VICTOR ZAMMIT
A Lawyer Presents the Case for the Afterlife
.

.

The Book 4th Edition

<< Previous Chapter : Book Index : Next Chapter >>

15. Direct voice mediums

“I think I can safely say I am the most tested medium this country has ever produced... I have been boxed up, tied up, sealed up, gagged, bound and held, and still the voices have come to speak their message of life eternal.”
Leslie Flint

Direct voice mediums have a rare gift. Those who have 'died' can be heard talking in their own voices in their presence; they do not use the medium's voice box or vocal organs but rather speak through a voice-box constructed of ectoplasm, a substance taken from the medium’s body.

John Sloan and Arthur Findlay

One of the greatest direct voice mediums in the UK was John Sloan. For many years he gave sittings without charge to small groups of friends. One of his long-term sitters was Arthur Findlay who, until he met Sloan, was an agnostic stockbroker.

Findlay was convinced of the afterlife when through Sloan he head the voice of his own deceased father and a family friend who conveyed to him information not known by any living person. He began a monumental study of psychic science and produced the series of world renowned classics listed in the Bibliography which I very highly recommend.

Leslie Flint

Another direct voice medium who was thoroughly tested in recent times was Leslie Flint. In his presence while in trance, with his mouth taped shut or full of water:

…literally thousands of different voices of discarnate persons have been tape-recorded for posterity, speaking in different dialects, in foreign languages unknown to me and even in languages no longer spoken on this earth (Flint 1971: 170).

In his autobiography Voices in the Dark Flint describes how he was 'boxed up, tied up, sealed up, gagged, bound and held, and still the voices have come to speak of life eternal' (Flint 1971: 169).

The picture left shows how in a test sitting (this one in 1972) he allowed scientists to gag him and bind him to his chair without any effect on his mediumship.

Flint describes how he gave sittings extempore in hotel rooms, in houses of strangers, in foreign countries, in halls, theatres and churches.

In 1948 Flint submitted to a series of experiments conducted by scientists from the Society for Psychical Research (see picture below)

The Psychic News of 14th February 1948 reports in detail one experiment where he conducted a séance with elastoplasts pressed over his lips, bandages over the elastoplasts, and his hands and legs tied to a chair.

The observers concluded that in spite of the above restrictions the voices were soon speaking with their usual clarity, even shouting. Some twelve persons in the room all heard more than enough to convince the most obdurate skeptic that the sealing of Mr. Flint's lips in no way prevented the unseen speakers from saying anything they wished. At the conclusion of the experiment they found the plaster and the cords intact and undisturbed.

Lawyer identifies judge’s voice

Dr Aubrey Rose, OBE, CBE, one of the most brilliant lawyers in England, attended many sittings with Leslie Flint and claims that through Flint he received “the most detailed evidence of survival of the individual beyond this life.” I

I n his recent autobiography The Rainbow Never Ends (2005) he states that his investigation into the afterlife began when he heard a tape recording of a voice re recognized as that of deceased Judge, Lord Birkett, speaking through Leslie Flint. Rose became a close friend of Leslie Flint and went on to become a spiritual healer himself.

No cold reading

The information coming through a Flint sitting was not, as some critics of mediums claim, vague suggestions which could apply to anyone. Take for example the following exchange between a young airman killed in World War II and his parents. He had initially appeared at a séance attended by Lord Dowding, giving his name as Peter William Handford Kite, and asking that his parents be contacted at an address he gave. The parents accepted an invitation to attend a second séance and for close on forty minutes Peter came through and in his own voice told them the following which his parents confirmed to be true:

• of a joke about buying an Alsatian he made before he died
• that his mother had put a photograph of himself and photographs of his grave in Norway in her bag that morning
• that he liked the cherry tree in the memorial garden they had planted for him
• that his bedroom had not been changed in the six years since he died
• that he had not liked the wallpaper in his bedroom
• that his father was still driving his car although it was a too small for him.

Flint describes his bitter disappointment with parapsychologists in the following extract:

When first I began to allow myself to be tested I was naive enough to believe that if the tests were successful the scientists and researchers who had carried them out under their own conditions would proclaim to all the world the truth of life after death. All too soon I learned the hard way that many of those who call themselves researchers have immutable values of their own which preclude belief in a meaning or purpose in man's existence or in the possibility of a life after death. Their concern was to disprove the reality of my voices and they would postulate any alternative however far-fetched or absurd sooner than admit the implication of their own successful experiment (Flint 1971: 169).

Flint rebuts the skeptics

Flint gives some examples of the ludicrous theories put forward by these psychic researchers. One was that the voices were not real but produced by a combination of hypnotic power on his part coupled with mass auditory hallucinations on the part of the sitters. This was disproved when the voices were recorded (Flint 1971: 167).

Another theory was that Flint was a ventriloquist. This was disproved when a throat microphone was attached to his throat so that the slightest sound made through his larynx would be magnified enormously while observers watched him through an infrared telescope (Flint 1971: 168). When they could come up with no further explanations one of the psychic researchers put forward the idea that Flint could talk through his stomach (Flint 1971: 163).

For those who, being unable to think of any other explanation, allege fraud Flint had this to say:

It has been hinted that I might have a two-way voice channel to another room where accomplices mimic the voices of the departed or that I might conceal tape-recorders which play prepared messages from the dead. There is no end to the ingenious tricks which have been thought up by those determined not to believe and who more often than not have never even had a sitting with me… I could also ask these stubborn cynics how these supposed accomplices of mine however skilled their mimicry contrive to produce the recognizable voice of a wife or a husband or other dead relative of a sitter who is as likely as not newly arrived from Australia, India or Timbuktu. I do not however waste my precious energies bandying words with skeptics who are as ill-informed as they are prejudiced (Flint 1971: 170).

One expert who did investigate Leslie Flint and thoroughly vouched for his authenticity was Professor William R. Bennett, Professor of Electrical Engineering at Columbia University in New York City.

My experience with Mr Flint is first hand; I have heard the independent voices. Furthermore, modern investigation techniques not available in earlier tests corroborate previous conclusions by indicating that the voices are not his. But to be thorough, one should consider the possibility of live accomplices... This suggestion became untenable for me during his visit to New York in September 1970, when, in an impromptu séance in my apartment, the same voices not only appeared but took part in conversations with the guests (Flint 1971: 220).

Emily French and Edward C Randall

Another American direct voice medium who was thoroughly investigated over many years was Mrs Emily French of Buffalo New York. For fourteen years this frail elderly woman sat in a séance every week at the home with a leading lawyer from Buffalo, New York, Edward C Randall, his wife and his close associates.

For five of those years they were joined by a prominent judge, Dean Shuart of Rochester, “a learned jurist and man of such impeccable character that he had been repeatedly elected to the responsible office of Surrogate Judge”.

Every person who attended the circle was initially skeptical and sure that the voices were fraudulent. And each person was allowed to conduct however many exacting experiments they needed to be convinced that they were genuine.

It is inconceivable that these people would waste their time in this manner if they had any hint that the phenomena were not 100% genuine. Mrs French was from a well-known family, had a reputation in her close community for over sixty years as a person of unimpeachable integrity and never took a cent for her involvement.

Were they all deluded?

In 1905 Edward C Randall wrote to Isaac K. Funk D.D. LL.D, a prominent psychic researcher and co-owner of the publishing house Funk and Wagnalls New York/London asking him to arrange for Mrs French to be scientifically investigated.

Dr Funk agreed on condition that Mrs French would come to New York City and conduct sittings every day for two weeks in the homes of people she did not know surrounded by highly experienced and skeptical observers.

Then 72 years old, extremely feeble and frail with a dangerous heart condition and almost totally deaf, Mrs French sat with Dr Funk with barely any time to rest after a long journey from Buffalo. She was surrounded by people who were skeptical of her.

And night after night she produced magnificent direct voice evidence of the afterlife.

The full favourable results of these detailed tests were published by Dr Funk in his “Psychic Riddle” and are reprinted in Chapter 11 of N. Riley Heagerty’s highly recommended book The French Revelation (1995).

On the Internet

To hear some of Leslie Flint’s voices on the Internet go to
The Leslie Flint Educational Trust http://www.leslieflint.com/

OR Paranormal Voices http://www.xs4all.nl/~wichm/death_ra.html


 

<< Previous Chapter : Book Index : Next Chapter >>

.

Home | The Book | Radio FAQs | Articles | Hall of Fame
Appearances | About Victor | Links | Contact

Copyright © 2001 Victor Zammit.  All rights reserved.  --  
Web site by happysean