Teachers & Witchcraft

SCHOOL TEACHER TORTURED AND BURNT FOR WITCHCRAFT

Four hundred years later some Scots are fighting for his pardon!

By Stephen Wilson

 

Some teachers have it hard! They can be fired, blacklisted, bullied and assaulted. At times it seems like a thankless job. But spare a thought for the luckless Scottish school teacher, John Fian, who was arrested, tortured and burnt to death on the false accusation of being a witch. Poor Fian had a rope tied around his head and was suspended, had his legs and feet crushed by 'spike boots 'and even had his finger nails pulled out and nails hammered into his fingers. Given this excessive torture is it any wonder Fian confessed to accusations of witchcraft? He felt he had no choice but to sign a confession that he had acted as the Devil's clerk', had dismembered corpses and was part of a group of witches who had attempted to sink two ships sailing from Denmark to Scotland carrying the Scottish King and Queen in 1590.

 

John Fian, a school teacher from Prestopans in Scotland, was just one of a group of 60 people who were rounded up after one woman who was tortured, Geilles Duncan, mentioned his name. The famous North Berwick trials of 1590 began when a powerful ballie depute, David Seaton, became suspicious of one of his servants. He discovered she was not always in bed and mysteriously disappeared during some evenings. In fact, it seems she was a faith healer who may have been called out to aid and relieve the pain of pregnant women with her knowledge of folk medicine. She was doing good rather than harming people. But this wasn't the conclusion of David Seaton. Without even getting official approval, Seaton accused her of witchcraft, had her arrested and tortured her. She eventually confessed to witchcraft claiming that she had made a pact with the devil, and attended meetings of other witches. She confessed to plotting with other witches to sink the King's ships by throwing a bewitched cat into the sea. She named many people who were also implicated in this 'conspiracy'.

Unfortunately, the school teacher John Fian's name came up. Geilles was imprisoned and and interrogated from December 1590 until June 1591. Just before her execution she declared that everything she had said had all been lies. But by then it was too late for her and others like John Fian.

 

John Fian was a school teacher at Prestopans and taught at Tranent. He is alleged to have used many aliases and appears to have been a highly-educated man. A lot of the information about John Fian came from a tabloid newspaper 'News from Scotland'. It almost certainly invented many colorful stories about Fian to boost its circulation. For instance, Fian confessed to having affairs with 32 women. How would a busy teacher find time to meet all those women? Another absurd but amusing story written to titillate readers was that Fian had fallen in love with the sister of one of his pupils. He asked the boy to bring him three hairs from his sister so that he could do a charm over them to make her fall in love with him. The brother told his mother. The mother took three hairs from a calf and told the boy to give Fian this instead. The result was that to Fain's embarrassment, a cow followed him around everywhere.

According to Fian's confession, he met and made a pact with the devil who promised him prosperity for serving him. Fian went into intricate details of how he was involved in using magic to ruin crops, destroy cattle, kill men and sink ships. Like Geillis, Fian was horribly tortured and later claimed he had been forced to sign a confession under duress. Although he momentarily escaped he was quickly recaptured then eventually executed.

 

From 1561 to 1727 an estimated 4000 people were arrested on accusations of witchcraft. Of those accused, as many as 1500 may have been executed. Historians will never be certain the exact number because some of the legal records may have been lost, removed or destroyed. But compared to other European countries Scotland had one of the highest records second only to Germany. Many Scots don't like to be reminded of one of the darkest periods of their history. They'd prefer to forget it. Even a silly and surreal postcard image of Scotland as a beautiful country of bagpipers, kilts and dancers is not so offensive. When tourists visit Edinburgh, they tend to be spellbound by the picturesque castle perched on a dead volcano which looms up. Only later might they learn that 300 accused witches were burnt on the castle hill esplanade.  

 

The reasons for the witch hunting are several. The growth of a new church theology which was intolerant, political intrigue as well as the need to find scapegoats for all kinds of problems. Many allegations of witchcraft arose out of conflicts between neighbors, or the odd behavior of a resident. An old woman who was alone and talked to herself might raise suspicion, or some unpopular person who had a sharp tongue might have made endless enemies. However, it is important to mention that contrary to myth, it was not easy to prosecute someone as a witch. The allegations had to have some witnesses and 'evidence' to back up the cases. Some accused witches were even acquitted. So not all people accused of witchcraft were executed. Some won their cases.

 

Are there any memorials to those who were executed for witchcraft?  There is one intriguing memorial to one witch near Dunning. It is known as the Maggie Walls monument. Every year some one paints the following words 'Maggie Walls, Burnt here, 1657 as a witch.' But who was Maggie Walls? There are no local or national records of such a person being burnt as a witch! This leads historians to speculate that Maggie Walls was a name representing all burnt witches. Yet Jess Smith, a well known Scottish storyteller, is convinced that such a person existed and even offers an explanation in one of her stories. She writes, 'We travellers know from ancestor stories that Maggie was a simple tinker herb woman who never hurt a soul. Folk had got all excited in those older ways with an extreme type of religion, and were burning lots of people who knew only the way of mother earth and not the teaching of the 'good book'. {page 6 of Sooking Berries , Tales of Scottish Travellers. 2008, Edinburgh}

 

What if poor John Fian the school teacher was also a folk healer who never hurt a soul? In fact, in the past few years a pressure group has been formed to campaign for a public apology, pardon and a memorial to all those executed for witchcraft. In Fife, activists such as Sheila Gaul founded an organisation called 'Remembering the Accused Witches of Scotland.' Another activist Claire Mitchell stated, "I launched the Witches of Scotland campaign on International Women's Day 2020.The Campaign has three aims:

- to obtain a pardon for those convicted as witches under the Witchcraft Act of 1563, to obtain an apology for all those accused and to obtain a national memorial to remember those killed."

So far the Scottish parliament and authorities have refused to offer a pardon. They don't think it is in the 'public interest' to issue one. Many claim that since it happened 400 years ago it is no longer relevant. It is just history. The activists disagree. They claim that the past is not quite the past. People are being currently scapegoated for the pandemic. And even some cultures believe that witchcraft is behind it. The United Nations recently warned of a significant rise in accusations of witchcraft. In Britain itself, the police have found that as many as 2080 children were at risk of being accused and beaten as 'witches' and blamed for either illnesses, job losses or financial problems. Such children are found among the African and Asian diaspora. In places such as India and Saudi Arabia people have been accused of witchcraft. Saudi Arabia has an anti witch hunt police unit!

 

So the teacher John Fian, and so many other victims, might yet receive a long overdue pardon and apology. Claire Mitchell who is campaigning for such a pardon stated, "I felt real anger that there was no apology to those people and no recognition of the terrible wrongs done to them".

 

I have relied on several sources :

 

Scottish Witches and Wizards, True Accounts, H.M. Fleming, 2001, Goblinhead, Musselburgh,

Scotland.

 

Magic and Witchcraft in Scotland, Joyce Millar, 2004. Goblinhead, Musselburgh,Scotland.

 

Sookin Berries,Tales of Scottish Travellers, Jessie Smith,2008, Birlinn, Edinburgh.