Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/147

Rh Mrs. Patterson and her relation to the Crafts, Ira Holmes, brother of Mrs. Crafts, makes the following affidavit:

Ira Holmes, being duly sworn, deposes and says:

I am 76 years of age. I reside in Stoughton, Massachusetts. I first met Mrs. Mary Patterson, now known as Mary Baker G. Eddy, of Concord, New Hampshire, in the year 1867. She was then living at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Hiram S. Crafts in East Stoughton, which is now called Avon. Mrs. Hiram S. Crafts is my sister, and Hiram S. Crafts is a brother of my wife, Mrs. Ira Holmes. The two families were, therefore, intimately connected, and I was acquainted with what occurred in the Crafts home.

Hiram Crafts and his wife, Mary Crafts, told me that they first met Mary Patterson in a boarding house in Lynn, Mass., where Hiram and Mary Crafts lived temporarily while Hiram Crafts was working in a Lynn shoe manufactory. Mr. and Mrs. Crafts were Spiritualists, and they have told me that Mrs. Patterson represented to them that she had learned a "science" that was a step in advance of Spiritualism. She wished to teach this science to Hiram Crafts, and after Mr. and Mrs. Crafts had returned from Lynn to their home in East Stoughton, Massachusetts, Mrs. Patterson came to their home for the purpose of teaching this new science to Hiram Crafts. I have heard her say many times, while she was living at Crafts' that she learned this science from Doctor Quimby. I have heard her say these words: "I learned this science from Dr. Quimby, and I can impart it to but one person." She always said this in a slow, impressive manner, pronouncing the word "person" as if it were spelled "pairson."

From my sister, Mary Crafts, and her husband, Hiram S. Crafts, I learned that Hiram Crafts had entered into an agreement with Mrs. Patterson to pay her a certain sum of money for instructing him in Quimby's science.

After Hiram Crafts had learned it, he took some patients for treatment, in East Stoughton, but in a short time he, with Mrs. Crafts and Mrs. Patterson, moved to Taunton, Mass., for the purpose of practising the healing system which Mrs. Patterson had taught him. I never knew of Mrs. Patterson treating, or attempting to treat, any sick person. I understood, from her and from Mr. and Mrs. Crafts, that she could not practise this science, but could teach it, and could teach it to only one person.

While Mrs. Patterson lived in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Crafts, she caused trouble in the household, and urged Mr. Crafts to get a bill of divorce from his wife, Mary Crafts. The reason Mrs. Patterson gave for