Documents relating to Marion Wood

On 17th November 1879, Mrs Wood was sentenced to 1 month's imprisonment for fortune-telling.

A woman employed by the police visited her and she pretended to give information about a young man whom she wanted to marry

 

In July 1880, she was again charged with having told fortunes. Maggie Wallace, a female detective who visited her, told the prisoner that her husband was poorly, and she wanted information respecting his fate, and what the future had in store for her personally. She was told that

she was bewitched by an old gray-headed old man [her husband] and was promised that, if she would return, she would be given something which must either kill or cure him

Maggie said she did not want him killing and she preferred having her fortune told on that occasion.

The prisoner placed the crystal, or beryl, & the cards, on the table, but what followed was not stated, only that Maggie gave the prisoner a 2/- piece which was marked.

Inspector Newburn entered the house as soon as Mrs Wallace left, & seized the crystal & the cards

 

Another witness was said to have had his home broken up through fortune-telling