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| Spencer State Hospital Source: WV History on View |
In June of 1937, a little old mountain woman made the trek from Greenbrier County to Charleston, WV. She came to see John Baker White, President of the Board of Control. She was on a mission; she had come to convince the Board of Control that her 57 year old brother, who was a patient at Spencer State Hospital, was not insane. Rather, he was bewitched.
The woman claimed that no less than four families, all with the powers of witchcraft, had used "little birds and dogs" as messengers to do their evil bidding against not just her brother, but her mother as well. These families allegedly wanted control over the bewitched family's farm in Frankford.
To White's credit, he did order an investigation into the brother's confinement, and wrote to the Superintendent at Spencer State Hospital. However, it was deemed that the man in question wasn't bewitched. He was suffering from "abnormal imaginary ideas" and needed to stay hospitalized.
Oddly, this wasn't the first time Spencer State Hospital dealt with a patient who blamed witchcraft on their ailments. Twenty years earlier, Crews/Cruse Hall, a farmer from Mercer County, was adjudged insane after claiming he, his farm animals, and even his farm equipment had been put under a spell by his neighbors. He had suffered similar delusions several years before, and sadly passed away from tuberculosis in 1919 at the hospital. You can read his story here: Bewitched Man Adjudged Insane
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| The Independent Herald (Hinton, WV) 09 June 1937 |
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| The Charleston Daily Mail 10 June 1937 |
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