Though The Apparitionists is the first attempt to consider William Mumler’s story in the context of early-American daguerreotypists and the photographers of the Civil War, I have relied on many books on these and other subjects to stitch together several historical strands into a single narrative.
The secondary sources to which I have turned for inspiration, leads, and understanding of the times in which Mumler lived include D. Mark Katz, Witness to an Era: The Life and Photographs of Alexander Gardner (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1999); Bob Zeller, The Civil War in Depth (New York: Chronicle Books, 1997); Robert Wilson, Mathew Brady: Portraits of a Nation (New York: Bloomsbury, 2013); Roy Meredith, Mr. Lincoln’s Camera Man: Mathew B. Brady (New York: Scribner, 1946; Dover reprint, 1974); James W. Cook, The Arts of Deception: Playing with Fraud in the Age of Barnum (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001); Geoffrey Batchen, Burning with Desire: The Conception of Photography (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997); Martyn Jolly, Faces of the Living Dead: The Belief in Spirit Photography (London: British Library Board, 2006); Clément Chéroux et al., eds., The Perfect Medium: Photography and the Occult (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004); Molly McGarry, Ghosts of Futures Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012); and Louis Kaplan’s collection of Mumler-related documents, The Strange Case of William Mumler (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008).
I am also indebted to other researchers on nineteenth-century Spiritualism, including Marc Demarest, whose blog Chasing Down Emma: Resolving the Contradictions of, and Filling in the Gaps in, the Life, Work and World of Emma Hardinge Britten (http://ehbritten.blogspot.com/) is a treasure trove of information about Spiritualists, their beliefs, and their communities. My work was also made much easier by the International Association for the Preservation of Spiritualist and Occult Periodicals (http://www.iapsop.com/), whose digitized collection of nineteenth-century newspapers served as a primary research portal for this book.
PROLOGUE
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1 “gray, begrimned,” “the tomb of purity, order, peace, and law”: Junius Henri Browne, The Great Metropolis: a Mirror of New York (Hartford: American Publishing Company, 1869), 528.
2 “fraud,” “felony,” “larceny”: New York Tribune, May 4, 1869.
2 “The Tombs has a history”: Browne, 530.
3 “He belongs to the heavy order of the Spiritualists”: Emporia Weekly News (Kansas), May 14, 1869.
3 “athletic” or “robust”: “Spirit Photographs: A New and Interesting Development,” Journal of the Photographic Society of London, January 15, 1863.
4 “hardened and degraded creatures”: Browne, 529.
6 “The history of all pioneers of new truths is relatively the same”: William Mumler, “The Personal Experiences of William Mumler in Spirit Photography, Part 1,” reprinted in Banner of Light 36, no. 15 (January 9, 1875), 1.
6 “every fibre of his body rebelled”: “Topics of Today,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 13, 1869.
6 “Spiritualism is the future church”: “Spiritualism,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 13, 1869.
7 “What is it you’ve got to say”: New York Herald, April 13, 1869.
8 “The intensity of the interest”: “Spiritualism in Court,” New York Daily Tribune, April 24, 1869.
8 “The case of the people against William H. Mumler”: Harper’s Weekly 13, no. 645 (May 4, 1869), 289.
8 “The accused does not know”: “Spiritual Photography,” The Illustrated Photographer, May 28, 1869.
1. PROCURE THE REMEDY AT ONCE AND BE WELL
14 “A rather portly man”: Earl Marble, “The Round Table,” Folio, September 1884, 94.
14 “Those desirous of making purchases”: Edward Hepple Hall, Appletons’ Hand-Book of American Travel (New York: D. Appelton & Co., 1869), 90.
14 “Although a self-made man”: Annual Report of the Perkins School for the Blind (Boston: Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1904).
15 “I had the reputation”: Mumler, “The Personal Experiences . . . Part 1,” 1.
15 “being the first to introduce”: Reading (Pennsylvania) Times, May 13, 1869.
15 “I am an engraver”: Mumler advertisement, 1860s, reproduced by Marc Demarest in Chasing Down Emma: Resolving the Contradictions of, and Filling in the Gaps in, the Life, Work and World of Emma Hardinge Britten, http://ehbritten.blogspot.com/2015_03_01_archive.html.
16 “For the cause of suffering humanity”: Ibid.
17 “After a man has passed”: William Mumler, “The Personal Experiences of William Mumler in Spirit Photography, Part 2,” reprinted in Banner of Light 36, no. 16 (January 16, 1875), 1.
17 “magnetism”: William Mumler, “The Personal Experiences of William Mumler in Spirit Photography, Part 5,” reprinted in Banner of Light 36, no. 22 (February 27, 1875), 3.
18 A. M. Stuart: Henry Augustus Willis, The Fifty-Third Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers (Fitchburg, MA: Press of Blanchard & Brown, 1889), 247.
18 “Hair braided to order”: Brooklyn Daily Eagle, March 30, 1848.
19 “natural clairvoyant”: Mumler, “The Personal Experiences . . . Part 5,” 3.
19 “What is electricity?”: Ibid.
20 “I have seen men faint”: Ibid.
2. LOVE AND PAINTING ARE QUARRELSOME COMPANIONS
24 “I can imagine mama wishing”: Samuel Finley Breese Morse, Samuel F. B.Morse, His Letters and...