Witches Galore - The Pendle Witches


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<h1>The Pendle Witches - by Catherine Rothwell</h1> It is a reasonable assumption that alongside the computer-orientated technology of the 21st century an interest will remain which has already endured twenty centuries: superstition, charms and witchcraft. Strange bedfellows! Even the scoffers who know it’s all rot avoid walking under ladders, refuse to make journeys on Friday the 13th, toss a pinch of salt over their left shoulder after upsetting the cruet and say “Bless you” when a friend sneezes. Passed down from generation to generation, these superstitions still lurk in the best computer of all - the human brain. Rooted in paganism, the belief in charms, witches and wizards spread throughout Europe and the New World. Stories from Sweden to Salem inspired books, plays and films. Even St Augustine was a believer, but it was King James 1 whose thunderous treatise “Daemonologie” on the need to destroy witches because they leagued with the Devil that brought about the death penalty. In the heart of Lancashire the drama of witchcraft peaked in 1612 and before the year was out had played to its grim end. Thomas Potts, Clerk to the Judges at the 1612 Lancaster Assize, produced “The Wonderful Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster” within three months of their execution. At least two of the accused had been known to dabble in the black art for the past fifty years, which raises the questions: Why the sudden clampdown and extermination? Was the local magistrate, Roger Nowell of Read Hall, wealthy landowner and High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1610, looking for quick fame? Was Puritanism getting a strong foothold in a county once predominantly in favour of the old religion? Some thirty years later the crime of regicide, regarded by some as bold, by others as monstrous, was committed when General Oliver Cromwell signed King Charles I’s death warrant. This was a far cry from persecuting terrified old women and simpletons ground down by poverty. The 13 accused were indeed a pathetic sight, dirty, ill-clad, mis-shapen and under-nourished. Poverty had been rife in Pendle Forest for years. A century earlier two women of Barley had been excused attending church because they had no clothes to wear. For the first time in their lives this motley crew were noticed and listened to by important people and appeared to be enjoying the attention unaware that they were incriminating themselves as the stories they told gathered momentum and embroidery. Rivalry and spite between the two main families of reputed witches merely fuelled the fervour of biased Magistrate and Judges. Although they were a bad lot, thieves, beggars and liars, they deserved help, not death. The Southern family, whose nickname “Demdike” became synonymous with witches, lived at Malkin Tower in Malkin Field, part of Sadler’s Farm, Newchurch. The Chattox family, another nickname, lived between Higham and the River Calder bordering Pendle Hill and Hunterholme where several witches were said to live. Between 1593 and 1595 Anne Whittle (Chattox) had been accused of murdering two men but nothing had been done about it. On March 13th 1612 Bessie Whittle, daughter of Chattox, stole from Malkin Tower “most of their linen clothes and a peck of oatmeal”. It is on record that Demdike had only a single garment to wear. Days later the outraged Southern family recognised some of their stolen property, reported this to the Greave of the Forest who informed the Magistrate Roger Nowell, a zealous witch hunter whose neighbour had lost two children reputedly by witchcraft. Under skilled questioning, Alizon said that her grandmother Demdike had encouraged her to become a witch, bewitched a cow, charmed a can of milk into butter and killed baby Emma Baldwin by her witchcraft in September 1610. Bear in mind that Demdike was blind. Unfortunately, a few days later Alizon, on her way to beg in the streets of Colne, stopped a peddler, John Law, and asked him for a few pins. When he refused she cursed him. John later suffered a stroke, possibly induced by fear or the weight of his heavy pack. Paralysed, he complained that his body was “pricked with knives and sickles” and that his lameness was caused by Alizon’s witchcraft. Cradled in fear and suspicion and no doubt astonished, Alizon sought out the sick man and apologised, which was considered tantamount to admitting guilt. At last Roger Nowell had a case. In this heady atmosphere, the tiny figure standing on a table, although legally too young to testify, a fact conveniently ignored, under further public questioning unearthed story after story. The blasphemy seems to have convinced Alizon that she had power passed on to her by her mother and grandmother Demdike, whom she unwittingly condemned. It was Alizon’s testimony, the brightest and most coherent, that was instrumental in the signing of the death warrants. Demdike, Chattox, Alizon and Anne Redfern were sent for trial at Lancaster Assizes, Picture their journey under guard through the Trough of Bowland, partly in a waggoner’s cart, partly walking through the steep Trough itself, finally to be incarcerated in the grim blackness of the dungeons at Lancaster Castle. Later, Elizabeth Davies, James Davies, Alice Nutter, Katherine Hewitt, Alice Grey, John and June Bulcock followed the same route and Jenet Preston of Gisburn was sent to York Castle. The executions were carried out in public on August 20th. The only ones to escape the scaffold were Jane and John Bulcock who were pronounced “Not Guilty” and old Demdike who died in prison. Lancashire certainly had its fair share of reputed witches, at Padiham, Widnes, Salmesbury, Singleton and Poulton-le-Fylde where a neighbour denounced Dorothy Shawe as “demdike and besom”. Although their male counterparts, warlocks, seem to have been revered, one, ostensibly a witch hunter, was hoisted by his own petard. Proof of guilt was that a witch would float when cast into a pond. He floated and was hanged. Of the many ways of keeping witches at bay, one was the rowan tree or mountain ash, known as witchen. It grows in profusion throughout the country: “Rowan tree or weed Puts the witches to speed”. Nevertheless, “witches’ sabbaths” were said to continue in secret, with midnight meetings lasting till dawn at Candlemass, Roodmass, Lammas and All Hallows Eve. Rites were led by a coven of 12 members and one devil. Although there is little evidence to support the story, according to Christina Hole, an authority on the subject, one of the few known “witches’ Sabbaths” held in England was at Malkin Tower, where it began with a feast of stolen mutton. Meeting at this so-called coven on Good Friday, April 6th 1612 to discuss Demdike’s plight, all present were deemed by Roger Nowell to be witches, condemned and sentenced. Nowadays, bewitching Pendle speaks in terms of lovely scenery: the impressive hulk of Pendle Hill frost-rimmed, snow-covered or swathed in mist. George Fox, founder of the Quaker Movement, was greatly impressed by the atmosphere when he climbed Pendle Hill in 1652 and this remains a profound experience. The Devil himself was reputed to live at Hell Hole on the River Ribble near Clitheroe, but the vale through which the rivers Ribble, Calder and Hodder wind, a glorious mass of trees, became known as Paradise. There are still cottages with witch posts where a crooked sixpence would be placed to speed the butter-churning, but no longer does the farmer toss a crown piece into the churn or make a sudden thrust into the cream with a red-hot poker to drive off Demdike with the hissing. However, “beating the bounds” and “lating the witches” traditionally continues on Longridge Fell. The remains of Malkin Tower may be a forlorn heap of stones near Blacko’s Malkin Tower Farm, but Roughlee Hall still stands, the home of Alice Nutter, condemned as a witch and hanged with the others at Lancaster on that awful day in 1612.