Apr 22: SENT TO JAIL: the flamboyant Sarah Wilds and the pious Mary Esty

Today in Salem: It’s 10:00 in the morning, but inside the Meeting House it’s dark, with so many people sitting on the windowsills that the light can’t get through. Nine people were arrested yesterday, and between the witnesses, accusers, family members, magistrates, and ministers the Meeting House is overflowing.

Rev Parris squints as he takes notes in the dim light. Six of the prisoners are quickly examined and sent to jail for future trials: a wealthy merchant’s wife, a slave, the wild child Abigail Hobbs’s parents, the unruly Bridget Bishop’s son and daughter-in-law. And one man is set free when he’s brought outside where the afflicted girls can see him better.

Things slow down, though, when the flamboyant Sarah Wilds sashays in. She’s 65 and married, but she’s always been glamorous and outspoken, and has spent her entire life leaving a trail of scandals in her wake. She’s been whipped for fornication, brought to court for wearing a silk scarf, and accused of witchcraft for years. Nothing fazes her, and now the afflicted girls launch into spectacular convulsions.

“What do you say to this?” the magistrate asks. “Are you guilty or not?”

“I am not guilty, sir,” she says. The magistrate is incredulous. Has she allowed the Devil to use her specter to hurt the girls? No? How can she deny what everyone can see?

The magistrates send her to jail for future trial. As she’s led away, one of the constables catches her eye and looks especially uncomfortable: he is her son, and he knows she’s innocent. But what does that mean about the other women?


The crowd is silent when the pious Mary Esty enters the room. She’s the exact opposite of Sarah Wilds. How can both of them be guilty of the same thing? Like her sisters, the beloved Rebecca Nurse & nervous Sarah Cloyce, Mary is esteemed and well-liked. The afflicted girls, though, are as wracked and convulsing as ever.

“How far have you complied with Satan whereby he takes this advantage of you?” the magistrates ask.

“Sir, I never complied, but prayed against him all my days. I will say it, if it was my last time—I am clear of this sin.”

She’s so insistent on her innocence that the magistrates press the girls to be sure the specter they’ve seen belongs to Mary. They’re certain though, and they continue their fits until the judges commit Mary to prison.


WHO was Sarah Wilds?

SARAH WILDS – Age 65. Sarah was bold, and in her younger years even a little glamorous. At age 22 she was whipped for fornication. In her mid-30’s she was charged with wearing a silk scarf (considered to be above her station; an offense to the Puritans).

Like many accused people, Sarah and her family had been part of several feuds and scandals. When her husband’s 1st wife died, he married Sarah within months – a scandalous insult to the 1st wife’s family, who accused Sarah of witchcraft early and often. Two of her stepsons had died; one mysteriously, and the other of depression or possession. And unexplained illnesses and deaths seemed to follow her arguments with neighbors. She was an outspoken non-conformist, which may have made her an easy target. Case files: Sarah Wilds

WHO was Mary Esty?

Age 58, née Towne. Sister of Rebecca Nurse and Sarah Cloyce. Married to Isaac Esty, with whom she had 11 children. Mary’s mother had long ago been suspected of witchcraft. Despite her piety, with the arrest and indictment of 2 of her sisters, it was no surprise that she was also caught up in it. Case files: Mary Esty

Mary Esty’s descendants include baseball great Ty Cobb.


LEARN MORE: Why would someone be whipped for wearing a silk scarf? What did it mean to dress “above one’s station,” and why was that bad?

Today we think of Puritans as wearing all black, with the women in tight white caps and even the children in mournful gray clothing. While that was somewhat true in the earliest Puritan colonies, 50 years had passed by the time of the Trials, and Puritan standards had loosened.

That said, they weren’t exactly ready for powdered wigs and waistcoats. In fact, men were forbidden to wear periwigs, with one Salem Trial judge calling them “Horrid Bushes of Vanity.” With the exception of the ministry, magistrates, and others in the upper-class, men’s hair was expected to be very short, not over the neck, the band, or the doublet collar. In the winter it might be allowed to grow a little below the ear for warmth. Facial hair was verboten; in fact, even 80 years later, not a single man who signed the Declaration of Independence had facial hair.

As for women’s hair, Cotton Mather’s father preached “Will not the haughty daughters of Zion refrain their pride in apparel? Will they lay out their hair, and wear false locks, their borders, their towers like comets about their heads?” Another clergyman called these women “Apes of Fancy, friziling and curlying of their hair.”

Puritan woman
Puritan colors

Of course, hair wasn’t the only object of the Puritan fashion police. Clothing was also regulated, for both sexes. Again with the exceptions of ministers and magistrates, men and women were expected to wear only “sadd” (serious) colors. This did not include the black clothing that we often associate with Puritans. Black was too bold, requiring scarce black dye and care that it not fade. Instead, Puritans wore subdued colors like russet, rust, purple, gray-green, dark green, and dark gray-brown. Shades of blue were usually reserved for servants and slaves.

King Charles I of England in his great boots and slashed sleeves

Higher class Puritans like magistrates, or those with a net worth higher than £200, were exempt from the laws. Poorer people who dressed like them were seen as greedy and envious, and sometimes liars — all punishable offenses.

Finally, clothing was not just about color. It was also about fabric, and cut, and design, especially for women. “Sumptuary laws” were very common throughout Europe and the colonies, and were meant to control behavior and distinguish the high classes from the lower ones. For the Puritans, the laws also implied morality. Dressing in a simple manner meant embracing modesty and simplicity, and rejecting the sins of pride, greed, and envy. Dressing extravagantly was wasteful and unseemly. For example, in Europe slashed sleeves revealed expensive undergarments that flaunted the wealth of the wearer. So the Puritans outlawed sleeves with more than one slash. Also out: lace, silk, gold and silver thread, any embroidery or needlework, scarves, and bright buttons, shoes with heels, leather great boots, and so much more.


Tomorrow in Salem: Newly accused: the former constable John Willards

Apr 21: Two wheels and nine arrests

Today in Salem: The powerful Thomas Putnam is shaking the cramp out of his hand, trying to write quickly with a scratching quill that’s leaving ink blots in its wake. The specter of Rev George Burroughs had tormented Ann last night, and bragged that he was more than a witch or wizard, that he could do the Devil’s work for him. The bitter, former minister of Salem Village has a vendetta against the Village, especially the Putnam family, and now he has the power to inflict great harm. This witchcraft threat is bigger and more complicated than anyone had realized, and the magistrates need to know.

arrest warrant
The warrant for the arrest of nine people, signed on April 21, 1692

“After most humble and hearty thanks,” Putnam writes, “for the great care and pains you have already taken for us … we thought it our duty to inform your Honors of what we conceive you have not heard, which are high and dreadful: of a wheel within a wheel, at which our ears do tingle …”

In another part of Salem, the cruel magistrate John Hathorne writes an arrest warrant in a slow and deliberate hand, then signs it with a flourish before giving it to the Marshall and “any or all constables in Salem or Topsfield or any other Towne.” They are to arrest nine people and bring them to Ingersoll’s Ordinary tomorrow morning for examinations. The Marshall doesn’t speak; he just looks at the paper and then at the judges. There are already 14 people in jail, and some have been moved to Boston due to overcrowding. Where will they put nine more?


In the Salem jail, Mary Warren has now spent two nights sleeping on the jail cell floor, and she’s bleary-eyed when the judges come to question her again. She’s been evasive for weeks. First she was afflicted, then she was suddenly cured when her masters beat her, then she said the other girls were lying, then the girls accused her of being a witch herself, then she almost confessed, and now she’s re-joined them and is afflicted again. What’s the truth?

The judges show her a large Bible. ”Is this like the book you signed?” they ask. ”Was it a Bible that your master handed you?” Mary says that it was the Devil’s book she’d seen, but she didn’t know it until she held it. And she didn’t sign it, not really. She just made a mark, accidentally.

The judges pounce. Wrong! It’s impossible to afflict others unless you sign the Devil’s book on purpose. But Mary is steadfast. Her masters, the Proctors, tortured her, she said, threatened to drown her, or burn her with hot tongs. They forced her to leave her mark. The judges step back. Once again they are unsure, and once again they leave her in jail.


LEARN MORE: What is a wheel within a wheel?

Thomas Putnam’s letter is referring to the Bible’s book of Ezekiel.

Ezekiel was a prophet who had a vision of a wheel within a wheel, and with rims that were high and dreadful. People have been trying to understand this vision for 2600 years, but it’s generally thought to mean that God was angry with Jerusalem, and as punishment would allow it to be destroyed (with the promise of rebuilding).

The phrase “wheels within wheels” is also used to describe a situation that’s complicated and affected by secret influences.

illustration of biblical vision of wheels
Engraved illustration of the “chariot vision” of the Biblical book of Ezekiel, chapter 1, after an earlier illustration by Matthaeus (Matthäus) Merian (1593-1650)

Tomorrow in Salem: SENT TO JAIL: the flamboyant Sarah Wilds and the pious Mary Esty

Apr 20: A minister works for the Devil, and the servant Mary Warren’s story changes again

Today in Salem: A stunned silence has descended on Salem since yesterday’s court appearances. It’s enough that the wild child Abigail Hobbs has confessed to being a witch. But the Devil had recruited her in Maine. And she was accused by someone who used to know her there – the servant and war refugee Mercy Lewis. Just how far afield is the Devil working?

man's shadow

Mercy is a servant in the Putnam family, and has often told stories about the wild child she knew in Maine. So 13-year-old Ann Putnam, the afflicted girls’ leader, has heard all about Abigail’s dangerous behavior. But she’s also heard stories about the minister there, Reverend George Burroughs.

The Putnam family remembers Burroughs well. He’d been the minister in Salem Village until 9 years ago, when the Village stopped paying him and the Putnams had him arrested for an unpaid debt. He’d left for Maine with bitterness on all sides, and has been ministering to a flock that, until recently, included Abigail Hobbs and Mercy Lewis.

This very night, Rev Burroughs’ specter attacks Ann Putnam, and her visions electrify her family. “A minister?” she shouts. ”Recruiting children’s souls for Satan?” The specter boasts that he’s the one who recruited the wild child Abigail Hobbs, not the Devil. Burroughs is more powerful than any witch or wizard. The Putnams are not surprised.


In Salem jail, the Proctors’ servant Mary Warren is picking dirty straw from her hair. Yesterday she’d fainted in terror during the court hearing, but now, after sleeping on the floor of the jail cell for the night, she’s had a chance to think about which side she’s on: afflicted, or accused.

The two magistrates keep their arms crossed when they question her. She did call the afflicted girls liars, she says, but the Devil had forced her to. And yes, she did sign the Devil’s book. But she didn’t know that’s what it was. Her master John Proctor (who was in jail himself) had just handed it to her. In fact, Mary says, it’s impossible for her to be a witch, because she’s still afflicted herself. Why, just last night she was visited by the specter of the cantankerous Giles Corey.

Mary chokes on Giles’s name and falls to the floor, gasping and crying, then describes exactly what the specter was wearing. The magistrates send for Corey, who’s in his own jail cell, but no sooner does Mary see him than she convulses again. The real Giles Corey, as all can see, is dressed exactly as Mary had said. Of course, they’d been in court together yesterday. And he’s wearing the same clothes now. But surely he could have found a way to change his clothes since then?

The magistrates just look at each other and turn to the wild child Abigail Hobbs. She fully confessed yesterday, but gives them a few more details about the specters she’s seen and who she herself has tormented. It’s enough to make the trip worth it for the magistrates. But they’re still not sure about Mary’s changing story, and they leave her to spend another night on the jail cell floor.


WHO was George Burroughs?

Age about 42. George Burroughs was the minister of Salem Village until 9 years before the Trials began. He lived in Maine when he was accused of witchcraft, but the people of the Village remembered him well. They’d been dissatisfied with him as the minister, and refused to pay him. So when his wife died suddenly, he had to borrow money to pay for her funeral. With no salary, Burroughs couldn’t repay the debt, so he resigned and left, which would come back to haunt him.

The court ordered them to settle their differences, and the Village agreed to pay him everything it owed, minus the amount of his debt. But when Burroughs arrived with the paperwork, he was arrested instead. Eventually the case was dropped, and the Village paid Burroughs some of what they owed. But it left bitterness for everyone involved. So when he was accused of witchcraft, there was already animosity on both sides.

Burroughs landed in Falmouth, Maine (now Portland), where he lived when an Indian attack destroyed the settlement. It was here that Burroughs met the families of Mercy Lewis and Abigail Hobbs. The attack drove the Hobbs family to Salem. But the Lewis family was killed, so he took Mercy in as a servant for a time, before sending her to another unknown family, and then eventually to Salem. He himself then moved further south to Wells, Maine, where he lived at the time of the accusation.

Burroughs’ history with Salem Village was troublesome enough. But people also suspected his physical traits. He was dark-skinned, very short, and muscular. He was also much stronger than he looked, even preternaturally so. His trial included testimony from people who’d heard that he could lift a 7-foot musket by inserting one finger into the barrel, then raising it to arm’s length. It was also said that he could “take up a full barrll of molasses wth butt two fingers of one of his hands in the bung and carry itt from ye stage head to the door att the end of the stage wth out letting itt downe.” Case files: George Burroughs

George Burroughs’ descendants include Walt Disney.


Tomorrow in Salem: Two wheels and nine arrests

Apr 19: A storm of accusations

Today in Salem: The normally cantankerous Giles Corey is swaying in front of the judges, his hands tied, bewildered. Prophesies? Suicide? He was just arrested yesterday afternoon, not knowing why he’s been accused. Now the cruel magistrate Hathorne is leaning in, relentless in his questions.

wheat field

Just last week, Giles had helped escort his gospel woman wife Martha from the jail in Salem to Boston, and promised to visit her next week. Now the judges want to know: Was he really just promising a simple visit? Or was he prophesying his own arrest? Does he realize that prophesies are a kind of magic? Giles protests, saying he’d run out of money for the ferry and was just telling his wife goodbye.

More important, several witnesses testify they’ve heard Giles say he’s tempted to do away with himself. The judges remind him that self-murder is a much greater sin than witchcraft. If Giles is willing to take his own life, wouldn’t he be even more willing to practice witchcraft? Giles denies everything.

The afflicted girls writhe and convulse as usual through more questions about his wife’s criticisms, his lame ox, and what was that ointment Martha had in their house? The judges send Giles to jail to wait for trial.


rainbow trees

Giles had been arrested with three other people, and now the judges turn their attention to the wild child Abigail Hobbs. The afflicted girls are suddenly quiet, staying calm throughout her examination.

“I have been very wicked,” Abigail says. “I hope I shall be better, if God will help me.” She goes on to admit to everything: signing the Devil’s book, using her specter to hurt the girls, and – most alarmingly – that this began in faraway Maine. The Devil has been operating on a far grander scale than the judges and ministers of Salem had realized. This would change everything. (What the judges don’t know is that Abigail’s statement today will set off a chain of events that, by tomorrow night, will link the witches’ and the Wabanakis’ assaults on New England. During the next seven weeks, fifty-four people will be formally accused of witchcraft, a sharp increase from the ten who’d been complained against in the seven weeks that ended two days ago.)

With the slave Tituba and the 4-year-old Dorcas Good, Abigail Hobbs becomes the third person to confess to witchcraft, and is sent to jail.


cat with shadows

When the third prisoner, the Proctors’ servant Mary Warren, approaches the bar, the afflicted girls – her former friends – are so violently seized that only one of them can speak.

Everyone in the Village knows the story: Mary had been afflicted herself, but soon was cured. Then she said the other girls were lying, and now the girls have turned around and accused her of witchcraft.

How is this possible? The judges demand an answer. How can Mary be afflicted, then an afflicter? She must have been a witch the entire time. Mary crumples to the floor, trying to confess through gritted teeth. The afflicted girls say that specters are trying to prevent Mary from confessing, and her distress is so acute that the judges send her away to recover before they ask more questions.


dying flower

Finally, the unruly Bridget Bishop approaches the bar. If Giles was bewildered, Abigail forthcoming, and Mary paralyzed with fear, Bridget is nothing short of exasperated. She rolls her eyes when the girls convulse, which only makes things worse.

“I am innocent to a witch,” she says. “I know not what a witch is.” But the judges turn it back on her. If she doesn’t even know what a witch is, how does she know she isn’t one? After more shrieking and accusations from the girls, Bridget is sent back to jail to wait for future trial.


Tomorrow in Salem: A minister works for the Devil, and the servant Mary Warren’s story changes again

Apr 18: Summary: This WEEK in Salem

Things are about to get real in Salem. Need to catch up? Here’s a snapshot of where we are.

SUMMARY

Four people are accused but still free, and ten people are in jail, some of them in Boston because it’s so crowded in the Salem jail.

With the jails so crowded and more accusations rolling in, the judges are becoming even more alarmed. They cannot start trials and clear the jails until the governor returns.


WHAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK

The constable’s two-month-old baby died, his first and only child, and he and his wife are heartbroken. Why did this terrible thing happen? He can only think of one possible cause: he’d said he wasn’t surprised that the nervous Sarah Cloyce and her sister, the beloved Rebecca Nurse, were witches. Their specters must have wreaked revenge.

Three more people were accused: the Proctors’ servant Mary Warren, who used to be afflicted and has now called the other girls liars. Those same girls have now accused her.

The unruly Bridget Bishop was also accused. She’s disliked and disreputable, and has been in and out of court for fighting with her husband and stealing brass, among other things.

Last, we’ve met the wild child Abigail Hobbs, who’s 15, wanders through the woods at night, and claims she’s made a pact with the Devil. She’s also been accused.

WHO’S WHERE

Accused

NEW – Bridget Bishop – an unruly woman who’s been in and out of court for years

NEW – Abigail Hobbs – a wild child who wanders through the woods at night, disobeys her parents, and claims she’s made a pact with the Devil

NEW – Mary Warren – the Proctors’ servant, who’s been afflicted, cured, and is now accused

Giles Corey (cantankerous) – the gospel woman Martha Corey’s husband

Arrested

(No one new)

In Jail (10 people)

Sarah Cloyce (nervous) – Rebecca Nurse’s younger sister. She’d stormed out of church, which sparked people to question whether innocent people were being accused.

Elizabeth Proctor (quarrelsome) – an opinionated tavern owner, married to the respected but harsh John Proctor

John Proctor (harsh) – a farmer and tavern owner, opinionated and sometimes overbearing, but respected

Martha Corey (gospel woman) – a slightly arrogant church member

Dorcas Good (4 years old) – the daughter of the beggar Sarah Good

Sarah Good (beggar) with her baby – a vagrant who smokes a pipe and has a terrible temper

Rebecca Nurse (beloved) – a 70-year-old grandmother who is well-loved throughout the community

Sarah Osborne (sickly) – a scandal-ridden woman who married her servant and is trying to take her sons’ inheritance

Tituba (slave) – the minister’s slave who was the first to be accused and the first to confess

A woman in a nearby town, where the affliction has spread.

Tried & sentenced

(No one … yet)

Died

(No one … yet)


Tomorrow in Salem: A storm of accusations

Apr 17: The wild child Abigail Hobbs

Today in Salem: The forest floor is thick with pine needles, cushioning her steps and releasing their fragrance as she walks silently between the trees. Heel toe, heel toe she thinks, moving slowly to avoid any twigs or stones that could snap or slide and give her presence away. Abigail Hobbs likes the idea of being a ghost, gliding through the forest undetected, able to vanish like that.

Her brother has taught her this, how to weave through the woods as silently as an Indian, leaving no footsteps or tracks behind. During the day she practices, looking down at her feet and closing her eyes, memorizing the forest path she’s created. At night she re-traces her steps, walking deeper and deeper into the dark woods, sometimes for hours before returning home.

She began wandering the woods when she was much younger, when they lived in Maine and the woods were thick with Wabanaki Indians ready to attack. Now she’s 15 and living near Salem, but she’s even more brazen, sometimes spending the night in the woods and not coming home until late the next day.

Abigail’s parents have given up on taming her. When they try, she talks back boldly, and she’s earned a reputation of being rude and disrespectful. And when her friends ask why she isn’t afraid to be in the woods, especially at night, Abigail says she’s sold her body and soul to him. She isn’t afraid of anything, she says. She’s made a deal with the Devil.

Now it’s catching up to her. Today it’s the Sabbath, and the afflicted girls can’t stop squirming and scratching and whispering. It’s no surprise to anyone when, after the Meeting, the girls say Abigail’s specter is tormenting them. The only question is why it took so long


WHO was Abigail Hobbs?

Abigail Hobbs’s mark

Age 15. Abigail and her family were from Maine, where Indian attacks had decimated the English settlements. It was here that she began wandering the woods at night. When her family, neighbors, and friends asked why she wasn’t afraid of being attacked, she said she “sold her selfe boddy & Soull to the old boy” and has “seen the divell and . . . made a covenant or bargin with him.”

When life in Maine became too dangerous, the Hobbs family moved to Topsfield, Massachusetts, which is next to Salem. Abigail continued roaming the woods at night, and developed a reputation of being rude and disrespectful to her parents. She even sprinkled water in her stepmother’s face in a mock baptism, and openly defied her parents in public.

Even though she was a teenager, no one was surprised when Abigail was finally accused of witchcraft. But, like some of the other accused, she soon realized that the best way to avoid being hanged was to confess and accuse others of witchcraft. It was only a delay, though, and eventually her execution was scheduled. She got lucky again, though, when the governor paused the trials and signed a reprieve for her and others.

Later, when Abigail was 32, she married Andrew Senter and had at least two sons, Andrew and Thomas. We don’t know how long she lived after that. Case files: Abigail Hobbs


READ MORE: Who were the Wabanaki Indians?

The Wabanaki, or “People of the Dawn,” are the first people of the area known today as Northeastern New England and Maritime Canada, and have lived there for more than 12,000 years.

During the time of the Salem Witchcraft Trials, Maine was sandwiched between New France (Canada) to the north, and British America to the south. By then, the native Wabanaki people had become more dependent on European guns and ammunition for hunting. When the English made it illegal to sell ammunition to the Wabanaki, and France stepped in to give it to them anyway, an alliance was born, most of it centered in Maine, with English settlers being the common enemy of both. The attacks were constant and merciless, with the Wabanaki people suffering as much as the English.

The Wabanaki people have continued to struggle in Maine. Until the 1950s, Wabanaki children were often taken away from their communities and sent to boarding schools, where they were forced to assimiliate into White American culture. Others were separated from their families through adoption, foster care, and placement in orphanages. In fact, in the mid-1970s, Maine had the second highest rate of Indian foster care placement among states. As late as the 1990s, Indian children in Maine were still being placed with and adopted by non-Native families without notification to the tribe, as required by the law.

Since then, Maine has established a commission — the first in the U.S. territory — that collaborates with tribal nations to focus on Indian child welfare. But, with only 8,000 tribal members alive today, it may be too little too late.


Tomorrow in Salem: Summary: This WEEK in Salem

Apr 16: NEW SPECTERS: Mary Warren & Bridget Bishop

Today in Salem: It’s been nearly two weeks since the Proctors’ servant, Mary Warren, said publicly that the other girls were lying. People believed her. She’d been afflicted herself, but after beatings and harshness from her masters, she’d been ”cured,” and posted a note of gratitude on the meeting house door.

The other girls, her former friends, had stood back and listened as she spoke about them. And they’ve shunned her since. But now Mary’s specter is afflicting them, and it’s clear why she said they were lying: she herself is being deceptive. She’s guilty of witchcraft, and using the guise of an innocent person to inflict torment. So today, finally, four of the girls accuse her of using her specter to inflict harm.

Also accused: a Town woman that many had heard of but few in the Village had met: the unruly Bridget Bishop. She’d been in and out of court several times over the years for fighting, calling her husband names on the Sabbath, stealing brass from a local mill owner, and was accused of witchcraft when her abusive husband died and she inherited his large estate (with almost nothing left for their children). That had been several years ago, but the stain has never left her, and now her specter has come back to life.


WHO was Bridget Bishop?

Bridget Bishop, age 60, was an unruly woman who, 20 years earlier, had been brought to court with her husband for fighting. Both of them were fined and ordered to be whipped if they didn’t pay the fine on time. Eight years later they were still fighting, and Bridget was brought to court for calling her husband names like “old rogue” and “old devil” on the Sabbath Day (never mind that he deserved it). This time they were ordered to stand back-to-back in the public marketplace, gagged, with pieces of paper labeled with their offense and fastened to each of their foreheads.

Bridget’s husband died a short time after that, and she inherited his sizable estate, worth about £70. But her daughter and two stepsons received only twenty shillings each. Immediately her stepsons accused her of bewitching their father to death.

Her notoriety continued when repairmen knocked down a cellar wall and found “several poppets made up of rags with hogs’ bristles with headless pins in them with the points outward.” The repairmen never actually produced the poppets – something like today’s voodoo dolls – but their testimony alone was evidence of black magic.

Five years later she was accused by the afflicted girls of the Salem Witchcraft Trials, but history doesn’t tell us what brought her to their attention. The important thing is that no one was surprised, and she quickly became the person the court was most focused on.

NOTE – Bridget is often described as a tavern owner who let loud, young people drink and play “shovel board” until the wee hours. This actually refers to her daughter-in-law, Sarah Bishop, who was also accused of witchcraft.


Tomorrow in Salem: The wild child Abigail Hobbs

Apr 15: A father’s grief

baby in father's hands

Today in Salem the heartbroken constable and his wife are holding their baby, who has just died from the fever and seizures that have been racking her tiny body for two days. Four days ago she was as hale and hearty as any baby could be. But the constable had muttered something against two of the accused witches, and now the worst has happened.

The constable’s brother is the powerful Thomas Putnam, and he and his wife have spent the afternoon trying to console the devastated parents. Their own baby girl had died mysteriously three years ago, left in the care of a farm hand, with their daughter Ann Putnam nearby. Ann was only 9 at the time, but as the oldest daughter she still dissolves into panic and tears whenever it comes up.

Now that same farm hand, John Willard, is a deputy. He’d visited the Putnams and offered to help when Ann was first afflicted, but they’d turned him away. How dare he cross their doorstep?


LEARN MORE: What was the infant mortality rate in colonial New England? How did the Puritans think of it?

In healthy Puritan communities like Andover (right next to Salem), about 10% of children died before their fifth birthday. In less healthy communities, like Boston, up to 30% of children died before they were five. Those were just the averages. The prominent minister Cotton Mather, who played such an important role in the Salem Witchcraft Trials, lost 8 of his 15 children before they were two years old.

The causes? Infants often died of bacterial stomach infections, intestinal worms, epidemic diseases like measles and smallpox, contaminated food and water, and neglect or carelessness.

Puritan views on infant death were complicated. On one hand was the natural affection of a parent toward a child. Cotton Mather called his children “little birds” and gave each of them a pet name. On the other, because childhood death was so common, parents were taught to keep some distance from their children, to see them as “on loan” from God.

Regardless, the death of a child was always met with grief, in the family and in the community, and their loss was often seen as God’s punishment toward the family or community for somehow going astray.


Tomorrow in Salem: NEW SPECTERS: Mary Warren and Bridget Bishop

Apr 14: The constable’s baby sickens

Today in Salem: The constable is stumbling through the day, so tired and distracted that he hardly understands what’s said to him. His two-month-old baby girl was violently ill last night, and he and his wife have hardly slept. In the middle of the night, desperate, he’d asked his mother to come. She’d brought a doctor with her, but there was nothing they could do. They agreed there was an evil hand upon the child.

How did this happen? What did he do to deserve this? He can only think of one thing: the nervous Sarah Cloyce’s examination was three days ago, and she was sent to jail to join her sister, the beloved Rebecca Nurse. After the examination the constable had said he wasn’t surprised they were witches, since their mother was one, too.

It seemed like such an easy comment. He could have said much worse. But still: Were Sarah Cloyce and her sister Rebecca Nurse angry? Were they sending their specters to hurt the baby in revenge?


Tomorrow in Salem: A father’s grief

Apr 13: This WEEK in Salem

Need to catch up? Here’s a snapshot of where we are in the story of Salem.

SUMMARY

Six women are sharing a single cell in the dark, lice-ridden jail, with one man in the men’s cell. It’s so crowded that they’re being transferred to the equally dismal jail in Boston, where three other prisoners have been for weeks. None of the ten prisoners has had a trial yet, though, and won’t until the governor arrives from London.
The witchcraft hysteria is beginning to spread to nearby towns, with several people afflicted, and one person in jail. So the judges have realized that the witchcraft problem is bigger than they can handle, and they’ve enlisted the help of legal assistants in Boston.


WHAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK

The jail keeper finally took pity on the beggar Sarah Good’s baby and pushed two thin blankets through the jail cell’s bars.

The harsh John Proctor and his quarrelsome wife Elizabeth put their bickering aside and said an intimate farewell before she was sent to jail. One day later, John was examined and sent to jail as well.

The nervous Sarah Cloyce was also examined and sent to jail, where she was reunited with her sister, the beloved Rebecca Nurse.

Salem jail is now so crowded that several people had to be transferred to the jail in Boston.


WHO’S WHERE

ACCUSED
Giles Corey (he doesn’t know it yet)

ARRESTED
• (No one new)

IN JAIL (10 people)
NEWSarah Cloyce (nervous) – Rebecca Nurse’s younger sister. She’d stormed out of church, which sparked people to question whether innocent people were being accused.
NEWElizabeth Proctor (quarrelsome) – an opinionated tavern owner, married to the respected but harsh John Proctor
NEWJohn Proctor (harsh) – A farmer and tavern owner, opinionated and sometimes overbearing, but respected

Martha Corey (gospel woman) – a slightly arrogant church member
Dorcas Good (4 years old) – the daughter of the beggar Sarah Good
Sarah Good (beggar) with her baby – a vagrant who smokes a pipe and has a terrible temper
Rebecca Nurse (beloved) – a 70-year-old grandmother who is well-loved throughout the community
Sarah Osborne (sickly) – a scandal-ridden woman who married her servant and is trying to take her sons’ inheritance
Tituba (slave) – the minister’s slave who was the first to be accused and the first to confess
• A woman in a nearby town, where the affliction has spread.

TRIED & SENTENCED
• (No one … yet)

EXECUTED
• (No one … yet)


Tomorrow in Salem: The constable’s baby sickens