Victorian society saw so many leaps forward when it came to technology and science.
Yet many people still clung to age old beliefs, and superstition was rife throughout the country.
In the courts there were many cases that came before magistrates in which people had either been shown to be gullible, such as in cases of fortune tellers.
But there were also many cases of people taking the law into their own hands when they thought they had been bewitched by a neighbour or even relative.
One such case was featured in The Bury Times Saturday the 21st of June 1862:-
“WITCHCRAFT” AND ATTEMPTED MURDER
At the Central Criminal Court, on Wednesday, a young man named Charles Tallbrook was charged with attempting to murder his grandmother, a feeble old woman, named King.
Mrs. King stated that the prisoner had been a soldier, and for twelve months after his discharge had been in the receipt of a pension, but had recently been supported by her and his mother, as he would not work.
HE ATTACKED HER AFTER DINNER
On the 13th of April last, after dinner, she was dressing herself, when the prisoner came in with something like a knife or razor in his hand.
He at once struck her with it across the forehead several times until she bled profusely, and he afterwards beat her about the head with a stick until the bones of her head became sore.
She had not had any quarrel with the prisoner, but he had told her before this happened that she should not live to see May-day.
THE ACCUSED RESPONDS
Prisoner(sullenly):- “I never used any such words. If I had wanted to take her life I should have locked the door. I merely intended to draw some of her blood, and that is the fact of the matter. (Sensation.)
If she does not work devilish arts, or witchcraft, I am willing to forfeit my life for hers.”
The evidence for the prosecutrix was corroborated by her husband.
SERGEANT SCARTH’S EVIDENCE
Sergeant Scarth stated that the prisoner, when the charge was read over to him at the police station, said:- “Damn her, she ought to have been dead years ago. Serve her right; she has done me harm enough.
I did not want to kill the old lady outright; I wanted to see her blood, which I have done.
It is not for what I shall have to suffer in this world but in the next.”
SHE HAD POWER OVER HIM
The prisoner said that the reason why he “shed her blood” was that she should not possess that power over him that she had done.
Two hundred years ago such a woman would have been put to death for witchcraft without any ceremony.
THE VERDICT AND SENTENCE
The jury, after conferring for a few seconds, returned a verdict of “Guilty of wounding with intent to murder.”
The prisoner was then sentenced to penal servitude for life.