1. Introduction: Framing Bazett’s Investigations
During the dark years of World War I, between 1916 and 1918, British medium and psychical investigator L. Margery Bazett compiled a meticulously recorded series of automatic writing scripts documenting alleged after-death communications. Published in her 1920 volume After Death Communications, Bazett’s work approached spiritualism not merely as a source of emotional solace for a grieving nation, but as an empirical study requiring systematic documentation, strict cross-verification, and thematic classification.
While Bazett explicitly notes in her Preface that a large proportion of her overall cases involved complete strangers or spontaneous messages received without any prior connection to the deceased’s family, Chapter II—titled “Cases Where Some Link with Communicators Existed”—adopts a deliberate structural focus. Rather than presenting cases in strict chronological order, Bazett groups them thematically to isolate and evaluate the precise evidential weight of spiritual communications when a pre-existing link exists between the medium, the sitter, or the discarnate communicator. By analyzing these linked cases, her research probes how established relationships affect the accuracy of verifiable transmissions and test the psychological continuity of human personality beyond physical death.
2. Methodological Framing of Pre-Existing Links
Isolating cases with pre-existing relationships served a dual analytical purpose in early 20th-century psychical research. On one hand, investigators had to rigorously account for alternative hypotheses. As prominent Society for Psychical Research (SPR) scholars like J. Arthur Hill observed in his introduction to Bazett’s text, researchers needed to discern whether script details stemmed from genuine discarnate agency or from the medium’s own subconscious mind (“subliminal matter”) harvesting latent memory or harvesting thoughts via telepathy from living minds. On the other hand, established emotional ties appeared to lower mediumistic friction, frequently allowing earlier, well-grounded discarnate entities (such as Christopher Thompson, introduced in Chapter I) to act as psychic guides or intermediaries for newly deceased friends who arrived disoriented or asleep.
The comparative breakdown below synthesizes the analytical rationale and methodological impact of evaluating cases where pre-existing links were present:
| Analytical Objective | Methodological Impact |
|---|---|
| Testing Against Alternative Hypotheses | Allows researchers to critically evaluate whether script details stem from telepathy among living sitters or subconscious memory retrieval (subliminal matter) by comparing known shared memories against unsolicited, verifiable facts unknown to the medium at the time of writing. |
| Intermediary Assistance | Examines how established discarnate entities (such as Christopher Thompson, whose communications began in July 1916) serve as psychic guides or intermediaries for newly deceased acquaintances who arrive disoriented, “asleep,” or struggling to adapt to post-mortem conditions. |
3. Deep Dive into Key Case Studies
Chapter II details several notable case studies where a pre-existing link framed the collection of evidential scripts. The following three cases highlight the range of physical, psychological, and clairvoyant evidence documented by Bazett.
3.1 Lieut. Baker: Premonitions, Air Combat, and Verifiable Details
- Pre-existing Link: Lieut. Baker was a personal acquaintance of L. M. Bazett and a close friend of discarnate communicators Christopher and Frank Thompson.
- Premonition & Dream Vision: On September 27, 1917, Lieut. Baker spent the day with Bazett in her garden, expressing a firm conviction that he would be killed shortly after returning to France. On the night of October 8–9, 1917, Bazett experienced a vivid dream vision of Baker lying dead on a stretcher with his head turned aside, surrounded by figures, while the entity Christopher Thompson stood nearby. In reality, Lieut. Baker was killed in a flying crash in the early morning of October 9, 1917.
- Unsolicited Intermediary Evidence (via Christopher Thompson): Well before official military accounts reached the family, Christopher Thompson communicated via automatic writing on October 16 and October 19, 1917, volunteering specific, unprompted clues:
- Manner of Passing: On October 16, Christopher stated Baker “went so suddenly.” Official written confirmation from the pilot arrived weeks later on November 10, stating medical help arrived quickly and determined Baker “must have died instantly.”
- Final Day Activities: Christopher noted Baker “mentioned dentist.” In response to a written inquiry, Baker’s sister confirmed that her brother had spent the entirety of his last day of leave at the dentist’s office.
- Psychological Disorientation: On October 19, Christopher reported Baker was “so asleep still” and thought he was “in a dug-out.” Bazett noted that Baker had recently transferred from the infantry to the Flying Corps, making a subconscious retreat to infantry dug-outs natural during his disoriented transition.
- Personal Garden Reference: Christopher noted Baker spoke of Bazett on a “hard chair.” Bazett verified that during Baker’s visit on September 27, they had sat in her garden, where she used an upright, hard chair that Baker had offered to replace with a more comfortable one.
- Combat Details: Christopher noted Baker’s “leg hurt badly” and that the “soldier in plane with him survived.” Letters from the chaplain and pilot later confirmed the pilot landed the aircraft safely, while Baker had been shot in the stomach, with the bullet penetrating sideways.
- Direct Script Evidence (via Lieut. Baker): On October 19 and November 4, Lieut. Baker communicated directly through Bazett’s hand, writing: “I was waiting for sound of aeroplane, and missed it, wind so strong…” (October 19) and “I heard gun, and that was all… German plane sank so low in wind, came out of cloud” (November 4). Written verification from Baker’s sister arrived on November 2, confirming military communiques of heavy storm clouds on the day of the crash. The pilot’s letter of November 10 further verified that a German fighter had dived out of a low cloud firing directly behind them. Crucially, Baker wrote the obscure sentence “Dalten lost big glass” on November 4. His sister later explained that an optician named Dalten (pseudonym) had failed to repair Baker’s flying goggles in time, forcing him into air combat without them.
- Evidential Temporal Sequence: The chronological sequence of this case underscores Bazett’s rigorous record-keeping: all specific scripts were recorded between October 16 and November 4, 1917, whereas the sister’s written confirmation arrived on November 2 and the pilot’s detailed account arrived on November 10. The script’s clear priority in time rules out post-hoc rationalization.
3.2 Sydney Pollock: Family Identifiers and the Reality of Persistence
- Pre-existing Link: The Pollock family was known to Bazett by name only. Following Sydney’s death in action in the autumn of 1917, his grieving mother—profoundly influenced by reading Sir Oliver Lodge’s landmark 1916 work Raymond; or, Life and Death, which had sparked a widespread cultural movement among bereaved WWI families—was introduced to Bazett by a mutual friend to request a sitting.
- Family Identifiers & Evidence: Sydney reassured his mother that he was not alone, stating, “Uncle Tom is a dear, mother; I do like him awfully.” In subsequent scripts, “Uncle Tom” provided strikingly accurate physical and behavioral traits of Sydney’s living father, Nigel Pollock. He noted that Sydney had “the head of his father, the same broad forehead,” was “made of the right stuff,” and correctly detailed Nigel’s early grey hair, his keen interest in politics, his love of golf, and his habit of smoking a pipe.
- The Plea for Recognition: The scripts capture the acute psychological struggle of the newly deceased attempting to project their continued survival to the living. Approximately six months after his death, Sydney communicated a poignant, direct plea to his mother:
“Mother, I say, do you think I am alive all the time? Don’t forget to do so, as it is hard on us, jolly hard, to fight out the feeling dead, it is hateful to us chaps. Some have never been thought really alive by a single relation, poor chaps.”
3.3 Miss Mary Bardsley: Clairvoyant Signalling via Light Phenomena
- Pre-existing Link: Bazett had met Miss Mary Bardsley only once or twice prior to her death in December 1916. However, Bazett’s sitting partner, Miss E. F. Cooper, was a close friend of Bardsley and had frequently discussed after-death communication with her in life.
- Methodological Adaptation for Female Communicators: Bazett explicitly recorded an intriguing mediumistic observation in Chapter II: she found obtaining automatic writing scripts from female communicators uniquely difficult and generally unsuccessful. When sitting on November 18, 1917, facing a bookshelf containing Bardsley’s personal books (gifted to Miss Cooper without Bazett’s knowledge), the motor automatism of writing proved exceptionally laborious and yielded no clear script.
- Clairvoyant Light Signalling & Verification: Forced to adapt when motor channels failed, Bazett observed a physical/clairvoyant phenomenon: a bright blue light hovered directly in front of the bookshelf, moving to a specific Bible and remaining stationary. During this session, the script produced a written date that was initially ambiguous—“which might have been 1870 or 1878, the last figure was not clear.” However, upon opening the physical Bible indicated by the blue light, the exact year 1878 was immediately confirmed written on the flyleaf, accompanied by the precise chapter and verse of one of Bardsley’s favorite scripture texts. The blue light then moved systematically to two other books on the shelf that Bardsley had deeply prized in life, leading Bazett to conclude that light-signalling offered vital potential when automatic writing encountered mechanical friction.
4. Synthesizing Evidence: Thematic Conclusions for Psychical Research
The cases gathered under Chapter II allowed Bazett and Miss E. F. Cooper to establish core thematic takeaways for the broader field of psychical research:
- Validating Emotional and Personal Continuity: The transmission of hyper-specific personal details—such as unreturned flying goggles, garden chairs, favorite pipes, and intimate family nicknames—demonstrates that physical death does not erase individual identity, cognitive memory, or personal affection. The scripts indicate that discarnate communicators preserve their distinct temperaments and psychological continuity.
- Systematic Dataset Construction: By categorizing cases by degree of acquaintance (linked acquaintances versus total strangers) and tracking sittings with relations present versus absent, Bazett provided a structured, objective dataset. Eminent SPR researcher J. Arthur Hill praised Bazett and Cooper for their painstaking habits of meticulous dating, complete record-keeping, and systematic verification tracking, noting that such methodological discipline offered a solid foundation for evaluating discarnate agency against subliminal mental activity.
5. Conclusion & Reader Reflection
L. M. Bazett’s systematic investigations during the First World War represent a disciplined, empirical response to an era dominated by unprecedented grief. By categorizing her automatic writing scripts and rigorously verifying every claim against military records, chaplain correspondence, and family attestations, she elevated mediumistic study into a structured scientific effort.
When reviewing scripts containing verified facts unknown to the medium—such as repaired watches, forgotten goggles, or private household habits—psychical research arrives at a fundamental question: Does the cumulative weight of this evidence demonstrate the actual survival of human personality beyond the veil, or does it evidence an extraordinary, subconscious telepathic capacity of the living mind? Bazett’s painstakingly documented records leave that final verdict to the analytical reader.
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