spiriter

Noun

1. One who spirits away another, particularly one who steals children to be sold into forced labour in the New World.
   • When Jupiter, in shape of Eagle, Came the young stripling to inveigle, And seizing him like any Sparrow With his Beak holding his Tiara, To make him sure as swift as Hobby, He bare him into Heaven's Lobby; Whilst the...
   • Her name was Susan. She had no other, for she was a foundling. His father had told him she'd been kidnaped by spiriters, evil men who seized orphans and shipped them to the Colonies as bond servants. - 1955, Nancy...
   • Few people knew what sort of life they were going to, some were cruelly duped and quite a few at the beginning of the 18th century were the victims of 'spiriters'. - 1983, Frank Martin, Rogues' River, page 122:

   Hyponyms: abductor kidnapper

2. One who is sensitive to spirits; a medium or spiritualist.
   • The spiriters sit round and wait, and, after some time, the spiriter with the largest amount of faith feels a spirit. - 1869 September 22, Q, “Philosophical Essays”, in Humbug: A Weekly Illustrated Journal of Satire,...
   • And on the following day, he goes to the house of the Sûta (court-minstrel and chronicler), and prepares a barley pap for Varuna; for the Sûta is a spiriter (sava), and Varuna is the spiriter of the gods: therefore it...
   • If you ain't a ghost, then you must be one o' these here second-sighters that can see 'em - spiriters, I guess they call 'em. - 1933, Great American Short Stories, page 661: