Edmund Rogers

Edmund Dawson Rogers (born Holt, Norfolk, England, 7 August 1823, died Finchley, London, 28 September 1910), was an English journalist and spiritualist.

Background and education

The son of John and Sarah Rogers, and given the middle name Dawson which was his mother's family name, he was brought up a strict Methodist and received a classical education at Gresham's School, Holt, then was apprenticed to a pharmacist.

Career

In 1845, he went as a surgeon's dispenser to Wolverhampton, where he joined the Staffordshire Mercury as a journalist. In 1848 he was appointed as editor of the struggling Norwich newspaper the Norfolk News, and put it on its feet.

On 10 October, 1870, Rogers became the first editor of the "Eastern Counties Daily Press", in 1871 renamed the Eastern Daily Press.

In 1873 he moved to London and established the National Press Agency in Shoe Lane, remaining as manager until he retired in 1894.

The National Press Agency had an enormous scoop as part of the Hawarden Kite affair in December 1885, when William Ewart Gladstone's son Herbert Gladstone gave Rogers what he said were his father's opinions on Irish home rule.

In London Rogers also published and edited "The Tenant Farmer" (1894–1898) and "The Free Speaker" (1873–1874).

piritualist

About 1843 Rogers was introduced by Sir Isaac Pitman to the work of Swedenborg. He went on to study mesmerism and mesmeric healing. He began to attend séances in 1869 with various mediums, especially Mrs Thomas Everitt and William Eglinton, and became a spiritualist. In 1873 he helped to form the British National Association of Spiritualists, and in 1881 founded the spiritualist journal "Light", which he edited from 1894 until his death in 1910. In 1881-1882 he founded the Society for Psychical Research, with Sir William Barrett. Its early members included William Stainton Moses, F. W. H. Myers, Henry Sidgwick, and Edmund Gurney, and Rogers was a member of its Council from 1882 to 1885. In 1884, he was a founding member of the London Spiritualist Alliance, afterwards the College of Psychic Studies, and was its president from 1892 until 1910.

Family

On 11 July 1843, Rogers married Sophia Jane Hawkes. They had two sons and four daughters. His wife died in 1892.

Publications

* "Life and Experiences of Edmund Dawson Rogers, Spiritualist and Journalist" (autobiography, 1911, new edition by Kessinger Publishing, London, 2004) ISBN 10 1419173030

References

*"Edmund Dawson Rogers (1823–1910), journalist and spiritualist" by W. B. Owen, revised Alan Gauld, in "Oxford Dictionary of National Biography" (Oxford University Press, 2004)
*"Diaries of W.E. Gladstone", volume 2