Mary Todd Lincoln held multiple seances in the White House during the American Civil War in a desperate, grief-stricken attempt to contact her young son Willie after he died of typhoid fever.

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Mary Todd Lincoln held multiple seances in the White House during the American Civil War in a desperate, grief-stricken attempt to contact her young son Willie after he died of typhoid fever. She invited notorious spirit mediums to the Red Room, where they would dim the lights, bang on heavy oak tables, and pretend to channel the ghost of a child while the entire nation was busy tearing itself apart in a bloody conflict. Even Abraham Lincoln supposedly attended a few of these spooky gatherings, likely just humoring his devastated wife while silently judging the obvious charlatans shaking the furniture. The highest office in the land was briefly transformed into a paranormal theater, demonstrating that enormous political power does not provide any immunity against being scammed by a guy in a dark room with a squeaky shoe