Described by Himself.
Originally published in Bradshaw's Manchester Journal (Bradshaw & Blacklock) vol.1 #9 (26 Jun 1841).
The subject of the following interesting and singular narrative was Mr. William Patten, of Newport, in America, a respectable clergyman. His story is perhaps the only authentic account on record of such an event as it discloses.
The event of which you requested an account from me, took place in the eighteenth year of my age. In the spring of that year, I attempted to pass a river called the Great or Lower Amonoosuc, at a fording place, at about forty miles northward of Dartmouth College. The stream is remarkably rapid, and had the preceding night been swollen by copious showers of rain, and the dissolution of snow on the adjacent ground. A number of persons, with whom I was in company, went over in a boat; but some circumstances induced me and two or three others to attempt to ford the river. About mid-way of the passage, my horse was turned upon his side, apparently by the force of the current. Thrown by surprise and with disadvantage into the water, it was some time before I could recover a standing. The water then flowed up to my chin. As soon almost as I was upon my feet, the current bore me down, and left me struggling for breath. I rose again, with the hope of walking to the shore, but in vain. The depth of the water being for a moment more favourable to my hopes, I made several other attempts; in the last of which, lying on the bottom, with my feet against the rocks, I determined to suffer my head to be buoyed up, till the weight of my body should counteract the force of the current, that in this inclined position I might be enabled to gain the shore. But I was immediately carried from this point, without finding my resistance of the least avail.
After this, as I was in deeper water, and my head down the stream, I attempted for the first time to swim. This exercise, to which I was accustomed, was perfectly easy to me. I rested on the surface of the water without any sensible difficulty, greatly refreshed by the air, which I had not freely inspired for fifteen or twenty minutes. I continued to swim without any other object than to get breath, but had not proceeded far before my strength suddenly failed, and I sunk without a struggle to the bottom. Of such an entire exhaustion of strength I never before had an idea. I could not have moved a finger to save the world. Arguing from the distress of being partially deprived of breath, the agony of the moment when it should be totally excluded, I anticipated this moment with extreme dread. When I sunk, this impression was fully on my mind, with a certainty that it could no longer be avoided. After a short time, however, it occurred to me that it was time to breathe. With this thought, I relaxed that exertion by which my breathing was suspended; and feeling water entering my nostrils, immediately resumed it, having before experienced the pain of inhaling the water, which was much more distressing than to be without breath.
Soon after this, my intellectual faculties very rapidly, but perceptibly, declined. I felt a pain in the small of my back, which I presume would have been acute had I been capable of a just sense of it, for I imagined that a rock or some other heavy thing lay on me. Before this I was like a person under the influence of an overpowering opiate, and yet feeling every inducement to keep awake, and soon after all consciousness of my situation and life ceased. At the first exercise of returning reason, I supposed myself in the bed in which I had slept the night before, and that the night was dark and gloomy. The circumstance of the scene through which I had been carried, occurred in a lively manner to my imagination, but I supposed them a dream. To be certain, I determined to arouse myself, but, in attempting it, was conscious of insuperable weakness; and then concluded, that as I should soon awake, I would try no further exertion. As soon as I rested in this hope, I heard a noise like a person clasping his hands, and I said, "You hurt me." With this recovery of hearing, my eyesight was restored. I perceived that I was surrounded by those with whom I had been in company, some of whom were striking my hands, and some were rubbing my stomach. My feelings at this time were greatly distressed. There was but a spark of life in a body of disorder and death; but the hope with which that spark was connected, spread a smile over the ruins, and I was very happy.
My friends informed me that I was taken from the water after I had disappeared about a quarter of an hour, and laid on the shore; that in bringing me to the shore, a small sound was perceived from my throat, but that my breast had not moved with breathing, and that my eyes continued lifeless till the moment I spoke. From the time of my falling into the water till my recovery, nearly an hour must have elapsed; as the struggle was long, so the distress was great. I can give no better description of it than by saying that my sensation corresponded with the appearance of the dead. My meaning is, that the aspect of a deceased person makes a complicated impression on my mind very similar to what I then felt, and may be regarded as a very natural symbol of the state of my own feelings.
But the prospect, and to me the certainty, of immediately appearing before God, the Judge of all, was inexpressibly more affecting than the pain of dying. What I felt in both respects cannot be described; it can be known only by experience. In such a situation, nothing but the power and the grace of Christ can support the mind; and I determined, when I recovered, to dwell upon his name, if ever I should be called to attend the dying.