Grace Sowerbuts and the Priests122
At the same time and place, namely, “at the Assizes and Generall Gaole-delivery, holden at Lancaster, before Sir Edward Bromley,” old Jennet Bierly, Ellen Bierly her daughter-in-law, and Jane Southworth, were accused by Grace Sowerbuts of bewitching her, so that her “bodie wasted and was consumed.” Grace was fourteen years old—a very ripe time for bewitchment and possession—and her evidence ran that for some years past she had been fearfully tormented by these women, for that “they did violently draw her by the Haire of the Head, and layd her on the toppe of a Hay-mowe;” and that Jennet Bierly appeared to her, first under her own shape and form, then as a black dog, and that as she was going over a style “she picked her off,” but did not hurt her much, for soon she was enabled to rouse herself up, and go on her way without any great damage. But often the women came to her as black dogs, tempting her to cast herself into the water, or dragging her into the hay-loft where they covered her with hay on her head and with straw on her body, they, the black dogs, lying on the top of the straw till they took away all sense and feeling and she knew not where she was; and oft they “carried her where they met black things like men that danced with them and did abuse their bodies, and they brought her to one Thomas Walsham’s House in the Night, and there they killed his Child, by putting a Nail into the Navil, and after took it forth of the Grave, and did boil it, and eat some of it, and made Oyl of the bones; and such like horrid lies,” says honest Webster, indignantly. But fortunately for the three accused, Grace Sowerbuts was a popish pet, and suspected of decided papistical leanings; and it was said that she was put up to all this by one Thomson, a popish priest, whose real name was Southworth, and who was a relation of old Sir John Southworth the great popish lord of the district; to whom also Jane, one of the accused, was a near relative, but a hated enemy, as is often the case—Sir John having been known to ride miles round to avoid passing by her house. Jane Southworth was a Protestant and a convert, therefore likely to receive the protection of public opinion in those parts; likely, too, to be doubly hated by her relative, first for herself, and secondly for her apostacy. So Grace Sowerbuts, an excitable young maid with but a slender regard to truth, was hit upon as the person best fitted to carry confusion into the enemy’s camp, and it was resolved to prove her bewitched by the devilish arts of the two Bierlys and the popish recusant. But Sir Edward Bromley, who cared nothing for the protestations of the Pendle witches, and hung every one of them with the most placid belief that he was doing a just and righteous work, gave a very different countenance to these Samesbury witches, all of whom would have been strung up like dogs had not the taint of papistry rested on Grace and her supporters. Leading her quietly to a denial of all she had asserted, Sir Edward got her to confess that she was an impostor, and that every article of her accusation was a lie and a fallacy from beginning to end. She had never known nor seen any devils; she had never been cast upon the henroof nor upon the hay-mow, but when she was found there she had gone of her own accord, and had covered herself with hay and straw to better prove the witches’ despite against her; she knew nothing of any child done to death by nails in its body; and all that she had said about the bones, and the oil, and the tender flesh roasted at the fire, was as false as the rest. She had never been possessed, but had flung herself into these fits by her own will and independent power; and what she did in them was a mere trick, which she could show their worships if they liked. In short, Grace Sowerbuts was forced to play the losing game in as masterly a manner as might be, and to own herself a cheat and an impostor while yet there was time for pardon. So the three Samesbury witches got off with a stern exhortation from the judge, who scarcely seemed to relish the release of even Protestant witches delated by papistical accusers.