Morbid - The DeFeo Family Murder

Episode Date: October 14, 2024

On the evening of November 13, 1974, twenty-three-year-old Ronald DeFeo Jr. burst through the door of Henry’s Bar in Amityville, Long Island, frantically yelling for help and telling the patrons tha...t someone had killed his parents. When a small group returned to the house with DeFeo, they discovered that not only had his parents, Louise and Ronald Sr., been killed, but so had his four brothers and sisters—all shot to death in their beds with a .35 caliber rifle.During a police interview that night, investigators became suspicious of Ronald DeFeo. Not only was his story of a mob hit difficult to believe, but he seemed incapable of keeping certain aspects of his story straight during the interview. The next day, DeFeo broke down and confessed to the murders, explaining that he had hated his father and telling investigators, “Once I started [shooting], I just couldn’t stop.”Ronald DeFeo’s trial was one of New York’s biggest news stories of 1975 and attracted considerable attention due to his attempt to mount an insanity defense and his frequent outbursts in the courtroom. In the end, the defense was unsuccessful and DeFeo was convicted of the murders and sentenced to life in prison. DeFeo’s conviction should have been the end of the story, but it turned out it was only the beginning of what would eventually become one of the most notorious supernatural claims in American history.Thank you to the Incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research and Writing support!!ReferencesCarter, A.J., Soper Susan , Dallas Gatewood, and Sam Washington. 1974. "DeFeo son is accused." Newsday, November 15: 3.Incantalupo, Tom, and Sam Washington. 1974. "A quiet drink turns into an invitation to disaster." Newsday, November 14: 3.—. 1974. "Six in Amityville family slain, each in bed, 1 bullet in back." Newsday, November 14: 1.New York Times. 1974. "Six in family found slain in bedrooms in L.I. home." New York Times, November 14: 97.Smith, Don. 1975. "Attack mounted on DeFeio's insanity plea." Newsday, October 25: 16.—. 1975. "Cellmate says DeFeo had insanity plan." Newsday, November 11: 6.—. 1975. "Cop quotes DeFeoL 'I... couldn't stop'." Newsday, September 24: 4.—. 1975. "Cop: DeFeo altered story." Newsday, October 22: 9.—. 1975. "DeFeo charges police beat him into confessing." Newsday, September 27: 13.—. 1975. "DeFeo defended as psychotic killer." Newsday, November 19: 17.—. 1975. "DeFeo guilty of family murder." Newsday, November 22: 3.—. 1975. "Doctor: DeFeo knew it was wrong." Newsday, November 13: 19.—. 1975. "Family clash is cited in DeFeo trial." Newsday, October 15: 22.—. 1975. "I killed a dozen others, DeFeo says." Newsday, November 7: 21.—. 1975. "'I left the room in awe of the horror'." Newsday, October 23: 17.Smith, Don, and Sam Washington. 1975. "DeFeo a heroin user, cop testifies." Newsday, October 18: 16.Stark, Thomas M. 2021. Horrific Homicides: A Judge Looks Back at the Amityville Horror Murders and Other Infamous Long Island Crimes. New York, NY : Archway Publishing.Sullivan, Gerard, and Harvey Aronson. 1981. High Hopes: The Amityville Murders. New York, NY: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan.Vecsey, George. 1974. "L.I. slayings suspect had used drugs." New York Times, November 16: 18.—. 1974. "Neighbors recall DeFeos as 'nice, normal family'." New York Times, November 15: 80. Cowritten by Alaina Urquhart, Ash Kelley & Dave White (Since 10/2022)Produced & Edited by Mikie Sirois (Since 2023)Research by Dave White (Since 10/2022), Alaina Urquhart & Ash KelleyListener Correspondence & Collaboration by Debra LallyListener Tale Video Edited by Aidan McElman (Since 6/2025) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey, weirdos, I'm Elena. I'm Ash. And this is morbid. And it's morbid in the morning. That's why we sound like this. We sound a little hoarse. Yeah, and I think Ash gave me her cold. Oh, I did.
Starting point is 00:00:38 Yeah, it's starting to creep up. To be fair, your children gave me my cold. It's the circle of life here. So that's just what's happening. The circle of germs. It's so weird. Drew, the last time I got sick, did not. get my cold. I know. This time did not get it. I'm like, I thought I was going to get away from it.
Starting point is 00:00:56 I still might. Knock on wood. I just have a scratchy throat and my nose is a little like for clumped, but like, but I think maybe. My nose is in a bit of a curmudgeon. It is. It's having a moment. So maybe, but sometimes this happens and then nothing comes out of it. Well, the other thing is like not to get all like, I don't know, but it's allergy season, I think. Not to get all. I don't know. I don't know. I'm looking at my coffee and I've only drank about me as much. Yeah, I haven't had a lot of coffee. But here we are. Elaine has two coffees sitting in front of her.
Starting point is 00:01:29 I have an iced and hot in front of me right now. That's who I am. That's who I am as a person. So we told you that after four harrowing, rutted, laborous, gut shattering. Gut shattering. Got shattering, exactly. Episodes of Albert Fish that we were going to lay it on easy for a couple episodes. It's just to ease you back into it.
Starting point is 00:01:53 Yeah. So we give you listener tales, which was fun. Those listener tales were so, I mean, I feel like I say it every time we do a listener tales. I'm like, that was such a good one, like one of my favorites, but they're all my, they are so good. I love listener tales. The one about the, I'm going to just say, the flush pedestrian, because somebody
Starting point is 00:02:10 on Twitter said that and I was cackling. Yes. And we got a couple. So we, I don't, so flesh pedestrians. Yeah. We, there was a couple of mentions, especially from like our Native American Patreon subscribers that were like, hey, next time, like, if you say the word, can you just like put out a trigger warning? Because like that is a very real thing, especially.
Starting point is 00:02:38 Well, no, it's just like that's like a very scary, very real thing. Especially in Native American cultures. So they were like, it's just like, I was driving and I almost like hit a tree like. Oh, shit. Oh, my God. I never wanted to do that. I didn't realize that. So Flesh pedestrians, I think you can tell what I'm talking about right now. Yeah. I'm going to say the word. So just like, trigger warning. Trigger warning. I'm about to talk about flush pedestrians. We were talking about skin walkers. And that's why. So I had no idea. So thank you for letting me know, because I had no idea. Yeah, same. We probably will do an episode on them at some point. I apologize in advance. And you know, you'll get lots of warning. But thank you for letting us know. that because I had no idea. I haven't looked into them. I woke up at 3 o'clock this morning and I had to pee so bad and it's all I could think about and I didn't want to walk. Was a flesh pedestrian. Yeah. And I didn't want to walk. I didn't want to pedestrianized to my bathroom. No. Pedestriized. Yeah. I don't know.
Starting point is 00:03:36 Ash has not had coffee. Let me just stir. Let me just take a quick little sip of this. So after that funness, because that was pretty scary. Yeah. We're going to get into, you know, I was like, I'm in the mood for a witch trial. You know? What else is new? You ever wake up and you're like, I'm just in the mood for a witch trial? Not to actually do one, but to like actually like learn about one. Study one. I do. So I found some because I was like, I got to move out of the Salem witch trials because like as much as I could just literally give you guys 65 episodes on that. Like I would love to revisit that and like really lay it out. We'll see. Making its own show. Making its own show. That'd be sick. But I figure there's so many witch trials that I feel like don't get talked about enough. And they're everywhere outside of the
Starting point is 00:04:23 United States in the United States. Because everywhere. When you did the Paisley Witch Trials like so long ago, I'd never heard of that. Exactly. I feel like they don't get enough, you know. Recognition. They really don't. So this one that I'm going to cover today is, and it's pretty, it's like intense, too. But it's called, it's commonly referred to as the O-Syth witch trials. It is O-Syth like the Star Wars villains I learned. Doing because I, it's pronounced, or it's spelled Saint O'SY-T-H, so I thought it was O-Syth for a while, but it's O-Syth. Okay. I did my research for you guys.
Starting point is 00:05:00 Don't get it twisted. And this is, so O-Syth is an English village near Essex. So we're going on across the pond. Not over there. So this took place February 19th, 1582. Pisces season. There you go. O-G. Picey season.
Starting point is 00:05:16 Woo-loff. There's, you know what? There's a lot of energy here. Emotions. There's a lot of emotions happening here. Pisces season, I'm just going to go ahead and say it. It's not for me. No, it's not for me at all.
Starting point is 00:05:28 No, you're a apricorn, so it's very much not for you. Pice season is by far not my season. Too emotional. Yeah, I hate it. Get it away for me. Please, please get it going to me. I'm so ready to like yeat myself into airy season. Yeah, that's John's season.
Starting point is 00:05:41 Yeah, and no, not Puppus. Like, he cusps it. He cusps that shit. So this started with a fight between Grace Thurlow and Ursula Kemp. Okay. Now, I found a couple of things that, like, went into, because it's from 1582. So as you can imagine. Did you find the newspaper?
Starting point is 00:06:01 Not super easy to find a lot of, like, actual documents, except this one happens to have a really gnarly document that survives to this day. What is it? It's called a true, the name of this is like my favorite. It's called a true and just record of the information, examination, and confession of all the witches taken at Ossiths in the County of Essex, whereas some were executed and others some entreated, according to the determination of law, where in all men may see what a pestilent people witches are and how unworthy of life and how unworthy of life. Can you imagine telling somebody they're unworthy of life? Because who are you? You pestilent witch.
Starting point is 00:06:44 You're unworthy of life. Unworthy. in a Christian Commonwealth. Like, I'll leave. Imagine that this was written by some guy who only goes by WW. And I imagine, can you imagine being WW and being like, hey, would you guys like to read my pamphlet? It's called the true and just record of the information examination and confession of all witches taken out of cysts in the county of Essex, whereas some were executed and some were entreated according to the determination of law, wherein all men may see that a pestil and people witches are and unworthy of life they are in a Christian commonwealth. Do you want one?
Starting point is 00:07:14 Don't keep it that weird. Do you want one? No. Like I'd be like, I'd be like, you lost me at, hey, do you want? I'd be like, I've lived an entire life while you told me the title of that. I had a whole family. I had a whole family. I retired. Yeah. I'm like, I'm in, I'm in Florida these days. I'm golfing now. I, bye. See you. By W. I'm playing shuffleboard with, um, yeah, with Mavis next door. With Mavis. I love that. But, you know, it's so this is a document. It's over a hundred pages long. It's like a pamphlet. And it's survives. It's got all the confessions, like he says, everything in there. And it's all all right there.
Starting point is 00:07:52 Where did you find this? It's a very like thorough document. Well, I found this book called England's Witchcraft Trials by Willow Winsham. Very interesting. Love. Very good book. It has a ton of other witch trials and like goes into certain witches or accused witches. And that's, she mentioned this in that book. And I was like, ooh, so I went and found it. And then I, I read all 100 page. Like, I went through every document. Let me tell you the old English way of writing. Hard.
Starting point is 00:08:24 Where they use a U instead of a V and like all other kinds. Like, thank goodness this other book, England's witchcraft trials, like kind of helped translate some of the names into what they actually are. Like wasn't on some hear-y-he-he-y shit. It's a lot. It's a lot. So let's start off with how this began. So Grace Thurlow, she was pregnant at the time, and she said that her son Davy had been sick the year before that and he was not getting better.
Starting point is 00:08:54 And her friend Ursula Kemp had come to her home to visit. She was like a well-known healer. She would like unbewitch people. That was like her thing. And she was just being nice trying to act like a friend and she had come to do some healing practices on Davy to try to help him out. All right. Apparently she took Davy's hand and said, a good child how thou art
Starting point is 00:09:16 laudan and you know as one does what's laudan um I think it's like you're a good child and like you are like um you're like basically like you're sick you're on your bed you know like your bedridden kind of thing
Starting point is 00:09:30 like but you're a good child like we want to help you out then she left but she had taken him by the hand and said that then she left came right back and did the same thing again she did it one more time three times in total Mm-hmm. She asked, so Grace was like, okay, I don't know what's going on. So she ended up calling Ursula back that night because, again, she's a healer. And she was like, I need some help because he's getting worse.
Starting point is 00:09:54 And she was feeling like comfort with Ursula's practices because he was getting, like, he wasn't getting worse, but he wasn't getting better. Okay. But she was like, you know, she's the local healer. I feel like I need her just here. Right. Just in case something gets worse. So Ursula was like, sure, I'll come back. And you know what she was like, Davy's going to be just fine.
Starting point is 00:10:11 we're going to get him on the mend. And she, according to that official record, said, I warrant thee, thy child shall do well enough. That's what she said. Okay. So that night, he got better. Great. He was better than he had ever been.
Starting point is 00:10:27 Now, this had been a year of him being sick. That's crazy. And suddenly Ursula's there, and he's better. So, in fact, when Ursula saw grace and asked about it, she said, quote, it took good rest this night. God be thanked. which is exactly, I love how that, like, it took good rest last night. God be thank.
Starting point is 00:10:47 That's exactly what I will say the night that my youngest child sleeps. It took good rest last night. It took good rest last night. God be thanked. I'm going to walk in with Starbucks and you're going to say that. And I'm going to skirt right out of the door. You're going to know. You're going to know.
Starting point is 00:11:01 When I come on this podcast, guys, you're all going to be here with me. When I come on here and I said, I say, it took good rest last night. God be thanked. You will know that she's gone around the bend. She's finally sleeping. No, you'll know that all is right. I don't know. I think I'll feel like all is wrong if you say that.
Starting point is 00:11:20 All will be right. I don't know. But yeah, so apparently, you know what? It took good rest last night. Davey was fine. I love that they refer to children a lot. And these records is it. They're like, well, it said that.
Starting point is 00:11:31 It's like, well, you know, it's a human. Yeah. But okay. But weirdly, in the record, it also states that the kid, you know, was doing much better that better than she had in or excuse me he had in the entire year before that and then there's also this weird little note in there that says the palms of the child's hands were turned where the back should be and the backs in the place of the palms what so his hands were like and i was like were her were his hands like upside down like what does that mean
Starting point is 00:12:05 ash is trying to do it right now with her own hands like i don't know i don't think it has like like it's not like a very pertinent piece of information, but to me I saw it. It does. Like, I just feel like I needed to discuss that one. Because they, it's very casual and very moved on from. Just like, that's what happened. For me, it feels pertinent. It felt pertinent to me, but the record did not find it pertinent. At first, I thought you meant like he was sleeping on his hands. No, it's just like his palms are where his back of his hand should be and his hands are where his palms should be. Hmm. Not sure. Okay. But when, so again, remember, Grace is pregnant as well. Oh, okay. Yeah. So when Grace was ready to give birth, she made a boo-boo. Oh. She didn't have Ursula there to help. And this was
Starting point is 00:12:48 taken as a real insult by Ursula. Well, yeah. She was kind of, she was a healer. She was a friend. She was kind of like a makeshift midwife. She wasn't like, I couldn't find anything that said she was like the midwife of the plate, but I think she did midwife duties. Well, and she also saved it. Yeah, exactly. She saved it. She saved it. So she was not, she was not happy about this. This was a real insult. And instead, Grace chose to have someone else assist her, and that was just bullshit to her. She made this pretty obvious and said she was really offended by the whole ordeal, and the two women immediately fell into a bad way with their friendship. A bad way. A bad way.
Starting point is 00:13:27 At one point, Grace suffered from what she referred to as a bout of lameness, which they always... Me too. I know. I'm in a constant bout of lamely. I feel like that's like a new insult, like, ugh. You know what? You're just in a bout of lameness, so call me back later. My entire high school experience could be referred to as a bout of lameness. No, here's where you're wrong.
Starting point is 00:13:50 I think the other people who were like rude to you, they were in a bout of lameness. You were just like reaching your prime. I'm just reaching for the stars. And they were peeking. But you know what? Grace was really suffering from a bout of lameness. Yeah, Grace actually was. And she basically insinuated to Ursula that, so she suffered from this bout of lameness
Starting point is 00:14:09 after they fell out. I can't stop. I can't stop. I can't stop. But after they fell out of their friendship, that's when the lameness occurred. Yeah. So she basically insinuated to Ursula
Starting point is 00:14:19 that she had no issue going to Justice Darcy. You know what I'm saying? About this sudden ailment. And she was, which is like basically her being like, I'm suddenly sick and you were like pissed at me. So like I could go to that justice and tell them that. Like basically being like, you know what happens to bitches who do that. Which I'm like, you are a conniving.
Starting point is 00:14:39 motherfucker. Yeah. You know what happens. She saved your baby's life. Like, don't be a butt. Maybe go away. But she was prepared to name Ursula as a witch. It was so wild back then.
Starting point is 00:14:52 I know. I'm like, Grace, I think you're just lame. I think you're just a betch. That you're just, you are like the other sense of lame. Literally. Now, apparently Ursula, which I had no idea. Ursula was a well-known witch name at the time, apparently. according to.
Starting point is 00:15:11 Oh, yeah, because like the little mermaid. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, a little mermaid. They had all seen it. Yeah, you know. Or as it says in the record, they refer to her as Ursly. Oh. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:15:22 A little nickname. Which apparently Ursula is like what you would get out of that now. Yeah. But it says in the record, quote, Ursly, thou hast a naughty name. Thou hast a naughty name. Thou hast a naughty name. Okay.
Starting point is 00:15:38 I was like, what is happening? Even back then. Right? That's funny. And because she had a witch name, she was more likely to be named and prosecuted. Now, also, Grace worked with or worked for Justice Darcy. She had some kind of like administrative position under him and had a protected position with him because it was shaky for a woman, even for a woman to accuse another woman of
Starting point is 00:16:01 witchcraft without the possibility of her herself having that thrown right back at her. There's three fingers pointing back at you, Grace. Exactly. So it's like, this was a huge advantage to her that she knew she was in a protected position because most women wouldn't, you know, would think twice at least, especially if they're not in a position of privilege of any kind to go accuse anybody because they're just going to turn around and go, well, you're a witch. And then you're thrown in jail with that person.
Starting point is 00:16:26 It's not good. But she was like Deja on this week's episode of RuPaul's Drag Race. Exactly. She has immunity. There you go. She has immunity. Now, Ursula was unbothered. Unbothered.
Starting point is 00:16:36 Okay. Here's the thing. I feel like you can't win. Because if you're unbothered, you're like a witch. Yeah. And if you're bothered, you're like a witch. Yeah. You can't win. But Ursula was just like, I literally am unbothered. I don't care. Okay. Like get fucked Grace. She's a queen. That's what she, in the official record, it says, thou hast get fucked Grace. Yeah, I believe it. I would have said that. It does not. I can imagine. In case you were word. Thou hast kick rocks, bitch. Now, Ursula was used to people kind of being. assholes because all their neighbors later said that, you know, she was known as a volatile women and she was a woman and she was quick-tempered and she was very assertive and people didn't have great things to say about her attitude. But to me, it just seems like she didn't
Starting point is 00:17:22 take any shit maybe and people just took that as her being an asshole. Yeah, that happens. It happens all the time. Maybe she was just a boss bitch. Trust me. It happens all the time. Maybe she was a capy. Maybe she was a Capricorn. We got called assholes all the time. For just working. Just for getting shit done. And for just working. Yeah. And she was out here working.
Starting point is 00:17:42 She was. She was just working. Saving its life. Saving its life, you know. And of course, she was also known, like I said before, like very briefly, that she was known to unhex or unbewitch people of the village upon request. Yeah. Just like helping everybody.
Starting point is 00:17:57 Yeah. Like she wasn't throwing hexes and be witches yet, according to everybody. But she was very adept at taking them off. Which to me is someone you want to have around. I would think so. That's somebody you don't want to piss off. Go get me that unhexing lady. I need her.
Starting point is 00:18:10 Go get me that naughty Ursula. Yeah, that naughty Ursula. No, she, but despite Grace threatening to expose her as a witch, which had just been changed to a felony in England. Fallonious behavior. Phelonious witchiness. She tried, she still tried to help. So despite the fact that Grace is like, I'm going to go to Justice Darcy and tell him that you are a witch. She said, no.
Starting point is 00:18:35 Ursula was like, all right, bitch, I'm unbothered. But like, I'm going to help your kid. Like, I'll try to help you out. Wow. Yeah. So she still tried to help. She told Grace she could help take this lameness hex off of her. And she said, it was easy, which I love this.
Starting point is 00:18:50 She said, all you have to do is send away that random birth assistant and let me take my rightful place. Which I'm like, get it. Way to get you. You're going to get in there one way or another. You're like, I can help you. One hand washes the other. Send that, send that girl packing. Yeah, she saw her time.
Starting point is 00:19:07 So Grace had a daughter who was healthy. Birth went great. Ursula helped. Everything great. Ursula also told her that she could show her how to take all bewitchings off of herself and others after this. She was like, if you want, I can teach you. She was like, I will take you under my win. Yeah, I'll teach you my ways.
Starting point is 00:19:25 You know, you got hexed. I don't know who hexed you. Maybe you need to do this in the future. Okay. I'm just saying. Okay. You're like, I don't know about herself. I'm like, listen, Ursula, you're getting a little shady with it.
Starting point is 00:19:35 here. She's getting a little shady. Now, another argument, unfortunately, occurred. They were doing well for a little while. They weren't meant to be friends. They weren't meant to be. They were not bosom buddies. No.
Starting point is 00:19:46 This is not. Now, it occurred again over, which this is apparently a very common argument back then, because at first I was like, oh, I feel like I can solve this argument very quickly. What was it? It was over who would nurse the baby? The mom. Yeah, that was my initial. I was like, okay, my initial thought was like, ladies, ladies, I can help you out.
Starting point is 00:20:05 Mama. Mama does that. Big mama. But back then, this was a very common thing that like the midwife would help nurse the baby and all that. That feels. It feels some type of way. It does. It certainly does. No, there was an argument over this because I think it was also to do with like, well, Grace, you've got that fucking lameness. So like maybe you should let me do it because I can be better at it. Your teat is also lame. I'm sure that was exactly what you said. You have lame teats. And Grace obviously wanted a. nurse her own child. Yeah, I wonder why. And Ursula was offended again. Ursula, you got to like put the offendedness aside. Then something really tragic happened. At three months old, the baby fell out of her cradle and died of a broken neck. Oh my God. Yeah. So the record states that in response to this, it says, quote, Ursula hearing to have happened made answer, it maketh no matter. for she might have suffered me to have the keeping and nursing of it.
Starting point is 00:21:05 So it's basically her being like, yeah, like I told you so, should have me do it. Whoa. And it's like, oh, okay. That's your friend. And that's a three-month-old baby that just rolled out of a cradle and broke her neck. Oh, my God. And she's just like, well, should have let me nurse her. Should have me do it, I guess.
Starting point is 00:21:24 And it's like, ooh. Ursula knows best. I guess so. Now, Grace immediately, I mean, she was heartbroken. obviously. And she immediately fell back into that lameness bout. All of a sudden it came roaring back. A.k.a. Depression. A.k.a. Depression. Exactly. And Ursula said if she gave her 12 shillings, she could get this hex off again. So now she has to pay her after her baby just died tragically. Exactly. So Ursula starts out here and you're like, all right, Ursula. You're not doing anything.
Starting point is 00:21:53 But slowly you're like, she becomes a con man. What's going on, Ursula? Right. Because she's like, yeah, just give me 12 shillings and I can get this hex off of you again. And it's like, why does she keep getting hexets on her, Ursula? Why? Why did she keep getting it? Why? And it seems like you're the unhexer. Like this seems like this is rife with things for you to do here.
Starting point is 00:22:11 Are you creating your own business opportunities here? We love an entrepreneur. I think you are. I think you are, Ursula. Now, Grace agreed because she was like, I just need to get this lameness off of me. Get it all. And for five or so weeks, she felt amazing and cured. Okay.
Starting point is 00:22:26 She felt amazing. But she had to tell Ursula, I can't afford the 12. feelings. Like I don't have that. So she got the cure, but she didn't have the money. Now Ursula said, and you know what? Ursula was like, okay, okay, that was a lot. I get it. Okay. Do you have some cheese? Oh, you couldn't pay me in cheese any day of this. This isn't the official record. Yeah, it is. She said you got cheddar. I was like, you know what? I'm kind of on Ursula's side again. I feel, I feel a little bit one with her for a second because I would be like 12. That's fine. Yeah. Do you have? Do you have.
Starting point is 00:23:00 a delicious gouda. You got a pound of Hoffman's? Do you have a good Danish blue? A brie? A brie? A wheel Monsego. I'm done. A Monterey Jack. Is it even Monterey? No. Yeah, you're good. Yeah. Yeah, you got it. Okay. I got that. So she was like, do you have some cheese? You know, I'll take that. And she was like, I don't have any cheese. Who doesn't have cheese? You know, back then, I don't think a lot of people had cheese. I thought everybody had cheese. I thought that's all they fucking ate bread and cheese. I thought cheese was fucking just spilling down the streets. I kind of did.
Starting point is 00:23:36 I thought cheese wheels were a plenty. People even had cloths for that shit. Didn't everybody have fucking cheese back then? I love how you were like, get out of here. I feel that way. Grace is a bullshit or everybody had cheese back. Grace is lame. Where's your fucking cheese lady?
Starting point is 00:23:52 I know. I'm like, what do you? You have a cheese I have in my refrigerator and I'm a lactose intolerant bitch. Oh, yeah. We just fight through that. I have I have ibs and I have fucking pounds of cheese in the fridge. Oh, but yeah, she didn't have cheese. She was like, I don't have cheese either.
Starting point is 00:24:07 Well, I'd hex the shit out of her at that point. Ursula left and she was pissed at this point. Yeah, I'll put a cheese hex on your ass. Not only did you not pay me, but you couldn't even give me the substitution of cheese. Get out. When as Ash said, like, Ursula's like, Ash told me everybody has fucking cheese around here. So. They retroactively traveled in time.
Starting point is 00:24:25 It was like, listen, Ursula, get that. Ash just poofed next to her and was like, girl. everybody has cheese. Every single fucking person here in this time period has cheese in their house. She doesn't like you. She's a liar. Now immediately, the ailment began again. And it got worse. Get you some cheese. It'll cure it. Because Ursula is like, I'm going to heck your ass.
Starting point is 00:24:45 Now, her son Davy, the one that got better, he would get worse. And then when she would get better, he would get worse. When he would get better, she would get worse. They were like fluctuating. Okay. And it was strange. giving each other some like 1500s illness that was literally that's what was happening going back and forth between them literally that's what was happening yeah they were just passing germs that's what was happening that makes but we're going to call it a hex um so yeah the records say
Starting point is 00:25:13 quote she becometh so lame as without I know it sounds so funny in modern language she becomes so lame that's what happened when I had kids You're so lame. You probably think this cheese is about you. 1,500 shit, you know. She becomes it so lame. I have like boogas coming out of my face. That's literally who I am as a person now.
Starting point is 00:25:52 She becomes so lame. I passed away. But this one says, she becomes so lame as without help she is not able to arise. or to turn in her bed. That's how lame she got. You can't even move. You can't even move. You can't even turn over in your bed.
Starting point is 00:26:13 You're so lame. So now according to the records, the 19th day of February, 1582, and it says like, for the date, which they just, it always sounds better over there.
Starting point is 00:26:28 Yeah. The 19th day of February, the 1582, year of the race. reign of our sovereign lady Queen Elizabeth. I'm like, oh, fuck, yeah, 1582. Yeah. Like, it's just like, whoa, that just made that year like, hell yeah.
Starting point is 00:26:41 Go off, Queen Elizabeth. Apparently on that crazy day, Grace went to the justice, and justice Brian Darcy was his name. Uh-huh. And she told Brian Darcy that Ursula Kemp was a witch who was hexing her and her children. Oh, shit. And she explained the whole ordeal above, including saying she basically murdered my three month old.
Starting point is 00:27:02 Oh. Which is like not good. I also be like, and you're just coming to me about that? Yeah, I'd be like, are you? Yeah. Now, after this, another woman, Agnes Leatherdale, also did the same thing and told the justice that Ursula had sent her own son to her home to ask her for scouring sand. Okay.
Starting point is 00:27:21 You know, how you, I ask my neighbors for scouring sand all the time. Yeah. Let me some scouring sand. You know? I am your neighbor. And I guess, exactly. And I guess Ursula was like, can I have some scouring sand? She sent her son.
Starting point is 00:27:32 And she said, in return, she said you can get, quote, the dying of a pair of women's hose for the sand. So she was going to dye her hose for the scouring sand. I love 1582. Me too. Like records. It's a lot of fun. So she's saying like, I'll die your stockings. So she's like, can I have some scouring sand?
Starting point is 00:27:54 And for return, because I don't like monies. We barter moon rocks here. Yeah. Money-shmoney. So she was like, in return, I'll die a pair of your hose. for you. Okay. Which apparently was like a need back then. So like, okay. Well, yeah. Yeah. You know. So I think it's a fucking bargain as far as I'm concerned. Here's some sand. Yeah, die my hose. Yeah, that's a great trade off. Now, Agnes said no, because she was like, no, I won't do
Starting point is 00:28:19 that. I'm not giving you scouring sand for dying hose. And you know why? She said, knowing her to be a naughty beast. A naughty beast. She said, I knew her to be a naughty beast. So I said, no. She wasn't going to send her shit. Okay. But Ursula saw Agnes' daughter give scouring sand to another neighbor. And she felt scorned. She was pissed. She was like, why don't I get scouring sand? I was going to give you dying of the hose. She's like, I'm not even a naughty beast. And I wasn't even asking for it for free. I was going to die your damn hose. Like, it's tradeoff. This is, come on. This is the way the world works. It's the economy. Come on here. Now, it's going to collapse if you don't get any of this.
Starting point is 00:28:57 Yeah, Agnes's daughter, who gave the other neighbor some scouring sand, she said that Ursula looked at her and mumbled a spell under her breath. And right after this, the child became very ill with a mystery ailment. She probably just said, like, you little beast. And then the kid just got some 1582 illness. Yeah, because like everybody was throwing their poop out the window. Yeah, exactly. No. No, it said the child came down, quote, as it lay very big with a great swelling in the bottom of
Starting point is 00:29:27 the belly and other privy parts. Oh. So I'm not sure what this is. I'm not a 1582 doctor. Yeah, I don't know. I'm pretty sure that was the time. Like, you know, it's like Victorian times when like they would be like, you have a great swelling in the bottom of your belly and other privy parts.
Starting point is 00:29:47 Do some cocaine about it. Yeah. Like I'm pretty sure. Maybe she like had her period and she was like bloated. Probably. I mean, I don't know about the other swelling. The privy parts. But yeah.
Starting point is 00:29:56 She had gone. on to another healing woman, uh, woman Agnes had who revealed that the person behind this mystery illness of her child was Ursula Kemp. So this other healing woman, I don't know if everybody's seeing what's happening here. Yeah. The other healing lady is, but healing women being like, I can get a monopoly on this village. Right. Right. So you know that other healing woman's going to be like, it was that bitch. Don't go to her. Come to me. By the way, do you have any scouring sand? Come to me. Right. So she named her. So they went to see another very well-known healing woman in town named Mother Ratcliffe.
Starting point is 00:30:33 You know her. You love her. She has cheese. She has cheese, I bet. I feel as she does. Not everyone. Not everyone, not grace. So she was very well known for taking hexes off as well.
Starting point is 00:30:46 You know, a few women in town had this specialty. How big is this fucking, most of all? Isn't this like a village? They all went to the same college course. Okay. Now, while they were walking there to go see Mother Rat. Cliff, Agnes was with her ailing child, taking her to see her to see what they could do. This ailing child, who we don't have a name for, it's just ailing child, it.
Starting point is 00:31:07 Horrible. I can't believe you did that. Apparently pointed to Ursula Kemp's window and was like saying that, like, she's the bad lady. Yeah, because he probably heard the word around town. I'm saying. Now, when they got to Mother Ratcliffe's, she tried, she did all our things, and then she said, I'm going to be honest, there's nothing I can do to help this child. It's that bad. going on, then were they like, you're a witch?
Starting point is 00:31:29 So they were like, wow, mother Ratcliffe, like, you're not going to get the monopoly on this village. So you're fake as fuck. The unnamed healing woman before you is going to get it. So thank you. They even brought in Ursula's son for the two Lord Darcy's, like, whole interrogation or something. Yeah, acquisition.
Starting point is 00:31:47 There you go. Who, according to the official record was eight years old. And when they say it, they say he was eight years old or thereabouts. They're just like, we don't fucking know. Somewhere in the range of 8 to 10. He was a kid. That's how I feel about kids. I see, like, I see these kids going to the bus stop up on my street and I'm like,
Starting point is 00:32:07 are you like 47? Are you like on Social Security? You guys in high school and they're like. Or are you an infant? Yeah, like, I don't know. I'm like, oh, you don't look old enough to go to school. Like, you're going on the bus. You're like, it's three days old.
Starting point is 00:32:18 What are you doing? It's like, I never know how old kids are. Have you gotten your grown up teeth yet? Probably not. Probably not. So he's eight years old. He's eight years old or thereabouts. he so her own son Thomas said that she Ursula did indeed have spirits one and she and he named them all
Starting point is 00:32:36 what does that even mean apparently spirits are basically familiars like a witch familiar oh like Franklin for me like Franklin okay or like RIP Bubba was yeah or is Lux also is my familiar I'm still my my familiar yeah Bubba's a round do you love that I just discounted one of my cats you did just Franklin I mean Lux is like Lux is like, a little chunk of monkey. Lux is like the assistant to the assistant to the assistant to the co-regional manager. He's just out here by then. Yeah, he totally is. But yeah, her own son Thomas, eight years old, is like, oh yeah, she has familiars.
Starting point is 00:33:13 Like, what's up? And then he named them all, which don't worry, I'll tell you their names because- Are they naughty, naughty beast names? There's a couple of naughty names in there. He also said these spirits drank blood from his mother's arm. and other places not specified. I think he was having an active imagination. You know, eight-year-olds, you know what I'm saying?
Starting point is 00:33:34 But the next day, Ursula was brought in to speak to Justice Darcy. She said she herself had actually come down with lameness. She's like, I've been hanging out with that grace bitch, and now her lameness rubbed off on me. I'm lame as fuck now. I'm a bummer. I am so lame. Me? Not a good time.
Starting point is 00:33:53 Not a good time. But she said her lame. occurred about 10 years prior. She was not currently lame. She was previously late. 10 years ago? Yeah, she said 10 years ago she was lame, but she is not lame now. And she said it was so bad that she sought out help from well-known healers in the village, like the ones they had talked to. One woman was from, was from Wheely, I think it is, which was a town about five miles north. That village over there. You know that one. This woman insisted that Ursula had been hexed at the time. Okay. Told her, you got a hex on you and we got to take this off. So Ursula made
Starting point is 00:34:32 her show her how to fix herself because she was like, if this happens again, like people are, people are crazy. I can't be coming out to wheel every weekend. I cannot. I need to know how to like self-unhex. Self-care, baby. So she was like, okay, so she showed her how to do it. And the remedy was to mix hogs dung. Shit. And something called sharp. together? I looked it up. I could find nothing that told me what Charvel was. I tried to look it up. If somebody knows what Charvel or Charvel is in olden times, we're not supposed to know. I imagine it's some other kind of poop, maybe, or dung, or something that you shouldn't mix together with other poop. Yeah. She then had to hold this mixture in her left hand and a knife in her right hand,
Starting point is 00:35:22 and then she had to use the knife to prick the mixture three times and then throw it in the fire. That was how you want to hack yourself. Interesting, because like it does feel witchcrafty. It's very witchcrafty. Like you just got a dagger out here in these streets. You're just like stabbing dung in your hand and then throwing it in a fire. And like three times. Three times.
Starting point is 00:35:39 Three times. Three times. Power of three. Now after she took three sage leaves and three pieces of herb John. The herb of John. John just produces herbs now. That is my favorite kind of herb. Herb. Herb John.
Starting point is 00:35:55 I will grow a garden of herb John. Just grow a garden of John. It's a garden of John. It's my John garden of John. I got to go water my John. So there was three sage leaves and three pieces of herb John and place them all in some ale, which is exactly what herb John should be placed in. John would agree. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:36:16 Some ale. Some delicious craft beer. Delicious yeast water. There you go. she was instructed to drink this in the morning and at night, like first thing morning, last thing at night, and then it would unhex her. I'm sorry, is the dung in there? No, you do.
Starting point is 00:36:31 So you do the dung thing first. You got that dung ball. You prick it with the dagger. Throw it in the fire. Step one. Then you take your sage leaves. You take your herb, John. You put them in an ale.
Starting point is 00:36:40 And you drink that in the morning. You drink that at night. Unhexed. It's like an elixir. It is. A tonic, if you will. I love that word. Elixir.
Starting point is 00:36:49 Me too. Wow. I'm going to name my first born. an elixir. Ooh, that just feels some type of way. It's like elixir. It's magical. It is.
Starting point is 00:36:56 That's a good one. Now, she did this. Okay. And it fucking worked. She was unhaxed. Okay. See, no lameness. For me, I feel like maybe it was all about mindset.
Starting point is 00:37:08 Yeah, for sure. Energy. Intentions, if you will. Yeah. Like, I don't know about the dummy, but. Now, Ursula told Justice Darcy that she had used this care on other women in the village because she just wanted to share this so that they would not suffer alone. Nice. Like, I'm just here to unhexed people. I don't want them to be hexed by
Starting point is 00:37:26 themselves. Just here to spread the wealth of knowledge. She said she had done it several times and it had worked several times. So at this point, Justice Darcy told Ursula, listen, if you confess that everything you have done to these children that they're claiming you have done to Grace and Agnes's kids, I'm going to, you're going to get leniency if you confess and you tell me of the other witches in this village. So according to the record, she immediately started sobbing and fell to her knees. Now, it should be noted that I am sure some light pushing happened to get this. I don't think she just fell to her knees sobbing and was like, I'm going to confess to you.
Starting point is 00:38:13 I'm sure they did something awful. Yeah, like pushing, like ripping her toenails off. Exactly. They did something awful, but they just, they didn't write that down. Yeah. The scribe was on lunch. Didn't put that one in there. No. So here's the confession. She said she had two female familiars and two male familiars. She's got four familiars working for her. The female's job was to cause that crazy lameness to people that she wanted a hex and also harm cattle, question mark.
Starting point is 00:38:40 Oh. Which is like a very specific job description. So I wonder if one of them had that in their LinkedIn profile. Like I can harm cattle. And she was like, you're hired. One time a farmer did me wrong. Because that just feels like a very specific. Like this one, can. didn't harm cattle. Yeah. And it's like, is that all that one does? Maybe. It's just like, I'm just here to heart cattle. Everybody has their specialty.
Starting point is 00:38:59 Well, the males were the ones who would cause death to anyone that Ursula chose. Okay. Here's where it gets awesome. She described and named the familiars. A male familiar, so a male familiar was a white lamb called Tiffin, which is just cute. Yeah, cutie. There was a female one that was a black toad called Pigeon. Pigeon.
Starting point is 00:39:21 which is really cute too. There was another male one, which was a black cat. Named locks. Jack. Jack, which is adorable. And then there was another female one that was a gray cat called Titty. Titty. I'm my next cat.
Starting point is 00:39:38 Mark my motherfucking words. It is Tuesday, March 15th. It is now 127 in the afternoon. And my next fucking cat is going to be a gray cat named Titty. Thanks for me. being here today. Drew? Drew, you heard?
Starting point is 00:39:55 I got to be real with you. Titty does some damage. Oh, shit. Maybe I retract my previous statement. It feels like it might be Tiffin who's really doing like the bad shit. But like. But it's Titty. Titty really does some stuff.
Starting point is 00:40:09 Titties can do damage. Yeah, I mean, I guess. I don't even know. All right. She. And actually, she admitted that Titty had been sent. she admitted that Tiddy had been sent to Hex Grace and Piggin had been sent to Hex Davy, her son.
Starting point is 00:40:31 So Titty and Piggins went and they fucked this whole family up. Pig and Tiddy. So she said she also sent Tiffin over to the baby to knock the cradle over and kill her. So Tiffin's the one who's like, fuck you Tiffin. And what's weird is Tiffin's a white land. I'm like, that seems like the most innocuous out of all of them. But that's where it's at, though. It's really bad, though.
Starting point is 00:40:55 She also admitted that her sister-in-law, Ursula's own sister-in-law, had called her a witch and a whore. And in response, she had sent Jack, the cat, to torture her to death. I mean... And that comes back later. Someone else says that this happened. Guess what, sister-in-law, fuck around and find out. I mean, you call me a witch and a whore. I'm going to send my familiar to torture you to death.
Starting point is 00:41:16 I'll send Tiddy to torture you. Yeah, I already got to the out in the world right now, taking care of someone for me. Yeah, I don't have. Well, yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. So after all of this, Justice Darcy brought Agnes and Grace into the room, the two accusers. And they had her confront Ursula and basically accuse her to her face because that was just like, they were like, let's make this fun. Yeah, let's watch. So apparently Ursula immediately fell to her knees and begged that they forgive her for what she had done, you know, killing and hexing her children.
Starting point is 00:41:47 Yeah. forgive me, please. That's a solid no, sister. Sorry that I sent Tiddy to knock your baby over. Sorry, Titty, Tiffin. No, it was Tiffin. Sorry, Titty gave them the lameness. Sorry, Titty made y'all lame. So as she's begging for forgiveness, she mentioned a woman named Alice Newman. She said Alice was involved.
Starting point is 00:42:10 Because now she's like, you want names, I got names. She literally said, go ask Alice. She literally was like, go ask Alice. She said Alice was involved and had sent spirits. to torment the children as well. So there was a whole fucking baseball team working to torment these kids. They just like put me in coach. I'm ready to play.
Starting point is 00:42:27 Yeah. Like there's a lot of jacks, as we'll see, a lot of jacks. I wonder what that's about. I don't know any jacks. I know jacks. You do. Yeah. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:42:37 So the next day, Ursula was like, oh shit, I forgot to tell you that like less than a year ago, Alice Newman and her, Ursula, had gotten a fight. Oh, she's getting into lots of fights. And she was like, Alice called me a witch. Ursula said that. And she said she was going to report that she was a witch to Justice Darcy. Again, Ursula was unbothered. She was like, didn't bother me?
Starting point is 00:43:03 She was like, go ahead and do that. Everything chilled out eventually and they made up, but like that accusation was still out there. And things went back to normal. But apparently they hadn't because Alice had actually taken some of Ursula's spirits in a pot and taken them home with her that day. She trapped Titty in a paw. She trapped Titty in a pot. This was, at first, she made it seem like things were not okay because she took my spirit.
Starting point is 00:43:28 And then later, she said that this was actually within her knowledge. Okay. That she had allowed her to take the spirit. Just babysit my familiars. You can take them and do what you will. Now, Ursula's son Thomas mentioned that Alice Newman was also involved in all this. Like, he had also brought up her name. And he had actually referred to her as.
Starting point is 00:43:47 is godmother Newman, which is very interesting. So was she his godmother? I have no idea. It never goes further into it. But it's like people will just like mention these words or like call people things that you're like, huh. And then you can never find anything else out about it. So crazy. She's actually his satanic grandmother.
Starting point is 00:44:03 There you go. I mean godmother. Godmother. He confirmed this story that they had, they had a fight made up and then Ursula gave her some spirits in a pot. He said that. So that's like a well-known thing in that house. Macaroni in a pot. Spirits in a pot.
Starting point is 00:44:16 Tiddy in a pot. He also said he heard Alice Newman tell his mother that she sent spirits to torment a man named Johnson and his wife to death. They died. I'm saying. Whoa. Happened. So around Christmas, after the whole thing with Grace, Ursula asked Alice to sent Tiddy in torment Grace. And torment Grace.
Starting point is 00:44:39 She said she would and she did. So she did send Titty to torment her. Okay. That was it. So Tiddy came back. And Ursula allowed it to suck her blood as a reward for a job well done. Titty sucked her blood. Yes.
Starting point is 00:44:54 Then she sent him back to Alice. Rightfully, Titty is now Alice's. Oh. Remember, that whole, like, sucking the blood thing is a very, it's a big thing in, like, witch lore and how they would, like, try to pretend that people were witches was like a birthmark. Yeah. A birthmark meant that you're familiar sucked your blood out of that area. And that's why you had that spot.
Starting point is 00:45:16 vampires as well. Yeah. It's like that's how you, you're like, well, you have a witchmark. That's where you're familiar. Like sucks your blood out of you. You would be so fucked. Yeah, I would be really fucked. So she said three months before that, John Stratton, a neighbor of hers, had had a fight with her. And this is Ursula. And she again called her a whore and, quote, gave her other evil speeches. So like said other shit. Like talk shit. And she also said, his wife wouldn't lend spices to Ursula's son. Why will nobody give Ursula's? Just give her some neighborly shit and she'll leave you alone.
Starting point is 00:45:55 She's going to hex your ass if you don't give it to her. I don't blame her. I'll give her some spices. You can have some, I have cumin. It's too bad Instacart didn't exist when this was all happening because so many hexes could have been avoided. So many.
Starting point is 00:46:06 I mean, I guess you just like hex your Instacart shopper. That's true. They got it wrong thing. There's a couple of Instacart shoppers that I've wanted a hex before. Me as well. But there's also been ones that I just want to like. send like oh there's some that i literally want to like invite to thanksgiving correct yeah me as well
Starting point is 00:46:21 so this was bullshit to ursula obviously so she had alice send jack the cat to his wife and jack went and fucked with her possibly killing her it's like on record that she might have been killed and was given blood from ursul's thigh and alice's thigh as a reward is that like better blood i guess I don't know. Thighblood. So they brought Alice Newman in now. And they're like, let's talk to Alice. Because now she's like fully involved.
Starting point is 00:46:49 She's got titty. So like we got to break her in. Alice has titty. We got to talk to her about this. So she basically was like, yeah, sure, we had a fight. Like she said. And she agreed that she had told Ursula that she knew she was a witch and she was going to report her.
Starting point is 00:47:02 She's like, fuck yeah, I said that. Yeah. And look, here we are now. Right. She's like, I was right. But she said everything else involving her was complete bullshit. No spirits, nothing. Now, let's for it, like, this is all fun and, like, funny.
Starting point is 00:47:15 Yeah. But this happened. This is real. This woman, Alice, got brought into court, essentially. And they said, do you have a familiar? Do you have an invisible friend who kills women? Yeah. Like, do you have an invisible gray cat that you intentionally sent to a woman to murder her?
Starting point is 00:47:38 To torment her to death? And then when it got back, did you let it bite your thigh? Yeah. What? Yep. That really happened. Reading this pamphlet and I can link to it too, it's, you forget that this is real. No, I feel like, this happened. That's why I just said, I was like, I need to remind myself and everybody else that this is for realsies. This is real. Okay. And this is how absurd it all was. One day you just wake up and you get called into court for this shit. For this bullshit. Imagine sitting there and being like, no, I don't have a fake cat.
Starting point is 00:48:12 named Tiddy that I send to kill people. I don't know how to prove that to you. But I do not. And then that's the thing. Once they decided that, they'd just be like, well, you're a liar. Once it's out there, they're not asking you to, like, clear your name. They're asking you to just confess. So they go through the motions.
Starting point is 00:48:26 But Justice Darcy told her that if she didn't confess, then he would take, which I love this. He said, if you don't confess, I'm going to take your spirits away. How are you going to find him? Well, and she replied, that's impossible because I'll just keep them with me all the time. She should not have said that. But then she was like, I mean, They don't exist. If I had any.
Starting point is 00:48:44 Yeah. Bingo, that was all they needed. They were like, you just answered like, you had spirits. And she was like, I don't know. Yeah. That was an interesting call. So then a guy named William Hook comes in. And he said, this is Alice's neighbor.
Starting point is 00:48:57 And he had a lot to say. Yeah. He said that Alice's husband, William, had been hexed by her, her own husband. He said that during mail times, he heard them speaking out loud, like to each other. And he heard her husband say, dost thou not see? like he was referring to something in the room. And he said he then heard Alice respond several times to this same statement that if he saw something in the room,
Starting point is 00:49:21 he should just give it some meat and it would go away. He then later heard William tell Alice to beat the thing to get it to go away. What? And she was, he was like, I think they were talking about the familiars. I mean, yeah, like give it some meat and it will go away. I mean, I think it might come back for more meat. Yeah, I mean, it's you're familiar. That's the whole point.
Starting point is 00:49:41 But he also said that Alice had gone to a man named Johnson, who we just talked about before. We mentioned him. How Alice said, like the familiars had been sent to Johnson and his wife to kill them. Yeah. He was the guy apparently in the village, just Johnson guy, who collected money for the poor in the village. A good man. And Alice had asked him for 12 pence to help her ailing husband, who remember everybody said she hexed to feel that way. She did this to her husband to get the money.
Starting point is 00:50:11 and Johnson said he couldn't give her the 12 pence and they had a fight. Alice had later sent spirits to Johnson and his wife and instructed them to torment them to death. Johnson died as a result. Okay. So he died. Like that's on record. He did die. I don't know if it was as a result of Titty.
Starting point is 00:50:28 I don't think it was a, I don't think it was Titty's fault. But meanwhile, Ursula is still confessing and still naming other quote unquote witches. Because she's thinking that's going to get her out of this. They promised her she could get out of this with that. So she's just singing like a canary. And then the stories just get more wild. More and more wild. Because Justice Darcy told her over and over, I promise you will be safe if you just provide names and you confess your own involvement.
Starting point is 00:50:52 Doubt it. So now she named Elizabeth Bennett, Alice Hunt and Agnes Glasscock. So it's thought that Justice Darcy was actually part of like a bigger network of people just trying to round up and extinguish witches in the village. He was likely using his employees like Grace Thurlow, who started. this whole thing to expose and manipulate gossipy grudges and rumors just for people to come in and be accused now ursula said she had gone to visit elizabeth bennett which is one of the people she accused she had gone to visit her about three months prior and she saw that she had a spirit and a pot but you keep your spirits in pots apparently this one was a ferret she said tiffin her spirit
Starting point is 00:51:36 had told her that elizabeth in fact had two spirits so now that you're going to be able to These spirits are gossipy motherfuckers. Yeah, it's like a secret circle. Yeah. They're like, oh, no, she has two spirits. Like, Tiffin's like, don't you dare. Let her tell you that. So one of these spirits was named Suckin and the other one was named Laird.
Starting point is 00:51:54 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. She said Elizabeth had actually hexed a man named Wyatt's wife to death. Okay. She had also sent a spirit to make three of his cattle very sick and two of the three died. Oh, I wonder who that was. Yeah. The one did that.
Starting point is 00:52:09 I'm like, which one had that in their profile? The guy on the LinkedIn who messes with the cattle. I mess with cattle. Hello. She had also sent spirits to kill a man named Willingale and a woman who was married to William Wiles. So there's a lot of murder happening here now. For like no reason. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:52:24 And she had most notably sent a spirit to torment another child as well. Get out of here. Now, Alice Hunt, who was accused by Ursula as well, had spirits. She also had killed, quote, six beasts that belonged to. to a man named Hayward. Alice Hunt had given it some blood to drink as a reward, so they were able to find like a witch mark.
Starting point is 00:52:47 Agnes Glasgow, another one of the accused by Ursula, had been accused by a local shoemaker as well. He had said she hexed and eventually killed his child. According to Ursula, she had asked Tiffin about this. We'll see. Tiffin, like really,
Starting point is 00:53:03 he knows everything. He's got the tea. She had asked Tiffin about this, and Tiffin said it was true. And he said, she had also been responsible for the death of another child because she had asked her spirits to torment those children to death. These people had way too much time on their hands. Now, I love it because they then asked her if Tiffin, who had been the real informant here,
Starting point is 00:53:22 relaying this information to Ursula, who related to Justice Darcy, they asked if Tiffin was a reliable spirit. Had he lied before? This is real. You're shitting me. Like, Tiffin's never given me a reason not to trust him, you know? Like, I feel like we're, I feel like we're bros.
Starting point is 00:53:39 I feel like we would tell each other everything. Does this imaginary source ever lie to you? Like, she's like, I told Tiffin about a surprise party once and that fucker is like a steel trap. Surprise the hell out of the birthday girl. Like, we don't have to, we don't have to worry about him. And they were like, you party? Do you dance? Did you show your ankle?
Starting point is 00:53:56 Yeah, they're like, you're a witch. We're going to kill you now. But she said, nope, he was totally honest. She had no reason to distrust him. This is all on actual official record that they had this, like a discussion about this. I love it. So they rounded up these accused women because Tiffin said so. Duh.
Starting point is 00:54:10 This Tiffin that we are just relying on. Reliable old Tiffin. Now, Agnes Glasgow was completely unfazed, just like Ursula. She was like, fuck you guys. She denied everything and was like, that lady is a kook. They searched her for witch marks anyways, and they found what they believed to be witch marks on her thigh and left shoulder. Remember, these are just freckles.
Starting point is 00:54:31 Freckles, beauty marks, birth marks. An itch you scratched. Literally anything. So she still, even though they were like, look, we found them. She still denied and was like, they are regular skin marks, you idiots. But they brought Ursula in and had her accuse Agnes to her face because they just love doing that apparently. Yeah, it's like the ultimate smackdown. It's like Celebrity Death Match.
Starting point is 00:54:50 Because you always believe that somebody's not going to accuse someone to their face or they're lying. Like say it. Yeah. But when death is on the line, like it's hanging is on the line. Yeah, I'm going to accuse someone. Get me out of here. Yeah. So Ursula did it.
Starting point is 00:55:05 she accused her right to her face and agnes lost her mind according to records she used a lot of vulgarities and called ursula a whore which i'm like why is everyone calling ursula a whore it's like bitch back then it's like the meanest thing they could say and told her she was going to scratch her face like the witch she was oh which i'm like damn i will scratch your face like the witch you are like woo she then accused ursula back of being a witch and said she had bewitched her and made it so she could not cry. What? She was like, see how I'm not crying? Her fault. She bewitched me and made it so I can't cry. Where did that even? When did that enter the chat? I don't know. She fucking froze your tear ducts? Tears for fears. I don't know. So they brought in Alice Hunt and another accused and she was like,
Starting point is 00:55:52 nope, not true. Not me. Like they're like, no. Even denying it, she was going to be arrested anyways. So she broke down and confessed to Justice Darcy because she's going to be arrested. She told him she had two spirits, Jack and Robin. Everybody's got a Jack. And there's a couple Robbins, too. We'll see. Okay. They were familiars in the form of a black and white cult.
Starting point is 00:56:11 So they are tiny horses. And apparently she kept them in a pot. So they're very tiny horses. She said they told her that Ursula would do this and betray her. She was like, they told me this would happen. Then she went further and said her own sister, Margaret, I think Simone, had two spirits and was a witch as well. So just accused her own sister.
Starting point is 00:56:33 Well, she's like if I got to be in here, so I would accuse you just so we could hang. Yeah. Not hang, but like actually hang out. Yeah. Hang before we hanged. Yeah. So she had two spirits, Toads named Tom and Robin. Okay. And she was a witch. So then she then said that they got these spirits as a gift from their own mother. So now she's accusing her mother, Mother Barnes, who was also a witch. Their mother was dead, by the way. I'm like, way to accuse your dead mother who can't say anything. They even defend herself. Yeah. But she's up. So they bring in. Margaret now to question her, the sister. And she's like, like, and I literally wrote in my notes, I would fuck my sister's world up if she
Starting point is 00:57:11 did this shit to me. Well, I did just tell you that I would have. So you definitely told me that you would. So that's good to know. Now, where am I? I just lost my place. So Margaret denied everything, but eventually she also confessed under what I'm certain was not nice, you know, interrogation.
Starting point is 00:57:30 Tactics. Exactly. That's the word I was looking for. Now remember, Justice Darcy promised all these women that he would be lean in on them if they just confessed or gave other names. I feel like he's not a man of his word. No. So Ursula had given all these names. Now Alice Hunt turned on her own sister, Marjorie, and then Marjorie said a widowed older woman named Joan Petchy was also a witch.
Starting point is 00:57:51 Joan Pesci. Joan Pesci. No, that's not what he said. She said she knew this. So Joe Pesci is now in here. He is also a witch. She said she knew this because her mother, Marjorie and, you know, what's her name? Marjorie and her sister's mother had told her if they didn't want the spirits that she had given them at any point,
Starting point is 00:58:15 that she should send them to Joan because Joan would use them because she was a witch. Okay. Now, she said when Ursula had originally been arrested, she sent the spirits to live with Joan because she was scared. She was going to be caught. So she's like, I sent them off to live with Joan. With the pot spirits. Exactly. It's just a lot. Alice, her sister also confirmed to this and said they grew up next door to Joan and would hear her talking to herself, which they assumed was talking to her familiars. Which if they live next door to me, they would also hear me talking to myself.
Starting point is 00:58:47 I walk into my house when I get home and I'm talking to myself. I'm talking to the calf. I'm talking to the fucking stove. Oh, yeah. I'd be fucked. They also said that Joan was an incredibly powerful witch. She knew everything about everyone. And she always. mentioned that Joan was with their mother the day before their mother died. Oh. So this is all just like a big, like, holy shit. So they brought in Joan Pesci. Now, she is elder.
Starting point is 00:59:13 She's like elderly. And she was like, absolutely not. I'm not a powerful witch. Right. She denied everything. She said Alice and Marguer, what is it, Marjorie or Margaret. I don't remember which one it is. M.
Starting point is 00:59:25 M. It spelled like several ways in different records. Old English. So her, so they're, the sisters, mother was also not a witch as far as she knew. She was like, this is bullshit. They're just lying. And she's like, I don't have any hot goss on anyone in the village. I'm not this like powerful witch that knows everything. When asked, she did say that the death of that guy Johnson, the man who collected money for the poor, she said that was very sudden and that he was a very honest man.
Starting point is 00:59:50 Okay, so that's suss. So she's putting out there like, I'm just saying. I don't know who did it. I'm just going to drop this right here. She also related that another man who was named Lurkin had said he was told by Johnson himself that he believed Alice Newman was bewitching him to death. Oh. So full on witch hunt through February and into March now. Of course. People were just turning on each other left and right. Now during this hunt, Henry and Sicily Sellis were accused and brought in.
Starting point is 01:00:20 They were a couple, like a man and a woman. A man named Richard Ross had a lot to say about them and had accused them. He said something about refusing to sell her malt because she was refusing the price. It was like a very weird involving selling something. She was refusing the price and it was hard to translate from the old English, but after this they had a falling out. And hard speeches were had. So they called each other a whore. Exactly. Then he said after this his barn had burned down and it was them who caused it through witchcraft. Oh. Cicely was accused of tormenting a couple of children to death, at least one belonging to a man named Thomas Death.
Starting point is 01:01:02 You're kidding me. In the record, his name is Thomas Death. Interesting. And also was accused of causing the cattle to act weird. Oh, why would you do that? Henry and Sicily's nine-year-old son Henry came in to talk against them and had a wild story, he said, about last Christmas. He said, last Christmas about midnight, he said, there came to his brother John. a spirit. He said it took his brother by the left leg and also by the little toe. Of course. He said it looked like his sister, but all black and mutiny. What? Like it looks like a mutant, like just shadowy his sister. Like sweet little baby, you had a nightmare. Yeah. So Henry said his brother John cried out, father, father come help me. There's a black thing that hath me by me
Starting point is 01:01:50 leg as big as my sister. What? That's what he said. And he said when his father, heard this. He heard his father say to his mother, why thou hoar cannot you keep your imps from my children? And she apparently called it away from John saying, come away, come away. And it left. Why? It's like you would have the people cutting the sheets. I'm saying, that's all you got to do. Come away. Come away. And imps are also like another like a familiar or a spirit or something like that. Henry said he told his mother he was terrified of this thing and that John had scars from it. His mother apparently was like, you're lying, fuck off. Like, just bye.
Starting point is 01:02:29 Yeah. He then told them he saw his mother feed these imps or spirits or familiars from a black dish with milk and salt. And he said their names were Hercules and Mercury. No. I cannot. And apparently one was black, one was white, one was a girl, one was a boy, and they had eyes like goose eyes.
Starting point is 01:02:49 Ooh, I don't like that. Also, imagine if your nine-year-old son spoke out against you, like in the middle of a witch trial. I'd be like, I'm going to learn witchcraft while I'm in the can over here. I think that's the toilet. What do they? Well, I'm in the can over here. What do they call it? Yeah. What's another word for jail? I don't know. They're at the pokey. No, that's not what I was thinking. That is a thing. I'm going to learn witchcraft in jail and I am going to hex your ass for the rest of your life. Because that was some bullshit. I would be like, listen, Father Darcy, whatever your name is. Justice Darcy. I'm not a witch, but I'm now choosing a path of witch. I'm choosing the path of witchcraft.
Starting point is 01:03:24 Thank you. To condemn this little turd over here. This little betrayer. I gave it life. A little Benedict Arnold. Yeah. Now, John, the brother, who was six, came in to talk. Did he have scars?
Starting point is 01:03:36 Well, they don't say that it was confirmed, but he did confirm that he had seen, quote, a black thing like his sister that took him by the leg and that he cried out saying, Father, father, come help me and defend me. For there is a black thing that hath me by the leg, at which he saith, his father said to his mother, you stinking whore, what mean ye? Can you not keep your imps from my children? Wow.
Starting point is 01:04:02 He said they have eyes that are huge and his mom called them imps. Okie dokey. So this is just like very concerning. Hex them all. Hacks all the kids. Now, a woman named Alice Mansfield was accused in a nearby town Thorpe. Joan Cheston. What? I just took a sip of coffee. I'm so sorry.
Starting point is 01:04:19 Thorpe? Thorpe. Thorpe. Thorpe. Yeah, like Thorpe. Thorpe. Exactly. So I had to take that moment. No, Joan Cheston, the widow of John Cheston, said the summer before Alice Mansfield had come to her house and asked for curds, but she had none. Nobody has cheese. Nobody has curds.
Starting point is 01:04:36 When she left, suddenly the cattle were lame as shit. Wow. Even the cattle are un-cooled. They're lame as fuck. Days later, she returned demanding curds again. So now she's demanding curds. Give me some motherfucking curds. Put them up.
Starting point is 01:04:51 Put them up. And she said they fought and Joan yelled at her that. She knows she bewitched her cattle, and if she didn't make them better and reverse the hex, then she would have her burned for it. Whoa. She left, and suddenly those cattle were good as new. Nothing weren't. So she's like, I scared her into it. Get out of here.
Starting point is 01:05:07 A woman referred to as Lynn's wife, which I'm like that nice. That's shitty. Said Alice Mansfield came to her to ask for milk, and she only had a little. So she said, no, she couldn't give it because she's like, I only have a little. I need it for me. She left pissed, and she said that night her calf. died and do you want to know how her calf died? I do. Direct quote. Being very lusty. What? I got questions. I got a lot of questions. He died being very lusty?
Starting point is 01:05:38 What the fuck does that mean? Like he had a crush on another cow? Like lusty? He was being very like seductive like this calf. Did he die humping a cow? Did he die doing the dirty? Doing some dirty shit? Did he die cheating on his cowwife? What happened? How did he die being very lusty? I need to know. It was in the record. Now, the accused were transferred to the jail at Colchester Castle, and people could come and talk to them, or they could come just view them like zoo animals.
Starting point is 01:06:10 Awesome. Very nice. Great. March 9th, Ursula told people that Alice Newman had sent a spirit to kill Lord Darcy, who was not Justice Darcy, but was a relation to him, like a father or some other. Darcy's. Lord Darcy died. Oh. So now Justice Darcy's own family had been touched by this. So no, no.
Starting point is 01:06:30 Well, was his dad like fucking 45 and super elderly at that point in time? Was his dad like 17 and like at the end of his life? Like, come on. No. Henry Durant, a local butcher, came to talk to Ursula. And he asked her about the death of his daughter. He was like, I got questions. Okay. It was sudden.
Starting point is 01:06:46 And he had suspected witchcraft. And Ursula said, yep, you're correct. It was witchcraft at work. She said Henry Durant had refused to give Alice Hunt and her mother, Mother Barnes, pork when they asked for some. And so they'd bewitched his child to death as punishment. Okay. No pork? Your kid dies.
Starting point is 01:07:04 I mean, it was a hard knock life out there. Very hard knock life. And wheel. Now, March 20th, Lawrence Kemp, Ursula's brother came forward and said his wife, Ursula's, or his wife, which is Ursula's sister-in-law, had suddenly come down ill with an ailing back and, privy parts. Well, she did call Orsula our whore, so... And after nine months of intense suffering, she had died. And remember, Ursula admitted earlier that she killed her own sister-in-law. She did say that. Yeah. Now, Lawrence said, and again, admitted in quotation marks, meaning, like,
Starting point is 01:07:38 who knows what they did her. Tung, like, pinched and hung on a wall, wow. Now, Lawrence said that his wife had told him throughout this ordeal that she was sure it was Ursula who was making it happen. The two women didn't get along, obviously, and had actually come to blows a couple of years before this. Does that mean they hit each other? Yeah. And he mentioned something else that further cemented everyone's opinion on Ursula as well. He said she showed up uninvited to his wife's deathbed, and that's when she finally died after Ursula touched her arm. Oh. Before that, she was like ailing for days in bed, but she just died when Ursula came. As soon as Ursula stepped on the scene. So March 29th, 1582, all the accused witches were tried.
Starting point is 01:08:22 So Ursula and Alice Newman were indicted for murder by witchcraft. So Ursula did not get the leniency that she was promised. Imagine if that was still a charge. I could not even fathom. No. And it actually in the official record, it says on 12 February 1582 at St. Osith, they bewitched Elizabeth, the bewitched Elizabeth daughter of Richard Leatherdale, so that she died on 26 of February.
Starting point is 01:08:49 And also that on 30th of November, 1581, at St. Oseth, they bewitched Adina, wife of John Stratton, so that she died on February 14, 1582. Those are the charges leveled against her. So both Alice Newman and Ursula Kemp were both indicted on killing Grace's baby by sending a spirit to throw her from the cradle. Alice Newman was remanded, which apparently means you are, you don't, get any, you're not sentenced and you're not charged.
Starting point is 01:09:20 You're just kind of like released. But like, there's like no, there's no real trial for you. But you can be brought back in for this trial. But she got released? But you got released. But you're not just released out into the world. You're released back into jail. Oh. Which is where they would mostly die. Yeah. Now, she was
Starting point is 01:09:35 remanded, but Ursula was found guilty with a trial and sentenced to hang. Elizabeth Bennett was also indicted and found guilty of murder by witchcraft for bewitching William and Joan buy it on October 1st, 1581, and causing them both to die on February 10th of 1582. She was sentenced to hang with Ursula. Wow. Alice Hunt was found not guilty of killing cattle and of murdering Henry Durant, the butcher's daughter.
Starting point is 01:10:04 I wonder what happened that made her not guilty? Because I feel like that just never happened. I know. Well, this was the real beginning of like the intense witch trial. So I think it started slower, maybe. Now, Agnes Glasgow was found guilty of a ton of murder by witchcraft, but was somehow remanded and didn't hang. Joan Petchy was old, and she was not tried at all. She was discharged by proclamation, which meant she was released without trial or verdict,
Starting point is 01:10:31 but she couldn't pay herself from jail, and she died in prison. Oh, my God. Now, Cicely Cellis was found not guilty of the arson charge of burning down that barn, but she was found guilty of bewitching Thomas Child's, uh, trauma, death's child to death. So they didn't think that she did the witchcraft on the barn, but she did on the person. She definitely killed the kid, but she didn't burn on that barn. They were like fire in a barn, unbelievable.
Starting point is 01:10:56 No. She was sent to prison on remand, but died while she was in there before release. Because remember, they can bring you back in on remand. And like the prison conditions. Oh, the diseases that would run through there, like you were just, that was your death sentence. Alice Newman was probably also one who died in prison. There's no record of her death. But she was an inmate listed August 2, 1582 with Sicily and Alice Hunt, and was still on that list March 4th, 1588 a few years later.
Starting point is 01:11:27 Wow. And had not been released. Then she's gone from the list June 15th, but it is not recorded that she was released. Interesting. So the general consensus is she died while awaiting release from prison as well. in the end, 14 people were tried and two were executed during this witch hunt. And this all started with one woman whose child wasn't feeling well. And many died in prison.
Starting point is 01:11:50 So many more people died from this. And this was the second really major witch trial since the crime of witchcraft became a felony. That is so crazy. And that is the Saint O Sith witch trials in a nutshell. Wow. And obviously, like with some of the old English and like terms, we had fun. Oh yeah. But the actual, it's, it's just, it's hard to wrap your brain around.
Starting point is 01:12:13 It's so crazy. This happened to real women. And that like spectral evidence gets entered. And like when you see that stuff and like the Salem witch trials and the other ones, it's just like how. And we're having like nine year olds testify against their mother about probably a fucking nightmare that they had. Absolutely.
Starting point is 01:12:29 Like a sleep paralysis moment. Like psychologist didn't exist back then. No, nothing. You just took people on there. And it was people. it was wild too to see people who knew what would happen if they accused someone and they still did it just because of like revenge or being angry or like some slight that happened or to save their own skin. And it's like you know this person's going to hang.
Starting point is 01:12:51 Like there's a real possibility this person will hang or rot in prison. Wow. And it's like they just would do it. They just turn around and just, yep. It's really sad when you think about it. And like what people can be driven to do in circumstances like this. Truly. So yeah.
Starting point is 01:13:07 So that's your, that was my like still scary, still very real, still very much crimes. But like we could have fun with some of the old English and like the silliness of the thought of like. Titty. Of Titty, the great cat that kills people. Well, yeah. You know. I liked it a lot. Thank you.
Starting point is 01:13:27 You're welcome. Thank you for putting out of together. Thank you. No, thank you. And we hope that you keep listening. And we hope you. Keep it weird. But not so weird that you go around and just like hexing people and not hexing people and letting your tities out.
Starting point is 01:13:42 Don't let your titty out. Don't accuse people of witchcraft. Yeah, I mean, it's not felony anymore, so. Don't do it. Is it? I'm just kidding. I'm totally kidding.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.