Richmond, Cora Scott
Richmond, Cora Scott (1840–1923)
(religion, spiritualism, and occult)Cora Scott Richmond, a Spiritualist medium, speaker of renown, and co-founder of the National Spiritualist Association, was born Cora Lodencia Veronica Scott on April 21, 1840, near Cuba, New York. She was born with a veil or caul, a membrane that covers the face in some babies that has been the subject of many folk beliefs. The attending physician therefore suggested her name, Cora, which designated a person with special powers. Richmond grew to womanhood during the first generation of the Spiritualist movement, which was centered in her home state. In 1851, the family moved to the Hopedale colony at Milford, Massachusetts, a communal establishment that drew on both Universalist and Spiritualist teachings. They stayed only a short time and then moved to Waterloo, Wisconsin, to establish a branch of the Hopedale community. At Waterloo, the still youthful Richmond began to show her spiritual talents, the first manifestation being her falling asleep and writing spirit messages on a school slate. She quickly evolved into a trance medium.
As she evolved, other members of her family began to manifest various mediumistic powers, as well. She also acquired a spirit control, a single spirit who would assume the role of guiding her to contact the spirit realm. In this case, the control was said to be Adin Augustus Ballou, the deceased son of Adin Ballou, the founder of the Hopedale colony. Most mediums have a control who will manifest and serve as a kind of master of ceremonies when the medium goes into trance. After the spirit control manifested for Richmond, other spirits developed a close relationship with her and frequently appeared at séances. At the age of fifteen, Richmond began to offer teaching (channeling) sessions, and it was announced that 12 different spirits were speaking through her.
In 1854 she was invited to move to Buffalo, New York, to share the state with Thomas Gales Foster, an advocate of Spiritualism, which at the time was still a decentralized movement. On occasion, she accepted tests of her abilities, including the holding of spontaneous lectures on subjects about which she had no previous knowledge. After two years in Buffalo, she moved on to New York City for a period. While becoming a successful trance lecturer, she also met and married Dr. Benjamin Hatch, a man who proved to be both a con artist and wife beater. When her situation was brought to the attention of the Spiritualist leadership in New York, they stepped in and assisted her in obtaining a swift divorce. She was soon able to resume her career. Over the next years she traveled widely, including a first trip across the Atlantic in 1873. She stayed in Great Britain for two years. When she returned from England, she became the pastor of a Spiritualist church in Chicago, a position she would hold for the remaining fifty years of her life. In 1878 she married William Richmond, a union that proved to be all the earlier marriage had not been. Rather than exploit her, he became her helpful assistant. He learned shorthand and began to take down and transcribe her lectures for publication.
Cora Richmond had previously published works such as a 250-page epic poem, “Hesperia,” on the theme of brotherhood accomplished by Hesperia, the spirit of liberty. Among her later major works are two on Spiritualist philosophy, Psychosophy and The Soul in Human Embodiments. She also wrote a fictional work, Zulieka. She developed an introductory presentation concerning Spiritualism, which was delivered at the Parliament of the World’s Religions that gathered in Chicago in the summer of 1893. That same year she participated in the founding of the National Spiritualist Association and was elected the association’s first vice president. Her lectures were a regular part of the association’s annual meeting for the next 20 years. She passed away on January 3, 1923, in Chicago.
The church she served continues today as the Church of the Spirit located on Chicago’s north side. The National Spiritualist Association evolved into the National Spiritualist Association of Churches, which remains as the largest Spiritualist body in the United States.