“In the evening, after dinner: ‘I fought my way in. His name was Banier—Banier—Banier. The sword was lying on a table by a written scheme of defence. Oh, my head! Banier had a plan written out for defence of the fortress. It was lying on the table, and his sword was by it.... Look! I have tried to tell you what you can verify.’”
Mr. Wedgwood reports his verification as follows:—
“When I came to verify the messages of Planchette, I speedily found that Col. Gurwood, the editor of the duke’s dispatches, led the forlorn hope at the storming of Ciudad Rodrigo in 1812 (note Planchette’s error in date), and received a wound in his skull from a musket-ball, ‘which affected him for the remainder of his life,’ (Annual Register, 1845). In recognition of the bravery shown on that occasion, he received a grant of arms in 1812, registered in the College of Arms as having been passed ‘upon the narrative that he (Capt. G.) had led the forlorn hope at Ciudad Rodrigo, and that after the storming of the fortress the Duke of Wellington presented him with the sword of the governor who had been taken prisoner by Capt. Gurwood.’”
The services thus specified were symbolized in the crest, described in the “Book of Family Crests”: “Out of a mural coronet, a castle ruined in the centre, and therefrom an arm in armor embowed, holding a cimeter.”
It was evidently this crest that Planchette was trying to sketch. The Annual Register of 1845 also confirms Planchette’s assertion that Col. Gurwood killed himself on Christmas Day of that year, and adds: “It is thought that this laborious undertaking (editing the dispatches) produced a relaxation of the nervous system and consequent depression of spirits. In a fit of despondency the unfortunate gentleman terminated his life.” Compare Planchette: “Pen was too much for me after the wound.”
Here are described four instances of automatic writing by means of Planchette. Two of these cases were reported to Mr. Myers, who has thoroughly canvassed them as regards their authenticity, as well as the ability and good faith of the persons concerned, both in the writing and reporting; and he has made use of them in his own able argument upon the same subject.
In the other cases the messages were written under my own observation, my own hands also being upon the board. In the case of Mr. and Mrs. Newnham the intelligence which furnished the messages disclaimed altogether the aid of any spirit except “wife’s spirit,” which did “unconsciously guide.” In the case reported by Mr. Wedgwood and Mrs. R., the intelligence distinctly claimed to be from Col. John Gurwood, who had died nearly fifty years before. In my own cases, in that written with the co-operation of my friend’s school-girl daughter, the intelligence claimed to be that of Peter Stuyvesant, while in those written with Miss V., various names were given, none of which was recognized as belonging to a person of whom we had ever had any knowledge, and all bore abundant evidence of being fictitious. One, indeed, professed to be “Beecher,” and declined to give an opinion on the prospective trotting qualities of a colt, on the ground that he was “no horseman”; and in our later experiments, when closely questioned, it distinctly stated that the intelligence came from the mind of Miss V. herself.
Let us analyze these messages a little further. Those written by Mr. and Mrs. Newnham were remarkable, not only because Mrs. Newnham was writing without any conscious knowledge of what was being written, but neither had she any conscious knowledge of the questions to which she was writing the answers. Evidently, then, her own ordinary consciousness was not acting at all in the matter regarding either the questions or answers, for she was fully awake, in her normal condition, and perfectly competent to judge of her own mental state and actions. Nevertheless, there was some intelligence acting reasonably and consciously, and making use of her hand to register its thoughts.
In a former chapter I have described and illustrated a somewhat unusual mental phenomenon, to which the name thought-transference, or telepathy, has been given; and in another I have endeavored to demonstrate the existence of a secondary or subliminal self or personality.
If I mistake not, it is here, in these two comparatively little known and, until recently, little studied, psychical conditions, that we shall find the key to message-bearing automatism, as well as other manifestations of intelligence which have heretofore been considered mysterious and occult. Applying this key to the Newnham Planchette-writing, the secondary personality or subliminal self of Mrs. Newnham took immediate cognizance of the questions silently and secretly written out by her husband, although they were utterly unknown to her ordinary or primary self, and made use of her hands to communicate the answer.