Biographers of old praised the famous; the inclination of our time is to cut them down to size. When I started looking into Lewis Edson Waterman's family life -- in particular, his split from his wife and his relationships with his children -- the fact that all details had been so thoroughly expunged from his official biographies primed me to assume the worst. As more information came in, however, I began to question my initial assumptions. The story still has many gaps, but Waterman now comes across as more victim than villain.
Waterman married Sarah Ann Roberts on June 29, 1858 in Pittsfield, Illinois. He was 20, she was 21. We know nothing about how they met, and next to nothing about her family background. By the time Waterman moved to Boston in 1864 to work for the Aetna Life Insurance Company, there were two daughters: Lou Ella, 4; and Fay Elma, 2. The following year Sarah Ann Waterman gave birth to twins, of whom only one, Rose Anne, survived. And with that, our story truly begins.
As noted in my
addendum to
Lewis Edson Waterman's long strange trip:
Waterman and his first wife were converted to Spiritualism in the late
1860s. The story is recounted in great detail in Benjamin Coleman, “The
Twin Sisters: An Instructive Narrative”, The Spiritual Magazine,
vol. 4, Sep 1869, pp. 401-404. Their daughter Rose, born in 1865, had a
imaginary playmate who turned out to be her twin sister -- Sarah,
called Lily -- who had died at birth. Waterman's wife Sarah Ann turned
out to have psychic powers and was recognized by Spiritualist
authorities as a medium. . . .
Since that was posted, further digging has dated the Watermans' commission of the "spirit portrait" of Lily to January 1869, and the matching photo of Rose to March 1869. Not only were copies of the images sold, but Sarah Ann Waterman was advertising her services as a "Psychometer, Clairvoyant and Medium" in the Boston-based weekly,
The Banner of Light ("
the newspaper of record for East Coast US Spiritualism"), from February 6, 1869 (p. 7, col. 1) on. In the June 12, 1869 issue (p. 8, col. 1) there was an enthusiastic article about the Watermans and their management of customers' communications with the departed: "Mr. Waterman, a thorough business man, has reduced the executive part of this correspondence between residents of the two worlds to a perfect system. Each letter sent or received, is numbered, copied and filed away alphabetically." Two more children had arrived by this time: Lewis Edson Junior, 2; and Sarah Amanda, 1.
Sarah Amanda died the following summer. "Effusion of Brain" was the cause listed on the
death certificate. The obituary above was published on August 6, 1870 in
The Banner of Light (p. 4, col. 4). Waterman's biographers state that his health broke in 1870 under the stress of work, obliging him to give up his position as Aetna's main Boston agent for less demanding freelance work. I had previously speculated that this might be associated with the
disappearance of the partnership of Waterman & Chester as Aetna's Boston agency in the fall of 1869, but whatever the pressures of work, the heaviest blows turn out to have landed a year later. Within a few months after Sarah Amanda's death, the Watermans had left Boston for New York: on November 19, 1870, under "Movements of Lecturers and Mediums" (p. 5, col. 1),
The Banner of Light reported "Mrs. S. A. Waterman, the psychometrical reader, was in town [Boston] last week, and was warmly welcomed by her numerous friends. Possibly she may locate in Boston again."
