Part 10 (2/2)

[1] Of course the proof that some of the accused really made pretensions to magic rests upon their own confessions and their accusations of one another, and might be a part of an intricate tissue of falsehood. But, granting for the moment the absolute untrustworthiness of the confessions and accusations there are incidental statements which imply the practice of magic. For example, Elizabeth Device's young daughter quoted a long charm which she said her mother had taught her and which she hardly invented on the spur of the moment. And Demdike was requested to ”amend a sick cow.”

[2] The gunpowder plot, seven years earlier, no doubt gave direction to this plan, or, perhaps it would be better to say, gave the idea to those who confessed the plan.

[3] James Crossley seems to believe that there was ”some scintilla of truth” behind the story. See his edition of Potts, notes, p. 40.

[4] Among those who never confessed seems to have been Chattox's daughter, Anne Redfearne.

[5] See above, p. 116.

[6] It is a satisfaction to know that Alice died ”impenitent,” and that not even her children could ”move her to confesse.”

[7] See above, pp. 112-113, and Potts, Q-Q verso.

[8] See Potts, I.

[9] It can hardly be doubted that the children had been thoroughly primed with the stories in circulation against their mother.

[10] Other witnesses charged her with ”many strange practises.”

[11] The principle that a man's life may not twice be put in jeopardy for the same offence had been pretty well established before 1612. See Darly's Case, 25 Eliz. (1583), c.o.ke's _Reports_ (ed. Thomas and Fraser, London, 1826), IV, f. 40; Vaux's Case, 33 Eliz. (1591), _ibid._, f. 45; Wrote _vs._ Wiggs, 33 Eliz. (1591), _ibid._, f. 47. This principle had been in process of development for several centuries. See Bracton (ed.

Sir Travers Twiss, London, 1878-1883), II, 417, 433, 437; Britton (ed.

F. M. Nichols, Oxford, 1865), bk. I, cap. xxiv, 5, f. 44 b.

It must be noted, however, that the statute of 3 Hen. VII, cap. II, provides that indictments shall be proceeded in, immediately, at the king's suit, for the death of a man, without waiting for bringing an appeal; and that the plea of _antefort acquit_ in an indictment shall be no bar to the prosecuting of an appeal. This law was pa.s.sed to get around special legal inconvenience and related only to homicide and to the single case of prosecution by appeal. In general, then, we may say that the former-jeopardy doctrine was part of the common law, (1) an appeal of felony being a bar to subsequent appeal or indictment, (2) an indictment a bar to a subsequent indictment, and (3) an indictment to a subsequent appeal, except so far as the statute of 3 Hen. VII., cap. II, changed the law as respects homicides. For this brief statement I am indebted to Professor William Underhill Moore of the University of Wisconsin.

What Potts has to say about Anne Redfearne's case hardly enables us to reach a conclusion about the legal aspect of it.

[12] This is the story in the MS. account (Brit. Mus., Sloane, 972). The printed narrative of the origin of the affair is somewhat different.

Joan had on one occasion been struck by Mistress Belcher for unbecoming behavior and had cherished a grudge. No doubt this was a point recalled against Joan after suspicion had been directed against her.

[13] In John Cotta's _The Triall of Witchcraft ..._ (London, 1616), 66-67, there is a very interesting statement which probably refers to this case. Cotta, it will be remembered, was a physician at Northampton.

He wrote: ”There is a very rare, but true, description of a Gentlewoman, about sixe yeares past, cured of divers kinds of convulsions, ... After she was almost cured, ... but the cure not fully accomplished, it was by a reputed Wisard whispered ... that the Gentlewoman was meerely bewitched, supposed Witches were accused and after executed.... In this last past seventh yeare ... fits are critically again returned.” Cotta says six years ago and the Northampton trials were in 1612, four years before. It is quite possible, however, that Mistress Belcher began to be afflicted in 1610.

[14] One of these was Sir Gilbert Pickering of Tichmarsh, almost certainly the Gilbert Pickering mentioned as an uncle of the Throckmorton children at Warboys. See above, pp. 47-48. His hatred of witches had no doubt been increased by that affair.

[15] See what is said of spectral evidence in chapter V, above.

[16] At least there is no evidence that Alice Abbott, Catherine Gardiner, and Alice Harris, whom he accused, were punished in any way.

[17] It seems, however, that Arthur Bill, while he st.u.r.dily denied guilt, had been before trapped into some sort of an admission. He had ”unawares confest that he had certaine spirits at command.” But this may mean nothing more than that something he had said had been grossly misinterpreted.

[18] Three women of Leicesters.h.i.+re, Anne Baker, Joan Willimot, and Ellen Greene, who in their confessions implicated the Flowers (they belonged to parishes neighbor to that of Belvoir, which lies on the s.h.i.+re border) and whose testimony against them figured in their trials, were at the same time (Feb.-March, 1618/19) under examination in that county.

Whether these women were authors or victims of the Belvoir suspicions we do not know. As we have their d.a.m.ning confessions, there is small doubt as to their fate.

[19] The women were tried in March, 1618/19. Henry, the elder son of the earl, was buried at Bottesford, September 26, 1613. John Nichols, _History and Antiquities of the County of Leicester_ (London, 1795-1815), II, pt. i, 49, note 10. Francis, the second, lingered till early in 1620. His sister, Lady Katherine, whose delicate health had also been ascribed to the witches, was now the heiress, and became in that year the bride of Buckingham, the king's favorite. There is one aspect of this affair that must not be overlooked. The accusation against the Flowers cannot have been unknown to the king, who was a frequent visitor at the seat of the Rutlands. It is hard to believe that under such circ.u.mstances the use of torture, which James had declared essential to bring out the guilt of the accused witches, was not after some fas.h.i.+on resorted to. The weird and uncanny confessions go far towards supporting such an hypothesis.

[20] _The Most Cruell and b.l.o.o.d.y Murther committed by ... Annis Dell, ... with the severall Witch-crafts ... of one Johane Harrison and her Daughter_, 63.

[21] This story must be accepted with hesitation; see below, appendix A, --3.

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