Alternatively, the witch could be “swum” — tied to a chair and thrown into water. If she floated she was a witch, and she was sent to the assizes. If she sank (and sometimes drowned) she was innocent. The surreal theory underlying the torment was that witches were resistant to water, because it was used in baptism.
Emboldened by his success at revealing all this sorcery, and enjoying the fame and money, Hopkins expanded activities, hiring help along the way. He rode to Aldeburgh, Ipswich, Stowmarket and Bury St Edmunds, rooting out witches everywhere — sometimes dragging them out of taverns by the hair. The truly unlucky ended up thrust into a barrel of pitch, to be burned alive.
By 1646, the 26-year-old Hopkins was at the peak of his powers: feared, revered, wealthy. Yet, in 1647, he abruptly “retired”, and a few months later he was dead, of tuberculosis. Stearne lamely tried to continue the witch-finding work, but without much luck. The craze was over.
So what happened — how did it all begin and end so suddenly? To understand this, we have to know what was occurring in England at the time, and how it echoes our own troubled times of Wokeness and “Cancellation”.
As now, England was then horribly divided: not by Brexit, or culture wars, but by actual Civil War. As now, England back then was menaced, everywhere, by a tenacious and nasty plague (many of Hopkins’ victims died of the disease, before they got to trial). In the midst of this violence, and turbulence, England had somehow tipped into a fearful psychosis, a brief, hallucinatory age when people could be denounced, tormented, and often executed — i.e. totally cancelled — for the most minor things. For muttering. For owning cats. For having a rival farmer with a grudge.
In a further echo of the madder aspects of modern Cancellation, some people — including judges — joined in the denunciations, even when they clearly disbelieved them, simply for fear of being accused of witchcraft themselves, if they stayed silent. Compare this with the mobs on Twitter, or the more extreme BLM protests, where, if you don’t join in, or express support, you must be suspect.
But what does this tell us of the future of our own witch-hunts? Here there is an unexpected but provocative new perspective.
It is generally assumed that the Hopkins witch-craze fizzled out because common sense prevailed. But modern historians, such as Malcolm Gaskill (author of Witchfinders), believe this is only partly true. A more immediate cause was that witch-hunting was simply too damn expensive.
For example, when Hopkins went to King’s Lynn, to prick the witches, he got £16 for his work — an enormous sum at the time. Moreover, all his many helpers had to be housed, fed and paid. Likewise, when Hopkins sent the witches for trial, assizes had to be held, judges summoned: these huge trials could nearly bankrupt a town. And, as for a barrel of pitch, to burn a witch, that might cost a man’s annual salary.
At a time of plague, war and enormous debt, these costs could not be sustained. So they weren’t. And my sense is that the same will likely happen to the similar extremes of wokeness. Pretty soon the UK will be trillions in debt. Can we afford tens of thousands of diversity officers and various related posts? Possibly not. Likewise, when plague is ravaging a country, sacking and cancelling useful people for saying a wrong word on social media might seem needlessly wasteful.
When I wake the next morning, in Mistley, it is cold but sunny, so I take a short stroll by the Stour, to a Georgian folly: the Mistley Towers. It is widely believed that Hopkins is buried here, under these riverside pillars.
Standing on the frosty grass, I listen again to the endless, rolling calls of the waterbirds. Local folklore claims they are the voices of the women Hopkins sent to the gallows, forever decrying the man who lies beneath my feet. And maybe he hears them. Maybe he turns in his unmarked grave, even now, as he sees history so strangely repeated.
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
Subscribe