The Pendle Witches
The most famous witches in English history are the Pendle witches that were tried and executed in 1612. The Pendle witches were known in their community as healers and cunning folk, led by Elizabeth Southerns alias Demdike and located in and around Malkin Tower. This occupation exhibited a vulnerability under the new rule of King James I. King James had a negative relationship with witches and developed a paranoia that witches were plotting against him, following an altercation with the North Berwick witches of 1590. The trials of the Pendle witches came shortly after the Gunpowder Plot in 1605.
Witchcraft in seventeenth-century England was no longer a case of white and black magic. Witchcraft was malevolent and fuelled by fear, suspicion and politics. These trials possess a uniqueness that became a catalyst for other witch trials in this period. Jennet Device was the youngest member of the Device family and was nine years old when she was approached by Sir Roger Nowell and Sir Edward Bromley. She was coerced in to complying with the authorities and provided a detailed statement of the ways in which her family were involved in witchcraft and damnable practices. Jennet’s testimony was an essential part of the Pendle witch trials in 1612.
The events that took place on 18 March 1612 sparked the beginning of the witchcraft accusations in Pendle that stretched to Samlesbury and York. Elizabeth Demdike’s granddaughter Alizon Device, was accused of placing a curse on John Law, a pedlar from Halifax. After he refused Alizon’s plea for pins, Law claimed he was approached by her familiar and suffered a fall. He remained paralysed on his whole left side which today would indicate symptoms of a stroke. This bewildering event brought with it accusations of bewitchment. Alizon apologised profusely and admitted to the part she played in cursing the pedlar. John Law’s son Abraham took the case to Sir Roger Nowell and Alizon was questioned at Read Hall. She expressed a genuine belief in her magical abilities and revealed vital information in regards to her families beliefs and practices.
On 20 April 1612 a meeting took place at Malkin Tower and saw the whole of the Device family and their neighbours accused of witchcraft. The reason for this gathering falls to the hands of Jennet Preston of Gisburn, a friend of Elizabeth Southerns. Preston had previously been accused and acquitted of witchcraft at the York Assizes and required assistance in orchestrating the murder of Thomas Lister. The gathering on Good Friday provided the authorities with a great deal of evidence that was used to convict the Pendle witches. Attendees were not only subjected to ridicule of their Catholic faith following their absence from church, but were accused of performing maleficium by making clay dolls, stealing cattle, cursing people in the community and conspiring to murder men. They were detained at Lancaster Castle and awaited trial in August.
The Lancaster Assizes met on 18-19 August 1612 and held the trials of Elizabeth, James and Alizon Device, Anne Chattox alias Whittle, Anne Redferne, John and Jane Bulcock, Alice Nutter, Katherine Hewitt and Alice Grey. Elizabeth Demdike, the matriarch, died awaiting trial in Lancaster Castle. The Pendle witches were questioned by Magistrate Roger Nowell and the trial was recorded by Thomas Potts who later published a detailed account of the Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster 1612 in 1613.
The paranoia that King James felt inspired works such as Thomas Potts’ Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches. This publication acted as a means of gaining recognition and patronage from King James. The language and structure of this pamphlet reveal an inclination towards politics, sexuality and gender. The accounts were extremely repetitive, detailing the use of familiars and charms to practice witchcraft.
The most significant text in the Pendle witch trials is King James I’s Daemonologie (1597). This text opened up the door for the Pendle witches execution. Daemonologie acted as a manual on witchcraft dismissing the division of white and black magic. This shifted pre-existing views on the Pendle witches known to the community as healers. The testimony of Jennet Device was accepted in court as King James I outlined “in a mater of treason against the Prince, Barnes or Wives, or never so defamed persons, may of our law serve for sufficient witnesses and proofes…such witnesses may be sufficient in matters of high treason against God”. Here he is stating how witchcraft is considered high treason and in such cases, children should be allowed to testify in court.
The case of the Pendle witches was a turning point for seventeenth-century witch trials. The testimony of children became a vital tool in the prosecution of witches. Attitudes towards witchcraft trials in England began to change in the 1630s and can be witnessed with the Lancashire trials of 1634. A young boy, Edmund Robinson, made an accusation and the guilty verdict was rescinded following an investigation in London. By the time the East Anglia hunts began in 1645, successful prosecution relied heavily on psychological torture. As opposed to oral testimony, this was used as a means of obtaining a confession. If we turn our attention to witch trials that took place further afield such as Massachusetts in 1693-4, a correlation can be found between the Salem witches and the Pendle witches in regard to the use of child witnesses and testimony. The children that testified were between ages four and seventeen – the youngest being Dorothy Good and the eldest Elizabeth Hubbard.
The beliefs of King James I enabled the Pendle witch trials to take place and influenced the witchcraft trials that came next. When it comes to the Pendle witches, Jennet Device’s testimony was pivotal in their trial and execution. The story of the Pendle witches leaves us with many unanswered questions: Did Jennet hate her family? Was she malicious? Scared? Was she coerced in to saying what she thought everyone wanted to hear? Can she be held responsible for the fate of her family in 1612?
This article has been featured in Inside History Magazine Vol. 1 Issue. 3. Click here to order your issue on witchcraft and superstition.
Featured image: Illustration by John Gilbert taken from William Harrison Ainsworth’s The Lancashire Witches (1854)
