The Trials Of The Salem Witch Trials

In January 1692, when a group of juvenile girls began to display bizarre behavior, the tight-knit Puritan community of Salem, Massachusetts couldn’t explain the unusual afflictions and came to a conclusion. Witches had invaded Salem. This was the beginning of a period of mass hysteria known as The Salem Witch Trials. Hundreds of people were falsely accused of witchcraft and many paid the ultimate price of death. Nineteen people were hung, one was pressed to death, and as many as thirteen more died in prison. One of the accused Elizabeth Bassett Proctor, a faithful wife and mother, endured her fictitious accusation with honor and integrity.

During the period of late seventeenth century in colonial Salem, Massachusetts, two girls began acting in an uncanny manner. These girls then accused two woman and a slave for being witches; which caused the town of Salem to emerge into a period of witch cleansing. Mostly, the people of Salem were Puritans who found many different reasons to accuse one of being a witch. The start of the witch trials began in 1692 and ended in 1693 by Governor Phips; whose wife was prosecuted as a witch. These Salem Witch Trials began by religious superstition, the appearance of the perceived witch, and through torture and forced confessions.

The Salem witch trials were a dark time in American history. It all started when Reverend Parris’ daughter and niece were acting strangely after spending time with Parris’ slave Tituba. For example, “They were believed to have danced a black magic dance in the nearby woods. Several of the girls would fall to the floor and scream hysterically” (“Witchcraft in Salem”). Parris then believed that Tituba along with two other women had bewitched his daughter and niece, thus starting the witch hunt.

During the seventeenth century, many Puritans became fed up with the Church of England and its devilish ways. They wanted to break free from it, and make changes elsewhere. They got permission to set up a colony in Massachusetts Bay, and soon after that, over twenty-thousand Puritans fled from England to America. They decided to base their colony on the word of God, and believed God would protect them if they followed his commandments. This meant that if anyone were to sin, “they didn’t want God to protect them because they already worshiped the devil,” and “anyone who worshipped the devil was a witch who used witchcraft to possess others.” Because of this theory, many people were accused of being witches and using witchcraft. The most notorious series of hearings and prosecutions for those accused of witchcraft took place in Salem Village, Massachusetts, known as the Salem Witch Trials.

The Salem Witch Trials were a time of paranoia and mass hysteria. In this small town of Massachusetts hundreds were accused of witchcraft and 19 people were executed. Salem was home to very devout Puritans. The worries arrived when young girls would become sick with no explanation or cure. The doctors not knowing what the cause of the illness was, quickly pronounce the girls bewitched. It spread terror through the town. The girls, as well as other residents, started accusing others of witchery. Many accusations were because of vengeance or self-interest. There were rivalries between families over land or wealth. Neighbors started accusing each other in order to gain their land. The religious community had an intensified sense of fear that the Devil was walking among them. They believed witches were out to destroy the Puritans. In order to purify the village of evil they had trials for the accused.

The Salem witch trials were a difficult time for the citizens of the Massachusetts Colony in the late seventeenth century. They were accused of practicing the Devil’s magic, which many believed to be real; so real that people were being imprisoned and executed for it. Between the years 1692 and 1693 there were over two hundred accusations and about 20 people and two dogs were killed altogether.

The witch trials of Salem are often thought to be a hysteria that can be categorized as fake and sometimes “crazy”. The trials started by the belief of the supernatural and the practice of the devil’s ability to grant people the ability to hurt others. Elizabeth Parris and Abigail Williams are the two young ladies that began the stereotypical beliefs in witchery. Williams and Parris started having hysterical fits and “uncontrollable” tantrums filled with screaming and crazy-like seizures. The result of all the insane opinions and conclusions to society were nineteen hangings, and one pressing. The Salem witch trials were a result of hasty decisions and the fear of God’s anger on the people of society. Today, the trials would be seen as crazy or fictional.

Twenty four people died during the Salem Witchcraft trials of 1692, and at least a hundred more were sent to jail under the accusation of witchcraft. These trials first began when Betty Parris, Ann Putnam, Mercy Lewis, and Mary Walcott were behaving oddly. The girls dashed under furniture, contorted in pain, and hallucinated, among other things. The people of a small Massachusetts colony called Salem panicked, not knowing what was causing the girls to act so oddly. There were three major reasons why this happened: childish behavior, religious beliefs and personal tensions between the two sides of the colony.

The Salem Witchcraft Trials were a series of trials in Salem, Massachusetts which accused many local women with witchcraft. The legal proceedings began in the spring of 1692. More than two hundred people were accused of this witchcraft. Of these two hundred people twenty were executed. The setting at the time of the Salem witchcraft trials was a period of unrest. There was increasing tension between the two main parts of Salem, which included Salem Village and Salem Town. “Salem town was a bustling port with a number of shops, large merchant’s houses, and local government buildings. In contrast, Salem Village consisted of a few scattered farms and farmhouses roughly clustered around the

The Salem Witch Trial is famous for its sudden outbreak, widespread influence, and mass accusations. The traditional story of the witchcraft hysteria starts from the strange illness that was experienced by the local minister’s daughter and niece, Betty Parris and Abigail Williams, who claimed

The Truth: The Salem Witch Trials began in 1692 and were named as so because they were a series of cases accusing people of Witchcraft occurring in Salem, Massachusetts. These trials were brought on due to the strange behavior of many of the young girls of Salem. During this time period it was not rare for people to be concerned about the Devil trying to destroy Christian towns and people, and the community of Salem was a highly religious town. After playing a fortune-telling game, many teenage girls became ill. They all suffered from similar symptoms including "fits," fever, contorting in pain, and hiding under furniture. In February of 1692, Salem's Reverend Samuel Parris arranged for the afflicted girls to be examined by a doctor, and the

The Salem Witch Trials took place in Salem, Massachusetts during 1692 when citizens turned on each other and accused their neighbors of witchcraft, the Devil’s magic. The trials, which lasted from June to September, resulted in nineteen men and women being hanged, one man being pressed to death, and many other people dying in jail. Almost as soon as it began, the hysteria that had swept through Puritan Massachusetts ended. There are many opinions as to why the witchcraft trials caused such hysteria in Salem but many conclude that it was triggered by a spoiled food supply, Puritan religious beliefs, the constricted roles of females in Salem society, and the political and social tensions in the colony.

The salem witch trials of the 1600s were the result of the mistrust and jealousy of members of the town of Salem, Massachusetts (Miller). The hysteria began with teenagers dancing in the woods near the town when they were caught by the town’s Reverend, Parris (Miller). Reverend Parris’ daughter Elizabeth, and niece Abigail Williams started having fits (Miller). They then accused a black maid of performing witchcraft (Miller). From there it escalated and, fairly quickly, neighbor accused neighbor just to get his land or belongings, or because of mere jealousy (Miler). Despite having a priest, who was proficient in

Even before the occurrence of the 1692 witch trials, citizens of Salem would often describe the town as quarrelsome, as a result of certain families holding power within the community; the Putnam’s and the Nurse’s (Jenrette 214). In addition to this tension, Salem would often quarrel with the neighboring town, further adding to an unsettling stress in the community. Because of the tension between Salem and its neighboring town regarding how to run the church and how to conduct its faith, it eventually broke off from the town and created its own church, separate from the other town’s. Pastors were hard to come by, and Salem was often between pastors, unable to keep one for more than a few years. One man, Reverend Samuel Parris, accepted the pastoral position in Salem in

Life in the New England colonies during the 1600’s proved to be harsh with the constant fear of Native American attacks, scarce food, freezing winters, and conflicting opinions about religion. From this perpetual state of distress, the Salem Witch Trials were birthed, causing a wave of hysteria in Salem Village and Salem Town. Though the exact day and month is uncertain, historians can claim that the trials emerged in early 1692 and came to a close in 1693. The Salem Witch Trials started in 1692 with more than one hundred fifty people being accused of practicing witchcraft, and the trials finally ended with the courts declaring there was no evidence in the cases being tried, and the Governor stopped the trials because his wife was accused.