The Accusers
The core group of accusers in the Salem Witch Trials were a group of young women with ages ranging 9-20 years old and their accusations centered around the idea that the women they accused had caused physical and mental harm to them through witchcraft. The girls had ‘fits’, screamed, barked and claimed that they were victims of Satanic possession. Dr. William Griggs diagnosed the girls as being ‘bewitched’ and they became known as the "afflicted".
Many of the girls were members of prominent village families, some were domestic servants and refugees of King William’s War, a long-running conflict that pitted English settlers against Wabanaki Native Americans and their French allies.
There have been numerous possible explanations for the girls’ actions: economic hardship, deliberate fraud, pressure from their parents, mass hysteria, mental illness or convulsive ergotism, a condition caused by a fungus that grows on rye and other grains. However, the truth of why it happened is impossible to know.
Elizabeth (Betty) Parris, 9 years old
Elizabeth “Betty” Parris was the first afflicted girl she was born in Boston on November 28, 1682. Her family and their salve Tituba, moved to Salem in November of 1689 when her father, Samuel Parris, was appointed the new minister of Salem Village.
In the winter of 1691-1692, some of the afflicted girls reportedly dabbled in fortune-telling techniques, such as a “Venus glass” in which the girls dropped an egg white into a glass of water so that a shape or symbol appeared, in an attempt to learn more about their future husbands and social status. Although some sources indicate that it was Tituba who taught the girls these fortune-telling techniques, there is no mention of this in the court records and no evidence that she was involved.
Shortly after the incident, Betty began behaving strangely in January of 1692, when she hid under furniture, complained of fever, barked like a dog, screamed and cried out in pain.
Soon after, Abigail Williams also started showing the same symptoms. Concerned, Samuel Parris called for Dr. Griggs, to examine them. Unable to find anything physically wrong with the girls, the doctor determined they must be bewitched.
In an attempt to cure Betty and prevent her from getting further involved in the witch trials, her parents sent her away from Salem Village (which is now modern-day Danvers) to live in the home of Samuel Parris’ cousin Stephen Sewall in Salem town where she continued to have fits when living in the Sewall household but eventually recovered.
Although Betty’s name appeared on the first complaint during the trials, she never testified in any court.
The Salem Witch Trials ended in 1693, and Samuel Parris was later dismissed from his job, in 1697. The family moved to Dunstable and then to Sudbury where Samuel served as a preacher.
Betty married Benjamin Baron, a shoemaker, in 1710, together thy had four children. She passed away at her home in Sudbury, Ma on March 21, 1760. Although many of the people involved in the witch trials were immediately remorseful for their actions and apologized for what they had done, Betty never issued an apology.
The site of the Salem Village Parsonage, where Betty Parris lived at the time of the Salem Witch Trials, Rear 67 Centre Street, Danvers, Ma (site is accessible via a cart path) was excavated in 1970 and is open to visitors.
Abigail Williams 11 years old
Abigail Williams was born on July 12, 1680, and at the time of the Salem Witch Trials, she was living with her uncle, Reverend Samuel Parris and his family. It is not known why she was living with the Parris family, but many historians assume her parents had died.
Shortly after the witch cake incident, the afflicted girls named three women they believed were bewitching them: Tituba, Sarah Good and Sarah Osbourne. The women were arrested and examined on March 1, 1692. Tituba’s confessed that she was a witch and told her examiners that there were other witches in Salem. Her confession sparked mass hysteria, and the witch hunt began in Salem.
After news of the witch hunt spread throughout the colony, Reverend Deodat Lawson, the previous Salem minister, returned to Salem in mid-March where he witnessed and published a firsthand account of one of Abigail Williams’ fits in his book A Brief and True Narrative of Some Remarkable Passages Relating to Sundry Persons Afflicted by Witchcraft, at Salem Village:
“On the nineteenth day of March last I went to Salem Village, and lodged at Nathaniel Ingersoll’s near to the Minister Mr. P’s House [Reverend Samuel Parris]…In the beginning of the evening I went to give Mr. P. a visit. When I was there, his kinswoman, Abigail Williams, (about 12 years of age), had a grievous fit; she was at first hurried with violence to and fro in the room (though Mrs. Ingersol endeavored to hold her) sometimes making as if she would fly, stretching up her arms as high as she could, and crying, whish, whish, whish, several times; presently after she said, there was Goodw. N. and said, Do you not see her? Why there she stands! And said, Goodw. N. offered her the book, but she was resolved she would not take it, saying often, I wont, I wont, I wont take it, I do not know what book it is; I am sure it is none of God’s book; it is the Devil’s book for ought I know. After that, she ran to the fire, and began to throw fire-brands about the house, and run against the back, as if she would run up chimney, and, as they said, she had attempted to go into the fire in other fits.”
The following day, Sunday, March 20, Abigail Williams disrupted services in the Salem Village meetinghouse several times due to the presence of accused witch Martha Corey. Corey had been accused of witchcraft the previous week and a warrant had been issued for her arrest on Saturday, March 19.
Since there wasn’t enough time in the day to arrest Corey and warrants weren’t served on Sundays, Corey was free until Monday and decided to attend services, which upset the afflicted girls, according to Rev. Deodat Lawson:
“On Lords day, the Twentieth of March, there were sundry of the afflicted persons at meeting, as Mrs. Pope, and Goodwife Bibber, Abigail Williams, Mary Walcut [sic], Mary Lewes [sic], and Doctor Grigg’s maid. There was also at meeting, Goodwife C. [Corey] (who was afterward examined on suspicion of being a witch.) They had several sore fits in the time of public worship, which did something interrupt me in my first prayer, being so unusual. After psalm was sung, Abigail Williams said to me, Now stand up, and name your text! And after it was read, she said, It is a long text…And in the afternoon, Abigail Williams, upon my referring to my doctrine, said to me, I know no doctrine you had, If you did name one, I have forgot it. In sermon time, when Goodwife C. was present in the meeting-house, Ab. W. [Abigail Williams] called out, Look where Goodwife C. sits on the beam suckling her yellow bird betwixt her fingers! Ann Putnam, another afflicted girl, said, There was a yellow bird sat on my hat as it hang on the pin in the pulpit; but those that were by, restrained her from speaking aloud about it.”
Also according to Lawson’s account, On March 31, the colonists held a public fast due to the suspicious activities in the village, during which Abigail Williams claimed she saw witches having a sacrament that day at a house in the village. Abigail said she saw the witches eating and drinking flesh and blood, which appeared as red bread and a red drink.
This claim came up again during Elizabeth Proctor and Sarah Cloyces’s examination on April 11, 1692, when Judge Danforth asked Abigail Williams about it, according to court records:
Q. Abigail Williams! did you see a company at Mr. Parris’s house eat and drink?
A. Yes Sir, that was their sacrament.
Q. How many were there?
A. About forty, and Goody Cloyse and Goody Good were their deacons.
Q. What was it?
A. They said it was our blood, and they had it twice that day.
It was during this examination that Abigail Williams and the other afflicted girls turned on John Proctor and accused him of witchcraft as well.
It is not known why exactly the girls accused John Proctor, but it is suspected that it was because Proctor was an outspoken critic of the girls, often calling them liars, and reportedly stated they should be whipped for lying.
The Proctors weren’t the only people Abigail Williams accused of witchcraft. As one of the main accusers during the Salem Witch Trials, Williams accused about 57 people of witchcraft; however, according to court records, she only testified against eight of them: Mary Easty, George Jacobs Sr, Susannah Martin, Rebecca
Of the people Abigail Williams accused and/or testified against, 15 were executed, one was tortured to death and the others either died in jail, were pardoned, were found not guilty, escaped jail or evaded arrest all together:
Arthur Abbott
John Alden, Jr
Daniel Andrews
Sarah Bassett
Bridget Bishop
Edward Bishop
Sarah Bishop
Mary Black
George Burroughs
Sarah Buckley
Martha Corey
Giles Corey
Elizabeth Colson
Sarah Cloyce
Martha Carrier
Bethia Carter Jr
Lydia Dustin
Mary Easty
Martha Emerson
Phillip English
Mary English
Thomas Farrer
John Flood
Elizabeth Fosdick
Sarah Good
Elizabeth Hart
Dorcas Hoar
Abigail Hobbs
William Hobbs
Deliverance Hobbs
Elizabeth Howe
Rebecca Jacobs
George Jacobs, Jr
George Jacobs, Sr
Susannah Martin
Sarah Morey
Rebecca Nurse
Sarah Osbourne
Alice Parker
Sarah Pease
Sarah Proctor
Benjamin Proctor
William Proctor
John Proctor
Elizabeth Proctor
Ann Pudeator
Susannah Roots
Mary De Rich
Wilmot Redd
Sarah Rice
Tituba
Mary Toothaker
Roger Toothaker
Mary Warren
John Willard
Sarah Wildes
Mary Witheridge
After Abigail Williams’ testimony against George Jacobs, Jr, circa May 1692, she disappears from the court hearings, for reasons unknown. It is possible her uncle, Reverend Samuel Parris, sent her away to prevent her from further participating in the witch trials, just like he sent his daughter away, but there is no evidence of this.
Neither Abigail Williams or Betty Parris ever apologized for their roles in the Salem Witch Trials. Ann Putnam, Jr., was the only afflicted girl who did when she submitted a written apology to the church in Salem Village in 1706.
Abigail never apologized for her role in the trials and there are no records indicating what happened to her after the Salem Witch Trials ended.
Ann Putnam Jr., 12 years old
Ann Putnam, Jr, was born on October 18, 1679, in Salem. She oldest of 10 children born to Thomas Putnam and Ann Carr Putman. The Putnam’s were a wealthy family who had lived in Salem for four generations. Thomas was a sergeant in the local militia who had served in King Phillip’s War and was a ringleader of the witch trials.
Shortly after Betty Parris and Abigail Williams began having fits and seizures, Ann, Jr., started experiencing the same symptoms.
According to the book The Salem Witch Trials Guide, once the witch hunt began, Ann became one of the most aggressive accusers among the afflicted girls:
“Following the removal of Betty Parris from Salem Village [she was sent to Salem town by her father Samuel Parris to avoid any further involvement in the trials], Ann and Abigail became the most active and aggressive of the so-called afflicted children. Ann Jr. ‘cried out against’ sixty-two people during the course of the trials. Ann’s father, Thomas Putnam, was one of the primary instigators of complaints against alleged witches in Salem Village. For this reason he has been identified by several key historians (including Paul Boyer and Stephen Nisenbaum) as a chief agitator and manipulator of the testimonies of both his daughter and his wife, Ann Putnam, Sr. Evidence indicates that many of those who were afflicted or gave testimony against the accused were connected to the Putnam family either by ties of kinship or faction.”
Many historians suggest the Putnam family were using the witchcraft hysteria as an excuse to seek their revenge against residents of Salem that they disapproved of.
“In 1991, Enders A. Robinson published The Devil Discovered: Salem Witchcraft, 1692, which introduces to the Salem episode a conspiracy theory on a far grander scale than previously suggested by an scholar. According to Robinson, Thomas Putnam and Samuel Parris formed a circle of local men who decided to take advantage of the testimony of the afflicted children and eliminate the opposing faction in the Salem Village Church. Among the leaders of this conspiracy who were responsible for instigating the witchcraft accusations he listed Reverend Samuel Parris, Sergeant Thomas Putnam, Dr. William Griggs, Deacon Edward Putnam, Captain Jonathan Walcott, Constable Jonathan Putnam, and Lieutenant Nathaniel Ingersoll. These ringleaders were assisted by an outer circle of co-conspirators including Thomas Putnam’s two uncles, John Putnam, Sr., and Nathaniel Putnam, his cousin Edward Putnam, Joseph Houlton, Thomas Preston, and Joseph Hutchinson. These men were less involved yet helpful when accusations and testimony were needed. Robinson alleged that what tied these conspirators together were bonds of kinship and friendship. Their goal was merely to reassert power over the families and forces that had gradually assumed control of Salem Village, seeking vengeance against those suspected of wrongdoing or what they deemed to be undesirable elements. In this task, they were ably assisted by their female children, servants, and relatives, including Mary Walcott, Sarah Churchill, Ann Putnam, Jr., Ann Putnam, Sr., Mary Warren, Susannah Sheldon, and Elizabeth Booth – in short, the majority of the ‘afflicted girls.’”
Thomas and Edward Putnam filed most of the complaints against the accused themselves, on behalf of the afflicted girls who were too young to legally do so.
A recent handwriting analysis, conducted by Professor Peter Grund from the University of Kansas, determined that over 100 of the Salem Witch Trial court documents were written by Thomas Putnam himself. These documents include the depositions of the afflicted girls which, coincidentally, share very similar language and phrases.
For example, many of these depositions state the afflicted girls were “grievously afflicted” or “grievously tormented” and they describe how the girls “believe in my heart” that the accused is a witch. These same depositions also frequently refer to the accused as “dreadful witches” and “dreadful wizards.”
This suggests the afflicted girls recorded testimonies may have been altered and tampered with by Thomas Putnam, who often served as a court clerk during the trials, indicating that he may have had an even bigger influence on the trials then previously thought.
In addition, a book titled The Salem Story: Reading the Witch Trials of 1692 speculates that one of the reasons Ann Putnam, Jr, may have gotten involved with the witch trials in the first place is because the Putnam children were being abused by their parents and Ann was directing her anger over the abuse at others around her:
“We might note that on June 3, 1692, Ann Putnam, testifying against John Willard, who would hang as a convicted witch, asserted that the apparition of her deceased 6-week-old sister Sarah cried out for vengeance against John Willard for having whipped her to death…Sarah’s mother, Ann Putnam, Sr., was herself an accuser in some of the cases, a woman who claimed to see specters. Who could fault one for speculating that she could not come to terms with having killed her own child, that she found some relief in the fantasy world of blaming witches? Ann Jr. may unwittingly have revealed the family secret; she may have responded to the beating death of her sister by lashing out at the community.”
One such victim of Ann, Jr’s, misplaced anger was her neighbor, Rebecca Nurse. Ann was particularly active in the case against Nurse. It is believed that Rebecca Nurse was targeted by the Putnam family due to a decades-long rivalry between her family and the Putnams, which first began with a battle for land with Rebecca’s father in Topsfield and continued with disputes about the boundary between Rebecca and Thomas Putnam’s adjoining property in Salem Village.
In addition, the Nurse family also disapproved of the newly appointed minister of Salem Village, Reverend Samuel Parris, whom was one of the Putnam family’s biggest supporters. To make matters worse, Rebecca Nurse also reportedly lectured the afflicted girls for dabbling in fortune-telling techniques that previous winter.
Ann Putnam, Jr., her mother Ann Putnam, Sr., and Abigail Williams were Nurse’s main accusers, and it was their accusations that led to Nurse’s arrest on March 24.
In her testimony against Rebecca Nurse, Ann, Jr, accused Nurse of biting, pricking and pinching her and trying to force her to write in the Devil’s book, according to court records:
“The deposition of Ann Putnam, Jr, who testifieth and saith that on the 13th March, 1691/92, I saw the apparition of Goody Nurse, and she did immediately afflict me, but I did not know what her name was then, though I knew where she used to sit in our meetinghouse. But since that, she hath greviously afflicted by biting, pinching, and pricking me, [and] urging me to write in her book. And, also, on the 24th of March, being the day of her examination, I was greviously tortured by her during the time for her examination, and also several times since. And, also, during the time of her examination, I saw the apparition of Rebekah Nurs [sic] go and hurt the bodies of Mercy Lewis, Mary Walcott, Elizabeth Hubbard, and Abigail Williams. Ann Putnam, Jun, did own the oath which she hath taken: this her evidence to be truth, before us, the Jurors for Inquest, this 4 day of June, 1692.”
Ann, Jr, also testified that she witnessed Nurse attacking her mother at their home on March 18 of that year.
Ann, Jr, and her mother were not the only Putnams to testify against Rebecca Nurse. Most of the witnesses who testified against her, including Abigail Williams, Edward Putnam, Thomas Putnam, John Putnam, Jr, Hannah Putnam, Samuel Parris, Henry Kenney, Mary Walcott, and Elizabeth Hubbard were either Putnam family members or friends of the family.
Nurse denied all of their accusations and was actually found not guilty at the end of her trial in June of 1692. However, upon reading the verdict in the courtroom, the afflicted girls began to suffer fits and Chief Justice William Stoughton asked the jury to reconsider their decision.
The jury briefly deliberated and then came back with a guilty verdict. Nurse was sentenced to death and was hanged at Gallow’s Hill on July 19, 1692.
As the Salem Witch Trials continued, the witch hunt began to spread to neighboring towns. In July, Ann Putnam, Jr., and Mary Walcott were invited to Andover, according to the book The Salem Witch Trials: A Reference Guide:
“Meanwhile, Ann Putnam Jr and Mary Walcott were invited to Andover, a town northwest of Salem Village. Goodwife Ballard was dying, and the doctors could not find the cause. Joseph Ballard and the assistant pastor of his church, the Reverend Thomas Barnard, thought it might be witchcraft. The two girls confirmed the men’s suspicions. They saw a spector at the head of the bed and one sitting on the woman’s stomach. The Reverend Barnard decided to repeat the experiment. He took the girls to another sickbed in another home, and then to yet another, and another. The girls saw specters in every case, but could name no witches because they didn’t know the people in Andover. To solve the problem, the Reverend Barnard invited the women of Andover to submit to the touch test. Sure of their innocence, the women agreed. The results of the touch test were overwhelming. Sixty-seven women were arrested.”
In September, the afflicted girls visited Gloucester, at the invitation of Ebenezer Babson, whose mother was complaining of seeing spectral visions of Indians and French soldiers. The girls accused a handful of local women there of witchcraft during that visit and accused several more during a return visit in October or November. A total of nine women were arrested for witchcraft in Gloucester.
Of the 62 people Ann Putnam, Jr, accused and testified against during the Salem Witch Trials, 17 were executed:
Bridget Bishop (June 10)
George Burroughs (August 19)
Martha Carrier (August 19)
Martha Corey (September 22)
Mary Easty (September 22)
Sarah Good (July 19)
Elizabeth Howe (July 19)
George Jacobs, Sr (August 19)
Susannah Martin (July 19)
Rebecca Nurse (July 19)
Alice Parker (September 22)
John Proctor (August 19)
Anne Pudeator (September 22)
Wilmot Redd (September 22)
Margaret Scott (September 22, 1692)
Sarah Wildes (July 19)
John Willard (August 19)
One victim was tortured to death: Giles Corey (September 19)
one victim died in jail: Sarah Osborne,
and the rest, including Elizabeth Proctor, Tituba and John Alden Jr, were either never charged, found not guilty, pardoned or escaped from jail.
Not much is known about Ann’s life after the Salem Witch Trials ended, however, Ann’s parents died suddenly in 1699 and she raised her seven remaining siblings by herself, whose ages ranged from seven months to 16 years.
Ann never married and remained in Salem Village the rest of her life. In 1706, when Ann wanted to join the Salem Village Church, she first had to confess any sins or wrongdoings in her past, according to the book A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Witch Trials and the American Experience:
“Seven years later Ann wanted to become a member of the Salem Village Church. Unlike other churches that had loosened membership requirements, the congregation still required a public statement describing the applicant’s conversion experience and confession of past sins. Reverend Green worked with Putnam to compose this. A draft was reviewed by Rebecca Nurse’s son Samuel, and he approved it. So on August 25, 1706, twenty-nine year old Ann Putnam stood before the congregation while Green read it aloud.”
Ann’s apology reads as follows:
“I desire to be humbled before God for that sad and humbling providence that befell my father’s family in the year about ’92; that I, then being in my childhood, should, by such a providence of God, be made an instrument for the accusing of several persons of a grievous crime, whereby their lives were taken away from them, whom now I have just grounds and good reason to believe they were innocent persons; and that it was a great delusion of Satan that deceived me in that sad time, whereby I justly fear I have been instrumental, with others, though ignorantly and unwittingly, to bring upon myself and this land the guilt of innocent blood; though what was said or done by me against any person I can truly and uprightly say, before God and man, I did it not out of any anger, malice, or ill-will to any person, for I had no such thing against one of them; but what I did was ignorantly, being deluded by Satan. And particularly, as I was a chief instrument of accusing of Goodwife Nurse and her two sisters, I desire to lie in the dust, and to be humbled for it, in that I was a cause, with others, of so sad a calamity to them and their families; for which cause I desire to lie in the dust, and earnestly beg forgiveness of God, and from all those unto whom I have given just cause of sorrow and offence, whose relations were taken away or accused.
[Signed]
This confession was read before the congregation, together with her relation, Aug. 25, 1706; and she acknowledged it.
J. Green, Pastor.”
Ann was the only one of the afflicted girls to apologize for her role in the Salem Witch Trials. She died 10 years later in 1716, at the age of 37, from unknown causes and was buried with her parents in one of the Putnam family cemeteries in Salem Village.
According to the book Salem Witchcraft by Charles Wentworth Upham, Ann had become chronically ill since the days of the Salem Witch Trials and this illness is what led to her early death:
“It seems she was frequently the subject of sickness, and her bodily powers much weakened. The probability is, that the long-continued strain kept upon her muscular and nervous organization, during the witchcraft scenes, had destroyed her constitution. Such interrupted and vehement exercises, to their utmost tension, of the imaginative, intellectual, and physical powers, in crowded and heated rooms, before the public gaze, and under the feverish and consuming influence of bewildering and all but delirious excitement, could hardly fail to sap the foundations of health in so young a child. The tradition is, that she had a slow and fluctuating decline. The language of her will intimates, that, at intervals, there were apparent checks to her disease, and rallies of strength, – ‘oftentimes sick and weak in body.’ She inherited from her mother a sensitive and fragile constitution; but her father, although brought to the grave, probably by the terrible responsibilities and trials in which he had been involved, at a comparatively early age, belonged to a long-lived race and neighborhood. The opposite elements of her composition struggled in a protracted contest – on the one side, a nature morbidly subject to nervous excitability sinking under the exhaustion of an overworked, overburdened, and shattered system; on the other, tenacity of life. The conflict continued with alternating success for years; but the latter gave way at last. Her story, in all its aspects, is worth of the study of the psychologist. Her confession, profession, and death point the moral.”
In her will, which was presented to probate on June 29, 1716, Ann divided the land she had inherited from her parents to her four brothers and her personal estate to her four sisters.
Ann Putnam, Jr, Ann Putnam, Sr, and Thomas Putnam’s unmarked graves are at the Putnam burial ground, 485 Maple Street, Danvers, Mass.
Elizabeth Hubbard, 18 years old
Elizabeth was born about 1674/5 in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. She was an orphan who lived with her aunt and uncle, Rachel Hubbard Griggs and Dr. William Griggs, in Salem Village. She had little family or economic support and faced an uncertain future as an orphaned domestic servant.
Elizabeth began to suffer ‘fits shortly after Abigail Williams and Betty Parris began and, on February 29th, the girls accused Tituba, Sarah Osbourne and Sarah Good of afflicting them.
Elizabeth testified against Tituba on March 1st and told the court she had been afflicted by Tituba since February 25th but explained that as soon as Tituba confessed at her examination that day, her symptoms ceased. She also told the court that she had been afflicted by Sarah Osbourne since February 27th and had been afflicted by Sarah Good since February 28th.
In January of 1693, a new court was set up to hear the remaining witchcraft cases and new rules were implemented that made spectral evidence, which was witness testimony that a person’s spirit or specter appeared to the witness in a dream or vision, inadmissible in court, thus making Elizabeth’s testimony unnecessary.
Of the people Hubbard accused and/or testified against, a total of 15 people were executed, one person died in jail and one person was tortured to death for refusing to move forward with his trial:
Bridget Bishop, executed June 10, 1692
George Burroughs, executed August 19, 1692
Martha Carrier, executed August 19, 1692
Giles Corey, tortured to death September 19, 1692
Martha Corey, executed September 22, 1692
Mary Easty, executed September 22, 1692
Sarah Good, executed July 19, 1692
Sarah Osbourne, died in jail May 10, 1692
John Proctor, executed August 19, 1692
Susannah Martin, executed July 19, 1692
Rebecca Nurse, executed July 19, 1692
George Jacobs Sr, executed August 19, 1692
Ann Pudeator, executed September 22, 1692
Alice Parker, executed September 22, 1692
Wilmot Redd, executed September 22, 1692
Margaret Scott, executed September 22, 1692
John Willard, executed August 19, 1692
It’s not exactly known what happened to Elizabeth after the trials, but it’s believed that she eventually moved to Gloucester and married a man named John Bennett, with whom she had four children.
Mary Walcott, 17-year-old
Mary Walcott was the daughter of Captain Jonathan Walcott, leader of the Salem Village militia and was related to the Putnam family by marriage; Ann Jr. was her stepcousin. The Walcott’s lived next door the Parris’, and Mary’s other aunt, Mary Sibley, had encouraged the baking of the “witch cake” that led to the accusations against Tituba. Mary joined the core group of accusers by March 1692, and went on to see numerous visions and suffer apparent afflictions at the hands of accused witches. Other times, she sat in the courtroom and knitted calmly while other afflicted girls had fits around her.
Of the people Mary accused and/or testified against, 16 people were executed, one person died in jail and one person was tortured to death for refusing to move forward with his trial:
Bridget Bishop, executed June 10, 1692
George Burroughs, executed August 19, 1692
Martha Carrier, executed August 19, 1692
Giles Corey, tortured to death September 19, 1692
Martha Corey, executed September 22, 1692
Mary Easty, executed September 22, 1692
Sarah Good, executed July 19, 1692
Elizabeth Howe, executed on July 19, 1692
George Jacobs Sr, executed August 19, 1692
Susannah Martin, executed July 19, 1692
Rebecca Nurse, executed July 19, 1692
Alice Parker, executed September 22, 1692
John Proctor, executed August 19, 1692
Wilmot Redd, executed September 22, 1692
Roger Toothaker, died in jail June 16, 1692
Samuel Wardwell, executed September 22, 1692
Sarah Wildes, executed July 19, 1692
John Willard, executed August 19, 1692
Some sources state that Mary married Isaac Farrer of Woburn in April of 1696 and had six children, while other sources state that she married a man named David Harwood on January 15, 1701, and had nine children.
There are official records for both of these marriages, and the children born during these marriages overlapped so it’s not possible that it is just the one Mary Walcott who remarried the second man later on. Therefore, one of these is the Mary Walcott from the Salem Witch Trials but it’s not clear which one.
The only hint is that Mary Walcott mentioned Harwood’s name during the trials when she testified that Rebecca Nurse’s specter confessed to her that she murdered David Harwood’s father, John Harwood in 1690.
Yet, another clue contradicts this. It was a tradition to name children after the couple’s parents and since Isaac and Mary named one of their children Jonathan, while David and Mary did not, this suggests that maybe the Mary who married Isaac was the Mary Walcott from the Salem Witch Trials.
Mercy Lewis, 17-year-old
Mercy Lewis, the daughter of Phillip Lewis, was born in Falmouth, Maine in 1675. On August 11, 1676, one-year-old Mercy and her parents barely escaped an attack by the nearby Wabanaki Indians that resulted in the death of her grandparents, cousins and many other members of the community.
Seeking refuge, the Lewis family fled to an island in Casco Bay along with the other surviving members of the community, including Reverend George Burroughs.
After the attack, the Lewis family moved briefly to Salem, MA. where Lewis’ uncle, Thomas Skilling, died a few months later, possibly from a wound he suffered during the attack. Mercy and her family then moved back to Casco Bay in 1683.
In the summer or fall of 1689, the Wabanaki attacked again killing both of Mercy’s parents. After their deaths, she was briefly sent to work as a servant in Reverend George Burroughs home. She later moved to Salem village, where her married sister lived, and became a servant for Thomas Putnam, who is considered to be one of the ringleaders of the Salem Witch Trials accusers.
It was in Thomas Putnam’s home that the nineteen-year-old Mercy befriended Ann Putnam, Jr. and when Ann began suffering fits and seizures, Mercy quickly followed suit. The first person she accused of witchcraft was Elizabeth Proctor on March 26th.
On April 18th, Mercy and the other afflicted girls turned on one of their own, Mary Warren, after Mary hinted that the girls may have been lying about their afflictions. During Elizabeth Proctor’s trial, the girls accused Mary of helping Proctor’s spirit torment them and Mary soon found herself in jail.
Mercy was also instrumental in the accusations of several people she knew from Falmouth, Maine since she was one of the only people in Salem who knew anything about their backgrounds, she was the main source of information about them. Of the numerous people Lewis accused and testified against, six were executed, one was tortured to death, one died in jail, three escaped from jail, and the rest were either pardoned, found not guilty or were never indicted.
According to court records, Mercy accused 9 people of witchcraft and testified in 16 cases:
John Alden Jr
Bridget Bishop
George Burroughs
Giles Corey
Martha Corey
Elizabeth Colson
Elizabeth Cary
Lydia Dustin
Sarah Dustin
Phillip English
Mary English
Thomas Farrer
Dorcas Good
Abigail Hobbs
Elizabeth Hart
George Jacobs, Sr
Elizabeth Johnson
Mary Lacey, Sr
Susannah Martin
Sarah Osborne
Elizabeth Proctor
John Willard
Mary Warren
Although it is not clear why Mercy accused and testified against Reverend George Burroughs, it was most likely an attempt to get revenge against a former employer. In her testimony against Burroughs, she told stories about her time living with him in Maine:
“The deposition of Mercy Lewes who testifieth and saith that one the 7’th of may 1692 at evening I saw the apparition of Mr. George Burroughs whom i very well knew which did grievously torture me and urged me to write in his book and then he brought to me a new fashion book which he did not use to bring and told me I might write in that book: for that was a book that was in his study when I lived with them: but I told him I did not believe him for I had been often in his study but I never saw that book their: but he told me that he had several books in his study which I never saw in his study and he could raise the devil: and now had bewitched Mr. Sheppard’s daughter and I asked him how he could go to be witch here now he was kept at Salem: and he told me that the devil was his servant and he sent him in his shape to do it then he again tortured me most dreadfully and threatened to kill me for he said I should not witness against him also he told me that he had made Abigail Hobbs: a witch and several more then again he did most dreadfully torture me as if he would have racked me all to peaces and urged me to write in his book or else he would kill me but I told him I hoped my life was not in the power of his hand and that I would not write tho he did kill me: the next night he told me I should not see his two wives if he could help it because I should not witness against him this 9’th may Mr Burroughs carried me up to an exceeding high mountain and showed me all the kingdoms of the earth and told me that he would give them all to me if I would write in his book and if I would not he would throw me down and brake my neck: but I told him they were non of his to give and I would not write if he threw me down on 100 pichforks: also on the 9’th may being the time of his examination Mr. George Bur-roughs did most dreadfully torment me: and also several times since. Mercy Lewis upon her oath did own this here testimony to be the truth before the jurers for Inquest: august 3: 92.”
Many historians believe that Mercy’s accusation against Captain John Alden, Jr., was payback for his alleged sales of powder and ammunition to the Native-Americans in Maine, which may have indirectly resulted in the death of her parents.
This theory is further supported by the fact that in Alden’s own account of his examination, he writes of one of the girls outright accusing him of selling supplies to the Native-Americans as well as fathering illegitimate children with Indian women:
“Then all were ordered to go down into the street, where a ring was made; and the same accuser cried out, ‘there stands Aldin , a bold fellow with his hat on before the judges, he sells powder and shot to the Indians and French, and lies with the Indian squaes, and has Indian papooses.’”
Not much is known about Mercy’s life after the trials, but it’s believed that she gave birth to an illegitimate child and in 1701, at the age of 28, she married a man named Allen from her hometown of Falmouth. They moved to Boston and her date and place of death is unknown.
Mary Warren, 21 years old
Mary Warren, the twenty-year-old indentured servant of John and Elizabeth Proctor, began having fits in March of 1692, shortly after Betty Parris and the other afflicted girls’ symptoms began.
John Proctor, believed the afflicted girls were lying and pretending to be bewitched, dismissed it as nonsense and threatened to beat Mary if she didn’t behave. And according to the book The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-by-day Chronicle of a Community Under Siege, on April 2nd, Mary’s fits stopped, and she tacked a note on the local meetinghouse door asking for prayers of thanks for this development.
The next day, Reverend Samuel Parris read the note to his congregation and questioned Mary after the Sunday service. At one point during the questioning, Mary stated “the afflicted persons did but dissemble.” It’s not exactly clear what she meant by this statement, but the congregation took it to mean that the afflicted girls were lying about their symptoms. This turned the other afflicted girls against Mary or even caused them to suspect she had fallen in league with the Devil.
However, as soon as Proctor left home on business shortly after, Mary’s fits returned and she joined the ongoing witch trials as a witness, much to Proctor’s dismay. And on April 4, several afflicted girls, Abigail Williams, Mercy Lewis, Mary Walcott, Ann Putnam, Jr., as well as John Indian (Samuel Parris’ servant and Tituba‘s husband), accused Elizabeth Proctor of witchcraft.
The following week, the same girls then accused John Proctor of the crime as well. According to court records, Mary was not one of the Proctor’s original accusers, however, she testified against him at his trial, stating that he made her sign the book of the Devil and his spirit tormented and tortured her:
“Mary Warrens Confession ag’t Jo: Proctor & ux charges them personally to cause her to sign or make a mark in there book and both of them committing acts of Witchcraft & being so & personally threatened the [illegible] with tortures if she would not sign & since con [page torn] have of times afflicted & tormented her large in her confessions vide.”
Like most critics of the witch trials, John Proctor’s attitude made him a prime target for the accusation of witchcraft and his criticism of the trials, as well as his mistreatment of Mary, came back to haunt him during his trial.
On April 18th, Ezekiel Cheever and John Putnam, Jr, accused Mary Warren, along with Bridget Bishop, Giles Corey and Abigail Hobbs of bewitching the afflicted girls.
Arrest warrants were issued, and they were examined in court the next day. According to court records, Judge John Hathorne asked Mary how she came to be an accused witch:
“[Hathorne]: Mary Warren, You stand here charged with sundry acts of Witchcraft, what do you say for yourself, are you guilty, or not?
[Warren]: I am innocent.
[Hathorne]: Hath she hurt you (speaking to the sufferers)?
Some were dumb.
Betty Hubbard testified against her, & then Hubbard fell into a violent fit.
[Hathorne]: You were a little while ago an Afflicted person, now you are an Afflicter: How comes this to pass?
[Warren]: I look up to God, & take it to be a great Mercy of God.
[Hathorne]: What do you take it to be a great mercy to afflict others?’
Betty Hubbard testified that a little after this Mary was well, she the said Mary, said that the afflicted persons did but dissemble.
Now they were all but John Indian grievously afflicted, & Mrs Pope also, who was not afflicted before hitherto this day: & after a few moments John Indian fell into a violent fit also.
Well here was one just now that was a tormentor in her apparition & she owns that she had made a league with the Devil.
Now Mary Warren fell into a fit, & some of the afflicted cried out that she was going to confess, but Goody Corey , & Procter, & his wife came in, in their apparition, & struck her down, & said she should tell nothing.
Mary Warren continued a good space in a fit, that she did neither see, nor hear, nor speak.
Afterwards she started up, & said I will speak & cryed out, Oh! I am sorry for it, I am sorry for it, & wringed her hands, & fell a little while into a fit again & then came to speak, but immediately her Teeth were set, & then she fell into a violent fit, & cryed out, Oh Lord help me, Oh good Lord save me!
And then afterwards cryed again, I will tell, I will tell, & then fell into a dead fit again.
And afterwards cryed, I will tell, they did, they did, they did, & then fell into a violent fit again.
After a little recovery she cryed I will tell, I will tell, they brought me me to it; & then fell into a fit again: which fits continuing, she was ordered to be had out, & the next to be brought in, viz: Bridget Bishop
Some time afterwards she was called in again, but immediately taken with fits, for a while.
[Hathorne]: Have you signed the Devils book?
[Warren]: No.
[Hathorne]: Have you not touch it?
[Warren]: No.
Then she fell into fits againe, & was sent forth for air.
After a considerable space of time she was brought in again, but could [not] give account of things, by reason of fits, & so sent forth.
Mary Warren called in, afterwards in private, before magistrates & Ministers.
She said, I shall not speak a word: but I will speak Satan — She saith she will kill me: Oh! she saith, she owes me a spite, & will claw me off –Avoid Satan, for the name of God avoid And then fell into fits again: & cryed will ye I will prevent ye in the Name of God, —
[Hathorne]: Tell us, how far have you yielded?
A fit interrupts her again.
[Hathorne]: What did they say you should do, & you should be well?
Then her lips were bit so that she could not speak. so she was sent away
Note: That not one of the sufferers was afflicted during her examination after once she began to confess, thom they were tormented before.”
Some sources state that during her examination, May told the court the afflicted girls were lying.
Yet, these court records indicate that one of the afflicted girls, Elizabeth Hubbard, merely reiterated Warren’s previous statements from the church on April 3rd that “the afflicted persons did but dissemble.”
At no point does Mary herself state the girls were lying during this examination nor does she do so in her later examinations.
May was examined by the judges a total of four times, twice in prison and twice in court.
She gave vague, indirect answers during her first examination but eventually confessed to touching the Devil’s book, although she explained that she was tricked into it by Elizabeth and John Proctor’s spirits who told her it was a good book.
These statements saved her life, since witches who confessed were spared the death penalty and released, but she may also have condemned the Proctors to death in the process. Warren was released from prison in June of 1692.
After confessing, Warren began aggressively accusing others of witchcraft and testified as a witness in numerous cases. Of the people she testified against, eight were hanged, one was tortured to death, one died in jail and the rest were either found not guilty, pardoned or escaped:
Bridget Bishop
Giles Corey
John Alden
Mary Toothaker
George Jacobs, Sr,
George Burroughs
Rebecca Eames
Wilmot Reed
Abigail Faulkner
Mary Lacey Sr
Ann Pudeator
Job Tookey
Mary Easty
Abigail Soames
Ann Foster
Nathaniel Cary
Daniel Eames
Mary Bradbury
Elizabeth Cary
Samuel Wardwell
Alice Parker, whom Mary accused of bewitching her mother to death and making her sister ill.
It is not known what happened to Mary after the trials ended. Reverend John Hale’s book A Modest Inquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft, written in 1697, mentions an anonymous afflicted girl who suffered from “diabolical manifestation” until her death and died a single woman.
Since most of the afflicted girls were known to be married by 1697 and only three of the girls, Abigail Williams, Elizabeth Hubbard and Mary Warren, are unaccounted for in the records at the time, it is possible Hale was referring to Warren.
Other Accusers:
Eleanor Hill-Babson, age about 62 and living in Gloucester
Joseph Bailey, age 44 and living in Newbury
Elizabeth Phelps/Phillips-Ballard, age about 46 and living in Andover. She died on July 27, 1692.
Sarah Bibber, age about 36 and living in Salem
Hannah Chandler-Bixby/Bigsby, aged about 40 and living in Andover.
Alice Booth, age 14 and living in Salem
Elizabeth Booth - age 18 and living in Salem
Elizabeth Wilkins-Booth, age 16 and living in Salem
George Booth, age 21 and living in Salem
William Bragg, age 8 and living in Salem
Mary Fellows-Brown, age about 46 and living in Reading
Phoebe Chandler, age 12 and living in Andover
Sarah Churchill/Churchwell, age about 25 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
John Cole, age about 52 and living in Lynn
Sarah Aslebee/Asselbee-Cole, age 34 and living in Lynn
Sarah Coleman, age 22 and living in Rowley
Mary Daniel, age about 19 and living in Rowley
John DeRich/Derrick/Dorich, age 16 and living in Salem
Joanna Dodd, age unknown and living in Marblehead
Ralph Farnum/Varnum Sr., age about 59 and living in Andover. He died on January 8, 1693.
Mary Stevens-Coit-Fitch, age unknown and living in Gloucester. She died on November 7, 1692.
Hannah Eames/Ames-Foster, age 31 and living in Andover
Rose Foster, age 13 and living in Andover. She died on February 25, 1693.
Mary Fuller Jr., age 17 and living in Ipswich
Goodwife Goodale/Goodall, Referred to as an "ancient woman" and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Mary Herrick, age 15 and living in Wenham
Betty Hews/Hughes, age 22 and living in Salem
Mary Hill, age 25 and living in Salem
Deliverance Hobbs, age about 50 and living in Topsfield
Jane Phillips-Hutchinson, age about 24 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
John Indian – slave of Rev. Samuel Parris and husband of Tituba. Age unknown and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Mary Swain/Swayne-Clark-Marshall, age about 49 and living in Reading
Abigail Martin, age 16 and living in Andover
Sarah Phelps, age 10 and living in Andover
Mary Pickworth, age 17 and living in Salem
Bethshua/Bethsheba Folger-Pope, Age 40 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Ann Carr-Putnam Sr., age 31 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Jemima Rea, age 12 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Mary Gould-Reddington, age 71 and living in Topsfield
Joseph Ring, age 28 and living in Salisbury
Mary Duncan-Sargent, age 33 and living in Gloucester
Susannah Sheldon, age 18 and living in Salem
Mercy Short, age 17 and living in Boston
Martha Sprague, age 16 and living in Andover
Timothy Swan, age 29 and living in Andover. He died on February 2, 1693.
Mary Thorne, age about 14 and living in Ipswich
Mary Watkins, age unknown and living in Milton
Elizabeth Weston, age about 29 and living in Reading
Bray Wilkins, age 81 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Daniel Wilkins, age 17 and living in Salem Village/Danvers. He died on May 16, 1692.
Rebecca Wilkins, age 19 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Samuel Wilkins, age about 36 and living in Salem Village/Danvers
Elizabeth Woodwell, age 33 and living in Salem
Frances Wycomb, age 17 and living in Rowley
