Hello Everyone and Happy Wednesday! Just one week from today is Samhain and I don't know about you, but the Sirens are getting more and more excited as the day comes closer. We hope you are enjoying the things we've brought to you and hold on tight... we have plenty more excitement. Today we have a story about Moll Dyer from Judas Antenesque over at Stirring the Cauldron With Judas. So sit back and hold on tight... here we go!

As  always at this time of year our  thoughts turn to ghost and those who have passed, especially those who were of accused of being witches and murdered for it, whether it be true or not.   When I first started following this path, I did all the normal research that one does looking into the famous witches who were persecuted in Salem, my mistake at the time was not looking into the ones that were accused, acquitted, or convicted and hanged here in Maryland. A few years after I was on this path,  a movie came out, The Blair Witch project.  Some said it was based around a story of a local witch, let me tell you that the only thing they got right was female, and witch.  And she was burned out of her home.

I began researching witches’ in Maryland. I found the witch they claimed to be talking about, I also discovered her story.  Now there are two paths of thinking about this one particular witch, one is that she was made up, and none of what happened to her actually happened. It is stated they can find no record of her ever living in St. Mary’s county, that she never existed.

The other path of thinking is that she cannot be found in the records because the courthouse that kept those records burned down at one time and original records with it. I am inclined to lean toward this explanation. Why?  Well I believe that NO town really wants to be remembered as the town that set a woman’s house on fire, chased her into the woods and left her to freeze to death.  That’s just my thinking. Honestly if they are not guilty of something then why does almost every yard in that area have a religious statue in it?  Still I began throwing myself into researching everything I could find about this woman.

Moll Dyer has been called a hermit, a widow, a woman hiding from something she did in Europe, and last but not least she was called a WITCH.  In 1697 only one of these was worth killing her over.  In looking deeper, we discovered that most of the people who were accused of being witches were just normal non-practicing people. Some were just not liked by certain groups of people, others had a prime piece of property that someone wanted and the only way to get it was to accuse the owner of being a witch. Still others like Moll, I think lived apart so she didn't have to be bothered with the pettiness of the town’s folk.  They say she practiced herb lore, that some went to her for healing, I believe this to be true.  This is was her downfall. 

1697 was a hard time for that area, people were starving, their crops failing in the fields, the bitter winter had brought with it sickness. What were the causes? Being the intelligent townsfolk that they were, they somehow managed to rule out nature, and come to the conclusion that just one woman was the cause.   They worked themselves into a frenzy and headed to Molls house, did they intend to burn her out? YES!  And that was just what they did.  After setting fire to her hut in the dead of night, they chased her through the woods until they got too cold to follow and left her to fend for herself.  They found her the next day frozen some say to a rock, others call it a boulder.  I have visited it and have to say, it looks like a big rock to me.   As the story goes she was found with her knees, and one hand resting on it, the other hand raised in calling down a curse on the town. Moll was facing Brenton Bay when she died against said rock, was she cursing them I am not sure, but I hope she was.

So after a couple of years of research, I decided to take a drive down  to Route 5 and Leonardtown.  With my trusty wife and a friend of ours we slid into the front of my pickup truck and took the two hour and some odd minutes’ drive.  I had things mapped out, where her hut might have been, and the route she might have taken running from the townsfolk.   We were going to check it all out.  I stopped at a Safeway just outside of Waldorf and picked up three roses to place on Molls rock/boulder. And thirty five minutes later we were pulling into the Leonardtown town square.   

Photo Credit Waymark

Our first stop was the boulder/rock, we found it sitting beside the jailhouse like they said though it was smaller than I might have imagined.  I reverently knelt down carefully running my fingers over its smooth surface, the outlines were not there but you could feel impressions in it.  Gently I touched it, quietly telling Moll that she may be gone but not forgotten.  I suddenly got dizzy, and felt nauseous. (Part of me thought it could have been because the rock/boulder is sitting next to underground cables)  but I have hunted ghost, traipsed through fields and a few houses, and the only other time I felt the way I did that day was during one of my Halloween visits to Gettysburg.  

We drove 326 to Brenton Bay,  where I explained that this was the spot she was found half way between.  Then we went looking for Moll Dyers Run road, or just Dyers Run as it’s called. We finally found Moll Dyers Road. This is where I had the greatest experience I have ever had, (no I did not talk to her).

   

While sitting close to what is now private property, the truck idling, we had the windows open and chatting about what we found, suddenly I began to get warm, okay three arses in the front of a pickup, on an October day in Maryland, yeah we can get warm.   We rolled the windows up and I turned the air on, this did not help.   Ten minutes after this I backed the truck up and pulled back onto route 5 heading to Point Look Out. We were almost to the civil war graveyard when I explained my sudden urge to leave.

Now I have been on fire before, (a lot of weed and a gas oven left me without my eyebrows and other hair for a while) and I have also stood in the front of a building that was on fire so I know what it feels like physically.  So to feel that kind of heat and smoke while sitting in the front of my pickup with two other people was very overwhelming.  I believe that was her way of answering me when I asked if she was real. I have called on Molls help now and again when it comes to getting local problems removed she is great to work with.  We haven’t taken that two hours and some odd minutes’ drive since our son was three, I am thinking that it’s about time to visit Moll.

SO the next time you drive through Maryland on your way to Ocean City and are tired of sitting in traffic on Rt.50, jump off and drive to Leonardtown, visit Molls rock/boulder tell me which one you think it is. And just say “Hi” She’s there I know it.

See you around the cauldron ~Judas

Today is Ours

What is it about this time of year that turns even the sternest of Witches into little children?  Is it the chill in the air, the apple cider, the pumpkin pies, or the pumpkin seeds?  Is it the decorations for our homes, is it that we can put out our The Witch Is In signs, and no one will raise an eyebrow?  

The countdowns to Samhain tickers have been going since the day after Samhain last year 2011, and I love it! 

Why?  Why do we all suddenly start acting like Linus gearing up for the arrival of the Great Pumpkin? 

My thoughts this day is OURS, we have marked it, feasted on it, and celebrated it in public and secret.  After years of hiding, it’s nice even if it’s only for one month to CELEBRATE our path.  Sure they have tried to do to Samhain what was done to Yule, they try to change it, but we don’t allow it to happen.  It is our day to celebrate our ancestors who have passed to the Summerland before us.  It is our day to revel, and watch the Wheel turn yet another year gone.    Yes it’s evolved, and there are now more “secular” activities, but it still retains the meaning.  It’s evident in the decorations, witches, zombies, ghosts, all true things about this day that we enjoy. 

We make special dinners, lay out snacks, enjoy the revelry of little children dressed up, all the while we are dancing inside like cats on a hot tin roof.  We watch the clock barely containing ourselves as the last of the trick or treating comes to an end.  Then it’s off with the outside lights, on with the candles or fire.  

Some of us scry, do card readings, use Ouija boards, or just open ourselves to communicate with our blessed dead.  We do away with the old year, and dance into the new.  Some of us sit by a big fire covered in heavy blankets so we can remain outside long after the fire has died hoping to catch a glimpse of the dead returning home, or the Fae on moving night. 

Maybe we are more like Linus than I thought, it may not be a pumpkin we are waiting for, but each of us waits for something.  In this season I wish you all the happiness, and joy of decorating, and enjoying the imagination of your witchlings.  Stir your cauldrons, my friends…see you again soon around mine.

~Judas

Today's Giveaway 

Today's Recipe

Up next in the crafting department we bring to you:

And the Winner is: 

The winner of the giveaway on October second from Tess at East Coast Craft & Curio is: NCDad! Please be sure to email us your shipping information so Tess can get your gift certificate in the mail to you.

For the October 3 giveaway from Three Cats and A Broom, you have until 8pm EDT tonight to participate!

Song of the Day

from Kestrell Trueseeker