NEW ENGLAND FOLKLORE

Last fall I gave a talk in Rowley, Massachusetts about New England witchcraft. As part of my program I showed the audience how to make a traditional New England witch bottle. Most people hadn't seen this before, which made me wonder: what are the public schools teaching kids these days?

I'm just kidding about the public school thing. I don't really think the schools need to teach children how to make witch bottles. But if you are interested in knowing how to make one read on. Maybe if you are a home schooler you can work it into your curriculum!

Witch bottles are an old European form of defensive magic, and were brought to New England by the English colonists when they crossed the Atlantic in the 1600s. The Puritan leadership frowned on any form of magic, considering it all diabolic, but many people in New England still practiced various forms of divination and defensive magic. They believed there were witches among them using malevolent magic, and it was best to fight fire with fire.

Witch bottles work on a very basic magic principle. The English colonists believed that a magical connection was made between a witch and their victim when the witch cursed them. The witch's malevolent magic would flow through this connection, causing illness, pain, and various other torments to their victim.

However, the magical connection was a two way channel. The witch sent pain and suffering through it, but the clever person could send pain along it right back to the witch. This could be done without even knowing who the witch was.

The witch bottle was designed to send pain or even death to an attacking witch. Surprisingly, for something so powerful, it could be made using common items found in any home.

There are only three ingredients: a bottle, pins or nails, and urine of the bewitched person. That last one is kind of gross, but I'll explain why it was considered necessary.

It's more of a jar, really, but it's what I had available...

A few notes about the bottle. In some European countries special bottles were sold specially for making make witch bottles. They were usually imprinted with an ugly face, and were often called Greybeards or Bellarmines. Bellarmine was a particularly notorious Catholic Inquisitor, so you can understand why you'd want his image on a bottle that was supposed to defeat witches. I haven't seen any records of Bellarmines here in New England. The early colonists did not have a lot of material luxuries and would have just used whatever bottles were available.

The nails and pins were used to send pain back along the magical connection to the attacking witch. I've seen some modern recipes for witch bottles that include special herbs and things like that. I suppose you could include herbs if you want to, but again I haven't seen any records of that being done in New England. The colonists just used sharp, metal items like needles, pins and nails. If you're feeling creative you could add some broken glass or thorns. Really anything that will cause pain will suffice.

Note: this isn't really urine in this photo, but Red Bull.

The final and grossest ingredient is urine from the bewitched person. A couple years ago I bought a cute little souvenir witch bottle from a Salem gift shop. It contains herbs, salt, a nail, and a little scroll with a spell. It is sealed with wax. It's really nice, but it wouldn't pass muster in the 1600s because it doesn't have any urine in it.

The urine is absolutely necessary for a witch bottle to function. Again, according to the theory behind witch bottles, a witch establishes a magical connection with their victim. This connection links to the victim's physical body. The connection is also linked to any product of the victims body, like their hair, fingernail clippings, or urine.

Many witch narratives from New England tell how a farmer notices that one of his farm animals is acting strangely. Suspecting witchcraft, the farmer will cause pain to his animal by doing things like cutting off an ear or beating it with a stick. The pain he causes to the animal travels along the magical connection back to the witch. Usually these stories end with a mean neighbor being seen the next day with bruises right where the farmer beat his animal or with a missing ear. It was gruesome proof that they were the witch.

Happily, even the early colonists realized they shouldn't beat the hell out of a bewitched child or cut off a bewitched spouse's ear. But because the magic connection is linked to products of the body, not just the body itself, they didn't need to. Instead they just needed to put urine from the suffering bewitched person into the bottle along with the nails. The urine served as a substitute for the bewitched person's body, and mixing it with the nails had the same effect as actually driving nails into that person's body. Pain from the nails would shoot back along the magical connection to the witch, causing harm to them and forcing them to stop bewitching the victim.

In Europe people would usually bury a witch bottle for safe keeping once it was assembled, and many have been unearthed by archaeologists. Not many have been found here in New England, though, even though historians know they were used. One reason might be that the early colonists often added a final special twist to their bottles. Rather than bury them, they would set them in the fireplace until the urine heated up and exploded, which was believed to send extra pain and suffering back at the witch.

DISCLAIMER: Obviously, don't try this at home. Even if you decide to try making a witch bottle, heating it up will just fill your house with boiling urine, broken glass, and hot nails. It might even be worse than being cursed by a witch.

Many years ago out in Western Massachusetts there lived a man named Tom Cook.

Tom was not popular in town. He was a "rough sort of customer and it was commonly believed that he was in league with the Devil."

This belief was indeed true. Many years ago Tom had sold his soul to the Devil for material success and had been reaping the benefits ever since.

Well, one cold morning Tom was getting dressed next to his fireplace when he heard someone knocking at the door. When he opened it he was horrified to see the Devil standing there.

"Tom," the Devil said, "You've had a good run but now it's time to pay the price. I'm here to take you down to Hell."

The Devil grabbed Tom's arm as he said this. His grip was firm like iron and burned like hot coals.

Tom gulped. Things didn't look too good, but as the Devil began to drag him out the door he had an idea.

Tom said, "Sorry, can you hold on a moment? I need to put on my suspenders."

The Devil chuckled. What did it matter? Tom's soul was his. "Sure," the Devil said. "I'll wait until you put your suspenders on."

Tom ran to where his suspenders were and threw them into the fire.

"Ooops, sorry, Mr. Devil," he said. "My suspenders are gone. You'll have to wait until I get some new ones!"

The Devil gnashed his teeth, realizing that he had been tricked. With an angry shout he disappeared in a cloud of sulfurous smoke.

Tom escaped the Devil's grasp, but he was never able to wear suspenders again as long as he lived.

*****

This little story comes from Clifton Johnson's excellent book What They Say in New England (1896).

Literature is full of stories about people who sell their souls to Satan. Probably the most famous one is Faust, whose story has been told by Christopher Marlowe, Johann von Goethe and even Thomas Mann. Literary stories about deals with the Devil usually end with a human being dragged to hell, and are heavy on the morality.

Folklore is also full of stories about people selling their soul to the Devil, but the folk tales tend to focus less on morality and more on how the bargain is either fulfilled or thwarted. Someone usually gets tricked.

For example, in this story a Connecticut man named Rufus Goodrich sells his soul to the Devil. Rufus wants to be famous. The Devil says, "Sure, you'll be so famous thousands will attend your funeral." Shortly after signing away his soul Rufus falls from a hayloft and dies. When his neighbors finally find his body they notice that it's covered with thousands of flies.

It's a gross story, but illustrates one of the key principles in these folk tales. The language used in the bargain is taken very literally. A person's true intention doesn't matter as much as what they sat. The Devil never actually told Rufus that thousands of people would attend his funeral, did he?

Usually the person who gets tricked is the Devil, as in the story about Tom Cook and his suspenders. The Devil probably meant to say "I can wait a minute or two before I drag you to Hell," but instead he said he'd wait for Tom to put on his suspenders. Again, the literal words are more important than anyone's intention.

You can see some other examples of literalism in this story about the Devil building a barn, or even this Native American story about a dwarf who grants wishes. Be careful what you agree to, and be careful what you say.

When some people think about New England witchcraft, they think "Oh yeah, that terrible stuff that happened in Salem in 1692."

Other people, and this probably includes you gentle reader, know that witchcraft beliefs in New England started before the Salem trials and continued well after them. Interesting witch stories can be found all across New England and well into the 20th century. I even read one recently from the 21st century!

One good source for witch stories is Eva Speare's book New Hampshire Folk Tales (1932). Speare's book has a wide variety of folk stories but includes twelve specifically about witches from different towns in the the Granite State.

I like this one about a woman named Jenny Gilchrist who lived in Hillsborough, New Hampshire on Barden Hill Road. Gilchrist was known in town as Aunt Jinny, but she doesn't seem very lovable:

Aunt Jinny, as she was commonly called, has been described as a little, sallow, weazened (sic), old woman with a fiery temper and vitriolic tongue, whose unhappy experiences in early life had so embittered her nature that she distrusted and shunned her neighbors...

Several stories tell how she terrorized the local miller and scared small children into doing chores for her, but the witchiest stories relate to how she died.

Aunt Jinny was never wealthy, but as she became older she grew ever more destitute. The town officials eventually decided that she should be removed from her home and taken to the poorhouse where she could be taken care of.

The Franklin Pierce homestead in Hillsborough.

When the town constable came to Jinny's house he was prepared for an argument, but she obediently and silently climbed onto his horse behind him. Then they set off for the poorhouse, which was many miles away.

They rode all night but when the sun rose the constable nearly fell off his horse in surprise. Instead of arriving at the poorhouse he realized they were riding back into Aunt Jinny's yard! Jinny had bewitched the horse so she wouldn't have to leave her home.

Jinny ended up dying at home soon after in the following way. One day one of her neighbors noticed one of his sheep was acting strangely. Fearing it was sick and would infect the other sheep he killed it with a club. At that very instant Jinny collapsed in her house. She had of course been bewitching the sheep, and the damage inflicted on the animal was also inflicted on her.

A kind woman who lived nearby came to watch over Jinny as she lay stricken. Wise old people in town warned that woman that if she wanted Jinny to live she should never avert her gaze from her. Witches didn't like to die when people were watching, they said. As long as she kept watch Jinny would refuse to die.

For many hours the woman kept close watch over Jinny, determine that she should live. But eventually she looked away, just for one second. That was all it took. When she looked back Jinny was dead.

There are a couple things I find very interesting about these stories. Aunt Jinny is an archetypal post-Puritan New England witch: a cantankerous and hated old woman who wants to live independently. But it's interesting that the community does try to care for her, even though she doesn't want their help.

I am also intrigued by the idea that a witch won't die while someone watches, which I haven't encountered before. It make sense though in the context of other New England witch lore. While they are alive witches are alleged to work much of their mischief by sending their souls out of their bodies. They do this secretly while no one is watching, often during the night when their families and spouses are sleeping.

When a witch dies, they send their soul out one last final time. They would want to die they way they lived, privately and secretly, unseen by the prying eyes of their neighbors.

One last note: stories about Aunt Jinny also appear in George Waldo Browne's 1921 book The History of Hillsborough, New Hampshire, so she must have been an important part of town folklore.

I'm taking a break this week from the usual witches, monsters and weirdness to ask a few questions:

1. Has your physician told you that you need to get more rum in your diet?

2. Have you ever wondered what a pirate might eat for breakfast?

3. Did you ever want to put vinegar on your pancakes?

If you answered yes to any of those questions I have a recipe you need to try.

I found it The Old Farmer's Almanac Colonial Cookbook, which was published by Yankee Magazine in 1976. This was given to me many years ago by my friend Dave, and it used to belong to his mother. The Colonial Cookbook contains lots of unusual recipes, like partridge in vine leaves, green corn pudding, and snow griddle cakes. It also has a recipe innocuously titled "rye pancakes."

In addition to rye flour, which you don't often see in pancake recipes, the recipe includes molasses and rum. It's very Olde New England (and also very piratey). I've never eaten pancakes with rum in the batter, so I thought I'd give the recipe a try.

Here's the recipe:

3 cups rye flour
1 cup flour
1 cup molasses
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 eggs
2 cups milk
1/2 cup New England rum

Combine ingredients, beat, fry!

A few things to note about this batter and these pancakes. First of all, the batter is very, very thick. The recipe warns that "These are very rich." That's an understatement. The batter is thick like a bread batter. I had to plop it into the pan, not pour it.

I also have to note that sadly most of the rum cooks away, leaving just a slight flavor but no real intoxication. The predominant flavor is molasses. Happily I love molasses!

Finally, these come out really brown. I realized while making these pancakes that a lot of New England cuisine is brown. Brown bread, Indian pudding, apple pie, roast turkey, New England pot roast, switchel, etc. It is the cuisine of a region where winter is long and summer is very, very short.

The Colonial Cookbook says the following about this recipe: "Here's a recipe that dates back to the early 1700s, when great fields of rye swayed in the wind all along the Taunton River in Massachusetts. The molasses or sugar required for these pancakes was brought up the river in smalls sloops or brigs... A cherished family tradition handed down from generation to generation."The Yankee Magazine web site says the recipe was submitted to them by a Miss Helen H. Lane.

I have no way of knowing if this recipe really dates to the 1700s, but the ingredients do make it seem possible. For example, the early New England settlers found that rye grew better than wheat in this cold climate, and it featured prominently in their baked goods, like brown bread. They always preferred wheat, though, and once New England became more prosperous they imported wheat from other states.

Rum and molasses also have deep roots in New England history. Yankee merchants would trade rum for slaves in Africa, and then trade the slaves for sugar and molasses in the Caribbean. They'd bring the molasses and sugar back to New England to make rum, which they'd then trade in Africa for slaves. They'd repeat this over and over, turning a profit with each transaction.

This exploitative economic system (known as the Triangle Trade) made the merchants quite wealthy, and also infused New England cuisine with Caribbean flavors. Molasses, rum, and spices like cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg are all essential to New England cooking, but all actually come from the Caribbean islands. It's strange to think that the so-called pumpkin pie spices, which are so homey and comforting, have their origin in such a dark period of history.

One last thing about these pancakes. Rather than topping them with butter and syrup, the Colonial Cookbook recommends topping them with vinegar and sugar. It says, "Fill a cereal bowl with sugar. Add enough vinegar to make the resulting mixture spreadable as butter. As you eat the pancakes, dab them with the mixture."

I thought this might be gross, but it was actually kind of delicious. The sour vinegar cut through the sweetness. The combination of vinegar and sugar is also an old New England one. It doesn't show up much these days, unless you are lucky enough to find someplace serving switchel.

Here's a nice creepy story. Not every fairy tale has a happy ending...

*****

Once upon a time, in the early 1900s, a woman and her husband built themselves a stone house in Middlebury, Connecticut. They liked peace and quiet, so they built it out in the woods.

Things went well in their new house for a while, but after a few months the wife became strangely agitated whenever she left home.

One day when they were walking back from town she grabbed her husband's arm. "Can you hear them?" she asked her husband.

"Hear what?" he said.

"Them. The little people in the woods," she said. "I think they're talking to me. I've heard them for weeks now..."

"My love, perhaps you need to rest. I only hear leaves blowing in the wind."

His wife rested, but it did nothing to cure her of the idea that fairies in the woods were talking to her. "They want something from me," she said, "but I don't know what it is. I'm scared they'll come into our house..."

Her husband didn't believe in fairies, but he loved his wife, so at her request he put bars on their windows to keep out the fairies.

One night after they had gone to bed the woman turned to her husband and said, "I know what they want from me. They don't want to hurt us, they just want houses like we have. They want a home like we have. They want us to build them a village!"

From Roadtrippers.com.

In the moonlight the man could see the manic gleam in his wife's eyes, but he loved her, so the next day he set to work building small houses in the woods. Under his wife's direction he built dozens of tiny structures out of stone, brick and shingles.

When the last house was finished his wife clapped with delight. "Now the only thing left to make is the throne," she said.

"A throne? For who?"

"For me. Because I'm going to be the Queen of the Fairies!"

The husband rolled his eyes, but he had already put bars on the windows and built a tiny village, so what was one more concession to his wife's madness? After all, he did love her.

Using a pick-axe he carved a gully into one of the rocky hills, and mortared the stones into a throne. It took him all day, and when it was done he called his wife out to see his handiwork.

From this site about haunted Connecticut.

Exhausted, he sat down on the throne. "What do you think, my love?"

A look of rage came over his wife's face. "What do I think?!"she screamed.

Her husband cowered. "My dear, what's wrong..."

"What do I think?!" She grabbed the pick-axe. "I think you need to get off my throne! I'm the Queen of the Fairies, not you!"

And with that she swung the pick-axe and split her husband's head in two.

The fairy voices suddenly went silent. For months they had been whispering, chattering, singing to her, and now they were gone. Aghast at what she had done and howling with grief, she ran to their house and hanged herself.

*****

Isn't that a great, gruesome story? There is also another version where the husband finally can't take it anymore and kills his wife, but either way it doesn't end well for this poor couple.

The story is told to explain one of the weirder places in Connecticut: the Little People's Village in Middlebury.

The Little People's Village consists of remains of multiple stone structures located out in the woods. There's a house-sized building with bars on the windows, there are the remains of many miniature buildings, and there is also something that looks suspiciously like a throne.

According to local folklore, the throne is cursed and anyone who dares sit on it will die within seven years. Either the fairies, the woman's ghost, or her husband's ghost don't want people to sit there. Needless to say, local teenagers of course go to the Village to sit on the throne.

Other legends say that anyone who lingers too long in the Village will begin to hear the fairy voices and go insane.

Historians say the Village was not built at the bidding of a fairy-maddened woman, but was instead simply part of a local amusement park that has long since gone out of business. Visitors would ride a miniature railroad through the village and admire the charming little fairy houses. It's interesting how something charming and twee can quickly become a source of horror.

I also think it's interesting how supernatural stories arise to explain things that seem anomalous or strange. For example, when I was teenager in Haverhill, Massachusetts one of the local cemeteries contained a headstone surrounded by an iron cage. My friends and I had been told the cage was there to keep the grave's undead resident in, but in reality the cage was to keep people away from the stone. The grave was for a countess who was the subject of one of John Greenleaf Whittier's poems, and in the 19th century fans of the poem would chip off pieces of the stone. The cage was built to keep souvenir seekers away, not to keep a vampiric spirit in.

That's a bit of a digression, but the same principal is at play with the Little People's Village. The origin of something becomes forgotten and legends arise to explain it. Certain patterns repeat in these legends. For example, the throne in Middlebury is not the only lethal site in Connecticut. People who visit Midnight Mary's grave in New Haven are also rumored to die after seven years. Further north in Montpelier, Vermont, anyone foolish enough to sit on the statue of Black Agnes will die in seven days.

A cursed site, death, and the number seven. You can see how the pattern repeats. I think people find great satisfaction in these stories, grim as they are. We all suspect there are secret powers at work in the world, even in our own hometowns. These stories are reflections of the secret order we hope and fear operates behind the mundane world.

Tony and I had hoped to visit the Little People's Village this spring but we didn't make it. If you go don't vandalize anything (many of the houses have been severely damaged) and watch out for ticks, which may be deadlier than evil fairies. If you can't go, you might want to watch this video of the village.

My sources for this post were Damned Connecticut, Roadtrippers.com, and this page about haunted sites in Connecticut. All excellent sources if you want more information.

One last thought: if you do visit, don't sit on the throne. You never know when a legend might be true.

When John Murray Spear became a Universalist minister, I am sure he never dreamed he'd help create a mechanical messiah destined to save the world.

Spear was born in 1804 in Boston, and in the early years of his ministry he worked towards the abolition of slavery and in support of the Underground Railroad. The Universalist Church was extremely liberal for its time - and remains so today as part of the Unitarian Universalist Church.

In the early 1850s Spear became influenced by another religious movement that was sweeping across America: Spiritualism. Started in upstate New York in 1848 by sisters Kate and Margaret Fox, Spiritualism claims that the spirits of the dead communicate with the living to give advice and inspiration. Certain people, called mediums, are more attuned to the spirit world and can communicate easily with the departed. For those of us not so gifted, the spirits are more likely to manifest as rapping sounds, movements on a Ouija board, and suddenly extinguished candles.

John Murray Spear was gifted and could communicate easily with the spirit world. The dead supposedly granted him healing powers, and also gave him knowledge that he otherwise could not know. For example, thanks to the spirits Spear once delivered a brilliant and factually correct lecture on geology, a subject he had never studied.

In 1853 a group of elite spirits called the Association of Beneficents contacted Spear. The Association, which was made up of important dead people like Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin and Socrates, told Spear that had plans to reform the world. They wanted to shake up government, the educational system and marriage. But before they could do that, they needed Spear to do one thing.

He had to create a mechanical messiah.

While the previous messiah had been a man of flesh and blood, the new technological age demanded a messiah made of metal and powered by magnetism. Makes sense, right?

The Association of Beneficents told Spear this awesome being would be born in Lynn, Massachusetts. A group of Spiritualists had already been communicating with angels ion Lynn's High Rock, a rocky promontory that rises up in the middle of the city. Those angels had been a sign of the mechanical messiah's coming.

High Rock as it appears today. The tower has great views!

Spear traveled to High Rock, and with the help of the Lynn Spiritualists constructed the messiah out of metal rods, gears and magnets. They spent more than $2,000 on materials, which was a significant amount of money for that time. Spirits guided Spear's hand as he constructed the mechanical being, which was known variously as the New Motive Power, the New Motor, and the Mechanical Infant.

Unfortunately, once it was constructed the New Motive Power didn't move. It just lay there inertly on a table in the cottage at High Rock. A body had been created, but was not inhabited by a spirit. Spear and his colleagues were filled with despair.

Meanwhile a Spiritualist woman in Boston was experiencing birth pangs. The woman was puzzled, because she had not shown any signs of pregnancy. Her puzzlement vanished when the spirits came to her and explained that she was giving birth to a purely spiritual being - the soul of the mechanical messiah. As her contractions increased she was rushed to High Rock, where she successfully birthed the soul of the New Motive Power into it's mechanical body.

Both John Murray Spear and the unnamed woman reported that they could feel pulsations traveling through the messiah's mechanical body, but it still didn't move. The Association of Beneficents instructed the woman to nurse the little robot, which she did. (Don't ask how, since I don't know.) The pulsations increased. Spear declared the creature was definitely alive!

It still didn't move, however.

The spirits finally told Spear that he would need to take the infant messiah to Harmonia, a Spiritualist community in Kiantone, New York. Harmonia was even more spiritually charged than Lynn, and the New Motive Power would thrive there.

The Spiritualists of Harmonia happily welcomed Spear and the New Motive Power, but the other citizens of Kiantone were less than thrilled to hear that a mechanical messiah had arrived in town. Okay, that's an understatement. They were outraged. They stormed Harmonia and smashed the New Motive Power into tiny pieces. Spear's dream ended under the feet and fists of an angry mob.

I have a lot of mixed reactions to this story. Spiritualism was a really powerful cultural force in the 19th century, and inspired people to do some unusual things, like dig tunnels to find treasure or try to create a mechanical messiah. From my privileged position in the early 21st century, it's easy to look back and wonder how Spear could be so dumb. Did he really think a robot was going to save our society?

Obviously he did, but he also believed that slavery should be abolished. The New Motive Power didn't work out, but Spear didn't give up hope that American society could improve. He continued to fight for abolition and saw slavery ended within his lifetime. Spear also founded several Utopian communities before he died in 1887. His body is buried in Philadelphia, but I am sure his spirit is still actively working for social justice in the after life.

*****

The main source for this week's incredible but true story is my book Legends and Lore of the North Shore, which also contains many other weird stories from Lynn.

As I've mentioned before, one of the nice things about living in New England is that you can find weird folklore almost everywhere. Well, at least I think it's one of the nice things...

I've lived in the Boston area for many years and have walked through Cambridge's Cambridgeport neighborhood hundreds of times. It's only recently that I learned about a weird story involving a witch, a curse, and an old church in that area. And the story might even be true. It first appeared in the Boston Globe in March of 1881, and newspapers don't print false stories, do they?

The church in question is the Cambridgeport Baptist Church. In 1881 a Globe reporter went to investigate some strange happenings at the church. The church had recently burned down, and parishioners and neighbors reported some unusual things:

Strange sounds are heard at night by persons who pass the ruined building - low moans and cries of intense agony, that rise to weird shrieks and die away in long-drawn signs. These unearthly sounds increase in frequency as the the work of clearing away the ruin progresses, and old residents remember that the same sounds were heard after the burning of the old church some sixteen years ago...

That's right. This was the second time the church had burned within a twenty year period. When the church was rebuilt the first time in 1865 people also heard unusual sounds, but they stopped when the cornerstone of the church was laid. Strange.

Equally strange, when that cornerstone was laid in 1865 the documents that were being ceremonially buried under it were burned by a sudden mysterious fire. Stranger still, in 1881 the same thing occurred:

As the stone was being lowered into place a spark of fire was struck out in some unaccountable way and communicated to the documents placed under the stone, but the block was quickly lowered to put the flame out. When the stone was raised the the other day there was nothing under it but a little heap of ashes...

Conveniently, the Globe reporter meets an elderly Cambridgeport man who tells him a story that was told to him by his grandfather. According to the story, many years ago a woman named Ann Hopkins lived in an isolated cabin on the banks of the Charles River. Hopkins was once a beautiful young woman who was courted by two rivals. She loved only one of the men and promised herself to him when he returned from the French and Indian War. As a token of her affection she gave him a ribbon.

The other man, scorned by Ann Hopkins, became bitter and jealous. He too went off to fight against the French, and served alongside Hopkins's true love. During a battle he shot the man Hopkins loved but made it appear he had been killed by the French. When he came back to Cambridge he told Hopkins the sad news. At first she believed his story, but when she saw he was wearing the ribbon she had bestowed upon her true love she realized what had happened. The shock drove her insane.

For many years after this Hopkins lived alone in her cabin, ignored by the Puritans of Cambridge. But that changed when a plague struck the town. As people grew ill, they noticed that Hopkins was unaffected. They also noticed that a cow that had strayed onto her property began to give bloody milk, and a child she had glared at sickened and died. Some people even said they had seen Hopkins flying over head on a broom.

Hopkins was brought to trial and found guilty of witchcraft. The Cambridge elders sentenced her to be burned at the stake. As the flames consumed her body, Hopkins saw among the spectators the man who had killed her lover.

The red light flashes back from her scorched eyeballs upon the throng, her cracked and bleeding lips part, and shaking the arm from which the flesh is dropping in shreds, she shrieks a terrible curse upon her murderers. They shrink back in chill terror, back into the gloom beyond the glare of the ghastly flames, and Ann Hopkins shrieks: "The curse of fire shall be upon this spot forever!"

The site of Ann Hopkins execution was of course the future location of the Cambridgeport Baptist Church. Her curse was the reason the church repeatedly burned down. The old man hints ominously that her spirit still lurks in the area...

Isn't that a good story? The ending is satisfyingly cathartic and also really gruesome. Unfortunately it's probably not true. For one thing, the Puritans didn't burn witches but instead hanged them, so there is no way Hopkins died burning at the stake. Well, maybe Ann Hopkins's curse is fixed on the place she was hanged rather than burned?

Perhaps, but there is no historical record of anyone named Ann Hopkins being accused of witchcraft in Cambridge. The story, with its doomed lovers and woman driven mad by loss, sounds like a 19th century romantic legend than an account of a 17th century witch trial. Real 17th century witch stories usually don't have much romance in them, but New England legends from the 19th century often do.

In his book Ghosts of Cambridge, my friend Sam Baltrusis wonders if the Ann Hopkins legend is a garbled version of the true story of Winifred and Mary Holman, two 17th century Cambridge women accused of witchery but ultimately acquitted. That definitely could be possible, but there is definitely no evidence of someone named Ann Hopkins being executed for witchcraft in Cambridge.

Although the 1881 Globe article doesn't point out the implausibility of a witch being burned at the stake in Cambridge, it does end on a debunking note. The reporter writes:

Here the old man's tale ended, and I looked up and said: "Do you think the ghost of Ann Hopkins stretched these telegraph wires overhead that are making all this weird moaning?" and the old man arose and gazed upon me reproachfully.

Although I like to look at the facts behind a supernatural story, I'm also not a huge fan of debunkers. I still think there's room for a little mystery and wonder in the world, even in Cambridgeport. Were the parishioners and neighbors really so naive that they would mistake the sound of telegraph wires for ghostly shrieks? That seems unlikely. And what caused the two mysterious fires that burned down the church? Why were there spontaneous flames during two cornerstone ceremonies? Things aren't explained as neatly as the article suggests.

Even if there is a scientific explanation for everything that occurred, I think this story nicely illustrates New England's ambiguous relationship with witches. On one had, people here know that the people accused of witchcraft weren't really witches. They were just innocent victims of religious mania and gossip. Even in this story it's clear that Ann Hopkins isn't really a witch.

On the other hand, although Hopkins isn't a witch she still successfully places a curse on the spot where she died. In this respect she follows in the footsteps of other accused witches who, although innocent of witchcraft, still manage to work some kind of magic as they die. For example, accused Salem witch Sarah Good cursed Reverend Noyes as she died, saying God would give him blood to drink. Near Plymouth a woman named Aunt Rachel cast a curse with her dying breath, while in Bucksport, Maine an accused witch (or maybe her son) cast a curse on the judge who sentenced her to hang.

Those are just a few of the New England stories where accused witches curse the people who execute them. These tales claim that even though witches aren't real, magic and the supernatural are. It can be found anywhere, even a few blocks from downtown Cambridge.

So we had beautiful summer weather this past weekend. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.

I suppose I should have gone out roaming through the woods looking for monsters or exploring historic old cemeteries (or maybe just going to the beach), but instead I decided to update the blog. Hopefully those of you out roaming through New England will find this week's information helpful, particularly if you are in Vermont.

Over the last year or so I've been researching the various fairies that make their homes in New Enlgand, and I realized I didn't have much information about Vermont. With it's rounded Green Mountains and dense woods I knew there had to be some fairies living up there!

There is a little bit of information floating around on the web, but I found a decent written source in William Haviland and Marjory Power's The Original Vermonters (1981), a book which summarizes anthropological and historical information about the Abenaki. The Abenaki were the Indian groups who lived in Vermont before the Europeans came, and who still live there today.

Haviland and Power describe quite a few mythical beings, but two of them seem particularly fairy-like. One of them is called simply "the swamp spirit" or "swamp creature." The swamp spirit was seldom seen, but could often be heard crying from the swampy areas where it lived. Lone travelers were the most likely to hear the creature's cries.

The authors claim this being was "more mischievous than malevolent," but then go on to say it liked to lure children into swamps where it either kept them forever or just outright killed them. This sounds malevolent to me, and it did to Abenaki parents as well, who warned their children to stay away from swamps. I've tried to avoid swamps most of my life - too many mosquitoes - and now I have one more good reason!

Me looking at a swamp. Stay away!

The other fairy-like creature Haviland and Power discuss are the Manogemassak, a name which they translate simply as "Little People." Happily these beings are much less malevolent than the swamp spirit.

The Manogemassak live in rivers and tend to avoid humans as much as possible. This is easy for them to do because of their unique anatomy. The Manogemassak are incredibly narrow, and their faces are described as being as thin as an axe blade. They are so thin that they can only be viewed in profile, not when faced head on. This makes it quite hard for humans to see them.

The Manogemassak also travel in stone canoes, and when humans approach they will submerge under water like a submarine. Stone canoes don't sound practical, but they work just fine if you are a magical being, and they feature in several American Indian myths from New England. For example, the gigantic culture-hero Glooskap was said to travel by stone canoe.

Although the Manogemassak are quite hard to see their handiwork is easy to find, particularly near Button Bay on Lake Champlain. The shores of Button Bay are littered with small round stones which the Manogemassak allegedly make (and which give the bay its name).

The website Native Languages includes a little more information about the Manogemassak. For example, it notes that they sometimes make small clay sculptures that look like animals or people. Finding one of these is considered lucky. The site also claims that geometric markings on rocks indicate a dwelling of the Little People, and that curious humans should stay away.

So, in summary, stay away from swamps and away from rocks with odd markings. Helpful advice for safely enjoying summer outings in the New England woods!

In order to promote this fall's upcoming Harry Potter film, last week author J.K. Rowling released a new story set in the Harry Potter universe. The story is set in Massachusetts and incorporates some aspects of local New England folklore.

The story, "Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," describes how the first school of magic is founded in North America by a plucky orphan girl fleeing from her malevolent aunt. The orphan disguises herself as a boy, hitches a ride across the Atlantic on the Mayflower, and founds the titular school on Mount Graylock, the highest peak in Massachusetts. Along the way she finds true love, rescues two other orphans, and encounters assorted magical creatures. Does she defeat her evil aunt? You'll need to read the story to find out.

As Harry Potter fans know, the British wizarding school in the Rowling's books is called Hogwarts, and the students at Hogwarts are assigned to live in one of four houses (dormitories) based on their personalities and talents. Ilvermorny, the American school, is arranged the same way. The four houses are named after creatures from American folklore.

Here are the four Ilvermorny houses, with their totemic creatures. Read on to find out how (and if) they relate to authentic New England folklore

Pukwudgie:
Students who are healers are drawn to this house, which is named after a type of magical little person from local Native American lore. The Native Americans of New England acknowledge a wide variety of magical little people. The term Pukwudgie was first used to describe them in 1934 by author Elizabeth Reynard in her book The Narrow Land. A Cape Cod Wampanoag chieftain named Clarence Wixon had used the term when he told stories about the Little People to Reynard, and the name has stuck.

People still claim to see Pukwudgies to this day, and they have been discussed in a variety of books and TV shows. J.K. Rowling portrays them as deadly, grumpy, but oddly lovable. I think most writers and paranormal investigators would agree on the first two traits but not the third. It seems highly unlikely they would become employees of a human school as they do by the end of Rowling's story.

Horned Serpent:
Scholars are attracted to this house. Horned serpents do appear in Native American folklore, and have been depicted in petroglyphs from this area. Here is a description by anthropologist Kathleen Blagdon:

Among the manitou (spirits) known ... was the giant horned or antlered, under(water) world serpent, a being familiar to other Algonquian-speaking people as well. Images of this fearsome underwater dweller sometimes decorated amulets, bowls, and other objects. Its powers were suggested by a curious story told to Josselyn of a sea-serpent or snake that lay 'quoiled up like a cable upon a rock at Cape-Ann; a boat passing by with English aboard, and two Indians, they would have shot the serpent, but the Indians dissuaded them, saying if he were not kill'd outright, the would all be in danger of their lives.' (Native People of Southern New England, 1500 - 1650. Blagdon is quoting English writer John Josselyn.)

Does this seem like the type of creature that would help orphans lost in the woods? Maybe, but maybe not.

Thunderbird:
In Rowling's story adventurous students are drawn to this house. The thunderbird is indeed also a creature from local Native American folklore. I'm going to quote Blagdon once again:

The analog of the underwater serpent or panther in the upper or sky world was the thunderbird, a sacred and beautiful bird in many Algonquian cosmologies. Often the enemy of the underwater panther or serpent... This powerful being is commonly depicted graphically, often as a figure with a profiled and prominent beak, or as a human figure with wings. Amulets in the same form were worn... (Native People of Southern New England, 1500 - 1650)

Image from this site.

Paranormal investigators claim that large cryptic avians, possibly thunderbirds, can still be seen in Massachusetts's Hockomock Swamp. Again, is this the type of being that aids wandering orphans? I'm not sure, but it seems the most likely to be helpful.

Wampus:
The final house at Ilvermonry is called Wampus, and is named after a legendary panther-like cat. Unfortunately, the wampus is not really part of New England folklore. Stories about the wampus are usually found in the southern parts of the United States. In some stories the wampus is similar to a werewolf and can be repelled by the Bible, while in others it is an anomalous six-legged panther-like creature. It has four legs for running and two for fighting. I was surprised to learn that may high school football teams in the South are named the Wampus Cats!

The Conway, Arkansas Wampus Cat. Go team!

In Rowling's story students who are warriors are likely to live in Wampus. I suppose that makes sense.

And Even More Creatures...

Rowling incorporates some other creatures into her story beyond the four associated with the school's houses. For example, she mentions hodags, snallygasters, and jackalopes. Sadly, none of these are from New England folklore either.

The hodag is found in Wisconsin folklore and originated as a hoax from 1893. The hodag is also the mascot of the high school in Rhinelander, Wisconsin.

Staged photo of a hodag.

The snallygaster is encountered in Maryland folklore, and its name may derive from the German words "Schneller Geist," which mean "fast ghost." The snallygaster is described as reptilian and winged. As far as a I can tell no high school claims the snallygaster as its mascot. I guess "Go Snallygasters!" doesn't make a good cheer.

Finally, the jackalope. Again, not from New England. It appears that the jackalope was first created by a talented Wyoming taxidermist in the 1930s, and jackalopes can still be purchased from outdoor retailer Cabela's.

One more creature appears in Rowling's story: the hidebehind, which she describes as a "nocturnal, forest-dwelling spectre that preys on humanoid creatures. As the name suggests, it can contort itself to hide behind almost any object, concealing itself perfectly from hunters and victims alike." The hidebehind is one of the villains in the story.

A drawing of a hidebehind from Wikipedia.

Happily for those of us who live here, the hidebehind is not from New England. Although many of the Little People from local Native American lore are shy and so thin they can hide behind trees, the hidebehind is found in the folklore from other parts of the United States. According to legend it likes to prey on lonely hunters and lumberjacks, so I'm glad this is one thing I don't need to worry about when I go walking in the woods.

A while ago I posted about how Tituba, the famous Arawak Indian slave from the Salem witch trials, came to be portrayed as black in fiction and drama.

That post got a lot of hits, but I think it's important to point out that while Tituba was not of African descent many other people involved with New England witchcraft were. Witchcraft was an equal opportunity belief system, and people of all races were accused of witchcraft. For example, a black slave named Candy was accused during the Salem trials, but happily was not found guilty, even after her accusers produced evidence in the form of a poppet she had allegedly made.

In Rhode Island, a black woman named Tuggie Bannock had a reputation as a powerful witch in the 1800s, well after the witchcraft trials had ended. And as historian William Pierson writes in his book Black Yankees (1988), many people of African descent across New England worked as diviners, fortune-tellers, and herbalists.

One of the earliest accounts from New England of a black person involved with witchcraft comes from 1679. In December of that year, a black slave named Wonn testified in the Salem court against a woman named Bridget Oliver. Oliver was an outspoken woman who had been married multiple times, and when her current husband Thomas Oliver beat her she would hit him back. Naturally, her neighbors in Salem suspected this independent woman of witchcraft.

Wonn testified to the court that one day the horses hauling his sled mysteriously and unaccountably ran into a swamp up to the their bellies. This doesn't seem like very significant evidence, but several witnesses said they had never seen horses behave so strangely before. And what unseen force had frightened them into the swamp anyway?

A week later Wonn saw Bridget Oliver's specter perched upon a beam in the barn, holding an egg in one hand. He swung at her with a rake but she disappeared. Finally, as Wonn ate dinner that evening two strange black cats appeared in the house. Upon seeing the cats Wonn tried to speak, but felt himself pinched by invisible hands.

Although Wonn (which is perhaps an older spelling of Juan) was of African descent his testimony contains many elements of classic New England witchcraft. The misbehaving livestock is a common trope, and bewitched draft animals often allegedly brought their wagons or carts into swamps or rivers. The black cats and invisible pinching are also classic witchery.

I'm not so sure about the egg, though, which I haven't seen in too many stories. Was Bridget Oliver stealing the egg? Was she brandishing it as a threat and planning to use it in a spell? It's not clear, but it's a very powerful image.

Bridget Oliver was initially found guilty based on Wonn's testimony, but the court later let her go free. She wasn't so lucky thirteen years later in 1692. Then married to her third husband and called Bridget Bishop, she was again found guilty of witchcraft again and hanged on June 10.

The history books don't tell us what happened afterwards to Wonn. Did he really think he was bewitched by Bridget Oliver? Did he have a personal grudge against her, or was he put up to it by his owner, John Ingersoll? Was Wonn still in Salem in 1692 for the witch trials? It's all a mystery.

*****

Special thanks go out to my friend Ed for suggesting this as a topic after he read New England Bound: Slavery and Colonization in Early America (2016) by Wendy Warren. I also got information from William Pierson's Black Yankees (1988) and Marilynne Roach's The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-By-Day Chronicle of A Community Under Siege (2002).

This weekend my friend Lori and I took a little tour of Marblehead, Massachusetts.

I don't use the word charming too much, but Marblehead is probably one of the most charming towns I have ever been to. Charming old 18th century homes everywhere, charming narrow streets, and of course a charming location on an isolated peninsula.

This might come as a surprise, but Marblehead was much beloved by the famous horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. Lovecraft was obsessed with the 18th century, and raved to all his friends about the town's historic architecture.

Lovecraft showed his love in a strange way - by setting several of his stories in a thinly fictionalized version of Marblehead that he called Kingsport. Probably the most famous of these is "The Festival," which tells how a young man comes to Kingsport to celebrate the winter solstice with distant relatives he has never met before.

Here's how Lovecraft describes the town:

... Kingsport with its ancient vanes and steeples, ridgepoles and chimneypots, wharves and small bridges, willow-trees and graveyards; endless labyrinths of steep, narrow, crooked streets, and dizzy church-crowned central peak that time durst not touch; ceaseless mazes of colonial houses piled and scattered at all angles and levels like a child's disordered blocks...

It all sounds very quaint on the surface but - surprise! - by the story's end the narrator is descending deep into the earth with a horde of semi-human cultists to celebrate ancient unspeakable rites:

... I saw some side passages or burrows leading from unknown recesses of blackness to this shaft of nighted mystery. Soon they became excessively numerous, like impious catacombs of nameless menace; and their pungent odor of decay grew quite unbearable... I shivered that a town should be so aged and maggoty with subterranean evil.

And that's how H. P. Lovecraft shows his love for a favorite town!

But all kidding aside, I think this story demonstrates the dual fascination people feel about this part of the country. On the one hand it's old, quaint and charming, but on the other hand some creepy things definitely happened here in the past and many people feel like they have left their imprint on the landscape. It's no accident that so many horror stories are set in New England, or that America's three greatest horror writers (Poe, Lovecraft and King) all were born here.

Marblehead these days is a very posh and charming town, but when it was founded it was a rough-and-tumble fishing town full of unchurched sailors. Some old European folklore survived in Marblehead longer than in other parts of New England, and several famous witches (Mammy Redd, Edward Dimond and Moll Pitcher) were also born in the town. And those tunnels Lovecraft wrote about may not just be fiction...

On our Marblehead trip Lori and I decided to first visit Fort Sewall, which was built on a bluff overlooking the ocean in the 1600s. The fort was expanded and renovated in the 1700s, and played a key role in the War of 1812 when its cannons saved the U.S.S. Constitution from being attacked by British warships. The fort is now a public park and on the National Register of Historic Places.

Something we didn't see on the trip were the caves located in the cliff underneath the fort. According to Pam Matthias Peterson's Marblehead: Myths, Legends and Lore there are caves in the cliff which were used in the past as a hiding place for smugglers. These caves would flood at high tide, and the town sealed them up to prevent people from being trapped inside and drowning. That sounds like a good idea to me.

Peterson also writes that according to local legend a vast network of tunnels runs beneath Marblehead, and even connects the caves to the main town. These tunnels were supposedly used by the smugglers to carry on their business undetected by the British. Peterson claims the tunnels are mostly just a legend, but at least one house in town (the King Hooper mansion) does have a sealed-off doorway in its cellar. Perhaps there is a kernel of truth behind the subterranean tunnels in Lovecraft's story after all?

A group of ghost hunters have investigated Fort Sewall several times. Over the course of six years, Nick Smith of Queens, New York has investigated Fort Sewall using high-tech ghost-hunting technology like an electromagnetic field detector and a microphone that can pick up sounds inaudible to the human ear.

Smith said he has twice captured a voice at the site yelling, “Help!” And another time, when Smith was alone at the fort, he said he recorded a voice asking a question, “as though a person were standing behind him.”

“There’s definitely something going on here,” Smith said as he setup equipment for the night’s investigation. “We just haven’t collected enough data to prove what that something is.”

From this November 2013 WCVB article.

Smith wasn't sure what's causing the haunting. The fort has a long history, but no particular tragedy is connected to it.

It does have a dungeon, though, so there was undoubtedly a lot of misery associated with it. The dungeon and the other rooms are sealed off with iron bars, but we were able to see inside. They look like a good place for ghosts to hang out.

If you want to watch Nick Smith and some colleagues investigate the fort you can find a video on YouTube. The beginning does feature the voice saying "Help me", which is pretty spooky.

Next week I'll post more about Marblehead, including its most famous ghost. Stay tuned!

While Lori and I were in Marblehead we took a tour of the Lee Mansion. While this historic house is not officially haunted it definitely has a few weird things going on. And I mean that in a good way.

Jeremiah Lee (1721 - 1775) was a wealthy Marblehead merchant and ship owner. He built the mansion that bears his name in 1768, but unfortunately Lee and his family only lived there for a few short years before he died in an unusual way.

In addition to being a merchant Lee was a smuggler, and had for several years been smuggling weapons into the American colonies to be used in the uprising against the British. One night Lee and two other Marblehead men were secretly meeting with John Hancock and Paul Revere at a tavern outside of Boston when they got word that a group of British soldiers were approaching. The men ran out of the tavern.

It was a fatal decision. In order to avoid detection Lee spent the night hiding in a nearby field. It was a chilly night and the exposure to the cold air made him ill. He never returned to Marblehead. Instead, he died three days later in Newton from a fever.

We asked the tour guide if Jeremiah Lee's ghost haunted the mansion. The answer was an unequivocal "No." Maybe he didn't live in it long enough to get attached, or maybe his spirit is wandering around somewhere in Newton. But either way he's not haunting the mansion.

Lee's family went bankrupt and in 1804 the mansion was sold to a local bank. They occupied it until 1909 when the Marblehead Historical Society bought it. Because the mansion has had so few owners the interior has barely changed since the 1700s. It even has the original wallpaper, which was hand painted in England more than 200 years ago. Our tour guide said there was only one other building in the US with equally old wallpaper, which is pretty impressive.

The mansion's walls are also covered with old paintings of merchants, ministers and other historic Marblehead notables. There are also quite a few paintings of children. When asked about the child portraits our tour guide told us they were mostly paintings commissioned by local families to memorialize children that died. Wealthy families would quickly bring in artists to paint portraits of their children's corpses before burial.

I suppose that's why so many of the children look really unhealthy. One painting, of a little girl holding a book, was incredibly spooky and reminded me of something from a horror movie. Lori thought I should take a photo for the blog but I declined. It seemed like asking for trouble. Let sleeping spirits lie.

The other weird thing we saw was this carved wooden figure. It kind of looks like it has fangs, doesn't it? It might just be facial hair, though.

We thought it was a doll, but our guide told us it was actually an implement used to tighten the ropes that supported a bed's mattress. Did you know the phrase "sleep tight" refers to a bed's ropes? I learn something new all the time!

While no strange legends are attached to the Lee Mansion, the same cannot be said of Lovis Cove, which is just a short walk away. Lovis Cove is said to be haunted by a famous ghost known either as the Screeching Lady, Screaming Woman, Shrieking Lady, or some variant therof. Whatever she's called you get the picture. The ghost is loud and very unhappy.

The cove itself is informally known as Screaming Woman Cove or Screeching Lady Beach. When I think of beaches I think of soft white sand, but that's not the case at Lovis Cove. The beach is covered with rocks and there are even more rocks - big sharp ones covered with algae - out in the water. It's not the type of beach you really want to spend a lot of time at.

The ghost doesn't want to spend time there either but apparently has no choice. Samuel Roads includes the story of the Screeching Woman in his 1880 book History and Traditions of Marblehead. According to Roads, way back in the late 1600s an English ship crossing the Atlantic was captured by Spanish pirates. All the passengers and crew of the ship were slaughtered except for one beautiful English woman, whom the pirates kept alive until they reached New England.

When the pirates came ashore at Lovis Cove with the woman they brutally murdered her on the beach. Roads writes:

The few fishermen who inhabited the place were absent, and the women and children who remained could do nothing to prevent the crime. The screams of the victim were loud and dreadful, and her cries of "Lord save me! Mercy! Oh! Lord Jesus, save me!" were distinctly heard. The body was buried where the crime was perpetrated, and for over one hundred and fifty years on the anniversary of that dreadful tragedy the screams of the poor woman were repeated in a voice so shrill and supernatural as to send an indescribable thrill of horror through all who heard them.

That's pretty gruesome, but Pam Matthias Peterson adds one more gruesome detail in her 2007 book Marblehead Myths, Legends and Lore. The pirates chopped off the woman's fingers while she was still alive to steal her rings. Ugh.

Peterson claims that Marblehead residents avoid the beach at night and that her screams can still sometimes be heard even today. The comments on this site include a few from people who say they have indeed heard her screams in the night. Creepy. Does a ghost like this ever find rest, I wonder?

It took Lori and I a while to find Lovis Cove, but here's a tip if you want to visit: it's located right next to the Barnacle Restaurant, which is at 141 Front Street. The cove doesn't sound like someplace you want to visit at night, though.

I don't know about you, but I actually like a rainy day now and then. My favorite type of weather is a windy and cloudy day. So this long spate of clear, dry (and hot) weather has been nice enough but I am ready for a change.

Much of Massachusetts is in a drought situation, so I think everyone is ready for a change. We had a little rain recently but it hasn't helped. The grass in all the parks near my house yellow and crunchy, and a lot of the flowers that usually bloom this time of year just haven't appeared. I feel like I'm living in California instead of New England. Is this what climate change looks like?

Happily we are supposed to get some more rain this weekend but probably not enough to alleviate our drought. Perhaps a little rain magic is due?

When I was a child in the unenlightened 1970s I always associated rain magic with American Indians, since cartoons often showed them performing dances to bring rain. Some Native American groups do indeed perform rain dances, as do other groups around the world as well. I haven't seen any indication that rain dances were ever performed in this part of the country, though.

Rain magic can be found in New England folklore, but most of it involves predicting when and how long it will rain. There isn't a lot of magic to actually bring rain. I think that might be because this area is usually pretty wet. But perhaps rain magic might be in order if we continue to get more droughts like this one!

Clifton Johnson's book What They Say in New England (1896) contains two techniques to bring rain. Johnson collected his folklore among the farmers in western Massachusetts. I don't think those crusty old farmers used words like 'magic' or 'spell' to describe their practices. They were just things you did. However, they sound like magic spells to me.

They are both violent and I don't recommend them since they involve killing animals, which is not a good thing to do! DO NOT KILL ANIMALS TO BRING RAIN. Anyway, here are the ~~rain spells~~ folkloric weather techniques.

A garter snake in my front yard.

The first is just to kill a beetle. That's it. Just kill a beetle and it will make it rain.

The second is to kill a snake, and then hang up its body. This should produce rain. On the other hand, if you want the weather to be dry you should bury the snake's body.

I'm not sure what the connection is between these animals and rain. Certainly, serpents are associated with water in myths around the world. In China dragons often live in water, and in ancient Babylonian mythology the god Marduk creates the world by killing Tiamat, a primordial water-serpent goddess. In some Algonquian myths the thunderbird fights a watery horned serpent. But would any of these myths really make their way to Yankee farmers in Massachusetts? If you have any insight please share it.

So to wrap up: don't kill animals to make it rain, but maybe try some other magic if you know some. The drought will end at some point I'm sure. What's the old New England saying? "If you don't like the weather just wait a minute."

One great thing about writing this blog is that I get to read lots of musty old books to find strange information. Usually those books are from the 19th century - a golden age of weird New England folklore - but sometimes those old books might only be from the 1980s.

For example, while I was on vacation recently I found a copy of Arthur Myers's book The Ghostly Register, which was published in 1986. That was only thirty years ago, but that's a long time to some people, and The Ghostly Register definitely has some strange information in it.

For example, it contains an account of a house in Somerville, Massachusetts that was haunted by a troll. I have never seen this mentioned anywhere else and thought it was worth sharing. Here are the details.

A young woman named Karen bought a Victorian-era house outside of Somerville's Davis Square in 1983. She liked living there, but there were a few things that seemed a little odd. The basement often flooded, which was annoying, but Karen suspected that something else was going on.

She often felt uncomfortable near the back wall of her house, particularly on the second and third floors. She kept her spare clothing up on the third floor but got such weird vibes that she did not go up there at night. She had tried sleeping in the back bedroom on the second floor, but did so only briefly because she felt uncomfortable there as well. She felt that there was something in the room with her at night:

"I had," she says, "a feeling of a presence at night, of its being almost like an an animal, as though it had claws or wanted to bite me."

A few years after buying the house Karen took a roommate. The roommate slept in the third floor bedroom and experienced many strange occurrences. She set up her bed about six inches away from the back wall, but every morning when she awoke she found that it had been moved flush against the wall. Her clothes and shoes would appear in strange places around the house, and lights would turn themselves on and off.

A still from the movie Troll (1986)

The two women finally realized their house might be haunted and approached a Cambridge psychic for help. But when the psychic came to investigate they were surprised to learn that the problems were being caused not by a ghost, but by a troll. The psychic said:

"Sometimes ... what we think of as ghosts - human beings who have died - are instead what might be called noxious rays, earth energies that are blocked. I felt this troll was stuck there. We did a ritual releasing of him. What came to me was to send him to another plane, where his energies could be transformed into a more positive and fruitful existence."

The troll was apparently connected with an underground spring that ran under the house and that caused the basement flooding. When the house was built on top of the spring the troll became trapped and would send its energy up along the back wall of the house. Karen had always felt its presence in the house, but the troll increased its activity once the roommate moved in and started to sleep near that wall.

The night after the ritual Karen heard a small voice speaking. It was the troll, begging her to let him stay. She also saw an image of her mind of a very small furry creature with claws. She didn't relent and told the troll he needed to leave.

It did. The strange occurrences in the house stopped, as did the basement flooding.

I find this story fascinating. For one thing, Myers gives the names of everyone involved and the address of the troll-haunted house. I have probably walked by the house several times. Here are a few more random thoughts:

1. Somerville is very, very densely settled. It has very little green space, so it's surprising that a nature spirit would show up there. I guess nature is everywhere, though, isn't it?

2. Myers's book was released in 1986. He doesn't say when the troll exorcism happened. In 1986 the horror film Troll was also released, which is about a troll taking over an apartment building. It stars Noah Hathaway as a character called Harry Potter, Jr. and Julia Louis-Dreyfus in her pre-Seinfeld days.

3. I find it very interesting that the psychic's diagnosis was a troll-haunting and not a ghost. You don't often read about troll's haunting houses in New England. I guess she was right, though, since her ritual worked. But maybe paranormal phenomena are shaped by our expectation. If you think the weird activity in your house is caused by a ghost, you'll see a ghost. If you think it's caused by a troll, you'll see a troll. If you think it's aliens, you'll see aliens.

4. This doesn't necessarily mean that paranormal phenomena exist just in our heads, though. Some writers (like Jacques Vallee or Patrick Harpur) suggest that there are actually entities out there that take different forms based on our cultural expectations. Maybe they're spirits, maybe they're daimones, or maybe they're extra-dimensional tricksters who just want to have a laugh at our expense. They could also be something lurking deep inside our subconscious, but I don't think that rules out any of the other possibilities. I'm sure there's a troll or two hiding somewhere deep inside my mind!

Austin Osman Spare was born in London in December of 1886. From a young age he showed an aptitude for the arts, and by age thirteen he was working in a stained glass factory and taking art classes by night. He went on to study at the Royal College of Art and his father, a London policeman, secretly submitted one of young Austin's drawings to the prestigious Royal Academy. It was accepted and exhibited. Spare was on the road to art world greatness.

But things didn't work out exactly as expected. Spare briefly had a successful art career, but he's more famous for his work as an occultist and practitioner of witchcraft. Spare claimed that a witch named Mrs. Paterson set him on this unusual path.

As a child Spare had been raised Anglican, but in his early adolescence met an elderly fortune teller named Mrs. Paterson. Spare described her as a "colonial woman," and Paterson claimed she was from a venerable line of New England witches who had escaped the Puritan prosecution in the 1600s. Although quite old and not traditionally attractive Spare found himself drawn to her. Paterson seduced him, and for the rest of his life Spare was attracted to older women.

Austin Spare and Witch, 1947, by Austin Osman Spare

Although Paterson was poorly educated and had a limited vocabulary she had a powerful grasp of abstract metaphysical concepts. More impressively, she had strong occult powers. In addition to being an accurate fortune teller she was able to materialize her thoughts into physical manifestation, and often created visions of the future for her clients using this power. Spare claimed she taught him this talent but he could never use it as skillfully she could.

Mrs. Paterson possessed several other unusual talents. Using her ability to externalize her thoughts, she was able to easily transform herself from an elderly woman into a beautiful young one. Spare painted portraits of her in both forms.

Paterson could also travel to the Witches' Sabbat, and took Spare with her several times. Spare claimed the Sabbat occurred in "spaces outside of space" that were indescribable and could not be physically represented. Paterson gave Spare the witch name "Zos" after initiating him into the cult. In return, Spare called her his Witch Mother.

Drawing by Austin Osman Spare

Spare eventually turned his back on the mainstream art world to devote himself to his occult and magical studies, briefly associating with Aleister Crowley before striking out on his own. (An interesting note: Adolf Hitler asked Spare to paint his portrait, but Spare turned him down, rightly thinking he was evil.) He lived in squalid conditions in London's slums where he wrote books with titles like The Book of Pleasure, The Focus of Life, and The Anathema of Zos, and sketched and painted his poverty-stricken neighbors and spirits that he summoned. He died in relative obscurity in 1956, but his work on magical sigils (a way of encoding desires in visual form) was rediscovered by occultists in the 1980s. Today his art work is quite expensive; the largest collection of his work is held by Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page.

And what of Mrs. Paterson, the New England witch who set him on this path? It's unclear what happened to her, if she really existed at all. Perhaps she is now residing in a space beyond space, but some writers think Spare simply made her up. People who start magical cults or new religions often claim they were taught by divine beings like angels, secret Ascended Masters, or extraterrestrials. After all, the magic has to come from somewhere. Mrs. Paterson fits into this pattern. Then again, if Spare really did have the ability to manifest his desires in the material world, perhaps the elderly witch emerged from his subconscious mind to teach him.

Witches, undated, by Austin Osman Spare

Whatever she really was, I find it interesting that Paterson allegedly came from New England. Britain has plenty of witches in its own history, so why would Spare need one of ours? There is a trend in the occult world to think that more 'primitive' people have the most powerful magic. Although 'primitive' is an ethnocentric and meaningless word when applied to cultures, occultists and New Agers have often thought that groups like American Indian medicine men, swamp-dwelling Voodoo practitioners, or rural Appalachian conjure folk have the secrets to the universe. Primitive people are allegedly closer to nature, and therefore closer to the source of magic. An elderly, uneducated fortune-teller from that wilderness called New England would probably have seemed primitive - and therefore powerful - to a Londoner like Austin Osman Spare.

Mrs. Paterson doesn't fit the mold of most traditional New England witches, who were not usually seductive. Accounts of the Witches' Sabbat from early New England witch trials were quite chaste and lack the descriptions of orgies that are found in European trial documents. There is some underlying sexual tension in tales of New England witchcraft - particularly those where the witch 'rides' her male victim all night long like a horse - but it is usually not explicit. If anything, Mrs. Paterson reminds me of the shape-shifting fairies and enchantresses from Medieval romances like Gawain and the Loathly Lady, where one of King Arthur's knights marries a hideous crone who later transforms into a lovely maiden.

"Dreams in the Witch House" from the Masters of Horror TV series, 2005

Paterson also reminds me of Keziah Mason, the ancient witch in H.P. Lovecraft's short story "Dreams in the Witch House." Like Paterson, Keziah Mason takes that story's male protagonist to the Witches' Sabbat, which lies beyond the boundaries of normal space. Unlike the highly libidinous Spare, Lovecraft was much more repressed, and Keziah Mason is not seductive in his story. (However, Keziah is both seductive and able to transform into an attractive young lady in the 2005 TV version directed by Stuart Gordon.)

Lovecraft and Spare were contemporaries, but I don't think they were aware of each other's work. Perhaps Mrs. Paterson was working behind the scenes? Lovecraft did once receive a letter from a female fan who claimed to be descended from the Salem witches. She offered to share her magical knowledge with him, but he declined her offer. Who knows what might have happened if he had taken her up on it.

Last week I wrote about A.O. Spare, the British art world, and witchcraft. This week I'm bringing the witchcraft back to New England for a particularly creepy story.

It comes from Christopher Balzano's Dark Woods: Cults, Crime and the Paranormal in the Freetown State Forest. I highly recommend this book if you like your folklore scary and weird. Balzano interviewed people who live near Massachusetts's Freetown Forest and also researched some uncanny occurrences that happened there. The result is a collection of spooky - and allegedly true - stories like this one.

Dave (no last name given) grew up in a rural area in southern Massachusetts. His backyard abutted the Freetown State Forest, and as a boy he and his friends liked to play in the thick woods. The forest has more than 50 miles of unpaved roads and covers more than 5,000 acres, so there was plenty of space for the boys to play.

There was also plenty of space for strange things to happen. One day when he was six, Dave and a friend were in the woods when they heard someone laughing at them. They thought they could see someone hiding in the trees nearby, but when they tried to get a closer look it seemed as though the light was refracting strangely around the laughing figure, making it hard to see. Both boys were terrified and ran home. They kept their encounter secret.

Dave didn't encounter anything strange again until he was ten, when he had a very vivid dream. He dreamed he was an adult male walking through the woods towards a small house. He carried an axe in one hand. When he entered the small house he saw a middle-aged woman with long gray hair making love to a Native American man. In a jealous rage he killed them both, but as he did the woman glared at him not with fear, but with hatred and evil.

OK. Let me just interject to say that's one freaky dream for a ten-year old to have. But more on that later. Back to David's story ...

The Freetown State Forest.

Things got really weird for Dave and the other boys in the neighborhood over the next few years. One day while the boys were out walking in the woods when they came upon the foundation of an old house. Dave recognized it as the ruins of the house he had seen in his dream. This discovery spurred discussion among the boys, and as they talked they all realized they had recently seen the same gray-haired woman. She often appeared outside their bedroom windows at night, begging to come in, while the boys hovered in the space between wakefulness and sleep. They all thought she might be a witch.

Only one of the boys had invited her to enter his bedroom. The results were disastrous. She forced herself on the boy, which terrified him. His parents had to break down the bedroom door to reach their screaming son, who lay in bed as if someone was holding him down. The family eventually moved away from the Freetown State Forest.

Dave had his own nighttime visit from the witch, which he claims happened while he was awake. He sometimes saw a white figure following him in the woods and heard the eerie laughter he had heard years ago. He also told Balzano that he had seen a large black cat in the area. Black cats aren't that unusual, but this one walked on its rear legs.

The witch definitely was scary, but despite this Dave and some of the boys became obsessed with her. They visited the old foundation repeatedly, and one of Dave's friends would wander through the woods trying to find her.

The witchy phenomena quieted down as Dave got older. He hasn't seen the witch for many years. He moved out of his parents' house, and has a girlfriend and a child. He still gets nervous when he goes to visit his parents at his old house near the woods, though.

******

I really like this story. Yes, it's spooky, but it reminds me of the stories I'd hear when I was just a kid, sitting on my back porch in the late summer. Plus, I love a good New England witch story.

First off, let's get something out of the way. Is this story true? I have no way to tell. Balzano says the Freetown Historical Society has no record of anyone living in the woods, but the ruins of the house seem to be real. I also don't recall any famous witch cases from that area, but that doesn't mean strange things don't still happen.

The Freetown State Forest.

Rather than trying to prove or debunk it, I think it's more interesting to look at what's happening in Dave's story, For example, it's interesting to compare this story with last week's post about Austin Osman Spare and Mrs. Paterson. Both involve older female witches trying to seduce teenage boys. Austin Spare found the experience liberating and enlightening; Dave and his friends were terrified. Can it just be chalked up to Spare's artistic sensibility? Maybe, but perhaps the Freetown boys were just much more aware that even women can be sexual abusers.

If I were a Freudian analyst, and not just someone who read some Freud in college, I'd probably make a lot out of Dave's dream where he is an adult male killing the witch and her lover. That feels like some heavy-duty Oedipal symbolism to me. That dream also somehow kicks off several years of unpleasantly sexual witch-haunting as the boys work their way through puberty. The haunting seems to have stopped when Dave and friends reached full maturity. It all seems to make symbolic sense.

Finally, what exactly who or what was this mysterious woman? The boys called her a witch because of her appearance, and the black cat seems to support them. She's also a ghost. I've mentioned on this blog before that witches tend to live on after death, so that's not really surprising. She also reminds me of the rapacious succubi, seductive female demons that appear in Medieval folklore.

Witch? Ghost? Demon? Maybe the forest just shows us what we're looking for. Balzano writes that "the paranormal is often defined by the people who experience it," so it makes sense that teenage boys who lived on the edge of a big New England forest experienced what they did.

Tony and I have actually been to the Freetown State Forest. We didn't see any ghostly witches, but did find the woods there kind of unsettling. So if you go looking for the witch use caution. Who knows what you might find there yourself?

There's been some weird stuff happening in New England recently.

First up: is a giant snake on the loose in Westbrook, Maine? It seems like the answer is "yes."

The story began back in early June, when a woman reported seeing a large snake in Westbrook's Riverbank Park. She told the police it was as big as a truck and had a "head the size of a basketball." Snakes in Maine don't get that large, so no one took her claim seriously.

However, on June 29 a Westbrook police officer reported seeing a ten foot long snake feeding on a beaver in the Presumpscot River. A second officer arrived and the two watched the snake swim across the river to the other side, where they lost sight of it. Game wardens investigated but found no sign of the snake.

The summer passed without any further snake sightings, but on Saturday, August 21 a Westbrook resident found a gigantic snake skin near the river:

Photo courtesy Westbrook Police, via The Portland Press Herald.

The shed skin is estimated to be at least 12 feet long. Snakes shed their skin when they outgrow them, so Wessie (as the creature has been named) is bigger than 12 feet and probably still growing...

The snakeskin has been sent for tests to determine what species it is from. Derek Yorks, a wildlife biologist with the State of Maine, said Wessie is probably not indigenous because the snakes native to Maine don't grow larger than five feet. He also said Wessie would probably not survive the winter if s/he is not a local snake species. I don't know - we've have had some mild winters lately...

*****

An animal of another kind created a frenzy in Salem, Massachusetts, but rather than a giant snake it was a dog locked in a car on a hot day.

On Saturday, August 14, Lorelei Stathopolous was arrested by the Salem police for disturbing the peace. But Stathopolous says the police didn't do enough to help a dog locked inside a car on a hot day.

Stathopolous is a witch and owns Crow Haven Corner, Salem's longest-running witch shop. She is also an animal rights activist. On August 14 Stathopolous received a phone call from the manager of Hex, another witch shop in Salem, who told her that a dog had been locked in a parked car in front of Hex. The temperature was around 90 degrees.

Lorelei Stathopolous

Stathopolous called the police and ran down to the parked car. The police officers on duty didn't think the dog was in any danger because the window was cracked open. Stathopolous thought otherwise and urged the police to summon the fire department to free the dog. They refused. Stathopolous then tried to pour water through the window for the dog over objections from the police. When the owner of the car finally arrived Stathopolous urged the police to arrest him. They refused, but instead arrested Stathopolous for disturbing the peace.

Stathopolous will go on trial October 26. You can see WHDH's coverage of the story here.

*****

Finally, if you'd rather learn about the historic Salem witch trials, head to the Boston Public Library on September 20 to meet Stacey Schiff, author of the recent bestseller The Witches: Salem 1692. The talk is free, and will be hosted by Brenton Simons, CEO of the New England Historic Genealogical Society and author of Witches, Rakes and Rogues.

Labor Day. The end of summer.

We could have gone to the beach.

Instead we went looking for... the Eighth Gate to Hell!

We didn't find it. Or at least I don't think we did.

The trail leading to Spider Gates.

The eighth gate to Hell is supposed to be located somewhere in Friends Cemetery in Leceister, Massachusetts, a rural town just outside Worcester. It seems odd that a Quaker burying ground would host a portal to perdition, but that's only one of the strange things about this cemetery.

While the graveyard's formal name is Friends Cemetery, it's probably better known by its nickname, Spider Gates Cemetery. It got that nickname because of these distinctive iron gates:

They do sort of look like abstract spiders, don't they? Maybe? From what I've read the gates are actually supposed to be images of the sun, with its happy connotations of life and rebirth. They don't really look like the sun to me, but then again they also have too many legs to really be spiders either.

Weird structures in cemeteries often give rise to weird legends. A strange-looking statue? It must be murderous. An inscription that seems out of place? It must be a warning about a curse. A strange slab? It's there to keep a witch down. Usually the weird structure has just one weird story attached to it. But at Spider Gates, there are many, many strange stories.

For example, it is said that the eighth gate to Hell is located somewhere in this cemetery. Or perhaps if you pass through seven gates at the cemetery the eighth one will lead you into Hell. It's little unclear, as good legends often are. I didn't even know there were eight gates into Hell, so it's always good to learn new things. There are only two formal iron gates (one large and one small) at the cemetery, but there are smaller openings in the stone walls throughout the woods. Maybe they all add up to eight?

The iron gates clearly gave rise to the gateway to Hell legend, but where did these ten other legends came from?

1. There is an oak tree with a rope hanging from it known as the Hanging Tree. Someone committed suicide here and their ghost still haunts the cemetery.

2. A demonic creature has been heard roaring in the woods.

3. Near the cemetery is a cave where a young woman was murdered many years ago.

4. Across from the main cemetery is a secret second cemetery that can only be seen once.

5. Unnatural white ooze emerges from the ground.

6. A haunted house is located nearby. Don't go inside!

7. Outside the walls of the cemetery are many small stones with strange runes inscribed on them.

8. The nearby river is actually the River Styx, which leads to the underworld.

9. At midnight, walk around the gravestone of Marmaduke Earle (b. 1749 - d. 1839) and then rest your head on it. You will hear him speak to you.

10. Satanists have permission to conduct their rituals in part of the cemetery called the Altar.

Those are all pretty cools stories, and I think there are more out there. Happily, Tony and I didn't encounter any strange phenomena, and the cemetery actually has a pretty innocuous history. It was established in the 1700s by a group of Leceister Quakers. In the mid-1800s they merged with the more numerous Worcester Quakers, who still maintain the cemetery today. The gates were built in 1895, and have been replaced at least once after being stolen. I think that's the most shocking thing that's ever been documented that happened at Spider Gates.

Earle family graves.

So are any of those legends true? I don't know, but there is at least a kernel of truth behind the Satanist legend. And here's why.

Last week I told a friend that I was going to visit Spider Gates. He said, "I love Spider Gates! I used to go there when I was in college." This friend attended a college near Leceister, and when he was a junior he was initiated into a secret society for seniors. The initiation happens like the this.

First, the senior members decide who they want to initiate from the junior class. Then the seniors don black hooded robes, find the juniors they want on campus, and wordlessly tap them on the shoulder. That tap is the invitation to join the secret society.

Me looking spooked!

Next, to become full-fledged members the juniors go through an initiation process that involves locating the grave sites of the college's founders. This doesn't sound too hard, except that they need to do it at night, in the middle of winter, and under the watchful gaze of the seniors, who silently stand by wearing their hooded robes.

As a junior, my friend had been to Spider Gates at night to find a college founder's grave. When he became a senior, he wore a hooded robe and watched the juniors do the same thing.

"The police totally left us alone," he said. "They knew it was just a bunch of dorky college kids and that we weren't causing any trouble."

Hmmm. Do you see how this initiation could have given rise to the Satanist legend? Someone may have seen the students in their black robes walking towards the cemetery, or maybe even in the cemetery itself. When they reported this to the police they might have been told, "Don't worry, they have permission to go there at night." Over time, a harmless college initiation could become misinterpreted as a dark Satanic ritual.

In reality, practicing adult Satanists are harmless as well and don't go around breaking the law. Think of the Martin Starr character on Silcon Valley, for example! However, the people who might sometimes break the law are teenagers experimenting with the occult or just partying in the cemetery. We did find the remains of a fire in the middle of the cemetery, right on the raised area called the Altar. Lighting fires in cemeteries is disrespectful and illegal, so don't do it! No one is supposed to be in the cemetery at night - not even college kids wearing robes.

I assume the fire was lit by teenagers, but who knows? Legends can give rise to imitators, so maybe someone really is out there at Spider Gates conducting abominable rites. It's easy for me to be a rational skeptic here in my well-lit study, but if you put me out in the woods late at night I might become a true believer.

There is a lot of information about Spider Gates out there, but I got most of mine from Joseph Citro's Weird Massachusetts, Daniel Boudillion's excellent page on the topic, and this fun little site as well. Special kudos to Tony for taking some great photos on our expedition!

It's starting to feel like fall here in Boston. The days are getting shorter and the temperatures are slowly dropping. This story from the Passamaquoddy of Maine somehow seems appropriate. A little bit creepy, a little bit magical.

Once upon a there was a beautiful young Passamaquoddy woman. Her father was very protective of her and didn't think any man was good enough for her. To keep men away he set up a special challenge that any suitor needed to meet.

"If you want to marry my daughter," he said, "You must do the following: when you spit into a fire, the flames must flare up. Sounds easy, doesn't it?" But he knew it was impossible. Saliva would dampen a fire, not make it burn brighter. Many men tried to win his daughter's hand, and they all failed.

The father didn't know it, but the Horned Owl also wanted to marry his beautiful daughter. He had watched hidden in the trees as all the other men failed, but he was determined to succeed. He went to his aunt, who was a powerful owl witch, for assistance.

"Drink this," she said, pouring a potion into his beak. "You'll definitely win that beautiful girl!"

After swallowing the potion the Horned Owl turned himself into handsome young hunter. Then he went to the Passamaquoddy father's lodge and announced himself. The father laughed at him.

"You can try," he said, "but you'll never win my daughter. Spit into the flames!"

The Horned Owl spit into the flames. His aunt had spoken true. As soon as his saliva hit the fire, it roared upwards towards the ceiling of the lodge, out through the chimney hole, and high into the night sky. The father scowled, but he gave his daughter to the Horned Owl. The beautiful woman was happy, though. This mysterious young hunter was quite handsome after all...

The Horned Owl brought the woman to his lodge, and they consummated their relationship. They both fell asleep afterwards, but in the middle of the night the woman woke up. A feeling of dread overcame her as she gazed at her husband in the firelight. Huge, feathered ears protruded from his hair, and his eyes were half-open even though he was deeply asleep. As she stared at his eyes his pupils shrank to narrow slits. Her new husband had the eyes of an owl.

Realizing that her husband was not human, the woman fled from his lodge in terror, screaming as she ran back to the safety of her father's home.

The Horned Owl was quite angry, but determined to get his wife back. He once again turned himself into a young hunter, but with a different appearance. He killed many moose and deer and brought them to the woman's village.

"Hello!" he said. "I'm a lonely hunter wandering through these woods. I have plenty of game to share. Can I become a member of your village?"

The beautiful woman and her father were suspicious, but the other villagers dismissed their fears. This hunter looked perfectly normal to them, and he seemed very generous. And who doesn't like free food?

The villagers cooked the game and had a big feast. Everyone had a great time, and as the night wore on they took turns telling scary stories. Eventually it was time for the beautiful young woman to tell the story of how she married an owl.

"This story is really scary," she said, "so I don't want to speak too loudly. I need to whisper. Can everyone pull their hair away from their ears so they can hear me better?" She looked pointedly at the young hunter.

Everyone exposed their ears, except for the young hunter, who refused. The villagers teased him and yelled at him until finally he pulled back his long hair. He had huge, feathered ears that stood up like horns. The villagers fled in panic back to their homes, screaming.

In dejection the Horned Owl flew home. He thought he'd never get to see his wife again. His witchy aunt had other ideas, though.

"Nephew be patient," she said. "In time she will forget her fear, and when that time comes you will lure her to you with music." She handed the Horned Owl a magical flute that played irresistibly beautiful sounds. He took the flute. Then he waited...

The beautiful woman and her father moved their house to the center of the village because they knew the Horned Owl was lurking somewhere out in the forest. But as the weeks passed the woman became less cautious. She hadn't seen any sign of her sinister husband. Perhaps he had moved on to other prey? Over time she slowly began to venture towards the outskirts of the village, until finally one day she went out into the forest itself.

After walking through the forest for a while she stopped to rest under a big tree. As she sat there she thought she heard a flute, softly at first and then louder and louder. It was the loveliest music she had ever heard, although somehow haunting. It seemed to be coming from somewhere high above her.

"I would willingly go with whoever is playing that flute," she said. "It's the most beautiful thing I've ever heard."

As soon as those words passed over her lips she heard the sound of huge wings above her. The Horned Owl flew down and grabbed her gently in his huge talons. He carried her off to the village of the owls, where she lived happily for the rest of her life.

*****

One of the many things I like about American Indian folklore is that animals are fully developed characters. They speak, they have motivations, and they have relationships with each other. They also have relationships with humans. Still, this story is a little creepy. That Horned Owl just won't get the hint.

I found this story in American Indian Myths and Legends, which my in-laws gave to me recently. (Thanks Guy and Phyllis!) I think it also appears in Charles Godfrey Leland's book of Passamaquoddy stories from the 1800s.

Do you ever feel like your house is being attacked by evil witches? Do you sometimes think that malevolent demonic forces are targeting your homestead?

I would suggest that healthy skepticism is usually the best defense against these feelings, but the Puritans of New England thought otherwise. They felt the world was a battleground between good and evil, and the Devil and his minions (human and otherwise) were out to cause trouble for the good people of New England.

To keep evil forces out of the home, the Puritans used some very simple forms of defensive magic. Local ministers thought that all magic was evil, but the average New Englander knew that sometimes you needed to fight fire with fire. If your house was under magical attack, you needed some magical defenses. These magical practices lingered well into the 18th and 19th centuries, well after the Puritans had faded away.

These practices tend to focus on doors, windows, and chimneys. These openings were obviously necessary for a functioning home, but they could also allow access to unwanted spirits or witches. I've written a few times before about horseshoes, which were one of the main ways to guard the house against attack, but there were others as well.

For example, a coin put under the door sill would prevent a witch from entering the house. This was pretty simple to do, providing you had money to spare. I suppose the symbolism here is two-fold. Coins obviously represent abundance and financial security, which are things a witch would hate. They are also made of metal, which tends to repel supernatural entities (think of silver bullets and werewolves, or iron and fairies). This type of magic is still widely practiced today. As this discussion on Snopes.com indicates, many people put pennies on their window sills. The practice is now said to be done for "good luck," but has it's origin as protection from witches or demons.

Fireplaces were central to the colonial home. Cooking was done there, and families gathered around fireplaces in the winter for warmth. While chimneys let smoke out, they unfortunately also could let evil beings into the home. People would often enclose shoes in the walls near the chimney to protect it. There is a lot of speculation about why this was done, but the predominant theory seems to be that somehow the witch or evil spirit would get trapped in the shoe and would be unable to escape.

If you were feeling crafty, you might want to carve a daisy wheel above a doorway, window or fireplace. The daisy wheel looks like this:

From a church in England.

Daisy wheels were easily made by carpenters using a compass, and have been found in many old homes in New England. For example, the 1699 Winslow House in Marshfield, Massachusetts has several carved above the fireplace, while the home of Salem historian Emerson Baker has one carved above the front door. They are also known as witch marks, hexafoils, or apotropaic marks, if daisy wheel sounds too silly for you. People aren't quite sure why daisy wheels were supposed to avert evil, but some historians have speculated it is because they represent the sun.

So again, if you really, really think your house is under attack by evil forces you might want to try some of this magic. I do think skepticism is the best defense, but as the days grow shorter and colder sometimes that skepticism is hard to muster.

*****

I found some of this information in Emerson Baker's book A Storm of Witchcraft, and in a few places on the web.

I hope those readers who practice Wicca or other forms of modern witchcraft realize that when I refer to "evil witches" I am referring to how witches were viewed by the Puritans and other early inhabitants of New England. I know that Wiccans and modern witches are not evil!

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Aunt Jinny, the Witch of Hillsborough, New Hampshire

Rye and Rum Pancakes? Breakfast Fit for A Pirate!

Connecticut's Haunted Fairy Village

The Mechanical Messiah of Lynn, Massachusetts

Ann Hopkins and The Curse of Fire

Little people and swamp spirits in Vermont

Harry Potter Comes to Massachusetts: Folklore and Fiction in J.K. Rowling's New Story

A Witch Trial and A Slave's Testimony from 1679

Weird Marblehead, Part One: Ghosts, Tunnels, and H.P. Lovecraft

Weird Marblehead, Part Two: Lee Mansion and Screaming Woman Beach

Drought, Snakes, and Rain Magic

A Troll in Somerville, Massachusetts?

Seductive New England Witches, Part One: Mrs. Paterson

Seductive New England Witches, Part Two: The Freetown Forest Witch

Weird New England News: A Giant Snake in Maine, A Witch on Trial, and A Witchy Author

Spider Gates Cemetery: Portals to Hell and College Kids in Robes

The Woman Who Married An Owl

Defending Your House Against Evil Magic