This chapter ranges over the St Osyth lndscape, mapping its haunted spots and the location of key encounters with familiar spirits, particularly those said to belong to Elizabeth Bennet, Margerie Sammon, Ales Hunt and Joan Pechey. It introduces further key figures from the wider Darcy estate and shows how more suspects were drawn into the witch hunt. It argues that the history and features of a landscape can tell us much about the origin of local witchcraft fears.

Introduces St Osyth, Essex: its history and landscape, and explains the context and setting of the witchcraft accusations of 1582.

This chapter examines the origin of the St Osyth witchcraft accusations in the strained relationship between Grace Thurlowe, a servant at St Osyth Priory, and the cunning woman Ursley Kempe. It reconstructs the network of magical healers in the locality, suggesting that competition and sensitivities around child-rearing and illegitimacy were important in sparking suspicion, as well as several recent deaths of key players in the village.

An emotive, haunting story of a community torn apart, the Essex witch accusations and trial of 1581-2 are, taken together, one of the pivotal instances of that malign and destructive wave of misogynistic persecution which periodically broke over early modern England. Yet, for all their importance in the overall study of witchcraft, the so-called witches of St Osyth have largely been overlooked by scholars. Marion Gibson now sets right that neglect. Using fresh archival sources – and investigating not just the village itself, but also its neighbouring Elizabethan hamlets and habitations – the author offers revelatory new insights into the sixteen women and one man accused of sorcery while asking wider, provocative questions about the way history is recollected and interpreted. Combining landscape detective work, a reconstruction of lost spaces and authoritative readings of newly identified key documents, Gibson skilfully unlocks the poignant personal histories of those denied the chance to speak for themselves.

This chapter explores the trial of the St Osyth witches and the witches from surrounding communities, and follows them to their judgement and - in some cases - their deaths. It examines the creation of the news pamphlet that recounted the story of the witch trial, and suggests an author for that famous account, showing how it shaped the story of the St Osyth witches that has been handed down to modern readers.