Observations placeholder
Lord Charles Beresford - Inside the cabin I saw a coffin in which my father was lying
Identifier
025127
Type of Spiritual Experience
Inter composer communication
Hallucination
Background
The communication was coming from a bodied soul who was 'seeing' the coffin in a state of high emotion
A description of the experience
Death and its Mystery – After Death – Camille Flammarian
Lord Beresford sent this account to the English Society for Psychical Research.
It was in the spring of 1864; I was on board the frigate Raccoon on its way from Gibraltar to Marseilles. I had to go down into my cabin to get my pipe.
Inside the cabin I saw a coffin in which my father was lying; I saw this as distinctly as if it had been real! I was deeply impressed, and at once told my companions what had happened; they were seated near there, between the cannon, talking. I also told the ship's chaplain, the Rev. Mr. Onslow.
In a few days we reached Marseilles, and there I learned of my father's death; he had been buried on the same day and at the same time at which he had appeared to me (half-past twelve). I must add that at the moment of the apparition there was splendid weather, and that I was feeling no uneasiness as to my father, having recently received reassuring news as to his improved health.
Between my father and me there had always been a great bond of sympathy, one far stronger than is usual between a man of seventy-two and a young man of twenty-four such were our respective ages.