Old Souls: the children who remember their past lives

Feb 10. 2023

The UVA Study

Do you believe in reincarnation?

Doctor Jim Tucker does.

The child psychiatrist from North Carolina has made it his life’s work to find out if reincarnation truly exists. Since the 1990’s, Dr. Tucker has been studying cases where children have had vivid, and at times troubling, “memories” of their past lives. Some of these cases are seriously incredible, and many of them have proven to be substantially credible, even while held up against the faces of logic and reasoning.

Dr. Tucker began working for the University of Virginia’s Division of Perpetual Studies in 1996 and took over as director in 2002. His team has collected over 2,500 documented accounts from all over the world in which young children have given intricate and (later-proven-as-) accurate details of someone else’s life—a life that they believe was once their own.

The Division’s investigation process includes first ruling out any possibility of unconscious or conscious bias (such as acquired information or exposure to television shows, books, etc.) or fraud (e.g., parent coaching). They then interview the child further to collect as much detail of these memories as possible and follow up by working to locate the deceased person that matches the child’s “memories”. Some of these studied children actually have physical marks that relate to their “past person”, such as a birthmark on their body in the exact same spot as where the deceased person had obtained a mortal injury in life. The children in these studies are generally between the ages of 2 or 3 when they start talking about their “past life memories” and between 6 or 7 when they stop. Dr. Tucker has stated that this end reference limit is due to the fact that humans begin to forget their earliest childhood memories around age 6.

Example Cases

James Leininger, Louisiana, United States

At two and a half years old, James Leininger of Louisiana began having nightmares.

A few months before, James’ father had taken him to the Cavanaugh Flight Museum in Dallas, Texas. James, who was generally your run-of-the-mill high-energy toddler, became notably solemn as they entered the Battle of Iwo Jima memorial bay.

After his nightmares started, he would wake up night after night from a sound sleep, shouting about his airplane being on fire, and kicking and shouting. James would recall these dreams to his parents, telling them they were actually memories. In them, he would say, he was flying an airplane that was shot down by another airplane with a red sun on its side. He also mentioned the name “Jack Larsen”. During the daytime of this phase, he would use his toys to mimic the action of a plane crashing.

A couple of months later, James began to tell his parents that the plane he flew was a “Corsair” and that he had flown off of a ship called the “Natoma”. He also began regularly drawing battle scenes of planes crashing and would sign them as “James 3”, claiming that he was signing this way not because of his age, but because he was the “third James”.

James’ parents, interested in his adamantly told stories, began investigating on their own, and discovered some remarkable things. Through their research, they found that on March 3, 1945, a 21-year-old pilot named Lieutenant James Huston was killed in action in World War II.  His plane, which had taken off from a ship called the Natoma Bay, was shot down by a Japanese fighter plane in the Battle of Iwo Jima. Although the plane James Huston had flown when he died was an FM-2, he had flown Corsairs through numerous test flights in his career. As for the name James gave his parents during one of his nightmare episodes: a pilot named Jack Larsen had flown the flightpath next to James Huston’s during the battle that took Lieutenant Huston’s life.

Later, James and his family were able to connect with Lieutenant Huston’s sister, Anne (who was by then 87 years old). Anne listened to James tell his story, and afterwards stated that there was no way he could have known the details he did unless he was in fact her brother, James Huston.

Cameron Macauley, Glasgow, Scotland

Cameron Macauley began talking about his “other life” at age two. He would insist that he lived on the island of Barra, and gave elaborate details of his past family, including physical traits of his mother and father, his three sisters and his three brothers. He also detailed information about playing with his family dog on the beach and of watching planes take off nearby. He would state that in his previous life, he was four years old when he fell off his bed, and that was how he came to his current parents. Cameron’s family eventually brought him to the island of Barra, which is just off the coast of Scotland. Cameron immediately recognized one of the houses and seemed to know the layout by heart, immediately leading his family members through the house and (accurately) remarking on rooms, just as if he had lived there his whole life.

Ryan Hammons, Oklahoma, United States

In 2004, a little boy named Ryan Hammons was born in Oklahoma. Ryan was a delayed speaker, having had a serious case of enlarged adenoids (which, in healthy people allow for lymphatic drainage from the nasal pathways). At four years old, he had an adenoidectomy to remove them, and immediately began speaking in full sentences… and recalling memories of a past life.

On Christmas Day 1964, forty years before Ryan was born, a 61-year-old man named Marty Martyn died in the hospital of a cerebral hemorrhage after a battle with the lymphatic cancer, Leukemia. During his life, after a failed acting career, Martyn had established the Marty Martyn Talent Agency in Los Angeles, which lead him to become very wealthy in his late life. Martyn, a steadfast republican, enjoyed the beach, his Beverly Hills home--complete with outdoor swimming pool--, Chinese food and his large sunglasses collection. He regularly visited his sister in Paris by boat—specifically the Queen Mary—and was married four times, having one biological daughter and five stepchildren (three of which being boys that he adopted, giving them his last name).

After four-year-old Ryan Hammons’ operation in 2008, he quickly began begging his mother and father to bring him to Hollywood. He was “homesick”, as he would often tell his parents, and longed to see his “other family” and to visit his three adopted sons. He said his “old home” had been much bigger and better than his current one, with a pool and a green car that only he was allowed to drive. He said that he had worked at a business where people would “change their names” and would regularly make political references that a young child could not have known—he also had a strong aversion to the early 20th century democratic president, Franklin D. Roosevelt. He also often mentioned visiting his sister in Paris and his frequent travelling.

Wanting to help her son, Ryan’s mother began to check out books about Hollywood from the local library to read with her son. In one particular book, about Old Hollywood, Ryan connected to many of the photographs, including one of Rita Hayworth and of Marilyn Monroe. The breakthrough came, however, when Ryan came across a photo of the 1932 movie, Night After Night. His past life, he claimed, belonged to the actor he saw there in the photograph. Unfortunately, the actor seen there was an uncredited extra in the film, so their amateur investigation became stalled.

A couple years later, in 2010, Ryan’s mother contacted Dr. Jim Tucker (remember: the child psychologist?) and through hiring a film archivist, the group was able to put a name to the uncredited actor’s photograph: he was a young actor named…. you guessed it… Marty Martyn.  

Sonam Wangdu, Seattle, Washington, United States

In 1987, as he was dying, the Tibetan Lama Dezhung Rinpoche III told his followers that he would be reborn in Seattle.

Four years later, a little boy was born to a Tibetan father and an American mother in the city of Seattle, Washington. Sonam Wangdu, as the boy was named, had the realization that he was Dezhung Rinpoche IV at only two years old, and from then on, would respond only to he name Trulku-la, or “reincarnation”.

Flown to Nepal, Sonam met with the High Lama of Sakya Monastery, Dagchen Rinpoche, who had been very close to Dezhung Rinpoche III while he was alive. Dagchen Rinpoche quickly recognized that Sonam had the same personality, attitude and mannerisms as his deceased friend and fellow monk, even at his young age. For Dagchen to fully accept that Sonam was indeed Dezhung Rinpoche III reincarnated, Sonam had to pass one final test. In New Delhi, Sonam was presented with a wide variety of religious icons, belonging to several previous Lamas, including Dezhung Rinpoche III. Some were even duplicate items (with one actually belonging to Dezhung III and one belonging to another deceased Lama). Without any instruction or introduction to the items, Sonam chose a bell and a set of rosary beads that had belonged to Dezhung Rinpoche III. Dagchen Rinpoche’s son, Ani Sakya, translating for his father, then said, “Only a person who owns these things would be able to pick them.” At four years old, Sonam Wangdu was officially recognized as the reincarnated Tibetan Lama by the Sakya Monastery.  He still lives at the Monastery today as Dezhung Rinpoche IV.

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So…do you believe in reincarnation?

I don’t know about you, but reading these stories definitely makes me wonder.

I found Dr. Tucker’s narratives on his case studies fascinating. The stories you read today are some of them in a nutshell, but there are so many more, and so many details that I couldn’t have reasonably fit into this post. It’s some pretty cool stuff. You can read about Dr. Jim Tucker’s work and case studies in his book, BEFORE: Children’s Memories of Previous Lives.

Have a great day, friends! And remember to be a good doobie...  you never know if you may otherwise come back as a mayfly. They only live for one day and like to randomly fly up people’s noses by the way. ;)

[DT]