It is hard to believe that a man who served as Prime Minister of Canada for 22 years could afford to lead a "double life" of the most sensational kind. But this is what happened to William Lyon Mackenzie: the general public learned that this outstanding statesman was interested in the paranormal only after his death in 1950.
The first to open the curtain over this secret corner of Mackenzie King's life was Canadian reporter Blair Fraser: on December 15, 1951, in MacLeon's Magazine, he called the late Prime Minister a convinced and even a "practicing spiritualist." This was followed by an illustrated article in Life under the heading “The Unknown Politician in Life. The late Canadian prime minister turns out to be a fan of spiritualism."
These statements resemble accusations and are formulated quite illiterately. "Practicing Spiritualist" - What Does That Mean? A person who accepts the main idea of this teaching (consisting only in the fact that after death the soul continues to live, retaining its individuality), does not automatically turn into a sectarian or schismatic, does not oblige to subscribe to any doctrines, and even more so something like that "to practice".
Indeed, Mackenzie King was always interested in the problem of "life after death": moreover, he himself began to study it with some caution and, back in 1920, decided for himself this question positively, while maintaining a skeptical attitude towards spiritual miracles and without becoming fiery a follower of the movement, nor its propagandist. So all these innuendos are unfair and indicate, at best, a lack of understanding of the essence of the subject in question.
Perhaps, to some, my statements will seem too harsh, but the fact is that for several years I was in personal contact with Mackenzie King and know better than anyone what views he held. Our correspondence is still unpublished, as it was marked with the “confidential” stamp, but now, after 12 years have passed since the death of the prime minister, it hardly makes sense to remain silent on this matter.
The very first letter I received from Mackenzie King was in the spring of 1938 when I was the research director at the International Institute for Psychical Research in London. The Canadian prime minister asked me to send him a copy of Baron Palmstierna's book The Horizons of Immortality, if possible with an author's autograph. This was an unusual request: there was clearly more to it than ordinary curiosity. Our institute issued a bulletin dedicated to the baron's lectures, timed to coincide with the publication of this book, and one of the copies somehow got to King.
The letter reminded me of the rumors that circulated in the spiritualistic circles of London: it was said that while visiting England, King had visited the famous mediums of his time - Helen Hughes, Esther Dowden and Geraldine Cummings. The organizer of these meetings, a good friend of mine, Mercy Fillmore (secretary of the London Union of Spiritualists) "submitted" the guest incognito, and mediums for many years did not suspect who the mysterious visitor was.
Subsequently, upon learning of this, all three women kept a secret, so that rumors about these sessions leaked to the press only after the death of the prime minister, when the London Psychic News published an interview with the Duchess of Hamilton, from which followed a rather frivolous conclusion that Mackenzie King in his political decisions was supposedly guided by clues from the "other world".
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I met Mackenzie King in 1929, when, as a journalist, I found myself on the very train that brought him from Le Havre to Paris: that was the year of the signing of the Kellogg Pact, whose participants, with enviable optimism, hoped to put an end to internecine conflicts. In those days, I had just set out on the path of researching the paranormal and did not suspect that King not only shared my interest in the supernatural, but, acting completely independently, had already gone quite far in understanding what was happening.
So, Baron Palmstierna considered it an honor to comply with the Prime Minister's request, and the publishers immediately sent the book to the addressee. This is what Mackenzie King wrote to me on April 19, 1938:
“I have just received from the publishers a copy of the book The Horizons of Immortality autographed by Baron Palmstierna, which you have deigned to receive from him. I thanked them in a letter and I will be glad if you convey to the Baron my gratitude for the book and autograph at a personal meeting. I gratefully accepted your invitation to become a member of the Institute for Psychical Research. Perhaps the time will come when I can use it. For reasons that you probably guess, I'd better not advertise my passion for parapsychology, so I will have to keep my views in secret for a while."
"For a while …" Apparently, King at that time was already thinking about leaving the political scene. “He was warned in advance of the danger,” Helen Hughes said in a letter to Blair Fraser. - Three years before his death, his mother warned her son that he was taking on too much and his heart could not stand it. In the end he followed her advice, but it was too late …"
The warning from the mother came from another world, and it was pronounced through the mouth of Geraldine Cummings. However, King had long been accustomed to ignoring this kind of advice and always did as he saw fit, in other words, and here he was not a "practicing spiritualist." In the second letter, dated August 8, 1938, I read the following:
“Having sent you a letter on April 19, I set about reading the book of Baron Palmstierna with great interest. Reincarnation remains a mystery to me in many ways. The part of the book that deals with this particular topic caused the greatest doubts in me. Everything that he writes about the posthumous existence of the spirit is in many respects consonant with my own thoughts on this matter. In the previous letter I noticed that for quite understandable reasons I cannot yet actively engage in psychic research. I am still too noticeable in the public arena. Regards…"
Mackenzie King's first encounter with the supernatural world took place under very curious circumstances. The Canadian prime minister turned to "psychism" in London through the Marquise of Aberdeen, who advised him to contact Mrs. Etta Wriedt, a "direct voice" medium from Detroit, about whose sessions Admiral Moore wrote two books at once. [4]
From the Vridt pipe, which flew through the air (it happened both in the dark and in the light), the voices of long-dead people who spoke different languages were heard, so-called "etherealizations" (luminous figures) appeared from time to time, ghost dogs barked - in one word, the audience was offered a whole bunch of various manifestations of mediumship. At one time, at the invitation of W. T. Steed, who became famous for his magazine "Review of Reviewers", she arrived in London and conducted more than two hundred sessions at the "Julia's Bureau" (named after Julia Ames, editor-in-chief of the Chicago Women's Union Signal).
After the death of Mrs. Wridt, she continued to communicate with Stead from another world: he wrote down her messages automatically, while in a trance.
The phenomenon of the materialization of dogs in Mrs. Wriedt's sessions seemed to be of particular interest to Mackenzie King. The Canadian prime minister adored these animals and loved to retell the strange story of a prophetic sign he received on the evening Pat died (he later named his two other dogs by the same name). And the following happened: a wristwatch suddenly fell from the coffee table for no reason. In the morning he found them on the floor: the hands showed 4 hours and 20 minutes. "I do not consider myself a clairvoyant, but at that moment an inner voice told me: Pat will die in no more than a day," King told reporter Blair Fraser. This premonition came true. The next night Pat climbed out of his basket, climbed onto the owner's bed for the last time, and gave up his ghost. The hands at that moment showed 4 hours and 20 minutes.
To realize the tragedy of this incident, one can only know how Mackenzie King, a very closed and lonely person, was attached to his only friend. The portrait of the deceased dog was soon framed above the fireplace: it was accompanied by a prose poem entitled "Dedication to the Dog."
Mrs. Wriedt was the first person from whom Mackenzie King learned about the possibility of making contact with the deceased. Let me remind you that it was she who was at the center of the sensational case with the lost will.
A certain Liberal Senator's father-in-law died. The wife, unable to find a will, consulted Mrs. Wridt. The medium informed her that the document was in a chest of drawers in the house of the deceased in France, and she was right. No one but the deceased senator could have known his whereabouts.
In one of the rooms of the College of Psychic Science (16 Queensberry Place, London) rests a gold clock on a blue velvet cushion. Mackenzie King himself donated them to the College on behalf of Mrs. Wriedt. They once belonged to Queen Victoria; she gave the watch to John Brown, her Scottish servant, a beloved medium through whom she came into contact with Prince Albert after the latter's death.
From Brown, through the hands of W. T. Sted, the clock passed to Mrs. Wredt, through whom the late Queen Victoria, in turn, addressed us who live here. Before her death, the medium decided that the watch should return to London and asked Mackenzie King to transfer it to the London Spiritualist Union - that was the name of the College of Psychic Science in those years.
Knowing now about the Canadian prime minister's deep interest in parapsychology, I made it a habit to send him all the books and reprints that in one way or another concerned this subject. On September 21, 1942, I read in his letter the following lines: “It was very generous on your part to send me a copy of your articles Sleep and Telepathy and Masonic Dreams. It was also pleasant to meet the mention of our meeting in 1929. Psychic science brings me extraordinary spiritual relief. This is an area of expertise that I would devote much more time to if I had one."
The study, entitled Sleep and Telepathy, was published in the American Image magazine. The main idea of the article was that telepathic contact is possible only between people whose past is psychologically identical. The thought that with these and other materials I could bring spiritual relief to Mackenzie King, in turn, overwhelms me with a sense of deep satisfaction.
W. E. Gladstone (1809–1898), a remarkable Victorian statesman who was re-elected Prime Minister of Great Britain for four terms, also showed considerable interest in psychic research. His memorable statement that "psychic research is the most important work carried out by humanity at the present time" is still cited quite often.
Unlike Mackenzie King, Gladstone was not afraid to join the Society for Psychical Research as a full member: this happened after he took part in a session of the medium William Eglinton on October 29, 1884. A sensational message about this spread all over the world, causing Gladstone a lot of trouble: some pious admirers immediately bombarded him with letters expressing horror and surprise that such a respected statesman could afford to "contact some sorcerers", others tried to warn him against excessive gullibility, fearing that scammers can take advantage of this.
Gladstone was let down by the chatty Eglinton, who spoke about the session in an interview with the leading spiritualist newspaper Light. Gladstone, according to Eglinton, stated the following: “I have always thought that science was too bogged down in its rut. Undoubtedly, scientists - each in their own field of knowledge - are doing a noble cause, but very often they are inclined to ignore facts that conflict with the views that are generally accepted in scientific circles. Often they immediately sweep aside facts that they did not bother to study properly, not quite, obviously, realizing that forces operate in nature, science, perhaps, are still unknown."
From Eglinton's interview (who, for obvious reasons, could not be objective enough here), it is not clear what exactly during that slate session made such a strong impression on the prime minister. "Slate" mediumship subsequently discredited itself so much that self-respecting mediums excluded it from their arsenal. There are too many ways in which a blank slate can be replaced with another one with a pre-prepared "message."
The activities of Eglinton, a specialist in slate writing, were more than once subjected to well-founded doubts. It remains only to assume that the texts he received had some meaning important for Gladstone (and perhaps they were "overheard" telepathically) - otherwise they would hardly have struck him so.
The prime minister's first question was, by all appearances, extremely trivial: "Name a year drier than this one." The answer - whoever was its true source - turned out to be correct: "1857". It is possible that Eglinton was able to read the question and somehow answered it himself.
It is not entirely clear how he managed to get an answer to the second question, which Gladstone wrote on the blackboard, retiring to a corner: "Is the Pope healthy now or is the Pope sick?" The summoned spirit inscribed in red chalk: "He is sick, but with the mind, not the body." More difficult questions followed. The answers, according to Eglinton, spontaneously appeared on closed slate boards, which were in full view of everyone in the brightly lit living room.
Eglinton claims that Gladstone carefully studied the answers received and did not find anything to complain about. The problem is that this is a version of the medium himself. When the Daily News asked the Prime Minister for clarification, his representative Goras Seymour replied: “Sir, Mr. Gladstone asked me to tell you that he received your letter. Not wanting to go into details, I would only like to say that he has not yet made a final opinion on the subject that interests you. Do not forget, however, that it was during these days that Gladstone joined the Society for Psychical Research: it is possible that something happened during Eglinton's session that no one else was able to learn more about.
From the book: "Between Two Worlds". Author: Fodor Nandor