In the January next following fifty persons were indicted. All who were tried were acquitted except three, who were pardoned. All who were not tried were discharged on the payment of thirty shillings each. In the following May, when a jail delivery had been decreed, one hundred and fifty went forth.
Lofty Character of the Condemned
Judge Joseph Story’s Tribute
Those who suffered were a remarkable company of men and women. They came from the humble walks in life, but most of them were old in experience and solidified in character and sentiments. Though they were posted as criminals, taunted with aspersions, forbidden counsel in law and religion, and had every word of defense twisted into a semblance of condemnation, yet they exhibited the true nobility of life in truth and righteousness; they counted their lives not dear to them, could they only reach the goal of their hope in God their Saviour.
But after all we must not judge the actors in this frenzied delusion harshly or rashly. Hon. Joseph Story, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, writes: “Surely our ancestors had no special reason for shame in a belief which had the universal sanction of their own and all former ages, which counted in its train philosophers as well as enthusiasts, which was graced by the learning of prelates as well as by the countenance of kings, which the law supported by its mandates, and the purest judges felt no compulsions in enforcing.”
The Witch Plat and the Crevice
The Place of Execution
The Crevice for the Corpses
