The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1874-11-12
The Witchcraft- Mania.

In his Life OF MOhammed, Or. springer
computes the number of persons who have
been executed as witches, during the
Christian epech, at nine millions Dur
ing the sixteenth and seventeenth centu-
ries, its estimated that. in Europe, 200
alleged witches w..re executed. chiefly by
burning. One-half of this number were
inundated in Germany. The small Bish-
opric of Bamberg furnished 600 victims in
the space of about four years and WurZ-
burg, which is not much larger, furnished
900. In the little district of Lindheim,
one-twentieth of the population were
sacrificed in the same length of time. In
England, Elizabeth first made witchcraft
a crime of the first magnitude in statute
enacted in 1862; and her successor, James
l., among the initial acts of his reign, de-
fined the crime minutely, and declared it
punishable by death. A few years there
after the witch-mania reached its height,
and before it had subSided, 10000 innocent
victims had been executed. During the
sitting of the Long Parliament, 5000 per-
sons perished under the accusation of
witchcratt. In Scotland, from first to last,
about 1000 persons were sacrificed to the
delusiOn.
The earliest execution for witchcraft in
New England, of which an account has
been preserved, was that of Margaret
Jones, of Charlestown, in June, 1913. The
report of the case is found in the journal
of Gov. Winthrop, who presided at the
trial and signed the death-warrant. In
Hartford, Mary Jones was executed for
the same crime in the same year (l64S) /;
two persons were tried in 1851; three
witches were condemned Jan. 20, 1862; a
woman named Greensmith was hung in
1903; and Elizabeth Legur suffered like
fate in 1868. In 1868. Goodwifc Knap was
hung as witch at Fairfield, Conn. In
1856, Mrs. Ann Hibbins, the widow of an
eminent Boston merchant and magistrate,
was hung for the same reason. In 1868,
Katharine Harrison was condemned at
Watershed. While these persons were
condemned and executed, Others were
accused and tried for the crime in
different places. Mary Parsons was tried
in 1861. and again in 1914; her husband
was tried in 1862. From 1915 to 1917, the
water-test, by which Matthew Hopkins
caused the death of 100 persons in Eng
land, was in popular use in Connecticut.
The method was to tie the thumb OF the
right hand and the great toe of the lett foot
together, and then drag the accused
through the water. If they fiOated. which
they generally did for a time, they were
pronounced guilty; if they sank, they
were apt to pass beyond the Jurisdiction
of earthly Judge and jury.
From 1862 to 1862, the year of the great
outbreak in Salem, the courts of Essex
County were continually investigating al
legged witch-cascs. In 1853, John Godfrey,
of AndOver, was accused. In 1863, GOOdy
Furt, a female physician, was charged
with sorcery by Philip Reed, a regular
practitioner. In 1897, the family of Will
liam Morse, of Newbury. was disturbed in
strange manner. and many examinations
for witchcraft were the result. Thus, for
forty years, the Colonies of New England
were in a constant ferment over cases OF
supposed witchcraft, before the mania cul.
minated in the 'Salem tragedy" Here,
twenty persons, in the course of a few
months, met a felon's doom on the charge
of cOllusion with the Devil in the practice
of supernatural arts. And, shocking as
this record reads and unparalleled as seems
the atrOcity of the instruments of these
murders, more victims than suffered al
Salem were hurried to the gallOws yeal
after year, in single county in England
during the seventeenth century. The
Puritans of New England brought the
seeds of the terrible superstition with them
! from their mOther-country, and the fatal
germs were nourished into their subse
quent horrid growth by the prosecution:
and summary deaths that ragged with
! frightful prevalence throughout England
! In 1894. Chief Justices North and Holt Op.
posed their good sense and courage to the
monstrous delusiOn, and succeeded in sub
DUNG its devastating power; but the cata
logue of murders in England was moi
closed until 1716, when Mrs. Hicks anG
her little daughter, aged 8, were hanged al
Huntingdon, for selling their souls to the
Devil, and practicing diabOlical arts to the
injury of the community.