Giles Corey

In the dead of night, as people sleep, that is when the spirits creep. As the bell tolls three dark things take power, we like to call it the supernatural hour. Welcome to the Supernatural Hour Podcast, I'm your host Raven. I'm Rogue.

This is Dark. And I'm Chad. Although, we needed to zoom Rogue in, and my microphone was having issues, so I'm using Rogue's actual microphone, so I could be like, Raven. Rogue's just been really popular recently.

I've been Rogue. You've been Rogue. Go on Rogue. I am.

Yes, I've gone Rogue. So I need to check out the cord on my microphone, it's given the buzzes. I don't like the buzzes. You sound great right now.

Today, I'm excited about today because this podcast is actually the first of like a three-part series. And the series, the overall series is Salem Witch Trials. We're going to be talking about different aspects of the Salem Witch Trial for our next three podcasts because Halloween, spooky season, it's coming up folks. It is the middle of September, and that pretty much means it's open season to decorate for Halloween.

Still waiting for those leaves to change. A little intro here for this three-part topic. We're going to start out with Giles Corey, and there's, I just want to tell you all now, but we do need to get to our business in such. Okay, talking about the business.

First of all, we've got some public investigations coming up. Our first investigation coming up is going to be at Fort Douglas at September 25th at 8.30 PM to midnight, and that's going to be an exciting event. Tickets are available at the events. Paranormal.com events page.

You can get them out on Eventbrite, but yeah, go on and get those. We're really excited to do this. That's always been a really fun investigation. It's historic.

There's all sorts of trigger objects. There's all sorts of things there. It's one of my very favorite venues. Following that on October 15th, we're going to go to Petitny School, and that's down in Payson.

That's October 15th from 8 o'clock to midnight, and that's the school that Raven went to when she was a kid, so it is really spooky. It is. Because it is spooky season, there's a couple of other things going on. There is the Bridger Land Para X on October 9th, which we're going to be at.

We're going to have our booth, and we'll be selling our events, Paranormal merchandise, much of which has been created and prepared by Rogue. We're excited to have that. It's going to be a fun time up there on October 9th. And then on October 29th and 30th, there's the Indian Hills Horror Haunted House, which is hosted by Klaus and at his place, and that's in Provo.

We'll get more information on that, but that is a really good private haunt where everybody can come. There's no cost. There is a donation star. People are interested in doing it, but Doc was one of the early workers on that, getting that set up and going in classes.

Then that's been going about 15 years. They didn't do it last year because of COVID, but two years ago, they had about how many people? 2500. It was amazing.

Yeah, 2500 people showed up. Over two nights. Over a couple of nights. It was pretty interesting because we had our event on Facebook and we had more likes, and people interested in the mall did for their Halloween event.

I had DJs and food trucks calling and asking if they could set up shop outside, and I had to inform them that this is a home haunt. We aren't a big large commercial haunted house. But it will be good. In terms of updates, Klaus just sent me a whole bunch of stuff.

He bought sense of different smells that go in the fog machines this year. So we've got projectors, we've got black lives, we've got strobes, we've got foggers, we've got sound, and now we've got smells. So we're just rambling this thing out. Oh, what kind of smells?

Chard corpse was one. I was a zing. Oh. One was called a haunted house.

I don't know. I haven't smelled them yet, but from what I have been told. Okay, we're up in the game here. Next year I want food.

I want samples of stuff. There you go. I have new. We got taste.

That's the last thing. We're just going to have to add that. Would you like taste of running Brooks? I'll pass.

Thank you. But yeah, it's going to be a pretty awesome event. It always is. It's a lot of fun.

Yeah, they put on a great show. They make it kid friendly for kids as they go through and they make it scary for teenagers. It's getting less kid friendly. I have been there every year since 2012 and it's been great.

Yeah, we've just built on what we did the year before and we just keep adding stuff. And we're going to have a booth there. So how much more can you ask for besides the whole tasting? We'll do samples and we'll do the supernatural hour slash advanced animal booth.

Maybe we'll have candy armpits. Maybe that'll be too. Oh yeah, we always hand out candy too. So if you're in the area and you want one of those fun sized Snickers bars or something, come on through.

And it's free, right? You don't charge people to come through? It is absolutely free. It always has been.

We started it with the intention of just bringing that element back to Halloween. We were a little disappointed by this big focus on trunk or treat and everyone was so concerned about safety and not letting their kids go door to door and we thought we got to do something to bring this Halloween spirit back. It's just become its own thing. That's awesome.

I think that's it for the business. All right, Rogue, we had an investigation recently. We sure did and I'll have to say that this investigation had one thing really going for it and that is location location location. This was in a historical building downtown Salt Lake and location alone.

I think we all went once we pulled up. I'll kind of have the feeling of, wow, there's something going on here just as a location, not just with the client. I had a little bit of wood floor envy. They had beautiful floors and just the woodwork in this apartment was out of this world.

This apartment is a big apartment building in Central downtown. I mean, kind of right in the middle of the old downtown area and it's like a three or four story apartment building built in the late 1890s or early 1900s. Beautiful woodwork. It was a beautiful place.

The apartment itself was awesome. Built in like a bench in the living room and I walked down. I want to live here now. Also, that was Salt Lake.

Right down town. Yeah, so that it was a great building. Do you think that every one of those apartments is decorated in that same decor? No, I think that's tenant.

That was a different thing. I think so. I'm not positive on that. With all of that, I mean, the way the wooden benches are built into it.

Those are the wooden benches and those things. I'm sure those were historic. Yeah, I'm sure it's that way. The way that they had the furnishings and everything and there's what I'm thinking of.

No, I think you're right. You're architected. Yeah. The built in benches and shelves and all of that stuff.

I'm sure that's... There's probably evidence that they have to keep that a certain way considering that it's a historical building. Yeah, it's on the historic register. Right.

That stuff just sits in absorbs energy and we found more energy happening in that three, four hundred square foot space between the bedroom and that little opening in the living room than I think we've seen in any one location all at once. Oh, yeah. I reached out and touched that mirror and that was over. Nope, nope, nope, nope.

Mirror's interesting things. Yeah, and I think that mirror is mirror that has been in the apartment. I don't think that's a mirror that has changed with tenants. So there's a lot of absorption of energy that has gone on in that apartment and then the client has their own experience.

That's what made that one interesting for me. The combination of the two. Yeah, so just a little history. She had had a little bit of some hardships growing up which did some ding of self-esteem.

And I don't even know self-esteem, self-confidence. Her confidence took a battery. And because of that, there were some darker entities that tried to take advantage of that weakness that she had. The investigation was not just around the building and that but also around events in her life.

And things that had been attached to her for some time. This wasn't an event or thing that had happened just as they got into this apartment, but it may have amplified the apartment. Correct, correct. And some of the things that they were saying were happening, those hermudes would change.

You know, just out of blue, she would act differently. They were arguing when they felt like they shouldn't be arguing. Do you remember were they seeing things? I don't remember that they said they saw anything.

I don't think that they had seen anything. I think they just both have feel things. Right. And her husband was fairly sensitive.

He's actually the one that noticed hermudes swings more than she did. Husbands do that. True. True.

We'll go there. No, but we asked her if she had blackouts of time and she said that she did. And that's always concerning. Because then you're looking into, you know, is those missing moments, you know, does something within her or is it, you know, a demonic possession?

Wait, after the course of the investigation, we decided that she was not possessed. But she was definitely being acted on. We found... Did you mention, uh, Raven that she's pregnant?

No, I did not. She also had that thrown into the puzzle. Right. Right.

So, you know, she's tired and going through all these things anyway, but it wasn't just because of the pregnancy. You know, we asked questions about that too. Things had gone on before, you know, the pregnancy and during the pregnancy. It's interesting.

We found a female spirit in the home who was not so much acting as a protector spirit but just trying to get their attention to tell them that there was something going on in the home. And this female spirit appeared as a woman from, we decided that like the late 17, early 1800s based on her clothing. Yes. And Raven, you got a picture of her.

And that is amazing. I did. I need to go back through and find that and post it. I mean, it's not clear as a bell.

If you get them clear as a bell, you have to ask yourself, is that? But who was it? Was it Andy that had seen her? Yes.

Yes. No, it was Andy who initially seen her when we went in. And then once I went into the bathroom was when I was first introduced to her. And then after we went and took pictures, you can see an outline of her.

You can't. You can see her puffy sleeves of her dress. It's a pretty amazing pick. You're going to have to get that a bunch of talk.

So then right across the street is an old church. And the church had, and by old church, we're talking late 1800s, and it had a bell that kept being in. And we said just the fact that there's this bell that chimes. Like on the hour, and at least church bells.

Half hour. We said the likelihood of you having a real nasty, you know, demonic entity type 3 is a lot less because they don't like the sound of church bells. But we crossed the spirit over in this home. And while we had the light open about 10 minutes worth of spirits that have been congregating over at the church.

Hey, there's an open. Yeah, there's a there's a there's a portal. Let's go through it because usually when we cross something over, it takes, you know, 30 seconds to a minute. And we sat there holding this portal open for what a good 10 minutes.

At least I was exhausted at the end of that. I really wanted to just go home and take it out and take everything out of me. Yeah. Every once in a while, because I'm you all have my eyes closed, concentrating and every once in a while, I'd open my eyes like did everyone teleport away and I'm just sitting here by myself.

Right. I agree. Me and the spirits and this open portal, but it was cool, you know, because everyone was helping and we needed everybody to help to keep that portal open that long. That was, you know, a lot of people would just congregate at that church waiting to, you know, try to find some peace and they found it that night.

All 2000 of them holding out. I don't know how many there were, but there were a lot. There were for me, it was like a scene out of the movie Poltergeist, the one, the original when she could just see that the line of spirits coming through. That's kind of what the visual was for me.

And they just kept going and going and going and going. And like I said, it was really exhausting. And one thing about spirits that we have found just in our investigations and just researching other investigations, if they haven't crossed over, they still act like they are when they're humans. So they're not going to walk through the wall.

They're going to go through the motion of, you know, turning the door knob. They might actually walk through the door. They might not have enough energy to physically open the door, but they will still go through the motions. So they don't just whoosh across the street and whoosh up to the portal.

They're going to walk across the street and walk up the stairs and walk down the hall. And you know, some of these spirits were older. That's why one of the reasons it took so long. They all got in line.

They were all kind of smushed together and gone through at the same time. But they all queued up in line like they're waiting to get a snow cone and they kept six feet of distance between each other. No, super clever. They didn't play by COVID.

Super clever. Super clever. For ghost, ghost, COVID. We also have a super clever event in downtown Salt Bay.

Sorry. There was so much going on in this area though. In the bathroom was a spirit. And this is the spirit that we initially crossed over, but he had committed suicide in the apartment.

I'm just living his wrists. And we crossed him over and they were feeling a lot of the anguish from him. Because they were in paths, both of them, right? And they were feeling his and that was a lot of things they had to come to the realization of is this isn't necessarily their own emotions, but emotions that they're tuning into.

Right. And that's one of the things that we told the woman. We said, some of these feelings that you're feeling, it's not you. You know, and you have to, if you're an empath and you're not aware of that, you know, you're thinking, you know, I'm suddenly really sad today.

I don't know why I'm suddenly really happy today. I don't know why. And so we had to tell her, you know, if an emotion just creeps up on you out of nowhere and you just, you know, you're so angry, but you ask yourself, there's no reason for me to be angry. You have to ask yourself, is this me or is this feeling coming from someone else?

Because as an empath, it's really easy to take on other people's emotions as your own. Yes, it is. So then this big mirror that we talked about, it was a big full length mirror. And the way the apartment was where I was sitting, the mirror was staring at me, but they had some doors and I at one point, I'm like, that mirror is just overpowering.

I have to shut this door because I can't have this mirror staring at me. So in the course of the investigation, we got up to investigate the mirror and I went over and felt it. And just swirling it was an angry, angry, angry, portal mirror, a negative mirror and it's old. And so, you know, again, probably has covenants in this apartment to keep it historical.

So you can't say, we'll take the mirror down and chuck it. So we just had to... Yeah, it wasn't a built in mirror. Yeah.

And great big. I mean, it was probably what? Seven feet tall. Three feet by seven.

Three feet wide or something. Yeah, it took up the whole wall. Yeah. So we just had to, we just had to box it in.

We made a wall. So it's still there, but we, you know, shut it out of the apartment. Because you couldn't, you know, blow the covenants away, right? Yeah.

Raven has things with mirrors. I bought her a jewelry cabinet that has a mirror front on it. And I made a mistake of putting it into the bedroom where she could see it from the bed, the mirror and it was no bueno. It's kind of an interesting thought though.

I mean, if you look at, you know, magical practices, a lot of times they will use mirrors to evoke demons. Oh, yeah. I think it's... And the scrying kind of things where they're looking into even a pool of water with the reflection.

Right. Is that reflective surface and crystal balls kind of that same idea too? Ages ago, we did an episode on mirrors. That's something I would definitely like to revisit because it's an interesting topic.

Mm-hmm. And that's a definitely one we could do. But then on the list... We should.

We should do mirrors because it's interesting. We can talk a little bit about invoking versus evoking entities. So Rogue, would we pretty much cover that investigation? You missed something.

Oh, no, what I missed. The animal spirits. Oh, yeah. Andy was seeing horses and cats.

What else did she see? I thought there were some dogs too, but... Probably. Yeah.

And the menagerie of all of these people and things heading for the port. So we should mention Andy is a client who is also a medium who asked us to join her on this case. Right. She actually gave the client a reading.

The client mentioned that there might be some things involved with not only her, possibly the house, so she called us out. A little follow-up. Andy sent me a text the next day and said for the first time in a very long time they were able to sleep without nightmares. So when you get that feedback, you go, maybe we're actually helping somebody every now and then.

You did some good. You did some good. That's what it's all about, is helping people. Alrighty.

Back to Giles Corey. So we're doing a three-part series like I mentioned earlier, and I am fascinated with the Salem Witch Trials. And to me, Salem Witch Trials is just the epitome of Halloween, you know, witches and cauldron, cauldron, tweil and trouble, cauldron burn, boil bubble. Even the location too is being up in New England and the fall and the leaves and...

It's old up there. Well, I mean for the US. There's people to say that this is another country. It's old.

Yeah, old, whatever. Yeah, sixteen hundreds, huh? Hmm, don't seem that old. So the little thing about Giles Corey is this is the same week as the anniversary of his death.

When did he die? When did you say his death was? September 19th, 1692. Okay, September 19th.

Do you all know what September 19th also is? The National Ghost any day. No, that's the 24th. Okay.

No, September 19th is talk like a pirate day. Er, how did I not know this? I don't know. How do we not all know this?

Is that not common knowledge? So Giles Corey was killed on the pirate day. Maybe he talked like a pirate day. He was a little insensitive.

I'm sorry. I just, I like talk like a pirate day. Okay, come on. There you go.

So Giles Corey is, for those that are, that don't know who he is, he was the only man that was killed, tried and executed as a witch in the Salem Witch Trials. And uh, Jedi, I've been there. We went there a few years ago. Yeah, Salem was a very neat place to go.

We missed it just as it was coming into the season. Yeah, I think the season started about a week after we were there. And I tried to muscle, muscle my way into some places that were closed. I said, we are clear from Utah.

Can we just come in? And they said no. I was there in October and it was a pretty spectacular, interesting place. But there were still quite a few places we could get into.

I mean, I don't feel like it was a, I mean, the shops were open, the, the witch house was open. And one of the things I guess. Go ahead. Did, did either of you on your trips go to the Howard Street Cemetery?

Yes. So I think the Howard Street Cemetery is the oldest cemetery there, correct? It's where they're buried, where the witches are buried from the trials. And then I noticed like there's apartments right there.

Like they didn't even get like six feet and they built their apartment building right there. Yeah, when I was there, the cemetery, they have a memorial there and a few other. Yeah, there's a memorial just laid out, right? Boom, boom, next to each other for all of the, all of those.

Sickums? Yeah. And you know, when I was there, there was fresh flowers that people were still laying out on the memorial site, basically. I think it's Salem, just in general, is a pilgrimage for, for people that identify as witches, the practice witchcraft.

That town has embraced the whole witch thing. You know, you go on it two ways with this. You try to just, you know, ignore your past and pretend nothing happened or you just die there and say, we're going to take this witch name and we're going to run with it. Now witchcraft, this could be a whole other topic on its own.

I want to get back into Giles Corey, but I think witchcraft is interesting because it has such a negative connotation and you can do bad things with it, like anything. Anything can be used for good or bad. It's how you use it. But a lot of the people that I've talked to in this, you know, in this field that are witches and practice witchcraft, most people, it's just nature stuff.

It's just, you know, using nature, using herbs, using natural remedies, natural things. Many of the kinds of practices and things that were done with the Celts pre-Christianity, that kind of stuff. Right, that's kind of wick-a-neopaganism and that kind of stuff. Right, I've run into probably a dozen people that say I'm a witch and one of them is out sacrificing children in the backyard with eye of Newt and hair of Toad.

I haven't run into any of them. Right, yeah. It's usually put up on a day's in your kids' room and demons won't come in. I think the definition of what constitutes a witch has changed pretty significantly since 1692.

Right. Right, so let's talk about Cory a little bit. So before the whole witch thing, let's delve into his earlier years as far as we know. He was actually considered to be, so at the time of the witch trials, he was in his 80s.

So he wasn't some strapping, you know, 30-year-old look. And to become, to get to the age of 80 in the 1600s, I mean, that in and of itself could probably be considered witchcraft. What are you doing to live so long? You're a witch.

Right, do you have a sorcerer stone? Is your name Nicholas Flamel? I'm going to be that person that puts a Harry Potter reference in everything. That's my new schtick.

And I'll still be the person that will shake in her head, go and I don't understand. Okay, you and I have to have a Harry Potter marathon lady. We got to get you up to snuff here. And which other movie references into?

Okay, folks, this is a new thing. I just came up on the fly. If I do a podcast without a Harry Potter reference, you let me know and I'll give you a candy bar. Okay, so he's 80s.

So he's already lived most of his life, right? But because he was so old and the town is so small and they didn't do a whole lot of traveling back in those days, you know, if he traveled, it was, you know, within 10 miles. A few miles, yeah. Right.

So a lot of people considered him to be a violent man already. He was, let's see, in 1676, he had a farm hand by the name of Jacob Goodale and Corey, Giles Corey beat him. He was charged with beating this farm hand to death, killed him. And he stood trial and there's a fellow by the name of John Proctor testified that he heard Giles Corey admit he had beaten Goodale.

But I don't know why, but they just find him and they're like, all right, pay $100. You're good to go. They didn't, they didn't put him away. I don't know why.

I didn't go into that. You know, it's the 1600s. We don't have a ton of records and forensic evidence and stuff, but he was only fine. And so when it came time, you know, for the witch trials and all the things that came down for him to be, you know, charged with that, he already had a ding against him.

You know, the people in the town already didn't love the man didn't love him and were suspicious of him to begin with, with things that were completely unrelated with. Also, when I was looking into him, I found that at the time of the witch trials, he was on his third wife, but when they were looking back at him, they felt like he had murdered his first wife, Mary, because they first deemed it as an accident that she fell down the stairs. But when they looked at it, excuse me, but when they looked at it, they showed where the stairs were that she couldn't, the two stairs didn't connect. So it really didn't make sense that she died falling down the stairs.

So they actually accused him of killing his first wife as well. Right, which, and then, you know, he killed his farm hand. It's not completely, and he admitted to it, not completely out of the realm of possibility. Right.

And it sounds like as this all the witch trials kind of evolved interestingly involving his third spouse, she was accused of being a witch as well. It's kind of where that starts out, right? It sounds like he was kind of on board with it when it first happened. He's like, oh yeah, she might be a witch.

You know, the Egyptians were so high back then, I think if you sneezed funny, they probably accused you of doing it. Princess Frank. It was so fun. They made these accusations and they're like, hey, we think you're wise a witch, you're like, yeah, probably.

And then all of a sudden, he's like, oh no, no, that's not true. Right, because he called and he's like, well, she could be a witch. My cat died and my ox is kind of sick, so I don't know. And so then they take her away.

And then a little while later, he's like, well, you know, maybe she wasn't a witch. And they're like, well, maybe you are a witch. Trying to cut for him. Why for crazy time?

But well, and then you know, you talked about the illness of the ox and the pet cat. You know, he claims that there was a sudden illness and then he told everybody, you know, my ox and my pet cat just boom, out of the blue got sick. But I noticed that my wife stays up late at night and she kneels by the fireplace like she's praying. And they said, you know, do you hear her reciting any prayers?

And he's like, no, she just kneels there. So obviously she's a witch. If you're not hearing those prayer words, witch, definitely. If it's heaven forbid, you say the words in your head.

Don't meditate. Don't be thinking about stuff. You gotta be saying stuff. I figured.

You know, it's a little chilly. She's probably there looking at the fireplace going, oh, I've got to clean this out. Just one more thing for me to do. And she's thinking, as long as I'm sitting here, he's not going to bug me because I'm praying.

He's a spidey. He's a jerk. You know, you get people a little afraid and you just can whip them up with a frenzy and then you start thinking crazy, crazy stuff. And then Corey Giles died.

The end. Good night. Podcast. All right.

We've got more. That was cool. One of the things they said was when they started having these trials, you know, there's the girls, and we'll get more into this in the next podcast. The actual sandwich trials were building up to the big event.

But the girls that started this accusation, you know, there's accusations in the talking. When they finally started having the trials, Giles and his wife at the time, Martha were some of the first people to attend these pre-trial examinations. It's almost like they wanted to be in the thick of things. Were they potsters?

Why were they the first ones? Ooh. They were just curious. Are they just curious?

You're putting people on trial for being witches. It's pretty interesting stuff. Your subscription to HBO that expires. That's right.

They didn't have Netflix in jail. I already binge-watched all the shows. We're just going to come to the trial. Pre-curture to TikTok with the trials, right?

That's not what we've researched a little bit. So, you know, so everything goes down. He goes to trial. And even the trials, it would have been interesting to be in a fly on the wall and watch these trials, because I'm sure the people at the time were not amused, you know, because they were killing people.

They were burning people at the stake. They didn't. Anybody at the stake. As I was saying that, I realized they were hanging people.

They were hanging people. They're killing people. They're killing. Burning at the stake was a different thing.

That's your opinion. If you go to Edinburgh and you're on the Royal Mile, there's a little plaque on a wall that shows where they drowned, which is not burned over the stake. It's still interesting. However, you know, there's multiple ways.

Yeah, so they weren't burned. They were... That's what happens when I improvise. I tell the wrong stories.

But if you go to the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, upwards the top, there's a little plaque and it talks about how they dunked the witches there. Nothing to do with... There's no burning. We're not talking about any burning witches today.

I heard a theory on that and important documentary on Monty Python. We're talking about white witches floated and didn't end ducks. Do you remember that? Oh, this is painful.

It was Monty Python, so y'all know those people. So that's it. I don't know. It's just something that he's giving the explanation of why witches don't float or do float because they're way the same as a duck.

That's right. So logically, if a witch weighs more than a duck. Or the way she... Yeah, we've less than a duck, then they're going to get...

They float and killed. So it works out. If they drowned and don't float, they're dead and they weren't a witch. But if they do float, they're a witch.

So then you take them out and burn on the stake. But only if you're in your... Great test. But only if you're in your...

You want to drown? You want to burn? Okay. Back to...

That's the reality. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

It's a sandy. I don't know. It's a sandy. But I'm sure that at the time it was very stressful because people were dying.

But looking back at this now, it's almost comical and I just don't understand. So they've got Giles Corey on stand and they're examining him. And they've got these judges and they're questioning him and they keep telling him that he's lying. You're lying.

And they were so afraid that he was going to practice witchcraft sitting on stand that during his trial they had to tie his hands behind his back so they couldn't wave his fingers and do hook his focus. That's what it's all about. Wave and fingers. Yeah, and one of them, there was a court record written by a fellow named Reverend Samuel Parris.

And he says, all the afflicted were seized, now with fits and troubled with pinches, then the court ordered his hands to be tied. And the magistrate said, what is it not enough to act witchcraft at other times, but must you do it now in the face of authority? And Corey said, I am a poor creature and cannot help it. Upon the motion of his head they had their heads and necks afflicted.

Magistrate, why do you tell such wicked lies against witnesses that heard you speak after this matter this morning? And Corey said, I never saw anything but a black hog that saw that went down. So they decided she was a witch in Titus hands so that he wouldn't. So people wouldn't be afflicted with pinches in the shakes apparently.

They're seizure-like activity. Yes. And they're like, why are you doing this? And he's like, I don't know, I'm not doing anything.

So they actually, at one point they untied his hands because they started to feel bad. I mean he's 80 year old man. I mean he's, you know. I'm sure that activity.

Boom. As soon as they untied his hands one of the girls in the audience started having fits. That's gotta be guilty. Yeah, it's gotta be a witch.

They probably had like dementia too. He was like 80 years old. He's like, I don't know, I'm not trying. And they're like, I'm gonna be a witch, die man, die.

No Corey initially was kind of into this whole thing. You know, he really got into it. He was one of the first people there. They showed up at the pretrial's, right?

Right. And I mean to the point that he even participated in accusing his own wife. Right. She's a witch.

But after a while he kind of lost his team. And I don't know if it's just he realized the severity of it. I don't know if, I don't know. You're like, no it was cute when it started.

But like for real people dying now. So. Yeah. What point did he go?

Oh, wait a minute. Once you become accused as a witch. Right. That's a pretty good point.

That's a good point to stop. And it sounds like after the accusation he refused to enter police. Is that right? Yeah.

He pretty much, you know, just got really stubborn. And so they started torturing him. And. Does the best police come out under torture when you're under duress?

Yeah. That says he had taken advantage of a widely used legal tactic. And this legal tactic was called standing mute when he was asked questions. Leave in the fifth, basically.

Leave the fifth, huh? So English, a lot that time ordered any prisoner who stood mute to be tortured in attempt to unmute. I didn't see that in the fifth amendment. I know, which I'm very glad.

I'm glad they refined that a little bit. That part was updated slightly. Thank you. So it was a tactic known as pienfort-edua, which is probably French.

And if you speak French, I know that that sounded about as great as my singing. So I apologize. But it translates into strong and harsh punishment. So the exact torture procedure consisted of, and if you remember we did a torture device episode last year about this time, the handshake, and people can just really be nasty to each other, but what they would do in Salem, they would strip the prisoner naked, they'd lay him on the ground, place the board on him, and then they would put heavy stones on it.

And the weight was slowly increased over the course of several days until the prisoner said, fine, here's the information. I mean, they're guilty or not guilty, right? Mm-hmm. And Corey kind of knew this was gonna happen.

He actually, before this happened, he took measures to protect his lands and to block local authorities from taking his positions, which I find is interesting. It's almost like he knew this was good. Yeah. There's no way out of it, you know, out of the accusation points.

Well, and some of the things on this, some of the accusations were about that. There were family feuds that had been taken, you know, that had been happening and things, and it's like I can take revenge on this other person by accusing them of being a witch, because, you know, they did a bad deal on the pig with me. You know, I felt like I got cheated on the pig, and so, hey, they're a witch. And I don't have to prove that I got cheated.

I just have to make an accusation that someone's gonna believe. And everyone's gonna run with it because no matter what you do, unless you're accused, it was such a frenzy that... A little me toish. Yes.

And I think he got to the point where, you know, when he said he really kind of stepped back away from it, I think he realized, wow, this is serious. I'm probably gonna go down. And the way he safeguarded his property is he actually gave his property to his sons and sons-in-law, so that the sheriff couldn't see it, because the sheriff had been seizing property of... Of the witch accused?

Of the accused. That is pretty smart. And I think they still live there and on the property to this day, from what I could tell from my current research. Did you have a family?

Yes. Interesting. Yeah, so this isn't funny. The next thing I'm gonna say is not funny, but the picture I have in my mind, I just feel so bad for this man, because they're pressing him, okay?

He gets to the point where they're like, no, you are your witch. We're gonna try to get this information out of you. We're gonna make you confess, lay down, we're gonna put a board on you. And he's 80 years old.

Right? 80, folks. And the 1600s. And he's saying to them is more weight, because he's not going to say he's a witch, so...

Right, he was not. He's gonna die. So there they are. This 80 year old man, they're pressing to death with stones, and he keeps saying more stones, more stones, so they're adding more on, adding more on.

So while he's there literally being squished, and I don't mean that with any disrespect, I really don't. That's what is happening. He's being crushed to death. He's being crushed to death.

And then somebody from the church comes over and is like, oh, on top of it all, you're excommunicated now. Yeah, thanks for holding true. I'm gonna get my son. I saw.

Aw. He just had a really bad day. So... Yeah, and then his tongue was hanging out.

And so they thought, well, he can't answer you, because he's dehydrated and his tongue is hanging out. So they would pay, I think it was a sheriff or somebody, would have somebody like once an hour go over and stick his tongue back in his mouth, because he would have the opportunity to talk. And they said his eyes were bulging out also. For my professional.

Yeah, so in the church documents, when they excommunicated him, the document said that he was either guilty of witchcraft or of suicide due to his choice to endure lethal torture, rather than enter up lead. And either one of them is excommunicable. No heaven for you is what they're basically telling him. You ended up in a predicament beyond your control, and you have two bad options.

No matter which one you choose, we're done. No, though. That's karma for you, right? Though he's got a little bit of karma coming back to him for what we know he did due to his farmhouse.

He's got a history, that's for sure. So the one interesting thing about his execution was, he was tortured for days. This didn't just happen over the course of the couple hours. It was days, multiple days.

So he was a tough, he was a tough 80 year old. Yeah, stubborn, super stubborn. And the sheriff got on the, I think it was like after day three, the sheriff got on top of 750 pounds and started jumping up and down on the rocks telling him, just say you're a witch, just say you're a witch. And that was putting him like in his final last breath.

Right. That kind of took him to the end. And even though he was a violent man and killed somebody, you do have to kind of give him some kudos. They gently killed somebody.

No, he confessed that he did. To someone, but not in court. Yeah. No, this was said he killed somebody.

This was the farm end. This was a winched up. No, that was still somewhat alleged error. So, you know, so regardless how violent he was or was not, you do have to give him some kudos that he was sticking to his guns.

I am not a witch and I'm not going to say it, even if you squish me, with 750 pounds of rocks. And the sheriff. That's a pretty darn impressive thing. But a positive thing, you know, so he got his karma.

You know, let's say he killed the farm hand. It actually happened. He did get his karma. But the interesting thing is, due to the the gruesomeness of his execution and how very public it was and, you know, how, the heminently he was denying it, it said that a lot of the residents of Salem started to question the whole thing.

You know, should we be doing this? Is this really a thing? You know, what are we doing? They took pause.

They stepped back and were like, whoa. Maybe we went too far. Let's look at some things. And did that basically end the witch trials?

I think so. I think that was definitely where it started to take that downturn and calm down. But we do have to mention with his final words, his words to the sheriff were, well, he cursed the sheriff. And it's amazing.

So do you want to talk about that? So he cursed, I didn't write down the exact words that he used. But then the sheriff within six months died of a heart attack. And then for 300 consecutive years, all sheriffs working in Salem died of heart attacks for some type of blood disease.

Yeah. So the exact words, the sheriff department, I actually wrote it down. He said, damn you, I curse you and Salem. And he, Corey said that to the sheriff before he died.

And then it says four years after he died, Sheriff Corwin, who was the jumping up and down sheriff, the sheriff at the time, died of a heart attack at 30 years old. And every sheriff from 1692 until 1991 had died of mysterious incidences. There's one in the 1970s. There was a fellow named Sheriff Robert Cahill.

He was forced to retire early due to a stroke, heart attack and rare blood condition. And he looked into the history of the sheriff's office. And there's a book described in the book, cursed in New England. So it says about 300 years later in 1978, Robert Cahill, one office, suffered a rare blood disease, a heart attack and a stroke.

Doctors could not find the cause of his afflictions. He was forced to retire as Sheriff of Essex County and his master and keeper of the jail. Today he lives in Florida. Mr.

Cahill notes that the sheriff before him also contracted a serious blood ailment wall in office at forced injury tire. He in turn had inherited the post from his father after the elder man died of a heart attack while serving a sheriff. The sheriff before him had suffered heart problems. So have all the others as far back as I could trace.

And the two men who have followed me have had an awful lot of trouble. So it makes you wonder if the curse is real or is it donuts? Ah, could be could be that high-fat content. Good point.

Good point. So in 1991, they actually moved the sheriff's office from Salem to a new prison in Middleton. And they think that's what broke the curse because they said since then no sheriff's had been diagnosed with any heart conditions or blood ailments. Moved it out of Salem, huh?

Yep. Now they local residents say that Corey's ghost haunts the area around the Howard Street Cemetery. And the discost is often seen before and after terrible events happen in town. So if you see Giles Corey, get out of Dodge because something bad is going to go down.

So it's not a very big town either. It's not pretty small. It's very welcome. That's why when you asked about the cemetery, I was thinking, I went to the main cemetery.

I don't know if there's another one. I don't know. I actually I don't think that they're actually buried there. Are they buried there or do they just have memorials?

I thought they just had memorials of all the. My understanding is Giles Corey is buried in an unmarked grave and that they have the memorial set up there. And that would have been the case with probably all of the witches because you weren't worthy of a grave site. You didn't get a you didn't get the Christian burial.

You didn't get the sacred ground on hallow ground. Just throwing in it. So let me give you an example of a terrible event. It was right before the Great Salem Fire in 1914.