Four draft horses in harness pull a timber carriage loaded with large logs, attended by three men on a grassy track.

Horseheath, hauling oaks 1928 (photo Leslie Hancock)(Cambridgeshire Collection)

Horseheath Data

Mike Petty's Horseheath Scrapbook

In the 1885 OS map of the village two smithies are shown. In 1871 Thomas Simkin was a blacksmith at Village End, Horseheath, aged 53, with his wife Mary, 53, Charles, 20, Julia, 16 and Mary A, 12.

Detail from an 1885 Ordnance Survey map of Horseheath showing roads, buildings, plots, a post office, and two smithies.

Horseheath, OS 1885

In 1883 Thomas Simkin, blacksmith of Horseheath died and his property was valued. The document is held by the Museum of Cambridge.

Thomas Simkin probate, Horseheath, 1883

In 1915 Catherine Parsons explained that witchcraft was still taken seriously in Horseheath. (See PCAS vol.19 Notes of Cambridgeshire Witchcraft).

Daily Record, 10 September 1928

WITCH & HER “IMPS.”

VILLAGE TERRIFIED BY GHOST.

GRIM PHANTOM.

The “ghost” of an old woman, reputed to be a witch, who died two years ago, is said to have been seen by many people in the Cambridgeshire village of Horseheath, and, in consequence, women and children are afraid to leave their homes after dark.

While she lived in Horseheath, “Mother Redcap,” as the “witch” was known, had a sinister reputation, and the “ghost” seems determined to live up to this record.

The apparition is said to have shaken its fist in the faces of villagers whom it has met at night, and generally to have behaved in a very menacing manner.

WEIRD TALES.

Remarkable tales are told in the village about the old woman.

“She was employed at a farm,” a villager stated.

“One day a black man called, produced a book, and asked her to sign her name in it.

“The woman signed the book, and the mysterious stranger then told her that she would be the mistress of five imps who would carry out her orders.

“Shortly afterwards the woman was seen out accompanied by a rat, a cat, a toad, a ferret, and a mouse.”

When she died, her “imps” were killed, it is said, and buried with her in her coffin.

Falkirk Herald, 12 September 1928

WITCH AND HER “IMPS.”—The “ghost” of an old woman, reputed to be a witch, who died two years ago, is said to have been seen by many people in the Cambridgeshire village of Horseheath, and, in consequence, women and children are afraid to leave their homes after dark. While she lived in Horseheath, “Mother Redcap,” as the “witch” was known, had a sinister reputation, and the “ghost” seems determined to live up to this record. The apparition is said to have shaken its fist in the faces of villagers whom it has met at night, and generally to have behaved in a very menacing manner. Remarkable tales are told in the village about the old woman. “She was employed at a farm,” a villager stated. “One day a black man called, produced a book, and asked her to sign her name in it. The woman signed the book, and the mysterious stranger then told her that she would be the mistress of five imps who would carry out her orders. Shortly afterwards the woman was seen out accompanied by a rat, a cat, a toad, a ferret, and a mouse.” When she died, her “imps” were killed, it is said, and buried with her in her coffin.

Cambridge Daily News, 30 June 1984

The story of Horseheath’s potent 20th century witch

Rodney Tibbs is on holiday this week, so we asked librarian MIKE PETTY to dip into the Cambridgeshire Collection. He came up with this story of 20th century witchcraft at Horseheath near Haverhill.

THERE is a spot on the road which leads from Horseheath to Horseheath Green which, even after heavy rain, is almost instantly dry. Horseheath people know the reason why — that is the spot where “Daddy Witch” is buried.

An ancient bony creature half-clothed in rags, she lived in a hut in Garret’s Close and, when she died, was buried in the middle of the road opposite the sheep-pond. It is the heat from her body that keeps the road dry.

Daddy Witch was no medieval monster — she lived in the nineteenth century. She was the earliest witch the village people could remember in 1915.

This was when a Horseheath woman, Catherine Parsons, sat down to record notes on the village’s witches in 1915 — less than 70 years ago.

In a talk she gave to the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, she spoke on witchcraft that existed in the village at that time.

“In this village we have ghosts as real as ever they were, superstition is rife, the wise woman is fresh in our memory, we have our folk lore, interesting customs and cures for almost every ill,” she told them.

“The parishioners tell you there always were witches and there always will be . . . the difference between a witch and an ordinary woman is that if the latter wishes you misfortune her wish has no effect but the witch is in league with the devil — she has the power to do evil.”

Superstitious people ascribed various powers to the wise woman and generally went out of their way to stay in her good books. When one lady admired some turnips growing in his field, a farmer sent her several of the best; girls in service who returned to Horseheath for their holidays often left the witch a few pence before leaving — but you could also be bewitched by accepting a gift from her.

Dead

Once an old lady sent some fine currants that she had grown in her garden to a Horseheath girl staying in London but the girl did not eat them, fearing she might be bewitched.

People believed they were safe provided the witch did not possess anything belonging to them — but could you be sure she had not picked up a piece of your broken crockery or taken a sprig from your garden hedge? That would be enough to give her power. Witches were extortioners and their craft remunerative. Whenever anything went wrong on Church Farm the tenant would send the witch five shillings, believing her to be up to her tricks.

A poor woman whose bread would not rise likewise paid for its release. A witch could cast a spell on our coal so that it would not burn and of course she could influence animals. Horses would stop dead in their tracks and only move after she had spoken to them. Pigs would go off their feed. She could send swarms of fleas to pester you and prevent cows giving milk.

But you could fight back — it was believed that there was a very close link between the witch and the thing bewitched. A farmer who beat his cow on the head when it mysteriously stopped producing milk was implored by his man not to hit her any more because he believed the witch would feel the blows and send other troubles. “So if I get a gun and shoot the cow I shall kill the witch an’ all,” he said.

Ducks

To protect themselves against witchcraft, Horseheath folk in 1915 believed there was only easy way. “You just go to the village shop and buy a ha’penny worth of salt without saying ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ for it; or you can put a piece of steel under your door mat — for a witch cannot cross steel. Putting a knife under the chair will stop the witch from sitting down if she does come to your house.

“Mother had a brood of young ducks and they were bewitched and covered with vermin. They just turned on their backs, kicked up their little feet and were dying fast — she sent to the shop for an ounce a new pins and stuck them in one of the dead ducks; then she made up a good fire and at midnight, without telling anybody what she was going to do, she put the duck right in the middle of the fire and afore the duck had been burning 10 minutes, the witch came screaming to her door, making the most terrible noises for the pain caused by the pins in the burning duck had entered the witch — in the morning the rest of the ducks were cured.

“You can get a pint and a half glass bottle, half fill it with water, put in a lock of hair from the noddle of your neck, also an ounce of new pins, heads downwards, some rusty nails from an old shoe and some parings of your finger and toe nails. Then cork the bottle and put it on the fire at midnight when you’re quite alone and boil it until that bursts — but you must not speak whatever happens. The witch will come outside screaming and ranting — and sometimes you just can’t keep quiet; soon as you make a sound before the bottle bursts that ain’t no good,” said Catherine Parsons.

Work

To make a contract with a witch the devil usually appeared to the person in the shape of an animal such as a rat, mouse or toad — “Perhaps this is why if either a toad or newt is found in a house at Horseheath, the creature must at once be put upon the fire, or the inmates of the house will have bad luck.”

Once recruited, the witch became possessed of imps or spirits which live upon her body and assist her — unless they were given plenty of work to do they became a terrible torment to their owner.

The Horseheath witch had five to find work for — their names Bonnie, Blue Cap, Red Cap, Jupiter and Venus. One woman spotted one on top of a box in the chimney corner — “it looked something like a mouse with very large eyes and a tail only two inches long — as soon as it was spotted it scrambled away up the chimney to report what it had seen to the witch — you cannot keep anything secret from her and her imps.”

Sometimes they tried to burn the imps — that happened at West Wickham: “They put them in a well-heated brick oven but they screamed so loud that they had to be taken out and were returned to the witch — and she was covered with burns but the imps weren’t marked — eventually they were put in her coffin and buried with her.”