Spirit Photography

 William H. Mumler, photography of Col. Cushman,  1869–1878.  Albumen silver print, approx. 4 × 2 in.). Public domain image courtesy of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.

Origins

Spirit photography finds itself grounded in the power of the Spiritualist movement of the 19th century and in providing what many believed to be tangible proof of the supernatural. As John Harvey notes in Photography and the Spirit, these images allowed “permanent perceptible proof” of disembodied spirits, allowing for a new form of communication between the living and the dead [1]. However, with the rise of spirit photography came many critics and skeptics who expressed strong views regarding what they called “manipulation” photography. The technique of double exposure, which enabled the creation of these ghostly images, led to accusations of falsification and fraud, with some claiming that the photographs were nothing more than deceptive tricks. This tension between belief and skepticism is explored through many sources, including Fred Getting’s Ghosts In Photographs, which highlights the grim and falsified undertones of spirit photography, and Mia Fineman’s exploration of the importance of early Photoshop adjacence from the 19th century. The Spiritualist movement itself is essential in understanding the complex legacy and rise of spirit photography. While some spiritualists embraced it as true proof of the afterlife, others criticized it as an exploitation of grief and a scam out of money. These sources come together to define a nuanced understanding of spirit photography, examining both its spiritual importance and the controversies surrounding its originality. 

Capturing the Ghosts of the Past

Spirit photography was remarkable in a number of ways, but most importantly, in providing recipients with mementos of their deceased loved ones, ushering in a new era of Spiritualism, and offering enduring, tangible proof of ghostly entities. Spirit photography, as it’s been commonly understood, refers to a form of photography that purports to show ghosts, especially of people who have died. Spirit photography began its rise in 1861 by William H. Mumler in Boston, thirteen years after a modern outbreak of spiritual phenomena in New York. While experimenting in a friend’s studio using their chemicals and instruments, Mumler attempted to capture a photo of himself, ultimately failing when it produced two separate forms of his person in the final product. Mumler claimed, “‘At this time I had never heard about spirit pictures, although I had been somewhat interested in the doctrine of Spiritualism. At first I laboured under what is now the general impression that the plate upon which the picture was taken could not have been clean and that the form which showed itself beside my own must have been left on the glass”’ [2]. This accidental result began an initiative that reignited and strengthened the Spiritualist movement, as well as bringing new uses for the double-exposure method and giving rise to concepts of invasive photography. In John Harvey’s novel Photography and the Spirit, he conveys, “...spirit photographs were anomalous and remarkable in terms of both their processes and their product. In this way, photography provided permanent perceptible proof of the existence of disembodied communicants” [3]. To Harvey’s point, spirit photography was not only nuanced in its ability to provide recipients with mementos of their late loved ones or spark a new era of spiritualism but also in its capacity to offer lasting, tangible evidence of ghostly beings. 

Spirit Photography and the Spiritualist Movement: Proof and Fraud 

The Spiritualist Movement of the 19th century was a foundational aspect of spirit photography in that the strengthening of the movement was both revered and detested by many activists of the movement itself. Of the many foundational aspects of spirit photography, one remains significantly important: the Spiritualist Movement of the 19th century. The strengthening of the movement following the creation of spiritualist photography was both revered and detested by many activists of the movement itself. On the one hand, spirit photography allowed for a reimagining of the spirit itself in a way that provided people with what seemed to be tangible evidence of ghosts. However, a different and faulty example, such as Mary Todd Lincoln's commissioning Mumler to use double exposure to create a spirit photo of her late husband standing behind her, meant something entirely different to advocates of the movement: that it was fraudulent. In Ghosts In Photographs by Fred Gettings, he discusses this negative point of view regarding spiritualists in response to spirit photography, saying, “Spirit photography has macabre and unhealthy undertones, not because it is involved with sciomancy (the raising of the shades of the dead) but because it has the effect of blurring the otherwise clear distinction between the natures of this world and the next.”[4] 

Although the spiritualist movement became more popularized by the cultivation of spirit photography,5there were spiritualists who felt as though this new wave would become less about spirits themselves and more about the false methods of portraying them in photographs. However, there were cases in which traditional spiritualists felt as though this form of photography enhanced the ability of others to open their minds to the more supernatural elements, especially the introduction for more on this popularization 

of photography [5]. As the spiritualist historian J.J. Morse stated, traditional spiritualists had methods that:

[C]onsist of a wide variety of tangible evidences, such as “rappings,” levitations of objects, visions, trances, “possessions,” direct voices, writings (produced directly by spirits), automatic writings by an individual impelled, compelled, or controlled, by spirits to write; by personations of departed people, accompanied by messages conclusively proving the identity of the spirit with that of someone previously living in this life, quite unknown by, and unknowable to, the “medium” used by the spirit. These and many other methods of obtaining the evidence in support of man’s belief in a future life have been practically utilised by Spiritualists since these modern miracles first occurred in 1848. [6]

In this way, photography served as an approach to creating more tangible proof of the supernatural as opposed to the methods early spiritualists relied on to present their case for the existence of spirits interacting with the living world. 

Double Exposure and Deception: The Controversy of Manipulation in Spirit Photography

In a similar way to the Spiritualist Movement of the 19th century having a profound effect on the circumstances of spirit photography, challenges of double exposure and manipulation of photography are called into question. During the 19th century, spirit photography brought about inquiries of manipulation and established itself as a form of “trick” photography that many did not consider to be a real art form [7]. The use of double exposure to create these illusions of spirits existing in the background of the photographs made their cultivation a relatively simple one and became a popular way to test and trick the perception of those viewing the image. In author Mia Fineman’s novel concerning methods of photo manipulation before Photoshop, she explains:

By the end of the nineteenth century, photography’s claims to flawless accuracy and verisimilitude were being greeted with widespread skepticism…Beginning in the 1890s, trick photography became a craze among amateurs, who scoured popular photo magazines and manuals for practical tips on how to create fantastic images of giant babies, flying elephants, tiny men trapped inside bottles, and other counterfactual confections [8].

Forms of manipulation such as these tricked the eye and were interesting to perceive, but for hard-core advocates of double exposure in photography, this tactic of deception was not taken lightly. Spiritualists immersed and dedicated to their movement during this time often found fabricated forms of spirit photography to be disgraceful, going so far as to put multiple individuals known to exploit photography in this way on trial for the manipulation of the images. Photographer and the cultivator of spirit photography, William Mumler, was placed on trial for reusing old negatives and applying a double exposure tactic to produce a new photo with a “ghost” in the background. People felt as though they were being scammed and tricked out of money after Mumler went on to create ghosts of people who were still alive [9]. However, as authors Vincent C. Patrick and Whately W. Smith conclude in their book, the Case Against Spirit Photography, “Much controversy followed this exposure; while many declared that spirit photographs were an utter fraud, others considered that though some were genuine, mediums frequently obtained their spirits by trickery in order to not disappoint their sitter” [10]. Manipulation tactics, although seemingly caused advocates of the spiritualist movement to abandon certain ideas of ghosts presenting themselves through the medium of photography, didn’t result in the ultimate debunking of the movement at all. In fact, many argued that the genuineness of spirit photography lay in the truthful conditions employed in their taking, leaving absolutely no room for loopholes. Although fraud using trick slides, concealed accomplices dressed as ghosts in the background, mirrors, double refracting lenses, and more have been used in the manipulation of spirit photography, spiritualists continued to believe in the real separation of our world and the next through the photos.

Mary Todd Lincoln’s Use of Spirit Photography

While some early forms of spirit photos appear to be purely accidental, William Mumler’s 1870 photo of Mary Todd Lincoln with the ghost of her late husband in the background had profound effects on the

movement of this photography form in the 19th century. In observing a spirit photo such as this one, viewers can see the ghostly, translucent form of the former President standing over his wife. The nature of his

stance and positioning seems to suggest as though he’s protecting and watching over his wife. This photo remains one of the most famous in this category, if not for the eerie image of her assassinated husband, but also for Mary Todd Lincoln and William Mumler’s act of preserving his memory.

The Evolution of the Supernatural in the Digital Age

Beginning in the 21st century, having access to our phones almost all the time has inspired some very interesting variants of spirit photography to emerge within the last few decades. Many of us grew up surrounded by legends of Bigfoot, the Lochness Monster, and UFOs flying around in the sky, many of these supposed phenomena being captured on film or in blurry, barely visible photographs. The question could be asked if our laughable attempts at uncovering the supernatural in our current era compete with the spirit photography and Spiritualist movement in the 19th century. In some ways, our present-day manipulation photography has advanced way beyond the double exposure tactics employed during the 19th century, but the principle remains the same. Author and spirit photography skeptic Fred Gettings comments on this ushering into the modern day, saying: 

To a certain extent, a new form of spirit photography is beginning to develop in modern times, and this must contribute further to the growth of spiritual materialism. Yet the fact is that these developments are, properly speaking, outside the limitations of this present book. I have particularly in mind the fascinating pictures that are being taken in increasing numbers of the misnamed and misunderstood UFO manifestations and of what have recently been called "critters."

The transition into modern times proves the idea that, on the one hand, humans seem to have an aptitude for trickery and manipulating the natural world into something much more interesting, while on the other hand, maybe we post fabricated videos of Bigfoot for the maximum amount of views that we can achieve on Tiktok. Either way, the movement of the adaption of spirit photography into modern times seems to be routed in a fascination spanning from the start of the movement up until now of the supernatural, raw proof of the inconclusive and the massive question mark of the unknown.

Endnotes

1. John Harvey, Photography and Spirit. Reaktion Books, 2007.

2. Morse, J. J. Morse, “A Brief History of Spirit Photography,” in Two Worlds: Manchester (1909).

3. Harvey, Photography and Spirit, 3.

4. Fred Gettings, Ghosts In Photographs, Harmony Books, 1978.

5. See Harvey’s Photography and Spirit (2007) for more on its popularization.

6. Morse, "A Brief History of Spirit Photography,” 175.

7. Vincent C. Patrick and Whately W. Smith, The Case Against Spirit Photographs, Kagan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co, 1921.

8. Mia Fineman, Faking it: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012.

9. Patrick and Smith, The Case Against Spirit Photographs, 36.

10. Patrick and Smith, The Case Against Spirit Photographs, 12.

11. Fred Gettings, Ghosts In Photographs, 100.