Sara Ramsey

A very interesting book about a woman and her husband who were committed to mental institution for being christian street preachers voluntarily living extreme poverty with the help of other christian churches. Apparently because they were neither married by common law nor civil law they were deemed insane because their internal "voices" said they were truly married (misinterpreting certain Bible passages). The story itself has no dates but the book jacket states that this occurred in December of 1912. Psychiatric science was horrendous back then with absurdities being taken to the extreme by Medical sadists being used by the Nazis in Germany during the early part of Hitler's regime. Freud also mentions lots of bizarre treatments for mental illness in his writings. This book's narrative purportedly took place at now called Patton State Hospital, San Bernadino California (Highland Insane Asylum). Sara Ramsey tells her story and those of others throughout the book. The book is essentially her testimony of how her study of scriptural New and Old Testaments helped her to survive and cope through her stay at Patton. Basically Ramsey started to interpret the scriptures from her own experiences of inhumane cruelty and physical torture. Ramsey had been pregnant but hid her condition until the medical staff were forced to let her give birth and then foster cared by a friend until Ramsey herself was released from Patton. I've never read a book such as this but narration is always suspect given time lapses and the inaccuracies memory. Los Angeles also has a mental hospital which I visited a few times as a volunteer. That facility is for the ultra violent or criminally insane. Criminally insane refers to people who have been convicted of felony crimes judged by a legal court by reason of insanity. I also worked with mentally ill persons held for treatment and before being released into the general public. This book portrays the "patients" more as "prisoners" and disposable unless they had wealth to be collected for their so-called medical treatments.… (más)