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Show BELIEVERS IN WITCHCRAFT. A Swedish Woman Tried for Be. witch in e Her Niece and Found . Guilty. The following particulars of the recent case of alleged witchcraft in Belgrade, this county, are vouched for by several leading citizens : Mrs. John Soloman has been sick for the past three years. She was attended for the first two years by reputable physicians but the present year, hearing of the witchcraft remedy ' in Sweden, Bhe wrote to parties in that country, and afterward sent a lock of her hair and a fragment of her clothing as requested, with' the amount of money called for by the witchcraft doctor. In response she received the information that her sickness was brought on by the manipulations of an old witch, who frequently came to her house. Thereupon There-upon she concluded that Mrs. Johnson, an aunt livins in Hebron, Nicollet county. who liad frequently visited her, must be the one, and she and her husband began to talk in public that Mrs. Johnson was the woman who had bewitched Mrs. Solo-man Solo-man and caused her long sickness. They received further information from the witchcraft doctor iri Sweden the Mrs. Soloman could only be cured by bringing" the woman publicly before the sick woman, wo-man, accusing her and slapping her on tli nnt.il her mouth bled. The Solomans then made complaint to the Swede preacher, A. Anderson, who ordered order-ed Mrs. Johnson brought up for trial. The trial took place after the service in the Swedish church on Sunday last, in the house of John Soloman, and in the presence of his sick wife, the preacher acting as judge and the deacon as jury, Mrs. Soloman testified thatthirteen years ago while riding in a wagon together, Mrs. Johnson touched her back and it tickled when she touched it, and that about three years ago, just before she was taken sick, Mrs. Johnson was visiting visit-ing at her house and while there she saw her take hold of the quilt on the bed, and ever since that she has felt that tickling in her back. - Charles Lind testified that he knew that Mrs. Soloman's disease was caused bv witchcraft. "Mr. John Peterson testified that she had seen the witches send the craft off, and had seen it fly in the air and strike the persons who were soon after taken sick. ' - Mrs. Johnson was found guilty, but at last accounts sentence had not been pronounced pro-nounced upon her. Another case somewhat similar happened hap-pened sometime ago in West Newton. A 3-year-old child of Joseph Belble was lost and could not be found, although 200 people peo-ple joined in the search. As a last resort the parents sought the aid of Minneapolis clairvoyants, and were informed that an aged couple knew pi its wnereaoouis. The parents and friends finally decided that the aged couple were Mr. and Mrs. Hokanson, Norwegians, who lived in Severance, Sibley county. One night Hokanson was called to the door by a man who wished to know the road to Stewart. As Hokanson stepped out he was seized by six masked men and placed in a wagon" Mrs. Hokanson was also thrown into the" wagon, although she wa3 only clad in her nightclothes. They drove a short distance andjstopped under a tree. A rope was thrown over a limb, and Hokanson was told that he must tell the whereabouts of the Belble child. Of course he would not tell, as he did not know. The six men then pulled the rope and he was drawn up and left hanging until nearly dead."- He was finally let down, and when he came to he. was again asked the question. . Four times did these men thu3 hang Mr. Holcanson, then they drove back to the house, where they left the aged couple, more dead than alive. The suspected parties were arrested, and several suits have followed. About a year ago the bones of the missing child were found in a marsh near the residence of its parents, where it had wandered and died. St. Teter (Jinn.) Correspondence New York Sun. |