The museum was founded by the English folk magician Cecil Williamson in 1951 to display his own personal collection of artefacts.

Its first location was at Windsor, Berkshire, and the next at Bourton-on-the-Water, Gloucestershire; in both cases it faced violent opposition and Williamson felt it necessary to move, establishing the museum in Boscastle in 1960.

After the Second World War, the former film producer Cecil Williamson decided to move into the museum business, and—probably influenced by personal interest—decided to open one that would be devoted to the subject of witchcraft.

[1] Williamson tried to open a museum to hold his collection of witchcraft and occult artifacts in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1947, but faced local opposition and had to abandon his plans.

[1] He then decided to open it in Castletown on the Isle of Man, an area which had much folklore surrounding fairies and witches, a tourist season, and local laws that were congenial to the establishment of a museum.

[1] In an interview with The Sunday Pictorial newspaper, Williamson claimed to be friends with at least a dozen witches, and that he had invited a coven from southern England to come and practice their rituals at his museum.

[1] The historian Ronald Hutton deemed this to "fairly clearly" be a reference to the Bricket Wood coven which was based in Hertfordshire and run by the Wiccan Gerald Gardner.

[2] Williamson also had a practical interest in magic, and in a 1952 interview with popular magazine Illustrated described himself as a consultant on the subject who could help remove curses from people, akin to an old cunning man.

Ripley's Entertainment Inc. bought the collection and in 1972 opened the "Museum of Witchcraft and Magic" at Gatlinburg, TN and San Francisco, CA.

The museum suffered various persecutions, including signs being painted on walls and dead cats hung from trees, and eventually it was largely damaged in an arson attack.

[7] A practising Pagan with interests in witchcraft, King owned a business manufacturing specialist cameras in Hampshire when he discovered that the museum was for sale in a newspaper article.

[7] King and Crow reorganised the museum and removed some of the more sensationalist exhibits, such as a partially clothed female mannequin which had been laid on an altar to represent the Black Mass.

[citation needed] He organised the burial of Joan Wytte, a woman who died in Bodmin Jail under accusations of witchcraft in 1813, and whose corpse had been at the museum for many years.

[12] It contained contributions from 51 individuals involved in the esoteric and Pagan communities, including prominent figures like Ronald Hutton, Philip Heselton, Patricia Crowther, and Marian Green.

[12] Reviewed by Pagan studies scholar Ethan Doyle White in The Pomegranate journal, he welcomed the volume yet described its contents as a "mixed bag, with the articles varying in their quality and relevance to the subject at hand.

[8] According to the anthropologist Helen Cornish, the exhibits in the museum "work to build narratives that illustrate witchcraft over time, and situate it as a significant force in the present".

"[15] Various practitioners interviewed by Cornish were sceptical about the claims that Williamson had made for many of the artefacts which he placed on exhibit, questioning whether there was sufficient evidence to warrant their continued display.