In the mid-19th century, spiritualism gained momentum across the country. The roots of the movement can be traced to the 1840s in upstate New York, where evangelical religious revivals had taken hold and laid the groundwork for personal and emotional interactions with the divine. Spiritualism’s basic tenets were that the soul continued to exist and evolve after the death of the body, and that the living could communicate with – and receive wisdom from – the dead. This belief in the persistence of the spirit and its ability to interact with the living gained enormous popularity in Cambridge, as in much of the nation, and also attracted criticism and even dire warnings from those who believed that spiritualism was at best a con and at worst an invitation to sinister forces.
Spiritualists had gained a firm foothold in Cambridge by 1852, so much so that the Rev. Joseph Lovejoy delivered a three-part series of public lectures, “Spiritual Knockings,” that sought to debunk the movement and uncover its fraudulent – and even demonic – origins.
Published in the Cambridge Chronicle, Lovejoy’s remarks take special aim at women; many of the most famous mediums of the day were female, and Lovejoy and his contemporaries argued that their gender made them especially susceptible to the “hysteria” of spiritualism:
“Spiritual manifestations, as they are called, from the time of Joan of Arc to the spirit rappings of to-day, have been made through and by hysteric, excitable young females. If Franklin, or Cooper had any thing worth coming back to tell us, they might be expected to assume the forms of old men, but no, they only communicate through one of these hysteric mediums. Put down all these wonders of which we are told, to excited nerves and inflamed imagination.”
Lovejoy’s characterization of the spiritualist movement as one led by young, impressionable and possibly opportunistic young women is a direct reference to the Fox sisters – Maggie, Kate and Leah. In 1848 Maggie Fox, 15, and her sister Kate, 12, claimed to be able to communicate with a spirit in their Hydesville, New York, home using a series of knocking or rapping sounds. They convinced their mother of their ability and soon took their seances on tour with their older sister, Leah, as manager. Although many challenged the Fox sisters and offered what would appear to be conclusive evidence that the girls were producing the sounds themselves by cracking their joints, their fame caused a craze for all things spiritualist for decades to come. They also became linked inextricably in the minds of those such as Lovejoy with youthful female exuberance and emotionalism gone too far.
By the mid-1850s, Cambridge had its own resident spiritualist mediums, including Lizzie Vose, whom the Chronicle described in 1856 as “a young lady in Cambridge, who, though of delicate physical organization and of extremely modest deportment and retiring manners in her moral condition, has exhibited extraordinary powers both as a speaking and healing medium.” The author assured readers that Vose was from “a gentleman’s family of the highest respectability in Cambridgeport, who is far from being of a superstitious turn of mind, and whose intelligence is a sufficient guarantee against the possibility of imposition.” The young woman had tried to keep the knowledge of her powers quiet, telling only her close family and friends, but her abilities soon grew too large and impressive to be kept secret.
The Chronicle article claims that, in addition to being able to facilitate communication with spirits through knocking sounds and moving items, “Miss V. seems to be the favorite speaking medium of some of the most eminent literary, scientific and theological professors who have ever lived.” Not only could Vose speak for the dead; she could heal the living. The article contains several stories of Vose restoring health to those who had been sick or injured, some for many years, through her psychic power. A newspaper notice the next year stated that “The afflicted will be glad to learn that Mrs. Scott, formerly Miss S.H. Vose, has returned to Cambridgeport, and will continue to prescribe for the sick, on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, at her residence on Hampshire street.” It is not clear whether Vose was charging for these healing services or performing them for free.
The author of the article remarks that “one or two of the Harvard professors, as well as a large number of the most respectable citizens of Cambridge, have become deeply interested in this remarkable phenomenon.” He also mentions that “a member of the Cambridge Divinity School has also lately become a spiritual medium of rare excellence,” referring to Harvard divinity student Frederick Willis, who would soon become the focus of a group of Harvard professors seeking to debunk spiritualism. The author closes by emphasizing the need for extensive research into spiritualist phenomena, especially because of the belief that the spirits of the deceased can continue to guide the living to the benefit of humankind.
Several Harvard professors set out to prove around 1857 that the spiritualists’ claims were fraudulent. That spring, Willis – by now experiencing visions and trances for two years – agreed to hold a seance to convince Harvard engineering professor Henry Eustis of the existence of spiritualist phenomena. During the seance, Eustis reached under the table and grabbed Willis, claiming to have discovered proof that the young man was knowingly producing the mysterious sounds himself. Despite letters of support from several prominent Cantabrigians, including Harvard Divinity School alumnus the Rev. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Willis was suspended from Harvard and did not return to complete his degree. Despite that, he was invited to become minister for a spiritualist congregation in Michigan; a note in the Chronicle in 1858 states that “Mr. F. H. Willis, who was expelled from Harvard theological school on account of his spiritual mediumship, has received a call to preach permanently at Coldwater, Mich., and is recently married.”
The Willis case proved to be a springboard for a wider investigation into local mediums, with Harvard professors Louis Agassiz, Benjamin Peirce, Eben Horsford and Cornelius Conway Felton joining Eustis in an effort to expose spiritualist deceptions over the next several months. The Harvard men and their circle were confident of their success in obtaining definitive proof that spiritualism was fraudulent, but not all Cantabrigians agreed that their approach was the right one. A Chronicle article written during the summer of 1857, at the height of the investigations, claimed that “the committee approached the subject with preconceived views … It is indeed a pity that with all their learning they have not learned that the testimony of a large body of men and women to facts of their own experience is entitled to respect.” Many local residents felt that the professors were using their advanced academic training to the exclusion of the experiences of those who had seen the spiritualists’ abilities firsthand.
Despite the evidence offered by the Harvard professors and other scientists and academics, the lure of spiritualism remained strong over the latter half of the 19th century and into the 20th century. The coming of the Civil War in the 1860s, when many thousands of men died and were buried far from home, spurred further the belief in communication with the spirit world and the ability of the dead to instruct and guide the living. Cambridgeport in particular remained a stronghold of spiritualist activity, with weekly meetings held around the neighborhood at least into the 1880s.
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