White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1929-02-15
V00DOOISM OF MANY
CULTS GRIPS CUBA
Find Right Cat Bone and
You Are Invisible.

practiced in many parts of the United
States have been linked by recent in
vestigation with the cult Of Nanigoism
in Cuba.
Comparative analysis of African
sacrificial customs have furnished I'M
usual evidence that both had a COM
mon origin in the Congo jungles and
that voodooism reached the American
continent by the importation of slaves
from Cuba and Haiti.
"Obeah," a mild form of voodooism,
Is practiced in Cuba and the British
West Indies with virtually identic
ceremonies. Negroes who came to la
Dor in Cuban sugar cane fields have
brought to this Spanish-speaking is
land not only the Obeah but also the
far more terrible and sanguinary rite
of Mango. The high priests and
priestesses of these cults have shown
great powers of resistance to the sup
pressive measures of the police.
Cuba has dealt severely with VOC
dooism, and it is believed that it's more
CHASTITY forms have been eliminated.
1t was largely in connection with the
governments campaign against Obeah-
ism and Nanigoism that measures
were adopted curtailing the immigra-
ton Of illiterate workers from Haiti
and Jamaica.
Takes Criminal Aspect.
Cuba has been particularly con-
cerned because voodooism here takes
on criminal aspect entirely exclu-
sive of the possibility of human sacri-
fee. In Oriente province, which lies
nearest Haiti, the voodoo priests of
that island WELD large powers. In
other parts of the island Nanigoism is
dominant among the negroes who take
their religion in this form.
Nanigoism is combination of devil
worship and gang spirit. Its priests
promise occult powers to law break
ers, and members of this cult are
pledged to render all possible protec-
ton and assistance to each other.
AS far as can be learned the SYM
bolism of the cults is very similar.
ALI include the sacrifice of roosters,
black cats. goats and other animals.
Cuban police records show cases
where the perpetrators of murder in
connection with voodooism have been
brought to justice, but it is claimed
that this type of sacrifice has been
eradicated.
Havana newspapers continue to
chronicle cases of Mango outrages
committed against those who have in
Cured the enmity of the gangsters. 1t
has been found that there is always
some one willing to carry out the
priests orders, because a Mango
neophyte fails of membership unless
he has one capital crime to his credit
At Mango funerals a black rooster
is slaughtered in the home of the de.
ceased. The fowl is then presented to
some neighboring non-Nanigo family
as warning.
Cat Bone Is Charm.
One of the strangest surerstitions
in the Haitian cult is that certain
bone in black cats body will confer
invisiblity to it's possessor. The rite
takes place in the presence Of three
witnesses, and the cat is thrust into
hot water. 1t is related by voodooists
that supernatural manifestations, such
as thunder and lightning, are an ac-
compartment of this process.
In the early years of the Nineteenth
century Jean La Fitte, famous pirate of
the Spanish Main, frequently brought
slaves to Cuba and the United States
His principal market in the United
| States was New Orleans and this fact
| is now being used to explain the par
ticularly close similarity between the
voodooism of Cuba and that of the
lower Mississippi valley.
There is a tradition that La Elites
encourage included several African
"conjur DOCTORS"
The successors of these doctors to-
day have considerable knowledge of
herbs and the curative properties OF
plant juices. In general they are EN-.
ployed to effect cures, but with other
herbs the doctor-priests are said to
he able to cause temporary or perma-
nent loss of memory to their enemies
This belief appears substantiated by
the recent discovery by United States
marines in Haiti of colony of ne.
groes, dazed or hypnotized, working
under their task masters on planta-
ton.
Priests frequently claim the power
to take on animal or reptile form.
This recalls the African leopard" SUI
perstition where certain clan were
credited with power to turn them
selves into leopards and prowl the