CONAN DOYLE, Arthur (1859-1930). The Case for Spirit Photography, London, [1922], 8vo, 16 photographed plates, original wrappers (lacks backstrip, frayed with some loss). FIRST EDITION. RARE. With 2 books of related interest. (3)

CONAN DOYLE, Arthur (1859-1930), and others.  The Case for Spirit Photography ... [From upper wrapper:]  With Corroborative Evidence by Experienced Researchers and Photographers. London: Hutchinson & Co., [1922]. 8vo (216 x 140mm). Half title, 16 photographed plates, one-page announcement by the "Society for the Study of Supernormal Pictures" at the end (a few leaves and plates loose, some spotting and light browning to text leaves). Original wrappers printed in green (lacks backstrip but replaced with later tape, frayed with some loss of letters to lower wrapper). Provenance: W. H. Smith (signature on title). FIRST EDITION. RARE. "The publicity given to the recent attacks on Psychic Photography has been out of all proportion to their scientific value as evidence. When Sir Arthur Conan Doyle arrived in the country, after his successful tour in America, the controversy was in full swing. With characteristic promptitude he immediately decided to meet these negative attacks by a positive counter-attack, and this volume is the outcome of that decision" (from Fred Barlow's Preface). The "recent attacks" mentioned in the preface refer to Harry Price's exposure of William Hope's forgeries in February 1922. Hope was a prominent member of the spiritualist group known as the "Crewe Circle" and a leading practitioner of "spiritual photography". Price, who, being a member both of the Society for Psychical Research and the Magic Circle, was well-qualified to adjudicate on such matters, wrote of him in his SPR report, "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes." Green & Gibson B31a. With 2 other books of related interest, namely Baron Von Schrenck Notzing's Phenomena of Materialisation. A Contribution to the Investigation of Mediumistic Teleplastics (London, 1923, original cloth, lacks spine, "Reissue of the First English Edition") and Private Dowding. With Notes by W[ellesley]. T[udor]. P[ole]. [From the upper wrapper of the jacket:] A Plain Record of the After-Death Experiences of a Soldier Killed in Battle (London, 1943, 8vo, original cloth, dust-jacket, "Fifth Edition (Enlarged)" [first printed in 1919]). Provenance: from the Collection of the late John Anthony Benjafield (1938-2023). (3)