Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials

People ask themselves, why 1692? What started the Salem Witch Trials? Why were the people accused of witchcraft? There are some answers to those questions, but not accurate as to give a full description, and correct facts about the trials. Each person has a different perspective towards those answers, but none have the proof for their answers. They are all commentaries that people get from their knowledge about history. The Salem Witchcraft trials were trials that resulted from the largest witch hunt in America history. The trials were held in 1692 in Salem, a town in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Nineteen people, both men and women, were convicted and hanged as witches. Another man was pressed to death with large stones for refusing to enter a plea of innocent or guilty to the witchcraft charge. Another 150 other resulted in the last witchcraft executions in America. The Massachusetts Bay Colony was an English colony, and many people there had brought the belief in witchcraft from England. Under English law, witchcraft was punishable by death. Sixteen people had been hanged as witches in New England before 1692. Throughout history millions of people, eighty-percent of which were women, have been accused, arrested, tortured, put to trial and persecuted as witches. In 1692, a tragedy occurred in America, the Salem Witch Trials. People would think that by the time the United States was colonized these injustices on humanity would have come to an end, but that was not so. Numerous witchcraft accusations had occurred in New England prior to 1692. As Indians attacked along the frontier and in the colonial landscape, most colonist feared for their own lives. In addition to the deadly cold winters, a smallpox epidemic had been around for over a decade. The superstitions of the people led them to believe that their God had abandoned them. In 1684, Great Britain withdrew its charter of Massachusetts, merchants sp... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials Salem Witch Trials The Salem Witch Trials all began on January 20,1962, with nine year old Elizabeth â€Å"Betty† Parris and eleven year old Abigail Williams, daughter and niece of the village reverend Samuel Parris. Soon the girls began exhibiting strange behavior, such as blasphemous screaming, convulsive seizures, trance like states and acting as if to cast mysterious spells. Within a short period, several other Salem girls began to illustrate similar behavior; physicians felt that the girls were under the control of the devil, Satan. Reverend Parris conducted prayer services and public fasting in hopes of revealing the evil forces that tormented them. In an effort to expose the ‘enchantress’, one man baked a witch cake made with rye bran and the urine of the ill girls. This counter-magic was meant to reveal the identities of the ‘witched’ to the ailing girls. Pressured to identify the cause of their misfortune, the girls named three women, including Tituba and two other slaves of Rev. Parris, as witches. On February 29, warrants were dispatched for the arrests of Tituba, Sarah Osborne, and Sarah Good. Although Good and Osborne sustained guiltlessness, Tituba confessed to seeing Lucifer, who appeared to her â€Å"sometimes like a hog and sometimes like a great dog.† Furthermore, Tituba certified that there was a collaboration of witches at work in Salem. On March 1, Magistrates John Hathorne and Jonathon Corwin investigated the three women in the courthouse in Salem Village. Tituba confessed to pursuing black magic. Over the next few weeks, other villagers came forward and testified that they too had been traumatized by or had seen strange phantoms of some of the village members. As the witch hunting prolonged, charges were made toward many different people. Frequently unmasked were women whose behavior was somehow disturbing to the social order and formalities of the time. Some of the accused had reco... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials Salem Witch Trials What was the cause of the Salem Witch Trials? In the 300 hundred years since the Witch Trials in Salem, there has been much speculation concerning whether those accused of witchcraft in 1692, were in fact witches or merely the object of the hysteria that raged through New England at the time. So how did it begin and why were these innocent girls accused of witchcraft? The Salem Witch Trials hysteria occurred in Salem, Massachusetts between 1692 and 1693. A total of 141 people were arrested, 19 people were hanged and one was crushed to death (SWT internet 3). It all started off when Rev. Samuel Parris before coming a minister, worked as a merchant in Barbados. In his return to Massachusetts he brought back two slaves. One of the slaves, Tituba, his nine-year-old daughter Elizabeth called Betty and his eleven-year-old niece Abigail. Tituba passed on stories to the other girls about voodoo. They soon became very interested in it and began playing with it all the time. One time when the other girls in the village knew about it, they all got into it and they all started telling each other's fortune. They did this by floating an egg white in a glass on water and predicted their future husbands. Betty started to feel ill and not long after the other girls in the village started to feel the same way and started to see things that weren't there. " Its hard to say whether the girls believed they were possessed or whether the whole thing started as an act which got out of control." (Drake 56) People in the village believed witches gained their power from the devil. It was decided to find the witches responsible for all the hysteria going around with the girls seeing things and hallucinating and kill them. All the girls accused Tituba for all the problems going around that the village thought was witchcraft since she was the one who brought it over. The first to be accused were Tituba, Sarah Good, and Sarah Osborne. Titub... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials People ask themselves, why 1692? What started the Salem Witch Trials? Why were the people accused of witchcraft? There are some answers to those questions, but not accurate as to give a full description, and correct facts about the trials. Each person has a different perspective towards those answers, but none have the proof for their answers. They are all commentaries that people get from their knowledge about history. The Salem Witchcraft trials were trials that resulted from the largest witch hunt in America history. The trials were held in 1692 in Salem, a town in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Nineteen people, both men and women, were convicted and hanged as witches. Another man was pressed to death with large stones for refusing to enter a plea of innocent or guilty to the witchcraft charge. Another 150 other resulted in the last witchcraft executions in America. The Massachusetts Bay Colony was an English colony, and many people there had brought the belief in witchcraft from England. Under English law, witchcraft was punishable by death. Sixteen people had been hanged as witches in New England before 1692. Throughout history millions of people, eighty-percent of which were women, have been accused, arrested, tortured, put to trial and persecuted as witches. In 1692, a tragedy occurred in America, the Salem Witch Trials. People would think that by the time the United States was colonized these injustices on humanity would have come to an end, but that was not so. Numerous witchcraft accusations had occurred in New England prior to 1692. As Indians attacked along the frontier and in the colonial landscape, most colonist feared for their own lives. In addition to the deadly cold winters, a smallpox epidemic had been around for over a decade. The superstitions of the people led them to believe that their God had abandoned them. In 1684, Great Britain withdrew its charter of Massachusetts, merchants sp... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials The Salem Witch Trials What caused the Salem witch trials? This is a question that has been asked for the last three hundred years. There is no easy answer to that question. There were numerous factors and events that lead to the trials. â€Å"A recent small pox outbreak, the revocation of the Massachusetts Bay Colony Charter by Charles II and the constant fear of Indian attacks helped in creating anxiety among the Puritans and a fear that God was punishing them. This fear of punishment established a fertile atmosphere in which a case of witchcraft could easily be interpreted by the Puritans as the cause of Gods wrath† (Victims) Other factors were politics, religion, family feuds, economics, and the imagination and fears of the people. These factors brought about a climate of repression, religious intolerance, social hierarchy combined with fanaticism and oppression of women. The Puritan leaders used the trials as a way to control the community and prevent change in the strict social hierarchy. Ac cording to Woloch â€Å"historian Carol F. Karlson points out most New Englanders accused of witchcraft were middle aged or older women, who lacking brothers or sons stood to inherit. Such women impeded â€Å"the orderly transition of property from one generation to another†.† (Woloch, 30) Lets start with the political problems of Salem. The tension over land was growing fast. The residents were divided into two groups: those that wanted to separate from Salem town, and those that did not. The farming families in the Western part of Salem Village wanted to separate from Salem Town. The families located in the eastern part of Salem Village and therefore closest to Salem Town wanted to remain part of the town. (Sutter) There was much overcrowding in in New England communities. In 1632, the general court granted Governor Endicott three hundred acres of land. With subsequent land grants to others, the boundaries and borders that told the people wh... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials The seventeenth century Salem witch trials brought panic and hysteria throughout the people of Salem. Whether or not the lives of apparently innocent men and women were taken illegally with insufficient evidence is still a subject of continuing debate. There are numerous factors and events that helped create and influence the trials. The main factors that started and fueled the trials were politics, religion, family feuds, economics, and the imaginations and fears of the people. Puritans believed in witches and their ability to harm others. They defined witchcraft as entering into a compact with the devil in exchange for certain powers to do evil. Thus, according to www.law.umkc.edu, â€Å"...witchcraft was considered a sin because it denied God’s superiority, and a crime because the witch could call up the Devil in his/her shape to perform cruel acts against others. In 1692, nineteen villagers were put to death in Salem, Massachusetts. Alice Dickenson, author of The Salem Witchcraft Delusion, states, â€Å"Reasons for conviction were the torment of teenage girls by supernatural means: witchcraft†(Dickenson 68). According to Shirley Jackson, author of The Witchcraft of Salem Village,â€Å"...these teens experienced pricking and pinching sensations, and some were contorted into strange bodily positions†(Jackson 44). The witchcraft outbreak originated in Salem Village with Betty Paris being the first afflicted girl. A woman by the name of Tituba was the first to be accused and the Heinzmann 4 first to confess of wrongdoing. The Salem Witchcraft Papers state, Tituba was asked to bake a witch cake in order to help the girls name their tormentors. A witch cake is composed of rye meal mixed with urine from the afflicted. It is then fed to a dog. The person(s) is/are considered bewitched if the dog displays similar symptoms as the afflicted. The girls were at first hesitant to speak, but Betty eventually spoke and named ... Free Essays on Salem Witch Trials 1629: Salem is settled. 1641: English law makes witchcraft a capital crime. 1684: England declares that the colonies may not self-govern. 1688: Following an argument with laundress Goody Glover, Martha Goodwin, 13, begins exhibiting bizarre behavior. Days later her younger brother and two sisters exhibit similar behavior. Glover is arrested and tried for bewitching the Goodwin children. Reverend Cotton Mather meets twice with Glover following her arrest in an attempt to persuade her to repent her witchcraft. Glover is hanged. Mather takes Martha Goodwin into his house. Her bizarre behavior continues and worsens. 1688: Mather publishes Memorable Providences, Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions November, 1689: Samuel Parris is named the new minister of Salem. Parris moves to Salem from Boston, where Memorable Providence was published. October 16, 1691: Villagers vow to drive Parris out of Salem and stop contributing to his salary. January 20, 1692: Eleven-year old Abigail Williams and nine-year-old Elizabeth Parris begin behaving much as the Goodwin children acted four years earlier. Soon Ann Putnam Jr. and other Salem girls begin acting similarly. Mid-February, 1692: Doctor Griggs, who attends to the "afflicted" girls, suggests that witchcraft may be the cause of their strange behavior. February 25, 1692: Tituba, at the request of neighbor Mary Sibley, bakes a "witch cake" and feeds it to a dog. According to an English folk remedy, feeding a dog this kind of cake, which contained the urine of the afflicted, would counteract the spell put on Elizabeth and Abigail. The reason the cake is fed to a dog is because the dog is believed a "familiar" of the Devil. Late-February, 1692: Pressured by ministers and townspeople to say who caused her odd behavior, Elizabeth identifies Tituba. The girls later accuse Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne of witchcraft. February 29, 1692: Arrest warrants are issued f...