Inventory of the records of the Hydrographic Office, Record group 37

Description

"Hutchinson, an Anglican cleric, was vocal advocate for the "miserable creatures [who] have been hang'd or burnt as witches and wizzards" during the witch persecutions and gathered together all the accounts of English witch trials that he could find. He then set them out systematically so that an accurate overview could be obtained, and analysed them in a way that revealed their absurdity and hypocrisy, thus stripping them of any vestige of legitimacy. By his own account Hutchinson's work would probably have lain unpublished ("slept in obscurity") had it not been for the publication of Boulton's "A Compleat History of Magick, Sorcery and Witchcraft" (1715-1716), a work which Hutchinson felt might "very likely ... do some mischief" by renewing the fervour for witch-persecution. Hutchinson's well reasoned refutation was published as the "Historical Essay on Witchcraft" and, despite a counter rebuttal by Boulton in 1722, effectively brought a permanent close to the debate on witchcraft in Britain. He opposed torture and acceptance of the phenomena, and was a critic of Cotton Mather's arguments on the subject. He also opposed Jean Bodin, an advocate of the realities of witchcraft, who was prepared to use torture to prove it."--Description from Second Life Books, Inc., bookseller

Subjects

Series Statement

• National Archives inventory series ; no. 4