Witchcraft : An Epidemic Of The Conspiracy Of Witchcraft

During the time of the Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692, more than twenty people died an innocent death. All of those innocent people were accused of one thing, witchcraft. During 1692, in the small town of Salem, Massachusetts many terrible events happened. A group of Puritans lived in Salem during this time. They had come from England, where they were prosecuted because of their religious beliefs.

The Salem Witch Trials are a series of hearings and prosecutions of people being accused of witchcraft. Many of the people that were accused of witchcraft was in Colonial Massachuse... ... middle of paper ... ...under heavy stones because he refused to submit to go to trial on witchcraft charges. Hysteria had got to a lot of people. 19 had died from the Gallows Hill in Salem, but others had died in prison. Hysteria began after a group of girls were possessed by the devil.

Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good proclaimed their innocence. Tituba at first, claimed she was innocent, but then later, she completely changed her mind and said she was guilty. Tituba said a man from Boston told her to sign the Devil’s book, or he would hurt Betty and Abigail. Tituba said she did, and saw nine other names, which included Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good. Tituba’s confession sparked a massive, hysterical, witch hunt in which at least 22 people were killed, in which nineteen people were hanged, between four to thirteen people who died in prison, and one person who was pressed to death.

This verdict triggered an investigation that took 25 lives and more than 200 people were accused of practicing witchcraft; prisons filled with wrongly accused people, and concerned the people of the community of Salem, Massachusetts. In the year of 1692 a group of several young girls, some being, Bridget Bishop, Alice Parker, Mary Easty, Betty Parris and Sarah Hubbard, were arrested, who were claimed by other colonist to be possessed by the devil. Later in February of 1692 arrest warrants were made to three women; all of them were accused by the group of young girls with the symptoms of the sickness, that they bewitched them. These three women names were a homeless beggar, Sarah Good, an elder Sarah Osborn and a Caribbean slave, Tituba. These three women were brought to court to be trialed for using witchcraft.

The Salem Witch Trials were started by a couple of bratty girls who decided it would be enjoyable to accuse someone of being a witch, and then contort their bodies and act afflicted any time that person came around. Sadly, the accusations of these girls were taken very seriously by the judge and adults of Salem. People were convicted of witchcraft simply because they had irregular moles or blemishes on their faces. Yes, the people of Salem were in a mass hysteria, filling up jails with “witches” to the point where the jails reached capacity and they could not fit any more people in them. They were able to accuse these people through mob mentality, Puritan culture, and forced conformity.

Ten months later, nineteen people had been hanged, stubborn Giles Corey who refused to plea Guilty or not Guilty was pressed to death by heavy stones, and more than 100 others jailed. Accusations spread wider and went way beyond the borders of Salem. This worried colonial leaders and they decided that the witch – hunts were out of control. The jury had about seen enough when the girls accused Samuel Willard, the pastor of Boston’s First Church and president of Harvard College, of practicing witchcraft. The governor disbanded the special court and ordered the remaining suspects released when he was stunned that his own wife was accused of worshiping the devil.

to the people of Salem. The comparison of the two time periods led to the writing of The Crucible. The destruction of lives is a theme that is very evident in The Crucible because throughout the whole play almost everyone that was accused of practicing witchcraft was charged as guilty and in turn their lives were ruined. Even the people that were deemed innocent and good citizens by the community of Salem were falsely accused. Rebecca Nurse is a prime example of someone who was seen as very respectable and kind was falsely accused with little to no physical or practical evidence.

Year 1692, Hundreds of people, accused with the conviction of witchcraft, stoned to death, or in confinement with no justice trials. “From June through September of 1692, nineteen men and women, all having been convicted of witchcraft, were carted to Gallows Hill, a barren slope near Salem Village, for hanging” (The Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692) What caused the mass hysteria and disaster of Salem; for, the answer is unknown. Yet, many events and factors had contributed to the accusations, the punishments, and the confessions of the sentenced. Many colonists in Massachusetts were puritans, seeking religious tolerance. Ironically, the Puritan code was strict and disciplined.

Salem Witch Trials Salem Witch Trials - Gender and Power in the 17th Century The year 1692 and early 1693 saw the prosecution and execution of nineteen witches, an old man stoned to death, several accused witchcrafts dying in jail and close to 28 being cast out of the infamous Salem Village (present day Danvers, Massachusetts) on the belief they possessed power to sway people into doing what they wanted (Goodbeer, 2011, p. 2). Early 1692, the daughter; Elizabeth and niece; Abigail Williams of first Salem Village ordained minister; Reverend Parris experienced and had frightening episodes of screaming, uttering voices and throwing things around. Another girl Ann Putnam also experienced the same and under magistrates Jonathan Corwin and John Hawthorne influence, the girls blamed their conditions on three women: Tituba, Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne for performing witchcraft on them (Goodbeer, The Salem Witch Hunt , 2011, p. 14). Richard Godbeer’s ‘The Salem Witch Hunt’ puts into account the proceedings of several accused cases with most of the accused being women and the McCarthyism paranoia that gripped Salem Town. Two of the accused women; Good and Osborne pleaded not guilty but Tituba confessed practicing witchcraft and that there were many more witches in Salem.

Several centuries ago, many practicing Christians and people of other religions strongly believed that the Devil could give a few people known as witches the power to cause harm to others for their loyalty. In the 1600s, a Reverend’s daughter and niece started having “fits”; they would scream, throw things, make weird noises, and put themselves into strange positions. Claiming that they were being “bewitched” by other townspeople, these young girls caused one of the most controversial court cases ever to be considered: the Salem Witch Trials. Some of the witches were tortured and thrown into jail; they had to pay for their food and many other things. They also had to pay for the chains they were held in; many of them died in these very chains.