The Salem Witch Trials Of 1692

The Salem witch trials were a result of mass hysteria. It was caused by false accusations. On May 1693, fourteen women, five men, and two dogs were executed for supposed supernatural crimes. The Salem trials have a unique place in our collective history today. (" Saxon, V,Procedure Used in...").

In January 1692, when a group of juvenile girls began to display bizarre behavior, the tight-knit Puritan community of Salem, Massachusetts couldn’t explain the unusual afflictions and came to a conclusion. Witches had invaded Salem. This was the beginning of a period of mass hysteria known as The Salem Witch Trials. Hundreds of people were falsely accused of witchcraft and many paid the ultimate price of death. Nineteen people were hung, one was pressed to death, and as many as thirteen more died in prison. One of the accused Elizabeth Bassett Proctor, a faithful wife and mother, endured her fictitious accusation with honor and integrity.

The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. These trials began after a group of young girls in Massachusetts claimed to be possessed by the devil and accused several other locals of witchcraft. After this broke out a special court convened in Salem to “hear and determine” (Mather 328)

Between the months of June to September of 1692, the infamous witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts resulted in the hanging of 19 men and women; the deaths of five others, including two children, while imprisoned in jail; the pressing to death of an 80-year old man, and the stoning of two dogs for collaborating with the Devil. Hundreds of others faced accusations and dozens more were jailed for months during the progress of the trials. For over three hundred years these events have not only captured the general publics' imagination, but that of the academic community. Beginning with Charles Upham, in 1867, historians have attempted to explain the mass hysteria that swept through Salem in 1692. These accounts vary both in their

The Salem witch trials were a dark time in our history, filled with paranoia, betrayal, the innocence of children, and vengeance.The incident would be so severe that it would leave bitter scars that have continued to this day.

By reading the two primary sources we are given a clear account of the Salem Witch Trials. John Hale describes the officials involved in the trial and those being prosecuted. Hale states, “I observed in the prosecution of these affairs, that there was in the Justices, Judges and others concerned, a conscientious endeavor to do the thing that was right.” he then later states “But what chiefly carried on this matter to such an height, was the increasing of confessors til they amounted to near about fifty.” While Governor phips goes into more detail in reference to the actual court proceedings, “When the Court came to sit at Salem in the County of Essex they convicted more than twenty persons of being guilty of witchcraft, some of the convicted were such as confessed their Guilt, the Court as I understand began their proceedings with the accusations of the afflicted and then went upon other humane evidences to strengthen that.” Only together the sources are able to give the reader the information needed, showing a disadvantage to using primary sources to evaluate history. These accounts illustrate comprehensively the picture of a court concerned with doing the right thing for their people and trying the accused in the way they see fit. They explain the use of accusations to testify against the convicted and

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 Salem witch trials were a difficult time for the citizens of the Massachusetts Colony in the late seventeenth century. They were accused of practicing the Devil’s magic, which many believed to be real; so real that people were being imprisoned and executed for it. Between the years 1692 and 1693 there were over two hundred accusations and about 20 people and two dogs were killed altogether.

Throughout history, there have been many cases of discriminatory accusations of people, including the Salem Witch Trials. The Salem Witch Trials were a string of trials, hearings and prosecutions of many people accused of witchcraft in Massachusetts between the dates of February 1692 and May 1693. The trials ended up leading to the execution of twenty people, men and women, but mainly women. The Salem Witch Trials that took place about three hundred years ago affected the lives of everyday civilians during that time in ways such as politically, religiously, economically, fearfully, mentally, and sometimes in other various other ways.

Human beings always have been curious creatures. We are a species that is always searching for answers to unexplainable events. Take aliens for example. To us, aliens may or may not exist (depending on your individual belief of course). Yet we still take such an interest in them that we continuously search for answers and proof of alien. Now that we have modern day technology, we can attain “proof” of alien life-form somewhere deep in outer space. But given the date 1692 in New England, if we were to even come in contact with aliens it would have been considered some supernatural phenomena, and even cause quite a bit of hysteria. That is what happened to the puritans in Salem village during the Salem Witch Trials, in Massachusetts, in the year 1962. The puritans of Salem village were extremely paranoid, and they believed that if something can’t be explained then it had the devils influence. So when a group of Salem girls spoke up about the devil and witches, the villagers of Salem went into a panicked frenzy. Truth of the matter is that there were no witches in Salem nor was the devil at war against Salem; the Salem Witch Trials were only a result of endless lies, conspiracies, and side effects of an illness.

The Salem Witch Trials were a series of accusations, trials, and executions based on the supposed outbreak of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts. The trials began during the spring of 1692, and the last of them ended in 1693. It all started when two young girls, Abigail and Betty Parris, began experiencing violent convulsions and outbursts, which were thought to be brought about by witchcraft. Whether they were faking these symptoms, were afflicted with an actual sickness, or were experiencing them because of some sort of psychological reason is widely debated, though it is known that the sisters accused their maid, Tituba, of forcing them to participate in witchcraft with her. Some who theorize about the causes of the trials dismiss the Parris girls involvement in the beginning and instead attribute the outbreak of accusations to judgement upon the members of society who break social or religious rules, or who struck the upright members of society as ‘strange’ and ‘suspicious’, such as the homeless, the poor, and old or widowed women. The cause of the hysteria that went on in Salem after this is what is speculated by so many. There are probably hundreds of theories out there, but a few in particular are more widely known, accepted, and supported than others.

During the late 1600s, Salem, Massachusetts faced a period of witch trials due to panic stirring among the Puritans in the area. Because of these

Neighbors accused neighbors of witchcraft, and the fright was mounting. (Sutter par. 4) The accused were mostly women, and to make them confess, different methods of torture were used. The confessions and trials of the accused witches were nonsense. Often, torture would continue until the victim had no choice but to confess of being a witch, and most of the confessions were forced. Trials and hangings continued and by the early autumn of 1692, doubts were developing as to how so many respectable people could be guilty. The educated elite of the colony began efforts to end the witch-hunting hysteria that had enveloped Salem. Increase Mather then published a work entitled Cases of Conscience, which argues that it were better that ten suspected witches should escape than one innocent person should be condemned. This urged the court to exclude spectral evidence. With spectral evidence not permitted, the remaining trials ended in acquittals and all the convicted and accused witches were let out of jail in May of 1693. By the time the whole witchcraft incident ended, nineteen convicted witches were hanged, at least four accused witches had died in prison, and one man, Giles Corey, had been pressed to death under rocks. About one to two hundred other people were arrested and imprisoned on witchcraft charges. The witchcraft accusations in Salem had taken the lives of at least twenty-four people.

Einstein once said, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who do nothing” (Gurteen). The Salem witch trials began in the Spring of 1692 in Salem Village, Massachusetts. A group of young girls, who claimed to be possessed by the devil, began accusing a few women of witchcraft, which caused hysteria among the people in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Approximately 150 people were convicted of practicing witchcraft, 19 were hanged at Gallows Hill, and others died in captivity (“Salem Witch Trials”). These tragic events lead to the convictions of many innocent people in Salem Village and later in Salem Town, Ipswich, Gloucester, and other towns (Brooks). The Salem witch trials are a

This started the hysterical beginning of the Salem Witch trials, which resulted in many women, men, and children being accused of practicing witchcraft. Out of the one hundred fifty people accused in Salem, twenty of them were executed as witches, while others rotted away and died in jail. The people of Salem did not discriminate who they executed or who they sent to jail so the result was a diverse range of citizens being accused.