It must have been somewhere about this time that the execution mentioned by Dr. More in his ‘Antidote to Atheism’ took place, when a mother and daughter were hanged at Cambridge for witchcraft and service to the Devil. When the mother was called on to renounce and forsake her old master, she refused to do so, saying that he had been faithful to her for fourscore years, and she would not be faithless now to him. And in that obstinacy she died, with a courage and constancy worthy a better cause. The daughter was of a contrary mind. She avowed her misdeeds, and asked for pardon and grace, was penitent, and faithful, and earnest in prayer. All of which the Devil took, as may be imagined, very heinously; and showed his displeasure by sending, in the midst of a dead calm, so sudden and violent a blast of wind, that the mother’s body was driven sharply against the ladder, and was like to have overturned it, while the gallows shook with such force that the men standing round were fain to hold the posts, for fear of all being flung to the ground. It was somewhat before this, that at Town Malling, in Kent, one of Queen Mary’s Justices, “on the complaint of many wise men, and a few foolish boyes, laid an archer by the heels because he shot so near the white at buts. For he was informed and perswaded that the poor man played with a fly, otherwise called a devill or familiar. And because he was certified that the archer aforesaid shot better than the common shooting, which he before had heard of or seen, he conceived it could not be in God’s name, but by inchantment, whereby the archer (as he supposed, by abusing the Queen’s liege people) gained some one day two or three shillings, to the detriment of the commonwealth, and to his owne inriching. And therefore the archer was severely punished, to the great encouragement of archers, and to the wise example of justice, but specially to the overthrow of witchcraft.” Which quaint little anecdote of Scot’s is worth a whole handful of jewels more richly set.
We are coming now to one of the most curious of the older trials, that of—
THE WITCHES OF S. OSEES,
held before Brian Darcey. It is contained in a rare and beautiful little black-letter book,[103] and is spoken of by Scot in his ‘Discovery’ without much sparing of ridicule. It opens thus: “If there hath bin at anytime (Right Honorable) any meanes used to appease the wrath of God, to obtaine his blessing, to terrifie secreete offenders by open transgressors punishments, to withdraw honest natures from the corruption of euill company, to diminish the great multitude of wicked people, to increase the small number of virtuous persons, and to reforme all the detestable abuses which the peruerse witte and will of man doth dayly devise, this doubtlesse is no lesse necessarye than the best, that Sorcerers, Wizzardes, or rather Dizzardes, Witches, Wise women (for so they will be named), are rygorously punished. Rygorously? sayd I; why it is too milde and gentle a tearme for such a mercilesse generation: I should rather have sayd most cruelly execueted; for that no punishment can be thought vpon, be it in neuer so high a degree of torment, which may be deemed sufficient for such a deuilishe and damnable practise.” These were the sentiments of W. W., as propounded to his patron “the right honourable and his singular good lorde, the Lord Darcey,” to whom he inscribes his little book. For Brian Darcy, evidently a relation, had lately put in practice the views and opinions of a worthy citizen and zealous Christian touching witches, at the great holocaust offered up at “S. Osees” (St. Osyth), in the 23rd year of Queen Elizabeth’s reign (1582): and witch hatred therefore ran in the blood.
The first complainant in this process was Grace Thurlowe, wife of John Thurlowe, who came to make her moan about the evil practices of her neighbour, Ursley Kempe, alias Grey. About twelve months since, said Grace, her son Davy was strangely taken and greatly tormented. Ursley came, like the rest of the neighbours, to see him; but, unlike the rest, she thrice took the child by the hand, saying each time, “A good childe, howe are thou loden:” going out of the house and returning between each phrase, which was evidently a charm, and no holy way of pitying a sick child. After this she said to Grace, “I warrant thee, I, thy childe shall doe well enough;” and sure it was so, for that night the child slept well, and after another such cantrip visit from Ursula, mended entirely. This was not much to complain to the magistrates about, but Grace had another and more grievous count. After this evident cure of her son she was delivered of a woman child, and, ungratefully enough, asked not Ursley to be her nurse; whereat sprang up a quarrel, and the child in consequence fell out of the cradle and brake its neck; not because it was clumsily laid, or carelessly rocked, but because Ursley was a witch and had a grievance against Grace. And to this mischance, when she heard of it, all that the old dame said, was, “It maketh no matter; for she might have suffered me to have the keeping and nursing of it.” Then a trouble and a “fratch” ensued, and Ursley threatened Grace with lameness, whereat Grace answered, “Take heed, Ursley, thou hast a naughtie name;” but in spite of her warning the old witch did her work, so that Grace was taken with such lameness that she had to go upon her hands and knees. And thus it continued; whenever she began to amend her child fell ill, and when her child was well she was cast down lame and helpless.
Then Annis Letherdall had her word. Annis and Ursley had a little matter of commerce between them, but Annis failed the suspected woman, “knowing her to be a naughtie beast.” So Ursley in revenge bewitched Annis’s child, and that so severely that Mother Ratcliffe, a skilful woman, doubted if she could do it any good; yet for all that she ministered unto it kindly. And, as a proof that it was Ursley, and only Ursley, who had so harmed the babe, and that its sad state came in no wise from bad food, bad nursing, and filthy habits, the little creature of only one year old, when it was carried past her house, cried “wo, wo,” and pointed with its finger windowwards. What evidence could be stronger? So then, to clinch the matter and strike fairly home, the magistrate examined Thomas Rabbet, Ursley’s “base son,” a child of barely eight years of age, and got his version of the mother’s life. The little fellow’s testimony went chiefly on the imps at home. His mother had four, he said—Tyffin, like a white lamb; Titty, a little grey cat; Pygine, a black toad; and Jacke, a black cat; and she fed them, at times with wholesome milk and bread, and at times they sucked blood from her body. He further said that his mother had bewitched Johnson and his wife to death, and that she had given her imps to Godmother Newman, who put them into an earthen pot which she hid under her apron, and so carried them away. One Laurence then said that she had bewitched his wife, so that when “she lay a drawing home, and continued so a day and a night, all the partes of her body were colde like a dead creatures, and yet at her mouth did appeare her breath to goe and come.” Thus she lingered, said her husband, until Ursley came in unbidden, turned down the bed-clothes, and took her by the arm, when immediately she gasped and died. Ursley at first would confess nothing beyond having had, ten or eleven years ago, a lameness in her bones, for the cure of which she went to Cook’s wife of Wesley, who told her that she was bewitched, and taught her a charm by which she might unwitch herself and cure her bones; which charm quite answered its purpose, and had never failed her with her neighbours; all else she denied. But upon Brian Darcy[104] “promising to the saide Ursley that if she would deale plainely and confesse the truth that she should have fauour, so by giving her faire speeche she confessed as followeth.” “Bursting out with weeping” and falling on her knees, she said, yes, she had the four imps her son had told of, and that two of them, Titty and Jack, were “hees,” whose office was to punish and kill unto death; and two, Tiffin and Piggin, were “shees,” who punished with lameness and bodily harm only, and destroyed goods and cattle. And she confessed that she had killed all the folk charged against her; her brother-in-law’s wife, and Grace Thurlowe’s cradled child, making it to fall out of its cradle and break its neck solely by her enchantments; and that she had bewitched that little babe of Annis Letherdall’s, and Laurence’s wife, and, in fact, that she had done all the mischief with which she was charged. Then, not liking to be alone, she said that Mother Bennet had two imps; the one a black dog, called Suckin, the other red like a lion, Lyerd: and that Hunt’s wife had a spirit too, for one evening she peeped in at her window when she was from home, and saw it look out from a potcharde from under a bundle of cloth, and that it had a brown nose like a ferret. And she told other lies of her neighbours, saying that her spirit Tiffin informed her of all these things; and Brian Darcy sat there, gloating over these maniacal revelations. But in spite of his soft words and fair promises, Ursley Kempe was condemned, and executed when her turn came.
Joan Pechey, widow, was then brought forward; and Ales Hunt, herself an accused witch, deposed against her that she was angry because, at a distribution of bread made by the said Brian Darcy, she had gotten a loaf which was too hard baked for her; whereat in a pet she said it might have been given to some one younger, and not to her, with no teeth to eat through the crust. And then Ales watched her home, and saw her go in alone to her own house where no human soul was; but there she heard her say, as to some one, “Yea, are you so sawsie; are yee so bolde; you were not best to bee so bolde with mee: For if you will not bee ruled, you shall have Symonds sawse; yea, saide the saide Joan, I perceive if I doe give you an inch you will take an ell.” All of which talk Ales Hunt found was to no Christian creature, but to her foul and wicked imps. The which testimony her sister, Margerie Sammon, confirmed, saying that old Joan was as clever as their own mother (a noted witch, one Mother Barnes), or any one else in S. Osees skilled in sorcery and magic. Another examinate then came forward with a story of a bewitched cow unbewitched by a fire lighted around it: which, however, does not apparently touch any of the accused. And then the accuser, Ales Hunt, was made to take the place of the accused, and listen to the catalogue of her own sins. The chief witness against her was her little daughter-in-law (step-child?) Febey, of the age of eight or thereabouts, who deposed to her having two little things like horses, the one white the other black, which she kept by her bedside in a little low earthern pot with wool, colour white and black, and which she fed with milk out of a black “trening” dish. When the Commissioners went to search the place they found indeed the board which Phœbe said was used to cover them, and she pointed out the trening dish whence they were fed; but the little things like horses were gone; when Phœbe said they had been sent to Hayward of Frowicke. After a time Alice Hunt was brought to confess not only to two, but four, imps; two like colts, black and white, called Jack and Robbin; and two like toads, Tom and Robbyn. Mother Barnes, her mother, gave them to her, she said, when she died; and she gave her sister, Margerie Sammon, two also. When Margerie was confronted with Alice and heard what she had deposed, she got very angry and denied the whole tale, saying: “I defie thee, though thou art my sister,” saying that she had never any imps given to her on her mother’s death-bed, or at any other time. But Alice took her aside and whispered something in her ear; after which Margerie, “with great submission” and many tears, confessed that she had in truth these two imps, given to her by her mother as her sister had said, and that she had carried them away that same evening in a wicker basket filled with black and white wool. Her mother had said that if she did not like to keep them old Joan Pechey would be glad of them; but she did not part with them just then; and that she was to feed them on bread and milk, otherwise they would suck her blood. Their names were Tom and Robbin, and last evening she took them away—being perhaps afraid to keep them longer, now that the scent was warm—and went into Read’s ground, where she bade them “go.” Immediately they skipped out of the wicker basket toward a barred gate going into Howe Lane, to Mother Peachey’s house, whereat she, Margerie, said, “All evill goe with you, and the Lorde in heaven blesse mee from yee.”
All of which Mother Peachy, who seems to have been an upright, high-spirited old dame, stoutly denied. She was threescore year and upwards, she said, and had lived forty years in S. Osees in honour and good repute. She knew Mother Barnes, yet knew her for no witch, nor ever heard her to be so accompted, or to have skill in any witchery; nor was she at her death-bed; nor knew she of her imps. For her own part she denied that she had any “puppettes, spyrites, or maumettes;” or had had any spirits conveyed to her by Margery Sammon, or since Mother Barnes’s death. She denied all that Ales Hunt had said, as, “Yea, art thou so bolde,” &c., she denied that she had had any hand in Johnson’s death, as she had been accused of, but when he died said only he was a very honest man: she also denied some very shocking passages with her son, which he, however, had been brought to confess; and when questioned more closely concerning her imps, said that she had only a kitten and a dog at home. When asked of what colour were they? she answered tartly, “Ye may goe and see.”
Ales Newman was also condemned and executed; being obstinate to the last; denying the four counts with which she was charged, viz. her imps, the slaughter of her own husband, of John Johnson, and of his wife. But William Hoke deposed that on his death-bed her husband had been perpetually crying out against her, saying, “Dost thou not see—dost thou not see?” meaning the imp with which she tormented him, and which he strove vainly to beat away. Seeing her obstinacy, Brian Darcy told her that he would sever her and her spirits asunder; to which she answered quickly, “Nay,” sayth shee, “that shal ye not, for I will carry them with mee.” Then seeing that they took note of her words, she added, “if I have any.” The admission was enough, and she was hanged.
Elizabeth Bennet denied that she had had any hand in the bewitching to death Johnson or his wife, saying that the aforesaid Ales had done it all. But William Bonner had his stone ready for her on the other side, accusing her of bewitching his wife, for “shee, being sickely and sore troubled, the said Elizabeth vsed speeches unto her, saying, a goode woman howe art thou loden, and then clasped her in her armes and kissed her. Wherevpon presently after her vpper Lippe swelled and was very bigge, and her eyes much sunked into her head, and shee hath lain sithence in a very strange case.” Yet these two women were familiar friends, and “did accompanie much together;” which shows that friendship was as dangerous as enmity in those mad times when the swelling of a lip, or the familiarity of a house pet, could bring the best of a district to the gallows. And then Ursley Kemp’s testimony was remembered against Elizabeth, and the mysteries of Suckin and Liard sought to be fathomed. Elizabeth at the first was obdurate and would confess to nothing beyond that she had certainly a pot, but no wool therein, and no imps to lay on it; but at last she too was persuaded by Brian Darcy’s fine false words; so falling on her knees, “distilling tears,” she made her public moan. William Byet and she dwelt as neighbours together, she said, living as neighbours should, well and easily; but latterly they had fallen out, because William called her “old Trot” and “old witch,” and “did ban and curse her and her cattle.” So she replied with calling him “knave,” saying, “Wind it vp Byet, for it will light vpon yourself.” And Byet’s beast died forthwith. Then Byet’s wife beat her swine with great “gybels,” and made them sick; and once she ran a pitchfork through the side of one so that it was dead, and when the butcher who bought it came to dress and cut it up, it proved “a messel,” so she had no money for it, for the butcher would not keep it and she was forced to take it back again. So far was only the ordinary quarrelling of ill-tempered country folk, and nothing very damaging to confess to; but now Brian Darcy’s fair words drew from her all about her imp Suckin, a he and like a black dog, and Lierd, a she and like a hare or a lion, and red. Suckin had first come to her a long time ago, as she was returning home from the mill; he held her by the coats, she being amazed, but vanished when she prayed. Again, when nigh hand at home, he tugged at her coats as before, yet vanished when she prayed. The next day he came with Lierd, and asked “why she was so snappish yesterday?” and thus they were for ever troubling and visiting her, till at last she yielded to their solicitations, and set them to the work she was accused of. This was the second instance in which Brian Darcy found that old Ursley and her imp Tiffin had spoken the truth.