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| Magicians Confounded |
Magicians Confounded
A few of the most famous magicians acknowledged having witnessed genuine phenomena. Spiritualists took such acknowledgement as their blanket approval, and seized upon it.
The clairvoyant powers of Alexis Didier stupefied the famous conjurer Robert-Houdin. His signed declaration, as published by Edwin Lee in his book Animal Magnetism (1866), reads: ‘‘I cannot help stating that the facts above related are scrupulously exact and the more I reflect upon them the more impossible do I find it to class them among the tricks which are the objects of my art.’’
In a letter to M. de Mirville, who introduced him to Didier, Robert-Houdin writes: ‘‘I, therefore, came away from this séance as astonished as anyone can be, and fully convinced that it would be quite impossible for anyone to produce such surprising effects by mere skill.’’
The stage magician Leon Bosco used to laugh at those who thought the phenomena of the famous medium D. D. Home could be imitated with the resources of his art. The magician Canti similarly declared to Prince Napoleon that he could ‘‘in no way account for the phenomena he saw on the principles of his profession.’’ In the Outlines of Investigation Into Spiritualism, (1862) by T. Barkas, he also published a letter expressing the same opinion. Robert-Houdin stated: ‘‘I have come away from that séance as astounded as I could be, and persuaded that it is perfectly impossible by chance or adroitness to produce such marvelous effects.’’
The stage magician Hamilton (Pierre Etienne Chocat), successor of Robert-Houdin, in a letter to the Davenport brothers published in the Gazette des Etrangers, September 27, 1865, declared: ‘‘Yesterday I had the pleasure of being present at the séance you gave, and came away from it convinced that jealousy alone was the cause of the outcry raised against you. The phenomena produced surpassed my expectations; and your experiments were full of interest for me. I consider it my duty to add that those phenomena are inexplicable, and the more so by such persons as have thought themselves able to guess your supposed secret, and who are, in fact, far indeed from having discovered the truth.’’
This letter was accompanied by a similar statement from M. Rhys, a manufacturer of conjuring implements, who examined the cabinet and instruments of the Davenports. He declared that the insinuations about them were false and malevolent.
Since the cabinet was completely isolated, all participation in the manifestations by strangers was absolutely impossible, he said.
A Professor Jacobs wrote on April 10, 1881, to the editor of Licht, Mehr Licht about the phenomena that occurred through the Davenport brothers in Paris: ‘‘As a prestidigitator of repute and a sincere spiritualist, I affirm that the mediumimic facts, demonstrated by the two brothers were absolutely true, and belonged to the spiritualistic order of things in every respect.
Messrs. Robin and Robert-Houdin, when attempting to imitate these said facts, never presented to the public anything beyond an infantile and almost grotesque parody of the said phenomena, and it would be only ignorant and obstinate persons who could regard the question seriously as set forth by these gentlemen.’’
Samuel Bellachini, court conjurer at Berlin, stated in an authenticated statement given to the medium Henry Slade (later exposed on several occasions as a fraud) the following: ‘‘I must, for the sake of truth, hereby certify that the phenomenal occurrences with Mr. Slade have been thoroughly examined by me with the minutest observation and investigation of his surroundings, including the table, and that I have not in the smallest degree found anything produced by means of prestidigitative manifestations, or by mechanical apparatus; and that any explanation of the experiments which took place under the circumstances and conditions then obtaining by any reference to prestidigitation is absolutely impossible. It must rest with such men of science as Crookes and Wallace in London, Perty in Berne, Butleroff in St. Petersburg to search for the explanation of this phenomenal power, and to prove its reality.’’ In January 1882, the great illusionist Harry Kellar witnessed a levitation of the medium William Eglinton, in Calcutta, India. Kellar’s account of this appeared in the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) (vol. 9, p. 359): ‘‘A circle having been formed, I was placed on Mr. Eglinton’s left and seized his left hand firmly in my right. Immediately on the extinction of the lights I felt him rise slowly in the air and as I retained firm hold of his hand, I was pulled to my feet, and subsequently compelled to jump on a chair and then on the table, in order to retain my hold of him. That his body did ascend into the air on that occasion with an apparently utter disregard to the law of gravity, there can be no doubt.
What most excited my wonder was the fact, for I may speak of it as a fact without qualification, that Mr. Eglinton rose from my side, and, by the hold he had on my right hand, pulled me up after him, my own body appeared for the time being to have been rendered nonsusceptible to gravity.’’
In contrast, the case of S. J. Davey is especially noteworthy. He was a magician who attended slate-writing séances with Eglinton and was impressed. He studied the problem thoroughly. In agreement with Dr. Richard Hodgson, he presented himself as a medium and produced all the characteristic phenomena of the séance room to the complete satisfaction of his sitters. An account of his demonstration was published in
the Proceedings of the SPR (vol. 4). He revealed that he did everything by trickery; but many committed believers did not believe it. Even Alfred Russel Wallace suggested that Davey was also a good physical medium and had produced phenomena supernormally since he exhibited the characteristic physiological ymptoms of trance convulsions.
A few of the most famous magicians acknowledged having witnessed genuine phenomena. Spiritualists took such acknowledgement as their blanket approval, and seized upon it.
The clairvoyant powers of Alexis Didier stupefied the famous conjurer Robert-Houdin. His signed declaration, as published by Edwin Lee in his book Animal Magnetism (1866), reads: ‘‘I cannot help stating that the facts above related are scrupulously exact and the more I reflect upon them the more impossible do I find it to class them among the tricks which are the objects of my art.’’
In a letter to M. de Mirville, who introduced him to Didier, Robert-Houdin writes: ‘‘I, therefore, came away from this séance as astonished as anyone can be, and fully convinced that it would be quite impossible for anyone to produce such surprising effects by mere skill.’’
The stage magician Leon Bosco used to laugh at those who thought the phenomena of the famous medium D. D. Home could be imitated with the resources of his art. The magician Canti similarly declared to Prince Napoleon that he could ‘‘in no way account for the phenomena he saw on the principles of his profession.’’ In the Outlines of Investigation Into Spiritualism, (1862) by T. Barkas, he also published a letter expressing the same opinion. Robert-Houdin stated: ‘‘I have come away from that séance as astounded as I could be, and persuaded that it is perfectly impossible by chance or adroitness to produce such marvelous effects.’’
The stage magician Hamilton (Pierre Etienne Chocat), successor of Robert-Houdin, in a letter to the Davenport brothers published in the Gazette des Etrangers, September 27, 1865, declared: ‘‘Yesterday I had the pleasure of being present at the séance you gave, and came away from it convinced that jealousy alone was the cause of the outcry raised against you. The phenomena produced surpassed my expectations; and your experiments were full of interest for me. I consider it my duty to add that those phenomena are inexplicable, and the more so by such persons as have thought themselves able to guess your supposed secret, and who are, in fact, far indeed from having discovered the truth.’’
This letter was accompanied by a similar statement from M. Rhys, a manufacturer of conjuring implements, who examined the cabinet and instruments of the Davenports. He declared that the insinuations about them were false and malevolent.
Since the cabinet was completely isolated, all participation in the manifestations by strangers was absolutely impossible, he said.
A Professor Jacobs wrote on April 10, 1881, to the editor of Licht, Mehr Licht about the phenomena that occurred through the Davenport brothers in Paris: ‘‘As a prestidigitator of repute and a sincere spiritualist, I affirm that the mediumimic facts, demonstrated by the two brothers were absolutely true, and belonged to the spiritualistic order of things in every respect.
Messrs. Robin and Robert-Houdin, when attempting to imitate these said facts, never presented to the public anything beyond an infantile and almost grotesque parody of the said phenomena, and it would be only ignorant and obstinate persons who could regard the question seriously as set forth by these gentlemen.’’
Samuel Bellachini, court conjurer at Berlin, stated in an authenticated statement given to the medium Henry Slade (later exposed on several occasions as a fraud) the following: ‘‘I must, for the sake of truth, hereby certify that the phenomenal occurrences with Mr. Slade have been thoroughly examined by me with the minutest observation and investigation of his surroundings, including the table, and that I have not in the smallest degree found anything produced by means of prestidigitative manifestations, or by mechanical apparatus; and that any explanation of the experiments which took place under the circumstances and conditions then obtaining by any reference to prestidigitation is absolutely impossible. It must rest with such men of science as Crookes and Wallace in London, Perty in Berne, Butleroff in St. Petersburg to search for the explanation of this phenomenal power, and to prove its reality.’’ In January 1882, the great illusionist Harry Kellar witnessed a levitation of the medium William Eglinton, in Calcutta, India. Kellar’s account of this appeared in the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) (vol. 9, p. 359): ‘‘A circle having been formed, I was placed on Mr. Eglinton’s left and seized his left hand firmly in my right. Immediately on the extinction of the lights I felt him rise slowly in the air and as I retained firm hold of his hand, I was pulled to my feet, and subsequently compelled to jump on a chair and then on the table, in order to retain my hold of him. That his body did ascend into the air on that occasion with an apparently utter disregard to the law of gravity, there can be no doubt.
What most excited my wonder was the fact, for I may speak of it as a fact without qualification, that Mr. Eglinton rose from my side, and, by the hold he had on my right hand, pulled me up after him, my own body appeared for the time being to have been rendered nonsusceptible to gravity.’’
In contrast, the case of S. J. Davey is especially noteworthy. He was a magician who attended slate-writing séances with Eglinton and was impressed. He studied the problem thoroughly. In agreement with Dr. Richard Hodgson, he presented himself as a medium and produced all the characteristic phenomena of the séance room to the complete satisfaction of his sitters. An account of his demonstration was published in
the Proceedings of the SPR (vol. 4). He revealed that he did everything by trickery; but many committed believers did not believe it. Even Alfred Russel Wallace suggested that Davey was also a good physical medium and had produced phenomena supernormally since he exhibited the characteristic physiological ymptoms of trance convulsions.
The two most tenacious magician opponents of Spiritualism, J. N. Maskelyne and Harry Houdini, focused public attention on themselves for many years. Both led crusades against mediums. Houdini had sought solace in spiritualism following the death of his beloved mother in 1913. He quickly saw through the deception that ran through many of the claims, and was even more adamant in his denunciation, perhaps,
since he felt personally battered from his own experiences.
In the preface to his book, Miracle Mongers and Their Methods, Houdini said that, ‘‘Much has been written about the feats of miracle-mongers, and not a little in the way of explaining them. Chaucer was by no means the first to turn shrewd eyes upon wonder-workers and show the clay feet of these popular idols. And since his time innumerable marvels, held to be supernatural, have been exposed for the tricks they were. Yet to-day, if a mystifier lack the ingenuity to invent a new and startling stunt, he can safely fall back upon a trick that has been the favorite of press agents the world over in all ages.’’
Maskelyne, nevertheless, did not absolutely discredit the paranormal, as revealed by a letter he wrote to the Daily Telegraph in 1881: ‘‘It may surprise some of your readers to learn that I am a believer in apparitions. Several similar occurrences to those described by many of your correspondents have taken place in my own family, and in the families of near friends and relations.’’
In the Pall Mall Gazette of April 20, 1885, Maskelyne acknowledges the phenomenon of table turning as genuine. He declared that Faraday’s explanation was insufficient and some psychic or nerve force was responsible for the result. At the same time he asserted that he could imitate any Spiritualistic phenomenon provided his own apparatus, which weighed more than a ton, was at his disposal.
Many later psychical researchers were amateur conjurers (notably Hereward Carrington, Harry Price, and W. W. Baggally) who were well acquainted with the tricks of the trade.
A conjurer’s performance may in fact afford evidence that the phenomena produced by the medium are genuine. Admiral Usborne Moore (Glimpses of the Next State, 1911) saw a conjurer reproduce the phenomena of the Bangs sisters on the stage. The effect was crude at first, although very satisfactory afterward. But the point, Moore remarked, was that the conjurer’s conditions were as different from the conditions of the Bangs sisters’ séances as a locomotive boiler is different from a teapot. Moore’s efforts finally convinced him that he had witnessed genuine spirit manifestations with the Bangs sisters.
After the Reverend F. W. Monck was accused of fraud in 1876, Archdeacon Thomas Colley offered a thousand pounds to J. N. Maskelyne if he could duplicate Monck’s materialization performance. Maskelyne accepted the challenge. His performance was declared unsatisfactory. He sued for the money and lost his reputation when Colley won. Sir Hiram Maxim, the great inventor, later challenged Maskelyne to produce a psychic effect he had seen in the United States under the same conditions, but Maskelyne refused. The challenge and its result were described by the inventor in a pamphlet, Maxim versus Maskelyne (1910).
The descendants of J. N. Maskelyne followed in his footsteps.
Capt. Clive Maskelyne issued a challenge in February 1925, when the visit of the medium ‘‘Margery’’ (Mina Crandon) to England was reported, that he could produce any of the phenomena she had produced in America. Spiritualist author H. Dennis Bradley, in an interview for the Daily Sketch, promised a hundred guineas to Maskelyne if he could duplicate the Valiantine phenomena. Maskelyne at first accepted, but withdrew when he heard what was expected from him.
In 1930 psychical researcher Harry Price offered one thousand pounds to any conjurer who could repeat Rudi Schneider’s phenomena under the same conditions. Nobody came forward. A skit, under the title Olga, was produced instead, in imitation of Schneider’s phenomena at the Coliseum Theatre (‘‘Olga’’ was Schneider’s claimed spirit control). Harry Price publicly challenged Noel Maskelyne from the stage of that theater on December 10, 1929, to simulate by trickery, for £250, one single phenomenon of Rudi Schneider’s under the identical conditions imposed by the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Maskelyne refused.
Will Goldston, one of the greatest professional magicians in Europe, author of 40 works on legerdemain, founder and former president of the Magicians’ Club of London, declared in the Sunday Graphic, December 2, 1929, concerning Schneider’s phenomena: ‘‘I am convinced that what I saw at the séance was not trickery. No group of my fellow-magicians could have produced those effects under such conditions.’’ Goldston tells the story of his conversion to Spiritualism in Secrets of Famous Illusionists (London, 1933). Two of his great fellow magicians—Ottokar Fischer of Vienna, and Harry Rigoletto— were quite accepting of psychic phenomena.
In the Sunday Dispatch (August 1931), Goldston testifies about Hazel Ridley and her direct voice phenomena as follows: ‘‘Miss Ridley sat at a table in our midst, and without the use of trumpets or any of the usual paraphernalia spoke in three different voices. No ventriloquist could possibly produce the effect this girl produced, and I say that after a long experience of ventriloquists. First there was a powerful, clear, man’s voice, ringing through the room in tones one would have thought no woman’s throat could have produced. The next voice, a very quiet one, like that of a child of six or seven years of age, added to my surprise. The third guide also spoke in a woman’s or a
child’s voice, but quite unlike the normal voice of the medium.
The séance lasted an hour and three quarters.’’ A year later he also spoke up in favor of Helen Duncan and declared that he was not aware of any system of trickery that
could achieve the astounding results he witnessed. Still, others testified that Duncan’s phenomena were fraudulent on some occasions.
Goldston also believed, as did many others, that Houdini was a great psychic. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle devoted about sixty pages in The Edge of the Unknown (1930) to the claim that Houdini was really a medium masquerading as a conjurer.
Whatever the true nature of Houdini’s inner belief, his demonstrations during the Scientific American investigation of the mediumship of ‘‘Margery’’ (Mina Crandon) did not greatly add to his prestige. The exposures that he publicized throughout the United States were not supported by substantial proof, and privately he backed away from some of his public absolutist admissions.
For example, on January 5, 1925, he wrote to Harry Price: ‘‘Another strange thing happened: with the aid of the spirit slates I produced a photograph of Mrs. Crandon’s brother, Walter, who was killed, and of all the miracles in the world, I ran across the photograph of the boy as he was crushed between the engine and the tender of the train, and which was taken one minute before he died. . .I doubt very much if there are any duplicates about’’ (Light, August 12, 1932).
Houdini was a clever magician, but considered narrowminded. According to Doyle, he died disbelieving that the phenomena of hypnotism were genuine. Houdini and Conan Doyle (1933), by Bernard M. L. Ernst and Hereward Carrington, contains many interesting letters about Houdini’s strange adventures in psychic realms.
since he felt personally battered from his own experiences.
In the preface to his book, Miracle Mongers and Their Methods, Houdini said that, ‘‘Much has been written about the feats of miracle-mongers, and not a little in the way of explaining them. Chaucer was by no means the first to turn shrewd eyes upon wonder-workers and show the clay feet of these popular idols. And since his time innumerable marvels, held to be supernatural, have been exposed for the tricks they were. Yet to-day, if a mystifier lack the ingenuity to invent a new and startling stunt, he can safely fall back upon a trick that has been the favorite of press agents the world over in all ages.’’
Maskelyne, nevertheless, did not absolutely discredit the paranormal, as revealed by a letter he wrote to the Daily Telegraph in 1881: ‘‘It may surprise some of your readers to learn that I am a believer in apparitions. Several similar occurrences to those described by many of your correspondents have taken place in my own family, and in the families of near friends and relations.’’
In the Pall Mall Gazette of April 20, 1885, Maskelyne acknowledges the phenomenon of table turning as genuine. He declared that Faraday’s explanation was insufficient and some psychic or nerve force was responsible for the result. At the same time he asserted that he could imitate any Spiritualistic phenomenon provided his own apparatus, which weighed more than a ton, was at his disposal.
Many later psychical researchers were amateur conjurers (notably Hereward Carrington, Harry Price, and W. W. Baggally) who were well acquainted with the tricks of the trade.
A conjurer’s performance may in fact afford evidence that the phenomena produced by the medium are genuine. Admiral Usborne Moore (Glimpses of the Next State, 1911) saw a conjurer reproduce the phenomena of the Bangs sisters on the stage. The effect was crude at first, although very satisfactory afterward. But the point, Moore remarked, was that the conjurer’s conditions were as different from the conditions of the Bangs sisters’ séances as a locomotive boiler is different from a teapot. Moore’s efforts finally convinced him that he had witnessed genuine spirit manifestations with the Bangs sisters.
After the Reverend F. W. Monck was accused of fraud in 1876, Archdeacon Thomas Colley offered a thousand pounds to J. N. Maskelyne if he could duplicate Monck’s materialization performance. Maskelyne accepted the challenge. His performance was declared unsatisfactory. He sued for the money and lost his reputation when Colley won. Sir Hiram Maxim, the great inventor, later challenged Maskelyne to produce a psychic effect he had seen in the United States under the same conditions, but Maskelyne refused. The challenge and its result were described by the inventor in a pamphlet, Maxim versus Maskelyne (1910).
The descendants of J. N. Maskelyne followed in his footsteps.
Capt. Clive Maskelyne issued a challenge in February 1925, when the visit of the medium ‘‘Margery’’ (Mina Crandon) to England was reported, that he could produce any of the phenomena she had produced in America. Spiritualist author H. Dennis Bradley, in an interview for the Daily Sketch, promised a hundred guineas to Maskelyne if he could duplicate the Valiantine phenomena. Maskelyne at first accepted, but withdrew when he heard what was expected from him.
In 1930 psychical researcher Harry Price offered one thousand pounds to any conjurer who could repeat Rudi Schneider’s phenomena under the same conditions. Nobody came forward. A skit, under the title Olga, was produced instead, in imitation of Schneider’s phenomena at the Coliseum Theatre (‘‘Olga’’ was Schneider’s claimed spirit control). Harry Price publicly challenged Noel Maskelyne from the stage of that theater on December 10, 1929, to simulate by trickery, for £250, one single phenomenon of Rudi Schneider’s under the identical conditions imposed by the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Maskelyne refused.
Will Goldston, one of the greatest professional magicians in Europe, author of 40 works on legerdemain, founder and former president of the Magicians’ Club of London, declared in the Sunday Graphic, December 2, 1929, concerning Schneider’s phenomena: ‘‘I am convinced that what I saw at the séance was not trickery. No group of my fellow-magicians could have produced those effects under such conditions.’’ Goldston tells the story of his conversion to Spiritualism in Secrets of Famous Illusionists (London, 1933). Two of his great fellow magicians—Ottokar Fischer of Vienna, and Harry Rigoletto— were quite accepting of psychic phenomena.
In the Sunday Dispatch (August 1931), Goldston testifies about Hazel Ridley and her direct voice phenomena as follows: ‘‘Miss Ridley sat at a table in our midst, and without the use of trumpets or any of the usual paraphernalia spoke in three different voices. No ventriloquist could possibly produce the effect this girl produced, and I say that after a long experience of ventriloquists. First there was a powerful, clear, man’s voice, ringing through the room in tones one would have thought no woman’s throat could have produced. The next voice, a very quiet one, like that of a child of six or seven years of age, added to my surprise. The third guide also spoke in a woman’s or a
child’s voice, but quite unlike the normal voice of the medium.
The séance lasted an hour and three quarters.’’ A year later he also spoke up in favor of Helen Duncan and declared that he was not aware of any system of trickery that
could achieve the astounding results he witnessed. Still, others testified that Duncan’s phenomena were fraudulent on some occasions.
Goldston also believed, as did many others, that Houdini was a great psychic. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle devoted about sixty pages in The Edge of the Unknown (1930) to the claim that Houdini was really a medium masquerading as a conjurer.
Whatever the true nature of Houdini’s inner belief, his demonstrations during the Scientific American investigation of the mediumship of ‘‘Margery’’ (Mina Crandon) did not greatly add to his prestige. The exposures that he publicized throughout the United States were not supported by substantial proof, and privately he backed away from some of his public absolutist admissions.
For example, on January 5, 1925, he wrote to Harry Price: ‘‘Another strange thing happened: with the aid of the spirit slates I produced a photograph of Mrs. Crandon’s brother, Walter, who was killed, and of all the miracles in the world, I ran across the photograph of the boy as he was crushed between the engine and the tender of the train, and which was taken one minute before he died. . .I doubt very much if there are any duplicates about’’ (Light, August 12, 1932).
Houdini was a clever magician, but considered narrowminded. According to Doyle, he died disbelieving that the phenomena of hypnotism were genuine. Houdini and Conan Doyle (1933), by Bernard M. L. Ernst and Hereward Carrington, contains many interesting letters about Houdini’s strange adventures in psychic realms.
