In March 1848, in the small town of Hydesville, in the United States of America, the first spiritualist phenomena of the modern era took place, which was the prelude to the advent of the Spiritist Doctrine, consummated with Allan Kardec's Codification. On 11 December 1847, the Fox family moved into a modest house in Hydesville, New York State, about 30 km from the city of Rochester. The group consisted of the head of the family, John Fox, his wife Margareth Fox and their two daughters, Kate and Margareth, who were teenagers at the time. The couple had other children. Among them, Leah stands out, who lived in Rochester, where she taught music. Leah wrote a book, The Missing Link, in 1885, in which she refers to the paranormal abilities of her ancestors.

At first, the Foxes experienced no disturbances in their new residence. However, some time later, more precisely in the first two months of 1848, the same unusual noises that had disturbed the previous tenants began to reappear. Shortly after moving in, the occupants began to hear scratching, unusual noises and banging on the living room ceiling, floor, walls and furniture, which became a real concern for this humble family.

These noises increased in intensity from mid-March 1848 onwards. Clearer banging and sounds similar to furniture being dragged began to be heard, which frightened the girls to such an extent that they refused to sleep alone in their room and wanted to sleep in their parents' room. At first, the inhabitants of the house, incredulous at the possible supernatural origin of the noises, got up and tried to locate the natural cause of the phenomenon. Lucretia Pulver, a young woman who had served as a lady's companion to the Bells when they lived in the house until 1846, told a curious story about a travelling salesman who had stayed with the Bells. One night when the salesman stayed with the couple, Lucretia was sent to sleep at her parents' house. Three days later, they came back for her.

Then they told her that the pedlar had left. She never saw that man again. Mrs Ann Pulver, who was acquainted with the Bell family, recounts that in 1844, when she visited Mrs Bell to knit in her company, she heard a complaint. The lady told her that she felt very ill and could hardly sleep at night. When asked the cause, Mrs Bell stated that it was unexplained noises; she had thought she heard someone walking from room to room, so she woke her husband and made him get up and lock the windows. At first, she explained to Mrs Pulver that it was probably rats. Later, she confessed that she did not know the reason for these noises, which were inexplicable to her. The Bells ended up moving house.

On the night of 31 March 1848, a way was discovered to make contact with the spiritual entity that was producing the phenomena. The couple's youngest daughter, Kate, said, clapping her hands: Mr Pé Rachado, do what I do. Immediately, the clapping was repeated. When she stopped, the sound also stopped. In response, Margaret said jokingly, ‘Now do exactly what I do. Count one, two, three, four,’ and clapped her hands. What she had asked for was repeated with incredible precision. Kate, jumping in, said with childlike simplicity, ‘Oh, Mummy! I know what it is.’ Tomorrow is the first of April, and someone wants to play a joke on us.‘ The mother later recounted, ’Then I thought of a test that no one would be able to answer. I asked them to state the ages of my children, one after the other. Instantly, the exact age of each one was given, with a pause between each one to separate them up to the seventh, after which there was a longer pause and three louder knocks, corresponding to the age of the youngest child, who had died. Then I asked, 'Is it a human being who is answering me so correctly? There was no answer.

I asked, ‘Is it a spirit?’ If so, knock twice. Two knocks were heard as soon as I made the request. Then I said, ‘If it is a murdered spirit, knock twice.’ These were given instantly, causing the house to shake. I asked, ‘Was he murdered in this house?’ The answer was the same as before. Does the person who murdered him still live? Identical answer, two knocks. Using the same process, I verified that it was a man who had murdered him in this house and that his remains were buried in the basement; that the family consisted of his wife and five children, two boys and three girls, all alive at the time of his death, but that the wife had since passed away. Then I asked, ‘Will you continue knocking if we call the neighbours so they can hear too?’ The affirmative answer was resounding.

Everyone was shocked by the events. Within a week, Mrs Fox had turned grey. And as everything suggested that the phenomena were related to the two girls, Margareth and Kate, they were sent away from the house. But in the house of their brother David Fox, where Margareth went, and in the house of their sister Leah, where Kate stayed, the same noises were heard. Leah, the older sister, had to interrupt her music lessons, as she also became involved in the phenomena. It was discovered that the communicating spirit was a former pedlar named Charles Rosma, who was seeking to reveal his presence and make contact with the people in the house. The individual bearing that name had been murdered years earlier in the Hydesville house. The murdered man revealed that he had been killed with a butcher's knife five years earlier; that the body had been taken to the cellar; that it had only been buried the following night; that he had passed through the pantry, gone down the stairs and been buried about three metres below ground.

He also added that the motive for the crime was the money he had, about five hundred dollars. Those most interested in solving the case decided to excavate the cellar in order to find the remains of the alleged murder victim. It should be noted that they arrived at the identity and history of the Spirit through an alphabetical combination in which each letter was indicated by a certain number of knocks. Charles Rosma had been a street vendor and was 31 years old when he was murdered in that house. The murderer was a former tenant. It could only have been Mr Bell. But where was the evidence, the victim's body? The solution would be to look for it in the cellar, where it would be buried. However, the excavations did not yield any definitive results, as no clues were found. For this reason, they were suspended.

In the summer of 1848, Mr David Fox himself, with the help of some interested parties, resumed the venture. At a depth of one and a half metres, they found a plank. As they dug deeper, they found coal, lime, hair and some bone fragments that were recognised by a doctor as belonging to a human skeleton; nothing else. The evidence of the crime was precarious and insufficient, which is perhaps why Mr Bell was not reported. On 23 November 1904, the Boston Journal reported the discovery, in the old Fox cottage, of the skeleton of a man with all the trinkets of a travelling salesman. Some schoolchildren were playing in the basement of the house where the Foxes lived, which was then abandoned because it was reputed to be haunted. Among the rubble of a wall—perhaps a false wall—in the basement, the children found parts of a human skeleton. Next to the skeleton was a tin can of the type used by travelling salesmen. This tin can is now in Lilydale, the headquarters of American spiritualists, where the old Hydesville house was moved. As the reader can see, 56 years after the Hydesville phenomena, on 22 November 1904, the story of Charles Rosma, told to the family of Kate and Margaret Fox in 1848, was confirmed.

Upon moving to Rochester, John Fox's family encountered their first obstacle: the pastor of the Methodist church they belonged to ordered the girls, under penalty of expulsion, to renounce such practices. The Fox sisters rejected this imposition and were therefore expelled from that religious community. In Rochester, the girls had to undergo three public investigations, conducted at Corinthian Hall, and suffered at the hands of the investigators. During the investigations, they were stripped naked and, when they dressed, their dresses were tied tightly against their bodies and they were placed on insulated flooring, in addition to other precautions to prevent the possibility of fraud. In the end, the various commissions formed for this purpose declared that distinct knocks were heard on the walls, floor, and other objects while the sisters were tied up. And that their questions, some of which were asked mentally, had been answered correctly.