Witchcraft (literally, the craft of witches, or witchery, or witchiness) has a long history of getting people’s backs up in England. Hundreds of years ago, fearful peasants and their thoughtful betters lived in a constant state of anxiety, detecting witchcraft almost everywhere, even in daft things like cups and herons. Thusly, women deemed suspicious were prone to being scooped up by the authorities and burned alive in the name of community cohesion.
Tell-tale signs of witch-hood included stroking a cat, living in a house, cooking, sweeping and attempting to cure ailments. In fact, many victims may have actually been in possession of knowledge that was of genuine medical benefit to the communities they witch-crafted in – alas, instead of profiting from this precious data, all too often alarmed types chose to destroy it. Fortunately, as the level of education is high, and scientific literacy rates great, in today’s Britain, medicinal advancement is respected by everyone – mind-crumbling imbecilic theories that fly in the face of the most basic forms of common sense thankfully a thing of the in-the-past.
In the Middle Ages, one Matthew Hopkins, the self-styled Witchfinder General, stalked the land with the aid of a horse and some accomplices. Apparently unsanctioned by any authorities save popular prejudice and hysteria, Hopkins burned witches by the dozen, as he sought a final solution to the sorceress question. For the accused, things were awkward: confessing to the charges meant death, but not confessing meant something far worse, as the offender was seen as both ungodly and insolent. Centuries later, authorities in the former British colony of America would employ a similar approach in their efforts to free the world from certain tyranny, housing possible miscreants in an overseas camp deemed far too important to exist on US soil proper.
After many years of evictions, harassments, beatings and burnings, the country’s lawmakers finally moved to strike the crime of witchcraft from the books. According to Goblin’s Guide to British Law, in 1934 Arch-Judge Peters Peterson made the necessary amendments to Britain’s binding legislative code during a “long and arduous evening, broken frequently by vicious lightning strikes that illumined the pen-chamber in sinister sheets of dazzling white”.
Things were finally looking up for evil women. However, in 1994 a coven of witches was exposed in Darlington and charged with wickedness. The Voice of Darlington wrote at the time:
“Which? Witch Trial to Begin
“Originally arrested last October, the usual delays caused by Darlington’s sluggish and lazy legal personnel have been aggravated by a keenness within the judiciary to seek ‘supplementary income through the commercialisation of justice’.
“In essence this has meant the quest for a trial sponsor – and one has now been found.
“Which? magazine has come forward to attach its name to the event because of the ‘scope for brand visibility and fun presented by the obvious alliterative conceit’.
“Lengthy talks with Hyundai, Dell and Argos all fell through.
“Which? symbolism will dress the proceedings and free copies of the famous read will be distributed to jurors, legal types and the accused alike.
“The three witches – Sue Pit, 56, Ribald McCuckings, 16, and Franet Dasher, 345 – have been charged with 78 charges of open evil under Article 4A of the Supernatural Activities Act 1988, and benefit fraud.
“It is alleged that the gruesome trinity annihilated, through powerful magical forces, the Van Goose family of Grievous Farm – while falsely claiming over £15,800 in housing benefit.
“The Department for Work and Pensions has worked closely with the parish council on the case. A spokesman said: ‘At the DWP we will not stand for abuse of taxpayers’ money. Evil must be stopped.’”
Sadly, the outcome of the case – indeed all traces of anything remotely connected to it, save the above article – was lost during a rainfall in 1995. Reviewing the episode as part of his 2017 farewell tour, former communities minister Eric Pickles told rapt listeners at the Andy Cole Hotel and Diner, Copenhagen, that, though the case didn’t interest him much, he liked to imagine everything worked out as best it could.
Mysterious EnGland 
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