Guppy v Cook: the inspiration behind my story

My story centres on two Mediums working in 1870s London – Mrs Wood and Miss Bird. While both were born in my imagination, they were inspired by the apparent rivalry between two great Victorian Mediums who were working in the 1870s: Mrs Agnes Guppy-Volkmann and Miss Florence Cook. One, Agnes, was established and prominent, the other, Florence, young and ambitious. Agnes – being a stout woman and ancient by Victorian standards – was supposed to resent the threat and talent of attractive fifteen-year-old Florence, thus sparking a great Victorian Spiritualist scandal which was – as is usual of these things – based entirely on gossip and supposition.

Agnes Guppy was born into poverty in Hull and brought to London around 1860 when she was about twenty, by a man who presented himself as either her father-in-law or her grandfather. Any real familial connection, though, is uncertain. Her gift and love of fun quickly drew attention, but it was when Alfred Russel Wallace, Darwin’s partner on the Voyage of the Beagle who had become fascinated by Spiritualism in the 1860s, became one of her advocates that things really took off. She married twice – first to Samuel Guppy and then, after Samuel’s death, to William Volkman – both of whom were well-known within London’s Spiritualist society but happy to play second fiddle to her talent.

Agnes is considered one of the greatest Mediums of Victorian England with a supreme talent for apporting. So good in fact, that in 1871 Agnes apported herself from her back parlour in Highbury over the chimneypots of London into the middle of a séance taking place in Lamb’s Conduit Street – giving her the affectionate moniker of the Flying Enchantress. Agnes remained unimpeached until her death in 1917, an exceptionally rare achievement for a public Medium.

Florence Cook, or Florrie as her many male admirers called her, was a young, ambitious medium who remains famous for being the first Medium in England to materialise a full spirit. Born and raised in Hackney, and working from her parent’s front room, fifteen-year-old Florence started attracting interest in 1871 and, while Agnes worked the tables for years before achieving fame, Florence was performing full spirit materialisations of her spirit guide, Katie King, within two years, both in England and on the East Coast of America.

And here the real story begins: While the idea of Agnes and Florence’s rivalry is largely based on gossip and speculation, there was indeed a grabbing scandal which can be cleanly linked back to Agnes: the culprit was William Volkman who was to become Agnes’s second husband a year later. On 9 December, 1873, Volkman had been given a seat one of Florence’s séances in exchange for a piece of jewellery.

When ‘Katie’ appeared, he leapt up and attempted to pull the spirit towards light, but was swiftly tackled to the floor by her supporters, losing half his beard in the process. While spiritualist newspapers ruminated on the link between him and Agnes, he was always adamant that he had been enacting his own experiment and Agnes had nothing to do with it. A few months later, the American Medium, Nelson Holmes, who had past beef with Agnes (as was common amongst these Mediums), wrote to the famous Medium D.D. Holmes that Agnes had told him that she felt threatened by Florence and that someone needed to throw vitriol in her ‘little doll-face’ to end her career.

“In January 1873, Mrs. Guppy called at our residence, 16 Old Quebec St., London, W. and endeavoured to enlist our co-operation in a plot whereby a certain Mr. Clark, Mr. Henderson, and one Vlockman (sic) were to be hired to attend a seance at Miss Cook’s, and watching their opportunity, at a favourable moment, while the manifestations were in progress to throw vitrol (sic) in the face of the spirit, hoping thereby to destroy for ever the handsome features of Miss Florrie Cook, and thus at one fell stroke to effectually remove from further use a medium who, Mrs. Guppy claimed, had and was taking all her, Mrs. Guppy’s, friends away from her and upon whose patronage Mrs. G. had long depended.”Excerpt from Letter from Nelson Holmes to D.D. Home – 16 September 1876

Of course, Agnes denied this strenuously and there is absolutely no evidence that this was ever a real plan or Volkman had intended to do such a thing. Fortunately, Agnes was so established in her work with well-connected patrons and friends that while she was furious about the stain on her reputation, she survived it.

With inexperience and controlled by the ‘patronage’ of rich old men, the real victim here was always going to be Florence. While initially triumphant, with the growth of spirit photography catching the attention of curious psychic investigators, and the rise in less talented frauds leaping onto the bandwagon – I’ve included below a few pictures of some of these ‘cunning’ manipulations, it’s astonishing that anyone ever caught them out – Florence’s popularity began to wain. She died in poverty 1904.