BETWEEN THE WORLDS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 5 January 1929, Page 9

BETWEEN THE WORLDS

SCIENTISTS and students of the occult are passing over the strange case of Mrs Ethel Baldwin, of Long Beach, California, whose apparent death and. seemingly miraculous resurrection recently startled the attendant physicians.

The very manner of Mrs Baldwin’s decease —if .decease it was—seemed. remarkable. Her husband, Boy Baldwin, had been ill with pneumonia. He was a patient in a hospital at Long Beach. Mrs Baldwin sat at his bedside. That morning a report on Mr Baldwin’s condition had been serious. Towards late afternoon he showed signs of improvement. Then he had a sudden sinking spell and died.

His wife was at tho bedside when the end came.

On fhe very instant that Baldwin, breathed his last fluttering breath, his wife lapsed into a death-like coma. All efforts to rouse her proved futile. She continued in her death-like trance after she was taken home.

Investigation into the lives of Mt and Mrs Baldwin revealed that their marriage had heen an ideal one. They had been separated for a night in the 16 years they had been man and wife. They loved the same boohs and sports and amusements. Never had they known oven a trivial quarrel, and never had an unkind word passed between them. Many times they had talked of what would happen when death came. They had prayed to. pass away together; neither one cared to survive the other.

Physicians acquainted with these facts realised that it would be a tremendous (task to bring her out of the apparent cataleptic state. ‘ ‘ The desire to live,” they said, “is essential to the. recovery of the majority of patients.” Mrs Baldwin probably ihad suffered the collapse because life held little interest for her after her husband had passed away. Therefore, on the chance that she might awaken of her own accord, her children were warned to stay in or near the house.. ‘‘ We are certain, ’ ’ .the physicians said, ‘ ‘ that if unconsciousness returns wo can renew the patient’s interest in life by having tire children talk to her.”

And so for eight long days and nights the two children sat by the bedside, calling her, and took only short periods of rest. Young Thurman Baldwin, to keep himself awake at night, would play his violin. Ho is quite a good musician, and his chum, George de Barnee, came to the house to. keep him company. De Itamoe is a pianist, atnd together the boys would while away the weary hours playing the violin and piano. .

AN EIGHT-DAY TRANCE

It was on the eighth day that the boys were playing some of the favourite airis of Mrs Baldwin’s. They hod just struck up the first solemn airs of ‘ ‘ Holy Night” when those at the bedside noticed a faint fluttering of Airs Baldwin’s eyelids. The nurse, quick to realise .that this change might be traceable to 'the effect of the music, bade the young men to continue their playing. The boys played as if inspired. Young Thurman realised that upon his playing might depend the life of his mother.

Suddenly the long, pale, fingers of the woman (began to move faintly. The watchers saw that they were beating a feeble rhythm to the music, and convinced that the music must be continued until the doctors came. The movement of the fingers gained strength as Thurman repeated the carol several times to the accompaniment of his chum.

The sleeper was now trying to- stir in the .bed. It seemed ,to the people at the bedside that life was fighting to efieep back into the body that had for .days laid rigid. The eyelids continued to flutter and the while hands gained strength. As the chords floated in from the, adjoining room in increased tempo, the fingers' kept (time. The boys kept playing for more than an hour and were almost exhausted, j

Then the. woman, who. had been in a trance for more than a week, slowly opened her eyes. “Holy Night,” she whispered. “I cannot, yet 1 must—l want to .go back to him.” Then her murmurs drifted into unintelligibility. Those who watched witnessed one of the strangest battles ever seen by human eye. It was as if the soul of Mrs Baldwin were being pulled back into space by unseen hands on the one side, and on the other .the forces of earth were trying to hold it. Agony was depicted on the ashen face of the victim.

Slowly, but surely, however, the call of life apparently drew the woman is soul back to earth, and soon she opened her eyes-, alight with consciousness. “I am so tired,” were her first words.

Informed of her long sleep, Mrs Baldwin was amazed.

There is a wide diversion of opinion concerning the remarkable awakening of Mrs Baldwin. Psychologists say that the trance was the result of hysteria. Physicians expressed the opinion that such trances may result pathologically from great shocks. But students of the occult insist that Mrs Baldwin ’s soul fled v r hen her husband died, and that she was called back to life by the attains of her son’s music.