Essex resident Rylan teams up with anthropologist Professor Alice Roberts to investigate one of the darkest and most harrowing chapters in Essex’s history, that witnessed the murder of hundreds of innocent women accused of witchcraft. Fascinated by the supernatural, Rylan is Mulder to Alice’s Sculley, this historical crime mystery investigates the truth behind the most infamous witch trials in England.
Each episode centres on a specific witch trial, with Rylan and Alice opening a cold case into the stories behind some of the women accused of witchcraft during the 16th and 17th centuries, many of whom were found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging. They visit the towns and villages in Essex where the women lived and died. Guided by original court documents plus a crack team of historians, psychologists and medical experts, together in their incident room, they explore these women’s lives, alleged crimes and trials, with each story brought to life through scenes of vivid and often disturbing scripted drama. Why were these women found guilty of witchcraft, and what (or who) drove their persecution?
Kicking off with the first Chelmsford Witch Trial held in 1566, Alice and Rylan examine the case of a family of poor women from nearby Hatfield Peveril. Agnes Waterhouse, her daughter Joan and her sister Elizabeth face Queen Elizabeth’s Attorney in a test trial of a newly passed Act of Parliament making witchcraft a felony, punishable by death.
Episode 2 covers the 1582 St Osyth witch hunt, where a petty feud between two peasant women grows to engulf the entire village. Healer and cunning women Ursley Kempe falls out with her former friend Grace Thurlowe, and with the ambitious local magistrate whipping up anti-witch hysteria, one of the largest witch hunts of the Elizabethan era takes hold.
Finally, episode 3 explores the rise of the self-styled Witch Finder General Matthew Hopkins who in 1645, amid England’s chaotic Civil War, starts his reign of terror in the coastal town of Manningtree. Disabled local woman Bess Clarke suffers abuse and torture along with her young friend Rebecca West, as Matthew and his cronies seek to rid Essex of witches by any means possible.