A lovely
little book that I am very fond of browsing through is Bygone Days
in Devonshire and Cornwall. First
published in 1874, it contains various weird and wonderful West
Country superstitions and customs, and also makes mention of “an
account of a trial at Taunton Assizes, on April 4, 1823, in which
three females were charged with stabbing an old woman, a reputed
witch.”
It
appears that this attack was carried out at the behest of a man named
Baker, a well known wizard in Devonshire, and a dig through the
newspaper archives produced the following story in the Taunton
Courier, and Western Advertiser for 9th April, 1823.
Elizabeth
Bryant and two of her daughters had been before the courts a few days
previous, charged with assaulting and beating the widowed and elderly
Ann Burge in Wivelscombe on 26th November, 1822. The
mother had grown concerned when a third daughter of hers had fallen
ill, experiencing fits that no one could explain. In her distress,
Elizabeth Bryant had visited the aforementioned Baker for advice and
she returned home convinced that her daughter had been bewitched and
that Ann Burge was the cause.
It seems
Baker also recommended some medicine for the ailing daughter to take
as a cure, advising that:
“The
jar of mixtur is to be mixt with half-a-pint of gen (i.e gin),and
then a table-spoon to be taken mornings, at eleven o clock, four and
eight, and four of the pills to be taken every morning fasting, and
the paper of powder to divided in ten parts, and one part to be taken
every night going to bed, in a little honey. The paper of herbs is to
be burnt, a small bit at a time, on a few coals, with a little hay
and rosemary, and, while it is burning, read the first two verses of
the 68th salm, and say the Lord's Prayer after.”
Whether
this remedy did any good is not recorded, but Elizabeth Bryant had
repeated to several people what Baker had told her, and it was not
long before Ann Burge heard the rumours circulating that she was a
witch and a cause of the Bryant girl's suffering. Understandably
aggrieved at this, Ann Burge called at the Bryant household to ask
Elizabeth Bryant if she was behind the rumours. Meeting Elizabeth
Bryant in the alleyway that led to her house, Ann Burge demanded:
“Betty
Bryant, I be come to ask you a civil question, whether I bewitched
your daughter?”
Elizabeth
Bryant's response left no doubt as to her feelings on the matter as
she told the older woman:
“You
damned old bitch, you have bewitched my daughter for twelve months
past, and I be all the worse for it.”
At this,
Elizabeth Bryant flew at Ann Burge, attacking the old woman and
threatening to kill her. Bryant's two daughters appeared on the scene
and were quick to help their mother, two of the women holding Ann
down whilst the other scratched her arm deeply with a nail. Not
satisfied with that, Elizabeth Bryant was heard to call several
times:
“Bring
me knives to cut the old bitch's flesh from her bones, for she shall
never go home alive.”
In the
space of the brawl the women ended up out in the open street, where
Ann Burge was finally rescued by the crowd that had gathered to
witness the spectacle. Badly shaken and hurt, with her arms torn and
lacerated, the old woman was will for at least a month following the
attack.
The judge
presiding over the case made his feelings known on the subject,
deploring the “infamous knavery” carried out by Baker on
the gullible Bryant women. The newspaper agreed wholeheartedly with
the Judge's recommendation to the Magistrates that “they would not
allow another Sessions to go over without arraigning him upon the
Vagrancy Act, to the penal provisions of which he was doubtless
amenable.”
Elizabeth
Bryant and her daughters were found guilty and sentenced to four
months imprisonment. Still ruminating on the case, a week later on
16th April 1823 the same newspaper printed another piece
on the matter, reporting that:
“The
observations of the Judge in passing sentence on the unfortunate
simpletons whose conviction was mentioned in our last, may be useful
in dispelling the doleful and mischievous superstition which even at
this day prevails among the ignorant on this subject.”
Among other things, the Judge was at pains to inform the Bryant women
and those assembled that their behaviour had been utterly
unacceptable, making it very clear that the law would not now
tolerate such attacks against anyone for whatever reason as he told
the defendants:
“Remember
well what I say to you. You are not prosecuted and tried for any
opinions which you may entertain, but for carrying those opinions
into violence and outrage against a fellow subject, whom the laws
equally protect.”
Remonstrating
further, he told Elizabeth Bryant and her daughters that they should
have gone to the magistrates with their concerns, not taken matters
into their own hands. He also reassured the women that there was no
truth whatsoever in their fears regarding witchcraft in any form,
pointing out that if they believed in God (something which he found
himself sadly doubting given their display) then they should not
think for one moment that the Almighty would allow such a thing to
happen as they accused Ann Burge of. His opinion on Baker was
unequivocal as he observed that it would be a great service to take
him before the magistrate,
declaring of the self-styled wizard that “he is a
nuisance that ought speedily to be got rid of.”
The Church of St Andrew, Wiveliscombe
Along
with this, the Judge was in no doubt that Elizabeth Bryant would have
killed Ann Burge if she had the means to do so, reminding her
chillingly that:
“As
it was, you and every one of you stood in peril of your lives for the
offence you have committed.... It was my doing that you were
prosecuted for this assault, instead of being tried for your lives.”
Although
he had saved them from facing the noose, the Judge did
not feel at all inclined to let them off entirely, as although he put
the majority of the blame at the nefarious Baker's door:
“...
yet it is necessary to visit you with a punishment that will cause
you and everybody to remember that it is at the peril of severe
punishment, if they act upon such ignorance and folly.”
Taunton Courier, and Western Advertiser, 9th April 1823 www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk.
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