The Salem Wizard Trial

support throughout the season. On a cold February day in sixteen ninety two, Mary Sibley set out to break the law. She knew what she was doing was wrong, but she reasoned to herself that she was doing it for the right reasons. She was doing it to protect the children her poor little neighbor girls, Betty and Abigail, who had been suffering so terribly for months. Since early January, Betty and her cousin Abigail had been subject to strange fits.

Their bodies would hunch and contort, assuming bizarre, painful positions. They muttered and babbled, speaking words no one could understand. They sometimes seemed gripped by a fear so intense it paralyzed them, stopping their breath. Doctor after doctor had examined the two young girls. They had prescribed remedies and treatments, all to no effect. People had begun to wonder whether the cause could be something stranger and darker than a

simple sickness. Maybe the girls were bewitched. Betty's father, Samuel Parris, focused on prayer to heal the girls, but Mary Sibley did not think prayer would be enough to fight a witch. She thought you had to act like one. The witchcraft was illegal, many people held onto folk practices to protect against dark magic. They hid horseshoes or eel spears in the walls of their houses and carved daisy wheels into

their door frames to prevent spirits from entering. The magic Mary Sibley was about to propose would be more dangerous than a hidden horseshoe, more intentional, riskier. If Mary was caught, she might be called a witch herself, But her heart likely ached for the two frightened girls. So Mary snuck over to the Paris's house one day and had a whispered conference with John Indian, the Paris's enslaved man, about

how to make a witch cake. It was simple. Mary told John take ryemeal, mix it with Betty and Abigail's urine, and then bake the mixture into a cake and feed the cake to a dog. The cake, thinks to the urine, would contain the essence of the witch. When the dog ate the cake, the witch would suffer and perhaps be exposed. John Indian and his wife Titchiba, also enslaved by the Parises, knew that their owners would not like the witch cake.

Samuel Parris was a minister, an un compromising man who had made his hatred for witchcraft of any sort known. So John and Titchiba waited until a night that Samuel and his wife Elizabeth were out. Then they made the cake. At first, the charms seemed to have backfired. Betty and Abigail's suffering intensified, their torments increased, But then suddenly, as if a veil had lifted, the girls could see they

could see the source of their misery. The witch cake had not hurt the witch, but it had revealed her. Soon after, Betty and Abigail told the Parises that it was Titchiba herself who was hurting them. Betty and Abigail's identification of Titchiba on February twenty sixth sixteen ninety two was the first claim of witchcraft in the Salem Outbreak,

but it would not be the last. Within months, dozens of Bay Colony residents would find themselves caught up in witchcraft, either afflicted by a witch, accused of being a witch, or both, and then in June the trials began. By that point, the outbreak had ballooned to such proportions that it seemed no one was safe, not respectable pious citizens, not children, not even as the trial of George Burroughs would show, a minister. The Salem witch Trials are one

of the most notorious episodes in American history. Their alien nature fascinates us, the strange superstitions, the archaic language, the gruesome details. But at their heart, the trials are a timeless story about what happens when fear and anger overrun a community and all hell breaks loose. Welcome to History on Trial. I'm your host, Mira Hayward. This week the

Massachusetts Bay Colony v. George Burroughs. When the Puritans, English separatists, who felt that the Church of England still cleaved too closely to Catholic traditions, established the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the sixteen twenties, they hoped to build what colonial leader John Winthrop called a city upon a hill, a shining paragon of prosperity and obedience to God. On paper, George Burroughs looked like the ideal citizen of such a place.

Born in sixteen fifty two, Burroughs was the grandson of a minister and the son of a merchant, giving him both ecclesiastical and worldly credit. Burroughs grew into a handsome, dark haired man, short but strong. Following in his grandfather's footsteps, Burroughs studied to become a minister. In sixteen seventy, he graduated from Harvard College. Three years later, he married Hannah Fisher, the daughter of a prominent family. But despite this elite pedigree,

Burroughs struggled to find his footing. Maybe it was his quick temper, maybe it was his slightly unorthodox religious beliefs, or maybe something else entirely, but either way, Burroughs did not hit the ground running. He didn't get his first posting until more than four years after graduation, and even then it was a less than desirable position in the frontier town of Falmouth, Maine, near present day Portland. Maine was looked down on by many Massachusetts Puritans thanks to

the area's practice of welcoming Protestants of all stripes. Burroughs, however, seemed to fit in well on the rough and tumble Frontier and bought property there, seemingly hoping to settle down. But the frontier was a dangerous place. Native American raids were common. King Philip's War, the most devastating conflict of the colonial period, broke out a year into Burrows's time in Falmouth. In sixteen seventy six, Falmouth was burned to

the ground and Burrows and many others barely escaped. Burroughs and his family joined the flood of refugees traveling south into Massachusetts. Many refugees were too frightened to ever return north, but Burroughs held on to his main homestead while he waited for the fighting to settle down. He served as assistant pastor in Salisbury, Massachusetts, but the position was not a permanent one, and Burrows needed a better way to support his growing family. In sixteen eighty, Burroughs received an

offer from Salem Village. The village was an inland satellite of the larger Harbourside community of Salem Town. Today, the village is called Danvers and the town is called Salem. Salem Village had only recently won the right to hire their own minister, but attracting a minister was easier said than done. The village was relatively close to the frontier, and as a small agricultural community, couldn't afford to pay their minister much. But there was something else too, something

that caused Salem Village to churn through ministers. At a time when the average tenure for a Massachusetts minister was twenty two years, Salem Village's first three ministers would last an average of less than five. The problem was that the people of Salem Village were petty. Salem, the name given to the area by its first English settlers in the sixteen twenties, was a derivative of the Hebrew word shalom, meaning peace. Sixty years later, the village's residents were not

doing the name proud. Arguing seemed to be the village pastime, with a specialty in power struggles, where property lines were whose pig had escaped and eaten a vegetable garden? Who got to choose the minister? Everything and anything, no matter how trivial became hotly contested. This last problem, choosing the minister, was an especially thorny one. The first minister, James Bailey, had endured years of fighting between villagers who supported him

and village who did not, before quietly stepping down. George Burrows had been a year behind Bailey at Harvard, and perhaps Bailey warned him about the difficulties of the Salem role. For Burroughs ultimately accepted the village's offer on the condition that, quote in case any difference should arise in time to come, that we engage on both sides to submit to counsel for a peaceable issue. Unfortunately for Burrows, the villagers were

not particularly interested in being peaceable. Not long after his arrival, the residents once again split into factions for and against their minister. As a result of all this fighting, the village was slow to pay Burroughs's salary. Due to the delay, Burroughs did not have enough money to pay for his wife, Hannah's burial when she died in sixteen eighty one. He had to borrow money from a villager named John Putnam

to cover the costs. Throughout sixteen eighty one, Burroughs held multiple town meetings to try to resolve the villager's various differences with Whate, but to no avail. In April sixteen eighty two, villager Jeremiah Watts wrote to Burrows that quote brother is against brother, and neighbor against neighbors, all quarreling

and smiting one another. Charming. In March sixteen eighty three, a very fed up Burrows moved his family, including his second wife, Sarah, back to Maine, choosing an active warzone overstaying in Salem. The villagers, furious at his departure, tried to sue Burrows for desertion of duty. The court told them that they didn't have much ground since they'd never

paid Burrows most of his salary. Eventually, Salem agreed to pay Burroughs' salary less the amount he owed John Putnam for Hannah's burial, But when Burrows returned to Salem to collect his money, John Putnam filed his own suit against the minister for non payment of a loan and had him arrested. Villagers who had supported Burrows were outraged and posted the minister's bond to keep him from being jailed. Putnam agreed to drop his suit, and the village offered

Burrows fifteen pounds, less than half of what they owed him. Burrows, thoroughly exhausted with the situation, accepted and returned to Maine. He was probably delighted to be done with Salem, but Salem was not done with him. Nine years later, George Burrows would be arrested in Maine and dragged back to the village accused of being a witch. Salem struggled to find a good replacement for George Burrows. It took them a year to hire their next minister, who didn't stay long.

In July sixteen eighty nine, the village's fourth minister, Reverend Samuel Parris, arrived after months of contract negotiations. These protracted negotiations were an omen of difficulties to come. If the residents of Salem had hoped that Reverend Paris would succeed in bringing their community together, they were sorely mistaken. Paris was a stubborn, demanding man who had entered the ministry

only after destroying his inherited family business through mismanagement. Within six months of Paris's arrival, Salem had once again split into factions for and against the minister. By late sixteen ninety one, the anti Paris faction had won control of the town council and voted to withhold the minister's salary and cut off his firewood allowance. In return, Paris began delivering spiteful sermons. Quoting Psalm one ten, the lords said, unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand until

they make thine enemies thy footstool. It was Paris's daughter Betty and his niece Abigail Williams, who lived with the family, who first began to show symptoms of being bewitched sometime in January sixteen ninety two. It was not hard for the girl's community to accept the existence of witches in their midst. The seventeenth century belief in the supernatural was

intimately tied to religious belief. Marilyn k Roach explains in her book The Salem Witchcraft Trials quote, with good and evil so obviously present in the world, to question the devil's reality was to doubt God's few doubted. Since there was a devil, it followed that some wicked or foolish mortals would pay allegiance to him in return for the power to work evil magic. This power could be used

to disrupt victim's lives. If you wronged a witch, they might make your beer barrels leak, or said insects to eat your crops. Their power could even kill. As John Godfrey, a Bay Colony resident who was oft suspected of being a witch, put it quote, it were hard to some witches to take away life, either of man or beast, Yet when they once begin it, then it is easy

to them. But people were not powerless against witches. They could use magical protections of their own, like Mary Sibley's witchcake, although most ministers frowned on such measures, recommending prayer instead. If prayer or shunning the witch failed, there was the legal system. Between fourteen hundred and seventeen seventy five, approximately one hundred thousand people were prosecuted for witchcraft worldwide, and

fifty thousand of them executed. Because witches were blamed for bad things happening, it follows that the number of witchcraft accusations rose when times were hard. Sixteen ninety two was a decidedly hard year for the Massachusetts Bay Colony five years earlier. Fed up with the colonies in subordination to royal authority. King James the Second of England had merged Massachusetts with the other northeastern colonies to create the Dominion

of New England. The dominion was ruled by the iron fisted Sir Edmund Andros, who dismantled the colonies representative government. Even worse, Andros ordered that the dominion enact a policy of tolerance for all Protestants, a serious blow to the Puritan hierarchy. Many feared that these changes signaled the end of John Winthrop's dream of a city upon a hill. After three years under Andros, the colonists rebelled and won backed their independence. But this victory came with problems of

its own. To establish a new government, the colony needed a new Royal Charter, which meant sending representatives to England and enduring lengthy negotiations until the new charter arrived, The provisional government had no real power. They could not establish courts,

for example, which created problems for morale. As historian Emerson W. Baker notes in his book A Storm of Witchcraft quote, the legal system acted as a safety valve for the colonists, mediating differences and resolving conflicts between individuals and within communities. Without a functioning legal system Bigger continues quote, a significant number of disputes and conflicts continued to fester and grow

without resolution. The lack of formal government also meant that the British military officers who had helped defend the northern frontier for the dominion, began abandoning their posts, leading to renewed attacks in Maine. By sixteen ninety, every settlement north of present day Portland had been abandoned. Salem Village was less than fifty miles from the southern edge of Maine, and villagers must have feared that the war would reach

them soon. On top of all of this, the weather was terrible, crops were failing, and the economy was tanking. So much uncertainty and suffering made for a frightened and angry populace desperate for something or someone to blame for their problems. It was fertile ground for a witch hunt. These high stress levels may also explain the symptoms experienced by the afflicted. Though no single cause can explain every case,

various theories about predominant causes have been suggested. Today, the most widely accepted theory is a condition called conversion disorder. We still have much to learn about conversion disorder also called functional neurological symptom disorder, but for the purposes of this episode will stick to the basics. Conversion disorder occurs when your brain converts mental health issues like acute stress or trauma into physical symptoms caused by the disruption of

regular brain or nervous system function. Symptoms can include seizures, ticks, tremors, unexplained pain and weakness, sensory impairments like tunnel vision or double vision, and speech impairments. These symptoms are almost exactly what early sufferers in Salem experienced. Emerson Baker argues that conversion disorder helps explain why the outbreak began in the Paris household. For Betty Paris and Abigail Williams were quote perhaps the children in the village under the greatest stress.

It must have been almost unbearable to reside in the parsonage while an agitated Reverend Paris prepared to battle Satan and his allies. Betty and Abigail were not the only stressed residents of Salem that winter. The area was filled with refugees from the frontier, traumatized by the violence they had experienced. Other accusers were servants or orphans, young women whose lives were bleak and futures were even bleaker. Once words spread of the initial afflictions, a vicious cycle could

have been triggered. Mass psychogenic illness, if not recognized and treated, Baker writes, can worsen and spread. This is not surprising, as an unresolved emergency naturally leads to more anxiety, which is the very source of the illness. Of course, no one in Salem was diagnosing the afflicted with conversion disorder. Instead, they put the symptoms into the cultural context that they lived in, one in which witches were real. When adults she trusted told nine year old Betty Paris that the

cause of her suffering was a witch. She had no reason to doubt them. She had likely grown up hearing stories about witches, how they tormented you or tempted you to join them in their wicked ways. It was easy for her to parrot these stories back to her parents and to identify women who were outsiders as the witches, and so the witch hunt began. After identifying Titchiba as a witch, Betty and Abigail accused two more women Sarah

Good and Sarah Osborne. Soon, two other girls, Elizabeth Hubbard and Anne Putnam Junior, also began displaying symptoms and accused of the same three women. From there, the outbreak grew exponentially. Not all of those who claimed to be afflicted. Eventually there would be more than seventy of them fit the profile of someone with conversion disorder. There is substantial evidence

that some later sufferers were knowingly fabricating their symptoms. In the chaos of the outbreak, it was hard for people to tell where the fear ended and the lies began. Ultimately, more than one hundred and fifty people would be accused of witchcraft. After someone was accused, a complaint would be sworn against them. Most of the afflicted were women who were not allowed to make legal complaints, so often a male relative would make it for them. Then the accused

would be arrested, imprisoned, and questioned. Reverend George Burrows entered the ranks of the accused on April twentieth, sixteen ninety two, when twelve year old Anne Putnam claimed that his spectral form appeared before her and demanded that she sign the Devil's Book and become a witch like him. When Anne refused, Burrows's spirit tortured her mercilessly. This was a typical pattern of behavior for a witch, but Burrows's status as a

minister made this case distinct. Anne herself was shocked, telling the specter that it was quote a dreadful thing that he, which was a minister that should teach children to fear God, should come to persuade poor creatures to give their soul to the devil. But she refused to let the specter's title intimidate her, declaring quote, I will complain of you though you be a minister, if you be a wizard.

Burroughs soon became a popular figure to accuse. It seemed natural to the afflicted that the witch's society would mirror their own, and so the witches required a minister. On April twenty second, a number of the afflicted reported seeing Burroughs's specter lead a witch's sabbath in Reverend Paris's pasture, giving a sermon in which he urged his fellow witches

to establish the Devil's kingdom in New England. That Burroughs's corporeal self was in Maine that day was no alibi distance was not an obstacle for witches, whose spectral forms could travel with supernatural speed. On April thirtieth, Anne Putnam's father Thomas, swore a complaint against Burrows, and a warrant was issued for his arrest. Burroughs was arrested on the evening of May second in his home home in Wells, Maine, and taken to Salem. Even while he was imprisoned, Burrows's

alleged assaults on the afflicted continued unabated. On May seventh, his specter tortured Mercy Lewis, an orphaned teenager who had once worked as a servant for the Burrows family and was now working for the Putnams. The next day, he threatened eighteen year old Susannah Sheldon with death if she testified against him. The day after that, he appeared before

Mercy Lewis again, mister Burrows. Lewis later recounted quote 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 break my neck. Shortly after taking Mercy Lewis up a mountain, George Burrows was examined.

Because the colony was still waiting for its new Royal charter, which was now on its way from England, no formal court could be established, but preparations for future trials could be made, including gathering evidences. Two local magistrates, Jonathan Corwyn and John Hawthorne, set about taking depositions and examining the accused. These examinations were not neutral fact finding missions. The afflicted

were often present and writhed in the audience. Corwin and Hawthorne usually placed the burden of proof on the accused, asking them to somehow prove that they were not witches. Anything the accused said was used against them. Because of Burrows's role as a minister, his examination was conducted carefully. William Stowton and Samuel Sewell, two future members of the trial court, joined Corwin and Hawthorne for it. The four men first questioned Burrows privately, away from the afflicted. The

questions focused on Burrows's religious practice. He admitted that he had not taken communion in some time, and that not all of his children were baptized. Troubling admissions for a Puritan minister. Burrows also denied that his house in Maine was haunted, but did admit that there were toads around it,

toads everyone knew were a sign of witchcraft. When Burroughs entered into the Salem Village meetinghouse for his public questioning, the afflicted present were quote grievously harassed with preternatural mischiefs. The young women gave accounts of Burrows's diabolical activities. Several of them also told of visits by the ghosts of Burroughs's first two wives, Hannah and Sarah, who apparently accused

their husband of murdering them. As Marilyn Roach observes quote in the flood of detail, and amid the traumatic spectacle of the afflicted, the magistrates overlooked or ignored the contradictions in the stories given by the supposed ghosts of Burroughs's wives. For these specters told Susannah Sheldon that he had smothered and choked them, but told Anne Putnam that he had stabbed and strangled them. But this was not a time to be caught up on small things like inconsistent goods hosts.

George Burrows was held over for trial and sent to jail the Salem in Boston jails, where most of the accused were held, were notoriously terrible. One former inmate called the Boston jail quote a grave of the living the suburbs of hell. Disease and lice ran rampant, Cold and damp permeated the cells, and overcrowding exacerbated the problems. The day after Burrows's examination, Sarah Osborne, one of the first to be accused, who had spent nine weeks in these conditions,

died in the Boston jail. In Maine, Burrows's children were suffering too, Apparently deciding that her husband's chances of exoneration were slim, Burrows's third wife, Mary, abandoned her seven step children, sold all of burrows possessions, and left The Burrows children were on their own, though their father sent them quote solemn and safery written instructions from prison. Their only hope, and Burrough's only hope, was that the trial court would be just and merciful. But was that too much to

hope for? On May fourteenth, sixteen ninety two, Sir William Phipps arrived in Massachusetts Bay, ready to begin his term as governor and stepped straight into a crisis. Phipps had been in England helping negotiate the colony's new charter, which he was now tasked with administering. He had expected to return to a colony in turmoil, perhaps, but the situation was far worse than that. By this point, forty people had been accused of witchcraft and sat awaiting trial in jail.

The outbreak seemed to be spreading. The accused were not limited to Salem Village, but now came from across the colony. Phipps needed to nip the scandal in the bud before word got back to England and through the colony's ability to lead itself back into question. Technically, it was the responsibility of the colony's legislature to establish a court, but the legislature wouldn't be meeting until June eighth. Phipps didn't

want to wait. Besides his fear of news reaching England, he also knew that the colonists were skeptical of his new government's authority. This was a chance to show the frightened colonists that he could protect them. So on May twenty seventh, Phipps created a special emergency Court and assigned nine men to sit as judges. These judges were not trained jurists. Instead, they were drawn from the colonies, political, mercantile,

and military elite. Two of the judges would be Salem's local magistrates, John Hawthorne and Jonathan Corwin, and five others had participated in at least one of the preliminary hearings. Despite their lack of formal legal training, these men now had to figure out how to try a witch They looked to English precedent for help, using language from England's Witchcraft Act of sixteen oh four for the indictments, and

studying contemporary legal sources to establish trial procedures. These sources recommended a similar standard of evidence in witch trials as for other crimes, either a voluntary confession plus evidence of witchcraft, or the testimony of two credible witnesses who had witnessed the same supernatural event. But, as Marilyn Roach points out, quote, since magic left so few material clues, courts could give more weight to circumstantial evidence than they usually would. This

flexibility was especially important for the Salem trials. Historically, most witch trials involved claims of magical damage that people could see a burnt field a dead milk cow, But most of the cases in Salem involved spectral attacks, incidents where the witch's spectral form allegedly attacked the victim. Even if other people could see the victim's visible suffering, they could not see the witch's specter. Could a victim's word alone be used as evidence. This was a hotly debated issue.

Many legal authorities cautioned against using this so called spectral evidence, so did local religious leaders. In a letter to the legislature, a group of ministers that included Increase and Cotton Mather, two of the most prominent ministers in the colony, cautioned against putting too much weight on spectral evidence. Quote blessed by too much credulity for things received only upon the devil's authority, there be a door opened for a long

train of miserable consequences. In the same letter, the ministers also warned against relying too much on folk tests, such as throwing a witch into the water to see if she would float. However, both religious and legal authorities did believe that certain folk tests carried some weight. The court in Salem would eventually begin employing the touch test, in which the accused witch was required to touch an afflicted person if the victim's suffering stopped. This was taken as

pre that the witch was guilty. Despite the Minister's cautions against spectral evidence and folk tests, they also acknowledged the need for quote speedy and vigorous prosecution, and it was this need that the judges would prioritize. The first trial of Bridgitt Bishop occurred on June second. By the time that George Burrows's trial began on August fifth, eight more witches had been tried. All of them had been found guilty and sentenced to death. Six of them had already

been hung. The day before his trial, Burrows was examined by a group of men who were looking for a devil's mark, a spot where a devil or a witch's familiar nursed from the witch's body. Benign growths like warts and moles were often interpreted as devil's marks. No mark was found on Burroughs's body, but George Jacobs Senior, examined at the same time, was not so lucky. The examiners claimed to have found three spots which looked quote natural.

On Friday, August fifth, George Burrows's trial began. Though the outbreak had begun in Salem Village, the trials and executions took place in Salem Town, which is now the location most associated with the events of sixteen ninety two. The trials were always well attended, but Burrows's trial was particularly crowded, full of people who wanted to see for themselves if the minister was indeed a witch. There was a prosecutor present at these trials, but his role was more clerical,

focused on organizing the trials and writing indictments. The judges were the ones who asked questions of witnesses. A jury composed of twelve men determined the verdict. The defendant did not have counsel so had to represent themselves. A number of written depositions about supernatural actions were submitted as evidence

in Burrows's case. Some of the afflicted testified in person, although Cotton Mather notes that it cost the court a wonderful deal of trouble to hear them, for when they were going in to give their depositions, they would for a long time be taken with fits that made them uncapable of saying anything. When Chief Justice William Stoughton asked Burroughs what he thought was the cause of these fits.

Burroughs said, he supposed it was the devil. How comes the devil so loath to have any testimony borne against you? Stoton retorted as in the examinations the judges, especially Stoughton, seemed to presume guilt and contorted defendant statements to suit this conclusion. Many of the afflicted mentioned being visited by the ghosts of Burroughs selected murder victims, including his first

two wives. Now at the trial. The afflicted claimed that the ghosts had appeared once more, quote, crying for vengeance against him. This was next level spectral evidence specters testifying against specters, and was apparently too far even for the sale of judges. They excluded this testimony, but evidence of

Burrough's supernatural abilities continued to pour. In. Of particular interest to the court were stories of Burrow's extraordinary feats of strength, which Caughton Mather believed quote could not be done without a diabolical assistance, as quote, he was a very puny man, yet he had often done things beyond the strength of

a giant. These feats included carrying a full barrel of molasses which could weigh nearly five hundred pounds with only two fingers, and lifting an enormous gun which one witness, Simon Willard, said he could barely hold with only one hand. Burroughs denied that he had lifted the gun as described,

saying that a Native American man had helped him. The men testifying against him denied seeing this Native American, but did say that quote they supposed the black man, as the witches call the devil, and they generally say he resembles an Indian, might give him that assistance. Once again, burroughs attempts to defend himself had been turned against him, twisted to serve as further proof of his guilt. After this, the trial turned to something less supernatural, Burrows's reputation for

mistreating his wives. The exact nature of this mistreatment is unknown, but many people thought that Burroughs was too harsh on his wives. Though none of this testimony related directly to witchcraft, Cotton Mather said that it quote not only proved him a very ill man, but also confirmed the belief of the character which had already been fastened on him. In other words, it proved that he was the kind of person likely to consort with the devil. Even Burroughs's former

brother in law, Thomas Ruck, spoke out against the minister. Ruck, who was the brother of Burroughs's second wife, Sarah, described an instance where Burroughs had seemed to travel faster than was possible and had known the contents of Ruck's conversation with his sister even though he had not been present for it. When Ruck asked how Burroughs could possibly know their thoughts, saying quote, the devil himself did not know so far, Burroughs allegedly replied, qu my God makes known

your thoughts unto me. These words from another minister might have been taken as testimony to the power of the Lord. In George Burrows's case, The judges instead decided that, by the assistance of the black Man, Burrows might put on his invisibility and, in that fascinating mist gratify his own jealous humor to hear what they said of him. Desperate to defend himself, Burrows handed a paper to the judges which he said was an argument against the possibility of

witches using spectral forms. The judges, instead of considering the arguments therein only asked Burrows about authorship, for they recognized the text as being copied from a book by Witchcraft's skeptic Thomas Ady. Burroughs denied having copied it from a book, but admitted that he had read the argument in a

manuscript and transcribed it. Exactly what was said in this exchange is unknown, but Cotton, Mather and the judges were suspicious and only saw this as further evidence of Burrows's duplicity. In Mather's words, quote, faltering, faulty, unconstant, and contrary answers upon judicial and deliberate examination are counted some unlucky symptoms of guilt in all crimes, especially in Witchcraft's. Now there was never a prisoner more eminent for them than George Burroughs,

both at his examination and on his trial. With the testimony concluded, the jury quickly delivered their verdict on the charges of Witchcraft. Reverend George Burrows was found guilty and sentenced to die. He denied the truth of the allegations, but said that he understood the jury's decision given all the testimony against him. George Burrows took the news stoically. However,

Burrows said he had been condemned by false witness. Reverend John Hale, a minister from nearby Beverley, who attended Burrows's trial, was disturbed by this possibility. Hale confronted one of the witnesses, telling her, quote, you are the one that brings this man to death. If you have charged anything upon him that is not true, recall it before it be too late, while he is alive. The witness told Hale that she

had quote nothing to charge herself with. Upon that account, there were indeed false witnesses in the Salem witch trials. Though most scholars agree today that some of the cases were genuine in the sense that their sufferers genuinely believed that they were being afflicted by witches, they also agreed that other cases were falsified. Multiple witnesses would later apologize for lying during the trials. Some did so for attention, others out of spite, and others did it to save

their own lives. Imprisoned witches were interrogated mercilessly by judges and other authorities. Physical torture was not unheard of. The reasons to confess were toofold for these witches, first to end the tormant and second to delay their trial. Only accused witches who refused to confess were tried in the summer of sixteen ninety two, and every one of them was convicted. Though most confess witches were eventually tried, not a single one of them was ever executed. One of

these confessed witches was Margaret Jacobs. The sixteen year old's entire family, including her mentally ill mother Rebecca, and her grandfather George, had been accused of being witches. When Margaret herself was accused, she would later say she was told that quote, if I would not confess, I should be put down into the dungeon and would be hanged. But if I would confess, I should have my life terrified. She confessed and named both her grandfather and George Burrows.

In her confession. The lies, she said were quote wounding of my own soul, and after her grandfather and Burrows's convictions in early August, her quote, soul would not suffer me to keep it in any longer. On the evening of August eighteenth, Jacobs went to visit George Burrows, apologize for her lies and ask for his forgiveness. He granted it, and the two prayed together. Though Margaret Jacobs's confession may have brought some peace to George Burrows, it would not

change his fate. When Jacobs went to the judges and told them that she had lied in her testimony, they did not believe her and threw her in jail the next day, August nineteenth. The five witches convicted in early August, Martha Carrier, George Burrows, George Jacobs Senior, John Willard, and John Proctor were taken to the gallows in a cart. A large crowd gathered to watch, including Cotton Mather. All five of the condemned declared their innocence and asked Mather

to pray for them, which he did. They forgave their accusers, asked for their own sins to be forgiven, and prayed that they would be the last innocence to die. When George Burrows was led up the latter to the gallows, he gave a short sermon. His speech, Robert Caliph, a critic of the trials, later wrote, quote was so well worded and uttered with such composedness, and such at least seeming fervency of spirit as was very affecting and drew

tears from many. Burroughs concluded by reciting the Lord's Prayer, A feat that many believed a witch incapable of unease rippled through the crowd. What if they had gotten it wrong, What if they were about to execute a truly innocent man? But there was no room for uncertainty. Burroughs's fate was sealed. Hanging in the manner most likely employed at Salem was not a quick death. The drop was not long enough to break the neck, so the condemned person slowly strangled

to death. As the crowd watched burrows struggle, they grew more and more uneasy. Once his body fell still, it seemed almost as if they would move to stop the remaining executions. But then Cotton Mather, mounted on a horse, spoke from his perch, this man is no ordained, Minister Mother said. If Burrows's speech had touched them, wasn't that just more proof of his diabolical powers. The devil has

often been transformed into an angel of light. Mother reminded the crowd, just as in his trial, Burrows's own words had been turned against him. The executions continued. The dead were cut down from the gallows and buried in a shallow grave. Tradition has that the families some the executed snuck to the burial site at night and took their loved ones for reburial. Burrows had no one to perform this service for him. His children were still in main

struggling to survive. The condemned had asked that theirs be the last innocent bloodshed, but it was not to be. The trials raged on for another two months. Every single person who pleaded not guilty was convicted by the court. In September, eighty one year old Giles Corey refused to enter a plea, meaning that he could not be tried. In an attempt to get Corey to either plead or confess, officials stacked increasingly heavy stones on his prone body. After

enduring two days of this torture, Corey died. Besides Corey, nineteen people were executed between June tenth and September twenty second, sixteen ninety two. Five more of the accused died in prison, along with two infants born to imprisoned women. By the time of the last executions, however, serious doubts were starting

to arise about the validity of the trials. Observers were troubled by the fact that not a single confessed wish had been executed, while every accused person who claimed innocence was convicted. More and more people began to criticize the use of spectral evidence and the touch test. Sir William Phipps, the colonial governor, began to worry that the court he had established to shore up the political uncertainty in the

colony might in fact be a destabilizing force. In a letter to the English Privy Council on October twelfth, Phipps tried to evade responsibility for the trials, writing that he quote depended upon the judgment of the court as to a right method of proceeding in cases of witchcraft. But on inquiring into the matter, I found that the devil had taken upon him the name and shape of several persons who were doubtless innocent. He had good reason to

believe in their innocence. One of the most recently accused was his wife. On October twenty ninth, Phipps halted further arrests, released many of the accused, and disbanded the special Court. In January, a new court was convened to try the remaining prisoners. This court cleared most prisoners of charges or found them not guilty. In February, Phipps commuted the death sentences of all the surviving convicted. Phipps also took measures

to suppress the story of the trials. In his October twelfth letter, he explained that I have also put a stop to the printing of any discourses, one way or other that may increase the needless disputes of people upon this occasion, because I saw a likelihood of kindling an inextinguishable flame if I should admit any public and open contests. However, Phipps did commission one account, a highly whitewashed version of events by Cotton Mather called The Wonders of the Invisible World.

In fairness to Mather, he was a faithful transcriptionist of the examinations and trials. It was his framing that was spectacularly biased. Mather's account was sent to England, where it was accepted as true, but those on the ground in New England knew better. Many people now believed that the trials, even if well intentioned, had been a grievous mistake. Consequently,

Phipps's publication ban was not obeyed for long. By the mid sixteen nineties, increasingly critical accounts of the trial were emerging. The most famous of these was by Robert Caliph, hilariously titled More Wonders of the Invisible World. Some of these criticisms came from the very authorities who had led the trials. In January sixteen ninety seven, the Colonial legislature, which counted many of the trial judges as members, declared a day

of fasting and prayer in contrition for the trials. Judge Samuel Sewell gave a public apology at a fast day service. Twelve former jurors provided a statement of apology to be published in Robert Califf's book. Not everyone involved in the trials repented of their rules. Chief Justice William Stoughton, who went on to become Governor of the Colony, defended his

actions until his death in seventeen oh one. Samuel Parris, whose devisive leadership style had likely helped spark the witchcraft hysteria, only issued a half hearted apology in November sixteen ninety four as part of a campaign to keep his job. No one bought it. In the early seventeen hundreds, more

and more formal apologies for the trial began occurring. Some were institutional, like the three and seventeen eleven exonerations of most of the accused by the legislature, who also granted reparations for lost property to surviving accused or their families. Others were more personal. In seventeen oh six, and Putnam Junior, George Burrows's first accuser, publicly apologized for her role in the trials and was welcomed into the Salem Church. Not

everyone would be satisfied by these efforts at atonement. George Burrows was cleared by the seventeen eleven declaration, but only his third wife, Mary, received financial recompense. His children, who had been orphaned after Burrows's execution and Mary's abandonment, received nothing. They would petition the legislature for a portion of their father's estate until as late as seventeen fifty. Some families did not even receive the comfort of a posthumous exoneration.

Several names slipped through the cracks during the petition process. The final accused to be formally exonerated by the Massachusetts legislature was Elizabeth Johnson on July twenty eighth, twenty twenty two. The discontent sparked by the Trials had deep ramifications for New England society. Many colonists faith in their rulers was irreparably shaken. In trying to show strength in the face of a crisis, Phipps and his government had acted hastily

and ended up making the problem far worse. Instead of acting as a guiding hand, the government had provided the spark to the tinder pile. Distrust in the government was a natural result of such a disaster. This skepticism of a royal authority's ability to protect them and represent their interests laid the early groundwork for the American Revolution. Even before the Revolution, the trial had become a potent political symbol.

In seventeen forty one, rumors of a conspiracy amongst enslaved people to burn down New York City led to mass arrests and the execution of more than thirty people. Josiah Cotton, Cotton Mather's first cousin, published an an anonymous letter in Boston and New York papers saying that quote the late terrible combustions at New York revived the remembrance of the tragedy at Salem. Over the centuries, the meaning of the trials has been adjusted based on who is speaking and

what they're speaking about. By the twentieth century, the Trials were most often used as shorthand for political persecution. This association was cemented by Arthur Miller's nineteen fifty three play The Crucible, which used the Trials as an allegory for

Joseph McCarthy's attacks on alleged communists. As Miller observed, the Red Scare of the mid twentieth century had much in common with the Witch Scare of the late seventeenth They were both times in which Americans fears about a changing world led them to turn on one another, encouraged by cynical politicians who capitalized on these fears for personal gain.

These two periods are not unique in American history. While writing his book on the Trials, Emerson Baker saw parallels to the surge of Islamophobia in the wake of the nine to eleven attacks. I Am Afraid, wrote Thomas Braddle, a critic of the Trials in October sixteen ninety two, that ages will not wear off that reproach, and those stains which these things will leave behind them upon our land.

Rattle was right to worry. More than three hundred years later, we still remember the injustices committed during the Salem which trials. What's more, we still enact those same injustices. We employ outdated, dubious forensic techniques such as blood spatter analysis, in the same way that the Salem judges relied on the dubious, outdated touch test. We convict people based on thin or fictitious evidence. We let our fear overcome our better judgment.

We've come so far in so many ways since sixteen ninety two, but we haven't fully shaken off the legacy of Salem. Our legal system is now as it was then, shaped not just by law and precedent, but also by an aggregate of personal choices. Bad choices like the judge's decision to admit spectral evidence, but also brave choices like Margaret Jacob's choosing at great risk to her life to

tell the truth. Don't worry, by the way, Jacobs was eventually acquitted of witchcraft, but only after spending seven months in jail. Most of our choices aren't as dangerous or dramatic as Margaret Jacobs's. But every choice we make matters, whatever our role in society, whatever our connection to the legal system. We have the power to make the right decisions, to choose compassion, to choose justice. Thank you for listening

to History on Trial. To see images of people and places in this episode, check out our instagram at History on Trial. My main sources for this episode were Emerson W. Baker's book A Storm of Witchcraft, The Salem Trials and the American Experience, Marilyn k Roach's book The Salem witch Trials, a day by day chronicle of a community under siege, and the Salem Witchcraft Papers collected by Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum and adapted by the University of Virginia. Again.

This is the final episode of season one. It has been such a privilege and a pleasure to get to learn more about these stories and to share them with you. To stay updated on what's next, please follow our instagram at History on Trial or subscribe to our newsletter, which you can sign up for on our website History on Trial podcast dot com. Special thanks to my producer, Jessefunk, who has edited and produced all the episodes this season, and to my friends, family and partner for their support.

History on Trial is written and hosted by me Mira Hayward. The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk, with supervising producer Trevor Young and executive producers Dana Schwartz, Alexander Williams, Matt Frederick, and Mira Hayward. Learn more about the show at History on Trial podcast dot com and follow us on Instagram at History on Trial and on Twitter at

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