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(SPIRITUALISM). (JACKSON). (CIVIL WAR). HATCH, MRS. CORA (Medium). A Lecture on Secession, by Gen. Andrew Jackson, Delivered at Dodworth's Hall, on the Evening of Sunday, Jan. 19, 1861. New York: S.T. Munson, 1861. 1st ed. 8vo. 18 pp. Orig. printed wraps. Front wrap nearly broken off near spine. $325.00

 

American National Biography: "At age sixteen Cora L. V. Scott married Benjamin Hatch, a man nearly three times her age, who became her manager. They moved to New York City, where her trance lectures attracted increasing attention. She would enter the lecture hall already in trance, then deliver a spontaneous lecture on a subject selected by a committee from the audience. Believers attributed these lectures not to the medium but to external intelligences who spoke through her. In addition to Adin Augustus Ballou, her controls included Andrew Jackson, Benjamin Rush, and Theodore Parker, who addressed a variety of political, scientific, and religious topics. For the most part, however, her trance lectures concerned metaphysical and poetic subjects. The extraordinary fluency of speech emanating from the unconscious teenage girl, along with her golden curls, enchanted believers and skeptics alike. Thus began a seventy-year career as a beloved trance medium.

    In 1858 Cora Hatch was awarded a divorce from Benjamin Hatch, whom she accused of frequenting prostitutes, of sexual misconduct, and of exploiting her financially. The divorce became a cause c?�l?�bre among Spiritualists and feminists who viewed her refusal to remain with an abusive husband as proof of the purity of their favorite medium. Henry James heard her speak in 1863 and used her as a model for the character of Verena Tarrant in The Bostonians (1886). She continued to attract adoring audiences in the hundreds and thousands throughout the cities of the North."