Three Sovereigns For Sarah

Sarah Cloyce felt that superstitions and Samuel Parris’ greed stirred by ancient quarrels were the cause of the Salem Witch Hysteria of 1692. The primary reason for witch hysteria was due to the boredom of the girls involved and superstitions of the times. What started off as innocent games between children changed when girls, such as Ann Putnam and Abigail Williams, enjoyed the attention they were given too much. Perhaps the greatest reason for the accusations of witchcraft was the long standing feuds between families like the Putnam and the Porters. Another reason was the appointing of Reverend Samuel Parris as minister of Salem Village. There were those towns people that opposed his appointing and those that supported him. Sarah believed all these factors contributed to the accusations of witchcraft.

    During the later acts of The Crucible, despite how vastly other characters have changed, Rebecca Nurse remains truthful and highly respected, in spite of being accused of witchcraft and arrested. In act four, Reverend Parris even testifies for her good character, which contradicts his earlier accusations of her witchery, by expressing to the judge that if they “let Rebecca stand upon the gibbet and send up some righteous prayer, [he’ll] fear she’ll wake a vengeance upon [the town].” The people of Salem see Rebecca as such a saintly woman that if she were unjustly killed, God himself would be angered. Reverend Parris recognizes this and feels that if someone so christian could be accused of witchcraft, then there is a serious flaw in the witch trials. This realization also reveals how most of the arrests were based on jealousy and paranoia, not actual evidence.

The Salem Witch Trials was a very dark period in our history that occurred in the colony of Salem, Massachusetts. These trials began in February 1692 and ended in May of 1693. There were over two hundred individuals who were accused of practicing witchcraft. Of those two hundred accused, nearly twenty innocent souls were lost. This was one of the most severe cases of mass hysteria in recorded history. There was a great effort exhorted by the Massachusetts General Court to declare a guilty verdict, that the framers of the United States Constitution went to great lengths to never let this type of tragedy occur again; commonly known as the eighth amendment. Remarkably so, some may argue that there were similarities in Salem and the

In the year 1692 many people were murdered during the Salem Witch Trials. The movie "Three Sovereigns for Sarah", is about Sarah Cloyce. She wanted to testify for her sisters who were killed by citizens of Salem because they thought they were witches. In the movie, Sarah Cloyce had to go through much pain and suffering. The movie had a unique way of telling about the deaths, religion, and people during the time of the Salem witch trials.

Imagine living in a household in Salem, Massachusetts. It is the year 1692 and you are a young female, around the age of 20. Now while a mass of events involving witch hunts are happening, everyone around you is panicking, accusing your friends, family and finally you of witchcraft, whether it was true or not that you had been practicing such sorcery. You confess anyways, being terrified, what happens to you next? The Salem Witch Trials should have been taken care of in a different way. The Salem Witch Trials a way to suppress people from exposing the truth behind the Government. The Trials were unfair, the Government and the townspeople were corrupt, and they had stress from outer threats surrounding the village.

The year of 1692 marked a time of mass hysteria and conflict within the small village of Salem, Massachusetts; this time was known as the Salem Witch Trials. The trials plagued the village with chaos, mystery, and accusations. As the hysterics of witchcraft rippled through Salem, more than two-hundred people were accused and tried, one-hundred-fifty townspeople were arrested, approximately twenty people were executed, and five others died in prison. The trials had a domino effect on the townspeople and sent the village into a downward spiral. Since then, the trials have become tantamount to paranoia, as almost three centuries later, they continue to beguile the great minds of many. To this day, though there are many possible theories, and

The movie Three Sovereigns for Sarah is about a terrified town that is struck by “the devils witchcraft” and takes extraordinarily inhuman actions to rid themselves of the bad fortune. The story is told by an old woman who was accused of being a witch, but luckily lives long enough to confront her accusers. Three Sovereigns for Sarah has many contributing factors as to why “witchcraft” was believed and used as a genuine reason to murder citizens of the thirteen colonies such factors that lead to these absurd and ridiculous decisions and actions are likely to be based off the early sexist concepts of gender roles that took place in the colonies, the strong pull to uniform religious beliefs, and a superstition that terrified people into an

Devastation come in all shapes and forms. Whether it is a hurricane that has destroyed a whole city or a plague that’s whipped out a whole country. In today’s society, we are able to track a hurricane and evacuate all nearby populaces before it arrives and a plague is highly unlikely due to our modern medicines, many different vaccines that have been and still are being created. However, in Salem Massachusetts, a devastation occurred that was unprecedented. It was not a hurricane or even a plague that had killed innocent people, but a group of girls. Could this have been prevented and lives saved? This paper will discuss the events that occurred in Salem in 1692 and the impact it had on the community.

Nineteen were hung, one was pressed and tortured to death, hundreds were imprisoned, and five had died while waiting to be trialed in prison. They were just a victim of being someone’s personal vendetta. The witch trials were revolved around a group of women that were said to of witnessed witchcraft. These young women were thirsting after their enemies to get the type of justice they thought to believe was reasonable for things certain people had done in the past that enraged them. Witch hunts like these root back far, all the way back to New England. During the 17th century europe was swarmed with accusations of

In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, he writes, “We are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law!” (Miller 77). This partially fictionalized tale of the Salem Witch Trials points to one of the causes of the trials, vengeance, but the over dramatized tale 's early stages were quiet. The Salem Witch Episode had humble beginnings in the town of Salem Village, Massachusetts, but evolved into one of the most widely known witch trials in American History. The gallows in Salem claimed the lives of nineteen men and woman during the spring and summer of 1692 due to the accusations of witchcraft with over a hundred people who were accused. After all the terror and the uproar of the trials occurred, everything came to a screeching halt (Linder 1). Due to the unique circumstances of this particular set of witch trials, from the rampant accusations to the discontinuation of the trials mass hysteria does not seem to be fault as with other witch trials, but a variety of factors. The Salem witch trials were not just a simple case of mass hysteria, but a combination of factors ranging from poisons to superstitions to scapegoats, resulting in the outbreak of the Salem Witch episode.

The witch trials of Salem are often thought to be a hysteria that can be categorized as fake and sometimes “crazy”. The trials started by the belief of the supernatural and the practice of the devil’s ability to grant people the ability to hurt others. Elizabeth Parris and Abigail Williams are the two young ladies that began the stereotypical beliefs in witchery. Williams and Parris started having hysterical fits and “uncontrollable” tantrums filled with screaming and crazy-like seizures. The result of all the insane opinions and conclusions to society were nineteen hangings, and one pressing. The Salem witch trials were a result of hasty decisions and the fear of God’s anger on the people of society. Today, the trials would be seen as crazy or fictional.

The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 caused hysteria throughout the town rapidly. Fear and paranoia were major causes of why this incident blew out of proportion and became such an intense historical event. When terror struck in the small town of Salem, the society went berserk. The fear of being hanged for witchcraft overcame the women of the community. The constant fright to be accused of trafficking with spirits, even if one knew they were not guilty, created this accusation frenzy. All the girls who had originally claimed they were “possessed by the devil” started blaming others for being witches and conjuring these spirits upon them, especially Abigail Williams. The court of Salem had said that all who did not confess were to be hanged because they were paranoid that if the women were to lie, there still would be witches lingering in their town. Some women decided to confess, even if they were innocent, because of the fear of death. Others did not confess because they were afraid of their reputation being ruined. Rebecca Nurse, a sweet, frail old woman in the town, exclaims, “Why, it is a lie, it is a lie; how may I damn myself? I cannot, I cannot” when the court tries to convince her to follow John Proctor’s lead and confess her sins. She will not confess because she knows she truly is innocent; she would rather be hanged over creating a lying confession and ruining her name. Fear and paranoia was the root cause of the Salem Witch Trials.

Many people know of the Salem witch trials that took place in Salem, Massachusetts in the year 1692 spilling over into the year 1693. But for those who do not know, the Salem witch trials were a series of trials against men, women, and children accused of being a witch and or practicing witchcraft. In “The Devils Snare: The Salem Witch Trials of 1692” by Mary Beth Norton, the author recollects the stories of real life accounts of those accusers and the accused in Salem during that time. Mary Beth Norton explains the Salem witch trials differently than other books and articles by giving wide-ranging background on incidents leading toward the trials and how events in history were related to the trials.

Reverend Samuel Parris is motivated to sustain his reputation because he took years to build up his name. Some of the folks already see him as unfit as the reverend. Having the assumption that there are sinful practices taking place under his roof, he, at first, denies the involvement of witchcraft with the odd behavior Betty displays. However, when a majority of the townspeople believe in the involvement of witchery. He does not want his name and reputation to be tarnished due to witchcraft, so he plays along and supports Betty’s and Abigail’s accusations. He uses Tituba as a scapegoat to divert the suspicion towards him. Parris threatens to whip Tituba if she does not confess that she has dealings with the Devil, and pushes her to her breaking point. Parris is motivated to uphold his reputation and tries to divert the possible blame and suspicion towards him to

After hearing this news, the girls were asked to pick out who they thought caused the fits. They blamed three women for the supernatural effects. The first woman that was blamed was Tituba. Tituba was the Reverend Parris’ Caribbean slave. The second woman blamed was a homeless beggar by the name of Sarah Good. The third and last woman blamed for cursing the children was an elderly and impoverished woman known as Sarah Osborn. After these three woman were accused of being witches, they were brought before the local magistrates and interrogated for several days (Aronson). Sarah Osborn and Sarah good both pleaded that they were innocent, but Tituba spoke differently. Tituba confessed that the Devil had come to her and had asked her to serve him. She then spoke of vivid images of red cats, yellow birds, black dogs, and a strange “black man” who had asked her to sign his book. She then stated that she did sign the book and that there were other witches in the area looking to destroy the Puritans (Blumberg). Some more people that were accused of being witches were Susannah Martin, John Proctor, and Samuel Wardell. Susannah Martin was in her late sixties. She was also a mother of eight and widowed to a blacksmith. Mrs. Martin was accused of witchcraft in the 1670’s, but her then husband had reversed the charges. John Proctor was a successful farmer,