The Witches of Warboys: An Extraordinary Story of Sorcery, Sadism and Satanic Possession in Elizabethan England

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On a foggy November day in 1589, when one of the five daughters of Robert and Elizabeth Throckmorton suddenly fell sick, no one in the small English village of Warboys could have predicted the terrifying events that would follow. Or envisaged that four years later, in April 1593, the Throckmortons' neighbours Alice, Agnes and John Samuel, would be dragged before a country court on charges of sorcery, enchantment and murder. There is no more dramatic story in the annals of English witchcraft than that of the witches of Warboys. Yet, despite a rich and colourful cast of characters, and a potent mixture of tension and pathos to match anything in the later Salem witch trials, it has never before been told in full. At one level, the story of Warboys features a conflict about honour and truth between two families in a close-knit Elizabethan village. At another level, the tale concerns a wider struggle between local gentry and yeomanry. But at the heart of the narrative coils a dark account of possession by demons, of malevolent spirits, of trust broken and of children accursed. What really happened in Warboys in the late sixteenth century, to drive this unremarkable rural community into such frenzy Philip Almond leads us into a half-forgotten world of horror and crime, of victims and victimisers, of spectres, sex with the devil and 'scratching' the witch: a macabre and dangerous world where nothing is as it seems, where evil begets evil, and where innocence is betrayed.

Reviews

'This is a splendid case-study, of the classic kind that tells a gripping story in order to illuminate major historical themes. The whole of Elizabethan witchcraft is concentrated into a vivid consideration of one Huntingdonshire trial and the events that led up to it. As the story unfolds, we are confronted with the horrific double problem of how people can come to believe in a monstrous untruth, and how they can persuade others to believe in it as well. Psychology, history and literary criticism all meet in these pages, and sixteenth-century demonology comes face to face with modern issues surrounding the ability of interrogation methods to reveal or distort truths. This is at once a compelling study of the thought world of Reformation-period Protestantism and one of the timeless psychopathology of confession. Philip Almond takes us quite literally to realms beyond reason, where the only alternatives confronting an enquirer are demonic possession, paranormal human powers or mental illness. Even if the truth of what happened probably lies beyond any person now living, what this book does establish, convincingly and disturbingly, is the universe of belief within which such a tragedy can occur.' - Ronald Hutton, Professor of History, University of Bristol and author of Witches, Druids and King Arthur and The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft 'The Witches of Warboys is a fascinating but neglected episide in the history of English witch-trials. Using contemporary texts and parish records, Philip C Almond pieces together the story with scholarly diligence, investigative determination, and the imagination of a dramatist. The result is an engrossing, frame-by-frame tale of fear, prejudice and persecution in a rural parish, with intriguing ramifications for the social and intellectual history of Elizabethan England. There are ghosts, devils and demoniacs, bizarre dreams, afflictions and accusations, harsh interrogations and sordid executions. Professor Almond is a trustworthy guide into this lost world of belief and brutality, stripping bare the alien cosmology and mentality of our tense and troubled ancestors.' - Malcolm Gaskill, Fellow and Director of Studies in History, Churchill College, Cambridge, and author of Hellish Nell: Last of Britain's Witches and Witchfinders: A Seventeenth-Century English Tragedy

Author Bio

Philip Almond is Professor Emeritus of Religion in the University of Queensland, and is internationally respected for his work on religion and the history of ideas, especially during the English Enlightenment. His seven previous books include The British Discovery of Buddhism, Heaven and Hell in Enlightenment England, Adam and Eve in Seventeenth Century Thought and Demonic Possession and Exorcism in Early Modern England.