by Karen Brooks
As you can imagine, part of me was a bit despondent to think maybe there was no story involving witches (but hey, I consoled myself, you write fiction, make it up), the other part of me was determined to get to the bottom of why my question had provoked such a reaction.
Along with Stephen, Kerry and Peter, we then walked to Pittenweem and hunted and asked questions. Not only did we find the loveliest of towns — the only one in the area still committed to fishing — and people, but we found witches.
When I finally read Leonard Low’s book, I was horrified, mesmerised and enthralled in equal measure. I also became a little obsessed. What followed was intensive research. I read history books, archives, a great deal of academic research on witches, about the Bargarran case mentioned in the novel — which was real — and many others that occurred in Pittenweem and the surrounding areas throughout the period. I also read contemporary sources of the era (including letters and local council records) and so much more. I knew I simply had to bring the women involved in this terrible tale (who are often just names and dates in the various sources, which tend to provide conflicting information) as well as their families and friends, to life, to flesh them out, give them words, emotions, loves, friends, enemies and occupations and in doing so, somehow explain or at least try to understand what motivated such a dreadful series of events.
After I returned to Australia, I discovered that for a number of years Leonard Low has been trying to get a monument or plaque erected to Janet Cornfoot and Thomas Brown. In fact, a few years ago, Mr Low began a petition. While thousands signed, it was ultimately defeated. There were more in the Fife area who did not want to be reminded of the shameful events of yesteryear. So to this day, there is still nothing to commemorate the victims of the terrible witch hunt of 1704–1705. In 2019 it was announced that the BBC were about to start filming a documentary about witches and witchcraft in Scotland, including the Pittenweem witches, which may yet change people’s views on a memorial. Let’s hope so.
In some ways I understand the locals’ reaction, but I’m also of the conviction that you cannot embrace growth and change and a promising future without acknowledging every aspect of the past, including the horrific and dishonourable — that goes for individuals, nations and towns. If we don’t acknowledge our mistakes, the tragedies, how can we learn from them let alone be certain we won’t repeat them?
Despite this, it’s due to the diligence and wisdom of many writers — from historians both amateur and professional, journalists, hobbyists, fiction writers and others — that my novel was given some good bones, including from those who still call the Weem home.
I was able to utilise not only some fabulous academic work (which I will mention shortly), but also the Annals of Pittenweem 1526–1793, and the Annals of Anstruther, which cover the council minutes of these towns, including the events I write about. I also managed to purchase copies of the letters from the anonymous Gentleman of Fife, which record a version of what happened in Pittenweem over that time, and the rebuff to those two letters, A Just Reproof, which offers a vehement and, frankly rather hollow defence of the reverend and the bailies. The quotes at the beginning of various chapters are often taken from these documents as are some direct quotes, which I place in characters’ mouths.
Apart from Sorcha McIntyre and her family, Aidan Ross and Sergeant Thatcher and various shopkeepers, neighbours and merchants, everyone mentioned in the novel existed and mostly — with some tweaking and artistic licence including imagined conversations, motivation and thoughts — acted as described. Sorcha and Aidan became my vehicles for exploring the people and events and, as you now know, I attributed the letters from A Gentleman of Fife mainly to Aidan (one to Sorcha), imagining that many might have been written, but only two have survived intact. These letters gave me the basis for Aidan’s character, just as learning about the tenacity of the fishwives gave me the basis for not only Sorcha’s character, but also for many of the other women in the book.
Fishwives were both loved and loathed. Independent, strong, in control of their lives and, when married, of their husband’s lives and the family finances, they were robust, capable women who didn’t suffer fools and broke with the traditional idea of a woman’s role. They were often regarded as a necessary threat to social order. You can see how the term ‘fishwife’, used in a derogatory sense, comes down to us now. I like to think of these women as life-affirming and bold; the courage it took to do what they did, particularly in the early 1700s (and before and since), labouring in a man’s world, given the losses they would have experienced is remarkable. They worked long hours at a range of tasks, many raising families, and from what I can gather, took pride in their work. I wanted to examine the women before fishing became an ‘industry’ (for want of a better word) and they became known as ‘Herring Lasses’, and instead look at the lives of fishwives during a time when Scotland was at war and Pittenweem itself was reeling from the loss of many men in earlier conflicts as well as a poor harvest and drave and was, indeed, in grave financial straits.
The historical context in the novel for the events in Pittenweem is accurate, including the fact soldiers were billeted in the town and that rapes happened. A woman named Isobel Courie did fall pregnant to an already married soldier and the reverend was angry that some of his parishioners chose to drink with the soldiers rather than attend kirk. Likewise, the other witch cases mentioned and the names attached to these (e.g. Maggie Moran et al) are real.
Now, here’s where I get to the difficult part. Where I separate out the fiction from the fact and tell you what really happened in Pittenweem between 1704 and 1705.
In terms of the book, Janet Cornfoot (also called Corphat and other variations of the spelling), Beatrix Laing, Janet Horseburgh (who I call Nettie to avoid any confusion), Isobel Adam, Lillie Wallace, Margaret Jack, Thomas Brown and their families existed. Everything that happened to them, from the accusations, their incarceration and terrible torture in the Tolbooth and St Fillan’s Cave, and the duration of these and the manner of their deaths, occurred. Using historical records of torture (not in the Weem per se), I recreated/imagined the scenes in the Tolbooth and later the horrific ones with Janet Cornfoot. I should add that Janet did indeed survive her two hours or more of dunking and beating, managing to escape briefly to a house before she was dragged from it and met her horrible death. She was crushed by a door and then a cart was rolled over it. Incomers were later blamed for her murder, and yes, Patrick Cowper did unlawfully release them despite Edinburgh demanding they be sent to the city for trial. He was never held to account for this.
Lizanne Henderson, in her fascinating book Witchcraft and Folk Beliefs in the Age of Enlightenment, Scotland 1670–1740, believes that posterity should remember Janet Cornfoot not as a scapegoat for a fear-driven community seeking ‘cleansing’, but as a martyr. This notion really struck me.
Brian P Levack acknowledges that what happened in Pittenweem over this time generally, and to Janet Cornfoot specifically, led to a change in the laws in Scotland some years later and put an end to witch-hunting in general (but not the beliefs).
While I don’t know the real name of the pricker hired by the council, I have given him one — Mr Bollard. The pricker did exist and according to the history of torture and what was involved in the barbaric act of pricking, what I describe is correct. If anything, I likely understate what the women endured — the lack of food, sleep, sanitation, etc. I know, isn’t that awful to consider!
Reverend Patrick Cowper was a real person. Sometimes his name was spelled Couper or another variation. He was a widower with eleven children. He appears to have had a hold over the people of Pittenweem that was extraordinary, even for a preacher of the time. Leonard Low believes the man was evil incarnate and I’m inclined to agree. In relation to the first release of the women from the Tolbooth, after the death of Thomas Brown and upon orders from Edinburgh, Low believes that Cowper felt cheated and was determined that the ‘witches’ should hav
e been brought to trial and burned. Low further writes, ‘he [Patrick Cowper] was in complete control and would revel in his popularity and importance. He would destroy the women with God on his side.’
Rather than present Cowper as one-dimensionally Machiavellian (which would have been easy), I have tried to understand his psychology, emotional state and motivation, approaching it from the point of view of his religious beliefs, but without minimising the dreadful impact he had or the deeds to which he was party. Furthermore, he really did preach the morning following Janet’s gruesome death without making one reference to her or the brutality that had unfolded.
Not only did Peter Morton — also known as Patrick Morton, but in one account from the times I read, he was called Peter, so again, to avoid confusion and having three Patricks (Morton’s father was also Patrick), I opted to use that name — collapse and become ill after a water/sea-charm was left outside his door by Beatrix Laing, but his ‘affliction’ went on for months. He also manifested the symptoms described in the book and the reverend did indeed sit with him daily. The accused women were also paraded before Peter in his bedroom while his face was covered, and were subsequently imprisoned. I have, to a degree, imagined the influence of the reverend (there’s no doubt in my mind he coached the boy) on the young man and why.
The Bargarran witch trial involving young Christian Shaw near Paisley really happened and was not only known to Fifers and those in Pittenweem due to the spread of news and pamphlets but, according to contemporary sources, Cowper read and talked about the young girl’s symptoms to Peter. In some accounts, he read the story over and over again, in others (A Just Reproof) he only mentioned it one or two times and then barely. Folk would also have known about Salem and the witch-hunt there. As Brain P Levack notes in his book Witch Hunting in Scotland: Law, politics and religion, there was a narrative of demonic possession circulating at the time that those affected followed. He notes that Cowper read Shaw’s account to Morton, and writes: ‘Demoniacs (those possessed) in all societies act the way in which their religious culture tells them they should act.’ Peter Morton was no exception. Internalising his beliefs and his fears, he likely collapsed/fitted, became caught up in a kind of ‘hysteria’ and then was coached to maintain a level of behaviour/symptoms that resembled possession as it was understood back then. As Levack adds, ‘Christian Shaw’s possession provided a script for yet another Scottish possession (Morton’s).’
Alexander McGregor is also a real character, a fisherman, and the events he was involved in also happened. The incident with Isobel Adam at Hogmanay really occurred, as did his remembrance of it almost a year later as an act of malfeasance that involved more than one woman, with terrible consequences. I tried to imagine the circumstances and conversations around all this and the role of the reverend (who was involved). His death, however, is a fiction.
In terms of the imprisoned women, the reverend was integral to their torment. He often ordered the torture, the restrictions imposed upon them, and washed his hands of them as described in the book. Whether or not he knew the guards were eating the food provided for Thomas Brown and his cellmates, I’m uncertain, but the family — and the Gentleman of Fife and the Edinburgh magistrates and lawyers — certainly believe Brown’s death shouldn’t have occurred.
Where Reverend Patrick Cowper is most guilty, however, is in his behaviour in the lead up to, and during, the horrific murder of Janet Cornfoot. He was behind her incarceration in St Fillan’s Cave, and in having her put in the lower cell of the Tolbooth. One can only assume he knew it wouldn’t be hard for her to escape (the grating was loose). He did dine with the bailies that night, and told the townsfolk, upon her arrest and return, to do what they wanted with her.
Now, we come to parts I simply couldn’t accept (keeping in mind I was already devastated by what had happened to these women, Thomas Brown and their families and the impact this had on their relatives and the entire town): not only did no one ever get punished for Janet’s shocking murder (or Thomas’s), but Patrick Cowper lived for years afterwards, remaining in charge of Pittenweem parish and conducting services in the kirk every Sunday. While there’s evidence to suggest his popularity declined (years after the events, the parish tried to fine him for allowing his cow to graze in the graveyard), he never, to use the parlance of the period, paid for his sins. In fact, he continued to instil fear and division in the community and hunt those who’d evaded his earlier attempts to have them seized and tried.
According to Lizanne Henderson:
1708, Rev. Cowper and fellow minister William Wadroper from Anstruther East once again brought charges of witchcraft against [Beatrix] Laing and Nicolas Lawson. Though the case was promptly dropped and the women released by a circuit court judge, the men would not let it rest and issued another warrant in 1709. The women were tried in Perth and found innocent.
The man never gave up!
It is this bit of information that also contradicts an account of what happened to Beatrix Laing as given by Mr Low. According to Low, she wandered outside the town walls and was, weeks later, found dead outside St Andrew’s. But, as we can see from contemporary accounts above, she faced charges of witchcraft again more than three years after the events at Pittenweem. Like Sorcha, Nettie, Isobel, Nicolas and the rest, I gave Beatrix the ending I felt she deserved — peace with her husband and friends in the town she’d lived in all her life.
The names of most of the Pittenweem bailies and their basic actions are according to history. The state of the harbour and pier was real as was the need for funds to repair them. Likewise, the Sophia really was a floating wreck that listed against the pier, a reminder of the town’s failing fortunes. Sightseers did flock to Pittenweem when Peter Morton first fell ill and witchcraft was believed to be the reason. Janet (Nettie) Horseburgh did seek to fine the bailies for their torment of her and in fact, in 1710, Bailie William Bell admitted not only to his part in her torment, but alluded to the fact that, in many ways, the case against the women was completely fraudulent. There’s little doubt guilt at his role ate at him and he felt he needed to cleanse his conscience.
I think it’s also important I remind myself and you, dear reader, that it wasn’t only Scotland that tried and punished witches. Witch-hunting and persecution were rife across Europe and the United Kingdom, resulting in dreadful penalties and horrific deaths for far too many.
I read so many books on Scottish history, witchcraft in Scotland, England and throughout Europe, as well as about fishing and Pittenweem and East Neuk/Fife and the sea-life to write this book and I am indebted and inspired by the writings of these authors and wish to pay tribute to as many as I can:
There was Neil Oliver’s A History of Scotland, Alistair Moffat’s Scotland: A History from Earliest Times, Chris Bambery’s A People’s History of Scotland, Hugh Trevor-Roper’s The Invention of Scotland: Myth and history, and David R Ross’s Women of Scotland.
The Makers of Scotland: Picts, Romans, Gaels and Vikings by Tim Clarkson, Curious Scotland: Tales from a hidden history by George Rosie, Walking Through Scotland’s History, Two thousand years on foot by Ian R Mitchell and The Landscape of Scotland by ER Wickham-Jones. Also excellent were The Domestic Life of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century by Marjorie Plant, and A History of Everyday Life in Scotland 1600–1800 edited by Elizabeth Foyster and Christopher A Whatley. A Handbook of Scotland’s Coasts edited by Fi Martynoga was a delightful read and took me back to Scotland and the many, many walks I did while there. I also used some books with a very local flavour that I purchased while in Pittenweem and Anstruther, and these were so useful. In My Ain Words: An East Neuk Vocabulary by Mary Murray — what a rich and marvellous way of expressing themselves the people of this region have! Auld Anster by Alison Thirkell — a wonderful little resource. I also used a photographic record of old Pittenweem simply called that by Eric Munson, which not only supplemented the many photos I took, but transported me back to another time and place.
In terms o
f books on witchcraft, apart from those mentioned above, I also used Witchcraft and Trials for Witchcraft in Fife by Johan Ewart Simpkins, The Scottish Witch-hunt in Context edited by Julian Goodare, The Witches of Fife: Witch-hunting in a Scottish shire 1560–1710 by Stuart Macdonald, A True and Full Relation of The Witches At Pittenweem [&c.] — Primary Source Edition, 1704 (various authors), A Collection of Rare and Curious Tracts on Witchcraft and the Second Sight with an original essay on Witchcraft by David Webster (1820), and, of course, the wonderful and deeply disturbing The Weem Witch by Leonard Low.
I also utilised many websites and newspaper articles about Pittenweem and the witches.
I bought a fabulous resource, The Scots Thesaurus edited by Iseabail Macleod with Pauline Cairns, Caroline Macafee and Ruth Martin, as well as other books that helped immerse me in the language and culture — that is, apart from my own wonderful memories of my Ross grandmother, Margaret, and relatives and Fraser step-grandfather, Charles, and my friend Robbie Gilligan with his beautiful, musical way of saying things.