Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1896-02-19
NEWELL THE HEALER
HAS GIVEN HEALTH TO THOUSANDS
 BY LAYING ON OF HANDS.

Until one hot day last August Brad ley Newell was only the blacksmith of the little Vermont village of Jackson vile. He was just like all the other blacksmiths the village had ever seen. From early sunrise until late in the day he made the sparks fly at the anvil, and the children used to gather at the door and watch him put on the stagecoaeh that runs from Brattleboro, 20 miles away. Now they look up to him with a feeling half wonder and awe From one of the most obscure of men he has sud denly become known for hundreds of miles about as the blacksmith healer, who, by the laying on of his hands, is able to cure nearly any disease. Dozens of his townspeople attest his cures, and hundreds from surrounding villages and towns have felt the healing influence of his touch.
 At the village tavern he is the sole topic of conversation and is pointed out to visitors as man gifted with super natural powers The blacksmith still works at his trade and stops between odd jobs that he does for the folk about the country to place his hands upon tine afflicted and bid them go their way cured. Newell is strikingly handsome man, large, we'll formed, with frank, open face, big hazel eyes and clear, white complexion. He himself claims nothing. All he knows is that he has cured Unlike Schlatter, he does not claim to be Christ.
 When asked from where he consider ed he received his power to heal, lie said :
 ' don't know. l guess l never shall know. One day last August was work ing in the shop, and there was buzz ing in my ears. It was strange, funny buzzing, buzzing that l had never heard before-not buzzing and ring ing like when you have cold i'll your head or have heard loud noise, but 8 buzzing that can't describe. l stopped and listened to it, and voice said just as clear and distinct as any voice ever heard:
 "'You can cure the sick by laying on your hands
 ''I didn't say anything to anybody because was afraid that they would laugh at me- just kept it to myself. One day not long after that my wife had headache, and the voice said to me. You can cure your wife. so says kind of dubious like, Ellen, I think can cure your headache. I took her hands, held lem on mine for minute, and she says, kind of surprised, Why, Bradley. my headaches all gone. That was the starting of it, aud 1t s been going on ever since. '1
 The people say, no matter where the blacksmith gets his power, over 2,000 people have been treated by him since last August, when the mysterious voice first buzzed in his ears and then told him he possessed the power to heal The spiritualists say that Newell is heal ing medium and the voice that spoke to him was spirit doctor who desired him to be under his control. The ones who profess to know it all sit about the tavern and say it's hypnotism. Others say it's magnetism.
 While the churchgoing population of the little village do not lend their sup port to the healer, they do not denounce him. They claim that any power he possesses comes through God Almighty. The minister of the only church in town is Miss Craven. She is Methodist and speaks pleasantly of Newell. She does not know that the healer's power is against any of the teachings of Scrip ture but is sure that he does not get it from the devil
 When asked what kind of diseases he had cured, the healer said, Mostly all kinds-rheumatism, lameness, swell ings. heart trouble, pleurisy, colds, tu- mors, deafness and nearly every kind. !" A man from Halifax with the erysipe- las, almost dead and crazed with pain, was brought to him. In five minutes his erysipelas was gone and he left well man.
 A boy named Freeman Hager, who had been unable to move muscle for 1 four days after case of scarlet fever, was cured by Newell. The boys father, who had suffered for years by being hurt l by a falling tree, was also cured at the l same time
 While many have claimed that the healer cured persons imagining they were sick, the fact that he has cured animals as we'll is held up by his be- lievers as strong proof that this is not true. He receives letters from all parts of the country. asking him to come to this or that place and do what he can. He seldom replies to them.
 He recently made trip to Brattleboro to be gone day, but so many people desired his services that he was com pelled to remain three days. The healer himself never promises cure and never asks anybody to have faith While not believer in religion, Newell is not a scoffer and thinAe that every man is entitled to believe as suits him best. For all his work he does not ask a cent. If any one desires to give him money and he feels they can afford it. he accepts it. If they are poor, he refuses the money. Since he has started to heal people it is estimated he has refused at least $10,- 900.
 Unlike Schlatter, the Vermont heal er's record is known to every one in the village He was born but a few miles