1937
WINTER
1936 - 1937
L. H., Mr. and Mrs. Wither, Isabella Farquhar; series of sitting, the Withers begin to show signs of both mental and physical mediumship.
In the séance room, Mr. Wither (weighing about 220 pounds), was levitated twice. An amazing phenomenon. L. H. passes her hands underneath his stocking feet, which she found to be about one foot above the floor. He groaned as if in great physical distress; he is only partly conscious - that is, he is partly entranced. After the sitting he describes his sensation: his body seemed suddenly very light; and he seemed literally to be floating in the air. Apart from this, he said he had no sensation of any kind - no fear, and no feeling that his levitation was being engineered by beings from another state.
Isabella was now beginning to show developing psychic faculties.
Throughout the last months of 1936, and into 1937, Isabella (known as "Faith") had visions of the Christ, both in the sittings and when working as a maid in the house. In the sittings she became entranced and spoke as a "Prophet", foretelling the coming of great sorrow to the earth, and the return of Christ in 'etheric' form, to be again with men and aid them through the dire times ahead.
Occasionally, impromptu sittings were held with Dawn in 1938. In 1939 work was begun in earnest with Withers and Dawn, at Walter's request.
The Presence-Manifestations of the Winter of 1937.
But the end of these things was not yet. During the winter and spring of 1937 we held our regular sittings, but with Dawn and Mercedes absent. The Presence-phenomena, of which they had seen a little, they regarded as blasphemous, and refused to attend. The others carried on; the group being comprised of Reverend and Mrs. McMillan, Reverend Wood, Mr. and Mrs. Wither, Mr. and Mrs. Shand, Glen and Jim quite often, myself, and Isabella. One arresting physical phenomenon appeared frequently during this time - the complete levitation of Mr. Wither a distance of several inches above the floor, for several seconds; the phenomenon being due, apparently, to the presence of our three potential physical mediums - Isabella, and the two Withers. Mr. Wither groaned and seemed greatly distressed while this was going on; and the two others also manifested considerable reaction to this extraordinarily powerful event. (Mr. Wither weighs about 200 pounds.)
During this time no more visions of the Christ appeared to Isabella; but in their place came a new demonstration, the appearance of what we came to call 'The Presence' at the close of each sitting. A Voice of great dignity and sweetness impossible to describe adequately, that spoke through Isabella, blessed us, called us His disciples, and sometimes laid His hands on us as if to give us power. It was a strange and moving experience for all of us, and although we never talked of this after the séance was over, will not be forgotten by those of us present privileged to take part in this impressive event.
Mrs. Wither, in trance, began to talk of 'Light', a being, whom, while she was in this state, she believe to be the Master; and before whom she showed the most profound reverence. In addition, Jack MacDonald experienced the phenomenon that has since come to Victor (Mr. Cooper) and to Ms. Elliott. A commanding voice spoke through Isabella and commanded him to describe what he saw. Like these others, almost with agony, and with great effort, he stated that he saw before him a cloud; that the clouds parted and out looked the face of the Savior, full, strong, beautiful, but with the eyes full of suffering. The brightness of this vision was to him well-nigh overpowering. He said that it was like looking into the sun with the form of a man outlined within. Power, for Jack to see this vision, appeared to be drawn from those about him, particularly from the three mentioned, who were definitely mediumistic.
This was the mainstream of events of this class that took place during the first five months of 1937. The rest you know and took part in. In August I went to see you in Dundas; Isabella followed in October; and in November, Victor had his first sitting with us, knowing nothing at all of this history. He too, unexpectedly, saw the Christ; and I need not remind you of the moving nature of his experience. I recall that we had a short and impromptu sitting with Isabella and Victor in the living room; that just as the sitting closed the Presence appeared to Isabella and in a loud voice commanded Victor to tell what he saw. Following this, Victor seemed to be laboring under a great stress of some kind and kept crying out that he could not look, that the vision was too bright. Finally he gasped out 'My God, I see Christ.' Then he fell to the floor and lay there for some time dazed and apparently in a semi-trance state. He recovered normal consciousness and seemed deeply shaken by this completely unexpected occurrence.
[Note: I also was present at a sitting held in my home in 1936 when Peter (Mr. Withers) was levitated by psychic force. I myself knelt on the floor and passed my two hands under his stockinged feet. He had been levitated about eight inches. He weighed at this time a little over 200 pounds. He was semi-conscious and groaned throughout this experiment. Dawn was not present. - L. H.]
April, 1937
[Handwritten at top of page - "Psychic Science" April 1937]
[Quarterly Transactions of B. C. P. S.]
The Death of Kitty A
A Case of Supernormal Cognition
Reported by Mrs. T. Glen Hamilton, of Winnipeg.
At a sitting held at the home of the writer on the evening of April 24th, a phenomenon occurred of the purely subjective type which, to those present, was a manifestation of singular significance from the evidential and experimental viewpoint. This was, generally speaking, a supernormal revelation regarding the death of a friend, Kitty A., living eighteen hundred miles away in British Columbia, and of which at the time, both sitters and mediums knew nothing.
Two mediums played a part in this transmission: Mary M., already known to readers of Psychic Science through various reports published in this Journal regarding her physical phenomena; and "Faith," a young girl-medium whose powers for producing subjective phenomena had only recently been discovered and whose regular development had been underway only some three months. Mary M. knew Kitty well; Faith did not know of her existence.
Two aspects of this newer mediumship require to be noted. The trance state with Faith exhibits all the ear-marks of the genuine and mediumistic sleep of the more pronounced type, definitely marked stages appearing each time trance comes on. These were as follows:
(a) a brief period of onset in which the subject is excited and manifests various features of a more of less hysterical nature;
(b) a period of muscular relaxation;
(c) a cataleptic stage in which there is marked rigidity of the whole body musculature;
(d) the recovery stage, which lasts anywhere from twenty to thirty minutes to occasionally an hour or more. Due to the somewhat unduly exhausting nature of this condition it had become our custom to put this young girl to bed at the end of the seance in a room by herself except for the presence of some one member of the group who remained to watch over her. Under these circumstances, as a rule she passes readily from trance-sleep into normal sleep, and from this again back to a normal or near -normal state of waking.
[There is some handwritten material at the bottom of this page which I cannot decipher - W. D. F.]
