Hysteria: The Indiscriminate Violence Of Witch Finder Britain | Century Of Murder | Chronicle

this channel is part of the history hit Network [Music] s 400 years ago you will be hanged by the neck until you are dead Mass trials and executions erupted across the country for this chaos and violence was witches people were convinced they sank ships brought famine and disease murdered and maimed because witches were for Satan hundreds of innocent people were persecuted thou witch tortured and put to death in a hysterical effort to Stamp Out the scourge of witchcraft imagine living in that world you could be accused tortured and executed on the basis of nothing more than gossip and superstition [Music] how could such a deadly and violent idea have got so out of control in Britain what drove the persecutors to such awful lengths and what was it like for the victims who were tortured and executed for crimes they couldn't possibly have committed come behind me this is the extraordinary story of how the terror of satanic witchcraft infected the British Isles and plunged it into chaos [Music] foreign [Music] ships had been battered by a violent storm chip sank and almost capsized the badly damaged Convoy had limped back to Scandinavia King James decided he would have to go and fetch his new wife himself but James would bring back far more than just a new Queen from Denmark [Music] James arrived here at cromberg Castle near Copenhagen in January 1590. Crossing had been equally violent the world James walked into was very different to his native Scotland hysteria was infecting Mainland Europe [Music] hundreds had already been executed as witches tens of thousands would follow the violence fear and hysteria spreading across Europe were largely the result of one incendiary book here at the Royal Danish library is one of the very few original copies this is the malleus maleficorum or the Hammer of the witches it was principally written by one German Dominican monk called Heinrich Kramer and he wrote it to argue The Witches existed and that they worked for the devil it was a legal manual for the hunting and executing of witches the mallius maleficaram pushed Grandma's terrifying belief that witches were obsessed with poisoning maiming and killing and they were doing it for Satan the aim was to harm to murder and to destroy and if witches were the problem the malleus was the answer it was a hugely influential book and one of the reasons it was so influential is printed at the front this is a Papal ball the Pope's equivalent of a Royal Proclamation it was issued in 1484 just before the malleus was published and it stated that witches were Heretics who had made an alliance with the Devil Kramer reprinted the ball to prove that the church stood behind his book because it appeared to have the church's backing the malliest man of the Quorum led to the wholesale torture and murder of thousands of people suspected of being in League with the Devil [Applause] exclusive history documentaries covering some of the most famous people and events in history just for you with familiar faces such as Dan Jones and Dr Eleanor yanega we've got hundreds of documentaries covering the greatest figures and events of medieval history we're committed to Bringing history fans award-winning documentaries and podcasts that you cannot find anywhere else sign up now for a free trial and Chronicle fans get 50 off their first three months just be sure to use the code Chronicle at checkout this idea that witches were the devil's handmaidens hell bent on death and Chaos hadn't yet reached James's Kingdom but in Denmark he came face to face with the reality of Satan's witches in April 1590 while James was still at Kronberg Castle Two Witches were arrested in Copenhagen and what was truly shocking was the that they confess to Conjuring up the violent storms that had hit James and Anne's ships they had attempted to murder the Scottish king and queen because Satan wanted them dead at least five more witches were later convicted of the same crime all were burned at the stake [Music] but if James thought he'd left the scourge of Witchcraft behind him when he returned to Scotland he was wrong with the Danish witches dead the whole thing might have become nothing more than a historical footnote and James might have lived out his Reign untroubled by the devil if it were not for one man his name was David Seaton and he was the deputy bailiff here in the small town of trenent nine miles east of Edinburgh what Seton did in November 1590 proved to James that the devil and his witches were alive and well in Scotland he claimed his young housemate Gillis Duncan had suddenly acquired healing powers and he'd seen her slipping out at night according to a contemporary Source Satan believed only one thing could explain her furtive Behavior and he was going to prove it [Music] where have you been I was tent into the gardens are lied to me about a witch please [Music] the story of Seton and Gillis is recorded in this pamphlet first published in 1591 it's called news from Scotland and it tells us exactly what Seton did next her master did with the help of others torment her with the torture of the pillow inks pillowwinks are thumb screws they crashed the Flesh and Bones of the fingers victims were often left permanently crippled are you a witch no no where'd you get the power to heal it's not magic sir Gillis must have endured unbearable pain but she would not confess to something that she had not done Seton didn't stop at thumb screws good where'd you go at night tell me the truth I won't stand any more of your lies he turned instead to wrenching [Music] as the Rope was pulled tight IT crushed the head fracture the skull and facial bones Gillis would not yield but the more she resisted confessing the harder Satan tried to break her confess damn you I don't think seton's actions had much to do with witch hunting I think his motives were sexual perhaps he'd lost it after her for a long time and felt that as Master he had a right to have her doesn't take a huge leap to imagine that a young woman is sneaking out at night might have been having a sexual liaison with someone other than Seton whatever was driving him I don't think that Satan could possibly have appreciated the death and suffering that would result from his obsession in Europe King James VI had seen that witches working for the devil had been hell-bent on killing him [Music] he was about to receive proof that this dangerous belief was infecting Scotland too the truth the man responsible was bailiff David Seton he was systematically brutalizing and torturing his housemate Gillis Duncan to make her confess to being a witch but Gillis would not yield Seton began to search her body because people believed the devil always left a mark on the bodies of his disciples it could be anything a birthmark Seton found what he was looking for on gillis's neck and for some reason this is what broke her and with the enticements of the Devil Himself I wrote to the town where a witch was received in service of the devil I danced in the rank with the others we'll never know why Gallas confessed now after she'd resisted thumb screws and wrenching perhaps the Mark was from a sexual liaison and in this highly religious time she felt too much shame and guilt gillis's confession had a seismic impact it was the first recorded incident of a Scottish witch admitting to working for the devil it's set and train a sequence of events that would kill hundreds of people [Applause] the repercussions would last a hundred years [Applause] [Music] in November 1590 gelas Duncan was brought here to the old Tollbooth prison one of edinburgh's most notorious jails the old prison no longer stands but what does remain is The Stone Heart of Midlothian that was at the doorway Gillis would have walked over this heart as she entered her period of incarceration [Music] being part of a coven she gave up the names of eight other witches they in turn named more in total over a hundred people were hunted down and tortured this racer Stakes enormously it was no longer an isolated case of Witchcraft it was now a conspiracy of witches [Music] under torture Gillis said that her coven had been in League with witches from Copenhagen the ones who'd been executed for attempting to Murder King James and his Queen this was Dynamite it changed everything it got the king's full attention [Music] and he did something almost unheard of became directly involved in the case foreign the person who had the most profound effect on King James was one of those named by Gillis Duncan a woman called Agnes Sampson Agnes was a midwife from Edinburgh she was accused of being the most senior witch in the coven and under torture she too confessed to the attempted murder of King James Agnes Sampson was taken down there to Hollywood house James VI official residence not once but twice to be directly interrogated by the king himself [Music] Agnes repeated the confession that had been beaten out of her in jail that her coven had met with the Devil we met in the Kirk at North Berwick the plan was to raise a storm for staying of the Queen's coming home he told me at the michelma storm and it would be great damage both at sea and land he said it should be hard for the king to come home the queen should never come James saw himself as a highly intellectual King he read widely and was fascinated by both natural philosophy and the new ideas of rational investigation Agnes's confession did not convince him she's not but a liar according to James Agnes repeated Pillow Talk between the king and his new bride on their wedding night when they were alone this was enough to convince him that Agnes must be a witch it certainly sounded like magic but whatever James may have believed in reality there was little privacy for a 16th century King even in bed possibly a juicy piece of Gossip escaped the palace or maybe the experienced Midwife simply made an educated guess but that leaves one big question why did Agnes go to Such Great Lengths in order to seal her own fate possibly the slowly woman enjoyed her moment in the Limelight she had a chance to meet the king and maybe even scare him but I think there may be a simpler explanation it ended her torture Agnes had been in prison in one of the worst jails in Scotland she had been tortured and she probably knew that this marked effectively the end of her life so the best that she could hope for was to ease her suffering and in that at least she was successful James ordered that her torture should cease foreign there was now clear evidence that an international satanic conspiracy was out to kill him and there was only one way to stop them kill them first on the 28th of January 1591 Agnes Sampson was brought here to Castle Hill in Edinburgh to be executed we don't know how many other convicted witches were with her that day we do know that she wasn't alone these were innocent confused and terrified people people who had been imprisoned and tortured people who had been prepared to say anything to stop the pain [Music] all the victims were probably garotted before the fires were lit it was considered Mercy and compared to burning to death it probably was [Music] [Music] as the convicted witches burned the air would have been thick with a stench of burning human fat it would have seeped into the crowd's hair their clothes even the porous walls of the surrounding buildings 200 people had been accused around 70 had been found guilty of Witchcraft and sentenced to death [Music] Gillis Duncan the young housemaid who started it all rotted in prison for a further year before she too was burnt at the stake events became known as the North Berwick witch trials they convinced James that satanic witchcraft threatened his land and his life and the King's personal involvement in the trials gave witch hunting the stamp of Royal approval over the next few years the infections spread across Scotland in East Lothian 62 people were accused 33-5 86 in Aberdeen and eleven in Ross few doubted that the devil and his handmaiden stalked the Earth at least in Scotland until now England had largely escaped the curse of mass witchcraft trials but on the 24th of March 1603 Queen Elizabeth the first died and her cousin James claimed the throne James carried the Witchcraft infection South to England but how it happened was totally unexpected foreign the English had high hopes for their new king he was young male and already had a couple of sons as heirs after 45 years of childless Queen Elizabeth the first it seemed too good to be true but James was an unknown quantity foreign King in an alien land his new subjects wanted to know what their new ruler was like what were his interests what were his beliefs and which way was the wind blowing in this new regime well they had one big clue a book published in London written by James himself [Music] it was called demonology [Music] only book ever written by a reigning monarch on the subject of Witchcraft and the devil James sets out his reason for writing in the preface he says the fearful abounding at this time in this country of these detestable slaves of the devil The Witches or enchanters has moved me beloved reader to dispatch in post this following treaties of mine and the purpose of it he says is to resolve the doubting hearts of many this is pretty unequivocal stuff what he's saying is that there are witches everywhere in Scotland that they are Satan's minions and that everyone better believe it James sets the book out in the form of a dialogue between two characters so we have phylomathies and epistemon pistamon is the thoroughly knowledgeable one the rational man who knows all about witchcraft he's undoubtedly James himself and over the course of the book epistemon convinces Philo matthees that actually witches are real that they should be prosecuted by the correct authorities and that anyone who doubts their existence is at best fooling himself and at worst in League with the Devil [Music] the book was very popular with the English it was republished in London at least twice demonology gave English people an insight into their new king and what they saw was a man hell-bent on hunting down Satan's witches [Music] and in 1605 James once again became involved in a case of witchcraft but this time in England here at Exeter College Oxford the country finally saw their new witch-hunting king taking on the satanic scourge in August a wealthy and well-connected man gained an audience with King James his name was Brian Gunter Gunter had a problem a problem with a witch now I think it's quite likely that Gunter had read James's book demonology and this was enough to convince him that the king would share his hatred of witches Gunter presented his daughter Anne to the king and claimed that she had been cursed by three witches the Affliction first besetter around mid-summer if it's a violent and her body contorts and when she's in the throes she vomits pins or pulls them from her nose a daughter is Bewitched sire seen her tormentors in her fits first is Good Wife Gregory the second is Mary people and the third is Mother pepwell [Music] is this true yes I [Music] Gunter wanted the king to bring the witches to Justice but James did something completely unexpected James ordered that and be examined by the Archbishop of Canterbury and noted skeptic and it didn't take the archbishop's team of investigators long to figure out that Anne was faking the symptoms on the 10th of October King James wrote to his chief minister about the case for your better satisfaction touching and Gunther we find by her confession that she was never possessed with any devil that the practice of the pins grew at first from a pin that she put in her mouth affirmed by her father [Music] Brian Gunter was the brains behind the deception he was seeking revenge against one of the accused and he tried using James to get it he was fined for wasting the king's time and thrown into jail for three years he'd got off comparatively lightly if he'd succeeded the women would have been executed Gunter had entirely misread the new king James's actions in the Gunter case seemed completely at odds with his reputation as a rabid witch hunter so what was really going on I think the answer lies in his book demonology if you read it you're left in no doubt at all that James wholeheartedly believed in Satan and witches but demonology is no malleus maleficarum it's not trying to use fear to whip people up into a frenzy of which hatred it's an opportunity to make a case by rational argument rather than by mere superstition it's designed as much to make sure the wrong people aren't convicted as the right people are James was a philosopher or at least that's how he saw himself subtleties of his bookish ideas were almost certainly lost on most of his subjects like Brian Gunter they probably took demonology at face value a license from the King to hunt witches and kill them this misunderstanding of James's ideas would light a touch paper that over the next hundred years would lead to the worst excesses of witch hunting in English History seven years after the Gunther incident the era of mass Witch Trials exploded in the English courts it began here in Pendle Lancashire on the 18th of March 1612 a girl called Alison device was near the town of cone in Pendle when she spied an elderly Peddler called John Law Sarah Pinter Alison didn't like being ignored cursed The Peddler [Music] from the description of John Law's condition paralysis down the left side loss of speech it seems likely that he'd suffered a stroke but from Alison's terrified point of view it was her curse that had struck him down Alison came from a family of cunning folk local healers who used herbs and sometimes magic to cure people so it would have been natural for her to believe in the power of her curse horrified by what she'd done Alison device confessed she was hauled up in front of local magistrate Roger Knoll [Music] Alison admitted to cursing The Peddler but according to a report made at the time she went much further I demanded that the platnor let me buy some pins from him and the Pedder refused to open his pack as I polish it from there appeared a black dog Black Dog said unto me what what's that have me do onto Yonder man I said what can't style do you want to eat and the black dog said I can lame him and I said [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] Allison accused her grandmother and two neighbors of being witches as well Noel began arresting the suspects named by Alison on the 2nd of April Alison device her grandmother old Dem Dyke their neighbor old chatterx and her daughter Anne Redfern were brought here to Lancaster Castle prison and they were kept in the bottom of this Tower it's still known as The Witch's Tower to this day [Music] we're interrogated eight further suspects including all of Alison's family joined them in the tower this is the very cell where they were kept and along with the 12 suspected witches there are another eight we know prisoners who were unrelated to the witch trial so that's 20 people in this space it must be 12 foot by 17 18 foot quite something to imagine that the suspected witches just ordinary people were kept in here for four months and some of them were very old they're in the 80s others people like Alison were as a teenager and they were in here in the dark for all that time awaiting their death Noel probably couldn't believe his luck a rural magistrate lived a humdrum life with few opportunities now no found himself heading up a high-profile Witch Hunt if he secured convictions this could make his career but that was easier said than done of all the cases that made it to court three quarters failed due to lack of evidence all no had were accusations and counter accusations what he needed was proof can't stop you and it was King James who inadvertently gave it to him era of mass witch hunting in England led to the torture and murder of hundreds of people it All Began here on the 17th of August 1612 with the prosecution of the Pendle witches one of the most infamous witch trials in English History this is the site of the original courtroom in Lancaster castle where the Pendle witches were tried although it's now a library the courtroom has only shifted a few feet just through here the courtroom was a hive of activity packed the public gallery to see The Sensational trial the judge was Sir Edward Bromley Roger Knoll was the prosecuting Magistrate a guilty verdict could be a huge boost to his career Thomas Potts was the court clerk and we know the detail of this trial because he later published his records in this book over the next two days 19 suspects stood trial accused of using witchcraft to harm or kill this should have been 20 but Alison's grandmother old demdike had already died in that cramped and stinking cell in the witch's Tower I demanded that The Peddler let me buy a pin off him but the Petra refused unfortunately Alison device felt such remorse for cursing The Peddler that she didn't even try to defend herself oh I said laying him she repeated her confession and was quickly found guilty the next to take the stand was Alison's Mother Elizabeth device you are accused The Good Friday passed you dined a mocking Tower with persons you knew to be witches at your meeting together you talked about killing the constable and blowing up Lancaster Castle I deny any such meeting ought or your spirit ball did appear to you in the form of a black dog Apple said Spirit bid you to make a picture in clay after the said John Robinson which you then did birming with fire and crumble that is not true the case was deadlocked between accusation and denial but Roger Knoll had a secret weapon [Music] Elizabeth devices own daughter nine-year-old Janet my mother is a witch cause on you because on you what do you say why are you saying this you stupid girl do you not know what you do shut up girl shut up silence knows that demon will come for thou and ravage thy mind I will snuff have thy children with my own fans silence I cannot speak with my mother here take her out [Music] [Music] the testimony of a child would not normally be allowed under English law James's book demonology promoted its use in Witch Trials and because of that Janet's confession was accepted and the fate of the witches were sealed my mother is a witch and that I know to be true I've seen a spirit many times in the likeness of a brown dog that she called ball and at one time I did see your last mother what she would have him to do mother answered that she would have bought to help her kill ER [Music] little Janet named names [Music] the wife of Hugh Hargreaves Christopher Howell Gates Elizabeth's wife dick miles and his wife for iax of the thorny home and his wife and my brother James devise has been a witch for three years we'll never know why Janet testified against her own family maybe she thought they really were witches maybe she liked being the center of attention or maybe given the way that her mother shouted at her and threatened her in court she was badly treated and she thought that this was an escape but I suspect the nine-year-old didn't understand the full consequences of what she said and maybe Noel bullied and brainwashed her into saying what she did just as Brian Gunter had done at the end of a two-day trial ten of the 19 accused were found guilty of witchcraft Janet's entire family was convicted [Music] grounds for this country where you will be hanged by the neck until you are dead God have mercy upon your souls [Music] on the 20th of August the day after the trial the ten convicted witches were brought here to a place still known as Gallows Hill to be hanged [Music] thank you perhaps under similarly Grim Skies the crowds would have gathered to see the spectacle to see the old unloved despised witches meet their fate and maybe amongst them there would have been the young girl who had condemned her family her own mother to meet the rough rope and the short drop [Applause] it was a gruesome form of execution the drop wasn't high enough to break their necks instead they died by agonizingly slow strangulation [Music] peers from the historical records after the trial but the name Janet device is listed as one of a group of 20 witches tried in Lancaster 22 years later it appears that she was convicted and probably died in jail we can't be sure if it was the same girl but it would be a cruel form of poetic justice if it was the Pendle trials were a water shed they triggered a hundred years of institutionalized murder in England and the blame for that must lie at least partly with King James his book demonology sanctioned forms of evidence and torture that drove the worst excesses of witch hunting he would have been mortified Pendle was everything the rational James disliked a case based on hearsay manipulation and Petty jealousies rather than based on scripture evidence and due process of law James news is terrible a thing to condemn the innocent as to let the guilty go unpunished and he'd written demonology as a manual to prevent precisely that but James failed to grasp how other people would see a book written by the King on the prosecution of witches and over the next 50 years or so this misjudgment would lead to hundreds of innocent people being sentenced to death next time witch hunting brings Terror to England not just of witches but of the man who was hunting them down welcome to the world of the witchfinder general tell me the truth foreign this is a sleepy Village of Manning Tree on the river stower in Essex in 1645 something apparently trivial happened here the grew to engulf this corner of England in a frenzy of paranoia that would leave more than a hundred innocent people dead it all started with a sick woman she was the wife of local Taylor John rivet on March 21st 1645 rivet petitioned two magistrates who were visiting Manning tree he believed they could save her my wife has been struck down by an all-consuming fever that threatens her life the first she complained of dizziness and nausea but now she is confined to her bed her body flushed hot and cold her senses dulled this is something more than merely natural my wife is Bewitched this whole time this was a completely rational explanation witches were as real to them as the ground beneath their feet and the sun above their heads they believed the devil made a pact with sealed by sex [Music] and that the devil gave witches Supernatural powers to maim and to kill people were terrified of them in the 17th century life was often nasty brutish and short everyone was looking for someone to blame when things went wrong so it makes sense that a person like John rivet grasped witchcraft as an explanation for his wife's otherwise inexplicable illness my wife is Bewitched by Elizabeth Clark Elizabeth Clark was well known around Manning tree she was around 80 years old she was a widow she was poor and she had only one leg she was also famously cantankerous much given to cursing with a quick temper she wasn't well liked [Music] rivet wanted Elizabeth convicted and executed save his wife but even in the 17th century accusations alone were not grounds for arrest and so it might have ended there if it hadn't been for one man local landowner John Stern we have evidence to support young rivets clay Stern carried eyewitness statements that would transform this from a minor local incident into a catastrophe in the statements locals said Elizabeth Clark had not only refused to deny being a witch should also claim to know plenty of other witches so they'd better watch their tongues Stern's eyewitness accounts changed everything the magistrates gave Stern a warrant to investigate the claims it backed him with the full weight of the law he could use anything short of torture to question Elizabeth Clark and any other suspected witches living in Essex essentially they'd given Stern a man with no legal status at all freelance license to hunt down witches it was this warrant that started the most brutal Witch Hunt in English History but it wasn't Stern who would drive it it was a young man standing quietly at the back of the room his name was Matthew Hopkins Matthew Hopkins was born in the 1620s though don't know exactly what year what we do know is that his father was a strict Puritan preacher from an early age Matthew would have been immersed in his father's faith he was brought up to believe that it wasn't enough just to Believe In Christ he also needed to demonstrate his faith through public Acts and in that Manning tree meeting room Hopkins saw an opportunity to do just that Hopkins offered to help Stern investigate Elizabeth Clark but proving her guilty would not be easy King Charles the first had suppressed witch hunting by requiring extremely demanding standards of evidence in the last 20 years very few witches had been convicted but Charles was now losing control and Civil War had broken out this violent chaos came as no surprise to the Puritans who dominated East Anglia they were expecting it they believed it signaled the end days before the apocalypse when the devil would walk the earth so finding witches living amongst them was exactly what they had anticipated collision between the terrifying chaos of war and rigid Puritan beliefs created the perfect conditions for witch hunting so Hopkins opportunistic approach to stern was perfectly timed Stern accepted his help [Music] Hopkins was on his way to launching the most brutal witch humps in English History foreign [Applause] [Music] Hopkins and John Stern two men with no legal training whatsoever had been given a warrant to interrogate suspected witch Elizabeth Clarke on Friday the 21st of March 1645 a group of women chosen by Hopkins and Stern went to Elizabeth's Cottage get her [Music] the women stripped and searched her looking for the devil's mark people believed that the pact between the devil and the witch was consummated with sex he would then Mark her body the devil often concealed these marks Beneath The Witch's body hair Searchers would do whatever it took to find it [Music] a devil's Mark could be any skin blemish a mole even an age spot so the chance of finding something on an elderly woman was pretty high [Music] this was an appalling level of casual brutality imagine the shame and humiliation for Elizabeth Clark remember we're talking about an old and disabled woman as a widow she didn't even have the protection of a husband but the mark alone wasn't enough to be certain of a conviction they needed Elizabeth to confess Hopkins and Stearns warrant restricted them to operating within the law which excluded torture so to get what they needed they would have to be creative Elizabeth Clark was tied to a chair and deprived of sleep wake up old woman in the 17th century sleep deprivation by the thinnest of margins was legal are you a witch no not I [Music] Hopkins henchmen worked on Elizabeth in shifts keeping her awake for three days and nights but Elizabeth Clark must have been tough as old boots still would not confess on the third day Hopkins and Stern paid her a visit it was the first time Hopkins had come face to face with Elizabeth I'm your Confessor what sins have you committed in his name continue [Music] Hopkins was never going to give up [Music] stop please stop foreign talk then old woman in what form did the devil come to you he was a tall proper black hair gentleman a proper man than you yourself to me three or four times in a week to my bed chamber and go to bed with me imagine the depths of degradation to which Elizabeth had been exposed she'd been brutalized starved and denied water and sleep and although she was clearly made of strong stuff the elderly Widow finally broke that gave her the dubious privilege of becoming Hopkins first victim and what Elizabeth did next doomed many more victims to follow her said that she was part of a coven there were more witches out there for Hopkins to hunt down after torturing Elizabeth Clark Matthew Hopkins and John Stern used her confession to forge new careers for themselves careers that had never previously existed in England they became freelance witch Hunters Hopkins and Stern used the Manning tree warrant to begin hunting down the people Elizabeth Clark had named Elizabeth was arrested in March six more arrests followed in April by June as Hopkins and Stern hit their stride the number had swollen to at least 30. expects were brought here to Colchester Castle and conditions in this jail were appalling the prisoners were Shackled day and night and routinely beaten by the guards there was no light no space no Sanitation by June four prisoners had already died most probably from typhus on the 17th of July 1645 the survivors were herded onto carts Bound for the courts at Chelmsford for many of them it wasn't the first time they'd been arrested for witchcraft but previous cases had been dismissed for lack of evidence perhaps they expected the same result this time if so they reckoned without Matthew Hopkins Zeal he was determined to rid the world of Satan's agents Elizabeth Clark was tried with the first group of suspects Hopkins recorded the details of the case himself how do you please I am innocent at the back Spectators heckled and hissed from the gallery and the judge intervened whenever he saw fit out then into the chaos of the courtroom stepped Matthew Hopkins [Music] Clark was apprehended and searched and found upon her three teeth so upon command from the Justice they kept her from sleep two or three nights immediately after this witch confesses several other witches happening Hopkins have something that recent trials had lacked the confession that he'd extracted from Elizabeth confession of a witch in my judgment is enough to hang a witch [Applause] [Music] and Hopkins had a secret weapon to convict the rest of the coven her name was Rebecca West [Applause] he had singled her out in jail and offered her Freedom if she gave evidence against the others the alternative was conviction and death so unsurprisingly she accepted [Music] we came to the house where there were five witches they commanded their spirits some to kill a man's horse some to lame a cow lay my child Rebecca's testimony sealed the fate of the accused women culpable is so non-cultabilities 15 of the accused including Elizabeth Clark were found guilty and sentenced to death Hopkins was Victorious it was the largest number of convictions in a single witch trial in English History on Friday the 18th of July Elizabeth Clark together with 14 other condemned women was brought here to where the Gallows stood in Chelmsford Market Square Clark had to be helped up to have the news put around her neck because of course she only had one leg foreign was to be poor bad tempered and in the wrong place at the wrong time when Hopkins was launching his career [Applause] execution was by the short drop thank you the victims died slowly of strangulation these deaths made Hopkins reputation to this to transform himself into something new and terrifying Hopkins gave himself a grand new title which finder General he became unrecognizable from the man who had stood quietly at the back of the meeting room in Manning tree this is a contemporary portrait of Hopkins notice what he's wearing he's got a high crowned hat boots spurs and he's carrying a staff he's the very image of a respected country magistrate when someone dressed like this walks into a room people are going to sit up and pay attention but I think it's obvious that Hopkins has dressed himself like this to have the appearance of authority I mean what does a man in his twenties need with a staff except to have the symbol of a rank that he doesn't actually possess [Music] in just four short months Hopkins had become one of the most feared men in eastern England his career was on a meteoric path the previous 20 years just two women had been executed for witchcraft in East Anglia cultivates [Music] Hopkins had now sent 15 to The Gallows in a single day this wasn't just good for God it was good for business because Hopkins received a fee for everyone news of his success at the Chelmsford Witch Trials began to spread Beyond Essex this is All Saints Church in brandiston Suffolk in 1645 the parishioners here published a pamphlet that accused a local man of Witchcraft Hopkins offered to help expose the witch but he had absolutely no legal right to do so Hopkins original permission came from two magistrates in Essex which meant he actually didn't have legal authority to operate in other counties such as Suffolk but Hopkins was clearly feeling very confident and why not not only did he genuinely think that he was doing God's work but also in the chaos of Civil War who exactly was going to stop him this wasn't the only sign of Hopkins grown confidence because the witch he went after in Suffolk wasn't some poor unloved one-legged old Crone it was an ordained clergyman [Music] hello is there somebody there Reverend John Lowe's had been the vicar at brandiston for over 40 years hello but he was so disliked that his parishioners described him as naught but a foul witch tackling such a conspicuous Target was risky for Hopkins no serving clergymen had ever been convicted of Witchcraft in England so in this case more than any other Hopkins simply had to get a result your operation is thinking out but a witch we'll see as ever what Hopkins needed was a confession to extract a confession Hopkins reused the procedure that had worked on Elizabeth Clark sleep deprivation and Hopkins had refined his technique instead of tying John Lewis to a chair he made him run up and down the room every few minutes Lowe's was walked constantly for days [Music] when did you make the pact with the Devil look at this tell me the truth I am your Confessor um no Hopkins had successfully used sleep deprivation many times to get a confession it was the most extreme technique he could legally apply but this time it had failed Hopkins new career was under threat Hopkins had built an entire reputation on getting results when no one else could foreign so he took a momentous step in order to get the results he wanted he would break the law of the land after all in his mind he was doing God's work [Music] foreign Hopkins had a problem he could not get vicar John Lowe's to confess to witchcraft [Music] it threatened to damage his Flawless reputation for success [Music] to win Hopkins would now do absolutely anything including breaking the law on a freezing day in the winter of 1645. Hopkins men dragged vicar John Lowe's half naked and terrified here to the moat at Framingham Castle to try and break loose Hopkins used a technique known as swimming the witch it came highly recommended [Music] James the first had written about it in his book demonology he said that by accepting the devil the witch rejected the sacred Waters of baptism and as a result the water would reject the witch's body and he or she would float if the suspect floated he was a witch and should be executed but if the suspect hadn't rejected the Waters of baptism then he would sink as the waters embraced him and he was proved innocent of course there was also a great chance that he would drown so by the time he arrived here sink or swim John Rhodes was a dead man [Music] whatever James the first may have said about this test it was considered torture and therefore highly illegal but Hopkins believed he could get away with it as long as it got results this decision would come back to haunt him the eight-year-old vicar was bound with ropes and thrown into the ice cold moat it's down partially drowning it must have been a terrifying ordeal [Music] [Music] there's no record of how many times John Lowe's was plunged into the water or we do know is the torture finally broken and sank ships Hopkins was Victorious but there was one thing those would not admit yeah made confident with the Devil oh my familia tried to persuade me to do so [Music] unlike the other accused Lowe's never confessed to making a pact with the Devil he gave Hopkins enough rope to hang him but he never truly broke his Covenant with God he was after all a man of the cloth smire someone who clung to what he believed was right through the appalling sleep deprivation and partial drownings and still would not yield that final inch Hopkins gambled to use torture had paid off and by the time Reverend Lowe's was hauled into court a few months later Hopkins already had 90 other witches on trial on that same day so the old ministers claimed that he'd been tortured had no chance of a fair hearing he was found guilty of being a witch and was sentenced to death in the summer of 1645 as Reverend John Lowe's stood at The Gallows awaiting his death he read his own funeral service [Music] though he were dead [Music] it is shown he had asked to do it himself he probably didn't trust the ungodly people around him [Music] and who could blame him [Music] tomorrow [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Hopkins had now had a sitting vicar convicted and executed he was using interrogation techniques that were expressly banned by law and he was operating in Seven Counties across the south east of England far beyond the legal limits of his original warrant and no one stopped him [Music] and I suspect there's a good reason for that what's really interesting ifkins called himself a witch finder he didn't actually have to find a single witch locals were doing all that for him look at Elizabeth Clark the local community essentially offered her up on a plate she was bad tempered and poor a charity case who was a drain on Village resources and all she offered in return was cursing and swearing and John Lowe's parishioners hated him so much they published a pamphlet denouncing him as a witch how much easier life would be if people like that simply disappeared [Music] to avoid the conclusion that towns and Villages were using the witch hunts as a form of social cleansing and Matthew Hopkins was simply the well-paid instrument of their will by the summer of 1646 Villages and towns across the southeast of England were clamoring for Hopkins help in July he was in Norwich where 20 witches met their end in September he was in Yarmouth where 11 more were tried Hopkins scored more successes at yorkford wesselton and great glenham at its widest his territory now spanned 300 miles Hopkins was now overseeing hundreds of interrogations and attending countless trials and he was receiving a fee for everyone but this success was storing up trouble for the witchfinder [Music] the first warning signs can be found here in the archives of the East Suffolk Records Office [Music] our accounting ledgers from 1645 and 1646. they detail payments made to Hopkins thank you in King's Lynn they pay 15 pounds to Mr Hopkins for interrogating suspected witches and a few weeks later they give him another three pounds for acting as a witness in order we have him paid on a regular basis so we have here on the 8th of September to Mr Hopkins a gratuity for being in town for finding out witches of two pounds he's paid the same amount on the 20th of December and again on the 7th of January and here in stowmarket we have that he's paid 23 pounds in the spring of 1646. Matthew Hopkins may have started out doing God's work but he had turned it into a very lucrative business [Music] and the witchfinder General's fee wasn't the only cost Counts from order bright tell us how much it cost to execute a witch so this reference here says to William Daniel for The Gallows and setting them up one pound and for Henry Lawrence the Roper for seven halters and for making the knots eight Shillings we've got a cost here for the sundry men for watching days and nights over the witches 13 Shillings and temperance in total it adds up to something like 40 pounds which would have been a seventh of the town's yearly income and to pay it the town had to raise a massive additional tax and it seems that this was a pattern that was repeated wherever Hopkins went in short Matthew Hopkins which founder General was starting to hit people where it mattered in their pockets Matthew Hopkins reign of terror was about to come crashing down around him [Music] Matthew Hopkins career as a freelance witch hunter had been a spectacular success I'm your Confessor in just two years he'd been responsible for the torture and execution of hundreds of accused witches [Music] but this success would ultimately bring him down [Music] it wasn't the killing they minded it was the cost at brandiston in Suffolk for example parishnas refused to pay for the execution of their own vicar John Lowe's people with serious objections to the witchfinder's cruel methods now joined the growing chorus of opposition against him one man in particular would go to any lengths to bring him down was a Puritan preacher here in the village of great Staunton he hated everything that Matthew Hopkins stood for and when he heard that the witch finder General was planning to come to his Parish he began to preach openly against him foreign [Music] ER is exceedingly doubtful a trade that was not taken up in England till this time it was risky for a lowly priest to take on the Superstar status of Hopkins but Gaul was too angry to care he discovers what he accused Hopkins of incompetence and self-interest [Music] Hopkins response to ghoul's sermons was to go on the attack [Music] he wrote to one of Gore's parishioners warning of the consequences of disagreeing with him on the matter of witches he writes I have known a minister in Suffolk preaches much against their Discovery In a Pulpit and forced to recant it in the same place this letter was a thinly Veiled Threat [Music] reminding Reverend Gaul that he'd already sent one vicar John Lowe's to The Gallows he could easily do it again Prince was being overconfident confident Gore wasn't this is a copy of the book that jungle wrote It's called select cases of conscience touching witches and Witchcraft and in it he says that Hopkins is just choosing easy targets he says every old woman with a wrinkled face a furrowed brow a hairy lip a gobber tooth a squint eye a squeaking Voice or a scolding tongue and a dog or cat by her side is not only suspected but pronounced for a witch Gore went on to say that Hopkins had Luca tree skill which is to say the whole thing was a money-making scheme that the witchfinder had no special skill or ability and was a job that Hopkins had simply invented it was a pretty damning attack when gaul's book was published it caught the attention of a group of influential Norfolk gentlemen when they read it they were outraged in Spring 1647 they went into open court in Norwich to present their objections to visiting Westminster judges Hopkins abusive techniques and his Cavalier attitude to the law would be his undoing they must be tortured to make them say anything which is a way to tame a wild cult besides this unnatural watching they were extraordinarily warped till their feet were blistered and so through that cruelty forced to confess who's wisest course of action would probably have been to ignore the accusations but they had thrown down a gauntlet and Hopkins picked it up he printed the accusations in a pamphlet alongside his defense it was a disastrous mistake this is an original copy of Matthew Hopkins pamphlet it's called the discovery of witches and in it he prints the allegations made by the Norfolk gentleman against him alongside his responses this one says all that the witch finder doth is to fleece the country of their money therefore he wrote goes to towns to have employment promises them Fair promises but it may be doth nothing for it Hopkins denies everything I demand for 20 Shillings a town and that is the great sum it takes me to maintain a company with three horses we know from the surviving Financial records that Hopkins was lying he was routinely paid far more than 20 Shillings but the most astonishing thing about this book is that he reprints accusations of a legal torture there have been an abominable inhumane and unmerciful trial of these poor creatures by tying them and heaving them into the water a trial not allowable by law or conscience and I would feign no the reasons for that Hopkins Justified his use of torture by quoting King James's book demonology King James in his demonology Seth it is a certain rule for saith he witches deny their baptism when they Covenant with the Devil so Hopkins justification was that James a king who'd been dead for 22 years had once approved of swimming witches this was no kind of legal defense [Music] to appreciate the danger of publicizing the accusations of illegal torture and of fleecing the public demand for his skills evaporated the witchfinder general had hunted his last witch we'll never know if Hopkins would have ended up in court for breaking the law because fate intervened first on Thursday the 12th of August 1647 [Music] in the village where his spectacularly bloody career began barely two years earlier [Music] Hopkins died most probably of tuberculosis [Music] in his short career he'd been responsible for the death of over a hundred innocent people [Music] [Applause] perhaps Hopkins truly believed he was doing God's work but he was also a ruthless opportunist who used the persecution suffering and death of innocent people to make his name and Fortune the hatred and hysterical fear of witches that he kindled was not easily extinguished over the next hundred years more than 500 innocent people were arrested tried and hanged in the British Isles as witches [Applause] Hopkins malign influence even crossed the Atlantic a trial 45 years after his death advocated the course that hath been taken in England for the discovery of witches Hopkins had found new admirers in a small East Coast Town in the Americas it was called Salem the 20 witches executed there added to Hopkins Legacy of suffering and death

Channel: Chronicle - Medieval History Documentaries

Views: 547,259

Keywords: 17th century, Chronicle - Medieval History Documentaries, british isles, century of murder, cultural anthropology, educational content, execution methods, fascinating history, folklore, historical documentary, historical investigation, history channel, mass hysteria, medieval society, mysterious past, persecution history, satanism, social panic, supernatural beliefs, witch finder general, witch hunts

Id: Rpic8sIh2JM

Length: 87min 46sec (5266 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 11 2023