Category: Community (Warminster)

Wilfred Middlebrook in his newspaper serialisation, ‘The Changing Face Of Warminster,’ first published in 1971, and again (by Danny Howell / Bedeguar Books) in 2003, made the following notes about Witchcraft in Warminster in days gone by.

After making a reference to a woman who lived in a little thatched cottage on West Street, Warminster, saying her name was Tilly Flaherty and that she was a reputed witch, Wilfred Middlebrook went on to write of witchcraft in Warminster in the 17th century. He noted:

In days gone by, witchcraft was as prevalent in Warminster as in any other part of the country, and there are several cases of witchcraft or complaints of witchcraft in the records of the county of Wilts., the Great Rolls of the seventeenth century Quarter Sessions. In 1650 a Warminster woman complained to the Justices that a neighbour called her a “bun’ or witch, while Victor Manley gives a more modern version when he describes how, in living memory, women of Warminster Common made a full-sized effigy of a woman who had been sentenced for prostitution. The effigy was seated all day on a chair by the door of the woman’s house, and in the evening was burnt; a true revival of witchcraft practices.

In 1613, at Marlborough Quarter Sessions, Margaret Pilton of Warminster was accused of being a witch by Avis Glasier. The two women met at the house of William Mathew at “Borom,’ [Boreham] where Avis had gone with her betrothed husband’s breakfast. As they walked back to Warminster – probably along Smallbrook Lane, or across the fields by a footpath that still threads its way precariously through the new Prestbury housing estate – “Margrett did desire the said Avyes to gyve her her soule or spirit,” promising that Avis would live twenty years the longer and recover her health. Avis refused but the witch “drew her home to her house and made her drinck some of her drinck,” and said if Avis told her friends she should live longer in her pains, and made her promise to send for her before she departed this world. This was the first week in Lent. In July, Avis sent for the witch, who ordered everyone out of the house and asked had she told anyone, “and then she said Margrett departed from the sayed Avyes and after her departure she said Avyes fell into a mervellouse Traunces as thoughe ye should have departed strayghte.

No mention is made of the sentence in the published report, though at that time most towns were equipped with a ducking stool for dealing with witches, but it is only fair to give Margaret Pilton’s version when she was examined by Edward Ludlowe on 27th July 1613. As they walked home from Boreham, Margaret asked Avis the cause of her sickness which proved to be an abscess or “imposthume,’ and “it was impossible for Avis to recover from it.” At her house in Warminster Margaret gave her friend drink “as shee did drincke of herselfe”; on departing, Avis entreated her to come if she should send for her. Then Avis was ill and sent for her, and Avis sent her company out of the house. Margaret denied asking Avis for her soul.