Written by Abbie Teal
Whilst scientific progress and industrial revolution might spring to mind when the Victorian era is mentioned, a much more mystical matter gripped the minds of many from the 1850s onwards.
A spiritual phenomenon was embedding itself within Victorian subculture; emerging in contemporary debates on science and religion and catching the attention of the press.
From Queen Victoria to Napoleon III, anyone who was anyone eagerly signed up to experience this new craze; to see for themselves the mystical wonder that was the Victorian séance.
But how did the séance emerge onto the Victorian scene, and why did it become so popular during this period?
Beginning in New York City in 1848, Margaret and Kate Fox’s case became infamous. Whilst conducting a séance, the pair reportedly communicated with the spirit of a man previously murdered in their home through the movement and knockings of their furniture. This widely publicised case put the spiritualist movement firmly on the map, and it arrived shortly after in England along with the emigration of American Spiritualist Mrs Hayden. Her séances usually began with a prayer before progressing to spirit communication, and it was customary for the medium to be restrained to prevent potential trickery.
Despite many being taken with the proceedings, not all were convinced, with Alfred Lord Tennyson commenting “I am convinced… that God and the ghosts of men would choose something other than mere table-legs through which to speak to the heart of man”.
However, with so many séance participants being of high social status or intellect, many Victorian readers unquestionably believed the strange happenings reported in these meetings.
In particular, the Victorian eras most famous medium, Daniel Dunglas Home, was himself well educated and connected, conducting seances for British aristocracy, royalty, politicians and scientists. His séances reported the appearance of ‘spirit hands’, the playing of musical instruments without human contact, a trembling room, and even his own levitation. His meetings received considerable press coverage and numbers flocked to find proof of his fraudulent behaviour.
However, in twenty-five years of conducting séances, Home was never once caught cheating. Dr Robertson, Commissioner for Lunacy, attended one of Home’s séances himself after suggesting the reports were a result of madness. However, after taking part in a session, he publicly admitted that he had been incorrect. Similarly, groups of stage conjurors and scientists made an appearance at Home’s séance to prove the accusations of trickery, but as with Dr Robertson, both parties publicly revoked their prior opinion, as they could not point to any obvious trickery.
So how did the Victorians, famously renowned for their repressive disposition and devout Christian proclivities, become so enraptured by a series of spiritualist pursuits?
The rise of spiritualism seemed to occur in relation to the various debates surrounding Christianity and religion, more specifically in response to the Victorian crisis of faith prompted by Darwinism and Biblical criticism. Put simply, there was a gap in the market for a new ideology which attempted to answer humanity’s perpetually pressing question “what happens after death?”, and the séance phenomena provided palpable evidence.
Perhaps this explains the willingness of many Victorians to accept an idea which would previously have been outlawed as witchcraft or blasphemy by their great-grandparents.
However, not all who attended séances converted to spiritualism. Another argument for séance popularity, and for the popularity of many bizarre Victorian phenomena, is perhaps the repressive tendencies of the era. In a society of strict expectations and formalities, the upper and middle classes took great pleasure in entering into the darkly lit séance rooms, where any unseemly action or speech could be attributed to the workings of spirits.
However, despite the Victorian crisis of faith and failure to disprove mediums like Homes, many Victorians remained unconvinced by spiritualism and unimpressed by séances.
Whilst many rejected it for the threat it posed to scientific or religious knowledge, others rejected it for the same reason people would continue to refuse it today: fear of the unknown.
Magic and mystery make the world a less certain and more ambivalent, uncontrollable place.
In the words of many Victorians, the séance phenomena had all the evidential problems of miracles but with none of the advantages.
Put simply, many couldn’t see the point or purpose of communicating with the dead.
Nevertheless, the séance phenomena hit Britain like an epidemic; making its mark on Victorian subculture and enticing curious historians with its mystical allure as it likewise enticed the occupants of the mid 1800s.
Bibliography
Holloway, Julian. “Enchanted Spaces: The Séance, Affect, and Geographies of Religion.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 96, no. 1 (2006): 182–87. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3694153.
Peter Lamont. “Spiritualism and a Mid-Victorian Crisis of Evidence.” The Historical Journal 47, no. 4 (2004): 897–920. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4091661.
Featured Image Credit: The magician William Marriott revealing a fraudulent method of levitating a banjo via Wiki Commons.
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