Biography: 'Medium of the Memelland'
Note: Much of the biography below is based on the old German book Hellsehen – Ein Kriminalfall by Karl Pelz (1937, Ludendorffs Verlag) in which the author, a detective with whom Else had worked on many criminal cases, recounts the biographical information she gave on record during the 1928 trial. Familial information stems from her family tree as well as from ancestral records.
Else was born Elsbeth Helene Charlotte Geffers on July 11 1871 in Gumbinnen, East Prussia. Her parents were Hermann Eduard Geffers from Insterburg, East Prussia and Helene Amalie Geffers nee Chambeau from Neidenburg, East Prussia. Else had at least one sibling, her sister Helene Emilie Geffers, who was two years older than her. Hermann Eduard Geffers was a postmaster. He was frequently transferred, which meant Else had to attend schools in different cities. Else was often sick during her school years and left school at the age of 15.
From The Times (Shreveport, Louisiana, Sun Sep 23 1928 issue):
Ever since her early childhood she had displayed powers unlike those of other youngsters. When she was four years old, she had warned neighbors that the Neuwieder Kathedrale (Cathedral in Neuwieder, East Prussia) would burn down. Four days later the cathedral did burn down. While attending Turnschule (physical education class), young Else remarked to a girl who stood next to her in class: “You better not exercise today, for before long you are due to have a baby.” An indignant teacher expelled Else for this “wicked and untrue” remark. It didn’t take the school authorities long, however, to discover that Else had spoken the truth. She was reinstated. Sicknesses and even deaths in her own family had, for years, been an open book to her as well. Often she would repeat telegrams before they had even been received at the house. Her amazed and alarmed relatives used to call her “Strange Elsie.” One day upon holding out her palm to a gypsie to have it read, the gypsie refused, saying: “You are a white gypsie. You see just as clearly as I do.”
Else married in 1897 at the age of 26. Her husband Kurt Günther was a businessman in Königsberg, East Prussia (now Kaliningrad in Russia) and later became a teacher and school principal after studying agricultural management. Else and her husband had four children, two daughters and two sons. One of their sons died just two years old. They lived in several places throughout Prussia before settling in Königsberg.
It seems Else began to make use of her abilities in a professional manner during World War I (1914-1918) and the period of inflation thereafter.
From The Times (Shreveport, Louisiana, Sun Sep 23 1928 issue):
In 1912 she began to read palms and give advice to acquaintances regarding sale of land, investments and petty thievery. This advice was always of great assistance. Questioned about her abilities during the witchcraft trial of 1928 she stated: “The forehead and the hand of a person have always been an open book to me.”
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After World War I, as Germany struggled with worthless paper money and positions were scarce, Else was able to support her family by her clairvoyant abilities. Around 1922 Else began working with telepathy, in addition to chiromancy (palmistry) and clairvoyance. Her reputation continued to grow despite the fact that she never advertised her abilities or services. She didn’t have to: the press celebrated her as a maverick medium, which lead to her being hired for criminal investigations by police and court officials, as well as members of the public who desperately hoped for cases involving loved ones to be solved.
From The Times (Shreveport, Louisiana, Sun Sep 23 1928 issue):
She had been famous throughout East Prussia for years, for “everyone went to her with their troubles.” Time and time again she told truthfully whether or not certain men would return alive from the war. [Later on] she was often called into consultation by the Criminal Police in various murder cases and against her own will became a sort of female detective [an exclusively male profession in early 20th century Europe]. At the 1928 trial [one of her cases] was brought out [to exemplify her criminal work]: In Waltersdorf, a small town in the neighborhood of Königsberg, a servant girl was murdered. The seeress was called. She went into a trance and immediately named the murderer. The man she named was the son of the owner of the villa where the murdered girl had worked. He confessed.
From A Science for the Soul – Occultism and the Genesis of the German Modern (Corinna Treitel, 2004, The John Hopkins University Press):
Simple but dramatic, her success quickly vaulted her to national fame. Typically, Günther-Geffers’ employer would bring her to the scene of a crime; once there, she would hypnotize herself, then with eyes closed and head thrust forward “like a bloodhound” would follow the trail of invisible clues supposedly left behind by the malefactor. A companion would then ask her questions to clarify the case: what is the criminal’s name? How was the victim murdered? Where did the killing take place? What happened to the body? Günther-Geffers clarified many mysteries in this fashion. Her success brought her not only public visibility but also negative scrutiny from certain quarters in the legal system.
Persons whom Else had identified as perpetrators often filed lawsuits of defamation against her. As far as is known though none of the defamation cases ever made it to court.
In May of 1927 Else was arraigned on charges of fraud for the first time. She stood accused of having deceived the public in more than 25 instances by 1) claiming to be able to ascertain the past and/or future by reading palms and 2) claiming to be able to solve crimes by means of telepathy and clairvoyance. Prior to the trial she had to endure several months in jail. The trial itself did not last long; she was acquitted of all charges. Her co-defendant and colleague, police officer Detective Radtke of Königsberg, was also acquitted of any wrongdoing.
But the prosecution filed an appeal, which lead to the infamous second trial of 1928, dubbed the Interburger Hexenprozess (Insterburg Witch Trial). At the end of that trial, Else was once again acquitted of all charges against her because dozens of witnesses took the stand to testify to the validity of her clairvoyant abilities and also because, as in the first trial and throughout all of her legal challenges, intent to defraud could not be proven. But the cruel highlight of the trial seems to have been the courtroom trance experiments during which Else was forced to fall into trance states that were then closely observed by scientists and “experts”, as well as the assembled media and legal teams [and then had to give the right answers to cases she was presented with].
From A Science for the Soul – Occultism and the Genesis of the German Modern (Corinna Treitel, 2004, The John Hopkins University Press):
In 1928 she faced more than 30 counts of fraud in court, [but] testimony from more than one hundred witnesses resulted in her acquittal, and the extensive coverage the trial received in Germany’s major mass-circulation papers enhanced her fame all the more.
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From The Times (Shreveport, Louisiana, Sun Sep 23 1928 issue):
Beyond a doubt the most astounding trial of modern times – that of a gentle old German lady for witchcraft – has just been decided in her favor. Two separate suits had been brought against Frau Else Günther-Geffers, the so-called ‘Medium of the Memelland,’ charging her with “Deceiving the public by telepathy and clairvoyance.” At the first hearing, which was brief, the white-haired mystic was almost immediately declared innocent of the accusations. But the second hearing was a more complicated business. It was only after a grueling test of her powers, during a trance, minutely observed by nerve specialists, psychiatrists, attorneys and journalists, that Frau Günther-Geffers was triumphantly freed from the stigma with which she had been falsely stained. She left the courtroom weeping softly, while her admirers pelted her with roses and shouted: “Hoch die Klarseherin des Memelland!” (“Long live the seeress of the Memelland!”)
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From The Tallahassee Democrat (Tue Oct 2 1928):
A gentle old German lady walked to the prisoner’s dock the other day in an Insterburg court and listened tremblingly while a prosecutor delivered an arraignment of her that was so bitter it was astounding. In the official’s own words she was a “Witch,” a wicked woman who “Deceived the public by means of telepathy and clairvoyance” and he intimated darkly that it might be best to borrow from the ancients an extra special method of dealing with her. […] The scene could conceivably have been lifted bodily from the Middle Ages.
Once the trial was over, it appears that Else continued her work as she had before, although little is known about the effect the trial had had on her.
From Königsberger Allgemeinen Zeitung (1928):
Columns have been printed extolling this poor little sibyl, endowed with God-given powers, who has been harassed and tormented by that unfeeling monster, the German law.
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Perhaps as a result of her national fame, Else appeared in the 1929 German silent horror film Somnambul directed by Adolf Trotz. It appears she played herself, “Die Hellseherin” (“The Clairvoyant”). I have yet to succeed in finding out if this film still exists.
Several books were written about Else in the late 1920s, and newspapers continued to report about her as well, such as when she visited her son Armin in New York in 1932.
From The Courier News (Wed Oct 12 1932 issue):
Detective – She’s Noted: A noted German criminal detective, Dr Elizabeth Günther-Geffers [Else did not have a doctor title], has been receiving many telephone messages of welcome from her friends since her arrival in the United States for a reunion with her son, Mr. Armin Günther-Geffers of New York. In addition to her extensive detective work on the European continent, Dr. Günther-Geffers is known as a cinema actress and as a healer of human ills through a special power that she is said to possess in her hands. She has offered to assist in the search for the kidnappers of the Lindbergh baby.
Chronologically speaking these are the last articles I have been able to retrieve thus far. At the time of her New York trip in 1932, Else was 61 years old.
I do not know when, how or where she died.
Update April 12th 2023: Through a 2021 article in the Berlin newspaper Taz (thank you so much to the author Bettina Müller!) I finally found out when and where Else died. I translated the article and updated the archive, but here is the last part:
"After World War II Else Günther-Geffers moved to Brandenburg, where she focused on working as a spiritual healer. She died on August 19th 1959 in Treuenbrietzen. Until the end she perceived herself, as she wrote in a letter to a relative, as “A much discussed, controversial and infamous clairvoyant”.