Author: Robin Mason

By Posted on Posted in History Tagged with , , ,
Rev. John Higginson grave in Salem, Massachusetts

While Massachusetts Bay ministers were lamenting the lack of devotion to the Puritan ideal and dwindling numbers of covenanted members in the late 17th century, everyday people were struggling with forces beyond their control. Between 1645 and 1715, the Little Ice Age was wreaking havoc in the North Atlantic region, which already was one of the most climatically unstable areas in the world. Bitter cold winters and hot summers not only impacted farming but fishing as well. Two of the biggest exports in Mass Bay were wood and codfish. Crop failures and early frosts, unexpected livestock deaths, and smallpox ravaged many communities. On top of that, political instability without a charter, high taxes, and inflation cut deep at every economic level.

Also struggling to survive from territory loss, famine, and cultural clashes, the Wabanaki attacked villages on the edges of the frontier. They sometimes teamed up with the French, who had a different motive but the same agenda to banish the English settlers. The seas weren’t safe either, with prowling pirate ships ready to attack fully loaded vessels.

One family’s story

In 1629, John Higginson (1616-1708) arrived in Salem on the Talbot with his parents. John grew up to become a minister like his father and married a minister’s daughter in Guilford, Connecticut. In 1659, his family decided to sail from Connecticut to England, but bad weather caused the vessel to shelter at Salem, where his father had first built a congregation. Perhaps it was fate when the town asked him to preach there for a year. He never left, though his sons ventured to Barbados, England, Arabia, and the East Indies.

While his son Nathaniel flourished in the employ of the East India Company (living in London and Fort St. George, Madras, India), his family in Salem struggled. Letters could take a year or longer to find their intended recipients if they arrived at all, but we’re fortunate some of the Higginson letters survived.

Rev. John Higginson was not of the upper echelon of society—like Samuel Sewall who married the mint master’s daughter—but he made a comfortable living. With the arrival of Sir Edmund Andros and his new government in 1686, however, political instability and economic factors infringed upon Mass Bay lives, including Higginson’s. In one letter to son Nathaniel, he writes about his ministerial salary: “almost 500 pounds of arrears [are] due to me from the town since 1686 and I saw no hope of receiving it” in his lifetime.

Higginson letters

“The French and Indian war, with other calamities, have greatly impoverished, diminished, and brought low New England,” Rev. Higginson writes to son Nathaniel in India. As a father, he’s concerned about his son Col. John Higginson, who lives in Salem:

“By his singular prudence and industry, [John] had attained a competent estate; but by the misery of these times, he has met with great losses, by the French, &c.; and so put out of his way as to be disenabled from making any use of the fishing trade; and been worsted in his estate, I believe, above a thousand pounds: and yet he is a Major and a Justice of the Peace, and the show of public occasions lies much upon him.”

Col. John Higginson writes to his brother in 1697:

“In the year 1689, when the war first broke out, I had obtained a comfortable estate, being as much concerned in the fishing trade as most of my neighbors. But since that time, I have met with considerable losses; and trade has been much decayed. Of 60-odd fishing catches belonging to this town but about six are left. I believe that no town in this Province has suffered more by the war than Salem.”

And in 1699:

“The late war with France and the Indians, which held almost 10 years, has greatly impoverished this town; by which means my Father’s salary has been much abated…. The war has also damnified me, not only by losses, but by being put out of a way. I have had a pretty large family of my own, and relations; and the several places I have held in civil and military concerns, have taken up much of my time, and not been advantageous to my estate…. The marrying and settling my children has much abated my quick stock; though I have an estate in house and land, &c.”

Several times Nathaniel sends money to his family in Salem, but it doesn’t always arrive. In 1695, for example, “the ship being taken, the money was lost.” Col. John explains:

“At this time, there are many men in our gaol for piracy; namely, Captain Kidd, who went from England with a ship and commission to take pirates, but turned pirate himself, and robbed many ships in the East Indies, and thence came into the West Indies, and there disposed of much of his wealth; and at last came into these parts with some of his stolen goods; who was here seized, and some of his men, and goods, who are in irons, and wait for a trial. And there was one [Joseph] Bradish, a Cambridge man, who sailed in an interloper bound for India, who, in some parts of the East Indies, took an opportunity, when the captains and some of the officers were onshore, to run away with the ship, and came upon our coast, and sunk their ship at Block Island, and brought much wealth ashore with them; but Bradish, and one of his men, broke prison and run away against the Indians; but it is supposed that he will be taken again.”

In the end it’s all about survival

What’s curious about these letters is that there’s no mention of witchcraft or the devil among them in Salem, even though Rev. John Higginson’s daughter Ann Dolliver was accused in 1692. Unlike his colleague Rev. Nicholas Noyes (1647-1717), with whom he shared the pulpit in Salem, Rev. John Higginson had little involvement in the Salem witch trials. His mentions of Ann are all about survival, like what provisions he made for her (since she was abandoned by her husband and “crazed in her understanding”) and her three children, who were apprenticed to learn trades “whereby they may get a livelihood when grown up.”

Read more “Higginson Letters” from Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, series 3, Vol. 7, pp. 196-222.

By Posted on Posted in Book, History Tagged with , , , ,

No doubt Samuel Sewall never anticipated his private diaries would be widely read and quoted by historians and others interested in the minutiae of his life. As a family man, merchant, and part-time judge, Sewall faced common challenges that rocked his world, from his fitful children dying young to his religious doubts of being elect. He wrote so often about attending funerals that it seemed like penance for making bad decisions that reverberated beyond hearth and home.

As his biographer, Richard Francis knows Sewall’s daily habits, his relationships, worldly concerns, and eternal worries, all of which were written in his journals. What Sewall rarely mentioned was the Salem witch trials, for which he’s best known. And so, Francis extrapolates from the diaries how Sewall’s character would react by writing Crane Pond: A Novel of Salem as historical fiction. Interspersed with court actions and executions, Francis reminds us that Sewall is not just a judge, he’s a man with a full and busy life. As an author, Francis helps the reader experience Sewall’s world, from the ferry trips from Boston to Salem with a meat pasty in his pocket to his first encounter with witchcraft and how it “was awful to see how the afflicted persons were agitated.”

Though Sewall agreed with the sentencing—there are no court documents that tell otherwise—in his diary he showed ambivalence toward the witch trials. For instance, Sewall participated in a fast and prayer meeting for his friend—and accused witch—Captain John Alden. He was relieved when Alden escaped from jail. On August 19, Sewall wrote: “This day George Burrough, John Willard, Jno Procter, Martha Carrier, and George Jacobs were executed at Salem, a very great number of spectators being present. [Ministers] Mr. Cotton Mather was there, Mr. Sims, Hale, Noyes, Cheever, &c. All of [the convicted] said they were innocent, Carrier and all. Mr. Mather says they all died by a righteous sentence. Mr. Burrough by his speech, prayer, protestation of his innocence, did much move unthinking persons, which occasions their speaking hardly concerning his being executed.” In the margins, Sewall wrote: “Dolefull! Witchcraft.”

Francis succeeds in creating believable dialogue and in building relationships. Judge William Stoughton talked like a formidable ally—or enemy. As expected, Sewall showed him the proper deference. With his daughter Hannah, Sewall was an attentive father, crawling into the closet where she hid to help her deal with her fears. After years of being consumed by his own role in the Salem witch trials, Sewall apparently did not think how the other judges would take his public apology in 1697. As Francis shows, he didn’t expect Waitstill Winthrop to sharply rebuke him outside the meeting house for speaking out of turn. The author also helps us understand Sewall’s struggles to be a noble father, a worthy citizen, a fair judge, and a faithful Puritan.

Using Sewall’s diary definitely adds substance to Francis’ novel. But the author slips on occasion, like referring to Rebecca Nurse—one of the most well-known victims—as a widow, though her husband died three years after she was hanged for witchcraft. He locates the site of Giles Corey’s pressing death at Proctor’s Ledge (where the convicted witches were hanged), though no contemporaneous source suggests it. And Francis claims that if a convicted witch made a confession before the hangman did his job, they would have an immediate reprieve. Ministers asked victims to confess to witchcraft—believing them to be real witches—but only so they could meet their maker with a repentant heart.

By telling the Salem story from a judge’s point of view, Francis offers a multidimensional perspective of the trials. I also suggest reading the author’s award-winning biography on Sewall.

Crane Pond: A Novel of Salem by Richard Francis

Judge Sewall’s Apology: The Salem Witch Trials and the Forming of an American Conscience by Richard Francis

Post edited 15 June 2021 to correct the length of time it took for Giles Corey to die under torture. Thanks, Professor Tony Fels!

By Posted on Posted in History Tagged with , , , ,

Massachusetts Bay Colony had numerous issues with pirates, from Dixey Bull to Blackbeard. During the interim (post-Andros, pre-Phips) government, the Court of Assistants ruled on a piracy case involving several men from Salem. The final verdicts would reverberate throughout the 1692 witch trials since seven of the nine justices who sat on the Court of Oyer and Terminer had served during the interim government.

For three months, Thomas Pound and his pirate crew captured several ships along the coast from Maine to Virginia. At his trial in January 1690, Pound detailed his travels and pillages. His plan was to head to Curacao to attack French ships, but Capt. Samuel Pease, commander of the sloop Mary, found them first. Outfitted by the government, Mary’s crew went to battle against Pound’s crew, and four pirates died. Capt. Pease died from his injuries a week later, adding murder to the felony and piracy charges.

Back in Boston, the Court of Assistants convicted the pirates and sentenced them to “be hanged by the neck until they be dead.” As the day of execution drew near, Magistrate Waitstill Winthrop sought support to ask Governor Simon Bradstreet to grant the pirates a reprieve. By the time the sheriff received the order, pirate Thomas Johnson had been turned off the scaffold and was dead, and the noose was being prepared for Thomas Hawkins. Since colonials rallied around such spectacles of death—and justice—Magistrate Samuel Sewall wrote in his diary, the last-minute reprieves “gave great disgust to the people; I fear it was ill done.” Sewall’s reluctant agreement with the other magistrates weighed heavily on him as he awaited reprisals from God.

Notably, in court Thomas Pound had pointedly claimed Thomas Hawkins, whose boat was used at the start of their enterprise, was not at any point a prisoner. Hawkins deserted the crew at Tarpaulin Cove, was captured separately, and taken in chains to Boston jail. He was not involved in the battle that killed Capt. Pease. Perhaps Pound wanted to remind the judges that Hawkins was well connected. Hawkins’ sister Elizabeth had married Adam Winthrop (brother of Waitstill) and John Richards, a magistrate; sister Abigail was married to the Honorable John Foster, a justice of common pleas; and sister Hannah was married to Elisha Hutchinson, a magistrate.

Influenced by elite connections instead of the rule of law, the judges failed in their duty to let justice be done. Two years later, these same men failed to respond to neighborly petitions to save victims accused of witchcraft based on spectral evidence. Yet when whispers of witchcraft enveloped elite members of society, those accusations never made it to court.

And as for the pirates? Most were released after paying 20 marks. Bound for England for trial, Thomas Hawkins was slain when the ship was attacked by a French privateer; Pound survived the battle, became captain of a Royal Navy ship, and died a “gentleman” in 1703.

Sources: Pirates of the New England Coast; Diary of Samuel Sewall, 1:309-310; New England Historical Genealogical Register Vol. 45:215-217; Baker, A Storm of Witchcraft.

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with , , ,

A student interview with Professor Emerson W. Baker on the triumph and tragedy of the 1692 Salem witch trials as part of the 2019 National History Day contest. (Missed Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, or Part 5?)

Kayleigh: Why aren’t the accused and condemned Salem witch trial victims considered martyrs?

Dr. Baker: I do see that term martyr thrown around from time to time; I sometimes use that term. I really think they were. I’m not really a religious historian but martyrs are people who willingly accept their fate—usually a gruesome, horrible fate—in the name of maintaining their religious beliefs. They refuse to yield. Let me put it this way. I don’t think anyone gets into the martyr business. It’s not a good career move. I don’t think anyone sets out to become a martyr to make a name for themselves. But they do it because they are such devout believers in their faith that they are willing to die for it rather than in any way malign or give up that faith or lessen it.

Certainly, it seems to me that by the late summer of 1692, it’s becoming increasingly clear that if you confess, you may not save your life but you will at least prolong it. Having said this, I know my friend Margo Burns disagrees with this to some degree. She’d be right in saying, “Tad, we don’t know if Governor Phips had let the Court of Oyer and Terminer meet in November if it would have convicted and sentenced to death even more of the folks who confessed.” In January they did, in fact, start convicting people who had confessed in the September meeting of the court. I think she’s right there. But having said that, by the summer of 1692, if you noticed the people who had gone to trial, those who had pled “not guilty” had a very quick trial and sentence and execution.

If you looked at those who said they were a witch, like Tituba and Abigail Hobbs, months after their confessions they were still alive. So families were starting to beg people to just confess. At the time, did they actually think that they would ultimately be spared? Maybe not. But if you wanted to stick to your strong Christian convictions, that was a real quick path to death in 1692. If you were willing to lie—to put a stain on your soul and your family for eternity—and say that you were a witch, you would still be living, at least for a while. I think that’s a critical thing to understand that went on in Salem, that many people took that way out.

So to me, these victims really are martyrs. Why are they not considered that today? I think it’s a good question; I never really had that question posed to me. I’m still thinking about it. A couple of things. One is that people today don’t really understand what really happened in 1692, they don’t actually understand who was executed and why, and who was not. Whenever I give a talk and I say over a third of the people who were accused confessed and died, people are shocked by it. They just don’t know that. I think part of the issue is just a lack of awareness.

Two, if you think about it, we’re such a secular society today that we really don’t have martyrs. And also, in the Puritan faith, at the time when these people might have been considered martyrs in the 17th century, certainly the church and the authorities didn’t think them to be martyrs because they had been the ones who put them to death. And at the time when you want to consider people that were martyrs in the 19th and 20th centuries. I think we have a much more secular society, so I think that explains it. So, a lack of understanding and also the nature of our society today.

Kayleigh: Salem is most famous for the 1692 witch trials and people still talk about that history, especially during October. Nowadays, there are witch hunts, like in Africa. Why don’t people seem to care that it’s still happening? Or don’t do anything about it? It’s rarely in the news at all.

Dr. Baker: You see a story show up once every year or so. To me, part of it goes back to the fact that every society has its witchcraft. We no longer accuse people of being witches but there are still cases of mob violence today. They are declining. But I think as far as trying to put a stop to it, there are actually some international efforts that are underway between some of the humanitarian relief organizations that are trying to work to address some of these concerns.

But as to why they are not more well known? I think part of it is that witchcraft persecutions we have today in places like Africa are not state-sanctioned trials and executions. This is essentially mob violence. What you’re talking about here, well, there’s no official thing you can do to intervene. Instead what’s really called for is education. I’ve tried to explain to people the reason why we’re having crop failures is because of global weather patterns and it’s not one poor person in town you think is cursing the fields. It’s sort of an insidious situation.

How do you stop hate crimes? How do we stop the mass shootings in the schools? And in the churches? You can’t legislate that. No amount of aid or money will necessarily solve those problems. We have some of these problems in our country and there’s no easy answer, except to solve these problems through education. 

———

Emerson (“Tad”) W. Baker is a historian and professor at Salem State University and the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998).

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with

A student interview with Professor Emerson W. Baker on the triumph and tragedy of the 1692 Salem witch trials as part of the 2019 National History Day contest. (Missed Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, or Part 4?)

Kayleigh: Are there any other lessons from the Salem witch trials that people of today should learn?

Dr. Baker: Any other lessons of the trials? Wow. That’s clearly like the big question.

If we can think before we rush to judgment, if we could try to put ourselves in other people’s shoes rather than scapegoating them, it would be nice. The other thing is how our society—well pretty much every society throughout history—has always considered itself to be superior to everyone who lived before. Even in the up-to-date, modern society of 1692 I’m sure they felt the same way: that previous generations were nowhere near as smart or as sophisticated or technologically savvy or you name it. We tend to put down previous generations and assume they were more stupid than we were.

You see it all the time on TV, for example. One of my least favorite shows on television is Ancient Aliens. It’s a show on the History Channel where they look at things from the ancient world that don’t make sense or that we don’t understand. For example, we don’t understand how they built the great pyramids. We don’t understand how they built things to such exacting standards in prehistoric times only using stone tools.

So if we don’t understand it, for some people the answer can’t be that these people had ancient wisdom and knowledge that we are not smart enough to figure out. In some ways, they were our superiors. As a historian, I can accept that and say, “wow, there’s a lot we could probably learn here.” But if you look at a show like Ancient Aliens, the basic premise is people long ago were clearly stupid and inferior compared to us. So if they were able to do things that we cannot explain—like building the great pyramids—the logical answer is that they had help from ancient aliens who flew in from outer space to do these things for them.

Every time I give a talk about the Salem witch trials, someone always says, “How can they be so superstitious?” Well, they weren’t superstitious, they were God-fearing Christians and the Devil was real. “How could they be so foolish and superstitious, so ignorant to execute all these people for witchcraft?” My point is: They weren’t foolish, they weren’t superstitious. They thought they were doing what needed to be done according to the knowledge of the day to protect the individuals and their society. They thought people who were believed to be witches were in league with Satan, and through Satan were using his black power to destroy the earth.

Every society has challenges. People looking back at history are going to judge them and say, “wow they were really stupid. Why did they do it this way? Why wasn’t it so obvious to them that the answer was something else?” If only we could try to be more like a just society, and try to eliminate hatred and discrimination and realize that we don’t have all the answers. We should try to do the best we can under the circumstances, and not judge our fellow people, nor judge people in the past unless we really try to understand their lives.

Emerson (“Tad”) W. Baker is a historian and professor at Salem State University and the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998).

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 6

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with , ,
Cotton Mather wrote the only government-approved book about the Salem witch trials.

A student interview with Professor Emerson W. Baker on the triumph and tragedy of the 1692 Salem witch trials as part of the 2019 National History Day contest. (Missed Part 1, Part 2, or Part 3?)

Kayleigh: As you said in your book, A Storm of Witchcraft, Governor William Phips created one of the first large-scale government coverups in American history by curbing free speech [about the Salem witch trials]. This happened again, during World War I, etc. Why do you think the government seems to repeat the same problems over and over again? Is it because they don’t learn from history or they forget about the past?

Dr. Baker: I don’t really think history repeats itself but I do think sometimes it burps itself back up. Part of it is that most politicians are not good historians. I also think too that unfortunately, it’s sort of a self-preservation reaction to try to cover something up. It’s an instinctive thing to muzzle the press, to quiet dissent. It’s weird because on the one hand, you know, it’s such an American thing to have dissent and to have freedom of speech and open opinion. It’s also part of a self-preservation mode to try to quash that, to control that.

Frankly, you can see that today in this whole bit about fake news. The president can’t control free speech, he can’t issue a public speech ban the way William Phips did, but what he can do as much as possible is to control the media by saying they are speaking falsehoods. To me, it’s the same kind of process. What’s interesting to me—and this is where Salem is so fascinating—is that every generation has that version, that incident of Salem: the Red Scare, McCarthyism, or earlier on, the treatment of Loyalists, or the issue of slavery. Every generation has its political fight where one group or multiple groups try to restrict the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, of other groups, for political ends. Ultimately, unfortunately, it almost seems to be part of human nature and it’s something we have to be constantly on guard for and to fight against.

At the end of my previous book, The Devil of Great Island, which is another case of witchcraft in New Hampshire in the 1680s, I say, unfortunately, as long as we have hatred and prejudices and racism and bigotry and persecution and scapegoating, we’re going to have some form of witchcraft. And we’re also going to have some kind of effort to restrict people’s freedoms. It’s not the most optimistic, uplifting note. But to me, it’s why studying this stuff is so important because it rings true today and it alerts us to the dangers of any efforts to restrict a free society.

———

Emerson (“Tad”) W. Baker is a historian and professor at Salem State University and the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998).

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 5
Part 6

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with ,
Proctor's Ledge

A student interview with Professor Emerson W. Baker on the triumph and tragedy of the 1692 Salem witch trials as part of the 2019 National History Day contest. (Missed Part 1or Part 2?)

Kayleigh: In Salem, they treat history like it’s more of a show than actual history. The museums are kind of terrible. Why do you think that is? Is it because they think people will be more interested in the drama than the truth?

Dr. Baker: I think part of the problem is that Salem has become a dark-tourism community, a witch-trials-tourism community. A large part of Salem’s economy depends on tourists, depends on people coming here to visit the sites associated with the witch trials. And it’s problematic. We have the 1692 deaths of 19 innocent people and we have the people who are promoting dark tourism. I call it the vampire-fangs-and-fried-dough phenomenon. People come here during Haunted Happenings and find this carnival-like atmosphere.

I think the problem is knowledge. One reason I started teaching about Salem witch trials and writing my book was that if you tell people the story, it gives them great pause about what they are doing in Salem. But the other problem is that people are doing this for a living. Most of the museums in Salem that make their money off of witchcraft tourism are not really museums. By definition, museums are nonprofit organizations. And these are all for-profit businesses, and, as you point out by your question, many of these places make their money promoting the spectacular, the morbid, the lurid, rather than trying to tell the story as we historians would like to have it told.

When they dedicated the memorial at Proctor’s Ledge* in July 2017, I was honored to be one of the few people who was asked to say a few words. What I said then was that I was thrilled to see Salem’s reaction when we came forward and told the mayor and her staff that we had confirmed the execution site. Frankly, when we did that I didn’t know what was going to happen. I was thinking, how on earth are we going to raise the money for a memorial? You know, we were just a small group of folks. Immediately, at that first meeting, the mayor and her aide simply said, “thank you for doing this. This is now our duty, our responsibility to help ensure that this site has been properly memorialized and is never forgotten again.” And the city took it upon itself immediately to build a memorial there.

To me, it was something wonderful that the city was willing to confront its past. So when I got to speak at the dedication, I mentioned this and the way the community came together to build this memorial. To me, I hoped it signaled a new beginning for Salem and how it treats the witch trials.

I would like to see in the future less celebration and more communion, dedication, and thought about the events of 1692, rather than celebration and the carnival-like atmosphere. Realistically, we’ll never get rid of that carnival-like element. I think we need more reflection and less celebration. I guess I am mildly optimistic that that can happen.

———

*Emerson Baker and the Gallows Hill Team spent five years researching data and analyzing topography to pinpoint the site where 19 victims of the 1692 witch hunt were executed. In 2017, a memorial was dedicated at the location.

Emerson (“Tad”) W. Baker is a historian and professor at Salem State University and the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998).

Part 1
Part 2
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6

#CommissionEarned on Amazon links

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with , , , ,

A student interview with Professor Emerson W. Baker on the triumph and tragedy of the 1692 Salem witch trials as part of the 2019 National History Day contest. (Missed Part 1?)

Kayleigh: Danvers, Massachusetts, is almost disassociated with the 1692 Salem witch trials. Of course, Danvers has its memorial but it’s kind of out of place and hidden. Do you think it’s because of the way, like you said earlier, “Gallows Hill cast a large and dark shadow on Salem”?

Dr. Baker: I think Danvers has very deliberately chosen a separate path. Richard Trask, the town archivist of Danvers, has posted on the Danvers Archival Center website various articles and materials. In one he has written about how Danvers became a town. I actually quote it in my book, A Storm of Witchcraft. He talks about the whole process of when Danvers finally was allowed to split off from Salem in 1752. Many historians, like [Paul] Boyer and [Stephen] Nissenbaum, believe—and I would agree too—one of the triggers that caused the Salem witch trials was the inability to split off from Salem in 1692. Ironically, it took another 60 years, until 1752, before the Salem Villagers were allowed to become a separate town, for a number of political reasons. Trask’s article traces that evolution to when the town is named Danvers after an English nobleman, which was a common practice back then. Trask thinks that the town was perfectly happy with that, that they enjoyed the anonymity of no longer being part of Salem.

I think you’re right, part of it is that shame, that humiliation, but Danvers also tried to much more normalize the relationship [to its 1692 past] over the years. Remember, it was Danvers that was the first community that had a memorial [in 1885]. Then they added onto it in 1892. To me what’s really fascinating is: Where was that memorial placed? It’s placed at the Rebecca Nurse farm. When the memorial was placed there, the farm had long been occupied by members of the Putnam family. Have you been to the Rebecca Nurse farm?

Kayleigh: Yes, I have. A couple of years ago.

Dr. Baker: If you go down to the cemetery there, you’ll notice that there are probably more Putnams buried there than Nurses. For me, the fascinating piece is that the Putnams are actually related to the Nurses.* Nowadays this is one big, happy family. What’s neat to me, you know, is that the Putnam family was willing to let the Nurse Family Association erect this memorial to the [witch trials] past in their family cemetery that they also shared with the Nurses.

I think Danvers has always tried early on to atone for what happened in 1692. To me, the very different treatment of the tercentenary is a good example of how Danvers deals with these things. They wanted to build a memorial. But they were much more low-key, they didn’t get [Holocaust survivor and author] Elie Wiesel to dedicate it or stuff like that. If you’ve seen the memorial, it’s right there by the elementary school, it’s across the street from the site of the 1692 meeting house, it’s sitting there amongst the ballfields and elementary school. It’s part of this residential community and it just seems to blend in very nicely.

The other thing Danvers did in 1992, and you see this at the Nurse cemetery, they reburied what they think are [witch trials victim] George Jacobs’ remains. The way they did this was so Danvers. Salem, you know, they unveil this memorial, they have Elie Wiesel, they have all these bells and whistles. Danvers essentially had this private committal service for George Jacobs. They went to great lengths to be historically accurate with this. They built—well, a fellow who is a good carpenter built—a replica of a 17th-century coffin to put the bones in, they did that replica 17th-century gravestone, and recreated a committal service like you would have had in 1692—and they basically did it as a private ceremony. I think there was one reporter they allowed to be there. But there weren’t all these press releases, “Come watch us bury George Jacobs!” So, to me, it was much more an acknowledgment of the past and the wrong, but with absolutely no efforts to commercialize it.

Since 1892, at least, Salem has had this complex relationship. On the one hand, people want to make good on past sins and say “let these things never happen again.” On the other hand, they’re saying, “Would you like to take a tour of haunted Salem for $30?”

Danvers is not like that, it has never been like that. They’ve never tried to commercialize it in any way or draw any publicity to the community. The Danversites are not interested in doing that. They take quiet, humble acts to try to do penance for the events of 1692.

———

*In 1692, some of the Putnam family, most notably Ann Putnam Jr. (1679-1716), accused 70-year-old Rebecca Nurse of being a witch. She was hanged on 19 July 1692. A generation or two later, the families intermarried.

Emerson (“Tad”) W. Baker is a historian and professor at Salem State University and the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998).

Part 1
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6

By Posted on Posted in History, Q&A Tagged with

Every year, more half a million high school students participate in the National History Day contest. In 2019, the theme was Triumph & Tragedy in History. Besides a multimedia website based on witch hunts, Kayleigh interviewed Emerson (“Tad”) Baker, historian and professor at Salem State University. Professor Baker is the author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience (2014), The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft & Conflict in Early New England (2007), and The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695 (1998). He also was a member of the Gallows Hill Project Team that verified the 1692 site where 19 people were hanged during the Salem witch trials.

Kayleigh: My project is following the history of witchcraft and showing this year’s theme of triumph and tragedy, of how the horrible deaths and torture that the accused went through caused people to change how they think about the government and how they treat trials. I know that in your book, A Storm of Witchcraft, you talk about the current significance of the trials. I was wondering how you think Salem has become a place where modern-day witches want to live when in history witches had been hunted and killed there.

Dr. Baker: Well, as I like to say, Gallows Hill has cast a large and dark shadow on Salem since 1692. And I really think that has been a point of shame and humiliation and reflection on people in Salem ever since. Note that it took until the 300th anniversary for the city to even build a memorial to acknowledge that. And that there were, as I talk about in the book, efforts before that. They tried at the 200th anniversary and there just didn’t seem to be the will in the community to face it. There really was an effort I think to really try to forget—collective amnesia.

Look at the whole side of the executions where people knew, well into the 18th century, the Proctor family owned the land, surely they knew where the executions took place, and yet somehow by the 19th century the community somehow managed to collectively “forget.” [If you were sitting here with me, you’d see I was putting quotes around the word “forget.”] And so it was a long sort of sore spot for the community, and as I point out in the book, Salem really was publicly ridiculed for it as early as 1697 in the first book where they do that.

So, back to your question: How does that get Salem to be a welcoming place? It is interesting. I was on a panel discussion about this subject a few years ago. Essentially, you hear about some of the people who come to Salem, for example, a fellow who had several murder sentences overturned—a very famous case—he was released from prison after a wrongful conviction after he served many years in jail. He and his wife moved to Salem. When asked why, his response was that the people in Salem understand how dangerous, how damaging it is to pre-judge people, to rush to judgment. He said it’s sort of like letting people be and prove themselves on their merits. In essence, they felt that Salem was a very welcoming place, that no one was making any assumptions about them or their past. They said that Salem had made that mistake before and the people here now wanted to be a more open and welcoming community, where people, regardless of who they are—their background, their faith, anything—that they would be welcome in Salem.

I get that sense here in the people of Salem overall that people want to try to make amends. The one way that you can do that is to be an open and caring community where everyone—immigrants from all over the world, people of whatever faith—can be comfortable and feel at home in Salem.

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6

By Posted on Posted in Genealogy, History Tagged with
Court record from the witchcraft prosecution of Eunice Cole in 1673. Massachusetts Archives Collection, Vol. 135, No. 9

Court record from the witchcraft prosecution of Eunice Cole in 1673

(Massachusetts Archives Collection, Vol. 135, No. 9)

We know very little about Eunice (—) Cole’s background and her life in England. By 1636, she was married to William Cole, who was 20 to 30 years older than she was. The couple was childless and apparently had no relatives in New England. Yet more than three hundred years after she died, Eunice is still remembered in Hampton, New Hampshire, and her difficult life can be traced in numerous court records.

In 1636, William Cole and his wife Eunice sailed to Boston as servants of Matthew Craddock, a wealthy merchant of London who had properties in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Once they landed, however, the couple did not work on Craddock’s properties and neglected to pay £10 for their ship passage. By 16 November 1637, Craddock’s agent was demanding payment, though they had no money to pay the debt. Even the town of Boston was cautious about helping the aged carpenter, giving him “two acres only for his present planting” at Mount Wollaston.

There, William and Eunice Cole met Rev. John Wheelwright, who shortly afterward was disenfranchised and banished from the colony. The Coles followed him. In April 1638, William witnessed an Indian deed between Wheelwright and Wehanownowit. He signed the Exeter Combination the following year.

In June 1640, William Cole received a grant in Hampton for a town lot and upland. It seemed like William and Eunice Cole’s fortunes were improving.

But in 1645, Eunice was brought to court for her “slanderous speeches” against her neighbors. Sitting in the stocks didn’t improve her behavior. In 1647, William Cole offered to “rescue [steal] goods out of the hands of William Fuller, the constable,” and he and his wife were charged with biting the constable’s hands. To top it off, Eunice had some choice words to say about Fuller. Eunice made several court appearances in 1648, 1651, and 1654 for unstated charges.

In 1656, Eunice was accused of witchcraft and imprisoned in Boston, but not convicted. Witchcraft was a capital crime, punishable by hanging, and in June of that year, widow Anne Hibbens was executed for witchcraft in Boston. Eunice was in prison so long that her husband William pleaded for her release in 1659. In 1660, Eunice was in court again for unseemly speeches and was whipped by Hampton constable John Huggins. From prison in 1662, Eunice asked to be released to take care of her 88-year-old husband as only a wife could do. She remained locked up, unable to pay her prison fees.

Meanwhile, William Cole was in dire straits. In 1657, Craddock’s estate made another demand for payment on the 10-pound bond. On 3 November 1659, William asked the General Court for relief. Instead, the court demanded the town of Hampton take over his estate and support him. Aged and very sickly, on 26 May 1662, William wrote his will, in which he gave his house, land, cattle, household stuff, and whatever remained to Thomas Webster upon condition of keeping him comfortable during his life—and then he promptly expired. The inventory totaled £59.14.0, with the five-acre house lot and the house upon it worth £20. To Eunice, he left only her clothes. The Norfolk county court set aside the will, and after debts were paid, half went to Thomas Webster and the other half went to the selectmen of Hampton for Eunice’s support.

Without a home to return to, in 1670, the town of Hampton erected a hut for Eunice Cole, and the townspeople took turns supplying her food and fuel. In a short time, old fears and stories returned of Eunice hurting or killing people and livestock, being a shape-shifter, having conversations with the devil, and trying to steal children. After gathering testimonies, in 1673 the jury decided Eunice was not legally guilty of witchcraft but strongly suspected her of familiarity with the devil. On 7 September 1680, again the court “vehemently” suspected Eunice of being a witch but without “full proof.” They ordered her imprisoned, with a lock on her leg.

Eunice returned to Hampton only to die, alone in her hut, in October 1680.

Sources

AmericanAncestors.org (vital records, court records, etc.)

Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England by John Putnam Demos (chapter 10)

Marked: The Witchcraft Persecution of Goodwife Unise Cole 1656-1680 by Cheryl Lassiter (“creative nonfiction”; p. 169 for record images of Eunice Cole’s death)