The Apparitionists
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133 “philosophical instruments,” “That photography is yet”: Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, 1851 (London: Royal Commission, 1852), 243.
134 “BRADY (United States, No. 137)”: Ibid., 277.
134 “opens a fresh field of philosophical inquiry”: Ibid., 245.
13. CHAIR AND ALL
139 “Ever since I have commenced”: Mumler, quoted in Spiritual Magazine, January 1863.
140 “Your article of yesterday”: J. W. Edmonds, letter to the New York Evening Post, reprinted in Photographic News: A Weekly Record of the Progress of Photography, January 9, 1863, 20.
141 “They are all Germans”: “The Confederate Deserters,” New York Times, June 30, 1861.
142 “You can rest assured”: Letter from William Guay, reprinted in Photographic Journal, April 15, 1863.
142 “The result was”: Ibid.
143 “Having since continued”: Ibid.
143 “the spirits of those,” “These movements became”: Isaac Rehn, quoted in Robert Hare, Experimental Investigation of the Spirit Manifestations (New York: Partridge and Brittan, 1855), 290. See also “Isaac Rehn and James Cutting Encounter Imponderable Forces,” http://www.iapsop.com/spirithistory/isaac_rehn_and_james_cutting_encounter_imponderable_forces.html.
144 “I have been harassed enough”: Mumler, quoted in Spiritual Magazine, January 1863.
145 “chair and all”: Rehn, quoted in Hare, Experimental Investigation, 290.
146 “The noble rock cod”: Charles Aldrich, The Life and Times of Azro B. F. Hildreth: Including Personal and Family Letters, Miscellaneous Correspondence, and Selections from His Writings (Des Moines: Redhead, Norton, Lathrop & Company, 1891), 544.
147 “the exhibition has already drawn”: New York Tribune, May 24, 1859.
148 “South African aboriginees”: Boston Aquarial Gardens advertisement, 1860, quoted in Jerry Ryan, The Forgotten Aquariums of Boston (Boston: Finley Aquatic Books, 2002).
148 “desperation of dullness,” “flaming advertisement”: New York Daily Tribune, November 16, 1860, quoted in Ryan, The Forgotten Aquariums.
148 “We went and found the fish tanks drained”: Ibid.
14. DID YOU EVER DREAM OF SOME LOST FRIEND?
153 “The living that throng Broadway” and quotes following: “Brady’s Photographs: Pictures of the Dead at Antietam,” New York Times, October 20, 1862.
155 “From these pictures the historian”: “Photographic Phases,” New York Times, July 21, 1862.
156 “Among the many sun-compellers”: Ibid.
159 “It is not in the Southern character”: “Death in the White House,” Athens (Tennessee) Post, March 14, 1862.
159 “ever after there was a new quality”: Alban Jasper Conant, “A Portrait Painter’s Reminiscences of Lincoln,” McClure’s Magazine 32, no. 5 (March 1909).
159 “. . . I have heard you say”: William Shakespeare, The Life and Death of King John, act 3, scene 4.
159 “Did you ever dream of some lost friend”: Doris Kearns Goodwin, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2005), 423.
160 “Willie lives”: Jean H. Baker, Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (New York: Norton, 1989), 220.
160 “out of regard for President Lincoln”: One of Mumler’s early images of Mary Lincoln can be seen in Lloyd Ostendorf, “The Photographs of Mary Todd Lincoln,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 61, no. 3 (Autumn 1968), 269–332.
161 “Mr. Lincoln was greatly annoyed”: Reverend P. D. Gurley, quoted in Harold K. Bush, Lincoln in His Own Time: A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2011), 65.
15. WAR AGAINST WRONG
163 “Superintending improvements”: Scrap Book and Magazine of American Literature, February 23, 1863.
163 “Persons residing at any distance”: Marc Demarest, “The Actual Likeness of Spirits: The Early Career of William H. Mumler,” Chasing Down Emma, March 17, 2015, http://ehbritten.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-actual-likeness-of-spirits-early.html.
164 “so much outre”: “Another Spirit-Photograph Recognized,” Herald of Progress, May 9, 1863.
164 “Being an investigator”: Charles M. Plumb, “‘Spirit Photographs.’ A Word of Caution.” Herald of Progress, April 11, 1863.
164 “Early in the progress”: Ibid.
165 “I propose to go”: Spiritual Magazine, January 1863.
165 “I wish it distinctly understood”: Ibid.
166 “To think that they should pretend,” “If there were a collection,” “I have neither the time nor desire”: Banner of Light 13, no. 2 (April 4, 1863), 5.
16. WHOSE BONES LIE BLEACHING
172 “The whole town, about 3000 inhabitants”: Eliza Farnham, quoted in D. Scott Hartwig, “Eliza W. Farnham—An Unsung Heroine of Gettysburg,” March 2, 2002, https://npsgnmp.wordpress.com/2012/03/02/eliza-w-farnham-an-unsung-heroine-of-gettysburg/.
172 “Dear friends of the Herald”: Eliza Farnham, letter to the Herald of Progress, July 18, 1863.
173 “ghosts and hobgoblins seen there”: Gettysburg Compiler, January 29, 1880.
174 “Unfit for Service,” “The Slaughter Pen,” “harvest of death,” “thrown behind him”: These and other descriptions of what Alexander Gardner claimed to have found at Gettysburg appear in Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War (Washington, DC: Philp & Solomons, 1865–66).
178 “The musket, rusted by many storms”: Ibid.
179 A local photographer: Peter Weaver’s images of living soldiers playing dead can be seen at http://civilwartalk.com/threads/the-weaver-photographs-at-gettysburg-nov-1863.83786/.
17. ALL IS GONE AND NOTHING SAVED
183 “Lincoln was kind”: J. W. Edmonds, Letters and Tracts on Spiritualism (London: J. Burns, 1875), 27.
184 “too torrid for human endurance,” “prostrated”: New York Herald, July 1, 1865.
185 “puffery”: “Barnum’s Museum,” New York Times, August 13, 1865.
185 “insatiate want of human nature”: Phineas Taylor Barnum, How I Made Millions: The Life of P. T. Barnum (New York: Dillingham, 1888), 57.
185 “The American people . . . like to be fooled”: Barnum, quoted in Edward Theodore Page, Advertising: How to Plan, Prepare, Write and Manage (Chicago: Publicity Publishing Company, 1903), 111.
187 “ingenious,” “a scientific chemist,” “remarkably ghostlike”: P. T. Barnum, The Humbugs of the World (New York: Carleton, 1866), 111.
187 “Money is in some respect”: P. T. Barnum, The Life of P. T. Barnum Written by Himself (Buffalo: The Courier Company, 1888), 176.
188 “best woman in the world”: Barnum, quoted in his obituary “The Great Showman Dead,” New York Times, April 8, 1891.
191 “My ‘puffing’ was more persistent”: Barnum, The Life of P. T. Barnum, 59.
192 “hastily put on one of his wife’s dresses”: New York Times, May 15, 1865.
192 “Nobody will attempt”: Green Mountain Freeman (Montpelier, Vermont), May 23, 1865.
192 $500 for Davis’s dress: Syracuse Daily Courier and Union, May 19, 1865.
192 “Put outside a picture”: Telegram from P. T. Barnum received by telegraph operator Ransom Phelps, May 17, 1865, quoted in Clement Augustus Lounsberry, Early History of North Dakota: Essential Outlines of American History (Washington, DC: Liberty Press, 1919), 509.
192 “If Barnum can get possession”: Springfield (Massachusetts) Weekly Republican, May 20, 1865.
192 “Before a month expires”: Brooklyn Daily Eagle, May 20, 1865.
192 “hang Jeff Davis from a sour apple tree”: For an example of this lyric’s political use from the period, see Hinds County Gazette (Raymond, Mississippi), June 12, 1868.
192 “The Belle of Richmond”: Materials related to Jefferson Davis wearing a dress can be viewed on the Library of Congress website: http:/
/www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2008661830/.
193 “As Jeff made his perilous descent”: “Disastrous Fire,” New York Times, July 14, 1865.
193 “It is suspected”: “The Destruction of Barnum’s Museum,” Pittsburgh Gazette, July 17, 1865.
193 “gave the flames such an impetus”: Samuel P. Richards, Sam Richards’s Civil War Diary: A Chronicle of the Atlanta Home Front (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2009), 286.
194 “All is gone and nothing saved”: “Disastrous Fire.”
18. A FAVORITE HAUNT OF APPARITIONS
197 “We are about making”: Mumler’s Jefferson Davis image and caption can be viewed online at https://www.icp.org/browse/archive/objects/we-are-about-making-a-movement-that-will-astonish-the-world-jd.
198 “A prophet is not without honor”: William Mumler, “The Personal Experiences . . . Part 2,” 1.
201 “The great commotion”: San Francisco Chronicle, March 26, 1869.
201 “Resolved, That this conference”: “The Spurious Spirits,” New York Sun, April 14, 1869.
202 “Too often in the busy life”: John William Draper, “President Draper’s Address,” Photographic Notes 5 (June 1, 1860), 151.
202 “improvements in developing chemicals”: Ibid., 152.
203 “My object of placing this”: Mumler pamphlet, quoted in Elbridge T. Gerry, The Mumler “Spirit” Photograph Case. Argument of Elbridge T. Gerry on the Preliminary Examination of W. H. Mumler, Charged with Obtaining Money by Pretended “Spirit” Photographs (New York: Baker, Vorhis & Co., 1869), 19.
204 “a brilliant collegiate course”: “The Laetare Medal,” Donahoe’s Magazine, June 1888.
204 “immediate and peremptory draft”: Samuel Merrill, Newspaper Libel: A Handbook for the Press (Boston: Ticknor and Company, 1888), 80.
205 “What our reporter thinks”: New York Sun, February 26, 1869.
206 “Many persons would gladly give”: New York Times, April 13, 1869.
206 “work of the devil”: La Civiltà Cattolica, 1853, quoted in Christopher M. Moreman, ed., The Spiritualist Movement: Speaking with the Dead in America and Around the World (Santa Barbara ABC-CLIO, 2013), 40.
206 “There is little reason to doubt”: “The Second Plenary Council of Baltimore,” New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02235a.htm.
207 “In the United States”: La Civiltà Cattolica, 1853.
19. THE SPIRITS DO NOT LIKE A THRONG
209 “sawdust swindle”: “An Old Complaint Book,” New York Times, November 28, 1886.
210 “These books were gathered together”: New York Times, June 27, 1886.
211 “any violations of the ordinances”: Jerome Mushkat, Fernando Wood: A Political Biography (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1990), 43.
211 “From 10 to 4 the big space”: “An Old Complaint Book.”
211 “a harlot, a gorilla”: “Oakey Hall on Horace Greeley,” New York Times, January 21, 1863.
212 “Not only is it possible,” “The spirits do not like a throng”: New York Times, April 13, 1869.
213 “produced surprising effects”: New York Herald, April 13, 1869.
213 “one dozen spirit photographs, ten dollars”: Ibid.
20. THE TENDEREST SYMPATHIES OF HUMAN NATURE
215 “He has a hard class,” “penetrating power”: James D. McCabe, The Secrets of the Great City (Philadelphia: National Publishing Company, 1868), 100.
216 “What is this modern Spiritualism?”: Gerry, The Mumler “Spirit” Photograph Case, 20.
217 “duty to procure scientific news”: New York Times, April 13, 1869.
218 “What led you to enter”: New York Herald, April 22, 1869.
219 “infamously brutal”: New York Times, January 17, 1866.
219 “The Fighting Lawyer”: John Drake Townsend, New York in Bondage (New York: by subscription, 1901), xiii.
220 “marked ability,” “recondite themes”: Adin Ballou, ed., An Elaborate History and Genealogy of the Ballous in America (Providence, RI: Press of E. L. Freeman & Son, 1888), 1109.
220 “Have you, Mr. Tooker, any other name” and quotes following: New York Herald, April 22, 1869.
221 “Bolivar,” “Walton,” “The Widow Rogers”: A. E. Costello, Our Firemen: A History of New York Fire Departments (New York: A. E. Costello, 1887), 555.
221 “incisive but never rancorous”: New York Times, July 8, 1896.
221 “What promise,” “That will do, Mr. Tooker”: New York Herald, April 22, 1869.
21. WEEP, WEEP, MY EYES
223 “I have nothing to do with the establishment!”: New York Herald, April 13, 1869.
223 “Were you present”: Accounts of the testimony of William Guay appear in the New York Herald, April 22, 1869, and the Spiritual Magazine, June 1, 1869, 244.
226 “I have known Mr. Mumler” and quotes following: Testimony of Judge Edmonds, quoted in “Spiritual Photographs: Trial of Mr. Mumler in New York,” Spiritual Magazine 4 (June 1869), 243.
227 “a man full of sympathy,” “warmly attached to her,” “Pleurez, pleurez, mes yeux”: Peyton Farrell Miller, A Group of Great Lawyers of Columbia County, New York (privately printed, 1904), 176–77.
228 “I was at the time withdrawn,” “I was invited”: John Worth Edmonds, Spiritualism (New York: Partridge & Brittan, 1858), 71.
229 “I know a great many persons,” “This is the most remarkable”: Testimony of Judge Edmonds from the New York Tribune, quoted in Emma Hardinge Britten, Nineteenth-Century Miracles (London: William Britten, 1883), 474.
230 “Spiritualists reason”: Spiritual Magazine, June 1, 1869, 244.
230 “I believe that the camera”: Ibid., 244–45.
231 “How do spirits dress?”: Ibid.
232 “I was impressed”: New York Times, February 14, 1886.
22. ARE YOU A SPIRITUALIST IN ANY DEGREE?
235 “Women have long printed”: Vassar Miscellany, November 1872, 116.
236 “Have you had any experience” and quotes following: New York Herald, April 22, 1869.
23. AN OLD, MOTH-EATEN CLOAK
243 “Lack of appreciation of art,”: James Sullivan, The History of New York State, Vol. 5 (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1927), 2324.
244 “The miniature in the presence”: Robin Jaffee Frank, Love and Loss: American Portrait and Mourning Miniatures (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000), 277.
244 “In his earlier professional life,” “Upon the decline”: “Samuel Raymond Fanshaw, 1814–1888,” National Academy Museum, Index of Artists, http://www.nationalacademy.org/collections/artists/detail/1315/.
245 “I am a miniature and portrait painter” and quotes following: New York Herald, April 24, 1869.
247 “In the front rank,” “Every one who knew him mourns”: New York Military Museum and Veterans Research Center, https://dmna.ny.gov/historic/reghist/civil/cavalry/6thCav/6thCavFanshaw.htm.
248 “If, looking through an old”: Ibid.
24. BY SUPERNATURAL MEANS
251 Testimonies of David A. Hopkins, Lutheria C. Reeves, and William W. Silver: New York Herald, April 24, 1869.
25. FIGURA VAPOROSA
260 “The Mumler spirit-photography case”: Fort Wayne Daily Gazette, April 27, 1869.
260 “A very deep interest”: Charleston Daily News, April 29, 1869.
261 “It is certainly very strange”: Semi-Weekly Wisconsin (Milwaukee), April 29, 1869.
261 “I will pay $100”: William Slee, letter to the New York Tribune, reprinted in Britten, Nineteenth-Century Miracles, 479.
261 “figura vaporosa”: El Criterio Espiritista, July 1869.
262 “I have been a photographer”: Jeremiah Gurney, quoted in Britten, Nineteenth-Century Miracles, 474.
264 “The color is leaden, almost brown”: New York Times, April 25, 1865.
265 “WAR DEPARTMENT, Washington City”: Edwin Stanton letter, April 25, 1865, in Compilation of the Offici
al Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1894), 952.
266 “DICKENS, GURNEY, AND BRADY”: Brooklyn Eagle, December 27, 1867.
267 “In justification of our mercantile honor”: Gurney, quoted in Susan Cook, “Celebrity Circulation I: Dickens in Photographs,” Journal of Victorian Culture Online, April 16, 2013, http://blogs.tandf.co.uk/jvc/2013/04/16/celebrity-circulation-i-dickens-in-photographs/.
268 “The effect was produced”: New York Herald, April 27, 1869.
269 “a veiled figure seated”: Ibid.
269 “1. The photographer might take”: “Spirit Photographs: How They Can Be Made,” Chicago Tribune, May 2, 1869.
270 “The actual developments of the case”: New York Tribune, April 29, 1869.
271 “Are you a believer” and quotes following in questioning of Abraham Bogardus: Oneida (New York) Circular, May 3, 1869.
26. THEY PAID THEIR MONEY, AND THEY HAD THEIR CHOICE
277 “Do you believe in spooks?”: The testimony of P. T. Barnum in the Tombs appeared in many newspapers, including the Philadelphia Evening Telegraph, April 29, 1869; the National Republican (Washington, DC), April 30, 1869; and the Oneida (New York) Circular, May 3, 1869, from which the account here is drawn.
280 “If people declare”: P. T. Barnum, The Humbugs of the World, 110.
27. THOSE MORTALS GIFTED WITH THE POWER OF SEEING
283 “the first time”: Amelia V. Brooks, letter to the New York Herald, April 21, 1869.
284 “The case under investigation”: “Argument of Mr. Townsend,” New York Times, May 4, 1869.
287 “May it please the court” and quotes following: Gerry, The Mumler “Spirit” Photograph Case, 19.
291 “After careful attention to the case”: Elk County Advocate (Ridgway, Pennsylvania), May 21, 1869.
28. CALM ASSURANCE OF A HAPPY FUTURE