5 Richmond (CA) News, March 5, 1920. Folklorist Ruth Ann Musick collected a dybbuk-like story that reportedly happened at West Virginia in 1914 (dybbuk refers to a Jewish folk belief in possession by spirits of the dead, rather than demons). It involved Fred Brown, a coal miner, who became possessed by Sam Vincci, a miner who died two years earlier. Musick writes, “I have several other stories of possession, all of Italian origin, I believe [my italics].” Ruth Ann Musick, The Bloody Lilac Bush (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1965), 179.
6 Oakland Tribune (March 6, 1920). There were few black people in El Cerrito in 1920, but the name suggests a real person and not the generic “negro ‘voodoo’” suggested by the Richmond (CA) Independent (March 5, 1920).
7 Different dates and times were reported for the Passion Display and learning the secret of the hole. The mystery of the hole was going to be revealed on March 7. According to the Richmond Independent (March 4, 1920), Rosa Bottini and her father believed that “[t]he ‘evil spirits’ were supposed . . . to disappear through a hole in the back yard at the Moro and Soldavini home, and the good spirits emerged from this hole.”
8 The Oakland Tribune reported that the group burned any bill with a seven in its serial numbers. Other newspapers claimed that as much as $700 was destroyed, but Rosa Bottini said that only “small change” went into the fire (Richmond Independent, March 4, 1920). Newspaper accounts claimed that there were several Ouija boards in the house, but Rosa said: “It is queer that people should say there four. One is enough to give the messages” (Oakland Tribune, March 4, 1920). If the board was incinerated on March 1 or 2, it might reveal something about how the group was evolving with four psychics in one séance room: Mrs. Moro was “chief invoker of the power of the Ouija board”; Josephine had psychic dreams; Mrs. Bottini was a trance visionary; and Adeline, the spirit medium. Perhaps they had become competitive. If so, did the board’s destruction represent Adeline’s emergence as the leader? She was often described as their “high priestess.”
9 Rosa is the only child who was identified. The Bottinis’ three-year-old girl is mentioned in newspaper articles but not the census and was probably there, along with the Soldavinis’ children: two-year-old Eleanor and four-year-old “Masimo.” (His name is difficult to read in the 1920 and 1930 censuses.) As for the fifth child, the Oakland Tribune reported that “the door of the shuttered house opened long enough for one of the group to dart out and seize a small child who was kept captive until the police arrived an hour later to find her brown curls had been added to the offerings.” While this sounds improbable, the two-year-old son of Louis Francesco was reportedly missing for a brief period that day and was presumably the child found in the Moro-Soldavini house.
10 The idea that grimoires, books of spells, could not be destroyed or discarded has become part of Ouija board lore. This example comes from an online forum: “he took the board outside to the fire pit and lit it a fire, through [sic] the board into it, and the board came flying back at him, he tried that several times and each time it flew back at him. The last time, it hit his head and caused him to bleed (he still has the scar some 20 yrs later). Gave up on the fire and threw it in the trash. the next day she woke up and it was sitting on the bed stand by her bed.” http://www.shadowsinthedarkradio.com/community.
11 Lima (OH) Sunday News, March 7, 1920.
12 Richmond Independent, March 6, 1920.
13 Moberly (MO) Monitor-Index, March 9, 1920. They were searching for the person who killed John Jones, an “old Welch hermit,” nine years earlier, or perhaps Jones’s missing treasure.
14 Oxnard (CA) Daily Courier, March 5, 1920.
15 Lima Sunday News, March 7, 1920. Rosicrucians claimed that “the Ouija board has nothing to do with spiritualism, or the claims of spiritualism, or even with the fundamental principles involved in real communication between disembodied personalities and earthly personalities.”
16 William Brady, M.D., “Health Talks,” Appleton (WI) Post-Crescent, October 12, 1920. The delusions were also seen as “readily communicable” (Oakland Tribune, March 5, 1920).
17 Oakland Tribune, August 1, 1920. Oakland had an outbreak of Ouija mania in 1919 involving three women: “One fully clothed, was walking calmly into a lake when rescued with difficulty. Another constantly ‘heard mysterious voices.’ The brilliant mind of the third had become shattered.” Charleston (WV) Daily Mail, December 5, 1919.
18 http://www.bloodydisgusting.com/news/5290.
19 Oakland Tribune, March 4, 1920.
Mrs. Wakeman vs. the Antichrist
1 “Plenty of False Christs,” New York Times, November 30, 1890.
2 “William Dorril: Early Religious Leader,” Greenfield (VT) Recorder, June 12, 1984.
3 William Barton, “On the Manufacture and Marketing of a Religion,” The Independent, January–December, New York, 1903.
4 The Index: A Weekly Paper Devoted to Free Religion, vol. 7 (1876), 438.
5 “Jones Cult Stirs Memory of Cobbites,” Arkansas Gazette, December 28, 1978.
6 Ibid.
7 Andrew Jackson Davis, Memoranda of Persons, Places and Events: Embracing Authentic Facts, Visions, Impressions, Discoveries, in Magnetism, Clairvoyance, Spiritualism. Also Quotations from the Opposition (Boston: White, 1868).
8 Acts 7:52 (King James Version).
9 2 Kings 2:23–24 (KJV).
10 Robert P. Wakeman, Wakeman Genealogy, 1630–1899 (Meriden, CT: Journal, 1900).
11 New York Daily Tribune, April 18, 1856.
12 New York Daily Tribune, January 31, 1856.
13 New York Daily Tribune, November 31, 1856.
14 Skaneateles (NY) Democrat, January 4, 1856, from the Syracuse Chronicle.
15 Similar lists appear in different newspapers, including the Albany (NY) Evening Journal (January 21, 1856), the New York Daily Tribune (January 21, 1856), and the Auburn (NY) Daily American (January 21, 1856).
16 New York Times, January 3, 1856.
17 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
18 Dr. E. C. Chamberlain testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
19 Proceedings of the Worcester Society of Antiquity, vol. 19 (1903).
20 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
21 Ibid.
22 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
23 James Nelson testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
24 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
25 Ibid.
26 New York Times, December 28, 1855.
27 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
30 “Trial of the Wakemanites,” New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
31 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
32 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, vol. 3 (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1902), 23.
33 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
34 Ibid.
35 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
36 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
37 New York Times, May 10, 1879.
38 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
39 Ibid.
40 Ibid.
41 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid.
44 Ibid.
45 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
46 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856; New York Times, January 7, 1856.
47 New York Times, January 3, 1856.
48 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
49 Leviticus 17:11 (KJV).
50 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
51 Earl Wesley Fornell, The Unhappy Medium (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1964).
52 “The Folk-Lore of British Plants,” The Dublin Universit
y Magazine, vol. 82 (1873), 568.
53 Scobie’s Canadian Almanac and Repository of Useful Knowledge for the Year 1855 (Toronto: Hugh Scobie, n.d.).
54 “Woodbridge and the Wakemanites a Hundred Years Ago,” paper read at the annual meeting of the Woodbridge and Amity Historical Society by Grace Pierpont Fuller, December 1955.
55 Ibid.
56 Israel Wooding testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
57 Almeron Sanford testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
58 Israel Wooding testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
59 Wellespring (newsletter of the Welles Family Association) (April 2004), 4.
60 New York Times, December 27, 1855.
61 Weekly Hawkeye and Telegraph (IA), January 9, 1856.
62 Wellespring (April 2004).
63 Polly Sanford testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
64 Trial of the Wakemanites, quoted in “Woodbridge and the Wakemanites a Hundred Years Ago,” paper read at the annual meeting of the Woodbridge and Amity Historical Society, by Grace Pierpont Fuller, December 1955.
65 “Woodbridge and the Wakemanites a Hundred Years Ago,” paper read at the annual meeting of the Woodbridge and Amity Historical Society by Grace Pierpont Fuller, December 1955; J. W. Daniels, Spiritualism versus Christianity (1856).
66 Delaware State Reporter, January 1, 1856.
67 Donald MacLeod, Life of Mary, Queen of Scots (New York: Excelsior Catholic Publishing House, 1898). Dr. David L. Dagget performed the postmortem and found “a wound back of the ear, on the head, and another parallel with the lower jaw on the neck. There were two wounds penetrating the upper lip; the large wound commenced near the top of the spine and extended to the wind pipe. On the fore-finger of the left hand there was a wound. The wounds on the chest were evidently made with a fork. These wounds could not have been made by himself.” Trial of the Wakemanites. This sort of violence, now called “overkill,” indicates personal enmity, but Sammy denied having any ill will toward Matthews. Sly apparently expressed his anger toward Amos Hunt on the body of Justus Matthews.
68 Fornell, The Unhappy Medium, 97.
69 “Woodbridge and the Wakemanites a Hundred Years Ago,” paper read at the annual meeting of the Woodbridge and Amity Historical Society by Grace Pierpont Fuller, December 1955.
70 New York Times, December 27, 1855.
71 Trial of the Wakemanites.
72 New York Times, December 27, 1855; New York Times, December 26, 1855.
73 New York Daily Tribune, February 5, 1856.
74 “Another Tragedy: Horrible Murders in Woodbridge,” from a New Haven newspaper, January 3, 1856.
75 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
76 Ibid.
77 Ibid.
78 Wellespring (April 2004), quoting the Hartford Daily Courant, January 3, 1856, 1.
79 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
80 The Journal of Psychological Medicine and Mental Pathology, edited by Forbes Winslow, M.D., Vol. IX, London, John Churchill, New Burlington Street, MDCCCLVI, 1856. According to an appendix in Donald MacLeod’s book, Life of Mary, Queen of Scots, Charles Sanford “stood over their corpses and gloated in the cry of ‘blood, blood, how bright it seems and how easy it flows. Who would not have blood for the redemption of man?’”
81 Reminiscences of Bethany.
82 Ibid.
83 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
84 Samuel Davidson, “Seymour Record” (1913). Over time other versions of the story appeared. In one of them, Mrs. Wakeman declares that a man named Matthew is the devil, and “Charles Sanford, having become crazed with her teachings, had a brand new axe with which he planned to exterminate Matthews, with the idea that he would be doing a great service to the world and started on his way. First coming to a sleigh in which Enoch Sperry of Woodbridge was sitting on his way home from New Haven, Sanford came up behind the sleigh and deliberately chopped down his victim.” Reminiscences of Bethany.
85 New York Times, January 3, 1856.
86 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
87 West Virginia Archives and History News, vol. 2, no. 1.
88 New York Times, January 4, 1856.
89 New York Daily Times, January 4, 1856.
90 The New Haven State House [date unknown], 17.
91 “Lies and Legends of Bethany,” a talk given by Robert Brinton, OrangeBulletin.com.
92 Ibid.
93 Personal communication from Barbara Narendra to author, May 21, 2012.
94 New York Times, January 4, 1856. The online collection at http://www.findagrave.com does not list Enoch Sperry’s grave at Westville, though it does have an “Enos Sperry,” 1789–1873.
95 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
96 New York Daily Tribune, January 31, 1856.
97 There is no reason for believing that Mrs. Wakeman was influenced by Freemasons, but the promise to have one’s head taken off before leaving or forsaking the Savior recalls the Mason’s oath to have his throat cut ear to ear if he betrays the group’s secrets. In addition, there is Mrs. Wakeman’s statement that her private papers “are only to be inspected by her few faithful followers who have taken ‘all the degrees’” [my italics]. New York Daily Tribune, January 31, 1856.
98 Fornell, The Unhappy Medium, 100.
99 New York Times, January 7, 1856.
100 Ibid.
101 Ibid.
102 New York Times, January 10, 1856.
103 Daily Free Democrat (Milwaukee, WI), January 21, 1856.
104 New Haven Courier (January 18, 1856), printed in the Tioga Eagle (January 31, 1856).
105 “Trial of the Wakemanites,” New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
106 Daily Standard (Syracuse, NY), January 7, 1856.
107 Trial of the Wakemanites; New York Times, January 4, 1856.
108 New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856; Ephraim Lane testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
109 Phebe A. Beckwith testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
110 George Root testimony, Trial of the Wakemanites.
111 New York Daily Tribune [date unknown].
112 Trial of the Wakemanites.
113 Ibid.
114 Ibid.
115 Fort Wayne (IN) Daily Times, May 1, 1856.
116 Ibid.; Trial of the Wakemanites.
117 “Trial of the Wakemanites,” New York Daily Tribune, January 21, 1856.
118 Ibid.
119 Beckwith’s Almanac, no. 10 (1857).
120 Fornell, The Unhappy Medium, 101.
121 Herbert Hiram, Poor Mary Stannard! (New Haven, CT: Stafford, 1879), title page.
122 Ibid., 46.
123 The Manson Women: An American Nightmare, History Channel (2002).
124 Freeman was a leading member of the small Adventist community at Pocasset and, like the Wakemanites, was found not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to an asylum. He eventually recovered and was released.
125 New York Times, October 3, 1886.
126 Encyclopedia Americana, vol. 23 (1952), 218.
The Littlest Stigmatic
1 Oakland’s Santa Fe Elementary School is at 915 54th Street, Oakland, California.
2 There is a surprising amount of confusion regarding her surname. It often appears as Robinson, sometimes as Starks and even Cloretta Starks Robertson. As she grew older, she used the name Cloretta Starks; presumably Starks is her biological father’s name. When Jet magazine ran an article about her, however, they used Robertson and it appears that way in newspaper ads placed by the family’s church.
3 Loretta F. Early and Joseph E. Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” Archives of General Psychiatry 30 (February 1974), 199. Another source claims that Cloretta read a book titled Before the Cross.
4 Jet, vol. 42, no. 3 (April 13, 1972), 14–15.
5 The Times (San Mateo, CA), March 23, 1972.
6 Rene Biot, The Enigma of the Stigmata (Portland, OR: Hawthorn Books, 1962), 72.
7 St. Bonaventura, Life of Saint Francis (London: Dent, 1904), 137.
8 Ibid., 140.
9 Stanley Krippner, “Stigmatic Phenomena: An Alleged Case in Brazil,” Journal of Scientific Exploration 16, no. 2 (2002), 207–224, 207.
10 Malcolm Day, “Blood Brother: Padre Pio,” Fortean Times (September 2002).
11 Marco Margnelli, “An Unusual Case of Stigmatization,” Journal of Scientific Exploration 13, no. 3 (1999), 463.
12 The Times (San Mateo, CA), March 23, 1972.
13 Arizona Republic, March 24, 1972.
14 The Times (San Mateo, CA), March 23, 1972.
15 Loretta F. Early and Joseph E. Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” Archives of General Psychiatry 30 (February 1974), 197; Daily Review (Hayward, CA), March 23, 1972.
16 The Times (San Mateo, CA), April 1, 1972.
17 New Castle (PA) News, April 1, 1972.
18 Daily Review (Hayward, CA), March 23, 1972.
19 Jet, vol. 42, no. 3 (April 13, 1972), 14–15.
20 Ibid.
21 Daily Review (Hayward, CA), March 23, 1972.
22 Stars and Stripes, March 25, 1972.
23 Daily Review (Hayward, CA), March 23, 1972.
24 Early and Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” 197–200.
25 Ibid.
26 Ibid., 200.
27 Ibid., 197–200.
28 Stanley Krippner, “Stigmatic Phenomena: An Alleged Case in Brazil,” Journal of Scientific Exploration 16, no. 2 (2002), 207–224.
29 Early and Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” 199.
30 Arizona Republic, March 24, 1972.
31 Early and Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” 199.
32 Ibid.
33 Ibid.; Daily Review (Hayward, CA), March 23, 1972.
34 Early and Lifschutz, “A Case of Stigmata,” 199.
35 Ibid.
Mrs. Wakeman vs. the Antichrist Page 20
