Page 24 - Garda Journal Summer 2019

The Last Witch Trial
Erin Watson digs into the fascinating history behind the Islandmagee Witch Trial.
Follower of Jan Mandijn, "The Witches Cove," 16th century
Many people know of witch trials; the most famous being the Salem witch trials (1692-1693) held in Salem, Massachusetts. However, what most people have not heard of is the Islandmagee trial, which have been described as and likened to a real life Irish Crucible story. Though generally overlooked and unknown, the Islandmagee witch trial was one of only three trials in total and the last one to take place in Ireland. The trial was held 1710-1711 on Islandmagee, Co Antrim and centered around Mary Dunbar and eight local women.
Mary Dunbar was a young, wealthy, and pretty newcomer to the Islandmagee area. She soon began showing symptoms of demonic possession like “shouting, swearing, blaspheming, throwing Bibles,
going into fits every time a clergyman came near her and vomiting household items such as pins, buttons, nails, glass and wool”.
Dunbar singled out eight local women and accused them of being witches and enchanting her. The trial was held in Carrickfergus, County Antrim and concluded in March 1711. The eight women were found guilty and were sentenced to a year in jail and four turns in the pillory, the common punishment for a first offence (the second being death).
In 2015, Martina Devlin,
journalist with the Irish Independent proposed a memorial to the women be created in Islandmagee, stating “Clearly the women were victims of a miscarriage of justice, there is nothing we regard as actual evidence against them,” she said.”The conviction still stands against these women. Even in the Salem witch trials, some of those who were convicted were given a posthumous pardon... I feel the women of Islandmagee deserve their good name to be
restored to them.”
Not everyone shared her opinions; in the same year, speaking to the Larne Times, TUV councillor Jack McKee described the proposal as “anti-God” and said he could not support it, over worries that the
24 GARDA JOURNAL
HISTORY | Witches