37. Amongst such unaccountable things as these, we may reckon the strange passages that happened at Woodstock in Anno 1649. in the Manor-house there, when the Commissioners for surveying the Manor-house, Park, Deer, Woods, and other the Demeasnes belonging to that Manor, sat and lodged there: whereof having several relations put into my hands, and one of them written by a learned and faithful person then living upon the place, which being confirmed to me by several eye-witnesses of many of the particulars, and all of them by one of the Commissioners themselves, who ingeniously confessed to me, that he could not deny but what was written by that person above-mentioned was all true; I was prevailed on at last to make the relation public (though I must confess I have no esteem for such kind of stories, many of them no question being performed by combination) which I have taken care to do as fully, yet as briefly as may be.
38. October the 13. 1649. the Commissioners with their servants being come to the Manor-house, they took up their Lodging in the Kings own rooms, the Bed-chamber and with-drawing Room; the former whereof they also made their Kitchen; the Council-hall, their brew-house; the Chamber of Presence, their place of sitting to dispatch business; and a wood-house of the Dining-room, where they laid the wood of that ancient Standard in the high-Park, known of all by the name of the Kings Oak, which (that nothing might remain that had the name of King affixed to it) they digged up by the roots.
October the 14 and 15 they had little disturbance, but on the 16 there came as they thought, somewhat into the Bed-chamber where two of the Commissioners and their servants lay, in the shape of a dog, which going under their beds, did as it were gnaw the bed-cords; but on the morrow finding them whole, and a quarter of Beef which lay on the ground untouched, they began to entertain other thoughts.
39. October 17. Something to their thinking removed all the wood of the Kings Oak out of the dining-room into the Presence Chamber, and hurled the chairs and stools up and down that room. From whence it came into the two Chambers where the Commissioners and their servants lay, and hoisted up their beds feet so much higher than their heads, that they thought they should have been turned over and over, and then let them fall down with such a force, that their bodies rebounded from the bed a good distance, and then shook the bed-steads so violently, that themselves confessed their bodies were sore with it.
October 18. Something came into the Bed-chamber and walked up and down, and fetching the warming-pan out of the with-drawing room, made so much noise that they thought five bells could not have made more.
And October 19. Trenchers were thrown up and down the dining-room and at them that lodged there, whereof one of them being shaken by the shoulder and awakened, put forth his head to see what was the matter, but had trenchers thrown at it.
October 20. the curtains of the bed in the with-drawing room were drawn to and fro, and the bedstead much shaken, and eight great pewter dishes, and three dozen of trenchers, thrown about the bed-chamber again, whereof some fell upon the beds: this night they also thought whole armfuls of the wood of the Kings Oak had been thrown down in their chambers; but of that, in the morning they found nothing had been moved.
40. October 21. The keeper of their Ordnary and his bitch, lay in one of the rooms with them, which night they were not disturbed at all. But October 22. though the bitch kenneled there again (to whom they ascribed their former night’s rest) both they and the bitch were in a pitiful taking; the bitch opening but once, and that with a whining, fearful yelp.
October 23. they had all their clothes plucked off them in the with-drawing room, and the bricks fell out of the chimney into the room; and the 24th they thought in the dining-room that all the wood of the Kings Oak had been brought thither, and thrown down close by their bed-side, which noise being heard by those of the with-drawing room, one of them rose to see what was done, fearing indeed that his fellow Commissioners had been killed, but found no such matter; whereupon returning to his bed again, he found two dozen of trenchers thrown into it, and handsomely covered with the bedclothes.
41. October 25. The curtains of the bed in the with-drawing room were drawn to and fro, and the bedstead shaken as before: and in the bed-chamber glass flew about so thick (and yet not a pane of the chamber windows broken) that they thought it had rained money; whereupon they lighted candles, but to their grief they found nothing but glass, which they took up in the morning and laid together.
October 29. Something walked in the with-drawing room about an hour, and going to the window opened and shut it; then going into the bed-chamber, it threw great stones for about half an hours time, some whereof lighted on the high-bed, and others on the truckle-bed, to the number in all of about four-score. This night there was also a very great noise, as though forty pieces of Ordnance had been shot off together; at two several knocks it astonished all the neighbouring dwellers, which ’tis though might have been heard a great way off.
During these noises which were heard in both rooms together, both Commissioners and servants were struck with so great horror, that they cried out to one another for help, whereof one of them recovering himself out of a strange agony he had been in, snatched up a sword, and had like to have killed one of his Brethren coming out of his bed in his shirt, whom he took for the Spirit that did the mischief: However, at length they got all together, yet the noise continued so great and terrible, and shook the walls so much, that they thought the whole Manor would have fell on their heads. At its departure it took all the glass away with it.
42. November 1. Something as they thought walked up and down the with-drawing room, and then made a noise in the dining-room: The stones that were left before and laid up in the with-drawing room, were all fetched away this night, and a great deal of glass (not like the former) thrown about again.
November 2. came something into the with-drawing room treading (as they conceived) much like a Bear, which first only walking about a quarter of an hour, at length it made a noise about the Table, and threw the warming-pan so violently, that it quite spoiled it: It threw also glass and great stones at them again, and the bones of horses, and all so violently, that the bedstead and walls were bruised by them.
This night they set candles all about the rooms, and made fires up to the mantle-trees of the chimneys; but all were put out no body knew how, the fire, and billets that made it, being thrown up and down the rooms; the curtains torn with the rods from their beds, and the bed-posts pulled away, that the tester fell down upon them, and the feet of the bedstead cloven in two: And upon the servants in the truckle-bed, who lay all this time sweating for fear, there was first a little, which made them begin to stir; but before they could get out, there came a whole coule, as it were, of stinking ditch-water down upon them, so green, that it made their shirts and sheets of that colour too.
43. The same night the windows were all broke by throwing of stones, and there was most terrible noises in three several places together, to the extraordinary wonder of all that lodged near them; nay, the very Cony-stealers that were abroad that night, were so affrighted with the dismal thundering, that for haste they left their Ferret in the Cony-boroughs behind them, beyond Rosamonds well.
Notwithstanding all this, one of them had the boldness to ask in the Name of God, what it was? what it would have? and what they had done, that they should be disturbed in this manner? to which no answer was given, but the noise ceased for awhile.
At length it came again, and (as all of them said) brought seven Devils worse than itself. Whereupon one of them lighted a candle again, and set it between the two chambers in the door-way, on which another of them fixing his eyes, saw the similitude of a hoof striking the candle and candle-stick into the middle of the bed-chamber, and afterwards making three scrapes on the snuff to put it out.
Upon this the same person was so bold as to draw his sword, but he had scarce got it out, but there was another invisible hand had hold of it too, and tugged with him for it, and prevailing, struck him so violently with the pummel, that he was stunned with the blow.
44. Then began grievous noises again, in so much that they called to one another, got together and went into the Presence-chamber, where they said Prayers and sang Psalms; notwithstanding all which, the thundering noise still continued in other rooms. After this, November 3. they removed their Lodgings over the gate; and next day being Sunday, went to Ewelm, where how they escaped, the Authors of the Relations knew not; but returning on Monday, the Devil (for that was the name they gave their nightly guest) left them not unvisited; nor on the Tuesday following, which was the last day they stayed.
Where ends the History (for so he was styled by the people) of the just devil of Woodstock; the Commissioners and all their dependants going quite away on Wednesday; since which time, says the Author that lived on the place, there have honest persons of good Quality lodged in the Bed-chamber and with-drawing room, that never were disturbed in the least like the Commissioners.
45. Most part of these Transactions, during the stay of these Commissioners, ’tis true, might be easily performed by combination, but some there are of them scarce reconcilable to Juggling: Such as 1. The extraordinary noises, beyond the power of man to make, without such instruments as were not there. 2. The tearing down and splitting of the bed-posts, and putting out so many candles and so great fires no body knew how. 3. A visible shape seen of a horses hoof treading out the candle. And 4. a tugging with one of them for his sword by an invisible hand. All which being put together, perhaps may easily persuade some man otherwise inclined, to believe, that immaterial beings might be concerned in this business; which if it do, it abundantly will satisfy for the trouble of the Relation, still provided the speculative Theist, be not after all, a practical Atheist.
The Natural History of Oxfordshire: being an essay toward the natural history of England.
Robert Plot, 1677.
… The populace dignified the nocturnal operator with the name of the Just Devil of Woodstock. It afterwards appeared that the whole was contrived by the ingenuity of an adroit and humourous royalist, named Joe Collins, who had procured the situation of secretary to the Commissioners, for the purpose of imposing on their credulity. When the jest was discovered, Collins was styled the Merry Devil of Woodstock; but the affair was considered at the time in so serious a light that a Mr Widdowes, then resident clergyman of the place, kept a diary of the wonders.
Oxford Journal, 5th December 1868.
The Genuine History of the Good Devil of Woodstock.
Being a particular account of the strange and surprising Apparitions, and works of Spirits which happened in the Months of October and November, in the year of our Lord Christ, 1649. When the Honourable Commissioners for surveying the said Manor, sat and remained there. Collected and attested by themselves.
In times when a general knowledge of the Sciences pervade mankind, we hope it may not be considered improper to show the weakness of our ancestors, in allowing their understandings to so readily give way to a belief in supernatural causes. However our public amusements tend to expose the arts by which the learned few imposed upon their contemporaries: the Phantasmagoria having a wonderful effect on the powers of the mind, and convinces me that all supernatural appearances have been produced by men misusing science, to delude and terrify the multitude, by an unmanly and unjust deprivation of their natural reason, in order to attain their own purposes.
The following story will elucidate this remark, and give strength to the justice of it: when we consider, that so lately as 1649. six gentlemen appointed as Commissioners from Oliver Cromwell, to survey the manor of Woodstock, were so grossly imposed upon by the practice of a little natural philosophy, and chemistry, as to believe themselves surrounded by evil spirits; and under the influence of this deception left the place, convinced that nothing but supernatural powers could have produced such causes.
The Honourable the Commissioners arrived at Woodstock manor house October the 13, and took up their residence in the kings own rooms. His Majesty’s bed-chamber they made their kitchen, the council-hall their pantry, and the presence-chamber was the place where they sat for the dispatch of business: His Majesty’s dining room they made their wood yard, and stowed it with no other wood but that of the famous royal oak, from the high park: which, that nothing might be left with the name of the king about it, they had dug up by the roots, and split and bundled up into faggots for their firing.
October, 16. This day they first sat for the dispatch of business. In the midst of their first debate, there entered a large black dog (as they thought) which made a terrible howling, overturned two or three of their chairs, and doing some other damage, went under the bed, and there gnawed the cords: the door this while continued constantly shut, when after some two or three hours, Giles Sharp their secretary, looking under the bed, perceived that the creature was vanished, and that a plate of meat which one of the servants had hid there was untouched, and showing this to their honours, they were all convinced there could be no real dog concerned in the case, the said Giles also deposed on oath, that to his certain knowledge there was not.
October, 17. As they were this day sitting at dinner in a lower room, they heard plainly the noise of persons walking over their heads, though they well knew the doors were all locked, and there could be none there; presently after they heard also all the wood of the kings oak brought by parcels from the dining room, and thrown with great violence into the presence chamber; as also, the chairs, stools, tables, and other furniture forcibly hurled about the room: their own papers of the minutes of their transactions torn, and the ink-glass broken.
When all this had sometimes ceased, the said Giles proposed first to enter into these rooms, and in presence of the Commissioners, of whom he received the key, he opened the doors, and entering, with their honours following him, he there found the wood strewed about the room, the chairs tossed about and broken, the papers torn, and the ink-glass broken over them, all as they had heard; yet no footsteps appeared of any person whatever being there, nor had the doors ever been opened to admit or let out any persons since their honours were last there. It was therefore voted Nem Con that the person who did this mischief could have entered no other way than at the keyhole of the said doors.
In the night following this same day, the said Giles and two others of the Commissioners servants as they were in bed in the same room with their honours, had their beds feet lifted up so much higher than their heads, that they expected to have their necks broken; and then they were let fall at once with such violence as shook them up from the bed at a good distance, and this was repeated many times, their honours being amazed spectators of it. In the morning the bedsteads were found cracked and broken: and the said Giles and his fellows declared they were sore to the bones with the tossing and jolting of their beds.
October, 19. As they were all in bed together, the candles were blown out with a sulphurous smell, and instantly many trenchers of wood were hurled about the room; and one of them putting his head above the clothes, had not less than six forcibly thrown at him, which wounded him very grievously. In the morning the trenchers were all found lying about the room, and were observed to be the same they had eaten on the day before, none being found remaining in the pantry.
October, 20. This night the candles were put out as before, the curtains of the bed in which their honours lay, were drawn to and fro many times with great violence; their honours received many cruel blows, and were much bruised beside with eight great pewter dishes, and three dozen wooden trenchers which were thrown on the bed, and heard afterwards rolling about the room.
Many times also this night, they heard the forcible falling of many faggots by their bed-side, but in the morning no faggots were found there; no dishes nor trenchers were there seen neither; and the aforesaid Giles attests, that by their different arranging in the pantry, they had assuredly been taken thence, and after put there again.
October, 21. The keeper of their ordinary and his bitch lay with them this night, they had no disturbance.
October, 22. Candles put out as before. They had the said bitch with them again, but were not by that protected: the bitch made a very piteous cry, the clothes of their bed were all pulled off, and the bricks without any wind, were thrown off the chimney-tops into the middle of the room.
October, 24. The candles put out as before. The curtains of the bed in the drawing room were forcibly drawn many times, the wood thrown about as before, a terrible crack like thunder was heard; and one of the servants running to see if his master was not killed, found at his return three dozen of trenchers laid smoothly upon his bed under the quilt.
October, 26. The beds were shaken as before, the windows seemed all broken to pieces and the glass fell in vast quantities all about the room. In the morning they found the windows all whole, but the floor strewed with broken glass; which they gathered and laid by.
October, 29. At midnight candles went out as before, something walked majestically through the room and opened and shut the window, great stones were thrown violently into the room, some whereof fell on the beds, others on the floor; and at about a quarter after one, a noise was heard as of forty cannon discharged together, and again repeated at about eight minutes distance.
This alarmed and raised all the neighbourhood, who coming into their honours room, gathered up the great stones, fourscore in number, many of them like common pebbles and boulders, and laid them by where they are to be seen to this day, at a corner of the adjoining field. This noise like the discharge of cannon was heard through all the country for sixteen miles round.
During these noises which were heard in both rooms together, both the Commissioners and their servants gave another over for lost, and cried out help; and Giles Sharp snatching up a sword, had nigh killed one of their honours, taking him for the spirit, as he came in his shirt into the room. When they were together the noise was continued, and part of the tiling of the house, and all the windows of an upper room were taken away with it.
October, 30. At midnight something walked into the chamber treading like a bear, it walked many times about, then threw the warming-pan violently on the floor, and so bruised it that it was spoiled; vast quantities of glass were now thrown about the room, and vast quantities of horses bones and great stones thrown in; these were all found in the morning, and the floor, beds, and walls were all much damaged by the violence they were thrown.
November, 1. Candles were placed in all parts of the room, and a great fire made. At midnight the candles all yet burning, a noise like the burst of a cannon was heard in the room, and the burning billets were tossed all over the room and about the beds, that had not their honours called in Giles and his fellows, the house had been assuredly burnt, an hour after the candles went out as usual the crack of many cannon were heard, and many pails full of green stinking water were thrown on their honours in bed, great stones were also thrown in as before, the bed-curtains and bedsteads torn and broken.
The windows were now all really broken and the whole neighbourhood alarmed with the noises, nay, the very rabbit stealers that were abroad that night in the warren, were so frightened at the dismal thundering, that they fled for fear and left their ferrets behind them.
One of their honours this night spoke, and in the name of god asked what it was, and why it disturbed them so. No answer was given to this, but the noise ceased for a while, when the spirit came again, and as they all agreed, brought with it seven devils worse than itself. One of the servants now lighted a large candle and set it in the door way between the two chambers to see what passed; and as he watched he plainly saw a hoof striking a candlestick into the middle of the room, and afterwards making three scrapes over the snuff of the candle to scrape it out: upon this the same peasant was so bold as to draw a sword, but he had scarce got it out when he perceived another invisible hand had hold of it, and at length prevailing struck him so violently on the head with the pummel that he fell down for dead with the blow.
At this instant was heard another burst like the discharge of a broadside of a ship of war, and at about two minutes distance each, no less than nineteen more such; these shook the house so violently that they expected every moment it would fall upon their heads. The neighbours on this were all alarmed and running to the house they all joined in prayers and psalm singing, during which the noise still continued in the other rooms, and the discharge of cannon without, though no one was there.
We shall conclude our relation of this event, by observing that though tricks have been often played in affairs of this kind, many of these things are not reconcilable to juggling; such as 1st: The loud noises made beyond the power of man without such instruments as were not there. 2nd. The tearing and breaking the beds. 3d. Throwing about the fire. 4th. The hoof treading out the candle. and, 5thly. The striving for the sword, and the blow the man received from the pummel of it.
To see however, how great men are sometimes deceived; Dr. Plot, who records this relation, concludes – that he had from under the mans own hand that he, Joseph Collins, commonly known by the name of funny Joe of Oxford, was himself this very devil; that he hired himself as a servant to these Commissioners, under the feigned name of Giles Sharp; and by the help of two friends, and an unknown trap door in the ceiling of the bedchamber, and a lb. of white gun-powder, played all these amazing tricks by himself and his fellow servants, whom he had introduced on purpose to assist him.
The candles were contrived, by a common trick of gunpowder put in them, to put themselves out at a certain time.
The dog who began the farce, was, (as he swore) only a bitch who had the day before whelped in that room, and made all this disturbance in seeking for her puppies: and which, when she had served his purpose he let out, and then looked for.
The story of the hoof and sword, himself alone was witness to, and was never suspected of the truth of his assertions, though in reality mere fiction.
By the trap door his friends let down stones, faggots, glass, water, &c. which, they either left there or drew up again, as best suited with them; and by this way let themselves in and out without opening the doors, or going through the keyholes as their honours had wisely determined.
All the noises he declares he made, by placing quantities of white gun powder over pieces of burning charcoal on plates of tin; which, as they melted went off with that violent explosion.
He tells us also, one thing beyond all the rest, and was what in reality drove them from the house, though they never owned it. This was, they had formed a reserve of part of the premises to themselves, and hid their mutual agreement which they had drawn up in writing, under the earth in a pot, in a corner of the room where they usually dined, in which an orange tree grew; when in the midst of their dinner one day this earth of itself took fire, and burnt violently with a blue flame, filling the room with a strong sulphurous stench; and this he also professes was his own doing by a secret mixture he had placed there the day before.
We are happy in having an opportunity of setting history right about these remarkable events, and would not have our readers disbelieve Collins’s account of them from his naming white powder going off when melted, or his making the earth about the pot take fire of its own accord; since, however improbable these accounts may appear to some readers, and whatever secrets they might be in Joe’s time, they are well known now in chemistry.
As to the last, there needs only to mix an equal quantity of iron filings finely powdered with some pure powdered sulphur, and make them into a paste with fair water; this paste when it has lain together twenty six hours, will of itself take fire and burn all the suphur away with a blue flame and a great stink.
For the others, what he calls white gun-powder, is plainly the thundering powder called pulvis fulminans by our Chemists, it is made only of three parts of salt-petre, two parts of pearl-ashes, or salt of tartar, and one part of flour [sic] of brimstone, mixed together and beat to a fine powder, a small quantity of this held on the point of a knife over a candle, will not go off till it melts, and then give a report like a pistol; and this he might easily dispose in larger quanitites, so as to make it go off itself when he was with his masters.
The End.
The Genuine History of the Good Devil of Woodstock.
( Christopher Smart, 1722-1771 Published 1802. ?)
https://www.proquest.com/docview/5348518?pq-origsite=summon&accountid=14785&imgSeq=1
https://academic-oup-com.ezproxy.uwe.ac.uk/nq/article/s8-III/66/256/4301654
The Just Devil of Woodstock
https://archive.org/details/woodstockorcaval00scot_0/page/488/
A poem describing it all from 1649
https://archive.org/details/woodstockorcaval00scot_0/page/484/