Brooch (phenomenon)

Brooch No. 1

In the evening of October 3, 1880, Mr. and Mrs. Hume organized a dinner party at their home at Simla, where the brooch no. 1 phenomenon occurred. Present at the dinner were Mr. and Mrs. Hume, Mr. and Mrs. Sinnett, Mrs. Gordon, Mr. F. Hogg, Captain P. J. Maitland, Mr. Beatson, Mr. Davidson, Colonel Olcott, and Madame Blavatsky.

The facts were related at the time in a short statement drawn up for publication and signed by the nine persons who witnessed it.

"Madame Blavatsky asked Mrs. Hume if there was anything she particularly wished for. Mrs. Hume at first hesitated, but in a short time said there was something she would particularly like to have brought her, namely, a small article of jewelry that she formerly possessed, but had given away to a person who had allowed it to pass out of her possession. Madame Blavatsky then said if she would fix the image of the article in question very definitely on her mind, she, Madame Blavatsky, would endeavor to procure it. Mrs. Hume then said that she vividly remembered the article, and described it as an old-fashioned breast brooch set round with pearls, with glass at the front, and the back made to contain hair. She then, on being asked, drew a rough sketch of the brooch. Madame Blavatsky then wrapped up a coin attached to her watch chain in two cigarette papers, and put it in her dress, and said that she hoped the brooch might be obtained in the course of the evening. At the close of dinner, she said to Mr. Hume that the paper in which the coin had been wrapped was gone. A little later, in the drawing room, she said that the brooch would not be brought into the house, but that it must be looked for in the garden, and then as the party went out accompanying her, she said she had clairvoyantly seen the brooch fall into a star-shaped bed of flowers. Mr. Hume led the way to such a bed in a distant part of the garden. A prolonged and careful search was made with lanterns, and eventually a small paper packet, consisting of two cigarette papers, was found amongst the leaves by Mrs. Sinnett. This being opened on the spot was found to contain a brooch exactly corresponding to the previous description, and which Mrs. Hume identified as that which she had originally lost. None of the party, except Mr. and Mrs. Hume, had ever seen or heard of the brooch. Mr. Hume had not thought of it for years. Mrs. Hume had never spoken of it to anyone since she parted with it, nor had she, for long, even thought of it. She herself stated, after it was found, that it was only when Madame asked her whether there was anything she would like to have, that the remembrance of this brooch, the gift of her mother, flashed across her mind."

The statement was signed by A. O. Hume, Alice Gordon, M. A. Hume, P. J. Maitland, Fred R. Hogg, Wm. Davidson, A. P. Sinnett, Stuart Beatson, and Patience Sinnett.

Repercussions

According to A. P. Sinnett, the reception of this publication was not positive:

When this narrative was published, the nine persons above mentioned were assailed with torrents of ridicule. Floods of more or less imbecile criticism have been directed to show that the whole performance must have been a trick; and for many persons it is now, no doubt, an established explanation that Mrs. Hume was adroitly led up to ask for the particular article produced, by a quantity of preliminary talk about a feat which Madame Blavatsky specially went to the house to perform. A further established opinion is that the brooch which Mrs. Hume gave to her daughter, and which her daughter lost, must have been got from that young lady about a year previously, when she passed through Bombay, where Madame Blavatsky was living, on her way to England. The young lady's testimony to the effect that she lost the brooch before she went to Bombay, or ever saw Madame Blavatsky, is a little feature of this hypothesis which its contented framers do not care to inquire into.

Brooch No. 2

On the night of October 19, 1880, A. P. Sinnett saw Master K.H. in his astral form, waking up for a moment, and immediately afterwards being conscious out of the body in the adjacent dressing-room. The next morning, he found a note from the Master, who wrote "I hope to prove to you my presence near you last night by something I took away with me. Your lady will receive it back on the Hill."

On October 20, 1880, while picnicking for the second time on Prospect Hill, Simla, Mrs. Sinnett's brooch No. 2 and a letter from Master K.H. is found inside a pillow.