The Lancashire Witches is the only one of William Harrison Ainsworth's forty novels that has remained continuously in print since its first publication. It was serialised in the Sunday Times newspaper in 1848; a book edition appeared the following year, published by Henry Colburn. The novel is based on the true story of the Pendle witches, who were executed in 1612 for causing harm by witchcraft. Modern critics such as David Punter consider the book to be Ainsworth's best work. E. F. Bleiler rated the novel as "one of the major English novels about witchcraft".
Biographical background and publication The subject of the Pendle witches was suggested to Ainsworth by antiquarian and long-time friend James Crossley, President of the Chetham Society. During 1846 and 1847 Ainsworth visited all of the major sites involved in the story, such as Pendle Hill and Malkin Tower, home of the Demdikes, one of the two families accused of witchcraft. He wrote the story in 1848, when it was serialised in the Sunday Times newspaper. On completion of the work, Ainsworth was paid £1,000 () and the copyright reverted to him.
As was common practice at the time, the novel was published in a three-volume set known as a triple decker. The first edition was produced by Henry Colburn in 1849, with the subtitle "A Romance of Pendle Forest". At £1 11s 6d, about the amount that a skilled worker could earn in a week, it was expensive. Routledge published an illustrated edition in 1854, reissued in 1878. The twelve full-page illustrations were by John Gilbert.
Plot Ainsworth based his story largely on the official account of the Lancashire witch trials written by the clerk to the court, Thomas Potts, first published in 1613 under the title The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster. Potts himself makes an appearance in the book, as a "scheming and self-serving lawyer". The novel consists of four parts, each written as a third-person narrative.
Introduction
The ten chapters of the Introduction, subtitled "The Last Abbot of Whalley", are set against the backdrop of the 1536 Pilgrimage of Grace, an uprising by northern Catholics against the English Reformation instituted by King Henry VIII.
It is late November 1536. Eight men, prominent among them John Paslew, Abbot of Whalley and the self-styled Earl of Poverty, are gathered together by a beacon at the top of Pendle Hill. An uneasy armistice has been declared in the Pilgrimage, and beacons have been built on high ground to act as a renewed summons to arms should they ever be lit; that is the signal the eight men are waiting for.
As dusk approaches the abbot and his party become aware of a tall dark man accompanied by a black hound standing close by, whom one of the party recognises as Nicholas Demdike, husband of Bess Demdike, "an approved and notorious witch". Demdike starts to sing, mocking the abbot and foretelling of his execution, which so enrages the abbot that he orders one of his archers to loose a shot at him. But Demdike merely laughs before disappearing down the hill, only pausing about half-way down to trace a circle in the grass and repeat some incantation.
In the growing darkness a signal fire is seen on a neighbouring hill, then another and another. Excitedly the abbot lights the beacon on Pendle Hill and prepares to ride to Whalley Abbey, to organise his forces in preparation for joining the main body of the rebel army the following day. But before he can leave, Demdike appears before him, to warn the abbot that if he proceeds with his plan his life will be forfeit. Demdike claims that he can save the abbot however, on one condition: that he baptise Demdike's infant daughter. Meanwhile a party of Royalist soldiers is ascending the hill in search of the abbot and his men, but Demdike conjures up a torrent of water from the spot where he had earlier traced the circle, and most of the soldiers are carried to their deaths. But still the abbot refuses to acquiesce to Demdike's request for his daughter to be baptised.
Capture and escape The abbot is subsequently captured by Royalist forces, tried at Lancaster Castle, and sentenced to death by hanging. He is condemned to be executed outside his family home of Wishall Hall, close to the abbey, where he is taken the day before the sentence is due to carried out. As the abbot and his guards are entering the abbey he is once again confronted by Nicholas Demdike, this time accompanied by his wife Bess and their unbaptised infant. Demdike repeats his request to the abbot that he baptise the child, promising that if he does so then Demdike can still save him even at this late juncture. But the abbot continues to refuse, saying to Bess "I curse thee witch ... May the malediction of Heaven and all its hosts alight on the head of thy infant ... A thing accursed, and shunned by her fellows, shall thy daughter be – evil reputed and evil doing".
After a specially granted Midnight Mass, the abbot is overcome by remorse for his treatment thirty-one years earlier of a rival for the position of head of the abbey, Borlace Alvetham, and asks that a priest be sent to hear his confession. The abbot confesses that he had contrived to have Alvetham falsely accused of witchcraft and bricked into a tiny cell from which the only escape was death. The priest then throws back his hood to reveal that he is Borlace Alvetham, and that he had succeeded in escaping from his tomb with the aid of a demon. He further reveals that the demon promised him vengeance against his enemy, the abbot, and that when he returned to the area of Whalley twenty-nine years after his escape he had adopted the name of Nicholas Demdike.
Following his revelations Demdike rushes out of the room shouting "To the gallows! – to the gallows!", leaving the abbot to his own thoughts. He is roused when Hal o' Nabs, one of a group of men intent on rescuing the abbot, places a hand on his shoulder. But the abbot has given his word to his captors not to escape in return for being allowed to celebrate the Midnight Mass, and so refuses to follow the man down the ladder by which he had ascended. He is nevertheless tricked into escaping, and taken to the abbey mill. Inside he finds the miller's wife with an infant on her knee. She explains that the child is not hers, but was brought to her by her husband following the death of Bess Demdike that afternoon, so distraught was she at the abbot's curse. She shows the disfigured child to the abbot; one of its eyes is set lower than the other.
Execution The abbot is quickly recaptured, thanks largely to Demdike. Shortly before the time for the death sentence to be carried out the following morning, the appointed executioner and his assistants disappear, because, it is suggested, they are reluctant to put churchmen to death. Demdike offers to take the executioner's place, and his offer is accepted. Moments before the appointed time, Demdike whispers to the abbot that he can spare him the indignity of a public execution by stabbing him to death if he would but retract the curse he had put on his daughter. The abbot's response is "Never ... thy child shall be a witch, and the mother of witches". Following his execution the abbot's body is entrusted to Demdike to be taken to the convent church. One of the abbot's erstwhile rescuers, Hal o' Nabs, has been warned that Demdike is impervious to all weapons forged by man, and so to wreak his revenge for the death of the abbot he secretes himself behind a great stone statue of St Gregory in the gallery of the church, waiting for Demdike to appear below it. When he does, Hal pushes the statue from its pedestal and it falls on Demdike, crushing him and killing him instantly.
Book The First
In the ten chapters of the first book, subtitled "Alizon Device", the novel has moved on more than sixty years.
The village of Whalley has been decorated for a May Day wake. In a cottage on the outskirts of the village, Alizon Device is being dressed as Maid Marion, Queen of May, ready to take her place of honour in the pageant which will soon be arriving at her door. She is a beautiful young woman, in stark contrast to her little sister Jennet, nine or ten years old, who is watching the preparations in a sullen silence. Jennet is small for her age, with sharp and cunning features. She also has several deformities, including a curvature of the spine and eyes that are positioned unevenly on her face. The two sisters are grandchildren of Nicholas and Bess Demdike's unbaptised child, now known as Mother Demdike. In the intervening years since the Abbot of Whalley's curse she has indeed become a witch, feared throughout the district.
As the procession reaches the village green the usher announces the arrival of Sir Ralph Assheton and his party. He is the great-grandson of the Richard Assheton who had led the group of men up Pendle Hill to apprehend the Abbot of Whalley, and almost been killed by the torrent of water conjured up by Nicholas Demdike. Fourteen years after that November evening he had bought Whalley Abbey from the Crown. Among Assheton's party are two of his cousins, Nicholas Assheton of Downham and Richard Assheton of Middleton. Richard, accompanied by his younger sister Dorothy, is about twenty-two years old and considered to be very handsome. Also among Sir Ralph's guests are Alice Nutter and local magistrate Roger Nowell. Alice Nutter is dressed in mourning clothes for her husband Richard, who had been suddenly taken ill and died an unexplained death within three or four days. Richard Nutter was convinced that he had been bewitched, and some locals believed that Alice had picked up a wax image in her husband's room, stuck with pins, and that when she had thrown it on the fire Richard had died. Alice has been persuaded from her secluded life at Rough Lee because she wishes to secure the help of Sir Ralph in a dispute she is having with her neighbour Roger Nowell over the boundary between their two estates. Sir Ralph, having been appointed umpire in the dispute, has already ruled in favour of Nowell, but as Alice has refused to accept his decision a lawyer has been summoned from London to give a final decision, Thomas Potts, who is also at the fair. Potts is also acting for another member of the local gentry, Sir Thomas Metcalfe, "a man of violent disposition", who is claiming ownership of a neighbouring house and estate.
Alizon is formally presented to Sir Ralph and Lady Assheton, and asked to choose her partner for the evening's dance to be held at the abbey. Blushing, she chooses Richard Assheton, who declares himself to be delighted by her choice, and asks if he may have the flower she is wearing as a token. Lady Assheton is quick to spot the mutual attraction between Alizon and Richard, which makes her a little uneasy. But the usher then leads Alizon to the maypole, where the festivities begin in earnest. Shortly thereafter Alizon becomes aware of a commotion some distance away, and on hearing that it is being caused by a swordfight between Richard and Sir Thomas Metcalfe, and fearful that Richard might be killed, she falls to the ground in a faint. But Richard is easily able to disarm his opponent, and, on the orders of Sir Ralph, Alizon is taken to the abbey to recover.
Meanwhile Alice Nutter and Nicholas have fallen into conversation about Mother Demdike. Nicholas is quite convinced that she is responsible for the death of Alice's husband, but Alice disagrees, and goes so far as to say that she does not believe in the existence of witches. Nicholas is adamant however, claiming that "Pendle Forest swarms with witches ... the terror of the whole country". Their conversation is overheard by Thomas Potts, and it gives him the idea to search out the witches that Nicholas refers to, and by so doing gain favour with King James, who is well known to have an interest in witchcraft.
Mother Chattox