Salem’s witches were pardoned, but Britain’s weren’t. There’s now a movement to change that

An illustration of an execution of witches in England, 17th century. (Heritage Images/Hulton Archive/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

While the women accused in the infamous Salem witch trials in colonial America have long since been pardoned, the convictions of hundreds of British women executed under similar laws officially still stand. Now, one local authority in southern England is campaigning to change that.

Decades before Salem, hysteria over witchcraft was already sweeping through England – and perhaps nowhere more fervently than in the southeast, such as in the neighboring counties of Kent and Essex, which border London.

Between 1560 and 1700, more than 500 women were tried for witchcraft in the southeast region, according to U.K. Parliament estimates. Of those, 112 were executed.

But one trial in Maidstone, Kent, in 1652 stands out for its scale and public fascination.

On July 30 that year, a court convened near where Maidstone Town Hall stands today. Thirty-two people faced charges ranging from theft and murder to witchcraft, Claire Kehily, councillor for Maidstone Borough Council, told CNN. Six women, accused of bewitching to death a 10-day-old infant, her mother, and a 3-year-old child, became the focus of the town’s attention, she said.

In the summer of 1652, the town was “abuzz with excitement,” Kehily explained. “People came down from London to witness what was going on. It was the biggest thing we’d had here for a long time.”

The accused were held in a small, dark jail that once stood on the ground floor of the courthouse, now tucked away in the attic of the rebuilt Town Hall.

The trial’s notoriety was such that a special pamphlet was published shortly after, titled “A Prodigious and Tragic History of the Arraignment, Trial, Confession, and Condemnation of Six Witches,” of which Maidstone Council has a rare replica.

The document describes bizarre and unverified claims – including one woman swelling “into a monstrous and vast bigness” before the court and another allegedly bearing “a visible teat under her tongue.”

Three women were convicted after failing a crude test: a pin thrust into their arms. The court account said the women “did not feel it, neither did it draw blood.”

Two others confessed to being impregnated “not by any man, but by the devil,” according to the document.

All six were convicted of “the execrable and diabolical crime of witchcraft” and sentenced to death.

Spectacle of execution

Their execution took place at Penenden Heath, now a tranquil park with soccer fields and woodland.

“They were dragged on hurdles – basically carts – to the heath,” Tony Harwood, a councillor for Maidstone Borough Council, told CNN. “Thousands came to watch. Public executions were entertainment, but also a tool of control.”

“These were women of all ages,” Harwood continued. “Very vulnerable individuals who had no idea what was going on or why they had been put into this situation. You just have to understand the absolute terror of these events – and that is partly what’s behind it. The powers that be wanted to instill terror.”

Harwood described the horror and spectacle of the scene. “Public executions – they were public participation events. Thousands of people would attend. There were crime waves around them: pickpocketing, thefts, lots of complaints. That’s why the execution spot at Penenden Heath was moved several times – because of the impact from the many thousands of sightseers who came to watch,” he said.

“There would have been people who were just there for the show. There would have been people who were appalled by what was going on. There would have been people who were excited by it.”

After the executions, the bodies were discarded without ceremony. “When roads were widened or housing built, human remains have often been found,” Harwood added.

A small stone plaque on the edge of Penenden Heath that commemorates these women – alongside the plaques for the many other people executed at this site – is the only mark of the atrocities that took place.

Seeking justice, centuries later

Though the frenzy surrounding witchcraft in England faded in the decades following the Maidstone trial, and all laws criminalizing witchcraft have long since been repealed, the convictions of those women – and hundreds like them – still stand.

Now, nearly 400 years later, Maidstone Borough Council is calling for change.

Stuart Jeffery, leader of the council, has written to Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, urging the British government to introduce legislation that would grant a general pardon to those executed under the Witchcraft Act of 1562, including the women hanged at Penenden Heath in 1652.

“Justice is timeless,” said Harwood. “These terrible wrongs carried out between 1542 and the mid-18th century echo through the ages. They cannot just be painted over.”

“We need to set the record straight. These were innocent, vulnerable individuals who were brutally judicially murdered – often for political or personal gain. That injustice will echo down the ages.”

Kehily said that the trials were “a very early form of violence against women and girls. It still happens. They were scapegoats.”

“By highlighting it, we remind people that this has happened – and we need to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” she added.

“To address a wrong that has been made,” Kehily said, “is to try and get it right, to learn from history, and to bring it to the fore. This hasn’t gone away.”

Precedents for pardon

Maidstone’s campaign follows similar efforts elsewhere in the United Kingdom to confront historical injustices.

In Scotland, then-First Minister Nicola Sturgeon issued a formal apology in 2022 to the thousands of people – mostly women – who were accused and executed under the country’s Witchcraft Act between the 16th and 18th centuries. The apology came after a sustained campaign by historians and activists who argued that the victims were persecuted for being poor, vulnerable, or simply different.

There is also precedent for legislative pardons.

In 2013, Queen Elizabeth II posthumously pardoned Alan Turing, the World War II codebreaker convicted under laws criminalizing homosexuality, and in 2017 the UK government extended the pardon to thousands of other gay and bisexual men convicted under similar statutes. Known as the “Turing Law,” it marked a significant step in acknowledging the injustice of discriminatory legislation.

Councillors in Maidstone hope that a similar approach can be taken to address the legacy of the Witchcraft Act.

“This is about justice,” Harwood said. “We’ve seen the government take steps to right past wrongs. Now it’s time to do the same for the women who were judicially murdered under the guise of witchcraft.”

A Home Office spokesperson told CNN the government would respond to the council’s letter “in due course.”

By James Frater, CNN