- Throughout your whole life you
were told that you're unique.
Of course you are.
Nobody could ever be just like you, right?
As it turns out, there have been some
spooky cases in the past of people who have
encountered their own doppelgangers,
clones of themselves that not only look just like them,
but have other similarities that are extremely unsettling.
(scratching)
(scream)
Here are 10 people who encountered their own doppelgangers.
(scratching)
Number 10 is Sister Mary of Jesus.
(creaking)
Sister Mary of Jesus of Agreda was a Spanish nun
as well as a spiritual writer who lived in the 17th century.
What makes her story so remarkable is that
her doppelganger reportedly appeared thousands
of miles away from her physical body and taught
Christianity to an indigenous tribe in North America.
A missionary called Father Alonzo del Benavides
encountered this tribe and was shocked to see
that they had the knowledge of Christianity
despite never coming into contact with Christians before.
They claimed that a woman dressed in blue had visited
them many times and had taught them about religion.
Father Alonzo verified this when speaking with Sister Mary
who told him that her spirit double had been
carried there by angels to allow her to spread
Christianity to the farthest corners of the planet.
(scratching)
Number nine is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
(creaking)
One theory is that these creepy doppelgangers
are the product of a time slip.
When people encounter a true doppelganger they are
simply seeing a future version of that person who has
momentarily stepped back in time without realizing it.
This was the case with the 18th century
German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
One day while traveling to the city of Drusenheim,
Johann encountered a man wearing a gray suit with gold trim.
The man appeared for only a moment and then vanished.
It was a strange experience, which Johann never forgot.
Eight years after the fact, he was once again traveling
through the same area and suddenly realized that he
was wearing the exact same gray suit with gold trim.
He was convinced that the day he saw the vanishing man
he had somehow glimpsed a version of his future self.
(scratching)
Number eight is Emilie Sagee.
(creaking)
American writer Robert Dale Owen reported
a true-life doppelganger encounter involving
a 32-year-old French woman named Emilie Sagee,
and it remains puzzling to this day.
In 1845 Emilie was a teacher in Latvia at a girls' school.
One day she was in her classroom
and was writing on the chalkboard.
As she was doing this,
she felt as though someone was standing beside her.
Turning to the figure she recoiled in horror
to see herself staring back at her.
Old traditions taught that seeing a shadowy
version of yourself is an omen of death.
So, she was visibly shaken by the event.
Throughout the next year this mirror version
of Emilie was seen several times by over 40 people.
One pupil tried to touch the strange figure only to
find that her hand was repelled by an unseen force
before the figure vanished before her very eyes.
(scratching)
Number seven is Guy de Maupassant.
(creaking)
Another writer who wrote about doppelgangers
was the French novelist Guy de Maupassant.
In his short story, which he simply called He,
he describes such a frightening encounter.
What makes the story so interesting is
that it was based on a real experience.
One night while working on a story,
de Maupassant looked up to see a
pale version of himself enter his study.
The figure then began dictating the end
of the story he was currently working on.
Throughout the rest of the writer's life
he was plagued by these encounters when alone,
as if he was being haunted by himself.
In the end, the visions drove him to madness
and the attempt on his own life.
Guy de Maupassant eventually stopped writing and spent
the last year of his life in a mental institution.
No one knows if the shadow self followed him there or not.
(scratching)
Number six is John Donne.
(creaking)
16th century English poet John Donne
claimed to have seen his wife's doppelganger,
and the experience was harrowing.
While visiting Paris his wife's mirror self
suddenly appeared in front of him, but she wasn't alone.
His wife was carrying a baby in her arms.
He knew that his wife was pregnant at the time,
but like many doppelganger encounters,
the story does not have a happy ending.
The visitation appears to have been an omen of doom.
Donne's wife appeared twice walking past him,
and when she drew near,
it was clear to him that the child in her arms was dead.
Witnesses verified that at the exact same moment
that the doppelganger appeared to John
his wife gave birth to a stillborn child.
(scratching)
Number five is Percy Shelley.
(creaking)
Mary Shelley wrote one of the most frightening
books of all time in the form of Frankenstein,
but her husband Percy Shelley's encounters
with a doppelganger are even more terrifying.
Percy was a famous poet during the Romantic period
and is rated as one of the most influential of all time.
But despite his achievements,
he hid a dark secret from everyone, including his wife.
Throughout his life he had been visited
by a horrid double of himself.
He finally confessed to Mary while on a trip to Italy
that he'd recently walked into his doppelganger
who asked him how long do you mean to be content?
After this he saw the doppelganger one more time.
The figure stood on a shore, silent, pointing to the sea.
Shortly after, Percy Shelley died.
He drowned while sailing in the very same waters.
(scratching)
Number four is Sir Frederick Carne Rasch.
(creaking)
The British houses of Parliament have been the
location for a number of historical moments,
but one of the most bizarre has to be the
appearance of a doppelganger in its very chambers.
The encounter took place in 1906 during a
debate when a member of Parliament called
Sir Gilbert Parker noticed that his friend,
Sir Frederick Carne Rasch, was sitting near him.
However, this was surprising as Sir Frederick
was extremely ill with influenza at the time,
so people did expect to see him for the debate.
When Sir Gilbert attempted to greet Sir Frederick,
he was given nothing back.
Sir Frederick continued to stare across the chamber
with a grim expression on his face.
That is when the figure vanished.
When Sir Frederick returned to
the Parliament in good health,
members of Parliament would poke him
to make sure that he was real.
(scratching)
Number three is The Bed Doppelganger.
(creaking)
Peter Brugger was a PhD student in neuropsychology
at the University Hospital Zurich in
the 1980s and had one patient who's
doppelganger encounter was nearly fatal.
The patient was a 21-year-old man
who had been suffering from seizures.
One morning he stood up out of bed and looked down in
horror to see that his doppelganger had taken his place.
The strange replica laid there staring up at him.
His consciousness switched between the man in the bed
and himself standing over the sleeping figure.
Eventually, the patient had no idea which one was truly him.
This drove him to leap out of a window.
He survived and after surgery to treat
his seizures the experience ceased,
but he was always left wondering whether it
had been a hallucination or a glimpse into the
sinister world of real doppelgangers.
(scratching)
Number two is Bridget Cleary.
(creaking)
While most doppelganger encounters pass by peacefully,
one horrific case resulted in the end of a life.
Bridget Cleary was an Irish woman who lived with
her parents and husband in the townland of Ballyvadlea.
In 1895 she was reported missing
after having a long illness.
As her health had declined,
her family came to believe that she
was not the Bridget that they knew.
They accused her of being a changeling,
a type of doppelganger who replaces
the original version of a person.
A number of horrific rituals were carried out
in order to bring the original Bridget back.
When she was finally reported missing,
Bridget's body was discovered by police.
She had been burned alive by her family.
Nine people were charged with her murder,
all of whom claimed that they were trying to save the
original Bridget from a fate much worse than death.
(scratching)
And number one is the Fregoli Delusion.
(creaking)
One of the biggest debates in doppelganger research is
whether they are the result of psychiatric illness or not.
The most severe of these is the Fregoli Delusion.
Fregoli was an actor who was known for being able to
perform quick changes of appearance during his acts.
Sufferers of the Fregoli Delusion believe that
several people are actually one person in disguise
who is trying to trick them for some unknown reason.
Paranormal investigators have suggested an alternative
that there are really some sinister forces at play
and that one or more doppelgangers may
invade a person's life and slowly begin
replacing their loved ones one person at a time.
So, next time you're with a loved one take a
good look before you welcome them back into your home.
They may just be a stranger.
(scratching)
(slow eerie music)