Mid seventeenth century Britain was a volatile place, we had religious extremism, civil war and regicide. In 1649 the Scots Covenanter parliament passed an extension on the Scottish Witchcraft Act of 1563, this made it a capital crime to blaspheme, beat or curse against your parents, worship false gods, or consult familiars or devils.
This sparked a rise in witch hunts in Scotland that soon spilled over the border into Northumberland, at Newcastle the Puritan magistrates employed a Scottish witch finder to help them with this scourge. He would receive 20 shillings per witch found. Of course witch hunts were not uncommon in England, there had been witch hunts, on and off, since the fifteenth century. The infamous Matthew Hopkins had been terrorising East Anglia during the 1640s, up to his death from tuberculosis in 1647.
All you had to do was to denounce a woman as a witch and she would be arrested and placed on trial for her life. During 1650 thirty women of Newcastle were taken to Newgate Gaol, and one, Jane Martin, was taken to Newcastle Castle, as this was the prison for those resident in Northumberland.
All 31 were tried, on the 21st August 1650 sixteen were found guilty and were hanged along with other malefactors on the Town Moor. Witches in England were typically hanged not burned as they were in Scotland, the only witches burned in England had other crimes levelled against them such as treason or murdering their husbands. But this was not the end of this persecution, it is now 1651, and we travel north to the charming market town of Morpeth.
Perfect Diurnall of Some Passages and Proceedings - 6th October - 13th October 1651.
"From Newcastle October 4 thus:
The Gaol delivery at Morpeth began on Wednesday last and ended on Saturday night; Col. Wastel was judge, there was six notorious thieves brought from Carlisle and five of them was condemned, and twelve more, whereof one Armstrong was to be pressed to death for murdering a woman (for saving his land) and two witches were condemned, old Mistress Pye of Morpeth, and Anne Cheney of Sheales; 18 of them were hanged and Mistress Pye was the first.
There was about 30 felons in prison, and many out upon bond that were not tried, because Colonel Wastel would not stay any longer, but he was very honest for the time he was there, (Mistress Pye's gold would not save her) Col. Fitch was at the Gaol delivery, and went to Wallington on Saturday night, and so for Carlisle, to provide and make ready for his march into Scotland.
The list of felons at Morpeth follows;
Frances Anderson, alias David Shealhoxson
Robert Armstrong, alias Hob The Lord
James Armstrong, alias Kinsmonth
Mr Elliot, alias Mow The Wallet
Henry Noble, George Armstrong, Will Duglasse, Robert Fletcher, James Turner, John Kea, John Henderson, John Thompson, Alex Hunter, Rich Dowthait, James Foster, Thomas Greene.
John Armstrong pressed to death to save his land, for killing a woman.
Mistress Pye of Morpeth, and Anne Cheney of Sheales, both witches."
Colonel Wastel was most likely the Parliamentarian officer Colonel Daniel Axtel who was in charge of security during the trial of Charles I in 1649, and was involved in the Cromwellian war in Ireland where he won several battles.
His killing of prisoners would later get him court marshalled and sent back to England.
After the restoration in 1659 he was arrested and in 1660 was executed at Tyburn by being hanged, drawn and quartered for regicide.
The others hanged with Pye were quite possibly mosstroopers, brigands who were very active on the borders at this time, the mosstroopers were the descendants of the border reivers.
So who were the Pye family?
According to "Hodgson the Historian" (John Hodgson-Hinde) in the Morpeth Herald - Saturday 12th January 1861;
"The family were old and respectable occupants of this town. Richard Pye was a bailiff in 1580 and 1584; John Pye in 1595, 1607, and 1612; Thomas Pye in 1628 and John Pye in 1632 and 1647, and Francis Pye in other successive years.
Three of the name Pye were rectors of Morpeth in the seventeenth century. A lady of the family, Jane Pye, was executed for witchcraft in 1658..... It is certain, however, that the present Queen's Head, in Bridge Street, in this town, belonged to this family."
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| The Queen's Head Prior to The Mock Tudor Facelift |
The Morpeth Witch Trials were the subject of a lecture by Mr Jas Fergusson at a meeting of the Young Men's Mutual Instruction Association in the St. Georges Presbyterian Schoolroom, published in the Morpeth Herald - Saturday 5th November 1881;
"In dealing with the Morpeth witches he told first of all how the renowned magician of the twelfth century, Michael Scott, undertook to make the tide flow right up to Morpeth, and how through the fear and curiosity of a woman it stopped at Sheepwash.
Coming then to the seventeenth century, full details were given of the famous Morpeth witch case......which attracted a great attendance of magistrates in the town, the accusation made by Ann Armstrong against Ann Baites minutely described; also the burning of Jane Pye in Goosehill, and the appearance of the 'woman in white' - said to have been Margaret Milbourne - on the High Stanners, as testified by Isabell Fletcher, and added to by Dorothy Himers. The absurdities, inconsistencies, incongruities of the evidence were fully pointed out. Both Ann Baites and Margaret Milbourne survived the accusation."
A more detailed account came from an article on the Pye family published in the - Morpeth Herald - Thursday 2nd October 1997;
"A very surprising fact is that a lady of this family was convicted of witchcraft in 1658 and at Goosehill was executed.
Ann Armstrong, a notorious witchfinder, accused a coven, which among others included Ann Bates of Morpeth, wife of a tanner, 'of dancing with the devil at Riding Bridgend.' It seems she did not suffer the fate of Jane Pye."
Jane Pye was not burned at the stake, but the execution site is interesting, Goosehill. In later centuries Fair Moor was used, and Morpeth Gaol, but this is the first time I have heard of Goosehill as a place of execution, I believe a Gaol from the sixteenth century to the early eighteenth century was located in this area.
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| A Map Showing Morpeth Castle 1604 |
Further information concerning Goosehill was published in an article called "Disappearing Morpeth" - Morpeth Herald - Friday 17th July 1964;
"The demolition of the Goosehill cottages has begun; that is, the terrace of five or six with another short terrace behind and running to the river. There is a tradition that these little houses were built for warders at the county gaol.....
Goosehill itself, by that name, goes back to 1658, when Jane Pye, of the family that lived in the Queen's Head was executed at this place for witchcraft, just two years after the date on the coat of arms of the Pyes in the hotel building. It does not have this name on the 1604 map, however, but instead a partly illegible name like 'Watgrene.'"
Ever since the 1861 and 1881 newspaper articles the date of Jane Pye's execution has been erroneously placed in 1658 instead of 1651, it has also been stated that she was burned, this was not the policy of executing witches in England, she was hanged. Another poor victim of religious fanaticism, among thousands.
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