "Of invisible transfers to a distance, the only subjects seem to have been Columba of Rieti, said to have been carried from her mother’s house in that town to the nunnery that afterwards received her, at Spoleto, twenty miles distant; and the river transits of Peter of Alcantara." 

Crookes refers in his article above to claims in his own time that Mrs. Elizabeth Guppy was teleported. The original source of such claims is the June 15, 1871 edition of The Spiritualist, a weekly newspaper. On page 170, we have a report by numerous witnesses claiming to have seen a case of human teleportation.  Here is the original account, signed by a series of witnesses, along with the witnesses who attested to have seen this marvel on June 3, 1871:

" On Saturday evening, June 3rd, at 61, Lamb’s Conduit-street, High Holborn, London, W.C., a séance was held in the rooms of Messrs. Herne and Williams, mediums. Before the séance began, the doors communicating with the passage outside were locked. The proceedings began, at the request of the mediums, with prayer. Then spirit lights, like small stars, were seen moving about, after which a conversation between the spirits John King and Katie King, was heard. John said, 'Katie, you can’t do it.’ Katie replied, ‘ I will, I tell you I will.’ John said, ‘ I tell you you can’t.’ She answered, 'I will.’ Mr. Harrison then said, ‘ Can you bring Mrs. Guppy ? ’ There was no reply, but a member of the circle urged that the attempt should not be made. Within three minutes after Katie had said, ‘ I will,’ a single heavy sound was heard for an instant on the centre of the table. Mr. Edwards put out his hand and said, ‘ There is a dress here.’ A light was instantly struck, and Mrs. Guppy was found standing motionless on the centre of the table, trembling all over ; she had a pen and an account-book in her hands. Her right hand, with the pen in it, was over her eyes. She was spoken to by those present, but did not seem to hear ; the light was then placed in another room, and the door was closed for an instant ; John King then said, ‘ She’ll be all right presently.’ After the lapse of about four minutes after her arrival, she moved for the first time, and began to cry. The time of her arrival was ten minutes past eight. Mrs. Edmiston, Mr. Edwards, and Mr. Harrison went at once to one of the doors, and found it still locked; the other door could not be opened during the séance, because the back of the chair of one of the sitters was against it. There was no cupboard, article of furniture, or anything else in the rooms, in which it was possible for anybody to conceal themselves, and, if there had been, we, the undersigned witnesses, are all certain that by no natural means could Mrs. Guppy have placed herself instantaneously on the centre of a table round which we were all sitting shoulder to shoulder." 

"Mrs. Guppy said that the last thing she remembered before she found herself on the table, was that she was sitting at home at Highbury, talking to Miss Neyland, and entering some household accounts in her book. The ink in the pen was wet when she arrived in our midst ; the last word of the writing in the book was incomplete, and was wet and smeared. She complained that she was not dressed in visiting costume, and had no shoes on, as she had been sitting at the fire without them. As she stated this to Mr. Morris, and Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, a pair of slippers dropped on the floor from above, one of them grazing Mr. Morris’s head ; this was after the séance, and in the light. We all went into the dark room for a few minutes afterwards, and four flower-pots with flowers in them, which Mrs. Guppy declared to be from her home, were placed on the table at once. "

“After tea a second séance was held. Within a minute or two after the light was put out, there was a cry for a light, and Mr. Herne was seen by four persons falling from above, on to his chair. There were bundles of clothes belonging to Mr. Guppy, Mrs. Guppy, and Miss Neyland on the table, and Mr. Herne declared he had just seen Miss Neyland in Mrs. Guppy’s house ; that she had pushed the clothes into his arms, and told him to ' go to the devil.'  The light was again put out, and when it was struck once more, Mr. Williams was missing. He was found in the next room, lying in an insensible state on some clothes belonging to Mr. Guppy. He said on awaking that he had been to Mr. Guppy’s house, and saw Miss Neyland, who was sitting at a table, and seemed to he praying."

N. Haqger, 46, Moorgate-street.

Caroline Edmiston, Beckenham. 

C. E. Edwards, Kilburn-square, Kilburn. 

Henry Morris, Mount Trafford, Eccles, near Manchester.

 Elizabeth Guppy, 1, Morland Villas, Highbury Hill Park, N. 

 Ernest Edwards, Kilburn-square, Kilburn. 

Henry Clifford Smith, 38, Ennis-road, Stroudgreen. 

H. B. Husk, 26, Sandwich-street, 

W.C. Charles E. Williams, 61, Lamb’s Conduitstreet, W.C.

 E. Herne, Gl, Lamb’s Conduit-street, W.C. 

W. H. Harrison, Wilmin Villa, Chaucer - road, S.E.”

We have here an astonishing report of a seance in a dark room with locked doors. The witnesses claim that a woman living quite a distance away was inexplicably deposited on the round table that they surrounded. There is no way to explain this report by imagining some kind of trickery by one or two people.  The only halfway-credible hypothesis a skeptic might use to dismiss the report is to claim that the report is all a big lie, and that nothing of the sort happened.  Here the skeptic is forced into becoming a conspiracy theorist, imagining some conspiracy by witnesses who falsely claimed to have seen something they never saw.

Crookes also refers in his paper to a report of a teleportation of a Mr. Henderson.  The account first appeared in the December 5, 1873 edition of the publication Medium and Daybreak, which you can read using the link below:

http://iapsop.com/archive/materials/medium_and_daybreak/medium_and_daybreak_v4_n192_dec_5_1873.pdf

Below is an image from the front page of that publication.

We read this:

"To the Editor of the Daily Telegraph. Nov. 14th, 1873,—

The object of this communication in to place on record an event of most remarkable character which occurred on the 2nd inst., when a gentleman-making one of our party at a seance - was transferred, instantaneously as he alleges, from within a sitting-room duly locked and with windows closed and shutters bolted, to a distance of one mile and a half under the circumstances herein detailed and testified to by the writers of this letter...."

The preserved version of the next page of the edition (page 562) is rather hard to read in some spots, but we get the main details about the seance, when it was held, its location (Mr. Guppy's house) and who were the witnesses:

The persons at the dark seance expressed various wishes, and Mrs. Guppy expressed the wish that someone might be carried out of the room. The table was reported to have made dramatic movements. After several minutes, it was found that the Mr. Blank (a pseudonym for a person who did not wish to give his name) had mysteriously vanished from the ring of attendees holding the hands of each other in the dark seance room.  Reportedly a message was given that Mr. Blank had been carried away and would not be seen that evening. Apparently the physical arrangement of the room meant that no one could have left without an opening of a door which would have caused light to pour into the dark room, light that no one observed. 

The vanished Mr. Blank gave a report that he found himself in a disoriented state, far away from the seance he had been in at Mr. Guppy's house. He reported that he found himself at the presence of Mr. and Mrs. Stokes, giving their address of 29 Kingsdown Road, and that he was "wholly unconscious of how he had got into their premises." He stated that he had no memory of how he had got from the seance room at Mr. Guppy's house to the location of  29 Kingsdown Road, about two miles away. Hearing this strange account from Mr. Blank, some of the members of the seance at Mr. Guppy's house went and interviewed Mr. and Mrs. Stokes, getting an account that was consistent with Mr. Blank's account. 

The Mr. Blank of the account (a pseudonym of someone who did not wish to give his name) was apparently the Mr. Henderson referred to in the paper by Crookes. 

The account has on page 562 with nine named witnesses agreeing to the testimony supplied. On the next page we have these named witnesses agreeing to the supplied account:

As evidence of a teleportation, the account here is weaker than the account of the teleportation of Mrs. Guppy, largely because of the refusal of the supposedly teleported person to give his real name. Accounts which hinge on the testimony of anonymous witnesses must be ranked as second-class evidence rather than first-class evidence. But the account of teleportation of Mrs. Guppy (to the ire of materialists) has the hallmarks of first-class observational evidence.  

Press accounts of apparitions seen by more than one

It Seemed the Paranormal Was Her Near-Constant Companion

Recently I had a dream about the late Kate Fox, one that struck me as being perhaps of great significance.  I dreamed I was standing in front of an elevator, and someone said, "Kate Fox wants to see you." I got in the elevator, and pressed a floor number. But it seemed I pressed a series of digits making a number much larger than 1000, as if I was trying to ascend very many times higher than the top of the world's tallest building. The combination of the motif of the deceased person wanting to see me and the motif of an ascent to some super-high elevation made the dream one of 400+ dreams I have had suggesting life after death. 

Kate Fox was one of the famous Fox sisters involved in the events in  Hydesville, New York beginning in 1848, and the events not long after in Rochester, New York, events that were the beginning of a series of dramatic manifestations that lasted for decades, and were reported in very many places in the United States and Europe, mostly when none of the Fox sisters were present.  The manifestation began as inexplicable sounds that were called "rappings" or raps.

The important American newspaper figure Horace Greeley reported on the visit of the Fox sisters to New York City:

"Mrs. Fox and her three daughters left our city yesterday, on their return to Rochester, after a stay here of some weeks ; during which they have subjected the mysterious influence by which they seem to be accompanied to every reasonable test and to the keen and critical scrutiny of hundreds who have chosen to visit them, or whom they have been invited to visit. The rooms which they occupied at the hotel have been repeatedly searched and scrutinized ; they have been taken without an hour's notice into houses they had never before entered ; they have been unconsciously placed on a glass surface, concealed under the carpet in order to interrupt electrical vibrations ; they have been disrobed by a committee of ladies, appointed without notice, and insisting that neither of them should leave the room until the investigation had been made, etc. , etc. ; yet we believe no one to this moment pretends that he has detected either of them in producing or causing the 'rappings,' nor do we think any of their contemnors has invented a plausible theory to account for the production of these sounds, nor the singular intelligence which [certainly at times] has seemed to be manifested through them. Some ten or twelve days since they gave up their rooms at the hotel, and devoted the remainder of their sojourn here to visiting several families, to which they had been invited by persons interested in the subject, and subjecting the singular influence to a closer, calmer examination than could be given to it at an hotel, and before casual companies of strangers, drawn together by vague curiosity more than rational interest, or predetermined and invincible hostility. Our own dwelling was among those they thus visited, not only submitting to, but courting the fullest and keenest inquiry with regard to the alleged ' manifestations' from the spirit-world by which they were attended.

'' We devoted what time we could spare from our duties, out of three days, to this subject ; and it would be the basest cowardice not to say that we are convinced beyond a doubt of their perfect integrity and good faith in the premises.  Whatever may be the origin or cause of the 'rappings,' the ladies in whose presence they occur do not make them. We tested this thoroughly, and to our entire satisfaction."

In 1855 Canadian author Susanna Moodie described a meeting she had with Kate Fox, who Moodie describes as having the most beautiful eyes she ever saw, eyes of a dark purple color:

"Miss F. [Kate Fox] told me to write a list of names of dead and living friends, but neither to read to her, nor to allow her to see them. I did this upon one side of a quire of paper, the whole thickness between her and me, writing with her back to me. She told me to run my pen along the list, and as a test the spirits would rap five times for every dead, and three times for every living, friend. I inwardly smiled at this. Yet strange to say, they never once missed."

Moodie reports a name being spelled out by raps, apparently under the common system of this time by which the alphabet would be recited, and a letter would be written down whenever a mysterious rap occurred after a letter was named.  The name spelled out (Anna Laura Harral) was someone whose name was unknown to Kate Fox, but who Moodie had made a compact with, under which either of the two people surviving death would try to communicate evidence of survival to the surviving person.  Moodie reports a wide variety of inexplicable sound phenomena occurring around Kate Fox (as did quite a few distinguished authors), including sounds (combined with vibrations) coming from the dirt or rocks Moodie stood on. Moodie reports a piano playing by itself, soon after Kate Fox suggested that it would. 

Moodie reports asking that the birth year and death year engraved under a ring Mr. Moodie was wearing be identified by the mysterious raps. The correct years were given, she says, as was her father's name and the date of his birth and death, and the place and cause of her father's death. Like countless other witnesses, she reports such questions were correctly answered, even though posed only mentally rather than orally. 

In an 1861 book Benjamin Coleman gives this remarkable account of meeting Kate Fox:

"The rappings in her presence are very loud and precise. When I  called on her one morning, the room resounded on all sides as if a host were giving me a joyous welcome. I asked if the spirits who were present would give me their names, and the names of Harry, Isabel, and Sylvester were spelt out, no names having been mentioned by me in Miss Fox's presence, and of course I and my family relations were wholly unknown to her. These were followed by other names of friends, spelt out in full, and one, a relative of my wife's said, 'Let me speak.'  A message followed, of a specially significant and touching character, which I am precluded from giving, as it relates to private family affair; but I may mention that the tenor of the message is an actual apology offered for an assumed injustice done to me during her life-time, now 20 years ago."

Alfred Russel Wallace (co-founder of the theory of evolution by natural selection) stated this about Kate Fox in 1874:

"Miss Kate Fox, the little girl of nine years old, who, as already stated, was the first ‘medium ' in the modern sense of the term, has continued to possess the same power for twenty-six years. At the very earliest stages of the movement, sceptic after sceptic, committee after committee, endeavoured to discover ' the trick ;' but if it was a trick this little girl baffled them all, and the proverbial acuteness of the Yankee was of no avail. In 1860, when Dr. Robert Chambers visited America, he suggested to his friend, Robert Dale Owen, the use of a balance to test the lifting power. They accordingly, without pre-arrangement with the medium, took with them a powerful steelyard, and suspended from it a dining-table weighing 121 pounds. Then, under a bright gaslight, the feet of the two mediums (Miss Fox and her sister) being both touched by the feet of the gentlemen, and the hands of all present being held over but not touching the table, it was made lighter or heavier at request, so as to weigh at one time only 60, at another 134 pounds. This experiment, be it remembered, was identical with one proposed by Faraday himself as being conclusive. Mr. Owen had many sittings with Miss Fox for the purpose of test ; and the precautions he took were extraordinary. He sat with her alone ; he frequently changed the room without notice ; he examined every article of furniture; he locked the doors and fastened them with strips of paper privately sealed ; he held both the hands of the medium. Under these conditions various phenomena occurred, the most remarkable being the illumination of a piece of paper (which he had brought himself, cut of a peculiar size, and privately marked), showing a dark hand writing on the floor. The paper afterwards rose up on to the table with legible writing upon it, containing a promise which was subsequently verified. (‘ Debateable Land,'  p. 293.)

But Miss Fox’s powers were most remarkably shown in the séances with Mr. Livermore, a well-known New York banker, and an entire sceptic before commencing these experiments. These sittings were more than three hundred in number, extending over five years. They took place in four different houses (Mr. Livermore’s and the medium’s being both changed during this period), under tests of the most rigid description. The chief phenomenon was the appearance of a tangible, visible, and audible figure of Mr. Livermore’s deceased wife, sometimes accompanied by a male figure, purporting to be Dr. Franklin. The former figure was often most distinct and absolutely life-like. It moved various objects in the room. It wrote messages on cards. It was sometimes formed out of a luminous cloud, and again vanished before the eyes of the witnesses. It allowed a portion of its dress to be cut off, which though at first of strong and apparently material gauzy texture, yet in a short time melted away and became invisible. Flowers which melted away were also given. These phenomena occurred best when Mr. L. and the medium were alone; but two witnesses were occasionally admitted, who tested everything and confirmed Mr. L.’s testimony. One of these was Mr. Livermore’s physician, the other his brother-in-law ; the latter previously a sceptic. The details of these wonderful séances were published in the Spiritual Magazine in 1862 and 1863 ; and the more remarkable are given in Owen’s ' Debateable Land,' from which work a good idea may be formed of the great variety of the phenomena that occurred and the stringent character of the tests employed. Miss Fox recently came to England, and here also her powers have been tested by a competent man of science, and found to be all that has been stated."

The scientist who Wallace refers to was William Crookes, not merely a "competent man of science" but one of the most accomplished physicists of his time, being the discover of the element thallium and inventor of the Crookes tube that was the technological ancestor of the television set. In the same year (1874) Crookes published his "Notes of an Enquiry Into the Phenomena Called Spiritual" in which he described various classes of inexplicable phenomena. Crookes listed as Class II "The Phenomena of Percussive and other Allied Sounds."  Describing that class of phenomena he stated this:

"The popular name of 'raps' conveys a very erroneous impression of this class of phenomena. At different times, during my experiments, I have heard delicate ticks, as with the point of a pin; a cascade of sharp sounds as from an induction coil in full work; detonations in the air; sharp metallic taps ; a cracking like that heard when a frictional machine is at work; sounds like scratching; the twittering as of a bird, &c.

These sounds are noticed with almost every medium, each having a special peculiarity; they are more varied with Mr. Home, but for power and certainty I have met with no one who at all approached Miss Kate Fox. For several months I enjoyed almost unlimited opportunity of testing the various phenomena occurring in the presence of this lady, and I especially examined the phenomena of these sounds. With mediums, generally, it is necessary to sit for a formal séance before anything is heard; but, in the case of Miss Fox it seems only necessary for her to place her hand on any substance for loud thuds to be heard in it, like a triple pulsation, sometimes loud enough to be heard several rooms off. In this manner I have heard them in a living tree—on a sheet of glass—on a stretched iron wire—on a stretched membrane—a tambourine—on the roof of a cab—and on the floor of a theatre. Moreover, actual contact is not always necessary; I have had these sounds proceeding from the floor, walls, &c., when the medium’s hands and feet were held—when she was standing on a chair—when she was suspended in a swing from the ceiling—when she was enclosed in a wire cage—and when she had fallen fainting on a sofa. I have heard them on a glass harmonicon—I have felt them on my own shoulder and under my own hands. I have heard them on a sheet of paper, held between the fingers by a piece of thread passed through one corner. With a full  knowledge of the numerous theories which have been started, chiefly in America, to explain these sounds, I have tested them in every way that I could devise, until there has been no escape from the conviction that they were true objective occurrences not produced by trickery or mechanical means.

An important question here forces itself upon the attention. Are the movements and sounds governed by intelligence? Ata very early stage of the enquiry, it was seen that the power producing the phenomena was not merely a blind force, but was associated with or governed by intelligence: thus the sounds to which I have just alluded will be repeated a definite number of times, they will come loud or faint, and in different places at request ; and by a pre-arranged code of signals, questions are answered, and messages given with more or less accuracy."

Wallace's account above refers to accounts in The Spiritual Magazine in 1862 and 1863. You can read some of those accounts here (pages 193 -201) and here (pages 260-264).  We read of some dramatic phenomena, but as evidence the accounts are far inferior to the accounts involving the materialization seances of Florence Cook. The reason is that there are not multiple named witnesses. Conversely, the seances of Florence Cook were promptly described in the greatest detail for very many months by very many named witnesses, who quickly published their accounts, typically within weeks (as I describe in my posts here and here). 

Wallace refers to the account of the Livermore seances with Kate Fox given by Robert Dale Owen in his book "The debatable land between this world and the next : with illustrative narrations." You can read the account by using the link here to access pages 483 and the next ten pages or so. On page 487 we have this narrative from Livermore of an event at a seance with Kate Fox:

"At last a luminous globe which had remained stationary some six feet to my left floated in front, and came within two feet of me. It was violently agitated, crackling sounds were heard, and a figure became visible by its light. Then there was revealed the full head and face of Estelle, every feature and lineament in perfection, spiritualized in shadowy beauty, such as no imagination can conceive or pen describe. In her hair, above the left temple, was a single white rose ; the hair being apparently arranged with great care. The entire head and face faded and then became visible again, at least twenty times ; the perfection of recognition, in each case, being in proportion to the brilliancy of the light." 

The physicist William Crookes gave this account of a meeting with Kate Fox:

"I was sitting next to the medium, Miss Fox, the only other persons present being my wife and a lady relative, and I was holding the medium's two hands in one of mine, whilst her feet were resting on my feet. Paper was on the table before us, and my disengaged hand was holding a pencil.  A luminous hand came down from the upper part of the room, and after hovering near me for a few seconds, took the pencil from my hand, rapidly wrote on a sheet of paper, threw the pencil down, and then rose up over our heads, gradually fading into darkness."

From such accounts above, you can get an idea of why a man like me might take it very seriously upon having a dream in which someone says,  "Kate Fox wants to see you." 

Kate Fox (later Kate Fox Jencken)

Postscript: The 1851 book "Pittsburgh and Allegheny Spirit Rappings" can be read here. On page 45 we have an account by William T. Coggshall dated June 6, 1851. It describes a meeting Coggshall had with Kate Fox on that date, June 6, 1851. We read of intelligent messages being received by raps, Coggshall describes a table in the room moving in mysterious ways -- away from him, and then towards him, with the movements sometimes being several feet, with Kate Fox being away from the table.  Similar spooky movements occurred to a chair, according to Coggshall. He describes mysterious raps coming from quite a few different places in the room, We read this:

"Numerous raps were now heard on the table, upon the floor, on the legs of the table, upon the under side, on one of the chairs, and the scratchings were repeated while the raps were being heard with great force. Again the table was moved back and forth, and presently there was a call for lie alphabet, and the word 'Done' was spelled."

The account is corroborated by another witness, E. F. Norton, in a statement dated June 6, 1851. We have here several hallmarks of first-class observational evidence: a named witness giving first-hand testimony of what he saw on the day he wrote such testimony, with someone else corroborating his statements.  The book is filled with similar testimonies, signed by named witnesses who date their statements. 

The SSOC page on www.iapsop.com (http://iapsop.com/ssoc/) is a valuable resource for contemporaneous accounts involving figures such as Kate Fox. I am able to find the an 1850 document by Dewey that gives one of the earliest accounts of a meeting with Kate Fox, an account by C. W. Hammond. He describes getting communications under a tedious system in which the alphabet is recited, and mysterious raps are heard after particular letters were recited, with the corresponding letter being written down. When he refers to "the family" he means the three Fox sisters (including Kate Fox) and their mother. On page 27 of the document, C. W. Hammond states this in a letter to Dewey:

"In compliance with your solicitation, I will proceed to lay before you a brief statement of  what has fallen under my observation, in regard to the 'mysterious sounds' and 'demonstrations,'  purporting to be made by intelligent spirits, who once inhabited an earthly tabernacle....On my next visit I was much-more successful. During the interval I had prepared my mind with certain questions, touching events unknown to the family, and of a remote date. The  sounds told me my age precisely, though my appearance is such as to indicate a difference· of eight or ten years. The names of six of my nearest deceased relatives were given me.  I then inquired, ' Will the spirit, who now makes these sounds, give me its name?' Five sounds directed me to the alphabet, which I repeated until the name of 'Charles' appeared, which answered to an infant child whom we consigned to the grave in March, 1843. To my inquiries, it gave me a true answer in regard to the time it had been in the spirit-land, and also the period since my eldest sister's death, which was nearly eighteen years, the latter fact ·not being recollected then, I found true by dates on my return home. Many other test questions were correctly answered; and yet, notwithstanding . the origin of these sounds seemed inexplicable, I was inclined to impute them to mesmerism or clairvoyance. However, as the spirit promised to satisfy me by other demonstrations when I came again, I patiently awaited the opportunity.

On the third visit, I was selected from a halfdozen gentlemen, and directed by these sounds to retire to another room, in company with the ' three sisters' and their aged mother. It was about eight o'clock in the evening. A lighted candle was placed on a large table, and we seated ourselves around it. I occupied one side of the table, the mother and the youngest daughter the right, and two of the sisters the left, leaving the opposite side of the table vacant. On taking our positions the sounds were heard, and continued to multiply and become more violent until every part of the room trembled with their demonstrations. They were unlike any 1 had heard before. Suddenly, as we were all resting on the table, I felt the side next to me move upward. I pressed upon it heavily, but soon it passed out of the reach of us all, full six feet from me, and at least four from the nearest person to it. I saw distinctly its position ; not a thread could have connected it with any of the company without my notice, for I had come to detect imposition, if it could be found. In this position we were situated, when the question was asked, ' Will the spirit move the table back where it was before V — and back it came, as though it were carried on the head of some one, who had not suited his position to a perfect equipoise, the balance being sometimes in favor of one side and then the other. But it regained its first position. In the meantime the ' demonstrations' grew louder and louder. The family commenced and sung the ' Spirit's song,' and several other pieces of sacred music, during which, accurate time was marked on the table, causing it to vibrate; a transparent hand, resembling a shadow, presented itself before my face ; I felt fingers taking hold of a lock of my hair on the left side of my head, causing an inclination of several inches; then a cold, death-like hand was drawn designedly over my face ; three gentle raps on my left knee ; my right limb forcibly pulled up, against strong resistance, under the table ; a violent shaking, as though two hands were applied to my shoulders ; myself and chair uplifted and moved back a few inches ; and several slaps, as with a hand, on the side of my head, which were repeated on each one of the company, more rapidly than I could count. During these manifestations, a piece of pasteboard, nearly a foot square, was swung with such velocity before us as to throw a strong current of air in our faces ; a paper curtain attached to one of the windows was rolled up and unrolled twice ; a lounge, immediately behind me, was shaken violently ; two small drawers in a bureau played back and forth with inconceivable rapidity ; a sound resembling a man sawing boards, and planing them, was heard under the table ; a common spinning-wheel seemed to be in motion, making a very natural buzz of the spindle ; a reel articulated each knot wound upon it ; while the sound of a rocking cradle indicated maternal care for the infant's slumbers  These were among many other demonstrations which I witnessed that evening, amid which I felt a perfect self-possession, and in no instance the slightest embarrassment, except a momentary chill when the cold hand was applied to my face, similar to a sensation I have realized when touching a dead body. That any of the company could have performed these things, under the circumstances in which we were situated, would require a greater stretch of credulity on my part than it would be to believe it was the work of spirits. It could not, by any possibility, have been done by them, nor even attempted, without detection. And I may add, that, near the close of the demonstrations at this visit, there was a vibration of the floor, as though several tons in weight had been uplifted, and suddenly fallen again upon it. This caused everything in the room to shake most violently for several minutes, when the force was withdrawn.

I have also tested the intelligence of these spirits in every way my ingenuity could invent. On one occasion, I wrote a word on a slip of paper privately, placed it in my wallet, went there, and the sounds, through the alphabet, spelled that word correctly as I had written it. That word was ' Sybil.'

 On the 29th of February, inst., the two youngest sisters made my family a visit. Here the sounds were heard — questions involving subjects wholly unknown to them were answered — a large, heavy dining-table was moved several times — and, on expressing thanks at the table to the Giver of all Good, some six or eight sounds responded to every sentence I uttered, by making loud and distinct sounds in various parts of the room. 

Yours, truly,

 C. Hammond. 

Rochester, Feb. '22, 1850."