1. This examinate** saith that she, sitting at a door or bench in Hardness aforesaid about Christide last was twelvemonth with one Michael Trevysard of Hardness aforesaid, used these words: “I would my child were able to run as well as any of these children that run here in the street!” Then said Trevysard, “It shall never run!” “No? That’s hard!” says this examinate again. “No, it shall never run,” answered Trevysard, “till thou hast another,” repeating the same words a dozen several times at the least with great vehemency. Whereupon this examinate, being much troubled in mind, especially upon a fear conceived by her before through the general bad report that went of him, departed from him. And the very same week the same child sickened, and consumed away, being well one day and ill another, for the space of seventeen weeks or thereabout, and then died.
2. This examinate further saith, that Peter Trevysard, son of the said Michael Trevisard, came to this examinate’s house to borrow a hatchet, which Alice Beere, servant to this examinate, denied, to whom the said Michael answered, “Shall I not have it? I will do thee a good turn ere twelvemonth be at an end.” And shortly the said Alice Beere sickened, continuing one day well and another day ill, for the space of eleven weeks, and then died. In which case both the husband of this examinate and a child of theirs fell sick, and so continued seventeen or eighteen weeks, and then died.
Equally relevant is the charge brought by Joan Baddaford against Alice Trevisard. In the course of some petty squabble Alice had told Joan’s husband, John Baddaford, to “go to Pursever Wood and gather up his wits” — doubtless a way of calling him dim-witted. Unfortunately, said Joan, “within three weeks after the said John Baddaford made a voyage to Rochelle, in the Hope of Dittsham, and returned home again out of his wits, and so continued by the space of two years, tearing and renting his clothes, in such sort as four or five men were hardly able to bind him and keep him in order”.(38) Moreover, Joan complained, Alice Trevisard had threatened that within seven years she should lose all her property; and this too had come to pass. And these events were only the culmination of a long history of disputes. Already three years earlier Joan had demanded a penny from Alice Trevisard for washing some clothes; Alice paid, but with the comment that the penny should do Joan “little good”. And sure enough, when Joan spent the penny on drink “she had no power to drink thereof, but the same night fell sick, and continued so by the space of seven weeks following”. The explanation must have seemed obvious: it has always been regarded as dangerous to receive anything, whether as a gift or as payment, from a witch.
So it came about that Joan Baddaford went, with several of her neighbours, to Sir Thomas Ridgeway’s home to lay a complaint against Alice Trevisard. On the way back they happened to meet Alice herself and began to rail at her. Probably they threatened her with burning, for although witches were not in fact burned in England, the common people were not always aware of this. At any rate, Alice said to Joan, “Thou and thine may be burned before long be!” A few days later her child, sitting on the hearth, was burned on the neck (or so it seemed to her) even though the fire was not kindled; and within three weeks it wasted away and died.
Another complainant was William Tompson, a sailor, who had had a nocturnal dispute with Alice in the streets of Dartmouth. In the end he struck her with a musket-rod; whereupon she uttered the threat, “Thou shalt be better thou hadst never met with me!” William Tompson had scarcely returned to sea when his ship caught fire and foundered; he himself was picked up by a Portuguese vessel and carried to Spain, where he was imprisoned for a year. When at last he returned to Dartmouth Alice Trevisard, meeting his wife, expressed her vexation and added, “He shall be there again within this twelve months.” And so it came to pass. William was captured by the Spaniards and kept in prison, this time for twenty-five months.
Christian Webbar, a widow, let a tenement in Hardness to Michael Trevisard, who failed to pay the rent. When Christian demanded the arrears, Alice Trevisard cursed her, “It shall be worse for you.” Alice threw water on Christian’s stairs; but a neighbour saw her and warned Christian to avoid those stairs. Alice herself carelessly used the stairs and at once fell under the influence of her own sorcery: “within one hour after, the said Alice.... fell grievously sick, and part of the hands, fingers, and toes of the said Alice rotted and consumed away, as yet appears by her”; while Christian too fell sick.
There were many others at Hardness who had grievances against the Trevisards. George Davye had a quarrel with Michael Trevisard; within a week his child leapt from his mother’s arms into the fire and was badly burned. When Trevisard heard of this he boasted that he could heal the child if he wished, but he would never do anything to help John Davye or his family. And the following week Davye himself, who was away at sea, was badly hurt in an accident. Henry Oldreve was another who suffered after a dispute with Trevisard: he lost twenty fat wethers in one week and then himself fell sick and died. William Cozen also quarrelled with Trevisard, and within a quarter of a year his daughter-in-law was crippled: “her neck shrunk down between her two shoulders, and her chin touched her breast, and so remaineth still in a very strange manner”.
As for Susan Tooker (or Turke), she had complaints to bring against all three Trevisards, father, mother and son. Some years before Alice Trevisard had threatened: “I will not leave thee worth a gray groat!”; and sure enough, Susan’s husband, on his very next voyage, lost ship and goods, and in a calm sea. Young Peter, being refused a drink by Susan, replied “that it had been better to have delivered him drink”. Next day Susan sickened, and she remained sick for seven weeks. And Susan had a tale to tell of Michael Trevisard as well. When Mr Martin, as mayor of Hardness, set up a fold or pound, Michael Trevisard mocked him, saying that wind and weather would tear it up. Mr Martin had done his best to counter the threat, moving the pound to places quite sheltered from the weather; “yet sithence it hath been plucked up very strangely, for it riseth up altogether, being timber of an exceeding great weight and bigness”. There was also the case of Joan Laishe, who had once refused Alice Trevisard a half-pennyworth of ale. “That shall be a hard half-pennyworth,” cried Alice, “I shall not leave you worth a groat!” Two days later one of Joan’s ale-casks fell to the ground and burst and all the ale was lost.
Like the Lucerne material, this story of the Trevisard family of Hardness, Devon, shows just how suspicions and accusations of maleficium arose amongst the common people when they were left to themselves, without interference from the secular or ecclesiastical authorities or from professional witch-hunters. And the picture that emerges is confirmed by the researches of Dr Alan Macfarlane on some hundreds of witchcraft prosecutions in Essex at the same period.(39) Macfarlane found that the accusations arose not necessarily as a result of a direct quarrel between two persons, but when a number of village families fell out with the same person or the same family. For each “witch” there were, on an average, four people who believed themselves to be the witch’s victims. But the number of those involved was far greater, for it included the families and friends of the “victims”. Often the whole population of a village would get caught up in the tension and gossip; the formal accusation would then express the consensus at which the village community had arrived after a lengthy exchange of complaints and rumours.