Mina I.

Gomez Thursday 06,2007

Salem Witch Trials

This paper will discuss the events related to Salem Witch Trials. The historical, and social

factors, which contributed to those events. This research is aimed to prove that there were several

reasons for persecution of Salem witches such as the desire of New England clergy to create true

Christian church, the assertion of male power, superstitious beliefs of people and their inability

to explain natural phenomena, and slow development in the field of medicine and incapability to

determine causes of certain illnesses.

Three hundred years ago, the people in and around Salem, Massachusetts were engaged in the

most massive witch-hunt in American history. Authorities arrested over 150 suspects from more

than two- dozen towns, juries convicted twenty-eight, and nineteen were hanged.

Contemporaries of the tragedy grappled with Satan's role in the affair. Embracing the reality of

witchcraft, many wondered if the Devil had not manipulated the people of New England into an

orgy of destructive accusations. With the passing of the participants, researchers began to

discount a satanic role and sought instead to assign blame to human agents for the tragedy.

In the seventeenth century people automatically assumed that their difficulties had a

supernatural explanation. Floods, thunder, lightning, hailstorms, hurricanes, earthquakes, and

comets were considered the harbingers of illness or destruction. Curses, spells, and the evil eye,

most believed, could cause harm. Reports of strange dreams, visions, unseen voices, and

prophecies circulated frequently. In England, practitioners of magic, men and women who

sought to manipulate supernatural powers, abounded. Rich and poor alike consulted cunning folk

to recover lost property, to discover a cure for illness, for help in finding missing family

members or livestock, for advice in making personal and business decisions, or to identify

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witches. New Englanders were engaged in fortunetelling; carefully read almanacs for

astronomical data essential to the practice of astrology; read about and pursued the mysteries of

alchemy; and a few boasted about their knowledge of the occult.

Religious and secular authorities in Catholic and Protestant regions grew concerned about an

organized cult of witches. In 1484, Pope Innocent VIII issued a bull condemning witchcraft as

heresy, the exercise of supernatural powers obtained through a demonic pact. Two years later,

with papal approval, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger, Dominican inquisitors, published the

Malleus Maleficarum also known as The Hammer of Witches, the first major treatise on

witchcraft beliefs. By the early seventeenth century, works on witchcraft beliefs collectively

offered a picture of a secret society of Devil-worshiping witches. Despite the efforts of writers

like Margaret Murray, Montague Summers, and Jeffrey B. Russell to prove the existence of such

cults, recent scholarship has demonstrated that no organized society of witches ever developed.

Women comprised almost eighty percent of those accused, making gender the most

significant characteristic. Approximately half of the males accused had direct involvement with

accused women as friends, supporters, or kin. Karlsen concluded "most witches in New England

were middle-aged or old women eligible for inheritances because they had no brothers or sons."

They stood in the way of the orderly transmission of property from one generation of males to

another." As land became scarcer in the more settled communities, men began to resent these

women who had access to it through a demographic accident. The resentment was expressed in

witchcraft accusations. "Whether as actual or potential inheritors of property, as healers or

tavern-keepers or merchants," Karlsen argued, "most accused witches were women

who symbolized the obstacles to property and prosperity."

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 Between the months of June to September of 1692, the infamous witch trials in Salem,

Massachusetts resulted in the deaths of twenty men and women as a result of witchcraft charges.

Hundreds of others faced accusations and dozens were jailed for months during the progress of

the trials. There are an infinite number of explanations for the hysteria that overtook the Puritan

population of Salem. For example, a combination of economics, religious temperaments,

personal rivalries, and precocious imaginations added to the furor. Significantly, a book

published by Cotton Mathers in 1689, “Memorable Providences Relating to Witchcraft and

Possessions” also contributed to instigating the events.

Many of the accused witches shared unsavory reputations. Some were known for their

contentious behavior. During Elizabeth Morse's trial, several witnesses testified to heated

confrontations with her. Like Morse, the accused often revealed special healing powers. It had

become commonplace by the late seventeenth century for people to suspect spiteful, poor, older

women of being witches. A witness of a witch hunt in Chelmsford, England, contended that

villagers had come to suspect "every old woman with a wrinkled face, a furred brow, a hairy lip,

a squint eye, a squeaking voice, or a scolding tongue, a skull cap on her head, a spindle in her

hand, a dog or cat by her side."

Superstition and witchcraft resulted in many being hanged or in prison. In the seventeenth

century, a belief in witches and witchcraft was almost universal. In Salem Massachusetts where

the witch trials took place many people who were suspicious and accused of witchcraft were

hanged. The Salem witch trials change many people’s lives and even led to death for some. The

power of superstition and hearsay can distort from the truth.

During February of 1692, a young Salem woman named Betty Parris became “strangely” ill.

Her symptoms included wildly running around, diving under furniture, contorting in pain, and

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complaining of fever. At this time, the Puritan writer Cotton Mather had already published what

was a popular and widely read book, "Memorable Providences.” In the book he describes an

incident of witchcraft in Boston, and Betty Parris' behavior was quickly interpreted in the

contexts of Mather’s account of the Boston “witch.” The talk of witchcraft escalated when other

local girls, including eleven-year-old Ann Putnam, seventeen-year-old Mercy Lewis, and Mary

Walcott, began to demonstrate similar symptoms of unusual behavior. A doctor was called to

examine the girls, and he suggested that the girls' problems might have a “supernatural origin.”

In many ways, the doctor’s inability to diagnose the medical nature of the problems increased the

widespread acceptance that witches were involved. The number of girls affected continued to

increase and a local West Indian slave girl, Tituba, was targeted because she had been known for

speaking of her native folklore, which involved stories of black magic and witchcraft.

The arrest warrants were issued in February 1692 and the trials actually began in June of that

same year. When Tituba, one of the first arrested, admitted she was a witch and named other

accomplices, any skepticism that may have existed was overwhelmed by the desire to “hunt” for

more witches.

At this time Cotton Mather was a minister of Boston 's Old North church, and a true believer

in witchcraft. He had investigated the strange behavior of four children of a Boston mason

named John Goodwin. The children had been complaining of sudden pains and crying out

together in chorus. Mather concluded that witchcraft, specifically that practiced by an Irish

washerwoman who had yelled at the children Mary Glover, was responsible for the children's

problems. Publishing his conclusions in one of the best known of his 382 works, "Memorable

Providence." Mather vowed to never use but one grain of patience with any man that shall go to

impose upon me a Denial of Devils, or of Witches.

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 His subsequent influence in Salem is significant. A new court was created for trials in the

witch-cases and five judges were appointed, three were close friends with him. Additionally,

Mather’s own narrative became textual fact for determining the evidence of witches. This

played easily into the court’s agenda. Mather himself urged the judges to seek confessions from

the accused, accepting claims such as “spectral evidence” as legal testimony. He enabled the

townspeople of Salem to interpret any kind of social behavior as potentially that of a witch.

It was Mather who urged the judges to consider “spectral evidence,” and to consider the

confessions of witches the best evidence of all. As the trials progressed, and growing numbers of

people confessed to being witches, Mather became firmly convinced that an Army of Devils had

horribly broke in upon the place. On August 4, 1692, Mather delivered a sermon warning that

the Last Judgment was near at hand, and portrayed himself among those leading the final charge

against the Devil’s legions.

Almost as quickly as it started, the Salem trials ended. As Weisman indicates, no execution

caused more unease in Salem than that of the village's ex-minister, George Burroughs.

Burroughs, was identified by several of his accusers as the ringleader of the witches. When

Burroughs found himself on Gallows Hill, where so many had already been hanged, he began to

recite the Lord’s Prayer aloud. In attendance was Cotton Mather, who was forced to interrupt the

hanging, as he himself had recorded that any witch was incapable of reciting religious prayers.

By September of 1692, doubts were developing as to how so many townspeople could possibly

be guilty. Reverend John Hale said, " It cannot be imagined that in a place of so much

knowledge, so many in so small compass of land should abominably leap into the Devil's lap at

once.

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 Increase Mather father of Cotton Mather, urged the court to exclude his son’s assertions of

spectral evidence. He said that “it was better that ten suspected witches should escape than one

innocent person should be condemned.” Judges and jurors who had participated in the witch

trials began issuing apologies for their lack of judgment and, by the end of 1692, all the accused

who were still awaiting trials were released ending the witch hunts, the accusations, and any

evidence of witches in Salem.

It is clear from the historical accounts of this time period that the influence of social hysteria

perpetuated the witch trials. However, what remains largely contestable is any certainty as to

what started the witch trials and what inspired the confession of Tituba. As with much of Puritan

history, it is only in the texts of white male religious rules that information can be gleaned to be

truthful.

There are no completely satisfactory explanations for the preponderance of women among the

accused. They obviously lived in a male-dominated culture. Men held political and religious

power, controlled most property, and were the acknowledged heads of households. Such

circumstances make it tempting to view the accused as women who challenged "prescribed

gender arrangements." This would make them the targets of a misogynist culture unwilling to

tolerate females who were assertive, economically independent, or reluctant to defer to men; in

short, individuals who had refused to accept their place in the traditional social order.

The Salem Witch Trials are one of the saddest pages in the history of America. The

immigrants of New England who brought the occult beliefs with them, sought to create a society

of closely knit Christian villages with a strong sense of communal responsibility. Inspired by the

belief that they were on a mission for God to preserve the true church, these committed

immigrants eagerly pursued the task of establishing a Christian utopia. God, they believed, had

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entered into a covenant with man to save his predestined elect status. One of the possible causes

of the massive witch-hunt was the desire of people to establish the true Christian church and

emphasize their special place in cosmos destroying those whose behavior was somewhat

different from traditional Christian beliefs. As it was mentioned earlier in this paper, some

witches had fortunetelling and healing skills. Also, some of them were old and ill and could not

attend church, and some women were unfaithful to their husbands. This fact contradicts the

normal Christian values set by the church.

There are other reasons like the desire of men to preserve their dominant status in the society.

As stated earlier, the majority of those accused were women. Women could strengthen their

status in society by inheriting property and gaining economic prosperity. The lack of knowledge

in the field of medicine was another reason of the witch-hunts. The doctors who were not able to

explain the origin of illness could not admit their incompetence and ruin their reputation so they

simply stated that witchcraft caused the illness. The Salem farmers suffered from unfavorable

weather conditions and could not find scientific factors to explain them so they also blamed it on

witchcraft. There are various interpretations of the persecution of witches in the seventeenth

century and we can certainly state that these women were innocent victims of an ignorant

society.

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 Works Cited

Aronson, Marc. Witch-Hunt: Mysteries of the Salem Witch Trials. Atheneum: New York. 2003.

Boyer, Paul & Nissenbaum, Stephen. Salem Possessed: The Social Origins of Witchcraft.

Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA. 1974.

Boyer, Paul & Nissenbaum, Stephen, Eds. Salem-Village Witchcraft: A Documentary Record of

Local Conflict in Colonial New England. Northeastern University Press: Boston, MA. 1972.

Breslaw, Elaine G. Tituba, Reluctant Witch of Salem: Devilish Indians and Puritan Fantasies.

NYU: New York. 1996.

Brown, David C. A Guide to the Salem Witchcraft Hysteria of 1692. David C. Brown:

Washington Crossing, PA. 1984.

Demos, John. Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England. New York:

Oxford University Press, 1982.

Godbeer, Richard. The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England.

Cambridge University Press: New York. 1992.

Karlsen, Carol F. The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England.

New York: Vintage, 1987.

Norton, Mary Beth. In the Devil's Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692. New York:

Random House, 2002.

Reis, Elizabeth. Damned Women: Sinners and Witches in Puritan New England. Cornell

University Press: Ithaca, NY. 1997.

Robinson, Enders A. The Devil Discovered: Salem Witchcraft 1692. Hippocrene: New York.

1991.

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Rosenthal, Bernard. Salem Story: Reading the Witch Trials of 1692. Cambridge University

Press: New York. 1993.

Trask, Richard B. `The Devil hath been raised`: A Documentary History of the Salem Village

Witchcraft Outbreak of March 1692. Revised edition. Yeoman Press: Danvers, MA. 1997

Weisman, Richard. Witchcraft, Magic, and Religion in 17th-Century Massachusetts. University

of Massachusetts Press: Amherst, MA. 1984.