Medium Doctor Monck
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Doctor Monck Medium
Some few pages may also be devoted to a summary of the very cogent objective
evidence which is offered by the casts that have been taken from the bodies of
ectoplasmic figures-in other words, of materialized forms. The first who
explored this line of research seems to have been William Denton, the author of
"Nature's Secrets," a book on psychometry, published in 1863. In Boston (U. S.
A.) in 1875, working with the Medium Mary M Hardy, he employed methods which
closely resemble those used by Richet and Geley in their more recent experiments
in Paris. Denton actually gave a public demonstration in Paine Hall, when the
cast of a Spirit Face was said to have been produced in melted paraffin. Other
Mediums with whom these casts were obtained were
Mrs Firman,
Dr. Monck, Miss Fairlamb (afterwards Mrs Mellon), and William Eglinton. The fact that these
results were corroborated by the later Paris sittings is a strong argument for
their validity. Mr William Oxley, of Manchester, describes how on February 5,
1876, a beautiful mould of a lady's hand was obtained, and how a subsequent
mould of the hand of Mrs Firman the medium was found to be quite different. On
this occasion Mrs Firman was confined in a lace net bag which went over her
head and was fastened round the waist, enclosing her hands and arms. This would
seem to be final as regards any fraud on the part of the Medium, while it is
also recorded that the wax mould was warm, which shows that it could not have
been brought into the seance room. It is hard to see what further precautions
could have been taken to guarantee the result. On a second occasion a mould of
the foot as well as of the hand was obtained, the openings of the wrist and
ankle being in each case so narrow that the limb could not have been withdrawn.
There seems to have been no explanation open save that the hand or foot had
dematerialized.
Dr Monck's results seem also to stand the test of criticism. Oxley experimented
with him in Manchester in 1876, and had the same success as with Mrs Firman. On
this occasion different moulds from two separate figures were obtained. Oxley
says of these experiences, "The importance and value of these Spirit Moulds
cannot be overestimated, for while the relation of spiritual phenomena to others
of doubtful and sceptical turn is valuable only on the ground of credibility,
the casts of these hands and feet are permanent and patent facts, and now demand
from men of science, artists, and scoffers a solution of the mystery of their
production." This demand is still made. A famous conjurer, Houdini, and a great
anatomist, Sir Arthur Keith, have both tried their hands, and the results,
laboriously produced, have only served to accentuate the unique character of
that which they tried to copy.
In the case of Eglinton it has been recorded by Dr Nichols) the biographer of
the Davenports, that evidential casts of hands were obtained, and that one lady
present recognized a peculiarity-a slight deformity-characteristic of the hand
of her little daughter who had been drowned in South Africa at the age of five
years.
Monck was a Nonconformist clergyman, a favourite pupil of
the famous Spurgeon. According to his own account, he had been subject from
childhood to psychic influences, which increased with his growth. In 1873 he
announced his adhesion to Spiritualism and gave an address in the Cavendish
Rooms. Shortly afterwards he began to give demonstrations, which appear to have
been unpaid and were given in light. In 1875 he made a tour through England and
Scotland, his performances exciting much attention and debate, and in 1876 he
visited Ireland, where his powers were directed towards healing. Hence he was
usually known as "Dr" Monck, a fact which naturally aroused some protest from
the medical profession.
Dr Alfred Russel Wallace, a most
competent and honest observer, has given an account of a materialization seance
with Monck which appears to be as critic-proof as such a thing could be. No
subsequent suspicion or conviction can ever eliminate such an incontrovertible
instance of psychic power. It is to be noted how far the effects were in
agreement with the subsequent demonstrations of ectoplasmic outflow in the case
of Eva and other modern mediums. Dr. Wallace's companions upon this occasion
were Mr Stainton Moses and Mr. Hensleigh Wedgwood. Dr Wallace writes:
It was a bright summer afternoon, and
everything happened in the full light of day. After a little conversation,
Monck, who was dressed in the usual clerical black, appeared to go into a
trance; then stood up a few feet in front of us, and after a little while
pointed to his side, saying, "Look."
We saw there a faint
white patch on his coat on the left side. This grew brighter, then seemed to
flicker and extend both upwards and downwards, till very gradually it formed a
cloudy pillar extending from his shoulder to his feet and close to his body.
Dr Wallace goes on to describe how the cloudy figure
finally assumed the form of a thickly draped woman, who, after a brief space,
appeared to be absorbed into the body of the medium.
He adds: "The whole
process of the formation of a shrouded figure was seen in full daylight."
Mr. Wedgwood assured him that he had lead even more remarkable manifestations of
this kind with Monck, when the medium was in a deep trance, and in full view.
It is quite impossible after such evidence to doubt the
powers of the medium at that time. Archdeacon Colley, who had seen similar
exhibitions, offered a prize of a thousand pounds to Mr. J. N. Maskelyne, the
famous conjurer, if he could duplicate the performance. This challenge was
accepted by Mr Maskelyne, but the evidence showed that the imitation bore no
relation to the original. He attempted to gain a decision in the courts, but the
verdict was against him.
It is interesting to compare the account
given by Russel Wallace and the experience later of a well-known American, Judge
Dailey. This gentleman wrote*:
* BANNER OF LIGHT, Dec. 15, 1881.
Glancing at Dr
Monck's side we observed what looked like an opalescent mass of compact steam
emerging from just below his heart on the left side. It increased in volume,
rising up and extending downward, the upper portions taking the form of a
child's head, the face being distinguished as that of a little child I had lost
some twenty years previously. It only remained in this form for a moment, and
then suddenly disappeared, seeming to be instantly absorbed into the Doctor's
side. This remarkable phenomenon was repeated four or five times, in each
instance the materialization being more distinct than the preceding one. This
was witnessed by all in the room, with gas burning sufficiently bright for every
object in the room to be plainly visible.
It was a phenomenon
seldom to be seen, and has enabled all who saw it to vouch for, not only the
remarkable power possessed by Dr. Monck as a materializing medium, but as to the
wonderful manner in which a spirit draws out.
Surely it is vain
after such testimony to deny that Monck had, indeed, great psychic powers.
Apart from materializations Dr Monck was a remarkable
slate-writing medium. Dr Russel Wallace in a letter to the SPECTATOR * says
that with Monck at a private house in Richmond he cleaned two slates, and after
placing a fragment of pencil between them, tied them together tightly with a
strong cord, lengthways and crosswise, in a manner that prevented any movement.
* October 7, 1877.
I
then laid them flat on the table without losing sight of them for an instant.
Dr Monck placed the fingers of both hands on them, while I and a lady sitting
opposite placed our hands on the corners of the slates. From this position our
hands were never moved till I untied the slates to ascertain the result.
Monck asked Wallace to name a word to be written on the slate. He chose the word
"God" and in answer to a request decided that it should be length ways on the
slate. The sound of writing was heard, and when the medium's hands were
withdrawn, Dr. Wallace opened the slates and found on the lower one the word he
had asked for and written in the manner requested.
Dr. Wallace says:
The essential features of this
experiment are that I myself cleaned and tied up the slates; that I kept my
hands on them all the time; that they never went out of my sight for a moment;
and that I named the word to be written, and the manner of writing it after they
were thus secured and held by me.
Mr. Edward T Bennett, assistant
secretary to the Society for Psychical Research, adds to this account: "I was
present on this occasion, and certify that Mr Wallace's account of what
happened is correct."
Another good test is described by Mr. W.
P. Adshead, of Belper, a well-known investigator, who says of a seance held in
Derby on September 18, 1876:
There were eight persons present, three
ladies and five gentlemen. A lady whom Dr. Monck had never before seen had a
slate passed to her by a sitter, which she examined and found clean. The slate
pencil which was on the table a few minutes before we sat down could not be
found. An investigator suggested that it would be a good test if a lead pencil
were used.
Accordingly a lead pencil was put on the slate, and the
lady held both under the table. The sound of writing was instantly heard, and in
a few seconds a communication had been written filling one side of the slate.
The writing was done in lead, and was very small and neat, and alluded to a
strictly private matter.
Here were three tests at once. (1)
Writing was obtained without the medium (or any other person but the lady),
touching the slate from first to last. (2) It was written with lead pencil at
the spontaneous suggestion of another stranger. (3) It gave an important test
communication regarding a matter that was strictly private. Dr. Monck did not so
much as touch the slate from first to last.
Mr. Adshead also
speaks of physical phenomena occurring freely with this medium when his hands
were closely confined in an apparatus called the "stocks," which did not permit
movement of even an inch in any direction.
In the year 1876 the
Slade trial was going on in London, as already described, and exposures were in
the air. In considering the following rather puzzling and certainly suspicious
case, one has to remember that when a man who is a public performer, a conjurer
or a mesmerist, can pose as having exposed a medium, he wins a valuable public
advertisement and attracts to himself all that very numerous section of the
community who desire to see such an exposure. It is only fair to bear this in
mind in endeavouring to hold the scales fair where there is a conflict of
evidence.
In this case the conjurer and mesmerist was one Lodge, and
the occasion was a seance held at Huddersfield on November 3, 1876. Mr. Lodge
suddenly demanded that the medium be searched. Monck, whether dreading assault
or to save himself exposure, ran upstairs and locked himself in his room. He
then let himself down from his window and made for the police office, where he
lodged a complaint as to his treatment. The door of his bedroom had been forced
and his effects searched, with the result that a pair of stuffed gloves was
found. Monck asserted that these gloves had been made for a lecture in which he
had exposed the difference between conjuring and mediumship. Still, as a
Spiritualist paper remarked at the time:
The phenomena of his mediumship do not
rest on his probity at all. If he were the greatest rogue and the most
accomplished conjurer rolled into one, it would not account for the
manifestations which have been reported of him.
Monck was sentenced
to three months' imprisonment, and is alleged to have made a confession to Mr
Lodge.
After his release from prison Monck held a number of test
sittings with Stainton Moses, at which remarkable phenomena occurred.
LIGHT comments:
Those whose names we have mentioned as
testifying to the genuineness of Dr. Monck's mediumship are well-known to the
older Spiritualists as keen and scrupulously cautious experimenters, and Mr Hensleigh Wedgwood's name carried much weight, as he was known as a man of
science and was brother-in-law of Charles Darwin.
There is an element
of doubt about the Huddersfield case, as the accuser was by no means an
impartial person, but Sir William Barrett's testimony makes it clear that Monck
did sometimes descend to deliberate and cold-blooded trickery. Sir William
writes:
I
caught the "Dr." in a gross bit of fraud, a piece of white muslin on a wire
frame with a black thread attached, being used by the medium to simulate a
partially materialized spirit.*
* S.P.R. PROCEEDINGS, Vol. IV., p. 38 (footnote).
Such an exposure, coming from so sure a source, arouses a feeling of disgust
which urges one to throw the whole evidence concerning the man into the
wastepaper basket. One must, however, be patient and reasonable in such matters.
Monck's earlier seances, as has been clearly shown, were in good light, and any
such clumsy mechanism was out of the question. We must not argue that because a
man once forges, therefore he has never signed an honest cheque in his life. But
we must clearly admit that Monck was capable of fraud, that he would take the
easier way when things were difficult, and that each of his manifestations
should be carefully checked.
The History
of Spiritualism
Volume I,
Chapter 13
by Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle
