Observations placeholder

Ernesto Bozzano - Psychic phenomena at the moment of death [110 cases suggesting survival after death]

First category - Cases in which the apparitions of the deceased are perceived solely by the dying person, and relate to persons whose death he knew.

13th case. – This is taken from the Light (1915, page 502). Ms. C.J. Chambers, volunteer nurse, recounts this fact:

This episode, of a dying child who sees and recognizes his dead father, came to my attention a few weeks ago when I was on duty at the County Hospital.

I was attached to the military room when I saw Nurse H., who was doing her work in the men's room, on the floor above. With half an hour of freedom, she came to have a cup of tea with me. We have various interesting cases entrusted to our care, and at a certain point I asked:

- How's the little Brown?

My friend shook her head. Tommy Brown was a 12-year-old boy who had had a serious operation in the hope of saving him; but this poor little exhausted body had proved powerless to resist the test. The boy belonged to a large and very poor family, where the mother had found it impossible to solve the problem of existence; just at the age when the child should have been feeding to grow, he rarely knew what it was to not be hungry; most often he was reduced to going to bed on an empty stomach. In these circumstances, his health was too weak to support a surgical operation. Instead of improving, he worsened rapidly, despite the constant care and charitable attention of doctors and nurses.

"I do not think," said my friend, "that he will survive until tomorrow. “ Two years ago, just then, his father was dying in bed next to the one where his Tommy is now.”

After a break, my friend added:

“- Poor child! Already several times I thought him dead; but as soon as I give the injection ordered by the doctor, he comes back to life. When he returns, he is shaken, gasps, opens his eyes, and immediately stares at the bed in front. The other night, while his mother was watching him, he said, ‘Mother, there's father!’

The mother looked in the direction indicated by the child, but she saw only the empty bed and the white wall.

‘No, my dear, there is no one,’ replied the poor woman, stroking her child.

‘- Yes, he is here. Do not you see, near this bed?’

And he showed again the bed where his father had died.

‘- Mum, go greet him and talk to him.’

The mother did not see anything, any more than me and the other nurse on duty.

Then the mother asked:

‘- What is he doing, your father, my child?’

‘- He's looking at you’. And soon after: ‘Now it's me he's watching; here he is waving his hand; he would like me to go with him. Saying this, he weakly sought to get up; we held him back, striving to calm him down.’

Once, the mother, believing that the little patient did not hear, said in a low voice: ‘His father died two years ago’.

But Tommy heard and replied, ‘No, it's not possible; he is there beside the bed and makes a wave of his hand. Look at it all then; he is there calling to me...’"

In pronouncing these words, he lost consciousness ... At 5 o'clock in the morning, poor little Tommy had answered his Father’s call.