Trial by fire: Remembering Ireland’s witchcraft trials — and their victims

In Ireland, so-called witchcraft practises — old cures and customs — were part and parcel of life. The supernatural wasn’t demonised. This regard for the old ways was very strong, even now it lingers on.

When tragedy calls, a candle is lit as often as a kettle is boiled. Rituals such as well visitations, an awareness of fairy forts, a respect for certain hawthorns still in existence, along with of course, a very solid tradition of celebrating Samhain, known also as Halloween.

Strangely enough, despite this, the first witch trial in Europe occurred in Kilkenny city. Known as ‘The Sorcery Trial of Dame Alice Kyteler,’ it took place long before the European witch trial craze.

In 1324, Bishop Richard Ledrede accused the dame, a wealthy merchant and moneylender, of leading a viperous sect of sorceresses, gaining her considerable power from a demon lover, sacrificing cockerels at the cross roads, chanting over skulls filled with herbs, entrails, and dead men’s nails, along with other demonic shenanigans.

Why, when Ireland had so little truck with witch-hunt hysteria, did such a significant case happen here? In truth, the origins of the trial were imported in the person of Ledrede himself.

The bishop was a Londoner educated at the court of the uber superstitious, Templar hunting, Pope John XXII. When he arrived in Kilkenny, he brought these ideas with him.

The dame was on her fourth husband. Her stepchildren from previous ones accused Alice of manipulating their late father into leaving all his wealth to her oldest son William.

These disinherited children took their case to Ledrede, claiming also that Alice was poisoning her present husband, who was emaciated, his nails dropping off, with no hair left on his body.

Ledrede took these allegations and added his own, much more fantastical, and supernatural. He quickly deduced that Alice Kyteler gained her wealth and status from a male source, a demon called Robin, Son of Art. It did not occur to the Ledrede that Kyteler might have acquired her wealth through her own efforts, that she might be as clever, indeed as ruthless as he.

The Kyteler case differs from many other trials, in that the accused was a person of power and means. Why did the bishop go after Dame Alice for heretical sorcery, and not some humble outsider offering herbal cures? As with many stories, it’s a case of following the money.

A person found guilty of heretical sorcery had their property seized by the church. Dame Kyteler’s estate was considerable — so wealthy and well connected was Alice, the King of England was in her debt. (He owed her five hundred pounds at the time of the trial.)

Dame Kyteler’s high status is fascinating. Had she not been accused by Ledrede; there would be no record of this powerful medieval woman. It makes you wonder who else has been left out of history?

She’s often reimagined as a young redhead, not an older woman, whose hair would’ve been grey. Just as Ledrede attributed Alice’s power and wealth to a male demon, contemporary commentators often attribute it to her ability to attract rich husbands. It seems the need to see women only in relation to men is a timeless one.

The dame escaped; some say to England… but her maid was not so lucky.

Of Petronilla, we know little but her name, that she was a mother, and the maid of Dame Alice. Ledrede used torture to illicit a ‘confession’ from Petronilla, torture was not common practise in Ireland, but Ledrede was uncommonly cruel in most respects.

The annals record the rest — ‘On this day a certain woman was consigned to the flames and burned.’

It was the first time death by fire was inflicted for heretical sorcery in Ireland, making Petronilla of Meath the first woman to be burned at the stake for witchcraft in the British Isles.

A mysterious case followed in 1578, also in Kilkenny city, in which two ‘witches’ were tried and executed — almost nothing is known about that trial. There are no more recorded cases in Ireland until 1661, and the trial of Florence Newton in Cork.

Florence, an elderly woman, called to Puritan John Pyne’s household to beg for food. Though it was Christmas, his maid Mary Longdon refused her, and sent her away, ‘muttering darkly.’

When they later crossed paths, Florence grabbed the maid, and kissed her. ‘Mary, I pray thee let thee and I be friends,’ she said, ‘for I bear thee no ill will, and I pray thee do thou bear me none.’

Florence Newton would pay dearly for her desperate gesture. Shortly afterwards, Mary began having fits and visions. She believed that Florence’s kiss had bewitched her. She also claimed to be afflicted by falling stones, and to have begun to vomit pins, nails, wool, and straw.

Strangely, the elders of their community supported these claims, going so far as to testify that Mary floated up into the rafters.

The case was brought to trial. In court, Mary took a fit and continued until Florence was removed from room. The Mayor ordered that the old woman be imprisoned in Youghal Gaol.

Here, in scenes that evoke a late-night horror film, the old woman was ‘tested’ till she bled by Valentine Greatrakes; an ex- Cromwellian turned healer, known as ‘The Stroker’.

It was believed that witches were incapable of uttering the Lord’s Prayer. When ordered to recite it, Florence fumbled over some words. ‘I am old and have a bad memory,’ she pleaded.

Imagine trying to say a prayer, knowing that one slip meant death? It is known that Florence died at this juncture, though neither the final verdict, or cause of death are recorded. It is likely that the woman did not survive her punishing ordeal. Cromwellians weren’t famed for their gentleness.

The year 1710 brings us to the presbyterian community of Island Magee in County Antrim, and into the household of James Haltridge’s where the new servant Mary Dunbar is claiming to be ‘strangely molested by spirits and witches.’

On the night of her arrival trouble began — aprons went missing and were found knotted with the flannel cap of James’s dead mother-in- law wrapped inside it. These mysterious knots, were thought to bode evil.

Mary had fits and a violent vision that night; in it she saw women, witches who were the cause of all the suffering in the house. She gave their names, describing older local women. They were rounded up.

Mary, it was said, fell into a fit when they were brought near the house. Unbelievably, based on a girl’s ‘vision’ — the mayor of Carrigfergus issued a warrant for the arrest of eight women.

During the trial, Mary described how during her fit, one of the witches twisted her tongue and tore at her throat with crooked fingers and swollen knuckles. One of the women was called to the bar to show her hands and her joints, which were ‘distorted as described.’

That moment in which a poor woman’s rheumatoid fingers were used to condemn her, echoes those moments in which Florence Newton, tried and failed to recite the lord’s prayer.

Also in court were the feathers, cotton, yarn, pins, buttons… domestic objects rendered uncanny by the story Mary had spun around them. The prisoners had no lawyer to defend them — all denied the accusations, one called God to witness that she was being wronged.

There was no evidence against the women. Based only on Marys ‘visions’ Judge James Mc Cartney sentenced them to one year.

As they were tried under Irish law, the sentence was gaol — had they been tried under English law, they would have certainly hanged.

Mary herself died three weeks after the trial, but not before accusing one more person, this time a man, of bewitching her, thus bringing those convicted by her ‘visions’ to nine. To this day, none of the victims of this injustice have had their names cleared.

This week marks the anniversary of Petronilla’s death. Having spent four years researching her story for my novel Her Kind, her fate on November 3, 1324 has stayed with me.

Each year, on that evening, I light a candle in her memory. How she must have suffered… She’s still referred to as ‘Ireland’s First Witch.’

In the sensationalism around such cases, we often overlook the humanity of these women, referring to them using the false accusations levelled by their tormentors.

The Kilkenny Witches, the Witch of Youghal, the Islandmagee Witches… despite their crimes, their persecutors and killers remain referred to respectfully by profession, even across the centuries, as judge, mayor, and bishop.

Niamh Boyce is an award-winning writer.