Alfred Vout Peters was born in England in 1867. He began seeing spirit children when he was very young and told his mother they were God’s angels who had come to play with him. He also had precognitive dreams and saw visions.

He was almost 30 before he attended a séance at his sister-in-law’s house in 1895. During the following three years, he developed his own mediumship skills and worked with a spirit guide named “Moonstone.” In 1898-1899, Peters, located in London, was controlled by a medium in Paris during several seances. During another event with Cecil Husk, a friend of Peters who was still alive materialized at Husk’s séance.

In 1902, Oscar Hansen, M.D. from Copenhagen reported on Peters’ accuracy during a séance. The medium described four spirits who appeared for Hansen and gave details of their various physical ailments. Hansen wrote, “It’s most important to observe that not only were all the descriptions so exact that I could not fail to recognize them, but Mr. Peters was absolutely ignorant of everything described.”

Peters’ mediumship was featured in Sir Oliver Lodge’s book Raymond, or Life & Death (1916). Sir Oliver was a British physicist and writer who described electromagnetic radiation and held key patents for the radio. Lodge also studied psychical research and spiritualism (mainly telepathy) in the late 1880s and was president of the Society for Psychical Research from 1901 to 1903. Lodge was a friend of Arthur Conan Doyle, and both men lost sons in World War I. Lodge’s book describes séances with both Peters and Gladys Osborne Leonard. 

Along with messages to Sir and Lady Lodge, there are also some personal statements from Moonstone. During one sitting, Moonstone gave insights into his life and his goal as a spirit. He said,” I lived a selfish life, a good life, but a selfish one, though I didn’t know it then. I isolated myself and did not mix with people, not even with family life. When I go over, I find it was a negative goodness, so then I wanted to help humanity, because I hadn’t helped it. I had not taken on the sufferings even of a family man. I was useless.”

Peters joined the Theosophical Society in 1923. He participated in a research experiment, “Joanna Sothcott’s Box,” in 1927. Peters was one of several psychometrists who tried to identify the contents before the box was opened by the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. His identification was quite accurate and was published in the Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, Volume XXI in 1927.

Peters died in May, 1934 at Longton, Staffordshire at the age of 67. His mediumship skills had taken him to 17 countries by that time. He was known for his trance mediumship, clairvoyance and psychometry abilities.

Additional Reading:

Hansen, Oscar (1902) Some Seances with London Mediums, In Light, Volume 22, November 22.

Lodge, Sir Oliver (1916) Raymond, or Life and Death. George H. Doran Publisher, London.

Alfred Vout Peters, Psypioneer, Vol 4, Number 2, Feb 2008 through Vol 4, Number 4, April 2008 (continuing series of articles) Paul J Gaunt, editor.