How did they know the “Great Witch of Weare” was really a witch?

<< BEFORE: Mrs. Dustin rides to Whitefield …

I’m dating this story in the 1790s, since Amos W. Bailey was born in 1789 and was a “boy” when Mrs. Dustin was active in town.  Bailey would have related his memories to town historian William Little in the 1880s.  Little didn’t believe in the archaic superstitions of the early days, and seems in this passage to be recounting town history with a bit of a wink.  Your enlightened grin may perhaps fade a tad, when you consider the constant and merciless suspicion, cruelty, bullying, and exclusion that early settlers seem to have imposed on our Mrs. Dustin for any number of petty reasons and unrelated phenomena.