A short pamphlet in which the East Anglian witchfinder Matthew Hopkins answered, in his own words, the objections put to his methods. It is the accuser speaking for himself: he defends the searching of bodies for marks, the use of watching and enforced sleeplessness, and denies that he took money improperly or that he tortured anyone. Its value to a reader now is that it records what the machinery looked like from the inside, and how ordinary it sounded to the man running it. It is not a description of witches. It is a description of a procedure that had already killed people by the time it was written.
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Literary Form Scholarship
First PublishedFirst printed in London in 1647, the year after the Essex witch trials it describes, while Matthew Hopkins was still actively working as a self styled witch finder across East Anglia. 1 What Counted as EvidenceHe defends searching the body for the witch's mark, a place said to be insensible where a familiar had fed, and watching, meaning a suspect kept awake and seated for long periods under observation. He denies that either amounts to torture. Neither test can return a negative result if the searcher is confident, and sustained sleep deprivation produces hallucination and compliance. 1 Sources
Textual NoteJohn Stearne published his own longer defence of their work in 1648. The two pamphlets are the principal accounts written by the prosecutors, which is why historians read them against the surviving assize and gaol records rather than instead of them. 2 Transmission
Manuscript TraditionSurvives alongside John Stearne's own longer 1648 defence of their shared work; the two pamphlets are the principal surviving accounts written by the prosecutors themselves, read by historians against the surviving assize and gaol records rather than in their place. 2 Scholarship and Forensics
Scholarly NoteHistorians treat it as the fullest surviving statement of Hopkins's own methods in his own words, written as a defense of his practices against contemporary criticism rather than as a neutral account. 2 Disputed
How Its Legacy Is ContestedThe number of deaths caused by the East Anglian campaign of 1644 to 1647 is disputed and no figure should be quoted as settled. 2 Scholarly estimates run from around a hundred upward. Higher totals circulate in popular accounts on much weaker foundations. The records are incomplete: some assize files are lost and deaths in gaol before trial are recorded unevenly. What is not disputed is that this was the deadliest concentration of witch prosecution in English history and that it took about three years. Origins
Era of Composition Era of Composition Attributed Author / CompilerMatthew Hopkins, who worked with John Stearne through Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk and neighbouring counties from 1644. 2 Structure
StructureA short pamphlet arranged as replies to queries put to him, apparently those raised at the Norfolk assizes. 2 Debunked
Textual NoteHopkins was himself put to the swimming test and hanged as a witch. 2 A later legend with no contemporary support. Hopkins died in 1647, most probably of consumption, and was buried at Mistley. Stearne, who had every reason to know, records an ordinary death. The story is recorded here only because it is repeated widely enough to need marking false. Learn More
The Witchfinder Answers for Himself
This pamphlet is unusual and uncomfortable, because it is the accuser speaking in his own voice and expecting to be believed. Matthew Hopkins had spent roughly three years working through Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk and neighbouring counties with his associate John Stearne, at a moment when the ordinary machinery of assize justice in England had been disrupted by civil war. By 1647 there were objections, and the pamphlet is his answer, arranged as replies to queries put to him.
He defends the search of the body for the witch's mark, a place said to be insensible to pain where a familiar had fed. He defends watching, that is, keeping a suspect awake and seated for long periods while observers wait for a familiar to appear, and denies that this constitutes torture. He addresses the swimming test, in which a bound suspect was put into water on the theory that water would reject a witch, and is careful about it. He denies taking excessive money. He denies that he obtained anything by force.
Read it for what it is: not a report on witches but a self-defence by a man whose methods worked exactly as designed. Sleep deprivation over days produces hallucination and compliance. Searching a frightened elderly body for an insensitive mark will find a mole. Nothing in either technique can come back negative if the searcher is confident.
Reading the Pamphlet Against the Court Records
Hopkins's pamphlet is a primary source and it is also an interested one, so historians read it beside the surviving assize and gaol records rather than instead of them. Malcolm Gaskill's reconstruction of the East Anglian campaign works that way, and the two accounts do not match. The pamphlet presents an orderly investigator answering reasonable questions; the records show a sequence of local panics, chains of accusation running from one confession to the next, and defendants held in conditions that killed some of them before trial.
The number of people who died in the campaign is disputed and no responsible figure should be quoted as settled. Estimates in the scholarly literature run from around a hundred upward, and higher numbers circulate in popular accounts on weaker foundations; the surviving records are incomplete, some assize files are lost, and deaths in gaol are recorded unevenly. What is not disputed is that this was the deadliest concentration of witch prosecution in English history and that it happened in about three years.
Hopkins himself died in 1647, most likely of consumption, and was buried at Mistley. The story that he was himself put to the swimming test and hanged as a witch is a later legend with no contemporary support. Stearne published a longer defence of their work in 1648. Both men died in their beds, which is more than can be said for the people they accused.
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