Spooky season is here, and people are telling stories of ghosts and witches to get ready for Halloween. Many Americans think of Salem, Massachusetts, when they think of witches and witch trials, not realizing that there were witch trials in colonial Virginia. It is believed that there were 2 dozen witch trials in Virginia between 1626 and 1730, although specifics are not known because many trial records of the Commonwealth were lost during the Civil War. Penalties in Virginian witchcraft cases were generally not as severe as the penalties imposed in the Massachusetts cases, as apparently no one died in the Virginia cases. In the most notable Virginian witchcraft case, however, the accused, Grace Sherwood, was held in the county jail for a trial in the colonial capitol, and it seems likely that her property was seized.
Grace Sherwood and her husband, James, brought two separate suits for slander against neighbors in 1698; one neighbor accused her of bewitching their pigs and their cotton, and another claimed she visited them in the night, turned into a black cat and left through the keyhole. The Sherwoods lost both suits and had to pay court costs and transportation for the defendants (Hudson, 91). James Sherwood died in 1701, not long after their unsuccessful suits. Grace Sherwood was left a propertied widow worth 3000 pounds of tobacco; she never remarried (Hudson, 91). In late 1705, Grace Sherwood and a neighbor, Elizabeth Hill, got into a fight and on December 7, 1705, Mrs. Sherwood sued Luke and Elizabeth Hill for assault and battery; she won the judgment. A short time later, on January 3, 1706, Luke Hill and his wife accused Sherwood of witchcraft. On February 7, 1706, “Whereas a complt [complaint] was brought agt Grace Sherrwood on Suspition of witchcraft by Luke Hill, etc.; and the matter being after a long time debated and order that the s[ai]d Hill pay all fees of this Compl[ain]t and that the s[ai]d Grace be here next Court to be Searched according to the Compl[ain]t by a Jury of women to decide the s[ai]d Differr: and the Sherr is Likewise ord[e]r to Soman able Jury accordingly.”
Sherwood’s body was inspected by a jury of women; the women stated that she had “two things like titts with: severall other spots (Cushing, 74).” It was common practice in England and Scotland to search for witches’ marks on the bodies of those accused of witchcraft, as these moles, birthmarks, scars and warts were then believed to be a mark of a pact with the devil. Following the find of Sherwood’s moles, the court tried to assemble a jury of women, but they failed to appear; the court asked the sheriff to assemble another jury of women, but he could not do so (Cushing, 71).
Subsequently the Princess Anne County court decided “being willing to have all means possible tried either to acquit her or to give more strength to ye. Suspicion [that] she might be dealt with as deserved therefore It was Order. yt. ys. day by her own consent to be tried in ye. water by ducking (Cushing, 71).” The first proposed day for the ducking, July 5, 1706, the weather was “very rainy & bad s[u]n…might endanger her health” and so the ducking trial was saved for the following Wednesday, July 10, 1706, when she would be taken to “Jno. Harpers plantacon”, which was on a branch of the Lynnhaven River, and put in “above mans debth & try her how she swims therein” (Cushing, 77); witch ducking stopped in England in the 17th century. Sherwood either floated, or was able to swim to safety. After the ducking test, she was examined again for witches marks by five women who said again on oath that she had two black moles on her private parts, like no other woman (Cushing, 77). The justices of the county decided that she should be taken into custody and sent to jail to wait for a future trial, presumably in Williamsburg at the colonial government seat. There are no records of a second trial. Scholars know that Sherwood paid a debt to the county court in 1708, and in 1714 she petitioned for a reinstatement of her land; if she was sentenced to prison, she must have been released by then. Her will was proved in 1740, so that is commonly believed to be the year she died. The fact that she had property to leave to her sons demonstrates that her final years may have been more peaceful.
In recent years, Grace Sherwood has become a popular figure; a street has been named Witchduck Road and the area where she was tested is now called Witchduck Point. There is a statue of her and a memorial plaque in Virginia Beach; the mayor declared July 10, 2006 as Grace Sherwood Day, and then-Governor Tim Kaine informally pardoned Sherwood, as a woman who had suffered a miscarriage of justice. She is known as the Witch of Pungo, after her birthplace. She remains the only person trialled by water for witchcraft in Virginia.
Additional Resources:
F221 .V82 Virginia Historical Society. Collections of the Virginia Historical Society. By Jonathan P. Cushing.
Edward W. James, “Grace Sherwood, the Virginia Witch,” The William and Mary Quarterly Historical Magazine 3, no. 2 (1894), 99-101.
BF1573.A2 B8 Narratives of the witchcraft cases, 1648-1706, ed. by George Lincoln Burr … with three facsimiles.
BF1577.V8 H833 2019 Hudson, Carson O. Witchcraft in colonial Virginia.
BF1578.S54 M66 2024 Moore, Scott O. The Witch of Pungo: Grace Sherwood in Virginia history and legend.
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