The Manningtree Witches: A. K. Blakemore

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Did these questions spark a reaction or an idea? Want to discuss it further? Join us for one of our book club meet-ups this month! If you’re on the right end of the scaffold, do you watch those to the left of you twist? Do you watch them die attentively to better understand what is to happen to you or is it best not to?”

Set in England in 1643, The Manningtree Witches is based on the activities of Matthew Hopkins, the self-styled Witchfinder General. Told through the eyes of Rebecca, one of the women later accused of witchcraft, the story begins with the arrival of Hopkins in the remote Essex village of Manningtree. It is the height of the Civil War and most of the men are away fighting. Hopkins takes over the village tavern, and is soon established as one of the local worthies. When a boy has a fit, and subsequently dies, after an altercation with a local woman, the accusations begin and Hopkins becomes involved. The “witches” are mostly unmarried women or widows, automatic objects of suspicion. They are removed to Colchester jail to wait, powerless, for whatever lies ahead. A.K. Blakemore's 2021 novel, The Manningtree Witches, is set in the town. [15] The novel won the Desmond Elliott Prize 2021, being described by the judges as "a stunning achievement." [16] Notable people [ edit ] a b c d Peers, Deborah (February 2009). "Once upon a time in... Manningtree". Essex Life. Archant Life. p.52.

Throughout the book, AK Blakemore includes fragments from archive materials, including testimonies from the witch trials of Manningtree. What is the effect of including these fragments in a work of historical fiction? The themes covered in this book are also top notch. We’re obviously talking about a lot of feminist topics due to the Manningtree supposed witches being all female. Ageing, motherhood, dating, virginity, sex, rape. That’s all covered. Then there’s poverty, classism, imprisonment, and lots of reflections on death. Narration: Sofia Zervudachi does an exceptional job – she carried the exceptional prose beautifully. A true delight to listen to. Church doctrine introduced in later centuries equated Pagan (i.e. non-Christian) spiritualism to that of Satanism under the umbrella term of “witchcraft”. This false equivalence, combined with a desperate need to demonstrate piety and devotion to the Christian triune God, provided a religious justification for the persecution and murder of countless women. Collitt, Andrea (17 April 2009). "Manningtree: Threat to Mayor". Harwich and Manningtree Standard. Archived from the original on 4 October 2011.

The 1600s also brings a charming, folky style of language that almost feels like a bed-time story narration. The language is bouncy and rhythmical, but in just the right way – I say as somebody who struggles with classics due to their flowery riddles. Let’s look at the opening, for example, ‘A hill wet with brume of morning, one haw berry bush squalid with browning flowers. I have woken up and out on my work dress, which is my only dress’. See, I told you – delicious.We can however imagine that this path was regularly walked by some of the accused women, like Anne Leech who lived at Mistley and her daughter Helen Clark from Manningtree. They would have been familiar with this way; in good times treading it between the villages to visit each other, and later during the dark days of the witch trials, perhaps fleeing along it for their lives.

Unfortunately (for Hopkins and Stearne, at least), clouds were soon gathering on the horizon for this highly lucrative new business. Ever since the executions in Bury, questions had been raised about the men’s activities and the methods they used to extract confessions. A prominent local puritan preacher by the name of John Gaule objected to the methods the men used and began openly preaching against them in his sermons. Gaule also published a book called ‘Select Cases of Conscience touching Witches and Witchcraft’ which exposed Hopkins’ and Stearne’s methods and questioned their legitimacy. The book was widely read and led many prominent people to question why two men with no apparent authority were allowed to roam the land torturing the poor for money. There have been several books recently on witch trials( with another one from author Chris Bohjolian soon to be releasesd) and despite the fact that this is material has been covered before I was still anxious to read this, the synopsis of course was intriguing but this one had me really exited to read and I was thrilled when NetGalley approved me for it. There is one long, narrow road that runs alongside the riverbank, from the little port of Manningtree...to old St. Mary's Church in Mistley...". People living a marginal existence occupy "a few dozen houses...in various states of disrepair...all moldy thatch and tide-marked...away from the river...rolling hills and fields where the true wealth of Essex [lives]...cows...full of milk...herds mill about neat little manor houses of the yeomen and petty gentry...". The year was 1643. Manningtree had been depleted of men since the English Civil War began. "For most in Manningtree the loss of a healthy steer or a good milker ranks among the greater calamities. The loss of a child, especially a girl child is a more miner misfortune." Practitioners of Wicca are referred to as “witches” but they are, on the whole, not Satanists (despite what the TV shows would have you believe). Call Wiccans “white witches” if you will. You can watch an interview with AK Blakemore about the book here on the SavidgeReads YouTube channel .

Set in the 1640, during England's Civil War, A.K. Blakemore's The Manningtree Witches is, without a doubt, the most perceptive, most beautifully written novel exploring witch trials that I've read. While not a huge genre, there definitely is a core body of witch trial novels and Blakemore's novel rises above all of them. The setting for A. K. Blakemore’s book of fiction, The Manningtree Witches, is England during the First Civil War. The Puritans were waging a war against Catholicism while advocating purity and piety. According to Matthew Hopkins—in his book The Discovery of Witches--it was while in Manningtree during this time that he began his career as a Witchfinder General. Alison: "If you want to bring an accusation against somebody, you would go to a Justice of the Peace (JP) and bring the charge. They would then start investigating it, and it’s at that point that John Stearne is brought into the procedure. Local people here asked John Stearne, who lived in Manningtree, to take their complaints to the JPs. The JPs asked Steame to help some of the investigations and then Matthew Hopkins got involved as well. It’s almost certain that Hopkins, Stearne, the accusers and the JPs met in pubs, because that’s where men of standing got together - in a meeting room in an inn. So I think any kind of local-ish pub that would have been around in the 17th century, you could probably make that case for."