CHAPTER VI
THE ATTACK ON MRS. DEANE AND MR. VEARNCOMBE

I took up my pen for the purpose of considering the case of the Crewe Circle and urging the folly of discarding the work of seventeen years on the score of a single case. I cannot, however, end my task without saying a few words as to the attack upon Mrs. Deane and Mr. Vearncombe, two other photographic mediums. This attack hardly deserves attention as it was anonymous, but it was brought out under the auspices of the Magic Circle, a society of conjurers who have been interesting themselves in matters psychic. As the two attacks were issued almost simultaneously they seem to have had some common inspiration, and to have formed a general assault upon the whole position of psychic photography. The same individual, Mr. Seymour, the amateur conjurer, actually took part, I understand, in both transactions.

Mrs. Deane, the person attacked, is a somewhat pathetic and forlorn figure among all these clever tricksters. She is a little, elderly charwoman, a humble white mouse of a person, with her sad face, her frayed gloves, and her little handbag which excites the worst suspicions in the minds of her critics. Her powers were discovered in the first instance quite by chance. When she first pursued the subject her circumstances were such that her only dark room was under the kitchen table with clothes pinned round it. None the less, she produced some remarkable pictures under these conditions, one of which fell into my hands, and I at once concluded that she had real powers. The portrait was of a young man in life, with a female spirit face behind him. This might well have been faked. Something seemed to be emerging from the young man’s head, however, and on observing this object with a lens I distinguished that it was a small but correct representation of the Assyrian fish-god, Dagon, wearing the peculiar hat with which that deity is always associated. This was so entirely the kind of freakish result which I expect from spirit photography, and was so removed from the normal powers of a charwoman, that I provisionally accepted her in my mind as a true medium, a position from which I have never been compelled to budge. I still retain this photograph, but the little head is too small for satisfactory reproduction.

Mrs. Deane (or Mrs. Deane’s control) has one embarrassing habit which I believe to be unnecessary, and which makes it very difficult to convince the sceptic, or, indeed, to prevent him from writing her down as an obvious fraud. Far from insisting that you bring your own plates, as Hope does, she likes them to be sent to her in advance, and she does what she calls “magnetising” them, by keeping them near her for some days. This is so suspicious that it can hardly be defended, but here, again, there is an element of fanatical obedience. My own personal belief is that her results are perfectly honest, that they are actually formed in the shape of psychographs during the days before the sitting, and that if her plates were examined before they were exposed to light, the pictures would be found already on them. This, of course, would very naturally be taken as clear proof of fraud by the superficial investigator, ignorant of the strange possibilities of psychic photography, but I believe myself that the psychic effect is a perfectly genuine one, but that the extra will very probably bear no relevancy to the sitter. I am speaking now of her general routine, for how can I guarantee every particular case or judge what a medium may do when dealing with so evanescent and elusive a thing as psychic power? When they have it they use it—when it fails them the human element may come in.

I have had one sitting with Mrs. Deane in which six plates were exposed. In four of them there were abnormal results. One of these was a female face smiling from an ectoplasmic cloud. What does Mrs. Deane know of ectoplasmic clouds? One such is visible in the specimen of her work which is shown in Figure 30. Exactly similar are some of the clouds which appear in Hope’s work. Such appearances do not aid deception. Why, then, should they appear if it is not that it is part of a psychic process?

Mrs. Deane gave me the choice of two packets of plates upon this occasion, and I admit that the effects may very well have been on the plates before the exposure. None the less, they were probably quite genuine as supernormal pictures. Such a statement may raise a smile from Mr. MacCabe or from Mr. Paternoster in Truth, but I have the advantage over them in the fact that I have had practical experience of the matter at issue.

Fig. 12.—Photograph of Mr. Wm. Jeffrey and his daughter, showing ectoplasmic bag. (See p. 37.)

Fig. 13.—Photograph taken immediately after that shown by Fig. 12. Position of sitters is unchanged, but the ectoplasmic veiling now contains an excellent likeness (slightly distorted) of Mr. Jeffrey’s deceased wife.

Fig. 14.—Psychic likeness of Agnes, daughter of Dr. Allerton Cushman. A life-like picture obtained by Dr. Cushman through a surprise visit paid to Mrs. Dean. (See p. 63.)

Fig. 15.—A normal photograph of Agnes Cushman for comparison with Fig. 14.

But I am bound to give my reasons for such a statement, or I might well be branded as credulous. My reasons are that I am convinced that this magnetising process is perfectly unnecessary and Mrs. Deane, within my knowledge, obtains her best results when there has been no possibility of knowing who her sitter will be. The very finest result which I know of in psychic photography was that obtained by Dr. Cushman with Mrs. Deane. Dr. Cushman, a distinguished scientific man of America, had suffered the loss of his daughter Agnes some months before. He went to the Psychic College without an appointment or an introduction. When he arrived he found Mrs. Deane in the act of leaving. He persuaded her to give a sitting, and then and there he obtained a photograph of his “dead” daughter which is, he declares, unlike any existing one, and is more vital and characteristic than any taken in life. When I was in the States I showed this picture on the screen as in Figure 14, and there was abundant testimony from those who knew Agnes that it was a life-like picture.

I would refer this case to the anonymous writers of the Magic Circle, who has done all they could to worry this poor woman and to destroy her powers, and I would ask them how that little bag of tricks which exists only in their own imagination could have affected such a result as that. It will be noted in the already quoted opinion of Dr. Cushman that since this scandal Mrs. Deane has been severely tested by him and others, and that they have been able under the Doctor’s own conditions to get psychic results.

Another excellent case of Mrs. Deane’s power is that which forms the subject of Figure 30. The extra in the ectoplasmic cloud is Mr. Barlow, senior, the father of the Secretary of the S.S.S.P. Beside him is a picture of how he looked twelve years before his death. No one can deny that it is the same man with the years added on. Mrs. Deane never knew Mr. Barlow’s father in life. How, then, was this result obtained? These are the cases which the Magic Circle report avoids, while it talks much of any negative results which it can collect or imagine. I hope that this short account may do something towards helping a woman whom I believe to be a true psychic, and who has suffered severely for the faith that is in her, having actually, I understand, endured the excommunication of her church because she has used the powers which God has given her. I have a recollection that Joan of Arc endured the same fate for the reason “le plus il change, le plus il reste le même.”

It only remains for me now, before giving place to others, to say a word about Mr. Vearncombe, the psychic photographer of Bridgwater. Mr. Vearncombe was a normal, professional photographer, but he found, as Mumler did, that inexplicable extras intruded upon and spoilt both his plates and his business. He then began to study this new power, which he seemed to possess, and to develop it for commercial use. Mrs. Humphreys, a member of the S.S.S.P. and a student of psychic affairs, lived in the same town and submitted him to certain tests which convinced her and others of his bona fides, though I cannot repeat too often that no blank cheque of honesty can ever be given to any man.

My own experience of Mr. Vearncombe and my knowledge of his work are far less than in the cases of Mr. Hope and Mrs. Deane, so that I can only say that I believe he produces genuine results, whereas in the other two cases I can say that I know they produce genuine results.

I have had two experiments with Vearncombe, but did not impose any test conditions in either case. I simply sent a closed envelope containing a letter and asked him to photograph it in the hope that some extra might appear which I could associate with the sender of the letter. In both cases a large number, six or seven, well-marked faces developed round the letter, but none which bore any message to me. Others, however, have been more fortunate in their experience and have assured me that they have received true pictures of the dead in that fashion. There is no ectoplasmic cloud or psychic arch, but the faces are as clear-cut as if they were stamped with a die.

I am in some degree responsible for Vearncombe’s troubles, as I mentioned his name as being one who might repay investigation upon the occasion when I gave evidence before a committee of these conjuring gentlemen. They seem to have made up a sealed packet to Mr. Vearncombe with instructions to get what he could. Upon its return they declared that the packet, which had furnished a psychic result, had been tampered with. No independent proof whatever was offered in support of this assertion, and Mr. Fred Barlow, who had obtained results from Mr. Vearncombe, where he was sure that the packets had not been tampered with, was sufficiently interested to hunt up the name of the sender and some details of the case from the Vearncombe end, rather than from that of the “exposers.” Fortunately Vearncombe had preserved the letters, and it was then found that the sender, when the packet and the psychic result had been returned, had at once written to Vearncombe to acknowledge receipt, adding the two statements:

Thus the Magic Circle had clearly fallen into the pit that it had digged, and its agent is convicted either of being a senseless liar without any cause, or else of having completely endorsed the result which the Circle afterwards pretended was a failure. It was one of those numerous instances when it is not the medium but the investigators who should really be exposed. My experience is that this is the case far more frequently than the public can realise, and that it is amazing how men of honour can turn and twist the facts when they deal with this subject. A well-known “exposer” assured a friend of mine that he would think nothing of putting muslin in a medium’s pocket at a séance, if he was sure that he could thereby secure a conviction.

I have seen a letter from Mr. Marriott, who is also busy in showing up “frauds,” in which, writing to Mr. Hope, he offered to teach him to make more artistic spirit-photographs, charging thirty guineas if the lessons were in London and forty if at Crewe. I am quite prepared to anticipate Mr. Marriott’s explanation that this was a trap, but it is an example of the tortuous, deceptive methods against which our mediums have to contend.

I understand that Mr. Vearncombe is so disgusted with the whole episode that he declares he will demonstrate his powers no longer, save to private friends. We can but hope that he will not allow ignorant or dishonest anonymous criticism to influence him to this extent. If all of us who endure annoyance, and even insult, were to desert the spiritualist cause in order to save our private feelings, we could hardly expect the truth to prevail.

Let me conclude by saying that I speak from a far larger experience than the representatives of the S.P.R. or of the Magic Circle, and that, leaving out Mr. Vearncombe, who needs no defence in the face of the admission quoted above, I have no doubt whatever of the true psychic powers of Mrs. Deane and of Mr. Hope, though I cannot pronounce upon every single case at which I was not present and when I have had no opportunity of examining the complete evidence. I fear that the most permanent result of this episode will be that the spiritualists will very reasonably refuse the present régime of the Research Society all access to their mediums, since experience has shown that they may, without a chance of self-defence, be attacked in consequence in a cheap, popular pamphlet before even the case has been examined by any impartial authority.