The Amber Witch

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THE AMBER WITCH

by

Wilhelm Meinhold

The most interesting trial for witchcraft ever known. Printed from an
imperfect manuscript by her father Abraham Schweidler, the pastor of
Coserow, in the Island of Usedom.

Translated from the German by Lady Duff Gordon.

Original publication date: 1846.

PREFACE

In laying before the public this deeply affecting and romantic trial,
which I have not without reason called on the title-page the most
interesting of all trials for witchcraft ever known, I will first give
some account of the history of the manuscript.

At Coserow, in the Island of Usedom, my former cure, the same which was
held by our worthy author some two hundred years ago, there existed
under a seat in the choir of the church a sort of niche, nearly on a
level with the floor. I had, indeed, often seen a heap of various
writings in this recess; but owing to my short sight, and the darkness
of the place, I had taken them for antiquated hymn-books, which were
lying about in great numbers. But one day, while I was teaching in the
church, I looked for a paper mark in the Catechism of one of the boys,
which I could not immediately find; and my old sexton, who was past
eighty (and who, although called Appelmann, was thoroughly unlike his
namesake in our story, being a very worthy, although a most ignorant
man), stooped down to the said niche, and took from it a folio volume
which I had never before observed, out of which he, without the slightest
hesitation, tore a strip of paper suited to my purpose, and reached it to
me. I immediately seized upon the book, and, after a few minutes' perusal,
I know not which was greater, my astonishment or my vexation at this
costly prize. The manuscript, which was bound in vellum, was not only
defective both at the beginning and at the end, but several leaves had
even been torn out here and there in the middle. I scolded the old man as
I had never done during the whole course of my life; but he excused
himself, saying that one of my predecessors had given him the manuscript
for waste paper, as it had lain about there ever since the memory of man,
and he had often been in want of paper to twist round the altar candles,
etc. The aged and half-blind pastor had mistaken the folio for old
parochial accounts which could be of no more use to any one.[1]

No sooner had I reached home than I fell to work upon my new acquisition,
and after reading a bit here and there with considerable trouble, my
interest was powerfully excited by the contents.

I soon felt the necessity of making myself better acquainted with the
nature and conduct of these witch trials, with the proceedings, nay,
even with the history of the whole period in which these events occur.
But the more I read of these extraordinary stories, the more was I
confounded; and neither the trivial Beeker (_die bezauberte Welt_, the
enchanted world), nor the more careful Horst (_Zauberbibliothek_, the
library of magic), to which, as well as to several other works on the
same subject, I had flown for information, could resolve my doubts, but
rather served to increase them.

Not alone is the demoniacal character, which pervades nearly all these
fearful stories, so deeply marked, as to fill the attentive reader with
feelings of alternate horror and dismay, but the eternal and unchangeable
laws of human feeling and action are often arrested in a manner so
violent and unforeseen, that the understanding is entirely baffled. For
instance, one of the original trials which a friend of mine, a lawyer,
discovered in our province, contains the account of a mother, who, after
she had suffered the torture, and received the holy Sacrament, and was
on the point of going to the stake, so utterly lost all maternal feeling,
that her conscience obliged her to accuse as a witch her only dearly-loved
daughter, a girl of fifteen, against whom no one had ever entertained a
suspicion, in order, as she said, to save her poor soul. The court, justly
amazed at an event which probably has never since been paralleled, caused
the state of the mother's mind to be examined both by clergymen and
physicians, whose original testimonies are still appended to the records,
and are all highly favourable to her soundness of mind. The unfortunate
daughter, whose name was Elizabeth Hegel, was actually executed on the
strength of her mother's accusation.[2]

The explanation commonly received at the present day, that these
phenomena were produced by means of animal magnetism, is utterly
insufficient. How, for instance, could this account for the deeply
demoniacal nature of old Lizzie Kolken as exhibited in the following
pages? It is utterly incomprehensible, and perfectly explains why the
old pastor, notwithstanding the horrible deceits practised on him in
the person of his daughter, retained as firm a faith in the truth of
witchcraft as in that of the Gospel.

During the earlier centuries of the middle ages little was known of
witchcraft. The crime of magic, when it did occur, was leniently
punished. For instance, the Council of Ancyra (314) ordained the whole
punishment of witches to consist in expulsion from the Christian
community. The Visigoths punished them with stripes, and Charlemagne,
by advice of his bishops, confined them in prison until such time as
they should sincerely repent.[3] It was not until very soon before
the Reformation, that Innocent VIII. lamented that the complaints of
universal Christendom against the evil practices of these women had
become so general and so loud, that the most vigorous measures must be
taken against them; and towards the end of the year 1489, he caused the
notorious Hammer for Witches (_Malleus Maleficarum_) to be published,
according to which proceedings were set on foot with the most fanatical
zeal, not only in Catholic, but, strange to say, even in Protestant
Christendom, which in other respects abhorred everything belonging
to Catholicism. Indeed, the Protestants far outdid the Catholics in
cruelty, until, among the latter, the noble-minded Jesuit, J. Spee, and
among the former, but not until seventy years later, the excellent
Thomasius, by degrees put a stop to these horrors.

After careful examination into the nature and characteristics of
witchcraft, I soon perceived that among all these strange and often
romantic stories, not one surpassed my 'amber witch' in lively interest;
and I determined to throw her adventures into the form of a romance.
Fortunately, however, I was soon convinced that her story was already in
itself the most interesting of all romances; and that I should do far
better to leave it in its original antiquated form, omitting whatever
would be uninteresting to modern readers, or so universally known as to
need no repetition. I have therefore attempted, not indeed to supply
what is missing at the beginning and end, but to restore those leaves
which have been torn out of the middle, imitating, as accurately as I
was able, the language and manner of the old biographer, in order that
the difference between the original narrative and my own interpolations
might not be too evident.

This I have done with much trouble, and after many ineffectual attempts;
but I refrain from pointing out the particular passages which I have
supplied, so as not to disturb the historical interest of the greater
part of my readers. For modern criticism, which has now attained to a
degree of acuteness never before equalled, such a confession would be
entirely superfluous, as critics will easily distinguish the passages
where Pastor Schweidler speaks from those written by Pastor Meinhold.

I am, nevertheless, bound to give the public some account of what I have
omitted, namely,--

1st. Such long prayers as were not very remarkable for Christian unction.

2d. Well-known stories out of the Thirty Years' War.

3d. Signs and wonders in the heavens, which were seen here and there,
and which are recorded by other Pomeranian writers of these fearful
times; for instance, by Micraelius.[4] But when these events formed part
of the tale itself, as, for instance, the cross on the Streckelberg, I,
of course, allowed them to stand.

4th. The specification of the whole income of the church at Coserow,
before and during the terrible times of the Thirty Years' War.

5th. The enumeration of the dwellings left standing, after the
devastations made by the enemy in every village throughout the parish.

6th. The names of the districts to which this or that member of the
congregation had emigrated.

7th. A ground plan and description of the old Manse.

I have likewise here and there ventured to make a few changes in the
language, as my author is not always consistent in the use of his words
or in his orthography. The latter I have, however, with very few
exceptions, retained.

And thus I lay before the gracious reader a work, glowing with the fire
of heaven, as well as with that of hell.

MEINHOLD.

[1] The original manuscript does indeed contain several accounts which
at first sight may have led to this mistake; besides, the handwriting
is extremely difficult to read, and in several places the paper is
discoloured and decayed.

[2] It is my intention to publish this trial also, as it possesses very
great psychological interest.

[3] Horst, _Zauberbibliothek_, vi. p. 231.

[4] _Vom Alten Pommerlande_ (of old Pomerania), book v.

INTRODUCTION

The origin of our biographer cannot be traced with any degree of
certainty, owing to the loss of the first part of his manuscript. It is,
however, pretty clear that he was not a Pomeranian, as he says he was in
Silesia in his youth, and mentions relations scattered far and wide, not
only at Hamburg and Cologne, but even at Antwerp; above all, his south
German language betrays a foreign origin, and he makes use of words which
are, I believe, peculiar to Swabia. He must, however, have been living for
a long time in Pomerania at the time he wrote, as he even more frequently
uses Low-German expressions, such as occur in contemporary native
Pomeranian writers.

Since he sprang from an ancient noble family, as he says on several
occasions, it is possible that some particulars relating to the
Schweidlers might be discovered in the family records of the seventeenth
century which would give a clew to his native country; but I have sought
for that name in all the sources of information accessible to me, in vain,
and am led to suspect that our author, like many of his contemporaries,
laid aside his nobility and changed his name when he took holy orders.

I will not, however, venture on any further conjectures; the manuscript,
of which six chapters are missing, begins with the words "Imperialists
plundered," and evidently the previous pages must have contained an
account of the breaking out of the Thirty Years' War in the island of
Usedom. It goes on as follows:--

"Coffers, chests, and closets were all plundered and broken to pieces,
and my surplice also was torn, so that I remained in great distress and
tribulation. But my poor little daughter they did not find, seeing that
I had hidden her in the stable, which was dark, without which I doubt
not they would have made my heart heavy indeed. The lewd dogs would even
have been rude to my old maid Ilse, a woman hard upon fifty, if an old
cornet had not forbidden them. Wherefore I gave thanks to my Maker when
the wild guests were gone, that I had first saved my child from their
clutches, although not one dust of flour, nor one grain of corn, one
morsel of meat even of a finger's length was left, and I knew not how I
should any longer support my own life, and my poor child's. _Item_, I
thanked God that I had likewise secured the _vasa sacra_, which I had
forthwith buried in the church in front of the altar, in presence of the
two churchwardens, Hinrich Seden and Claus Bulken, of Uekeritze,
commending them to the care of God. And now because, as I have already
said, I was suffering the pangs of hunger, I wrote to his lordship the
Sheriff Wittich V. Appelmann, at Pudgla, that for the love of God and
his holy Gospel he should send me that which his highness' grace
Philippus Julius had allowed me as _praestanda_ from the convent at
Pudgla, to wit, thirty bushels of barley and twenty-five marks of
silver, which, howbeit his lordship had always withheld from me hitherto
(for he was a very hard inhuman man, as he despised the holy Gospel and
the preaching of the Word, and openly, without shame, reviled the
servants of God, saying that they were useless feeders, and that Luther
had but half cleansed the pigstye of the Church--God mend it!). But he
answered me nothing, and I should have perished for want if Hinrich
Seden had not begged for me in the parish. May God reward the honest
fellow for it in eternity! Moreover, he was then growing old, and was
sorely plagued by his wicked wife Lizzie Kolken. Methought when I
married them that it would not turn out over well, seeing that she was
in common report of having long lived in unchastity with Wittich
Appelmann, who had ever been an arch-rogue, and especially an arrant
whoremaster, and such the Lord never blesses. This same Seden now
brought me five loaves, two sausages, and a goose, which old goodwife
Paal, at Loddin, had given him; also a flitch of bacon from the farmer
Jack Tewert. But he said I must shield him from his wife, who would have
had half for herself, and when he denied her she cursed him, and wished
him gout in his head, whereupon he straightway felt a pain in his right
cheek, and it was quite hard and heavy already. At such shocking news I
was affrighted, as became a good pastor, and asked whether peradventure
he believed that she stood in evil communication with Satan, and could
bewitch folks? But he said nothing, and shrugged his shoulders. So I
sent for old Lizzie to come to me, who was a tall, meagre woman of about
sixty, with squinting eyes, so that she could not look any one in the
face; likewise with quite red hair, and indeed her goodman had the same.
But though I diligently admonished her out of God's Word, she made no
answer until at last I said, 'Wilt thou unbewitch thy goodman (for I
saw from the window how that he was raving in the street like a madman),
or wilt thou that I should inform the magistrate of thy deeds?' Then,
indeed, she gave in, and promised that he should soon be better (and so
he was); moreover she begged that I would give her some bread and some
bacon, inasmuch as it was three days since she had a bit of anything to
put between her lips, saving always her tongue. So my daughter gave her
half a loaf, and a piece of bacon about two handsbreadths large; but she
did not think it enough, and muttered between her teeth; whereupon my
daughter said, 'If thou art not content, thou old witch, go thy ways and
help thy goodman; see how he has laid his head on Zabel's fence, and
stamps with his feet for pain.' Whereupon she went away, but still kept
muttering between her teeth, 'Yea, forsooth, I will help him and thee
too.'"

_The Seventh Chapter_

HOW THE IMPERIALISTS ROBBED ME OF ALL THAT WAS LEFT, AND LIKEWISE BROKE
INTO THE CHURCH AND STOLE THE _VASA SACRA_; ALSO WHAT MORE BEFELL US

After a few days, when we had eaten almost all our food, my last cow fell
down dead (the wolves had already devoured the others, as mentioned
above), not without a strong suspicion that Lizzie had a hand in it,
seeing that the poor beast had eaten heartily the day before; but I leave
that to a higher judge, seeing that I would not willingly calumniate any
one; and it may have been the will of God, whose wrath I have well
deserved. _Summa_, I was once more in great need, and my daughter Mary
pierced my heart with her sighs, when the cry was raised that another
troop of Imperialists was come to Uekeritze, and was marauding there more
cruelly than ever, and, moreover, had burnt half the village. Wherefore I
no longer thought myself safe in my cottage; and after I had commended
everything to the Lord in a fervent prayer, I went up with my daughter and
old Ilse into the Streckelberg, where I already had looked out for
ourselves a hole like a cavern, well grown over with brambles, against the
time when the troubles should drive us thither. We therefore took with us
all we had left to us for the support of our bodies, and fled into the
woods, sighing and weeping, whither we soon were followed by the old men,
and the women and children; these raised a great cry of hunger when they
saw my daughter sitting on a log and eating a bit of bread and meat, and
the little things came with their tiny hands stretched out and cried "Have
some too, have some too." Therefore, being justly moved by such great
distress, I hindered not my daughter from sharing all the bread and meat
that remained among the hungry children. But first I made them pray--"The
eyes of all wait upon thee"; upon which words I then spake comfortably to
the people, telling them that the Lord, who had now fed their little
children, would find means to fill their own bellies, and that they must
not be weary of trusting in him.

This comfort did not, however, last long; for after we had rested within
and around the cavern for about two hours, the bells in the village began
to ring so dolefully that it went nigh to break all our hearts, the more
as loud firing was heard between-whiles; _item_, the cries of men and the
barking of dogs resounded, so that we could easily guess that the enemy
was in the village. I had enough to do to keep the women quiet, that they
might not by their senseless lamentations betray our hiding-place to the
cruel enemy; and more still when it began to smell smoky, and presently
the bright flames gleamed through the trees. I therefore sent old Paasch
up to the top of the hill, that he might look around and see how matters
stood, but told him to take good care that they did not see him from the
village, seeing that the twilight had but just begun.

This he promised, and soon returned with the news that about twenty
horsemen had galloped out of the village towards the Damerow, but that
half the village was in flames. _Item_, he told us that by a wonderful
dispensation of God a great number of birds had appeared in the
juniper-bushes and elsewhere, and that if we could catch them they would be
excellent food for us. I therefore climbed up the hill myself, and having
found everything as he had said, and also perceived that the fire had, by
the help of God's mercy, abated in the village; _item_, that my cottage
was left standing, far beyond my merits and deserts; I came down again and
comforted the people, saying, "The Lord hath given us a sign, and he will
feed us, as he fed the people of Israel in the wilderness; for he has sent
us a fine flight of fieldfares across the barren sea, so that they whirr
out of every bush as ye come near it. Who will now run down into the
village, and cut off the mane and tail of my dead cow which lies out behind
on the common?" (for there was no horsehair in all the village, seeing that
the enemy had long since carried off or stabbed all the horses). But no one
would go, for fear was stronger even than hunger, till my old Ilse spoke,
and said, "I will go, for I fear nothing, when I walk in the ways of God;
only give me a good stick." When old Paasch had lent her his staff, she
began to sing, "God the Father be with us," and was soon out of sight among
the bushes. Meanwhile I exhorted the people to set to work directly, and to
cut little wands for springes, and to gather berries while the moon still
shone; there were a great quantity of mountain-ash and elder-bushes all
about the mountain. I myself and my daughter Mary stayed to guard the
little children, because it was not safe there from wolves. We therefore
made a blazing fire, sat ourselves around it, and heard the little folks
say the Ten Commandments, when there was a rustling and crackling behind
us, and my daughter jumped up and ran into the cavern, crying, "_Proh dolor
hostis_!" But it was only some of the able-bodied men who had stayed behind
in the village, and who now came to bring us word how things stood there. I
therefore called to her directly, "_Emergas amici_" whereupon she came
skipping joyously out, and sat down again by the fire, and forthwith my
warden Hinrich Seden related all that had happened, and how his life had
only been saved by means of his wife Lizzie Kolken; but that Jurgen Flatow,
Chim Burse, Claus Peer, and Chim Seideritz were killed, and the last named
of them left lying on the church steps. The wicked incendiaries had burned
down twelve sheds, and it was not their fault that the whole village was
not destroyed, but only in consequence of the wind not being in the quarter
that suited their purpose. Meanwhile they tolled the bells in mockery and
scorn, to see whether any one would come and quench the fire; and that when
he and the three other young fellows came forward they fired off their
muskets at them, but, by God's help, none of them were hit. Hereupon his
three comrades jumped over the paling and escaped; but him they caught, and
had already taken aim at him with their firelocks, when his wife Lizzie
Kolken came out of the church with another troop and beckoned to them to
leave him in peace. But they stabbed Lene Hebers as she lay in childbed,
speared the child, and flung it over Claus Peer's hedge among the nettles,
where it was yet lying when they came away. There was not a living soul
left in the village, and still less a morsel of bread, so that unless the
Lord took pity on their need they must all die miserably of hunger.

(Now who is to believe that such people can call themselves Christians!)

I next inquired, when he had done speaking (but with many sighs, as any
one may guess), after my cottage; but of that they knew nought save that
it was still standing. I thanked the Lord therefore with a quiet sigh;
and having asked old Seden what his wife had been doing in the church, I
thought I should have died for grief when I heard that the villains came
out of it with both the chalices and patens in their hands. I therefore
spoke very sharply to old Lizzie, who now came slinking through the
bushes; but she answered insolently that the strange soldiers had forced
her to open the church, as her goodman had crept behind the hedge, and
nobody else was there; that they had gone straight up to the altar, and
seeing that one of the stones was not well fitted (which, truly, was an
arch-lie), had begun to dig with their swords till they found the chalices
and patens; or somebody else might have betrayed the spot to them, so I
need not always to lay the blame on her, and rate her so hardly.

Meanwhile the old men and the women came with a good store of berries;
_item_, my old maid, with the cow's tail and mane, who brought word that
the whole house was turned upside down, the windows all broken, and the
books and writings trampled in the dirt in the midst of the street, and
the doors torn off their hinges. This, however, was a less sorrow to me
than the chalices; and I only bade the people make springes and snares,
in order next morning to begin our fowling, with the help of Almighty God.
I therefore scraped the rods myself until near midnight; and when we had
made ready a good quantity, I told old Seden to repeat the evening
blessing, which we all heard on our knees; after which I wound up with
a prayer, and then admonished the people to creep in under the bushes
to keep them from the cold (seeing that it was now about the end of
September, and the wind blew very fresh from the sea), the men apart, and
the women also apart by themselves. I myself went up with my daughter and
my maid into the cavern, where I had not slept long before I heard old
Seden moaning bitterly because, as he said, he was seized with the colic.
I therefore got up and gave him my place, and sat down again by the fire
to cut springes, till I fell asleep for half an hour; and then morning
broke, and by that time he had got better, and I woke the people to
morning prayer. This time old Paasch had to say it, but could not get
through with it properly, so that I had to help him. Whether he had forgot
it, or whether he was frightened, I cannot say. _Summa_. After we had all
prayed most devoutly, we presently set to work, wedging the springes into
the trees, and hanging berries all around them; while my daughter took
care of the children, and looked for blackberries for their breakfast. Now
we wedged the snares right across the wood along the road to Uekeritze;
and mark what a wondrous act of mercy befell from gracious God! As I
stepped into the road with the hatchet in my hand (it was Seden his
hatchet, which he had fetched out of the village early in the morning), I
caught sight of a loaf as long as my arm, which a raven was pecking, and
which doubtless one of the Imperial troopers had dropped out of his
knapsack the day before, for there were fresh hoofmarks in the sand by it.
So I secretly buttoned the breast of my coat over it, so that none should
perceive anything, although the aforesaid Paasch was close behind me;
_item_, all the rest followed at no great distance. Now, having set the
springes so very early, towards noon we found such a great number of birds
taken in them that Katy Berow, who went beside me while I took them out,
scarce could hold them all in her apron; and at the other end old Pagels
pulled nearly as many out of his doublet and coat pockets. My daughter
then sat down with the rest of the womankind to pluck the birds; and
as there was no salt (indeed it was long since most of us had tasted
any), she desired two men to go down to the sea, and to fetch a little
salt-water in an iron pot borrowed from Staffer Zuter; and so they did. In
this water we first dipped the birds, and then roasted them at a large
fire, while our mouths watered only at the sweet savour of them, seeing it
was so long since we had tasted any food.

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