FROM THE ARCHIVES:Spiritualism came into vogue on this side of the Atlantic in 1864 with the arrival in London of the American Davenport Brothers, illusionists who claimed to be able to persuade spirits to play musical instruments. A more transparent piece of "spiritualism" prompted this editorial about a case in Co Tipperary. –
THERE IS now in the Jail of Carrick-on-Suir, just entering on her punishment of twelve months’ imprisonment with hard labour, one Mary Doheny who professed to perform a greater feat than any the Brothers Davenport can boast of.
In one respect Mary Doheny was wiser than the great prestidigitateurs; she knew that if spirits return they would come for something more sensible than flinging fiddles about the ears of dupes. Her spirits required nourishment and she procured it for them.
A Mrs. Mary Reeves was her victim. Death had been busy with the family, two sisters, a child, and her father had been numbered amongst the dead; a younger child was ailing, and to cure her the “wise woman,” Mary Doheny, was called in. For ten months Mary Doheny attended the sick child, and in that time, doubtless, she ascertained the mental power of the child’s parents. At last she told Mrs. Reeves that all the dead of her family were coming home again. Adopting a popular superstition she said that at present they were confined in Ballydine Moat.
There was in the moat also one Captain James Power, who had died, but who undertook to write letters from the dead to the living. A great number of letters came from the moat, but they all contained references to comforts anything but ghostly. Sound wheaten bread, good fresh butter, tea, – though how the spirits managed to make it in the moat without a kettle is a puzzle, – potatoes, wine, whiskey, and tobacco, were obtained by Mary Doheny, for the dead, every evening for four months.
At last the “wise woman” offered to show Mary Reeves her father; and the strangest part of the story is, that Mary Reeves, on the trial, swore “she did see him sitting on a chair in the kitchen, near the door, wearing a blue coat, knee breeches, and a hat, and leaning on a stick.” A child’s voice, too, was heard “outside the door,” which Mary Reeves “believed” was her child’s voice.
The husband of Mary Reeves confirmed the main parts of this extraordinary story, and adds, that he, too, saw his father-in-law. His son, also, was seen, and he remained in view for “five minutes.” The deception was effected by confederates. The husband of Mary Doheny – a blind man – and the person who led him about, personated the dead men, and plundered Mary Reeves by wholesale.
The husband of Mary Reeves is a sub-constable of police, one of those specially drilled, armed and trained as soldiers. If there are such men in the police force it is no wonder that murderers are not detected. A threat from a wise woman would be sufficient to paralyse the pursuer.
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