Witchcraft

Bessie Stevenson and St Ninian's Well, 1659

St Ninian's Well, Wellgreen, Stirling

1659

The two sources used here agree on the case and the charges but differ on the ending. Your Stirling says she was tried, found guilty and executed. The Stirling City Heritage Trust says she was found guilty at the Tolbooth trial and that her fate is not recorded. The heritage trust also notes that the record for the 17th century has gaps, so an execution is possible but I could not confirm it.

The folk-healing method described, transferring an illness into clothing washed at a holy well, is a typical form of the kind of practice that authorities in the period read as witchcraft. The well is on Wellgreen Place in the Lower Town.

Evidence
Disputed or debunked
Access
Open ground
Location
56.115, -3.937 (Parish-level only, treat as an area)

Sources: Your Stirling, "War, Witchcraft and Plague" [other]; Stirling City Heritage Trust, "Stirling's Witches" [other]

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