The history of witches Series: Part One: History not hysteria!
- ouruntamedroots
- 9 hours ago
- 11 min read
In this episode of Our Untamed Roots, we step into the entangled space where folklore and history blur. This is a small step back into recent history to look at a common theme for witches. My friend Kellie helped with doing research for the story that kicks off this episode.
The Tilley bend witch + history.
The Tilley Bend Witch
This episode begins with a twisted tale, with incredible research done by my best friend Kellie and read by me.
“Have you heard of the Tilley Bend Witch?” Kellie asked me.
No—even though I’m also from north Georgia, this is a story I hadn’t heard before.
Kellie then says:
“There’s a story going around Blue Ridge, Georgia, that a witch named Elizabeth Jane Bradley was hanged at a church after her daughter was murdered.
According to local legend, Elizabeth was a folk healer of mixed Creek Native and European heritage. She was born in 1846, married at the age of 22, to Jason Riley Bradley, and together they had a large family. She passed at the age of 60 in 1906.
The story says two of her daughters married into feuding clans—one into the Tilley family and one into the Stanley family.
Similar to the Hatfield and McCoys, the Tilley and Stanley families got into many arguments. Unfortunately, during one of these fights, one of Elizabeth’s daughters was fatally shot.
It goes on to say that after her daughter was murdered, Elizabeth (the mother) put a curse on anyone in the area to keep them from having a living child.
Still today, if you go to the cemetery, there are many children and babies buried there. Elizabeth’s grave is even facing a different direction from the others.
This implies she can’t enter “heaven” when the “rapture” happens.
This is the story everyone hears, so it must be true, right?
Well—not at all.
Questioning the Story
Kellie goes on to say that after visiting the area a few times, she just couldn’t quite believe any mother—witch or not—would wish death on the unborn. She immediately started searching. She wanted to find the actual truth and have facts to back it up.
What the Records Reveal
The part of the story that is true is that Elizabeth Jane Bradley was a mother. She had many children.
Unfortunately, the church was flooded due to a dam being built. They rebuilt the church on higher ground, but important documents were already ruined. Most people would give up, thinking that was the end. Not Kellie. She decided to research Elizabeth’s daughters. According to the census, she had five daughters and two sons. All of her daughters lived at least into their early 50s and beyond.
The interesting part is that none of them married into the Stanleys or the Tilleys. In fact, Elizabeth was a Tilley before she got married, and her brother was a preacher at the very church she’s buried at. No one was even shot or murdered, according to death certificates. Elizabeth very well could have been a healer or even a midwife, but she didn’t curse babies. She didn’t put evil on people. She was a woman who was doing her best to survive the harsh mountain area of north Georgia.
Setting the Record Straight
Kellie concluded by stating that she isn’t sure how this story got started, or how she’ll ever know who or why someone decided it would be fun to put that kind of label on an innocent woman—not the label of being a witch, but being the person who cursed babies, especially someone who isn’t even with us any longer. Kellie truly hopes Elizabeth finds some kind of peace knowing people now know the truth, and that someone cared enough to dig into her story and pour their heart into setting the record straight.
Thank you, Kellie, for telling me this story and allowing me to share with listeners what you felt passionate about correcting in history, and for giving us a prime example of a common theme throughout the history of witches.
A Broader Look at Witch History
Before we tie this together let's go into a little bit of the history.
Witches appear in every corner of the world—from European countrysides to African villages, Asian mountains, and American colonies—even the mountains of north Georgia, as we just heard.
This is going to be a series since fitting it all in one episode would be almost impossible.
It's important we get a sensible definition of what magic is.
Understanding Magic
Magic itself is morally neutral. The determination of magic being good or bad depended on who used it, as well as the person judging it.
The word “magic” often suggests something fictional or childish. That is because of how Hollywood has portrayed it—as something imaginary—and not how it was historically or academically understood.
At its core, magic is a system of belief. It is a practice based on the idea that intention and symbolic action can influence outcomes. This perspective suggests that results stem from unseen connections between things rather than through physical force.
The boundaries between religion, medicine, and magic simply didn’t exist at the start of the witch hunts the way they do now.
Even in ancient times, often usually women—performed incantations for protection, fertility, healing, and communication with the divine.
The Three main Types of Magic
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the three types of magic are:
Productive magic
This is magic people use to bring about good results—such as hoping for a big harvest, good weather, or a successful wild game hunt.
Protective magic
This kind is meant to keep people safe, typically using charms, amulets, or spoken blessings to ward off danger, illness, or bad luck.
Destructive magic
Also called sorcery, this type is intended to harm others and is often connected with envy or conflict within a community.
These categories help scholars understand how different cultures use magical thinking—either to support life, defend against harm, or intentionally curse others. These topics will be covered in other episodes for listening or posts for reading.
The Word “Witch”
The people using magic or intention to influence outcomes were not uniformly evil. Most were respected healers or goddesses of magic. The idea that magic itself was sinful came much later.
“So where did it all begin? Who were the first witches?”
The word witch was once a title of respect before it became viewed as something evil. The etymology of the word witch originates from Old English wicce (female) and wicca (male) it referred to those believed capable of shaping the unseen such as—healers, star readers, and people deeply attuned to the natural world.
The word witch didn’t start as an insult.
Power, Control, and Fear
Originally, witch wasn’t a moral label. It didn’t mean good or bad. This shift happened as Christianity became institutionalized. Anything existing outside church authority became questionable. Folk knowledge, herbalists, and those who practiced divination didn’t seek permission from the church, so the label witch stopped being respected and became feared. The church wanted control, and they didn’t care if that meant innocent people were harmed or given death sentences. By the late Middle Ages, the word witch was used to easily shun those who wouldn’t bow or conform—most often women, the poor, the elderly, and the outspoken.
Basically, anyone who wasn’t easily manipulated into conforming, or anyone they didn’t want to care for—such as the elderly or mentally ill.
The word witch didn’t change who these people were. It was a shift in power and enormous ego-driven authority that changed how things were structured.
From Healers to Hunted
Here’s the bigger question:
How did we go from seeking out magical healers and respected spiritual intermediaries to witches being hunted, tortured, and murdered under the assumption they were pure evil?
This shift occurred in medieval Europe, where fear, religion, and power collided.
The Devil and Witchcraft Accusations
The Devil. I’m constantly told that witches worshiped the Devil. Let’s talk about the Devil for a moment.
Christianity did not invent the idea of an evil adversary, but it significantly reshaped and intensified the figure that later became known as the Devil. Earlier religious traditions already contained concepts of spiritual opposition, chaos, or moral dualism. Christianity drew on these ideas and developed them into a single, personalized enemy of God.
Ideas resembling a devil figure appear in several pre-Christian sources. Jewish texts from the Second Temple period, such as the Book of Enoch, describe fallen angels who rebel against divine order.
Hebrew Bible vs. New Testament
In the Hebrew Bible, Satan is usually not a proper name. The word means “adversary” or “accuser” and often describes a role rather than an evil being. For example, in Numbers 22:22 and the Book of Job, Satan functions as a heavenly prosecutor acting within God’s authority.
In the New Testament, this role changes. Satan becomes a more clearly defined, individualized figure—described as a tempter, deceiver, and the “ruler of this world”—opposing God’s purposes and humanity’s spiritual well-being.
Early Christian thinkers helped formalize the idea of Satan as a fallen angel who rebelled due to pride.
The Invention of the Satanic Witch
The familiar horned, monstrous image of the Devil does not come from early biblical texts. This imagery developed gradually during the Middle Ages, shaped by folklore, medieval art, and literary works. These representations reinforced the Devil as a terrifying physical embodiment of evil rather than a purely spiritual adversary.
Within Christian theology, the Devil ultimately served as the framework for explaining moral evil, temptation, and suffering without attributing these directly to God.
The belief that witches worshiped the Devil and entered into Satanic pacts did not originate from ancient pagan practices or folk magic traditions. Instead, it was largely constructed by European religious and legal authorities during the 15th century.
Witch Hunts and False Narratives
During this period, witchcraft was redefined from localized folk practices—such as healing, divination, and charms—into a form of nonconformity. Authorities framed witches as members of an organized, secret conspiracy allied with Satan and actively opposing God and Christian society.
By the 16th and 17th centuries, this false narrative fueled widespread panic, igniting witch trials across Europe then spreading to colonial America. This escalated into mass accusations, torture, and executions—despite the lack of evidence that such Satanic cults actually existed. Keep in mind, a century is one hundred years. We are currently in the 21st century, which means all of this began roughly 426 years ago in what we call the United states.
There is no credible historical evidence that witches, as a group, ever worshiped the Devil. The Satanic witch stereotype was a theological and political invention used to justify persecution during times of religious instability and social fear.
Returning to Elizabeth Jane Bradley
in hopes of giving her a better ending and giving my friend Kellie some realistic answers to her questions:
If we look closely and carefully, what we find is people's desire for scandal and drama. They wanted someone to blame for things they couldn’t explain—or to cover up true evil actions committed by people in power—or to maintain fear in order to push unwanted agendas onto the town. It could have been all of the above.
Medicine, Midwives, and Misunderstanding
During Elizabeth’s lifetime, women usually weren’t respected, records weren’t accurately kept, and as pharmaceutical and medical industries expanded, herbalists and midwives were often blamed for deaths or complications to distract people from systemic failures.
What we do know is this:
There isn’t a reliable documented list of named brothers for Elizabeth Jane Tilley, later she became a Bradley. What can be said with confidence is that she had at least one brother, and he was a preacher. He served at—or was closely connected to—the very church where Elizabeth is buried.
That detail alone matters.
Life, Death, and Accusation
Elizabeth lived in the mid to late 1800s, but medically, her world resembled medieval Europe.
There was no medical testing as we understand it today—no ultrasounds, no blood tests, no fetal monitoring, and no understanding of genetics. Germ theory existed late in her lifetime, but it wasn’t widely applied, especially in the mountains of Appalachia.
Births didn’t happen in hospitals. They happened at home. Doctors were expensive, and further away in most cases.
Midwives and experienced women assisted in deliveries using observation, experience, herbs, positioning, and generational knowledge—yet they were punished and given the title of witch in an evil sense.
The Pattern Repeats
Infant mortality in the 1800s was devastatingly high. Communities expected child death statistically, but emotionally, they still needed someone to blame.
And when science couldn’t provide answers, suspicion fell on the women closest to the suffering.
This is exactly what happened during the European witch trials.
Once someone was labeled a witch, facts suddenly became skewed and missing gaps in records were filled in with rumor.
A Necessary Woman, Not a Monster
So when we ask why Elizabeth Jane Bradley was called a witch, the answer isn’t because she practiced dark magic.
It’s because she lived in a world without medical answers, because she stood close to birth and death, because records were lost, and because history has a habit of turning misunderstood women into monsters.
She wasn’t dangerous. She was necessary.
A Personal Interpretation
What do you think really happened for Elizabeth Jane Bradley to become labeled as the Tilley Bend Witch?
I personally believe she was a midwife or general healer. This is my personal interpretation of her story. I hope it helps fill in the gaps and brings some closure.
Closing Thoughts
This is a huge part of what happened in the history of witches. This is Part One of the Witch History series.
To stay looped in send an email to ouruntamedroots@gmail.com say hi and that you would like to subscribe to the newsletters. This ensures you will receive the emails and they won't go to spam.
Rest in peace, Elizabeth Jane Bradley, from Kellie and myself.
If anyone has a witchy topic they would like covered send your request to ouruntamedroots@gmail.com and it will be added to the list for a possible future episode
Additional information/details about parts of this episode:
◇The church discussed in the case:
Tilley Bend Baptist Church, located in Blue Ridge, Georgia (Fannin County). Established around 1856/1858
6216 Old Dial Rd, Morganton, GA 30560
◇ What is mixed Creek Native?
When people say “a mixed Creek Native folk healer,” they’re describing someone with both Creek and European roots who used land-based, generational knowledge to help their community. This wasn’t formal medicine or witchcraft—it was practical care passed down through experience, at a time when doctors weren’t accessible.
REFERENCES/FOOTNOTES:
1. United States Census Bureau, Federal Population Census Schedules, 1850–1900, Georgia; indexed records accessed via FamilySearch and Ancestry.
2. Georgia Department of Public Health, Georgia Vital Records: Death Certificates, pre-1910 collections.
3. Georgia Archives, Criminal Case Indexes and Execution Records, 18th–19th centuries; see also James C. Bonner, “Capital Punishment in Georgia,” Georgia Historical Quarterly 42, no. 2 (1958): 101–120.
4. Friedman, Lawrence M., Crime and Punishment in American History (New York: Basic Books, 1993).
5. Georgia Historic Preservation Division, Cemetery Preservation and Relocation Reports, late 19th–early 20th century.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Historical Overview of Dam and Reservoir Construction in the Southeastern United States (Washington, DC).
7. United States Census Bureau, Federal Census, 1880 and 1900; Georgia marriage registers and death certificates accessed through FamilySearch.org.
8. Southern Methodist Episcopal Church, Circuit Preacher Registers, 19th century; fragmentary church abstracts compiled by the Georgia Historical Society.
9. James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (London: Macmillan, 1890).
10. Bronisław Malinowski, Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays (Boston: Beacon Press, 1948).
11. Marcel Mauss, A General Theory of Magic (London: Routledge, 2001; original lectures 1902–1903).
12. Encyclopedia Britannica, s.v. “Magic,” https://www.britannica.com�.
13. Encyclopedia Britannica, s.v. “Types of pMagic,” including productive, protective, and destructive magic.
14. Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “witch,” Old English wicce (f.) and wicca (m.).
15. Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller, An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898).
16. Ronald Hutton, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
17. Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe, 4th ed. (London: Routledge, 2016).
18. Jeffrey Burton Russell, The Devil: Perceptions of Evil from Antiquity to Primitive Christianity (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1977).
19. Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan (New York: Random House, 1995).
20. The Hebrew Bible, Book of Job 1–2; Numbers 22:22.
21. The New Testament, Gospel of Matthew 4; Gospel of John 12:31.
22. Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger, Malleus Maleficarum (1487), trans. Montague Summers (London: John Rodker, 1928).
23. Silvia Federici, Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation (New York: Autonomedia, 2004).
24. Irvine Loudon, Death in Childbirth: An International Study of Maternal Care and Maternal Mortality, 1800–1950 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992).
25. U.S. Census Bureau, Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1970, infant mortality tables.
26. Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English, Witches, Midwives, and Nurses: A History of Women Healers (New York: Feminist Press, 1973).
27. Philip J. Deloria and Neal Salisbury, eds., A Companion to American Indian History (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2002).
28. David S. Jones, Rationalizing Epidemics: Meanings and Uses of American Indian Mortality Since 1600 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004).
29. Russell Thornton, American Indian Holocaust and Survival: A Population History Since 1492 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1987).
30. Ronald Hutton, The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017).
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