The Salem Witch Trials

The seventeenth century was a time of great religious excitement both in Europe and America. It had been widely believed even before the Puritans left England that witchcraft was a well-practiced profession in Europe. The times for settlers in the New America proved to be quite different and so ever changing. With many new rules, laws, regulations and curfew a true government was being born. Throughout this vast change, religious beliefs became so strong to be studied and participated in. Religions that divided from Christianity and Catholic beliefs, such as Puritans, who had a clear vision of what their churches were going to be like. Witchcraft had been a crime a long time before the trials in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and prior

At the surface, the Salem Witch Trials appear to have resulted from the conformist nature of the predominantly Puritan New England society. The Puritans emigrated over to what is now New England, mainly during the “Great Migration” of the 1630’s. Their society prospered largely due to their homogenous nature. For instance, the Puritans believed that a strong work ethic was crucial to keeping in touch with God, which made the New England colony suitable for sustainable population growth. Since their societies were predominantly Puritan, the society was self-policing, punishing anyone who stepped out of line. There was abundant behavior that to the Puritans was considered “sinful”, such as not attending church, or amassing wealth. The Puritans also held the belief that the everyone had an inner conflict between good and

The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 were a dark and very crucial time in American history. The late sixteen hundreds consisted of relying on young girls for the truth; but to what extent did the puritan’s religion and culture have in the proceedings of the Salem Witch Trials? A focus on the religion that the puritans believed in and their culture will be discussed. Also, how their faith turned them against those who were accused of witchcraft. It is also needed to discuss how they faith of the puritan’s even came about.

The Salem Witch Trials tried to accuse innocent members of the society of doing witchcraft. The trials began June 2, 1692 in a court house in Salem, Massachusetts (Burgan 18-19). It affected four counties in Massachusetts: Salem Village, Ipswich, Salem Town, and Andover Counties (Totallyhistory.com). Anyone accused would be brought to a local magistrate to testify if they were truly a witch or not. Over two-hundred people were accused of doing witchcraft and 19 people were hanged (Brooks).

The Puritan Salem Witchcraft Trials were cases brought to the county court of trials in 1692 during which accusations of witchcraft were made against both men and women in three towns in Massachusetts. After bringing 100-200 people in for trial, it was brought to the conclusion that 19 men and women were in the

Poorer families from the west side of Salem accused rich men and women of witchcraft and the judges executed many of them because they were afraid of losing power over the colony. Then Governor Philips stopped the trials in 1693 and released the others because there was no evidence.

Between the 1300s and 1600s, there had been an uprising of witch accusations in Europe. When it finally died down, the craze soon followed into the colony of Massachusetts Bay. While in the 1690s, the Salem Witch Trials threatened New England’s freedom of religion and conservative beliefs; the evil entity as well threatened the country’s political and economic system, giving the government a reason to get involved. Because Massachusetts Bay was filled with religious refugees from England, a lot of tension formed between the colonies, England, and France. The King Williams War between France and the English colonies had put a tremendous strain on the Salem resources and its people. The colony was barely able to support itself and when more refugees fled to Salem from sounding areas, it came close to collapsing. Within the Puritan community, there had been a lot of hardship and strenuous issues mainly due to the shift between the people in society at the time. The Salem Witch Trials were not influenced by the presence of witchcraft but rather the exhausting hardships, the societal changes and the desire for complete control of the Puritan community.

"You 're a liar! I 'm no more a witch than you are a wizard! If you take my life away, God will give you blood to drink!" (Sarah Good). To this day, there is still so much speculation on what was the actual cause of the hysteria that was the Salem Witch Trials. Were any of the women accused, like Sarah Good, actually practicing witchcraft? Or were the accusations placed on these women placed out of spite or jealousy? What caused these young women to have these strange symptoms in the first place? There are many theories to the cause of the chaos that occurred in Salem. The goal of this paper is to identify the different factors that played into the start of the trials and to discuss what went on in the trials themselves. This paper will explore these theories and come to a conclusion on what caused Salem to go into such a frenzy as it did in this time.

Witchcraft was defined as the act of invoking spiritual powers to accomplish a supernatural task- such as placing a curse upon a neighbor or predicting the future (Goss 1). In the belief of the ancient Israelites, being able to tell the future was limited to the realm of God was considered a form of witchcraft; these were also the beliefs of the puritans. The Puritans were a group of Christians, similar to the Pilgrims, envisioned a reformed Christian society; eventually they fled England to Massachusetts Bay. In 1628, the resident governor John Endicott was given the task to prepare Massachusetts Bay for the arrival of thousand of English Puritans fleeing the antagonistic Anglican Church. When these Witch Trials

From June until September of 1692, nineteen men and women were accused of being witches and performing witch craft. The accused were sent to Gallows Hill, a place near Salem Village to be prosecuted and hanged. Other people were also unofficially murdered. A senior was pressed under heavy stones until he died, for refusing to go to a trial for witchcraft. Many more were accused and had to spend months rotting in jail without being sent to a trial. The uproar began quickly and ended just as rapidly.

The Salem Witch Trials began in 1692 and became one of the most infamous witchcraft episodes in United States history. It all started in the small Puritan village of Salem when little Betty Parris and Abigail Williams become ill and did not show any sign of improvement. This is when Reverend Parris, Betty’s father, called in the village doctor William Griggs. His diagnosis of bewitchment had the village overtaken with mass hysteria that would continue to plague them long after the May 1693 end. During the trials one hundred and fifty six people were accused of witchcraft: fifty four of which confessed, nineteen of which were hanged, four of which died in jail, and one whom was pressed to death.

The Salem Witch Trials was a series of events that killed innocent people and brought fear to the community. The infamous Salem witch trials began during the Spring of 1692, located in Salem Village, Massachusetts. The people of Salem wanted to purge against anything that was considered remotely unholy. A group of young girls claimed that they were possessed by the devil and accused several local women of witchcraft. A special court was made due to this wave of hysteria that spreaded through colonial Massachusetts. The first convicted witch, Bridget Bishop, was hung in June of 1692. More than 150 men, women, and children were accused of being witches and eighteen others were trialed and executed. There were also two dogs that were trialed

In 1692, in Massachusetts Bay Colony town of Salem Village there were many contributing factors to the execution of fourteen women, five men, and two dogs. 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. It began as a few girls being accused of witchcraft, then slowly and more progressively it was many people that were being accused. The first few started it out of boredom, then it gout out of hand. The process of identifying witches began with suspicions or rumours.

The Salem Witch Trials took place in early 1692. During these trials around 150 people were accused of being witches by a group of young girls. The girls claimed that these “witches” had the power to harm them as a result of giving their loyalty to the devil. The Puritans strict culture and previous tension due to the fear of native american attacks bordering the village made it more susceptible to falling victim of the widespread chaos known as the Salem Witch Trials.

Throughout the town of Salem in 1695, Puritans thrived off of the word of God and his great-doings. In this paper readers will begin to understand the exact events that had led up to the accusations against the townspeople of Salem for witchcraft. Puritans possessed strong feelings of vengeance around the time the accusations began. They would accuse anyone even slightly suspicious of anything other than loving God and being pure which was correct to live as such back then. Many innocent people hung back then for being accused of witchcraft. What really started the suspicion in the first place though? Who decided that witchcraft was the correct form of language for such an act?