Five decades after the Salem witchcraft trials, where over 200 people were accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusets, there was an outbreak of witchcraft in Abiquiu, New Mexico.
Dr. Rick Hendricks and Malcolm Ebright wrote a book titled, “The Witches of Abiquiu: The Governor, the Priest, the Genizaro Indians and the Devil,” based on a little-known event that took place in northern New Mexico in the eighteenth century. Hendricks served as the New Mexico State Historian from 2010 through 2019. Ebright is a historian, an attorney and director of the Center for Land Grant Studies.
The event developed into three distinct phases:
The first phase of the witchcraft activity in Abiquiu began in the summer of 1760. The governor of New Mexico, Francisco Antonio Marin del Valle, received word from the Franciscan friar, Juan Jose Toledo, that devil worshipers were preventing attempts to convert the Native people in Abiquiu to Christianity. They were sticking pins in dolls, using the evil eye, poisoning people, and forming pacts with the devil. There was a School of the Devil operating in Abiquiu run by a man known as “El Cojo” (the cripple).
The second phase began in the spring of 1763. A young Native by the name of Joaquinillo had bewitched a woman and made her ill. A witch hunt, similar to Salem’s, took place in Abiquiu. Authorities began to create lists of victims associated with each purported witch. In the documents the witch’s name appeared in one column and the list of his or her victims in a second column. The list of witches described dozens of local witches and an extensive network extending into central Mexico.
The third and final phase began in the summer of 1764 when the Inquisition became involved. By that date, the Inquisition was not very interested in witchcraft and that feared institution had no authority over Natives in any event. The Inquisition disputed the Devil’s involvement and suspected something might be wrong with the priest.
Join Dr. Rick Hendricks on Saturday, April 13 at 2:00 p.m. in the Gracie Lee Room at the Placitas Community Library located at 453 Hwy 165. This presentation is co-sponsored by the Historical Society of New Mexico.