CREDULOUS TURKS

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 137, 13 June 1927, Page 8

CREDULOUS TURKS

SPOOKISM THAT PAID. Captain David McC.hie. R.E., for years a prisone of war in Turkish Asia Minor, has a profound respect for the spook phases of spiritualism. He has set.-n the spooks unlock doors and loosen prison Lars. Among his British fellowpi isoners were several officers skilled in fake spookisin, and thev so worked on the credulity of the Turkish guards that, on pretence of locating treasure in the ruined residences of murdered Armenians, these psychic experts were escorted to such places as they named, and were given considerable liberty. Their magic powers were made by them a lever °to obtain greater freedom for their fellow captives as well as themselves, and the prisoners soon were allowed plenty of picnics, on the plea of '*no picnics', no buried treasure": The charm worked even to the point of facilitating escape' Two or the psychic captives became so filled with zeal that they were sent out of Turkey certified as insane. Their brains recovered beyond the three miles' limit—or whatever is the war-time equivalent of such.