Tag Archives: Thomas Putnam

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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

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Apr 1: the Darkness of Light

Today in Salem: Thomas Putnam watches silently as his servant, the war refugee Mercy Lewis, is spitting, over and over, refusing to eat or drink anything from the Devil’s Supper, now in its second day. Thomas’s daughter Ann is quiet for once, and now they are both listening, waiting for Mercy to say the name of her spectral tormenter. Thomas has signed three of the six complaints against the accused witches, and he’s ready to do it again if need be.

Suddenly Mercy relaxes. Later she will tell her master that she’d seen Christ, surrounded by brilliant white light, with multitudes singing and praising his name. She is calmer than she’s been in a long time.

At the parsonage, Rev Parris is not calm, not at all. Once again his payday has come and gone, and once again nothing is offered. It’s now been nine months since he was paid. His supporters, led by Thomas Putnam, have provided food and firewood when they can. But the committee that oversees taxes has consistently refused to collect those taxes from the other people in the Village.

Most Puritans would ask God how they had sinned that God would allow them to be abused this way. Rev Parris is not most Puritans, though. He knows he’s right, and he will root out his enemies one at a time until they are vanquished.

Tomorrow in Salem: RELEASED: the maid Mary Warren is free of affliction

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Mar 14: AFFLICTED: the refugee Mercy Lewis

Today in Salem: Mercy Lewis, 18, is swinging a stick wherever 12-year-old Ann Putnam points. There! Ann screams. No, there! Mercy swings wildly, but the specter of Martha Corey just swings backs with a phantom red hot iron rod.

fire

Ann’s father, the powerful Thomas Putnam, has invited the real gospel woman Martha Corey to visit, just to be sure that Ann’s visions are correct. It’s no small thing to accuse a church member of witchcraft. It’s a mistake, though. The minute Martha Corey entered the door Ann had contorted herself in torment.

Now Ann claims to see a man skewered on a spit, roasting right there in her parents’ hearth, with Martha Corey turning the spit. Suddenly Mercy loses control, swinging sticks and screaming at the specter, even though Ann is the only one who can see her.

Now it’s late at night. In a chair at the hearth, smoke is curling from her skirts as the refugee and servant Mercy Lewis inches closer and closer to the fire. She remembers her entire village burning, every structure blazing with heat and fire, even the cattle destroyed, and her parents dying brutally. How had she escaped? Why was she still alive? She can’t answer those questions. Now the fire pulls her toward it. It doesn’t matter that she’s sitting in a chair, that the hearth is laid with rough bricks, that two grown men are sweating and grunting as they try to pull her away. The chair just keeps moving forward, dragging all of them with it. Finally Ann Putnam’s uncle throws himself between Mercy and the fire then lifts, tilting her backward into the other men’s arms. They carry her to the corner of the room, where she’s safe, for now.

LEARN MORE: Why did Native Americans attack and destroy settlements in Maine?

22 years before the Salem witchcraft trials, English officials banned selling ammunition to Native Americans, hoping to quell rising tensions. Instead, they were inflamed. So when war broke out in southern Massachusetts, Commissioners were sent to northern Massachusetts – today’s Maine – to proactively enforce the ban on ammunition sales.

Letter about the Indian raid on Casco Bay
A letter dated Sept. 13, 1676 and sent to John Leverett, Governor of Massachusetts, about an Indian raid on Casco Bay, Maine.

The war spread to Maine, though, when the French (longtime foes of the English) gave ammunition to the Native Americans anyway, and British sailors killed a Native American baby. After five weeks of aggressive fighting on both sides, 60 miles of Maine coastland was wiped clean of English settlements. Native American villages were just as devastated. Families were forced to flee their homes and leave fields unharvested. With no access to fishing grounds or guns for hunting, many Native Americans starved.

A peace treaty was eventually negotiated, but the English settlers ignored it, flagrantly. Over the course of the next 20 years they intentionally blocked fishing streams, let their cattle destroy Native American crops, and inflicted other major abuses. (In one overture for “peace,” the English invited 400 Native Americans to attend a conference, and promptly captured and enslaved 200 of them.)

War broke out again, with the major event being the burning destruction of Falmouth (now Portland), Maine. Many of its traumatized residents – including at least one accuser and four who were in turn accused – fled to Salem, just two years before the witchcraft hysteria began.

WHO was Thomas Putnam?

A third-generation resident of Salem Village. Some of the most prolific accusers were his daughter Ann, his niece Mary Walcott, and his servant Mercy Lewis. He gave their accusations legal weight by seeking arrest warrants, transcribing depositions, swearing out complaints, and writing letters to the judges.

Thomas was aggressive in his support in part because he was a resentful and bitter man, for several reasons.

On a general level was an ongoing family feud between Thomas’s family, the Putnams, and the Porters. The Putnams lived in the rural Village, while the Porters lived in the Town. The Putnams were farmers, and the Porters were merchants. The Putnams were prosperous enough, but all of their worth and income were tied up in a farm. The Porters, with their ability to start and fund new businesses, eventually became one of the wealthiest families in the region. It was a classic conflict of rural vs. urban, farmer vs. merchant, and Thomas was squarely on the rural farmer side.

On a more personal level, Thomas’s father had recently died and left most of his estate to Thomas’s stepmother and half-brother, whom he disliked. Thomas felt cheated, even disinherited, and contested the will, but he failed. Adding insult to injury, his half-brother then married into the enemy side: Porter family. The feud just intensified.

To sum it up: Thomas had a lot of axes to grind. Case files: Thomas Putnam Jr.

Tomorrow in Salem: SUMMARY: This WEEK in Salem

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Mar 6: ACCUSED: the quarrelsome Elizabeth Proctor

Today in Salem: The girls’ leader Ann Putnam is sweating and shaking when her father demands “Who afflicts you?” Thomas Putnam is one of the most powerful and vengeful men in the Village. When he speaks, people listen, including his wife and children.

Ann is 12, but her father still frightens her. So when he asks if it’s the quarrelsome Elizabeth Proctor who’s tormenting her, Ann just nods. There’s been more than a whiff of suspicion around Elizabeth for 30 years, thanks to Elizabeth’s grandmother, a Quaker midwife and healer who was tried (and acquitted) for witchcraft 30 years earlier. Now Elizabeth is 40, stronger and more capable than most Puritan women, perhaps even too much so. She is her husband’s quarrelsome third wife, raising six of his children while adding five more of her own. She’s also supporting a 700-acre farm, running a tavern from the Proctor home and, like her grandmother, sharing knowledge of her garden herbs when people need a healer. If the Proctors are successful, it’s in good part due to Elizabeth.

Thomas is a Village farmer and has never liked the Proctors, whose tavern is open only to merchants and other well-to-do people from Salem Town. It wouldn’t surprise him if their prosperity was ill-gotten, through earthly means or not.

LEARN MORE: What was the difference between Salem Town and Salem Village?

Salem was divided into two distinct parts: Salem Town and Salem Village. Although they were part of the same entity, they were distinct in economy, social class, and values. The Village was inland, and most of its people were farmers. But the Town was a prosperous seaport, and most of its residents were merchants (many of them wealthy). But even though it was more prosperous, the Town still collected taxes from the Village, and depended on its farms for food.

map of accused and accusers

As much tension as there was between Town and Village, there was also division within the Village itself. Those who lived near Ipswich Road, close to the Town, made more money as merchants and tavern keepers (like the Proctors). But those who lived farther away weren’t as prosperous, and believed the Town’s worldliness threatened their Puritan values.

In the early days of the witchcraft hysteria, most of the supposed witches and those who accused them lived on opposite sides of the Village, with the “witches” living closer to the Town.

WHO was Thomas Putnam Jr.?

Thomas, age 40, was a third-generation resident of Salem Village. Some of the most active accusers were his daughter Ann, his niece Mary Walcott, and his servant Mercy Lewis. He gave their accusations tremendous legal weight by seeking arrest warrants, transcribing depositions, swearing out complaints, and writing letters to the judges.

Thomas was seen as a resentful and bitter man, for reasons that boiled down to a family feud between Thomas’s family (the Putnams) and the Porters.

The feud began 20 years before the Trials, when a dam and sawmill run by the Porters flooded the Putnam farms, with the Putnams then suing the Porters. The Putnams lived in the rural Village, while the Porters lived in the urban, mercantile Town. The Putnams were farmers, and the Porters were merchants. The Putnams were prosperous enough, but all of their worth and income were tied up in a farm. The Porters, with their ability to start and fund new businesses, eventually became one of the wealthiest families in the region. It was a classic conflict of rural vs. urban, farmer vs. merchant, and Thomas was squarely on the rural farmer side.

The feud continued when Rev Samuel Parris arrived, and a Village committee dominated by the Putnams gave him a generous offer of house and lands. Later the Putnams were ousted from the committee and replaced by the Porters and others who were hostile to the Putnams.

The feud exploded personally for Thomas when his father died and disinherited him, leaving his estate instead to a half-brother who’d married into the Porter family.

Now, as the Trials set in, many of those accused of witchcraft were connected to the Porter family, with many of the accusers connected to the Putnams.

And Thomas had more than a few axes to grind.

WHO was Elizabeth Proctor?

When Elizabeth was about 10, her grandmother was tried (and acquitted) for witchcraft. Like her grandmother, the adult Elizabeth also grew medicinal herbs, had a significant knowledge of folk medicine, and was sometimes consulted as a healer.

Elizabeth was the third wife of John Proctor, a somewhat harsh man who rented a large farm just south of the Village. They also ran a tavern from their home, serving patrons only from the Town (not the Village), and while John ran the farm, Elizabeth ran the tavern. She was confident and quarrelsome, always insisting on payment, even if it was in the form of goods rather than money.

Elizabeth and John had 6 known children, one of whom had died. She was pregnant with a seventh when she and John were arrested. When she was tried and sentenced, her execution was stayed until after she gave birth. The executions came to an end before the birth of her son, whom she named John Jr.

Tomorrow in Salem: PAYING FOR THEIR SINS: the slave Tituba, the beggar Sarah Good, & the sickly Sarah Osborne