“A Wonderful Mesmeric Revelation, giving an Account of the Discovery and Description of a Sunken Vessel, near Caldwell’s Landing, supposed to be that of the Pirate Kidd; including an Account of his Character and Death, at a distance of nearly three hundred miles from the place.”
This strange mesmeric revelation came from a Mrs. Chester, the wife of Charles Chester, of Lynn, Massachusetts. She declared that she had never heard anything about the sunken vessel; that never had she been upon the Hudson River; that she had never read or heard of the career of Kidd; and that she had never even been spoken to upon the subject, until, when placed in the magnetic state, the extraordinary revelation had been made to her.
While in this mesmeric condition, she saw, with clearest vision, the sunken vessel. Her eyes, with supernatural powers, pierced water, timbers, sand, and chests. There she saw bars of massive gold, heaps of silver coin, and precious jewels including many large and brilliant diamonds. The jewels had been enclosed in shot-bags of stout canvas. The bags had decayed, and the jewels were clustered in brilliant heaps. She also saw “gold watches, like ducks’ eggs in a pond of water,” and the wonderfully preserved remains of a very beautiful woman, with a necklace of large and lustrous diamonds around her neck.
A man was seen just leaving the spot, who was preternaturally revealed to Mrs. Chester as Captain Kidd. He was a large, stout man, not very tall, with broad chest and shoulders, thick neck, aquiline nose, piercing eyes, and a head indicative of great power and all destructive qualities.
A very able writer in the Merchant’s Magazine, of 1846, writes sarcastically of this mesmeric announcement:
“This most singular revelation, as it is corroborated by the traditions, presents us with another triumph of animal magnetism, and must serve not only to advance that science, but to demonstrate how much safer it is to rely upon tradition, than upon record evidence made in courts of justice held contemporaneously with the events, or official documents preserved in the public archives.
“In the present case, mesmerism has taken a progressive step; for it has not only disclosed what is now to be found in the waters of Cocks-rack, but also who was there one hundred and forty-five years ago. In this new application of the science we may hope not only to see the earth disembowelled, but the very forms and features of the ancient time brought up to our present view.
“What is more remarkable, if the traditions existed, as is pretended, is, that no individual or company should have undertaken, when the witnesses were living, to raise the vessel, especially as so many persons were found, near the time of the transactions of Kidd, credulous enough to ruin themselves in vain explorations after his money. But that perhaps was not an age of enterprise like the present, nor of humbug.”
There is usually some ground for a tradition. Its basis is generally truth.
As we have mentioned, in the days of Captain Kidd the seas were swarming with pirates. It would require volumes to relate their adventures. Many of these lawless men performed deeds far more extraordinary and infamous than any perpetrated by Kidd. There was, however, at that time, a pirate by the name of Bradish, whose actions, in the popular mind, were blended with those of Kidd.