Part 5

by A.C. Fisher Aldag

This segment of "Another Pagan History" will discuss those individuals who actually practiced witchcraft in the British Isles during the modern era. These accounts include people who used divination as a method to foretell the future, performed "necromancy" or communicating with the spirits of the dead, underwent shamanic journeying, or used magical spells to facilitate change, including protection, healing, and increase. Some believed in supernatural forces, while others thought that their abilities were just another talent, like the ability to sing. The neighbors of these magical folks either feared and despised them – or became their clients.

The words witch or witchcraft were not always used to describe people who used magic or practiced a folkloric religion. In Cornwall, these individuals were called "pellars", which may a diminutive of spellers or dispellers. A midwife or herbalist of Scotland was called a "howdie". In the Orkney islands, "spae wives" were those skilled in healing, divining, spell-casting, and spirit communication right up to the late 1800s. In Ireland, they were sometimes referred to as "fairy doctors". "Cunning folk" practiced throughout England and Cornwall, including London and other large cities. In other locations, they were called conjurors, herb wives, old wives, wizards, hedge witches, hedge riders, hexen, hags, crones, grannies, medicine men, wise women or men, and gypsies. The term "witch" was often used as a pejorative, and witchcraft was interchangeable with infernalism or diabolism. Sometimes, ordinary people used magical means as "protection against witchcraft". Spells and rituals usually had the goal of thwarting those who employed supernatural forces to cause harm. Objects such as witch balls and witches’ pegs were meant to scare away witches or deflect witchcraft. Yet in other locations, the term Witch was a positive label for a person who practiced benevolent magic, cast spells, foretold the future or assisted with healing.

Many place names and landmarks of the British Isles have the word "witch" in their titles. These locations are sometimes named for an historic event or person. There are witch’s rocks, witch’s caves, witches’ woods, a Witches’ Knowe or burial mound, a Witch’s Quay and a place nicknamed Witch Island. The Witches’ Stone in Edinbourogh is shaped somewhat like a woman’s vulva. Women still slide down the rock formation as an act of fertility magic. The Witches’ Dub is a pool supposedly used for the tortuous trial by "swimming" during the witch hunts. The Coventina and Matronae statues and frescoes are often called the Witches Three. The witch hazel tree is known for the astringent properties of its leaves. However, the famous Witches’ Mill owned by Gerald Gardner probably didn’t have anything to do with witches at all.

The stereotype of the witch, with her pointy black hat and striped socks, flying on her broomstick across the full moon, may have come from several sources. Pictures of Mother Goose show her wearing a peaked hat with a buckle, a style which was in vogue during the late 1600s. The image may have been used to imply age or wisdom, or perhaps a lack of modern fashion sense. Her position as a goose-keeper may be an indication that she was of the servant class. Mother Goose’s witchy stockings might be representational of poverty, because frugal country people used remnants of yarn from other projects, knit together to make wildly colorful socks and mittens. During the period of Celtic revival in Wales, a Welsh national costume was adopted which very much resembles Mother Goose’s ensemble – or the literary interpretation of a witch.

The traditional image of the witch may also have come from Frau Holt or Old Dame Holde, who might have been derived from the German goddess Holle, Holda, Hulda or Heartha. She is also called Hilda or Mathilde of the Night, whose legends tell of her mystical ride along with the wild hunt. Hilde or Hilda is often associated with the "hexen" of Saxony. The word malkin, a colloquialism for a cat or elderly woman, may have come from the name Mathilde. In Wales, she is called the Mailte y Nos, or old woman of the night. Her "witches’ ride" is said to occur on either Beltane Eve / Walpurgisnacht or Samhain night. Some legends say she flew on the back of a goose, a hound, a horse or even a broomstick. The icon of the witch’s broom may also have come from a character called Besom Betty in English ritualized street theatre, who sweeps the stage and the audiences’ feet to banish evil spirits. However, Betty may have gotten her broom from older folkloric sources pertaining to witchcraft.

Be that as it may, none of our real witches were known to wear pointy black hats or fly on broomsticks. However, many of them were believed to cast spells, foretell the future, cure ailments and use other forms of magic. Most of these people used their mysterious talents openly, without being prosecuted as witches, although the Witchcraft Act was in force during their lifetimes.

One of the last native Cornish speakers, Dorothy "Dolly" Pentreath was born in 1692. She drank beer, smoked a pipe, and had a son out of wedlock, all of which was considered scandalous in her time. A fishwife and laundress by profession, Dolly also practiced astrology and lifted curses. She was famous for scaring away a "press gang", a group of men who forced others to be drafted into the English military. When the press gang beached their boat near her home, Dolly screamed at them, threatening them with curses. (Other accounts say that she chased them with an axe!) The press gang quickly sailed away, without taking any Cornish citizens to be drafted. It is believed that Dolly lived to the ripe old age of 102.

Joan Wytte was born in 1775 in Cornwall. She was sometimes called "the Fighting Fairy Woman" or the Wytte (white) witch. Her healing practice included the use of "clooties", cloth strips tied to a tree as a form of sympathetic magic. When the cloth rots, the disease is believed to dissipate. Joan was also famed as a clairvoyant. Unfortunately, she was incarcerated in Bodmin Jail, not for witchcraft but for public brawling. Due to tooth abcesses and poor conditions in the jail, Joan passed away at the age of 38. Her bones were disinterred and used for séances and various pranks, then later displayed at the Witchcraft Museum. Joan was finally laid to rest in Boscastle in a peaceful wooded area.

In the late 1700s to early 1800s, John Parker practiced as a cunning man in Lincolnshire. He lifted curses, created charms and talismans, told fortunes, and even used pamphlets to advertise his services. Parker supposedly learned his craft from a London occultist.

An elderly "beldame" named Bessie Miller, born in 1814, was believed to have a talent for controlling the weather. For a sixpence, Bessie would "sell a favorable wind" to sailors. Little is known of her other than this magical ability, including her location, which is listed alternatively as mainland Scotland, the Orkneys or the Isle of Man. Her nickname was "awful Bessie", which at the time actually may have meant "awesome".

John and Henry Harries were brothers who practiced the cunning craft in Carmarthenshire, Wales in the mid-1800s. They possessed a vast library on the subjects of the occult and astrology. The brothers practiced fortune-telling, clairvoyance, herbalism and other methods of healing. Not all of their neighbors approved, and several called for their arrest. Others exalted them as "wizards" and trusted them to perform conventional medicine as well as herbal and magical cures. Some accounts state that the Harries brothers learned the craft from their father, who was also an acclaimed cunning man and healer.

Tamsin Blight, sometimes called Tamson, Tomasine or Tammy Blee, was one of the most famous witches of Cornwall in the mid-1800s. Along with her husband James Thomas, she engaged in shamanic trances using hallucinogens to help her predict the future and communicate with spirits. She was also skilled at making charms and herbal cures and dispelling harmful magic. Tamsin was labeled a hedge witch or "white" witch, and was beloved by her neighbors for her power to renew magical amulets, heal farm animals and arrange matches for young people. James was later arrested for making a pass at another man, so Tammy distanced herself from him. Her magical practice did not seem to be affected by her former husband’s indiscretion.

In 1906, an elderly Cornish witch called Granny Boswell was nearly hit by a car. She cursed the offending auto, shouting that it wouldn’t make it to the end of the street. The car promptly threw a rod in its engine. Granny Boswell also had the ability to tell fortunes, cure ailments in livestock, break curses and assist young people with love magic. Believed to be of Romani descent, her husband was called "King of the Gypsies".