The Union County Witch Trial Traditional Cache
The Union County Witch Trial
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Difficulty:
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Size: 
(small)
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You are looking for a small tin container with log book and swag, hidden at the border of Union county. It was placed there to commemorate a most unusual historic event in the early days of settlement of what is now Union County, North Carolina.
According to The State magazine (Vol. 24, No. 14, December 1956)
"There is a curiously mediaeval touch to the tragedy of Rev. William Richardson, one of Union's noted early preachers.
The Rev. Richardson was subject to melancholia, induced, perhaps, by the suffering of his people in Scotland and the termoil in the colonies. In one of these fits of depression he comitted suicide. Family and friends, fearful of the harm his act would do to those who admired him, kept secret the manner of his death.
This air of mystery started tongues wagging, and finally the beautiful widow was openly accused of having caused her husband's death through witchcraft.
Her relatives were resentful and demanded that the matter be brought to trial. In this superstitious manner, perhaps a survival of custom in the old country:
'That the corpse of the dead be exhumed and the accused one required to touch it, when, if guilty, blood would immediately gush forth'
This gruesome 'trial' was held. The body was disinterred, and before the asembled congregation Mrs. Richardson was put to the test, but not a drop of blood appeared.
Wrote Lily Doyl Dunlap:
" 'Tis said that one man crushed her hand into the forehead in his eagerness to see the blood flow."
And to make the story even more remarkably like a scenario:
In the assembly was George Dunlap, a young man, who was so moved by the young widow's travail, that he followed her home and offered her his protection and love. They soon were married.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
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