Tea at Trianon: The Mannheim Case

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, April 3, 2020

The Mannheim Case

The case upon which the novel The Exorcist was based. From Return to Order:

The central figure in the story was a teenager known by the pseudonyms “Robbie Mannheim” or “Roland Doe.” While Robbie’s true identity and that of his relatives remains a secret the details of the extraordinary events of this 1949 exorcism were meticulously recorded in the book Possessed by Thomas Allen. Robbie grew up in Mount Rainier, Maryland. As the only child of Karl and Phyllis Mannheim, (also pseudonyms) he would often play games with adults. One such person was his Aunt Harriet, a spiritualist, who lived St. Louis, Missouri and frequently visited the Mannheims. During a visit in January of 1949, she taught her thirteen-year old nephew how to use a Ouija board.

Not long afterwards, the Mannheims noticed strange things happening around their son. They heard strange noises in his room such as the incessant sound of dripping water and later a scratching noise like claws scraping across wood. Around the same time, Aunt Harriet died and Robbie began using the Ouija board as a means to contact her. He would use the board for hours on end, until the game became for him a possession, both figuratively and literally.

Soon, his parents noticed alarming physical abnormalities on their son’s body such as scratch marks, welts and bruises, which appeared for no apparent reason. More disturbing still was the personality transformation. Their normally quiet, timid boy suddenly became aggressive with frequent outbursts of anger and violent temper tantrums directed at them. He began to speak in Latin, a language he had no means of knowing. That is when the parents decided they needed help.

They tried everything from a regular medical doctor, to psychologists, psychiatrists and even a psychic before finally turning to their minister, Rev. Luther Miles Schulze. While the parents already considered the possibility of diabolical possession, Pastor Schulze was skeptical. He looked upon possession “as a medieval relic, something that had been left to Catholics when the Luther-led Reformation split the Christian world.”2 (Read more.)