A spellbinding witches' haunt in East Anglia

By Jane Slade
Posted: 2011/10/31

JANE SLADE discovers the perfect Hallowe'en home - a medieval hall used for a 16th-century witchcraft hearing which sparked the infamous witch trials in East Anglia that saw two women hange

THE VILLAGE of St Osyth in Essex was at the centre of the witchcraft hysteria that swept East Anglia in the late 1500s when 14 women were charged with "bewitching to death", a crime that carried the death penalty. St Clere's Hall, a Grade I medieval manor house which has just come up for sale, was the former home of magistrate Brian D'arcy, who conducted the first hearing at the hall before the women were sent to Chelmsford Assizes.

This stunning seven-bedroomed property was built by John St Clere who came over with William the Conqeror. For the past 30 years it has been owned by former Ford motor company director William Craig, 69, and his wife Geraldine, a retired teacher.

They paid £120,000 for the 5,500 sq ft property which has three bathrooms, two kitchens, a Jacobean staircase with Elizabethan dog gate, moat and several Grade II listed farm buildings, ripe for conversion. "We are architectural nuts and the house is full of history in a beautiful location," says William.

It has massive moulded mullion windows and a mysterious two-headed gargoyle said to ward off evil spirits. All the stuff, in fact, you might expect from a house built on the site of a Bronze Age settlement with a moat said to date from Saxon times. "It was designed as an aisled-hall house with the main wall supported on two oak columns of 18 inches square that go up into the roof," says William.

The focal point is the imposing 35ft long, 25ft wide baronial hall dominated by a 15ft-wide inglenook Tudor fireplace. It is here that the first witches' hearing is said to have taken place but has subsequently been used as a venue for dining feasts and parties.

Such is the size of the house it also has its own tower and the 6ft boiler is stored in a separate building. "It has been a wonderful home," says William. "We have done a lot of work restoring it. It was previously owned by one family from 1940 to 1975; they were the grandees of the village but they did let the house go.

"We have lived here alone for 15 years and have been rather slow on the uptake to downsize."

The house, which is reached at the end of a 1,200ft drive, stands in two acres of grounds which has its own well that feeds water to the moat. "We also have lots of wildlife which we will miss," says William. "We have pheasants and partridge in the garden, hares which appear early in the evening, water voles in the moat, foxes, woodpeckers and owls in the oak tree."

Even though the couple have occupied the house for 30 years it still has its mysteries. "We haven't found the cellar," says William, "and there is also supposed to be a tunnel leading to the priory two thirds of a mile away which we haven't discovered either."

In 1921 two female skeletons were unearthed in St Osyth. Both had iron rivets driven into their knees and elbows which was a traditional method of preventing witches rising from the grave. They are believed to be Ursula Kempe and Elizabeth Bennet, two women who were hanged in the witches' trials. Fortunately they weren't found on the Craigs' property.

? INFORMATION St Clere's Hall is a mile from Great Bentley where trains to Colchester take 15 minutes. Most commuters to London drive to Colchester and take a fast train (49 minutes) to Liverpool Street. The property is priced at £995,000 through fine.co.uk (01206 617115/564259).