The Season of the Witch

Wee Walks occasionally does Wee Talks and I spoke about witchcraft at Hobbyhorrors a few weeks ago (IYKYK). Since then I've been following the news about the botched execution of Christa Pike, a convicted murderer in America who had been on Death Row in Tennessee for almost thirty years. In September, she survived not one but two execution attempts and that started me thinking about how had this have happened a few hundred years ago Christa Pike would have definitely been suspected of being a witch and she would have been tried for that as well as her other crimes.

The last witch trial in Ireland took place in County Antrim and the story starts in Islandmagee in 1711 when Ann Hattridge who is the widow of the Presbyterian minister in the village died after apparently suffering months of what were described as demonic attacks in her home. She says small stones are being thrown at her, the curtains round her bed are moving and her bedclothes are being pulled off. She also says when she gets out of bed her bedclothes keep being arranged to look like a corpse. At one stage there’s a cat which wanders into the house and they kill it and throw it outside but when they look later on they can’t find its body. There would have been lots of wolves in Ireland at that time so no surprise there. She loses things including a religious book which she then claims is handed back to her by an apparition of a small boy.

After her death her niece, a girl of about 18 called Mary Dunbar, arrives from County Down and starts to experience the same thing. She says her clothes are thrown around the room, she finds an apron which had been apparently locked in a cupboard tied up with strange knots. She says when she unties the knots she finds Ann Hattridges cap wrapped inside which she says disappears and then reappears. She starts convulsing, she is struck with pains and she says a woman with a dirty face appears at the end of her bed and says, “how do you do Mary Dunbar?” She also says she sees several women from Islandmagee whilst she is having these fits including two women called Janet Mean and Janet Carson but she says she’s not saying any more or else they’ll kill her. Janet Carson's daughter hears about her mother being accused of being a witch so she goes to the local Presbyterian minister. He tells her she’d better tell her mother and then he goes to Mary Dunbars house. Janet Carson then appears at the house, presumably to ask what the hell is going on, and Mary Dunbar apparently has to be held down in the bed. She says she knows who Janet Carson is even though she’s never seen her before. Mary then describes a mother and daughter who were both lame and the people in the neighbourhood decide that’s Janet Liston and Elizabeth Sellor. There are already rumours that these women are witches, presumably because of their disabilities. About thirty different women, including Janet and Elizabeth are brought into Mary Dunbars room and she says its definitely them.

They are taken into a separate room and asked to recite the Lords Prayer which they can’t. A few days later Mary Dunbar says a woman called Catherine is now one of her tormentors and they find a woman in Islandmagee called Catherine McCalmond who is described as an “ignorant, irreligious woman”. Again, Mary Dunbar starts to fit when Catherine is brought into her room. Later that day she claims to see a woman called Kitty along with Janet Liston, Janet Main and Janet Latimer (maybe she just didn’t like women called Janet) and the next morning the Mayor of Carrickfergus, a man called Edward Clements, decides to arrest the four women at 10AM. There are two ministers sitting with Mary Dunbar at the time of the arrests and they claim to see something moving along the floor that is larger than a mouse (a rat maybe?!). For reasons unknown, Janet Carson and Catherine McCalmond are brought to Mary Dunbars house after their arrest and when Mary sees them she takes another fit.

The ministers ask her does she see anyone else and she says one called Main and one called Latimer. Theres a woman called Janet Main who lives in Broad Island (now Templecorran or Ballycarry) and she is described as being marked with smallpox and having a mark upon her breast. They find another woman who lives in Carrickfergus called Janet Latimer who is described as being very ill coloured and they decide these are the two women Mary Dunbar was talking about. They bring them both to the house and when Mary Dunbar sees Janet Latimer she says she recognises her and when she sees Janet Main she takes another fit. Again, both women are taken into another room to say the Lords Prayer which they do but apparently ‘confusedly”.

The next day they ask Mary Dunbar to go to the meeting house which she does. She has more fits here and claims to see a one-eyed woman with a red face and reddish coloured hair. So, they start to round up red-haired one-eyed women and bring them in but Mary Dunbar says it's none of them. Then Edward Clements, the Mayor comes to examine her and asks her if the six women in custody are her tormentors and she says yes. So, he asks why she got Janet Liston mixed up and call her Elizabeth and Mary says they told her that they would destroy her so she got confused.  She then decides this mystery red-haired one-eyed woman is called “Mrs Ann” and someone tells them there’s a woman who fits that description in Carrickfergus. So off they go and they find a woman who sort of fits the description walking down a street in Carrickfergus smoking a pipe only annoyingly she has brown hair. Nevertheless, they start accusing her of being a witch and she starts shouting and swearing so of course they decide she’s the woman! Another slight problem is that she’s also called Janet! So, Janet Miller as this woman is called is taken to see Mary Dunbar and Mary says yes that’s her so Janet Miller is then arrested and thrown in jail with the other Janets and Elizabeth Sellor. Mary Dunbar says during one of her fits Janet Miller turns into a spider and John Getty, a Merchant from Larne who is with Mary Dunbar (I have no idea why!) says he saw a spider but when he tried to catch the spider he couldn’t (hello late summer in Ireland where we have massive spiders!)

She seems to fixate on ‘Mrs Ann’ for the next few days and then she starts to vomit all sorts of weird things such as horsehair, feathers, pins, wool, all which she claims ‘Mrs Ann’ has put down her throat. She then decides that Mrs Ann is middle aged and Janet Miller doesn’t quite fit the bill so off the men go again looking for the red-haired one-eyed woman and they find Margaret Mitchell in Kilroot just outside Carrickfergus. They bring her to see Mary Dunbar who is again with the fits and the yes definitely her. She starts vomiting more feathers and buttons, which it turns out belonged to the ministers waistcoat but she says Margaret Mitchell now put them in her mouth so Margaret Mitchell is arrested and put in jail with all the Janets. Mary Dunbar continues to vomit all sorts of things over the next few days; knotted linen thread, more feathers, pins before she is taken to Carrickfergus for the trial of these women. On the way there she has more fits and decides these are now being caused by a man with light brown and grey hair, an old woman with smallpox and a girl of about 20. They decide this is William Sellor and his wife and daughter. William hears about this and takes off but he hands himself in a few days later. He is brought to Mary but has no effect on her until a few days later she decides that he has appeared to her with a knife. He is arrested, tried and found guilty. Interestingly Mary Dunbar was unable to testify as she claimed to have been robbed of speech just before William Sellors trial.

Mary Dunbar died a month after the initial trial so William Sellor was probably executed by hanging making him one of only two people put to death in Ireland under the Witchcraft Act and history doesn’t record what happened to the eight women who were accused of witchcraft in 1711 but they presumably served their one-year sentences before being released from prison.

In 2022 there was a plaque unveiled in Islandmagee to commemorate these eight women and one man who were convicted of witchcraft in 1711.

So, what have we learned?

Witches come mostly from County Antrim

Don’t upset anyone called Janet.

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