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WALES. GEORGE CHAPMAN, who died on August 9, aged 85, was one of Britain’s most remarkable healers. For 60 years he treated patients from all walks of life – including royalty, celebrities and members of the medical profession – by going into trance and allowing the spirit of William Lang to “operate” through him. The “surgery” was carried out on their spirit (or etheric) bodies from which the benefits were transferred to their physical bodies.

It may seem a farcical explanation to sceptics, but his supporters point to the many astonishing healings achieved and confirmation of his spirit doctor’s former existence, as evidence of the genuineness of his mediumship.

Chapman, himself, maintained that the purpose of his healing mission was to prove life after death. The healings were secondary.

Born in Liverpool on 4 February 1921, George William Chapman was brought up by his maternal grandparents, the Barlows, from the age of five, on the death of his mother. Finding employment was difficult when he left school in Bootle and he took work as a garage hand, butcher and docker before becoming a professional boxer.

Joining the Irish Guards in 1939, he subsequently transferred to the Royal Air Force as an air gunner and served for periods with the Air Force Commandos, Royal Marines and Royal Navy, before ending up at RAF Halton, near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, in 1944 where he trained apprentices in unarmed combat, self-defence, small arms and battle drill.

It was in Aylesbury in 1944 that he met and married Margaret May Dickinson. But their first child, Vivian, born in 1945, survived only four weeks. The Chapmans were devastated but, encouraged by a fellow fire officer, they used a glass-and-alphabet to get spirit messages which reassured them their daughter was alive and well in the next world.
These experiments also induced a trance state in Chapman and a variety of “entities” spoke through him. In time, however, “Dr Lang” manifested, explaining that his mission was to heal the sick.

Over the years, actors Laurence Harvey, Stanley Holloway and Patricia Neal, writers Barbara Cartland and Roald Dahl, and the exiled King and Queen of Romania were among those who sought the spirit doctor’s help. So, too, did dental surgeon S.G. Miron whose wife, ironically, had the roof of her mouth perforated during a tooth extraction. No surgical procedure could cure the problem but William Lang’s spirit-world intervention caused the wound to heal, resulting in Miron writing a book, “The Return of William Lang”, about this and other remarkable cases.

Devon-born William Lang, son of a wealthy merchant, had been an ophthalmic surgeon at London’s Middlesex Hospital from 1880 to 1914 and his cultured tones from beyond the grave were in stark contrast to those of the Liverpudlian fireman through whom he spoke.
Some may have dismissed this vocal contrast as acting on George Chapman’s part, but William Lang’s daughter, Lyndon, and his grand-daughter, Susan Fairtlough, were among those who spoke with him through the entranced medium. They confirmed not only that his speech and mannerisms were as they remembered them, but also that they discussed events and people who would have been unknown to George Chapman, who was not even in his teens when Lang retired from private medical practice.

Lyndon Lang was so impressed with Chapman’s mediumship that she entered into a contract with him to hold twice monthly meetings in London, at her home, to which she invited friends and contemporaries of her brother, Basil Lang – also a surgeon – most of whom had known William Lang. This arrangement continued for 10 years while Chapman served as a fireman and also held healing clinics, mostly in the Midlands.

When Chapman left the Fire Brigade in 1956, those meetings became weekly, but he also had more time to see patients and to travel. Eventually, he ran regular clinics in Paris and Lausanne, and carried out spirit operations in the United States, India and other parts of the world.

Lyndon Lang showed her support for Chapman and his mediumship by leaving much of her estate to him on her death in May 1977.

By then, Chapman had moved to Pant Glas, close to Machynlleth, and with his advancing years he let more patients come to him rather than travelling the world. A healing clinic adjoined the house and most patients were unaware that the examination couch on which they rested while the spirit doctor “operated” on them was the same one he had used during his earthly life.

In fact, Chapman was surrounded by Lang’s family relics – given to him by Lyndon Lang and other family friends and colleagues, in gratitude for the communications they had with the dead ophthalmic surgeon. The medium even slept in William Lang’s bed – another gift from the surgeon’s daughter.

George Chapman is survived by a daughter, Lana, and a son, Michael – a healer in his own right who has been assisting his father since the age of 21 – and his partner of over 30 years, Eliane Yovanovitch, who acted as translator and helped set up his clinics in French-speaking countries.

George Chapman continued his healing mission almost to the end, announcing only in July this year that he would no longer be seeing patients.

There was standing room only at Llangynfelyn Church, the Welsh chapel close to his home where a Christian funeral service was held on 18 August, attended not only by George and Eliane's children and grandchildren but also by numerous friends and many who had benefitted from his healing. Roy Stemman (pictured below, centre, with George and his son, Michael, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary celebration of the Chapman-Lang partnership), a long-time friend who co-authored "Surgeon From Another World" with Chapman, addressed the congregation and spoke about the impact of his healing work, stressing that the healer believed the main mission of his mediumship was to prove life after death.

After 60 years of surrendering his body four hours at a time, in trance, so that the spirit of William Lang could operate through him, the time had now come, Roy Stemman added, for George Chapman to surrender his body permanently and to meet for the first time the ophthalmic surgeon who refused to let death stop him from treating the sick.

A cremation service took place later that day at Aberystwyth Crematorium.

Posted on Monday, September 04, 2006
Category: Mediumship

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