Part 4

Chapter 44,104 wordsPublic domain

Essex ss. The jurors for our sovereign lord and lady the king and queen present, that George Burroughs, late of Falmouth in the province of Massachusetts Bay, clerk, the ninth day of May, in the fourth year of the reign of our sovereign lord and lady William and Mary, by the grace of God of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, king and queen, defenders of the faith, &c. and divers other days and times, as well before as after, certain detestable arts called witchcrafts and sorceries, wickedly and feloniously hath used, practised and exercised, at and within the township of Salem, in the county of Essex aforesaid, in, upon and against one Mary Walcot, of Salem village, in the county of Essex, single woman; by which said wicked arts, the said Mary Walcot, the ninth day of May in the fourth year abovesaid, and divers other days and times as well before as after, was and is tortured, afflicted, pined, consumed, wasted and tormented, against the peace of our sovereign lord and lady the king and queen, and against the form of the statute in that case made and provided. Endorsed _Billa vera_. Three other bills were found for the like upon other persons, to all which he pleaded not guilty, and put himself upon trial, &c.

The afflicted and confessing witches were first examined, for although, by the advice of the elders, this kind of evidence was not to be deemed infallible; yet it was presumptive, and, with other circumstances, sufficient proof. It would be tedious to recite the whole of this evidence, especially as it was of the same sort with what has been already related in the confessions. The most material circumstance which distinguished him [Burroughs] from the rest, was, that he was to be a king in Satan’s empire.

The other evidence was that being a little man he had performed feats beyond the strength of a giant; particularly that he would take a gun of seven feet barrel behind the lock and hold it out with one hand; that he would take up a barrel of molasses or cider and carry them in a disadvantageous place and posture from a canoe to the shore; and when in his vindication he urged that an Indian which was there held out the gun as he did, the witnesses not seeing or not remembering any Indian, it was supposed it must be the black man or the devil, who, the witnesses swore, looks like an Indian.

Besides this it was sworn that he had treated his wives, having been twice married, very harshly, and would pretend, when he had been absent from home, that he could tell what had been said to them, and that he persuaded them to swear, and to oblige themselves by a writing, which in the printed account of the trial is called “a Covenant,” not to reveal his secrets, and that they had privately complained to the neighbors that their house was haunted by spirits. One of his wife’s brothers also swore that going out after strawberries they rode very softly—slowly, I suppose—two or three miles, when Burroughs went into the bushes, after which they rode back a quick pace, and when they came near home, to their astonishment found him on foot with them, and that he fell to chiding his wife for talking with her brother about him, and said he knew their thoughts, which his brother intimated was more than the Devil knew, but Burroughs replied his god told him.

The prisoner said, in his defence, a man was with him when his brother left him, which was also supposed to be the black man.

This was the sum of the evidence. He is said to have used many twistings and turnings, and to have contradicted himself in making his defence. At his execution he concluded his prayer with the Lord’s prayer, probably to show his innocence, for it was generally received that a witch could not say the Lord’s prayer, and it was used as a test at the examinations when several of the old women, as children often do, blundered at _give_ and _forgive_ in the fourth and fifth petitions, and it was improved against them.

September 9th, _Martha Corey_, _Mary Esty_, _Alice Parker_, _Ann Pudcator_, Dorcas Hoar and Mary Bradbury were tried; and Sept. 17 _Margaret Scott_, _Wilmot Read_, _Samuel Wardwell_, _Mary Parker_, Abigail Faulkner, Rebekah Eames, Mary Lacey, Ann Foster, Abigail Hobbs, and all received sentence of death. Those in italics were executed September 22d.

Mary Esty, who was sister to Nurse, put into the court a petition in which she tells them that, although she was conscious of her own innocence, yet she did not ask her own life, but prayed them before they condemned any more they would examine some of the confessing witches, who she knew had belied themselves and others, which she was sure would appear in the world to which she was going, if it did not in this world.

Those that were not executed probably confessed their guilt. All whose examinations remain on the files, of which there are three or four, did so. Wardwell had confessed, but recanted and suffered. His own wife, as well as his daughter, accused him and saved themselves. There are a great number of instances of children and parents accusing each other. I have met with no other than this of husbands or wives, and surely this one ought not to have been suffered.

Giles Corey was the only person, besides what have been named, who suffered death. He, seeing the fate of those who had put themselves upon trial, refused to plead to the indictment; but the judges who were not careful enough in observing the rules of law in favor of the prisoners, took care to do it against this unhappy man, and he was pressed to death; the only instance I have ever heard of in any of the English colonies.[67] History furnishes us perhaps with as many instances of cruelty proceeding from superstition, as from the most savage barbarous temper of mind.

Besides the irregularities which I have already mentioned in these trials, the court admitted evidence to be given of facts, not laid in the indictments, to prove witchcraft eight, ten or fifteen years before; indeed, no other sort of evidence was offered to prove facts in the indictments but the spectral evidence, which, in the opinion of the divines, was not sufficient. It would have been well if they had consulted lawyers[68] also, who would have told them that evidence ought not to be admitted even against the general character of persons charged criminally unless they offer evidence in favor of it, much less ought their whole lives to be arraigned and no opportunity given them of making defence.

This court of Oyer and Terminer, happily for the country, sat no more. Nineteen persons had been executed; but the eyes of the country in general were not yet opened. The prison at Salem was so full that some were obliged to be removed, and many were in other prisons reserved for trial. The General Court which sat in October, although they had revived the old colony law which was in these words, “If any man or woman be a witch, that is, hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit, they shall be put to death”—yet this not being explicit enough, they enacted another in the words of the statute of King James, which continued in force until the trials were over, but both were afterwards disallowed by the crown.[69] Another act was passed, constituting a Supreme Court,[70] which was to be held at Salem in January; but before that time many who had been forward in these prosecutions became sensible of their error. Time for consideration seems to be reason enough to be assigned for it; but another reason has been given. Ordinarily persons of the lowest rank, the dregs of the people, have had the misfortune of being charged with witchcraft; and although this was the case in many instances here, yet there were a number of women of as reputable families as any in the towns where they lived, who were charged and imprisoned, and several persons of still superior rank were hinted at by the pretended bewitched or the confessing witches. The latter had no other way of saving themselves. Some of the persons were publicly named. Dudley Bradstreet, a justice of the peace, who had been appointed one of President Dudley’s council, thought it necessary to abscond; so did his brother John Bradstreet, sons of the late Governor Bradstreet. Calef says it was intimated that Sir William Phips’s lady was accused.[71] One at Boston complained of being afflicted by the secretary of Connecticut colony.[72]

At the Superior Court held at Salem in January, the grand jury found bills against about fifty persons, all but one or two women, who either were in prison, or under bonds for their appearance. They were all but three acquitted by the petty jury, and those three were pardoned by the Governor. Divers others were brought upon trial soon after at Charlestown in the county of Middlesex, and all acquitted. The juries changed sooner than the judges. The opinion which the latter had of their own superior understanding and judgment probably made them more backward in owning or discovering their errors. One of them, however, Mr. Sewall, who always had the character of great integrity, at a public fast sometime after gave in a bill, or note, to the minister, acknowledging his errors and desiring to humble himself in the sight of God and his people, and stood up while the note was reading.[73] It is said that the chief justice Mr. Stoughton being informed of this act of one of his brethren, remarked upon it, that for himself, when he sat in judgment he had the fear of God before his eyes, and gave his opinion according to the best of his understanding, and although it might appear afterwards that he had been in an error, he saw no necessity of a public acknowledgment of it. One of the ministers, who in the time of it approved of the court’s proceeding, remarked in his diary soon after that many were of opinion innocent blood had been shed. The afflicted were never brought to trial for their imposture. Many of them are said to have proved profligate, abandoned people, and others to have passed the remainder of their lives in a state of obscurity and contempt.[74]

ERRATUM.—The reference, in the text, to Note 49, should have been placed after the word “proceeded,” at the end of the first sentence of the paragraph.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The council met on the 16th, 17th, 20th, 24th and 27th of May, 1692. On the 27th the appointments named (of sixty-seven justices, eight sheriffs, and two coroners) were made. The twenty-eight councillors were also authorized to act as justices in their own localities. This injury to the manuscript was occasioned by its being thrown into the street during the stamp-act riot on the evening of August 26, 1765, when Gov. Hutchinson’s house was sacked. In his subsequent draft, as the date was missing, he did not supply it, but said “At the first general council,” &c. This paragraph commences on page 8 of the manuscript.

[2] The date named for the beginning of the Springfield troubles is probably three or four years too early. Gov. Hutchinson relied for the date of what he supposed to be the earliest witch case in the Massachusetts Colony, on Johnson’s _Wonder Working Providence_, p. 199, where the date 1645 stands at the head of the page. As I have explained in my reprint of Johnson (pp. xiii.-xv.), these headings are unreliable, and, quite likely, were as often inserted by the printer as by the author. The date in the heading may be true as to some incident recorded on the page and erroneous as to other incidents. Keeping in mind the date when the work was written—from 1649 to 1651—the statement in the text involves no error. This portion was written in 1651. The author says, “There hath of late been more than one or two in this town [Springfield] greatly suspected of witchcraft; yet have they used much dilligence, both in finding them out, and for the Lords assisting them against their witchery, yet have they, as is supposed, bewitched not a few persons, among whom two of the reverend Elders children.” The cases came to examination and trial the same year the narrative was written, 1651, and the testimony offered covers the two previous years.

[3] Johnson.

[4] The name of this woman was not Mary Oliver, but Mary Parsons. She was tried in Boston, May 13, 1651, on the charge of witchcraft and for murdering her own child. She was convicted on the latter charge on her own confession, and sentenced to be hanged. She was reprieved till May 29 (Mass. Rec. iv. p. i. p. 47). In Judd’s _History of Hadley_ (p. 234), it appears that Mary Parsons was again tried for witchcraft in 1661, and discharged. This is doubtless an error in copying or printing 1661 for 1651, when the trial already named took place; for in both instances she was charged with bewitching the children of Mr. Moxon the minister. Mr. Moxon returned to England in 1652.

Hugh Parsons, her husband, had previously been tried and convicted of witchcraft; and the most damaging charges against him had been brought by his wife. Among these were the following:—1. Mrs. P. had an intimate friend Mrs. Smith, to whom she freely expressed her mind. Now Mrs. Smith was a person who went little abroad, and Mrs. P. was sure she would not speak of the secrets committed to her trust; and yet her husband knew all about their conversation. 2. He would be out late nights; and half an hour before he came home, she would hear strange noises about the house. 3. He would come home in a distempered mind, put out the fire, pull off the bed clothes, and throw peas about the house. 4. He would gabble in his sleep, have strange dreams, and say he had been fighting the Devil. The jury found him guilty. The magistrates set aside the verdict, and the case came before the General Court at Boston, May 31, 1652, when he was acquitted (_Ibid._ p. 96). The numerous and very curious depositions in the Springfield cases may be seen in the Appendix of Drake’s _Annals of Witchcraft_, 1869, pp. 219-258. Hutchinson (in note, vol. i. p. 165) mentions the case of Hugh Parsons, but not that of his wife. He mentions it again (vol. ii. p. 22), and does not seem to be aware that his Mary Oliver case was that of Parsons’s wife. My references to Hutchinson are to the edition of 1795.

[5] Vol. i. p. 150. [Hutchinson’s references to his earlier vol. are to the ed. of 1764.]

[6] Margaret Jones was executed June 4, 1648, and was therefore by more than two years, so far as now appears, the first case of conviction and execution for witchcraft in the Massachusetts Colony. The case is reported in Winthrop’s _Journal_, ii. p. 326, and Hale’s _Modest Inquiry concerning Witchcraft_, p. 17. Mr. Hale relates incidents not recorded by Winthrop. On the day of her execution, he, then twelve years of age, went to her cell, “in company with some neighbors who took great pains to bring her to confession and repentance; but she constantly professed herself innocent of that crime.”

[7] No writer on this subject seems hitherto to have given the name of the person who suffered at Dorchester. Mr. John Hale, in _Modest Inquiry_, 1697, p. 17, thus alludes to the matter: “Another that suffered on that account sometime after was a Dorchester woman. And upon the day of her execution Mr. Thompson [Wm. Tompson], minister of Brantry and J. P. her former minister took pains with her to bring her to repentance. And she utterly denyed her guilt of witchcraft, for she had when a single woman played the harlot, and being with child, used means to destroy the fruit of her body to conceal her sin and shame; and although she did not effect it, yet she was a murderer in the sight of God for her endeavors, and shewed great penitency for that sin; but owned nothing of the crime laid to her charge.” Mr. Drake in his _Annals of Witchcraft_, and the _History of Dorchester_, make no mention of this case.

I think I have found a clue to the name of this Dorchester woman. Increase Mather, in his _Remarkable Providences_, 1684, gave some of the cases of witchcraft which had occurred in New-England. He sent a copy of this book to his brother Nathaniel, a minister in Dublin. In a letter, dated Dec. 31, 1684, Nathaniel Mather acknowledged the receipt of the book, and says: “Why did you not put in the story of Mrs. Hibbins witchcrafts and the discovery thereof; and also of H. Lake’s wife, of Dorchester, whom as I have heard the Devil drew in by appearing to her in the likeness, and acting the part of a child of hers then lately dead on whom her heart was much set; as also another of a girl in Connecticut, who was judged to die a real convert, though she died for the same crime?—stories, as I have heard them as remarkable for some circumstances as most I have read.” (Mather Papers, _Mass. Hist. Coll._, vol. xxxviii. p. 58.) Mr. Mather probably heard these stories before he went abroad. The precise date of his departure does not appear. It was, however, before March 23, 1650-51, when he writes from London. There was a Henry Lake residing in Dorchester in 1678, who, with his children, was named as the residuary legatees in the will of Thomas Lake, a prominent citizen of the town, who died Oct. 27, 1678 (_History of Dorchester_, p. 125). Mr. Savage (_Geneal. Dict._) says there was a Henry Lake, currier, in Salem, in 1649, “who may have been the Henry Lake of Dorchester”; but he makes no mention of his wife being executed for witchcraft.

The details of the case as related by Mr. Mather are quite unlike those related by Mr. Hale. One or both of the statements must be incorrect. The error I think must be in that of Mr. Hale. Mr. Mather was a resident of Dorchester, and a graduate of the college in 1647. He gives the name of the person accused, and was so situated as to be familiar with all the incidents. Mr. Hale was a resident of Charlestown, and in 1650 was but fourteen years of age. He did not know the name of the person, and gives the same incidents to a Springfield case. He says, p. 19: “There was another executed of Boston anno 1656 [Mrs. Hibbins] for that crime; and two or three of Springfield, one of which confessed, and said the occasion of her familiarity with Satan was this: She had lost a child, and was exceedingly discontented at it, and longed _Oh that she might see her child again!_ And at last the Devil in likeness of her child came to her bed-side and talked with her, and asked to come into the bed to her that night and several nights after, and so entered into covenant with Satan and became a witch. This was the only confessor in those times in this government.” If any person, other than Mary Parsons, was executed at Springfield for witchcraft, no details have come down to us. Increase Mather probably omitted to mention the cases of Mrs. Hibbins and Mrs. Lake, with which he must have been familiar, in deference to the feelings of their friends then living.

[8] This was the case of Mrs. Kendal, of Cambridge, who was executed for bewitching to death a child of Goodman Genings, of Watertown. The principal evidence was that of a Watertown nurse, who testified that the said Kendal did make much of the child, and then the child was well, but quickly changed in color and died a few hours after. The court took this evidence without calling the parents of the child. After the execution the parents denied that their child was bewitched, and stated that it died from imprudent exposure to cold by the nurse the night before. The nurse soon after was put in prison for adultery, and there died, and so the matter was not further inquired into. Hale’s _Modest Inquiry_, p. 18.

Rev. Lucius R. Paige, of Cambridgeport, has recently found in the Middlesex court records, 1660, another alleged case of witchcraft in Cambridge, which was tried that year. Winifred Holman, an aged widow, was accused by her neighbors, John Gibson and wife, their son John Gibson, Jr., and their daughter Rebecca, wife of Charles Stearns. Actions of defamation were commenced against these parties, and on the trial, they, by way of justification, presented their supposed proofs of witchcraft, some details of which may be seen in _Hist. and Geneal. Register_, vol. xxiv. p. 59. Probably other cases were tried in the courts of that period, of which nothing is now known. John Dunton, in 1683, said there had been twenty cases of witchcraft recently tried in the colony. (_Letters_, p. 72.)

[9] Vol. i. p. 187.

[10] See _Mass. Rec._, vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 269. Joshua Scottow’s representation, dated March 7, 1655-6, that he did not intend to oppose the proceedings of the court in the case of Ann Hibbins, is in _Mass. Archives_, vol. cxxxv. fol. 1. She was executed June 19, 1656.

[11] Magnalia.

[12] The case of Ann Cole was fully reported in a letter by Mr. John Whiting, minister at Hartford, under whose observation it occurred, to Increase Mather, dated Dec. 10, 1682. The document is one of the _Mather Papers_, and is printed in _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, vol. xxxviii. pp. 466-469. An abstract of the case is in Increase Mather’s _Remarkable Providences_, chap. v. pp. 96-99, London ed. 1856, and Cotton Mather’s _Magnalia_, Hartford ed. 1855, vol. ii. p. 448. Several of the incidents are not correctly stated by Hutchinson, either in the manuscript or printed text. Ann Cole did not live next door to a Dutch family. The name of the woman executed, Greensmith, appears in both abstracts by the Mathers, but not in Mr. Whiting’s original statement. The woman and her husband were both executed.

[13] This woman was one of the victims hanged for witchcraft at Salem, in 1692. The evidence offered at her examination is in Mather’s _Wonders_, pp. 70-76; Calef’s _More Wonders_, pp. 125-132, and Woodward’s _Records of Salem Witchcraft_, vol. i. pp. 193-233. She bore the reputation of a witch for many years, and her suits at law frequently brought her name into the General Court records.—_Mass. Rec._ iv. pt. 2, pp. 540-555; v. pp. 6, 26.

[14] To a person interested in the psychological inquiries pertaining to the witchcraft manifestations of the seventeenth century, the case of Elizabeth Knap is one of the most interesting that occurred in New-England. It took place twenty-one years before the great outbreak at Salem, and under circumstances which gave opportunity for calm observation. Samuel Willard, afterwards pastor of the Old South Church, in Boston, and who distinguished himself by his prudent conduct in 1692, was the pastor of the church in Groton at the time, and was the daily attendant and spiritual adviser of the family. He wrote a full account of the case, which fortunately has been preserved, and is now printed in the _Mather Papers_, pp. 555-571. In this paper he has calmly discussed the question whether her distemper was real or counterfeit. At first he was inclined to the latter opinion, and at times she confessed as much; but in view of all the facts he was of the opinion that there was something preternatural in the case. Increase Mather has an abstract of Mr. Willard’s account in _Remarkable Providences_, p. 99. See also _Magnalia_, vol. ii. p. 449.

[15] Rebeckah Nurse.

[16] Complaints against Eunice Cole for being a witch were made as early as 1656, and were continued till 1680, when she was up before the Quarter Court at Hampton, and committed on suspicion of being a witch. During most of this period she was a town pauper. Thirty-five depositions and other original papers relating to Eunice Cole’s case, from Sept. 4, 1656 to Jan. 7, 1673-4, are in _Mass. Archives_, vol. cxxxv. fol. 2-15. See also Drake’s _Annals of Witchcraft_, pp. 99-103.