The phrase that stands out in Jeanne Le Vesconte's case is 'infecting some and curing others'. It captures exactly the position of the village healer in the sixteenth century: the woman people went to for cures was also the woman they blamed when their animals sickened or their children died.
Jersey Heritage's history of the island's witch trials gives what is known. In November 1585 Jeanne Le Vesconte was brought before the court, accused of 'the diabolical art of witchcraft, always carrying out evil spells and employing her arts towards both people and their property'. She was convicted and executed at St Ouen, in the north-west of the island, where the Seigneur of St Ouen had his own gallows. Her trial is the first death sentence entered in the Cour de Cattel books, the series of criminal court records that make Jersey's witch trials unusually well documented.
The name Le Vesconte comes up again in the witch records. Wikipedia's account of the Channel Island trials describes a Paquette Le Vesconte who had been arrested and banished, returned to the island, was rearrested, and confessed 'that she had entered into partnership with the Devil, and by his help perpetrated innumerable crimes and homicides'. The sources we have do not say whether Paquette and Jeanne were related, or when Paquette was tried, so we note her here without drawing a connection.
We do not know where in St Ouen Jeanne lived or where the gallows stood, so the record is pinned to the parish.
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