Thompson, Mrs. R.

Thompson, Mrs. R.

Mrs. R. Thompson developed as a medium at the Delphic Circle organized by Frederic W. Thurstan at Hertford Lodge in Battersea, London. She was a trance medium and initially produced a wide variety of physical phenomena such as rappings, psychokinesis, levitation, psychic lights and orbs, elongation, apports, direct voice, scents and materializations. The earliest records of her sittings are found in Light magazine in 1897 and 1898.

Thompson came to the attention of the Society for Psychical Research and agreed to submit to experiments for them from 1898 onward. Unfortunately Frederick W. H. Myers discouraged her from continuing with physical mediumship and had her concentrate on working as a trance medium.

Thompson’s spirit guide was her daughter Nelly, who had died in infancy. Another frequent communicator was Miss Cartwright, who had been a mistress at the school where Thompson was educated. Thompson’s trances were not deep and it was reported that at times it appeared she was not in trance at all. Dr. Richard Hodgson was not impressed with her mediumship but others were, including the skeptic Frank Podmore.

Psychical researcher Margaret Verall had twenty-two sittings with Thompson and analyzed them as follows: 238 definite statements were made of past and present happenings. Of these, 33 were false, 64 were unidentified, and 141 (or fifty-nine percent) were true. Although Verall could see many of Thompson’s own characteristics coming through, with her own speech patterns, the conclusion was that many of the personalities were easily recognized and acknowledged by the sitters. Dr. van Eeden came from Holland to test Thompson and received dramatic communication from a young suicide who spoke to the doctor in Dutch, a language unknown to Mrs. Thompson.

Frederick Myers’ work with Mrs. Thompson convinced Myers of the survival of spirit after death. He and his friends had 217 sittings with her, about two thirds of which he attended himself. When Myers died on January 17, 1901, Thompson—although she had retired from mediumship at that time—contacted Sir Oliver Lodge and gave him two sittings. At both of these, communications were received that Lodge acknowledged were characteristic of Myers.

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