Hypnotising the Bride.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume IV, Issue 264, 2 October 1902, Page 1

Hypnotising the Bride.

ALLKGED CASE OF COERCION. A case is now under consideration in the Supreme Court at Rochester, U.S., in which a young woman declared she was, whilst under hypnotic influence, induced to marry a man she hated. The girl in the case is Ida May Kassell, a pretty blonde of twenty, and the defendant is Willard J. "Wharton, who is twenty-seven. The case was tried without the presence of the youog man in Court. Wharton was employed in one of the departments of a concern known as the Institute of Science, and there met Miss Kassell, who war then eighteen, antt a stenographer at the Institute. He fell violently in lore -with: her. The Institute of Science teaches hypnotism, and amongst other accomplishments is said to pretend to impart the art of inducing, by hypnotic influence, people to fall in lore with the hypnotieers. Wharton is alleged to have acquired this art. The girl allowed herself to be used as a subject many times. - She could easily be induced t» fall into a trance. Wharton was one of those

who tried to hypnotise her, and the girl says he was a success at it. Several times he proposed marriage to the girl, and she refused him each time. Four days before October 19th last, the date of their marriage, he sought her hand again and she told him she was not ready to marry. On the afternoon of October 19th he walked with her to 218, Oak street, where she lives, and left her. At 7 p.m. he called there, and they were alone in the parlour. "He kept looking at me," said (he girl at the trial, " and passed bis bands before me. I said nothing to bim, and he did not speak. I had no control of myself, but simply got up and left the house with him. He walked to the house of the Rot. Gerald B. F. Hallock, of the Presbyterian Church." The girl said she had no power to resist Wharton's influence. He kept his eyes on her, and while he did this she obeyed his wishes. Once he removed hia eyes, and she was afraid, and nearly cried out. She answered all the questions that were put to her. When they got c . c the preacher's house he tol ■ •".»■■ (they were married, and aske; to go to her father's house him. She did so, and immed W<~■:-•■

parted from Wharton at the .-v She spoke with her husband or>;„« twice afterwards, and then at her mother's direction. Letters were shown to the girl in wb'ch she addressed Wharton as " Swe» thaart," and said she pined for a visit from him. "Do you love Wharton ? " asked the young man's lawyer. "I regarded him as a friend." "Did you regard him as a friend when you wrote that letter ? " "1 didn't intend to marry him." Wharton's father, a retired Baptist clergyman, was examined as to his son's romance. He said that before the marriage both came to him and announced that they were about to wed. He gave them hie hand, and remarked that he would not interfere.

The girl's mother told of he* drughter'ssusceptibility to hypnotie influence, and said that Ida never expected to marry Wharton, and that their marriage could never have been brought about except by fraud or duress. She had tried to get her daughter to live with Wharton to avoid scandal. Dr Frederick Remington, a medico-legal expert, who has been a witness in many murder trials, said that after bearing the testimony he was satisfied that the girl was under hypnotic influence when she married. Wharton. The

girl, he declared, was evidently in the somnambulistic state -when she married Wharton ; in other wsrfdi ; was as though asleep. She woulc. in that condition, do just Wharton advised her. The Rev. Dr Hallock was , witness for the defence. He «»"■ he had seen the girl prior to L < marriage. He asked her all the questions usually asked by him when people came to he married, and she answered them without making mistakes. "Did you think she was under the influence of the

bridegroom ?" asked Wharton's lawyer. ■' I did not," he replied. "She seemed perfectly natural." Dr Hallock said that if Wharton had been staring at the girl whilst in his office he would have noticed it. The reason given for the nonappearance of Wharton was that he had just secured a situation, and did not want to leave. His lawyer desired to have it understood, however, that he did not propose to lose the girl if he could help ifc.