Page 40 - Encyclopedia of the Unusual and Unexplained Vol. 3

20 Ghosts and Phantoms

Ghost image of a woman accounts of alleged communication with the
frightening an elderly dead to be authentic, they must first of all be
man in a double exposed veridical; that is, they must relate to an actual
film from ca. 1910. event that was occurring, had occurred, or
(CORBIS CORPORATION) would occur. In addition, these cases must
each contain an independent witness who
could further testify to the truth and import of
the experience. The account of James Chaf-
fin’s will is a case that truly seems suggestive of
survival of the human personality after death.
On September 7, 1921, James Chaffin of
Davie County, North Carolina, died as the
result of a fall. A farmer, Chaffin was survived
by his widow and four sons, but the will that
he had had duly attested by two witnesses on
November 16, 1905, left all of his property to
the third son, Marshall.

One night in the latter part of June 1925,
four years after James Chaffin’s death, James
Pinkney Chaffin, the farmer’s second son, saw
the spirit figure of the deceased standing at his
Sitwell, Sacheverell. Poltergeists. New York: Universi-
bedside and heard the specter tell of another
ty Books, 1959.
will. According to the son, his father had
Stevens, William Oliver. Unbidden Guests. New York:
appeared dressed as he often had in life. “You
Dodd, Mead & Co., 1957.
will find the will in my overcoat pocket,” the
spirit figure said, taking hold of the garment
Spirits of the Dead
and pulling it back.
According to the “USA Snapshots” feature in
The next morning James Pinkney Chaffin
the April 20, 1998, issue of USA Today, 52
arose convinced he had seen and heard his
percent of adult Americans believe that
father and that the spirit had visited him for
encounters with the dead are possible. In his
the purpose of correcting some error. His
1994 analysis of a national sociological survey,
father’s black overcoat had been passed on to
Jeffrey S. Levin, an associate professor at East-
John Chaffin, so James traveled to Yadkin
ern Virginia Medical School, found that two-
County to examine the pocket to which the
thirds of Americans claimed to have had at
spirit had made reference. The two brothers
least one mystical experience. Of that remark-
found that the lining of the inside pocket had
ably high number, 39.9 percent said that they
been sewn together, and when they cut the
had an encounter with a ghost or had
stitches, they found a roll of paper that bore
achieved contact with the spirit of a deceased
the message: “Read the 27th chapter of Gene-
person. According to a survey published in the
sis in my daddie’s [sic] Old Bible.”
December 1997 issue of Self, 85 percent of its
readers believed in the reality of communica- James P. Chaffin was then convinced that
tion with the spirit world. the specter had spoken truthfully, and he
The more that is learned of the remarkable brought witnesses with him to the home of his
powers of the human psyche, the more difficult mother where, after some search, they located
it is to prove that one has actually made con- the dilapidated old Bible in the top drawer of
tact with a spirit of a deceased person, rather a dresser in an upstairs room. One of the wit-
than experienced some facet of extrasensory nesses found the will in a pocket that had
perception, such as clairvoyance or telepathy. been formed by folding two of the Bible’s
In order for psychical researchers to consider pages together.

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