Florence Newton

According to accounts of her trial, in Christmas of 1660, Newton was heard to mumble curses after she was denied a piece of beef at the house of John Pyne. Afterwards, she met an employee of Pyne, the maidservant Mary Longdon, on the street and "violently" kissed her. Longdon then became sick, and experienced fits, cramps, and visions. Sorcery was suspected, and a coven of witches was claimed to exist in the area. Longdon claimed that Newton was responsible for her illness. Newton was also accused of causing the death of her gaoler, David Jones, by sorcery. At Newton's trial, Jones' widow said that Newton had kissed the hand of Jones through the bars of a prison gate, and afterwards, he had become sick and died after having screamed the name of Newton on his death bed.

While Seymour in 1913 believed Newton had probably been convicted and executed,^[1] Andrew Sneddon in 2019 published proof that she had in fact died before the trial could be concluded.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Islandmagee witch trial
• Alice Kyteler

Sources

• Sneddon, Andrew (15 May 2013). Possessed By the Devil: The Real History of the Islandmagee Witches and Ireland's Only Mass Witchcraft Trial. The History Press.
  ISBN 978-0-7524-8087-9
  .
• Sneddon, Andrew (November 2019). "Select document: Florence Newton's trial for witchcraft, Cork, 1661: Sir William Aston's transcript". Irish Historical Studies. 43 (164): 298–319.
  S2CID 197849651
  .