‘Which way is Witch? ‘ Sible series #1 Traditional Geocache
‘Which way is Witch? ‘ Sible series #1
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Sible Hedingham is the second largest village in Essex and historically renowned as being the last place in England where witchcraft was recorded in 1863.
This is the first in, what we hope will be a series, of caches celebrating some interesting facts about the village.
This is a simple ‘cache and dash’ which, despite being very small, (please bring a pencil to fill in the log), should be easy to find.
** FTF andy uk63 **
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An elderly man died as a consequence of the shock of being `swum in water' as a witch and two people appeared in court as a result of his death.
The victim was an elderly man of French origin who was deaf, dumb and was estimated to be in his mid 70's when he died. He lived in a small house on the outskirts of the village and was known to most locals as ‘Dummy'. He was a strange character who made a living by fortune telling.
The Swan public house was in the centre of the village and on the evening of the 3rd August, Dummy was in the pub. Emma Smith, the wife of the Inn keeper at nearby Ridgewell spoke out in a loud voice that she had been ill for some 9 - 10 months and that her illness was caused by Dummy, who had bewitched her. She begged him to remove the curse. She was so desperate for Dummy to remove the curse she offered to pay him 3 sovereigns but he declined the offer. Smith continued to plead with the man to the amusement of the now packed pub, by now the group moved outside.
Seeing she was getting nowhere, she hit dummy several times with a stick and dragged him towards the brook, where she pushed him in. Dummy tried to get out of the brook at the opposite bank, but was stopped by Smith who had rushed round to the other side. Samuel Stammers, 28 years old who was a local man now joined Smith in pushing Dummy back into the water. Eventually he managed to pull himself from the water and lay exhausted on the bank only to be once again thrown back into the icy waters. Then someone shouted, "If someone does not take the old man out, he will die in a moment." Stammers, perhaps coming to his senses, jumped into the brook and pulled the old man out on to the bank.
Dummy was helped back to his home where he was left alone. The following day he was visited by a villager who found him in a terrible state, still wet and trembling violently and very badly bruised. Superintendent Thomas Elsey was informed and had Dummy taken to the Halstead Workhouse where he died on the 4th September, of pneumonia brought upon by the immersion into the icy waters.
Smith and Stammers were charged by Superintendent Elsey, before the magistrates at Castle Hedingham, with having "unlawfully assaulted an old Frenchman commonly called Dummy, thereby causing his death." Witnesses to the events were reluctant to give evidence against Smith and Stammers, but several told the court the facts as are related above. On March 8th 1864 the two accused stood next to each other in the dock. They pleaded Not Guilty. Emma Smith told the court that Dummy made her ill and bewitched her.
The judge, Sir William Erle, sentenced both defendants to 6 months hard labour.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
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