In the spring of 1645 several witches were seized at Manningtree in
England and were subsequently condemned and hanged. One of these was
an old woman named Elizabeth Clarke, and the most important witness
against her was “Matthew Hopkins, of Manningtree, gent.” It appears
that Hopkins had watched with her several nights in a room in the house
of a Mr. Edwards in which she was confined, to keep her from sleeping
until she made a confession, and to see if she was visited by her
familiars. He declared, among other things, that on the night of the
24th of March, which appears to have been the third night of watching,
after he had refused to let her call one of her imps or familiars, she
confessed that six or seven years before, she had surrendered herself
to the devil, who came to her in the form of “a proper gentleman, with
a laced band.” Soon after this a little dog appeared, fat and short
in the legs, in color white, with sandy spots, which when he hindered
it from approaching her, vanished from his sight. She confessed that
it was one of her imps named Janiara. Immediately after this had
disappeared, another came in the form of a greyhound, which she called
Vinegar Tom; and it was followed by another in the form of a polecat.
“And this informant further saith, that going from the house of the
said Mr. Edwards to his own house, about nine or ten o’clock of the
night with his greyhound with him, he saw the greyhound suddenly give
a jump, and run as if she had been in full course after a hare; and
that when the informant made haste to see what his greyhound so eagerly
pursued, he espied a white thing about the size of a kitten, and the
greyhound standing aloof from it; and that, by-and-by, the said white
imp or kitten danced about the said greyhound and by all likelihood bit
a piece of the flesh of her shoulder, for the greyhound came shrieking
and crying to this informant with a piece of the flesh torn from her
shoulder. And this informant further saith that coming into his own
yard that night, he espied a black thing porportioned like a cat, only
it was thrice as big, sitting on a strawberry bed, and fixing its eyes
on this informant; and when he went toward it, it leaped over the pale
toward this informant, as he thought, but ran quite through the yard
with his greyhound after it to a great gate which was underset with a
pair of turnbull-strings, and did throw the said gate wide open, and
then vanished; and the said greyhound returned again to this informant
shaking and trembling exceedingly.” Hopkins had not ventured to remain
alone with the witch, but had with him John Stern, who also added
“gentleman” to his name, and who confirmed all that Hopkins had said,
deposed to the coming of imps and added that the third imp was called
Sack-and-Sugar. They watched at night with another woman, named Rebecca
West, and saw her imps in the same manner. She stated that the first
time she saw Satan he came to her at night, and told her he must be her
husband, and married her. The severe treatment to which the accused
were exposed, forced confessions from them all, and they avowed being
guilty of every species of mischief, from the taking away of human
life to the spoiling of milk. The names and forms of their imps were
equally fantastic. Rebecca Jones, a witch from St. Osythe’s, said that
she had met a man in a ragged suit with great eyes, that terrified her
exceedingly, and that he gave her three things like moles but without
tails, which she fed with milk. Another had an imp in the form of
a white dog, which she called Elimanzer, and which she fed on milk
pottage. One had three imps, which she called Prick-ear, Jack and Frog.
Several witnesses, poor and ignorant people, were brought to testify to
the mischief which had been done by these means. A countryman gravely
related how, passing at day by the house of one of the women, named
Anne West, he was surprised to find her door open at that early hour,
and looking in he saw three or four things like black rabbits, one of
which ran after him. He seized upon it, and tried to kill it, but it
seemed in his hands like a piece of wool, and stretched out in length
as he pulled it without any apparent injury. Then recollecting that
there was a spring near at hand, he hurried thither and attempted
to drown it, but it vanished from his sight as soon as he put it in
the water. He then returned toward the house and seeing Anne West
standing outside the door in her smock, he asked why she sent her
imps to torment him. This seems to have been the first appearance of
Matthew Hopkins as a witch-finder, for which he afterwards became
notorious, and which he now assumed as a legal profession. He proceeded
in a regular circuit through Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambrigeshire, and
Huntingdon, accompanied by John Sterne and a woman whose business it
was to examine the bodies of the females in search of their marks. In
August 1645, we find them at Bury, in Suffolk, where, on the 27th of
that month, no less than eighteen witches were executed at once, and a
hundred and twenty more were to have been tried, but a sudden movement
of the king’s troops in that direction obliged the judges to adjourn
the session. Some of the imps here appeared in the shape of snakes,
wasps and hornets, and even of snails. They were mostly employed
in petty offences; one man and his wife were guilty only of having
bewitched the beer in a brewhouse and making it stink. Others however,
confessed to have caused mischief of a more serious character.
The most remarkable victim of this inquisition, was an aged clergyman
named Lowes, who had been vicar of Brandeston, near Framlingham, in
that county fifty years, a well known opponent of the new church
government. This man, we are told by Sterne, one of the inquisitors,
had been indicted for a common imbanatator, and for witchcraft above
thirty years before, and the grand jury found the bill for a common
imbanator, who now, after he was found with the marks, confessed that
in pride of heart to be equal with, or rather above God, the devil
took advantage of him, and he covenanted with the devil and sealed it
with his blood, and had those familiars or spirits, which sucked on
the marks found on his body, and did much harm both by sea and land,
especially by sea, for he confessed he being at Lungarfort, in Suffolk,
where he preached, as he walked upon the wall there, he saw a great
sail of ships pass by, and that, as they were sailing by, one of the
three imps, namely, his yellow one, forthwith appeared to him and asked
him what he should do, and he bade it go and sink such a ship, one
that belonged to Ipswich, so he confessed that the imp went forthwith
away, and he stood still and viewed the ships, and perceived that the
ship to be immediately in more trouble and danger than the rest; for he
said the water was more boisterous near that than the rest, tumbling
up and down with waves, and soon after it sunk directly down into the
sea, when all the rest sailed on in safety; then he confessed, he made
fourteen widows in one quarter of an hour. When asked if it did not
grieve him to see so many men cast away in a short time, he swore by
his Maker, “No; he was joyful to see what power his imps had.” He was
hanged, in 1645, at Bury St. Edmund’s.