WITCHCRAFT IN PENNSYLVANIA
H. O. Waltermeyer
(Transcribed by Anne Howard)
Perhaps the cry of superstition - foolish - ridiculous! is the correct way of greeting stories of witchcraft, but back in the small Pennsylvania town where I was born, 36 years ago, such things were never treated lightly. And only a few months ago our newspaper carried an article, in which a Pennsylvania hex doctor was charged with allowing a child to die. The people concerned evidently believed the child was ill by "evil intent", and also that the "doctor" had power to cure and the Jury saw fit to convict her, so that she was sent to prison for two years.
Somewhere, evidently, in this year 1946, there are those who consider the art of casting spells anything but a 'lost' one.
In my home town, when I was a child, witch lore was our first teaching. The power of witches, my parents believed, was far-reaching; they declared emphatically that witches could and did cast spells from a great distance on either persons or animals. They recited tales by the score, brought to America from the old country, of witches who changed form at will, and who could change their victims from human to animal forms. They taught us never to look a strange person straight in the eyes, or anyone whom we did not know very well. We repeated the Lord's name in the presence of anyone of ill repute, and made the sign of the Cross to protect ourselves from all manner of evil. The Crucifix was in many a purse and pocket (tho the community was non-Catholic) and, of course, the inevitable charm against witches was there also.
The Tryer, or hex-doctor, must practise a rigorous spiritual life, and must know the Bible from the first to the last pages, since many passages from it are used for healing. And he (or she) must have at command the cure-prayers which have been handed down thru the generations. In my home town the German language was used for all prayers and incantations.
Men seemed to be the best Tryers, but there also were many good ones among the women, who excelled in curing such things as poison ivy, bee stings, headaches, and fevers. My own aunt 'tryed' by laying her hands on the affected parts or the body. I can remember the day she took the fire out of a burn I had received. She laid her hands on the elbow above the burn, and while saying a prayer in her native German, moved her hands down over the burned arm and away from the body. This was known as casting away the pain. The pain left the burn, which was a bad second degree one, and it remained painless and healed very fast.
A Mr. Rubbel from Hummelstown (Pa.) was known as a powerful hex-doctor, and I have personal knowledge of some of his cures. There was a girl in our neighborhood who would go into convulsions every night about midnight, and the 'regular' doctor could do nothing. The parents called in Mr Rubbel, and at midnight he nailed an old horseshoe over the girl's door, using three nails. The girl slept peacefully and was never troubled with the attacks again. But three days later the woman suspected of casting the spell fell ill and almost died. Mr. Rubbel heard of it, came and removed the horseshoe, and on the following day the woman was seen up and out of doors.