1 00:00:01,080 --> 00:00:04,320 Speaker 1: Welcomed Unobscured, a production of I Heart Radio and Aaron Minky. 2 00:00:11,160 --> 00:00:14,720 Speaker 1: Bell had known him for decades. When they were children 3 00:00:14,840 --> 00:00:17,599 Speaker 1: growing up in the Dutch community along the Hudson River, 4 00:00:17,840 --> 00:00:20,639 Speaker 1: the two had played together, the Dutch Boy and the 5 00:00:20,680 --> 00:00:24,680 Speaker 1: Black Girl, enslaved by his neighbors. Isaac's father had owned 6 00:00:24,680 --> 00:00:27,080 Speaker 1: slaves as well, but as he grew up, he and 7 00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:31,680 Speaker 1: his brother rejected its brutality. Bell had lived through that brutality, though, 8 00:00:31,920 --> 00:00:34,400 Speaker 1: and the scars on her back would be a reminder 9 00:00:34,440 --> 00:00:38,720 Speaker 1: of its evil for the rest of her life. Maybe 10 00:00:38,840 --> 00:00:41,760 Speaker 1: somewhere along the way, Belle had heard that Isaac condemned 11 00:00:41,760 --> 00:00:45,239 Speaker 1: the evil that his neighbors considered normal. Maybe it was 12 00:00:45,360 --> 00:00:48,240 Speaker 1: just their mutual friends who told Bell that Isaac would 13 00:00:48,320 --> 00:00:52,800 Speaker 1: lend her a hand, whatever the case. On July, Bell 14 00:00:53,040 --> 00:00:57,760 Speaker 1: knocked on Isaac's door. When he welcomed her inside. Bell 15 00:00:57,840 --> 00:01:01,360 Speaker 1: stepped in, holding her infant daughter, and then quickly explained 16 00:01:01,400 --> 00:01:04,040 Speaker 1: what had happened. By that time, though the man she 17 00:01:04,120 --> 00:01:08,360 Speaker 1: had escaped was hard on her heels. Soon enough, a 18 00:01:08,440 --> 00:01:12,560 Speaker 1: second fist was pounding on Isaac's door, his voice demanding 19 00:01:12,640 --> 00:01:15,759 Speaker 1: that Bell come back to his home, to his land. 20 00:01:16,319 --> 00:01:20,360 Speaker 1: The slavery, never wanted to shrink from danger or oppression. 21 00:01:20,920 --> 00:01:24,720 Speaker 1: Bell answered back, yes, she was here, but no, she 22 00:01:24,760 --> 00:01:28,800 Speaker 1: would never go back to her old life. Furious, the 23 00:01:28,840 --> 00:01:32,000 Speaker 1: pair continued to spar until Isaac stepped in and paid 24 00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:34,600 Speaker 1: the man off. He marched back out to the road, 25 00:01:34,680 --> 00:01:38,399 Speaker 1: fuming with anger and frustration, his money clenched in a 26 00:01:38,440 --> 00:01:42,280 Speaker 1: tight fist. Isaac turned to Bell and said, there is 27 00:01:42,360 --> 00:01:45,520 Speaker 1: but one master, and he who is your master is 28 00:01:45,600 --> 00:01:49,760 Speaker 1: my master. The pair stood together as they always had, 29 00:01:49,800 --> 00:01:55,480 Speaker 1: nothing more than children of God, following his voice, agonizing 30 00:01:55,560 --> 00:01:58,320 Speaker 1: days were ahead, though Bell stayed as a guest with 31 00:01:58,360 --> 00:02:01,400 Speaker 1: Isaac's family while she decided what to do next. But 32 00:02:01,440 --> 00:02:04,360 Speaker 1: the rest of her children were still held captive, and 33 00:02:04,400 --> 00:02:07,520 Speaker 1: Isaac heard news one day the Bell's five year old son, Peter, 34 00:02:07,920 --> 00:02:12,960 Speaker 1: a spirited, mischievous, inquisitive boy, had disappeared from the farm. 35 00:02:13,000 --> 00:02:16,079 Speaker 1: Asking more questions, they learned that the man's nephew had 36 00:02:16,120 --> 00:02:18,919 Speaker 1: taken the boy to New York City and sold him 37 00:02:18,960 --> 00:02:23,880 Speaker 1: to Alabama. The malice behind the sale was clear. Bell 38 00:02:24,080 --> 00:02:27,080 Speaker 1: charged back to the farm and confronted the family. The 39 00:02:27,120 --> 00:02:30,760 Speaker 1: farmer's wife mocked her and spat venomous slurs. Both at 40 00:02:30,800 --> 00:02:33,800 Speaker 1: her and her boy. But whenever she recalled that moment 41 00:02:33,919 --> 00:02:37,240 Speaker 1: years later, Bell would say, I was sure God would 42 00:02:37,240 --> 00:02:39,600 Speaker 1: help me to get him. I felt as if the 43 00:02:39,639 --> 00:02:43,359 Speaker 1: power of the nation was with me. But she knew 44 00:02:43,400 --> 00:02:46,600 Speaker 1: the nation she imagined, the one that honored her dignity 45 00:02:46,639 --> 00:02:50,280 Speaker 1: and worth, was still struggling to be born. For now. 46 00:02:50,360 --> 00:02:52,720 Speaker 1: The United States was still gripped by what she called 47 00:02:53,000 --> 00:02:57,200 Speaker 1: a national sin that made America Babylon instead of New Israel. 48 00:02:57,800 --> 00:03:03,919 Speaker 1: Here's historian Margaret Washington. This is our second sense of 49 00:03:04,440 --> 00:03:06,760 Speaker 1: what a powerhouse this woman is going to be. The 50 00:03:06,800 --> 00:03:09,680 Speaker 1: first one is when she challenges her owner and flees. 51 00:03:10,080 --> 00:03:14,760 Speaker 1: The second one is when she will not accept the 52 00:03:14,880 --> 00:03:18,760 Speaker 1: fact that her son has been sold. And she basically 53 00:03:18,919 --> 00:03:24,040 Speaker 1: campaigned all over the neighborhood of Ulster County, rilling people 54 00:03:24,120 --> 00:03:27,560 Speaker 1: about this, and especially the Quakers, because it is against 55 00:03:27,560 --> 00:03:32,359 Speaker 1: the law. But what enslaved woman has the wherewithal to 56 00:03:32,639 --> 00:03:39,400 Speaker 1: challenge the slave power? Antislavery? Quakers rallied to her cause 57 00:03:39,640 --> 00:03:41,840 Speaker 1: and helped to pay for a lawyer, But when they 58 00:03:41,920 --> 00:03:45,600 Speaker 1: reached the courtroom, things were already tilted against Bell. The 59 00:03:45,640 --> 00:03:48,360 Speaker 1: district attorney on the case was another nephew of the 60 00:03:48,400 --> 00:03:51,720 Speaker 1: farmer that Bell had escaped. The jury was a collection 61 00:03:51,760 --> 00:03:55,400 Speaker 1: of other wealthy slaveholders and their relatives, and at one 62 00:03:55,400 --> 00:03:58,240 Speaker 1: point the Justice of the Peace even suggested pain Bell 63 00:03:58,400 --> 00:04:01,800 Speaker 1: six hundred dollars to settle trial. But this was her 64 00:04:01,840 --> 00:04:05,760 Speaker 1: son's life on the line. Belle raised Hell, and she 65 00:04:05,800 --> 00:04:09,240 Speaker 1: had allies on her side, Quakers, yes, but also the 66 00:04:09,280 --> 00:04:12,520 Speaker 1: spirits of her dead father and the spirit of God himself. 67 00:04:13,040 --> 00:04:16,680 Speaker 1: She talked with God as she traveled the countryside organizing support. 68 00:04:17,240 --> 00:04:20,120 Speaker 1: By the day of the trial, well healed country squires 69 00:04:20,400 --> 00:04:24,120 Speaker 1: were squaring off on both sides of the case. It 70 00:04:24,200 --> 00:04:26,160 Speaker 1: took a year, but in the end, Bell and her 71 00:04:26,200 --> 00:04:29,080 Speaker 1: son Peter won their reunion under the laws of New York, 72 00:04:29,520 --> 00:04:31,919 Speaker 1: much to the anger of some of the states citizens. 73 00:04:33,640 --> 00:04:36,080 Speaker 1: Bell would later talk about these divisions in New York 74 00:04:36,120 --> 00:04:40,160 Speaker 1: as a spiritual contest like the one between Babylon and Israel, 75 00:04:40,600 --> 00:04:43,359 Speaker 1: a contest for the soul of the nation. But for 76 00:04:43,400 --> 00:04:46,360 Speaker 1: too many women like Bell, that fight was not just 77 00:04:46,520 --> 00:04:50,719 Speaker 1: a metaphor. Her story makes clear what was at stake 78 00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:52,720 Speaker 1: in the battles she would fight for the rest of 79 00:04:52,720 --> 00:04:56,240 Speaker 1: her life, whether the next generation of black Americans would 80 00:04:56,240 --> 00:04:59,200 Speaker 1: continue to be shuffled from bondage to bondage for the 81 00:04:59,240 --> 00:05:03,080 Speaker 1: profit of powerful slaveholders, or whether black families would be 82 00:05:03,120 --> 00:05:07,479 Speaker 1: able to break the system of chattel slavery rebel The 83 00:05:07,560 --> 00:05:12,880 Speaker 1: fight was as personal as it gets, but Bell didn't 84 00:05:12,920 --> 00:05:17,240 Speaker 1: struggle alone. Together with her friends and the anti slavery 85 00:05:17,360 --> 00:05:21,679 Speaker 1: societies of the Northeast, including those in Rochester, she became 86 00:05:21,760 --> 00:05:26,320 Speaker 1: part of something bigger, a movement, a driving force of 87 00:05:26,440 --> 00:05:32,279 Speaker 1: radicalism and revolution, a force that was all too familiar 88 00:05:32,360 --> 00:05:42,360 Speaker 1: to someone else, the spiritualists. This is unobscured. I'm Aaron Manky. 89 00:06:18,040 --> 00:06:21,680 Speaker 1: The call to freedom was spiritual. You'll remember that when 90 00:06:21,720 --> 00:06:24,520 Speaker 1: Bell freed herself, she was following the voice of God, 91 00:06:24,920 --> 00:06:27,440 Speaker 1: and when she took up the fight for her son's freedom, 92 00:06:27,560 --> 00:06:30,320 Speaker 1: she viewed it as a divine mission. In fact, most 93 00:06:30,440 --> 00:06:35,599 Speaker 1: radical reformers in the eighteen hundreds were intensely religious. One 94 00:06:35,640 --> 00:06:38,479 Speaker 1: abolitionist would later say that she left her church more 95 00:06:38,560 --> 00:06:41,520 Speaker 1: because it was comfortable with slavery than because she stopped 96 00:06:41,520 --> 00:06:45,080 Speaker 1: believing any of its teachings. Even Amy and Isaac Post 97 00:06:45,160 --> 00:06:48,920 Speaker 1: criticized their fellow Quakers not because they rejected the religion, 98 00:06:49,200 --> 00:06:52,040 Speaker 1: but because they saw how corrupt some Quakers had become. 99 00:06:53,480 --> 00:06:55,800 Speaker 1: When Bell started living with a family known as the 100 00:06:55,880 --> 00:06:58,880 Speaker 1: Van Wagoners. She joined them from Methodist camp meetings in 101 00:06:58,960 --> 00:07:01,640 Speaker 1: rural New York. She found in the New Church a 102 00:07:01,680 --> 00:07:06,600 Speaker 1: warm antislavery community who welcomed black converts and black preaching. 103 00:07:07,080 --> 00:07:11,000 Speaker 1: And at these meetings she started to have amazing experiences. 104 00:07:11,960 --> 00:07:15,840 Speaker 1: The feeling of Jesus presence, cool and refreshing and as 105 00:07:15,880 --> 00:07:18,400 Speaker 1: she would later say, be mean with the beauty of 106 00:07:18,400 --> 00:07:21,880 Speaker 1: holiness would wash over her. And it was an experience 107 00:07:21,920 --> 00:07:24,800 Speaker 1: that she wanted to share, so she started to preach, 108 00:07:25,040 --> 00:07:27,600 Speaker 1: telling the story of her fight to recover her son. 109 00:07:28,120 --> 00:07:30,920 Speaker 1: When Methodists from New York City visited and heard her 110 00:07:30,960 --> 00:07:35,760 Speaker 1: freedom sermons, they were struck. Here's historian Margaret Washington. Once again, 111 00:07:36,520 --> 00:07:40,640 Speaker 1: They essentially said, your message is too important for you 112 00:07:40,720 --> 00:07:44,200 Speaker 1: to be here. She had a kind of specialness about 113 00:07:44,240 --> 00:07:49,600 Speaker 1: her because of her experiences, because of her capacity to communicate, 114 00:07:50,080 --> 00:07:53,400 Speaker 1: keeping in mind that her English is not very good, 115 00:07:53,800 --> 00:07:58,160 Speaker 1: but she's able to communicate with him even with her 116 00:07:58,200 --> 00:08:01,680 Speaker 1: broken English and her Dutch rogue, in a way so 117 00:08:01,760 --> 00:08:05,720 Speaker 1: that they find her incredibly inspiring. And she becomes a 118 00:08:05,720 --> 00:08:09,840 Speaker 1: Revivalist preacher. And there was plenty of preaching to do 119 00:08:10,520 --> 00:08:13,840 Speaker 1: for fifteen years she taught about the moral reform and 120 00:08:13,880 --> 00:08:17,040 Speaker 1: renewal of the nation. In New York City, she opened 121 00:08:17,040 --> 00:08:20,320 Speaker 1: a Sabbath school in the infamous Five Points neighborhood, known 122 00:08:20,320 --> 00:08:24,840 Speaker 1: for its theaters, saloons, dance halls, and brothels. Among the 123 00:08:24,840 --> 00:08:28,040 Speaker 1: other New York Methodists who are preaching a reformed society, though, 124 00:08:28,280 --> 00:08:30,600 Speaker 1: there was one man who would give Bell her first 125 00:08:30,640 --> 00:08:35,080 Speaker 1: glimpse at seeing her faith and best impulses exploited by others. 126 00:08:35,480 --> 00:08:38,960 Speaker 1: He called himself Matthias, and he was among the Methodists 127 00:08:39,000 --> 00:08:41,880 Speaker 1: who objected when church leaders said that they wanted to 128 00:08:41,880 --> 00:08:45,920 Speaker 1: make the Methodist Church less radical and more respectable. Here's 129 00:08:45,960 --> 00:08:51,440 Speaker 1: Margaret Washington again, by the lady eteen twenties. The Methodists 130 00:08:51,520 --> 00:08:55,440 Speaker 1: wanted to become just like High Church. They wanted to 131 00:08:55,480 --> 00:08:59,640 Speaker 1: become like Presbyterians and Congregationalists. All the things that made 132 00:08:59,800 --> 00:09:04,240 Speaker 1: me tois m a religion of expression, those were left 133 00:09:04,280 --> 00:09:08,280 Speaker 1: by the wayside, and concerned for the poor, those were 134 00:09:08,360 --> 00:09:12,040 Speaker 1: left by the wayside. And so people who were Methodists 135 00:09:12,240 --> 00:09:15,720 Speaker 1: objected to this. So they left the Methodist Church and 136 00:09:15,840 --> 00:09:22,920 Speaker 1: founded these little perfectionist cells, and the Matthias Kingdom grew 137 00:09:22,920 --> 00:09:27,040 Speaker 1: out of one of those Yes, you heard that right. 138 00:09:27,320 --> 00:09:30,760 Speaker 1: The Matthias Kingdom, you see, it started with the Communal 139 00:09:30,760 --> 00:09:34,480 Speaker 1: House downtown, a place where these newly independent Methodists could 140 00:09:34,559 --> 00:09:37,120 Speaker 1: keep caring for the poor and teaching the people that 141 00:09:37,200 --> 00:09:40,040 Speaker 1: the other church leaders wanted to leave behind, like those 142 00:09:40,080 --> 00:09:43,520 Speaker 1: suffering from cholera in New York. Sixth ward not to 143 00:09:43,600 --> 00:09:46,520 Speaker 1: mention the city sex workers or all of the families 144 00:09:46,520 --> 00:09:49,120 Speaker 1: who were simply struggling as they tried to find jobs 145 00:09:49,160 --> 00:09:53,960 Speaker 1: inside the slums. When none of matthias followers were hit 146 00:09:54,040 --> 00:09:56,240 Speaker 1: by cholera, they took it as a sign they were 147 00:09:56,240 --> 00:09:59,280 Speaker 1: on God's path. But working in the Five Points put 148 00:09:59,320 --> 00:10:02,360 Speaker 1: Matthias and Bell in the crosshairs of the law. They 149 00:10:02,400 --> 00:10:05,480 Speaker 1: were too unsavory for the polished up image of the 150 00:10:05,520 --> 00:10:09,520 Speaker 1: Methodist church. They made enemies among church leaders, and that 151 00:10:09,600 --> 00:10:12,880 Speaker 1: left them vulnerable. After their home was raided by the police, 152 00:10:13,080 --> 00:10:16,160 Speaker 1: Matthias was thrown into an asylum. When he was released, 153 00:10:16,400 --> 00:10:18,760 Speaker 1: he decided it was time for his followers to leave 154 00:10:18,800 --> 00:10:24,560 Speaker 1: the city. But that's when things went sideways. Bell found 155 00:10:24,600 --> 00:10:28,080 Speaker 1: herself in a mansion outside the cities. Matthias said that 156 00:10:28,200 --> 00:10:31,240 Speaker 1: his goal, like Aiden Blue, was to form a perfect 157 00:10:31,280 --> 00:10:34,360 Speaker 1: community that he called Zion Hill. It would be a 158 00:10:34,360 --> 00:10:38,400 Speaker 1: place of temperance, clean living, prayer and unity. But when 159 00:10:38,440 --> 00:10:42,199 Speaker 1: Bell arrived, she realized the reality didn't pass the smell test. 160 00:10:43,520 --> 00:10:46,360 Speaker 1: You see, Matthias had made some wealthy friends, and from 161 00:10:46,400 --> 00:10:49,360 Speaker 1: their new center of gravity outside the city, they started 162 00:10:49,400 --> 00:10:53,320 Speaker 1: plotting a run of real estate speculation downtown. They also 163 00:10:53,440 --> 00:10:57,400 Speaker 1: threw temperance to the wind. Lavish meals turned to lavish parties. 164 00:10:57,800 --> 00:11:03,320 Speaker 1: Lavish parties turned into something more. Soon Matthias was teaching 165 00:11:03,320 --> 00:11:05,840 Speaker 1: that God had given him the right to other men's wives, 166 00:11:06,160 --> 00:11:08,720 Speaker 1: and the families in the commune fell into a series 167 00:11:08,760 --> 00:11:13,719 Speaker 1: of backstabbing, recriminations, and eventually even criminal charges. When one 168 00:11:13,760 --> 00:11:16,320 Speaker 1: of the men died. That's when one of the women 169 00:11:16,360 --> 00:11:19,160 Speaker 1: who had been sleeping with Matthias tried to pin the 170 00:11:19,240 --> 00:11:24,280 Speaker 1: murder on Bell. Here's Dr Washington again. So she wanted 171 00:11:24,280 --> 00:11:27,320 Speaker 1: to put the blame on the colored woman. And that 172 00:11:27,400 --> 00:11:30,720 Speaker 1: would make sense to the average white New Yorker, because 173 00:11:30,800 --> 00:11:35,800 Speaker 1: part of the attitudes toward black women was that they 174 00:11:35,800 --> 00:11:41,480 Speaker 1: were loose women. Bell wasn't afraid though. She'd been to 175 00:11:41,559 --> 00:11:44,720 Speaker 1: court before, as we've already seen, and she had won. 176 00:11:46,440 --> 00:11:48,040 Speaker 1: And the one of the ways in which she got 177 00:11:48,080 --> 00:11:51,760 Speaker 1: prepared is she went to an editor and told her 178 00:11:51,800 --> 00:11:56,160 Speaker 1: story of the commune, which I'm in the process of reproducing, 179 00:11:56,280 --> 00:12:00,400 Speaker 1: republishing her story of what happened. And she said, as 180 00:12:00,160 --> 00:12:03,640 Speaker 1: it's a wonderful quote. I've got the truth on my side, 181 00:12:04,080 --> 00:12:08,720 Speaker 1: and I can crush them with the truth. Not only 182 00:12:08,760 --> 00:12:11,360 Speaker 1: did Matthias and his followers fail to pin the death 183 00:12:11,440 --> 00:12:14,600 Speaker 1: on Bell, but she turned the situation around and sued 184 00:12:14,640 --> 00:12:19,640 Speaker 1: them for defamation of character, and she won. Bell didn't 185 00:12:19,720 --> 00:12:22,840 Speaker 1: quite leave the situation unscathed, though. She came out of 186 00:12:22,840 --> 00:12:26,360 Speaker 1: the Kingdom of Matthias with a new disgust for flamboyant 187 00:12:26,440 --> 00:12:29,280 Speaker 1: leaders and for how easily the desire for a loving 188 00:12:29,360 --> 00:12:32,920 Speaker 1: community could be turned to selfish ends. She also had 189 00:12:32,920 --> 00:12:35,960 Speaker 1: a renewed reliance on her own internal compass and the 190 00:12:36,040 --> 00:12:38,760 Speaker 1: voices of spirits who would guide her better than any 191 00:12:38,880 --> 00:12:45,199 Speaker 1: charismatic preacher ever could. Other tragedies soon followed, though. Bell's son, Peter, 192 00:12:45,400 --> 00:12:47,640 Speaker 1: who had grown from that five year old boy into 193 00:12:47,720 --> 00:12:51,640 Speaker 1: a working sailor, died at sea, and the political landscape 194 00:12:51,640 --> 00:12:55,200 Speaker 1: in New York was changing too. Somehow, despite their work, 195 00:12:55,600 --> 00:12:59,560 Speaker 1: pro slavery forces had risen to power Harry in the 196 00:12:59,559 --> 00:13:02,840 Speaker 1: way of all that tragedy, Bell left the city, and 197 00:13:02,920 --> 00:13:05,400 Speaker 1: it was this journey that finally led her into a 198 00:13:05,440 --> 00:13:08,440 Speaker 1: new identity, when the Voice of God confirmed that it 199 00:13:08,520 --> 00:13:11,120 Speaker 1: was her calling for the rest of her life to 200 00:13:11,240 --> 00:13:14,880 Speaker 1: travel and teach and to crush her adversaries with the truth. 201 00:13:16,160 --> 00:13:19,160 Speaker 1: That same voice of God comforted her when a Quaker 202 00:13:19,160 --> 00:13:21,840 Speaker 1: woman mocked her for still carrying the name she'd had 203 00:13:21,840 --> 00:13:25,280 Speaker 1: in slavery. As true as God, as true, the Voice 204 00:13:25,320 --> 00:13:27,679 Speaker 1: had said to her. So she took a new name, 205 00:13:28,440 --> 00:13:32,640 Speaker 1: Sojourner Truth. That she could do. It was, in her 206 00:13:32,679 --> 00:13:36,160 Speaker 1: own words, a name with a handle to it. At 207 00:13:36,200 --> 00:13:41,160 Speaker 1: the age of forty six, she began traveling between Methodist camps, working, cooking, 208 00:13:41,400 --> 00:13:46,920 Speaker 1: and preaching both religion and abolition. Unfortunately, Sojourner Truths run 209 00:13:46,920 --> 00:13:49,800 Speaker 1: in with Matthias wasn't the only time the story of 210 00:13:49,840 --> 00:13:54,360 Speaker 1: Spiritualism saw predators ready to take advantage of a heartfelt faith. 211 00:13:55,400 --> 00:13:58,960 Speaker 1: It seems that as Spiritualism grew, there were more and 212 00:13:59,040 --> 00:14:10,800 Speaker 1: more wolves waiting in the shadows. Victoria was named after 213 00:14:10,840 --> 00:14:14,560 Speaker 1: the Queen. We can't be sure why. At the time, 214 00:14:14,600 --> 00:14:17,120 Speaker 1: it was a tribute that must have seemed even stranger 215 00:14:17,160 --> 00:14:20,840 Speaker 1: than the Davis family naming their boy for a presidential candidate, 216 00:14:21,240 --> 00:14:23,560 Speaker 1: especially for a family that lived in a wood shack 217 00:14:23,640 --> 00:14:27,240 Speaker 1: on the side of a hill in Homer, Ohio. The 218 00:14:27,280 --> 00:14:29,520 Speaker 1: story goes that the kids in the neighborhood like to 219 00:14:29,600 --> 00:14:31,920 Speaker 1: run along the rickety porch so that they could hear 220 00:14:31,960 --> 00:14:34,800 Speaker 1: the boards rattle. But it wasn't just the house that 221 00:14:34,880 --> 00:14:40,280 Speaker 1: barely held together, it was the family too. Victoria's spirit 222 00:14:40,360 --> 00:14:43,960 Speaker 1: ecstasies came from her mother Anna. She had been a 223 00:14:43,960 --> 00:14:46,680 Speaker 1: poor girl who elevated her station in life by working 224 00:14:46,720 --> 00:14:49,520 Speaker 1: as a maid for the governor of Pennsylvania. But the 225 00:14:49,560 --> 00:14:53,160 Speaker 1: governor's son, John, was as venal and entitled as anyone 226 00:14:53,240 --> 00:14:55,760 Speaker 1: born to wealth and power you can imagine, and as 227 00:14:55,840 --> 00:14:59,840 Speaker 1: friends were worse. Friends like Buck Claflin, a law school dropout, 228 00:15:00,120 --> 00:15:04,440 Speaker 1: put his talents and intelligence in service to his predatory instincts. 229 00:15:05,240 --> 00:15:07,520 Speaker 1: When Buck fell in with the governor's son and the 230 00:15:07,560 --> 00:15:11,160 Speaker 1: pair started stealing horses to assemble a private racing stable, 231 00:15:11,360 --> 00:15:13,360 Speaker 1: he was living in the room next door to Anna. 232 00:15:13,760 --> 00:15:17,040 Speaker 1: When Buck and Anna married in eighteen five, she was 233 00:15:17,160 --> 00:15:21,120 Speaker 1: already three months pregnant. Buck and John didn't know which 234 00:15:21,120 --> 00:15:25,240 Speaker 1: of them was the father. During their painful marriage, Anna 235 00:15:25,280 --> 00:15:28,200 Speaker 1: would give birth on average every two years over a 236 00:15:28,240 --> 00:15:31,560 Speaker 1: twenty year period. She followed Buck when he parted ways 237 00:15:31,600 --> 00:15:35,080 Speaker 1: with John, but it wasn't for security. They bounced from 238 00:15:35,080 --> 00:15:38,680 Speaker 1: one Pennsylvania river town to another, while Buck ran taverns 239 00:15:38,720 --> 00:15:43,720 Speaker 1: and crude riverboats. Here's author Mary Gabriel Buck class and 240 00:15:43,800 --> 00:15:48,520 Speaker 1: her father was a notorious thief arsonist. He called himself 241 00:15:48,560 --> 00:15:50,840 Speaker 1: a lawyer, but his main connection to the law was 242 00:15:50,880 --> 00:15:54,800 Speaker 1: breaking it. When two of their daughters died of typhus, 243 00:15:54,800 --> 00:15:58,560 Speaker 1: and his grief hardened into permanent bitterness. Her only solace 244 00:15:58,640 --> 00:16:01,080 Speaker 1: came in the fervor of her the just visions, and 245 00:16:01,320 --> 00:16:06,960 Speaker 1: she wasn't quiet about it either. Here's Mary Gabriel again. Basically, 246 00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:09,560 Speaker 1: the mother would go out and kind of have hallucinations 247 00:16:09,680 --> 00:16:12,600 Speaker 1: and shout to the skies her problems about her husband 248 00:16:12,840 --> 00:16:14,880 Speaker 1: and said what she was doing was speaking to it 249 00:16:15,000 --> 00:16:18,000 Speaker 1: to spirits from another world after dead relatives or her 250 00:16:18,040 --> 00:16:22,640 Speaker 1: dead children. The problem was Buck saw Anna's zeal as 251 00:16:22,720 --> 00:16:25,440 Speaker 1: one more way to play at a game. He convinced 252 00:16:25,440 --> 00:16:27,840 Speaker 1: Anna to start setting up a table as a fortune 253 00:16:27,840 --> 00:16:30,680 Speaker 1: teller at local fairs. When he caught wind of the 254 00:16:30,680 --> 00:16:33,840 Speaker 1: new science of mesmerism. Well, he added that to her 255 00:16:33,880 --> 00:16:37,080 Speaker 1: act as well. By the time Victoria and her younger sister, 256 00:16:37,240 --> 00:16:40,200 Speaker 1: Tennessee were born, Anna had a habit of falling into 257 00:16:40,240 --> 00:16:43,760 Speaker 1: trances and firing invisible energies into her daughters to cure 258 00:16:43,800 --> 00:16:46,040 Speaker 1: them when they were sick. By the time her children 259 00:16:46,080 --> 00:16:49,160 Speaker 1: had survived the vulnerable days of their infancy, Anna was 260 00:16:49,240 --> 00:16:53,280 Speaker 1: convinced that she had the power to heal. But she 261 00:16:53,360 --> 00:16:56,520 Speaker 1: went further. Anna told her daughter Victoria that she had 262 00:16:56,600 --> 00:16:59,720 Speaker 1: other eyes, eyes she could use to see the girl's thoughts, 263 00:17:00,160 --> 00:17:03,160 Speaker 1: and that when she doctored the girls with mesmerism, she 264 00:17:03,280 --> 00:17:06,920 Speaker 1: healed not just their bodies, but sanctified their souls as well. 265 00:17:08,840 --> 00:17:11,800 Speaker 1: Anna might have gained another eye, but somewhere along the way, 266 00:17:11,840 --> 00:17:14,639 Speaker 1: Buck had lost one, almost two on the nose for 267 00:17:14,800 --> 00:17:18,200 Speaker 1: his approach to life. One writer calls Buck a one eyed, 268 00:17:18,280 --> 00:17:21,880 Speaker 1: one man crime spree, and honestly, that's just about right. 269 00:17:22,359 --> 00:17:25,240 Speaker 1: With his wife so focused on healing, Buck joined in 270 00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:28,840 Speaker 1: selling bottles of a life elixir for one dollar each, 271 00:17:29,160 --> 00:17:32,840 Speaker 1: a mix of alcohol, opium, herbs, and molasses, and it 272 00:17:32,960 --> 00:17:35,680 Speaker 1: was popular, but Anna probably took more of it than 273 00:17:35,760 --> 00:17:39,960 Speaker 1: anyone else. It seems that everything Buck tried his hand 274 00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:42,880 Speaker 1: out was a con except maybe for the violence that 275 00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:46,160 Speaker 1: was real enough. He was brutal with his wife and 276 00:17:46,240 --> 00:17:49,359 Speaker 1: his children. Things were so bad in their household that 277 00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:52,600 Speaker 1: one of Victoria's brothers disappeared when he was thirteen to 278 00:17:52,840 --> 00:17:57,680 Speaker 1: escape the family's vicious life. Victoria, though, followed in her 279 00:17:57,680 --> 00:18:01,640 Speaker 1: mother's footsteps. Religious x to sees, lifted her spirit out 280 00:18:01,680 --> 00:18:04,720 Speaker 1: of the violent home. In one of their neighborhoods, Victoria 281 00:18:04,760 --> 00:18:07,600 Speaker 1: found daily refuge with a woman who fed her, washed 282 00:18:07,600 --> 00:18:10,199 Speaker 1: her hair, and taught her to read and write. It 283 00:18:10,280 --> 00:18:13,800 Speaker 1: was a comforting and carrying presence in an otherwise harsh world. 284 00:18:14,359 --> 00:18:17,520 Speaker 1: But when that neighbor died, the sense that only a 285 00:18:17,560 --> 00:18:21,600 Speaker 1: different world could provide an escape from suffering lodged into 286 00:18:21,680 --> 00:18:26,040 Speaker 1: Victoria's heart. She would later say that her neighborhood friend's 287 00:18:26,080 --> 00:18:30,240 Speaker 1: spirit was her first visitation. As Victoria wept over the 288 00:18:30,280 --> 00:18:33,560 Speaker 1: woman's death, the woman's tender hearted ghost took her by 289 00:18:33,600 --> 00:18:36,520 Speaker 1: the hand, lifted her off the ground, and for three 290 00:18:36,560 --> 00:18:40,600 Speaker 1: hours the pair soared over Homer, Ohio. Except to her 291 00:18:40,640 --> 00:18:43,680 Speaker 1: mother Anna, it only looked as if Victoria had collapsed 292 00:18:43,680 --> 00:18:47,480 Speaker 1: on the floor rather than flying. She lay as if 293 00:18:47,520 --> 00:18:52,119 Speaker 1: dead for three hours. That wasn't the last time it 294 00:18:52,160 --> 00:18:56,560 Speaker 1: would happen either. Trances and paralysis became a regular part 295 00:18:56,560 --> 00:19:00,920 Speaker 1: of Victoria's life. Then other remarkable thing started to happen 296 00:19:00,960 --> 00:19:04,439 Speaker 1: around her. Anna reported that once, when Victoria was taking 297 00:19:04,440 --> 00:19:06,840 Speaker 1: care of a sick baby, the girl fell into a 298 00:19:06,880 --> 00:19:11,520 Speaker 1: trance and the baby's fever dropped. Years before spiritualism arrived 299 00:19:11,520 --> 00:19:14,560 Speaker 1: in New York, it seemed that Victoria was already a 300 00:19:14,600 --> 00:19:20,080 Speaker 1: trance healer. When Victoria was ten, Buck ensured the unused 301 00:19:20,080 --> 00:19:23,640 Speaker 1: gristmill on the land near their shack for four thousand dollars. 302 00:19:24,119 --> 00:19:27,560 Speaker 1: Then it mysteriously caught fire while he was drinking at 303 00:19:27,560 --> 00:19:30,840 Speaker 1: a nearby pub. When Buck tried to collect the insurance, 304 00:19:31,119 --> 00:19:34,240 Speaker 1: the neighbors random out of town, but they didn't think 305 00:19:34,320 --> 00:19:38,480 Speaker 1: that he worked alone. In fact, they suspected Anna and 306 00:19:38,560 --> 00:19:41,760 Speaker 1: Victoria of helping him set the fire. Buck had been 307 00:19:41,800 --> 00:19:44,600 Speaker 1: the town's postmaster too, and when he was gone, they 308 00:19:44,640 --> 00:19:48,440 Speaker 1: discovered a trunk filled with empty envelopes addressed to homer residence. 309 00:19:48,840 --> 00:19:51,240 Speaker 1: It seems mail theft could be added to his long 310 00:19:51,320 --> 00:19:56,680 Speaker 1: string of offenses. In the winter of eighty eight, when 311 00:19:56,680 --> 00:19:59,040 Speaker 1: the Fox sisters were meeting the ghost of a murdered 312 00:19:59,040 --> 00:20:01,800 Speaker 1: peddler who claimed be buried in their basement. The women 313 00:20:01,800 --> 00:20:04,760 Speaker 1: of Homer, Ohio were organizing a fundraiser to pay for 314 00:20:04,800 --> 00:20:07,800 Speaker 1: Anna's exit. She packed up the kids into a wagon 315 00:20:08,040 --> 00:20:11,639 Speaker 1: and rattled off over the frozen ground. Hard scrabble years 316 00:20:11,640 --> 00:20:14,800 Speaker 1: would follow, but so would greater and greater interest in 317 00:20:14,880 --> 00:20:19,440 Speaker 1: communicating with the spirits. When he finally rejoined his wife 318 00:20:19,440 --> 00:20:22,160 Speaker 1: and children, Buck knew that the spirits were on the move. 319 00:20:22,600 --> 00:20:25,720 Speaker 1: There was never a trusting soul that Buck couldn't exploit, 320 00:20:26,119 --> 00:20:29,280 Speaker 1: and as always, he took out every scheme, impulse, and 321 00:20:29,440 --> 00:20:35,359 Speaker 1: outburst on his daughter's Victoria was rarely strong enough to work, though, 322 00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:38,879 Speaker 1: so Buck began using his youngest daughter, seven year old Tennessee, 323 00:20:39,280 --> 00:20:41,840 Speaker 1: in his schemes. He dressed up a wagon with a 324 00:20:41,880 --> 00:20:45,480 Speaker 1: bright red canopy, blue trim, and a playbill announcing the 325 00:20:45,560 --> 00:20:49,400 Speaker 1: wonder child who would channel spirits. After their first tour, 326 00:20:49,840 --> 00:20:54,000 Speaker 1: he roped in the sickly Victoria. In eighteen forty one, 327 00:20:54,040 --> 00:20:57,119 Speaker 1: he opened rooms at the boarding house in Mount Gilead, Ohio, 328 00:20:57,480 --> 00:21:00,440 Speaker 1: and broadcast that his fourteen year old daughter, Vick Torria, 329 00:21:00,600 --> 00:21:03,800 Speaker 1: was a medium. Just like the Fox sisters. She could 330 00:21:03,840 --> 00:21:09,600 Speaker 1: hold seances, convey spirit messages, and make spirit music. All 331 00:21:09,680 --> 00:21:13,160 Speaker 1: for the low low price of just one dollar per 332 00:21:13,280 --> 00:21:22,639 Speaker 1: visit the opiate of the masses. By now, it's a 333 00:21:22,720 --> 00:21:25,959 Speaker 1: famous put down of religion. In the eighteen fifties, there 334 00:21:26,000 --> 00:21:27,960 Speaker 1: were plenty of folks who thought it was a perfect 335 00:21:28,000 --> 00:21:31,520 Speaker 1: description of spiritualism, and with people like Buck on the scene, 336 00:21:32,000 --> 00:21:35,280 Speaker 1: who could blame them if the new movement was going 337 00:21:35,359 --> 00:21:37,400 Speaker 1: to be dismissed as a con game, though, there would 338 00:21:37,480 --> 00:21:41,040 Speaker 1: need to be some proof. Mediums and their seance visitors 339 00:21:41,040 --> 00:21:45,320 Speaker 1: were certainly witnesses to something, but what exactly. When the 340 00:21:45,359 --> 00:21:47,960 Speaker 1: Fox sisters were sitting at Barnum's Hotel in the summer 341 00:21:48,000 --> 00:21:51,040 Speaker 1: of eighteen fifty, they convinced many of their observers that 342 00:21:51,080 --> 00:21:53,680 Speaker 1: there was no better explanation than the one they gave. 343 00:21:54,200 --> 00:21:59,160 Speaker 1: They were simply well tuned instruments of the spirits. Among 344 00:21:59,200 --> 00:22:02,280 Speaker 1: those converts was Horace Greeley. He was the publisher of 345 00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:05,439 Speaker 1: the New York Tribune and a significant intellectual figure in 346 00:22:05,480 --> 00:22:08,280 Speaker 1: American life. In August of that year, he wrote in 347 00:22:08,280 --> 00:22:10,679 Speaker 1: his newspaper that the girls had been put to every 348 00:22:10,760 --> 00:22:15,439 Speaker 1: reasonable test. They had absorbed keen and critical scrutiny. No 349 00:22:15,480 --> 00:22:18,160 Speaker 1: one could detect any method of fraud as far as 350 00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:21,119 Speaker 1: Horace could tell, whatever the origin of the noises might be, 351 00:22:21,320 --> 00:22:26,239 Speaker 1: he wrote, Leah, Maggie and Kate did not manufacture them. 352 00:22:26,280 --> 00:22:29,560 Speaker 1: An opposing verdict arrived that winter. You see, the Fox 353 00:22:29,560 --> 00:22:32,240 Speaker 1: sisters left New York City in the fall and started 354 00:22:32,280 --> 00:22:35,760 Speaker 1: touring throughout the Northeast. In December, they spent three weeks 355 00:22:35,760 --> 00:22:39,840 Speaker 1: in Buffalo. The following February, three professors from the University 356 00:22:39,840 --> 00:22:42,959 Speaker 1: of Buffalo published a joint letter in the local newspaper. 357 00:22:43,640 --> 00:22:46,720 Speaker 1: Unlike Horace Greeley, they said they had a better explanation 358 00:22:46,800 --> 00:22:50,560 Speaker 1: than spirit contact for the strange rapping sounds. It was, 359 00:22:50,680 --> 00:22:55,680 Speaker 1: they said, simply the popping of knee joints. Leah, managing 360 00:22:55,720 --> 00:22:59,040 Speaker 1: the public face of her younger sisters, immediately challenged the 361 00:22:59,080 --> 00:23:03,560 Speaker 1: professors to of it, which they accepted. The game was on. 362 00:23:05,600 --> 00:23:08,480 Speaker 1: Things didn't exactly go well for the Fox sisters, though. 363 00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:12,320 Speaker 1: The tests left the doctors unconvinced, and they didn't mind 364 00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:15,840 Speaker 1: saying so. But when the professors published their findings, it 365 00:23:15,960 --> 00:23:18,199 Speaker 1: was clear that they were looking down their noses at 366 00:23:18,240 --> 00:23:21,639 Speaker 1: the girls from the start. Their report called Leah, Maggie 367 00:23:21,680 --> 00:23:25,600 Speaker 1: and Kate the Rochester females, and according to some readers. 368 00:23:25,640 --> 00:23:28,200 Speaker 1: Those doctors had been a little too eager to see 369 00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:32,360 Speaker 1: what they wanted in the tests. The report described how 370 00:23:32,359 --> 00:23:34,920 Speaker 1: the three men gripped the girl's legs and help them 371 00:23:34,920 --> 00:23:38,240 Speaker 1: in a static position. During those sittings, there were no 372 00:23:38,359 --> 00:23:41,520 Speaker 1: strange knocking sounds. When the girls were allowed to sit 373 00:23:41,560 --> 00:23:44,040 Speaker 1: comfortably on the sofa with their feet on the floor 374 00:23:44,240 --> 00:23:48,360 Speaker 1: and without the professors squeezing their legs, the tapping sounds resumed. 375 00:23:48,880 --> 00:23:51,960 Speaker 1: The three professors agreed that this was definitive proof that 376 00:23:52,000 --> 00:23:55,480 Speaker 1: their theory was right. The fox sisters, they claimed, had 377 00:23:55,520 --> 00:24:00,280 Speaker 1: created the sounds with popping joints. Here's historian Kathy Gautier ris, 378 00:24:02,119 --> 00:24:05,960 Speaker 1: the existence of fake flowers does not disprove the existence 379 00:24:06,000 --> 00:24:12,280 Speaker 1: of real ones. The idea that because there are occasional cheaters, 380 00:24:12,440 --> 00:24:17,480 Speaker 1: or that an actual medium occasionally cheats, is sort of 381 00:24:17,520 --> 00:24:20,520 Speaker 1: easily incorporated into the world view. So if you thought 382 00:24:20,520 --> 00:24:22,800 Speaker 1: they were ridiculous began with you continued to think they 383 00:24:22,840 --> 00:24:27,800 Speaker 1: were ridiculous after the Buffalo investigations, And if you thought 384 00:24:27,840 --> 00:24:30,840 Speaker 1: they were the real deal, but they are just kids 385 00:24:30,840 --> 00:24:35,040 Speaker 1: put in this awkward position, so sometimes it got slippery, 386 00:24:35,480 --> 00:24:40,200 Speaker 1: then that's what you thought. This wasn't the most damaging test, though, 387 00:24:40,720 --> 00:24:43,240 Speaker 1: no that came in April of the same year, when 388 00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:45,480 Speaker 1: The New York Herald decided to go head to head 389 00:24:45,560 --> 00:24:48,760 Speaker 1: with Horace Greeley's New York Tribune. In an article co 390 00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:51,320 Speaker 1: signed by a doctor and a minister, one of the 391 00:24:51,359 --> 00:24:56,399 Speaker 1: Fox in laws, Mrs Culver gave some damning testimony. She 392 00:24:56,480 --> 00:24:58,919 Speaker 1: said that for two years she had believed the knocking 393 00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:02,879 Speaker 1: sounds were genuine communication from the dead. That is until 394 00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:06,000 Speaker 1: a recent visit when Maggie was away and Kate asked 395 00:25:06,040 --> 00:25:09,280 Speaker 1: for some assistance with a seance. That was when, according 396 00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:13,040 Speaker 1: to Mrs Culver, Kate showed her how it worked. She 397 00:25:13,119 --> 00:25:15,120 Speaker 1: said that Kate told her it was the girls who 398 00:25:15,160 --> 00:25:18,159 Speaker 1: made the knocking sounds by popping their knees and toes 399 00:25:18,720 --> 00:25:21,199 Speaker 1: in the early tests. Mrs Culver said the girls had 400 00:25:21,240 --> 00:25:24,000 Speaker 1: accomplices who knocked on the walls from the room next 401 00:25:24,000 --> 00:25:28,000 Speaker 1: door when necessary. Taken together, these accounts caused to stir 402 00:25:28,600 --> 00:25:32,160 Speaker 1: The first, the three Buffalo professors, came from people who 403 00:25:32,240 --> 00:25:35,640 Speaker 1: leaned on their academic credentials. The second, the New York 404 00:25:35,680 --> 00:25:38,920 Speaker 1: Herald challenge, came with the flavor of an exposed cover up. 405 00:25:38,960 --> 00:25:42,480 Speaker 1: Writing on the social standing of religious and medical authorities 406 00:25:43,200 --> 00:25:46,440 Speaker 1: from both angles. These articles claimed that the Fox Sisters 407 00:25:46,520 --> 00:25:50,880 Speaker 1: the Rochester females were tricksters and the movement that trusted 408 00:25:50,920 --> 00:25:53,760 Speaker 1: them as four Runners and champions was based on a 409 00:25:53,840 --> 00:25:58,960 Speaker 1: simple prank that had grown into a massive fraud. These 410 00:25:59,040 --> 00:26:02,159 Speaker 1: debunking effort were all about what was true, but they 411 00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:05,000 Speaker 1: also carried a whiff of the town meetings in Wisconsin 412 00:26:05,200 --> 00:26:07,680 Speaker 1: when the leaders of the community got together to shut 413 00:26:07,720 --> 00:26:10,960 Speaker 1: down Cora and Mary, who had challenged their authority. On 414 00:26:11,040 --> 00:26:14,000 Speaker 1: one level, debunking was an attempt to hold back the 415 00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:18,200 Speaker 1: opportunistic frauds of the world, predatory hucksters like buck Laughlin, 416 00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:21,399 Speaker 1: But too often it was also clearly an attempt to 417 00:26:21,480 --> 00:26:25,120 Speaker 1: keep society's reigns in the hands of the professor's, doctors 418 00:26:25,119 --> 00:26:29,439 Speaker 1: and ministers who had held them for so long. And 419 00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:32,920 Speaker 1: of course, being convinced of spirit contact wasn't the only 420 00:26:33,000 --> 00:26:35,440 Speaker 1: reason that someone might pay a few pennies to step 421 00:26:35,480 --> 00:26:39,280 Speaker 1: into a concert hall and see young women shuddering entrances 422 00:26:39,320 --> 00:26:42,040 Speaker 1: on stage, or to slide a dollar over to a 423 00:26:42,080 --> 00:26:45,119 Speaker 1: medium's manager or an evening's meeting with her in a 424 00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:48,840 Speaker 1: dimly lit parlor. But spiritual belief was just one of 425 00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:52,680 Speaker 1: the many conflicting reasons for holding hands around a seance table. 426 00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:55,640 Speaker 1: It could also have been a thirst for thrills, for 427 00:26:55,680 --> 00:27:00,199 Speaker 1: a night of entertainment, or a simple curiosity about something bizarre. 428 00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:03,720 Speaker 1: Two amateur sleuths, what could be more tantalizing than a 429 00:27:03,800 --> 00:27:06,360 Speaker 1: chance to go out and do a little fraud detection 430 00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:09,719 Speaker 1: of your own. But don't take these early attacks on 431 00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:14,040 Speaker 1: spiritualism at purely face value. Yes, they were assaults on 432 00:27:14,080 --> 00:27:17,600 Speaker 1: a new and growing movement, but there were something else too, 433 00:27:18,680 --> 00:27:21,400 Speaker 1: Because when it came to turning tables for a profit, 434 00:27:21,920 --> 00:27:34,399 Speaker 1: sometimes even bad press was good business. Cora was headed 435 00:27:34,440 --> 00:27:38,080 Speaker 1: back to Spiritualism's heartland. She had traveled with her father 436 00:27:38,160 --> 00:27:41,720 Speaker 1: all over Wisconsin, speaking in trances and working with her 437 00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:45,880 Speaker 1: German doctor to heal illnesses. But they had received tragic news. 438 00:27:47,400 --> 00:27:50,760 Speaker 1: Their friend Aidan Blue, whose Hope Dale community was their 439 00:27:50,760 --> 00:27:55,480 Speaker 1: original launchpad, had suffered a blow. His son, Augustus had died. 440 00:27:55,960 --> 00:27:58,480 Speaker 1: The boy had only been nineteen, but had also been 441 00:27:58,520 --> 00:28:01,520 Speaker 1: an ardent follower of his father's teaching. He was an 442 00:28:01,520 --> 00:28:06,199 Speaker 1: apt scholar, an enthusiastic reader of European socialist writers, and 443 00:28:06,359 --> 00:28:10,800 Speaker 1: an eloquent speaker. But now he was dead. Under normal 444 00:28:10,840 --> 00:28:14,119 Speaker 1: circumstances that might only have required some mailed gift or 445 00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:17,320 Speaker 1: a message of sympathy. But the times were new, and 446 00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:21,320 Speaker 1: it seemed that Augustus wasn't done preaching just yet. In fact, 447 00:28:21,359 --> 00:28:24,520 Speaker 1: word of his death reached Cora and her father before 448 00:28:24,560 --> 00:28:27,359 Speaker 1: the message that raced over the telegraph lines to the west. 449 00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:31,240 Speaker 1: You see, Augustus had begun to speak through Coras trances. 450 00:28:31,720 --> 00:28:34,119 Speaker 1: From this point forward, he would become one of her 451 00:28:34,160 --> 00:28:37,600 Speaker 1: most common spirit controls, and he had more words of 452 00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:41,160 Speaker 1: hope and healing for his country and for his father. 453 00:28:42,440 --> 00:28:44,920 Speaker 1: So in the summer of eighteen fifty two, Cora and 454 00:28:44,960 --> 00:28:47,680 Speaker 1: her father boarded the very same steamer that had brought 455 00:28:47,720 --> 00:28:50,600 Speaker 1: them to Wisconsin, a canal boat called the Globe, to 456 00:28:50,680 --> 00:28:53,120 Speaker 1: make their way back to New York. By the time 457 00:28:53,120 --> 00:28:55,760 Speaker 1: they reached their destination, they had a new convert to 458 00:28:55,800 --> 00:28:58,920 Speaker 1: Cora's cause. The captain of the boat had suffered from 459 00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:02,240 Speaker 1: an ulcerous fever sore. When Cora sat with him during 460 00:29:02,240 --> 00:29:05,160 Speaker 1: the voyage, his pain had cleared and the ulcers started 461 00:29:05,200 --> 00:29:08,240 Speaker 1: to close. He was just one of thousands who would 462 00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:13,640 Speaker 1: experience something miraculous in her presence. They brought word back 463 00:29:13,680 --> 00:29:16,720 Speaker 1: east from Augustus to his family in Hopedale, but also 464 00:29:16,840 --> 00:29:19,960 Speaker 1: to Cuba, New York, where Cora's father grew up. There 465 00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:23,400 Speaker 1: were no Mrs Culver's and Corus family. Her large circle 466 00:29:23,440 --> 00:29:26,000 Speaker 1: of relatives paved the way for her to speak in school, 467 00:29:26,000 --> 00:29:29,800 Speaker 1: district houses, and town halls across the county. Despite all 468 00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:32,880 Speaker 1: the fake flowers in the garden, a medium was blooming 469 00:29:32,960 --> 00:29:35,560 Speaker 1: in the family, and in the spring of eighteen fifty 470 00:29:35,560 --> 00:29:40,760 Speaker 1: two that meant something. With Augustus Blue as her spirit guide, 471 00:29:40,840 --> 00:29:45,040 Speaker 1: Corus trances started to become more complex. Soon it wasn't 472 00:29:45,120 --> 00:29:48,120 Speaker 1: just Augustus. Like the crowds of spirits that arrived in 473 00:29:48,240 --> 00:29:51,480 Speaker 1: Rochester to speak through Isaac Post, a full roster of 474 00:29:51,560 --> 00:29:55,680 Speaker 1: significant figures appeared in her spirit sessions. She would speak 475 00:29:55,720 --> 00:29:59,640 Speaker 1: on philosophy, she would speak on ethics. One writer remarked 476 00:29:59,640 --> 00:30:02,400 Speaker 1: that ardless of whether her lectures were her own thoughts 477 00:30:02,680 --> 00:30:06,160 Speaker 1: or truly from a spirit control, they would have astonished him, 478 00:30:06,160 --> 00:30:10,000 Speaker 1: coming from the most accomplished orator in the world. But 479 00:30:10,120 --> 00:30:12,880 Speaker 1: things changed for Cora when her father died in eighteen 480 00:30:12,920 --> 00:30:17,400 Speaker 1: fifty four. Her mother and siblings retreated to the Hopetale community, 481 00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:21,160 Speaker 1: but Cora's fame had outgrown its shelter. And that's when 482 00:30:21,200 --> 00:30:24,160 Speaker 1: Cora was invited to join a spiritualist circle in Buffalo, 483 00:30:24,440 --> 00:30:27,960 Speaker 1: where the university inquisition had wrung the Fox Sisters dry 484 00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:32,400 Speaker 1: two years earlier. Just fourteen years old, Cora took up 485 00:30:32,440 --> 00:30:35,880 Speaker 1: the challenge, and it threw her star into the sky. 486 00:30:36,000 --> 00:30:38,760 Speaker 1: When she arrived, there were plenty of friendly spiritualists to 487 00:30:38,800 --> 00:30:42,040 Speaker 1: watch out for her when the interrogations came, and come 488 00:30:42,160 --> 00:30:46,680 Speaker 1: they did. James Mapes, professor of chemistry there, decided that 489 00:30:46,720 --> 00:30:49,200 Speaker 1: he would be the first. He challenged Cora to speak 490 00:30:49,240 --> 00:30:52,160 Speaker 1: for the spirits on geology. The text of the spirit 491 00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:55,120 Speaker 1: lecture is lost to us, but by the end Mapes 492 00:30:55,240 --> 00:30:58,440 Speaker 1: was stunned. I have been all my long life an 493 00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:02,600 Speaker 1: investigator on scientific subjects, he said, but I stand here 494 00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:07,640 Speaker 1: this afternoon dumb before this girl. More friends in high 495 00:31:07,680 --> 00:31:10,800 Speaker 1: places followed. One of them was Samon P. Chase, the 496 00:31:10,840 --> 00:31:13,640 Speaker 1: former senator who had been elected governor of Ohio in 497 00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:18,920 Speaker 1: eighteen fifty. A host of other professional skeptics, lawyers, doctors, 498 00:31:18,960 --> 00:31:23,200 Speaker 1: and scientific agnostics were also baffled by her. At least, 499 00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:26,840 Speaker 1: that's the story that comes down to us. Not so 500 00:31:26,880 --> 00:31:31,160 Speaker 1: easily dismissed as a simple trickster. Cora instead directly confronted 501 00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:35,840 Speaker 1: the man's world of the intellectual elite, and somehow she thrived. 502 00:31:37,320 --> 00:31:40,640 Speaker 1: The first Spiritual Society of Buffalo ballooned as a result. 503 00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:43,000 Speaker 1: By the summer of eighteen fifty five. They had to 504 00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:46,160 Speaker 1: rent out a larger hall for their regular meetings. Of course, 505 00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:49,840 Speaker 1: they made Cora their centerpiece. As we've seen though, such 506 00:31:49,880 --> 00:31:53,120 Speaker 1: a bright light also tends to attract moths, which is 507 00:31:53,160 --> 00:31:57,440 Speaker 1: where she met Dr Benjamin F. Hatch. As one historian 508 00:31:57,480 --> 00:32:01,320 Speaker 1: puts it, his m d was um self awarded in 509 00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:04,480 Speaker 1: his fifties. He had been, like Buck Laflin, a pitchman 510 00:32:04,600 --> 00:32:06,840 Speaker 1: for a number of cures that he talked to patients 511 00:32:06,920 --> 00:32:10,520 Speaker 1: under false credentials until he landed on his golden ticket. 512 00:32:10,720 --> 00:32:18,200 Speaker 1: That is Here's historian John Busher, Benjamin Hatch was alternative 513 00:32:18,560 --> 00:32:22,200 Speaker 1: physician in that time. That could mean almost anything. In 514 00:32:22,240 --> 00:32:26,360 Speaker 1: his case, it meant that he was one who was 515 00:32:26,640 --> 00:32:31,120 Speaker 1: very intent on using masmerism as part of his tools. 516 00:32:33,400 --> 00:32:36,600 Speaker 1: He must have projected an air of success. He was 517 00:32:36,640 --> 00:32:40,280 Speaker 1: convincing enough to Cora's friends and then to Cora herself. 518 00:32:40,680 --> 00:32:44,520 Speaker 1: In fact, he convinced the girl to marry him after 519 00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:47,080 Speaker 1: he pulled her out of Buffalo. Benjamin put her name 520 00:32:47,120 --> 00:32:50,040 Speaker 1: in lights. It was as Cora Hatch that she would 521 00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:52,920 Speaker 1: become best known. But the story of Benjamin and Cora 522 00:32:53,040 --> 00:32:56,000 Speaker 1: would become a major scandal in the spiritualist movement over 523 00:32:56,080 --> 00:33:01,160 Speaker 1: the next five years. Here's Kathy Gutierrez once again. She 524 00:33:01,280 --> 00:33:06,040 Speaker 1: was very beautiful, and every single newspaper account of her 525 00:33:06,360 --> 00:33:10,479 Speaker 1: just fulminates over her long blonde curls, and she was 526 00:33:10,560 --> 00:33:16,520 Speaker 1: always decked out in a slightly racy outfit. And as 527 00:33:16,560 --> 00:33:20,440 Speaker 1: for Benjamin, he was, not, to put too fine a 528 00:33:20,520 --> 00:33:22,960 Speaker 1: point on it, a bit of charlatan and something of 529 00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:26,680 Speaker 1: a pimp. There is no need to treat him with 530 00:33:26,760 --> 00:33:30,000 Speaker 1: kid gloves. After only two years of marriage, Cora was 531 00:33:30,080 --> 00:33:36,360 Speaker 1: run ragged, exhausted, sick, and trapped. One night in New Haven, Connecticut, 532 00:33:36,400 --> 00:33:40,000 Speaker 1: a bedraggled Cora burst into a hotel and begged for shelter. 533 00:33:40,600 --> 00:33:42,720 Speaker 1: She had run out into the night to escape a 534 00:33:42,760 --> 00:33:45,560 Speaker 1: beating from Benjamin. She was worried that he was going 535 00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:48,480 Speaker 1: to kill her. One of the guests in the hotel, 536 00:33:48,600 --> 00:33:52,080 Speaker 1: William Britton, heard the noise in the entry hall. William 537 00:33:52,280 --> 00:33:55,760 Speaker 1: was a spiritualist, and he recognized the famous girl. He 538 00:33:55,840 --> 00:33:57,840 Speaker 1: stepped out with a book in his hand and saw 539 00:33:57,840 --> 00:34:00,800 Speaker 1: the tears on her face, the fear in her eyes. 540 00:34:02,040 --> 00:34:04,680 Speaker 1: William covered the cost of her room that night and 541 00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:07,560 Speaker 1: delivered her into the care of her friends. Soon enough, 542 00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:11,040 Speaker 1: Cora and Benjamin launched divorce proceedings that would become a 543 00:34:11,120 --> 00:34:15,000 Speaker 1: snarl of lawsuits, battles for the proceeds of her lectures, 544 00:34:15,040 --> 00:34:18,240 Speaker 1: and venomous public statements that would stretch out for almost 545 00:34:18,239 --> 00:34:21,480 Speaker 1: a decade. And in the midst of that fight, William 546 00:34:21,520 --> 00:34:25,480 Speaker 1: Brittain's assistants became a rare example of something much needed 547 00:34:25,520 --> 00:34:28,160 Speaker 1: in the lives of the mediums who would go public 548 00:34:28,280 --> 00:34:38,040 Speaker 1: with their work kindness. Buck knew how he wanted the 549 00:34:38,040 --> 00:34:42,560 Speaker 1: seances to work, but Victoria wouldn't cooperate. She would fall 550 00:34:42,640 --> 00:34:45,200 Speaker 1: so deeply into her trances that she wouldn't respond to 551 00:34:45,239 --> 00:34:47,640 Speaker 1: his commands, and when she woke back up, she would 552 00:34:47,640 --> 00:34:51,160 Speaker 1: be disoriented. And it was important that she did what 553 00:34:51,239 --> 00:34:53,600 Speaker 1: she was told because Buck was counting on his daughters 554 00:34:53,640 --> 00:34:57,040 Speaker 1: for his drinking and gambling money. So when Victoria started 555 00:34:57,040 --> 00:35:00,200 Speaker 1: getting sicker and sicker, he called on a doctor. He 556 00:35:00,320 --> 00:35:04,319 Speaker 1: called on Kenning Woodhall. He was one of the many 557 00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:06,480 Speaker 1: who were making their way west to find a place 558 00:35:06,480 --> 00:35:09,400 Speaker 1: in the world, but Canning came to Mount Guillet, Ohio 559 00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:12,320 Speaker 1: with the story that bolstered his prospects more than most. 560 00:35:12,800 --> 00:35:18,920 Speaker 1: Here's Mary Gabrielle again. Keening Woodhall was supposedly a medical 561 00:35:18,960 --> 00:35:22,920 Speaker 1: doctor who rolled into Mount Guillet, Ohio, where Victoria was 562 00:35:22,960 --> 00:35:25,840 Speaker 1: living with her family, and set up a practice. Keening 563 00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:28,600 Speaker 1: Woodhall was in his early thirties and Victoria was fifteen, 564 00:35:29,400 --> 00:35:32,359 Speaker 1: and he started wooing her and told her that he 565 00:35:32,480 --> 00:35:34,640 Speaker 1: was related to the mayor of New York City, and 566 00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:37,479 Speaker 1: was a relative of a judge in New York, and 567 00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:40,640 Speaker 1: that he was a practicing doctor, and in other words, 568 00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:45,640 Speaker 1: he was everything Victoria Woodhall wasn't. Maybe it was because 569 00:35:45,680 --> 00:35:48,359 Speaker 1: of these famous connections the Buck decided to ask him 570 00:35:48,360 --> 00:35:52,200 Speaker 1: to treat Victoria, and his first prescriptions seemed promising enough. 571 00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:56,640 Speaker 1: A healthy diet, school lessons instead of seances, and regular 572 00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:59,920 Speaker 1: walks in the fresh air. On one of her walks, 573 00:36:00,280 --> 00:36:03,319 Speaker 1: Victoria ran into Channing in the street. He asked the 574 00:36:03,320 --> 00:36:05,400 Speaker 1: girl to come to him to Mount Gilead's Fourth of 575 00:36:05,480 --> 00:36:09,320 Speaker 1: July picnic. She agreed and sold apples by hand until 576 00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:12,000 Speaker 1: she had stashed enough money away from Bucks Clutches to 577 00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:15,840 Speaker 1: buy clothes for the event. Afterwards, when he was walking 578 00:36:15,840 --> 00:36:19,160 Speaker 1: her back to her family's door, Canning ling down and said, 579 00:36:19,600 --> 00:36:22,080 Speaker 1: tell your father and mother that I want you for 580 00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:25,879 Speaker 1: a wife. Anna saw a way to get her daughter 581 00:36:25,920 --> 00:36:29,680 Speaker 1: out from under Buck's predatory thumb. Buck saw the same thing, 582 00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:33,040 Speaker 1: just from his own point of view. He confronted Canning 583 00:36:33,080 --> 00:36:35,720 Speaker 1: and told him to stay away from Victoria. But despite 584 00:36:35,719 --> 00:36:38,680 Speaker 1: these attempts to keep her under his control, Victoria slipped 585 00:36:38,680 --> 00:36:41,680 Speaker 1: out and married Channing anyway. She had known him for 586 00:36:41,760 --> 00:36:45,720 Speaker 1: only a few months, but an escape was still an escape. 587 00:36:46,840 --> 00:36:49,440 Speaker 1: It turned out to be a terrible one, though sure. 588 00:36:49,520 --> 00:36:52,240 Speaker 1: Canning was less harsh than her father, and he taught 589 00:36:52,239 --> 00:36:54,839 Speaker 1: her some social graces that she had never learned at home, 590 00:36:55,239 --> 00:36:57,279 Speaker 1: but it also gave her a long hard look at 591 00:36:57,320 --> 00:37:01,319 Speaker 1: what was beneath his veneer of respectability. Canning was not, 592 00:37:01,640 --> 00:37:04,920 Speaker 1: as he claimed, related to judges and mayors, but he 593 00:37:05,040 --> 00:37:08,799 Speaker 1: was an alcoholic and a morphine addict. His medical credentials 594 00:37:08,840 --> 00:37:12,200 Speaker 1: matched Benjamin Hatches too, and to put a punctuation mark 595 00:37:12,280 --> 00:37:14,640 Speaker 1: on all the lies, he spent the third night of 596 00:37:14,680 --> 00:37:19,560 Speaker 1: their marriage at the local brothel. Soon enough, Victoria was 597 00:37:19,600 --> 00:37:22,840 Speaker 1: a teenage wife without love or money, She followed Canning 598 00:37:22,920 --> 00:37:26,560 Speaker 1: from tavern to brothel to tavern. Six weeks into their marriage, 599 00:37:26,560 --> 00:37:28,920 Speaker 1: she found a letter in her husband's jacket from his 600 00:37:29,000 --> 00:37:33,320 Speaker 1: previous mistress. By the middle of eighteen fifty four, Victoria 601 00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:36,720 Speaker 1: had left Ohio and the Clafland clan behind her. Winter 602 00:37:36,920 --> 00:37:40,040 Speaker 1: found her living in a Chicago tenement. She was pregnant, 603 00:37:40,360 --> 00:37:42,759 Speaker 1: far from home and trapped in a marriage with a 604 00:37:42,840 --> 00:37:47,120 Speaker 1: counterfeit doctor. She would later write, I soon learned that 605 00:37:47,160 --> 00:37:50,000 Speaker 1: what I had believed of marriage and society was the 606 00:37:50,080 --> 00:37:53,880 Speaker 1: merest sham, a cloak made by devotees to hide the 607 00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:58,480 Speaker 1: realities and to entice the innocent into their snares. The 608 00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,279 Speaker 1: deep suffering and dis illusionment of those experiences would take 609 00:38:02,360 --> 00:38:05,879 Speaker 1: roots in Victoria. Over time, they would fuel a fire 610 00:38:05,960 --> 00:38:08,400 Speaker 1: that would burn so hot it would threaten the central 611 00:38:08,440 --> 00:38:12,240 Speaker 1: pillars of the society that allowed men like Matthias but Claflin, 612 00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:16,360 Speaker 1: Benjamin Hatch, and Canning Woodhall to wield so much power 613 00:38:16,600 --> 00:38:20,439 Speaker 1: over the women in their lives. Victoria didn't know it then, 614 00:38:20,560 --> 00:38:22,799 Speaker 1: but there were already a host of people working to 615 00:38:22,920 --> 00:38:26,440 Speaker 1: challenge that society and to bring something new into being. 616 00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:29,759 Speaker 1: And they were nowhere more active than in the town 617 00:38:29,800 --> 00:38:33,839 Speaker 1: of Northampton, Massachusetts. That's where sojourn Or Truth found her 618 00:38:33,840 --> 00:38:39,880 Speaker 1: way into their company. Here's Margaret Washington. Northampton was a 619 00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:43,799 Speaker 1: very special place. First of all, it was founded by 620 00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:47,200 Speaker 1: William Lord Garrison, the head of the American Anti Slavery Society, 621 00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:51,280 Speaker 1: founded by his brother in law. That made it sort 622 00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:57,920 Speaker 1: of an entrepole for anti slavery. The next headquarters after 623 00:38:58,040 --> 00:39:03,239 Speaker 1: Boston was really rot Chester. Northampton was in between. For 624 00:39:04,200 --> 00:39:10,600 Speaker 1: individuals leaving Boston and that area to go into the Midwest. 625 00:39:10,680 --> 00:39:15,480 Speaker 1: To speak, then Northampton was a stopping place for them 626 00:39:15,480 --> 00:39:18,439 Speaker 1: going that way. It was also a stopping place if 627 00:39:18,520 --> 00:39:21,920 Speaker 1: they were going to go north. It was also an 628 00:39:21,960 --> 00:39:28,360 Speaker 1: important underground railroad entrepos All of the reasons that someone 629 00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:31,680 Speaker 1: would want to be in Northampton as sort of the 630 00:39:31,719 --> 00:39:36,040 Speaker 1: core of anti slavery in the East were there for Sojourner. 631 00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:41,280 Speaker 1: The friends at Northampton lived in rustic Plaine farming quarters. 632 00:39:41,560 --> 00:39:44,280 Speaker 1: It was a refreshing contrast to the brawl of life 633 00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:49,360 Speaker 1: in the Five Points or the hypocritical indulgence of Matthias's mansion. Besides, 634 00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:52,680 Speaker 1: Sojourner had finally found a community that prided itself on 635 00:39:52,760 --> 00:39:56,480 Speaker 1: equality of races and the equality of men and women too. 636 00:39:57,360 --> 00:40:03,080 Speaker 1: The air was full of ideas communal living, transcendentalism, abolitionism, 637 00:40:03,120 --> 00:40:05,680 Speaker 1: and of course they were also discussing the ideas of 638 00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:10,799 Speaker 1: Andrew Jackson Davis. When his Harmonial Philosophy reached Northampton. Some 639 00:40:10,880 --> 00:40:14,759 Speaker 1: in the group found his writing verbose, redundant, and derived. 640 00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:17,800 Speaker 1: In their eyes, he was just a poor man's Emerson. 641 00:40:19,360 --> 00:40:22,839 Speaker 1: In light of her history with Matthias, Sojourner was suspicious 642 00:40:22,840 --> 00:40:25,759 Speaker 1: of spiritualism's preference for talking with the spirits of the 643 00:40:25,800 --> 00:40:29,240 Speaker 1: dead overhearing from the voice of God. As her friends 644 00:40:29,239 --> 00:40:33,400 Speaker 1: read Davis's book, Sojourner rejected his approach to Christian teaching. 645 00:40:33,840 --> 00:40:37,040 Speaker 1: He denied the doctrines of the Trinity, original sin, and 646 00:40:37,080 --> 00:40:41,040 Speaker 1: the miraculous conception of Christ. Throughout her life, Sojourner had 647 00:40:41,080 --> 00:40:44,760 Speaker 1: seen enough miracles and enough sin for his new visions 648 00:40:44,800 --> 00:40:49,719 Speaker 1: to leave her unimpressed. Once, in eighteen fifty one, she 649 00:40:49,840 --> 00:40:53,560 Speaker 1: visited Rochester and stayed with Amy and Isaac Post. She 650 00:40:53,719 --> 00:40:56,399 Speaker 1: was there at the right time too. The Posts were 651 00:40:56,400 --> 00:41:00,000 Speaker 1: forming a seance circle, and they invited Sojourner to join them. 652 00:41:00,160 --> 00:41:03,359 Speaker 1: The spirit knocking did come, but it came faint and low. 653 00:41:03,760 --> 00:41:06,879 Speaker 1: There were long gaps in between, nothing to set your 654 00:41:06,880 --> 00:41:09,360 Speaker 1: traveling feet to if you were a woman on a mission. 655 00:41:09,719 --> 00:41:12,680 Speaker 1: In the words of one writer, so Journer listened with 656 00:41:12,719 --> 00:41:16,640 Speaker 1: all her soul until her patients ran out. She leaned 657 00:41:16,640 --> 00:41:19,760 Speaker 1: down to the floor and called out, come, spirit, hop 658 00:41:19,840 --> 00:41:21,959 Speaker 1: up here on the table and see if you can't 659 00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:25,279 Speaker 1: make a louder noise. She clearly knew how to keep 660 00:41:25,280 --> 00:41:28,160 Speaker 1: her head and her sense of humor when she was 661 00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:31,600 Speaker 1: less than convinced, But her own beliefs still shared too 662 00:41:31,640 --> 00:41:34,960 Speaker 1: much in common with Davis's to keep her completely apart 663 00:41:35,040 --> 00:41:39,359 Speaker 1: from her spiritualist friends. In reality, she agreed with much 664 00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:43,359 Speaker 1: of what they believed about the afterlife. After all, she 665 00:41:43,440 --> 00:41:46,640 Speaker 1: had been speaking with the spirit of her father for decades, 666 00:41:47,440 --> 00:41:57,160 Speaker 1: only she didn't need a table to do it. Not 667 00:41:57,280 --> 00:42:01,200 Speaker 1: every medium wanted to change society. Some just wanted to 668 00:42:01,239 --> 00:42:05,840 Speaker 1: float above it, like our Scottish friend Daniel Hume. The 669 00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:08,480 Speaker 1: day he held his seance with Maria Hayden was a 670 00:42:08,520 --> 00:42:11,880 Speaker 1: turning point for the spread of spiritualism to Europe. She 671 00:42:12,000 --> 00:42:14,400 Speaker 1: took the voices of the spirits with her to harvest 672 00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:17,920 Speaker 1: converts in the Old world, but Daniel hadn't quite tapped 673 00:42:17,920 --> 00:42:23,360 Speaker 1: every well in American soil. After Maria's husband William published 674 00:42:23,400 --> 00:42:26,480 Speaker 1: his story of their seance, Daniel never again had a 675 00:42:26,520 --> 00:42:30,600 Speaker 1: spare moment. Every day and every night he had people 676 00:42:30,680 --> 00:42:33,640 Speaker 1: clamoring to see the power of the spirits turned tables 677 00:42:34,400 --> 00:42:38,480 Speaker 1: like Cora. He was flooded with invitations from doctors and scientists, 678 00:42:38,760 --> 00:42:41,400 Speaker 1: from ministers who wanted to put his spirits to the test, 679 00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:44,520 Speaker 1: and from writers who wanted to see for themselves if 680 00:42:44,520 --> 00:42:48,280 Speaker 1: the stories were true. When the voice of a spirit 681 00:42:48,320 --> 00:42:50,520 Speaker 1: helped him find the missing will of a dead man 682 00:42:50,560 --> 00:42:54,160 Speaker 1: in Ohio, Daniel made the story his banner. Finding the 683 00:42:54,239 --> 00:42:57,239 Speaker 1: document allowed the man's niece to inherit the land. It 684 00:42:57,360 --> 00:42:59,759 Speaker 1: was a point of pride for the young medium, and 685 00:43:00,040 --> 00:43:03,480 Speaker 1: no surprise, it put him in the most charming lights imaginable. 686 00:43:05,040 --> 00:43:08,560 Speaker 1: Through his new communication with the spirits, justice could be 687 00:43:08,600 --> 00:43:11,440 Speaker 1: done for the women of America, who were so often 688 00:43:11,480 --> 00:43:14,520 Speaker 1: built of their rights and property and were suffering from 689 00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:17,760 Speaker 1: losses at the hands of powerful men and tilted scales. 690 00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:20,560 Speaker 1: There was a new way to be made whole again 691 00:43:21,120 --> 00:43:26,759 Speaker 1: by Daniel's telling. That new way was him. There were 692 00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:29,840 Speaker 1: plenty who were ready to hear his White Night stories too, 693 00:43:30,000 --> 00:43:32,520 Speaker 1: and as Daniel started to travel around New England, he 694 00:43:32,560 --> 00:43:35,560 Speaker 1: was supported by a string of benefactors who shielded him 695 00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:39,640 Speaker 1: from scrutiny. In eighteen fifty one, when the Fox Sisters 696 00:43:39,640 --> 00:43:42,480 Speaker 1: were being ridiculed by their relatives and the faculty at 697 00:43:42,480 --> 00:43:46,840 Speaker 1: the University of Buffalo, Daniel was befriending former Presbyterian minister 698 00:43:46,920 --> 00:43:50,839 Speaker 1: George Bush, who taught biblical languages and ancient literature at 699 00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:55,040 Speaker 1: New York University. Daniel then hopped over to poet, journalist 700 00:43:55,120 --> 00:43:58,560 Speaker 1: and lawyer William Cullen Bryant. After that it was Harvard 701 00:43:58,600 --> 00:44:02,840 Speaker 1: engineer and economist Vid Aims Wells. Their report on the 702 00:44:02,920 --> 00:44:06,120 Speaker 1: violent energy of the spirits at his seance, with shocks 703 00:44:06,160 --> 00:44:09,120 Speaker 1: that shook the room, cemented their belief that there was 704 00:44:09,280 --> 00:44:13,800 Speaker 1: some powerful intelligence manifesting through him. Of course, he was 705 00:44:13,880 --> 00:44:17,120 Speaker 1: also a man, so no one bothered to restrain his legs. 706 00:44:19,040 --> 00:44:22,239 Speaker 1: Where the height of the scientific community and the intellectual 707 00:44:22,320 --> 00:44:25,919 Speaker 1: sets came down heavily on the Fox Sisters, those same 708 00:44:25,960 --> 00:44:30,560 Speaker 1: forces actually assisted Daniel Humes rise, but as we'll soon 709 00:44:30,640 --> 00:44:34,839 Speaker 1: find out, they weren't the only forces lifting him up. 710 00:44:37,239 --> 00:44:41,240 Speaker 1: That's it for this week's episode. Of Unobscured. Stick around 711 00:44:41,280 --> 00:44:44,479 Speaker 1: after this short sponsor break for a preview of what's 712 00:44:44,520 --> 00:44:52,080 Speaker 1: in store for next week. Next time on Unobscured. A 713 00:44:52,120 --> 00:44:55,400 Speaker 1: group of prominent citizens in turn organized their own spirit 714 00:44:55,440 --> 00:44:58,719 Speaker 1: circle in eighteen fifty six, which included members of the 715 00:44:58,760 --> 00:45:01,960 Speaker 1: Savoy nobility and even the vice president of their parliament, 716 00:45:02,280 --> 00:45:05,200 Speaker 1: But under pressure from the Catholic Church, that group didn't 717 00:45:05,280 --> 00:45:09,799 Speaker 1: last more than two years. In Spain, the response was 718 00:45:09,840 --> 00:45:13,279 Speaker 1: even more dramatic. They're The Bishop of Barcelona called on 719 00:45:13,320 --> 00:45:15,960 Speaker 1: the military to help. He had heard that a Spanish 720 00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:19,560 Speaker 1: bookseller ordered a shipment of spiritualist books from France, and 721 00:45:19,600 --> 00:45:23,280 Speaker 1: they were arriving on a French steamship called the L Monarca. 722 00:45:23,440 --> 00:45:25,920 Speaker 1: They whispered that the captain was a known smuggler who 723 00:45:25,960 --> 00:45:29,239 Speaker 1: had used compartments in the ship to transport government fugitives 724 00:45:29,719 --> 00:45:33,520 Speaker 1: and forbidden literature. From the bishop's point of view, El 725 00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:35,960 Speaker 1: Monarca might as well have shipped the books direct from 726 00:45:35,960 --> 00:45:39,120 Speaker 1: the fires of Hell. When the ship landed, soldiers marched 727 00:45:39,120 --> 00:45:41,960 Speaker 1: aboard and toward apart. They carted the books into the 728 00:45:41,960 --> 00:45:45,800 Speaker 1: city square and threw them into a bonfire. The drifting 729 00:45:45,920 --> 00:45:49,360 Speaker 1: spiral of smoke was all the levitation the bishop wanted, 730 00:45:50,640 --> 00:45:52,759 Speaker 1: but there were some who claimed that, just like the 731 00:45:52,800 --> 00:45:55,920 Speaker 1: mob in Hartford, the book burning had the opposite effect. 732 00:45:56,440 --> 00:46:00,560 Speaker 1: When Barcelona's citizens realized what was happening, a crowd gathered. 733 00:46:01,120 --> 00:46:05,160 Speaker 1: First there were just murmurs, but then someone shouted down 734 00:46:05,280 --> 00:46:09,520 Speaker 1: with the inquisition. Soon the boldest people in the crowd 735 00:46:09,640 --> 00:46:13,160 Speaker 1: rushed toward the flames and snatched burning fragments of paper. 736 00:46:13,840 --> 00:46:18,680 Speaker 1: The declaration of forbidden knowledge ended up drawing curious citizens 737 00:46:18,719 --> 00:46:22,960 Speaker 1: like moths to a flame. An underground network of spiritualist 738 00:46:22,960 --> 00:46:43,120 Speaker 1: societies had formed, and it was spreading. Un Obscured was 739 00:46:43,200 --> 00:46:46,320 Speaker 1: created by me Aaron Manky and produced by Matt Frederick, 740 00:46:46,400 --> 00:46:50,240 Speaker 1: Alex Williams, and Josh Thane in partnership with I Heart Radio. 741 00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:53,160 Speaker 1: Research and writing for this season is all the work 742 00:46:53,200 --> 00:46:55,840 Speaker 1: of my right hand man Carl Nellis and the brilliant 743 00:46:55,880 --> 00:46:59,520 Speaker 1: Chad Lawson composed the brand new soundtrack. Learn more about 744 00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:03,040 Speaker 1: our control remading historians, source material and links to our 745 00:47:03,120 --> 00:47:07,680 Speaker 1: other shows over at history unobscured dot com, and until 746 00:47:07,719 --> 00:47:18,400 Speaker 1: next time, thanks for listening. Unobscured is a production of 747 00:47:18,400 --> 00:47:20,800 Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Aaron Minkey. For more podcasts for 748 00:47:20,880 --> 00:47:23,480 Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit i heeart radio, app, Apple podcasts, 749 00:47:23,520 --> 00:47:25,160 Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.