Jonathan Walcott and Nathaniel Ingersoll, against Elizabeth Proctor.
Perusal of the records shows that very many of the most intelligent,
influential, highly respected, and trusted men of the Village were
complainants; and shows also that, as early as February 29, when the first
complaint was entered, there were four afflicted ones: two in the family
of Mr. Parris; one in that of Thomas Putnam, living more than two miles
north from the parsonage; and one in that of Dr. Griggs, dwelling more
than two miles east from the same. Thus much had the trouble spread before
the law was invoked to aid in its suppression. The homes of the minister,
the doctor, and the parish clerk--a capable and good-one, too--were the
first invaded. Not mean abodes housed, nor low-lived people cared for the
first afflicted ones. Men of the highest standing there were leaders off
in the impending conflict with the devil. Two were most prominently and
persistently active, viz., Thomas Putnam and Mr. Parris. And why? If any
people then and there knew what the emergency required, these two would be
among them: none were more competent than they to perceive and perform the
duties of such an hour. They, too, and theirs were the chief sufferers. No
other active men there had motives pressing as theirs to work for prompt
relief in their households; and we will notice these two as
representatives of the prosecutors.
Thomas Putnam deservedly held high position among the inhabitants there,
and possessed the esteem, respect, and confidence of the whole community
around him. How came it that this very intelligent, influential, and
useful citizen, then a little more than forty years old and in the full
vigor of manhood, was prominent among the foremost and most pertinacious
prosecutors? Why was such a one an enterer of complaints against
neighbors, whether high or low, good or bad? Our response is, that in his
home a loved and loving wife, cultured, refined, and of acute
sensibilities,--a daughter, twelve years old, bright and charming,--and
also Mercy Lewis, a young domestic, were all so mysteriously tortured at
times, that no doubt existed in a mind which comprehended the creed of
that day, that the devil was author of the abnormal torments. That enemy
must be getting access to these innocent and loved ones, the creed said,
through some neighbors--at least some living mortals--who had made
covenants with the Evil One, and thus become his agents. Imbued and bound
by the creed of his day, this husband and father could cherish no
expectation that his wife and child could be shielded, or that comfort,
tranquillity, and peace could come to him and his dear ones, so long as
such covenanters were allowed to live. His creed--the general creed of the
times--called upon him to invoke the law's aid, since by help from no
other source could he hope to reclaim wife, child, and domestic from the
clutches of hell's sovereign, and save his own fireside from continuing on
indefinitely a frenzied pandemonium. The higher his manhood, and the
deeper his love for wife and children, the more vigilant, resolute, and
untiring would be his purpose and his efforts to use any and every
available means for delivering his family from the hell which had been
thrust in under his roof.
The sufferings of his dear ones, then necessarily operative upon his mind
and affections, we presume were the chief prompters of his course and
incentives to his perseverance in it. Defense and protection of wife,
children, and all within his household are incumbent on any one worthy to
be called a _man_. Think not the worse of Thomas Putnam because of his
resolute purposes and speedy as well as prolonged efforts to rescue from
sufferings and perdition wife, child, and domestic. Because a prominent
sufferer, he became a prominent prosecutor--yes, the most prominent.
Though that fact stands boldly out on the pages of history, no one in his
time or since, so far as we have noticed, ever imputed to him an unworthy
motive, or annexed a disparaging epithet to his name. Perhaps he, as well
as Mr. Dane of Andover, was "tenderly touched" because of "a fair
character."
In part the same can be said in defense of Rev. Samuel Parris as we have
adduced in defense of his co-sufferer and co-laborer for relief. During
the weeks from January 20 to the end of February, both his little daughter
and niece, under his own roof, were so strangely and sorely tormented that
he and his whole household must have been wearied, agitated, and rendered
miserable. When medical aid and kind nursing had proved abortive, and
medical authority announced the working of an _Evil Hand_ there, who can
wonder, knowing the creed of the day and place, that Mr. Parris sought the
law's aid for bringing relief to the little sufferers and to all beneath
his roof? Samuel Parris and Thomas Putnam, the minister and the clerk of
the parish, were both the first and the greatest sufferers affectionally
at the oncoming of invasion by mysterious tormentors, and both have fair
claims to be judged of tenderly in their connection with witchcraft
prosecutions. The chief apparent action of the minister was as scribe or
reporter for the courts, and this because he was more competent to that
work than any other person obtainable there. Such action is surely not
censurable. His position and abilities, however, were such that it was
quite as much within his power to have stopped the whole proceedings as in
that of any man then living; and they, no doubt, had his sanction and
efficient support. And yet we find no ground from which inference either
must or can fairly be drawn that the motives of the minister's actions
_pertaining to that special matter_, both at its commencement and in its
subsequent progress, were other than those common to the most enlightened
and best members of the community. Still we have not learned to like the
_man_. Selfishness, and disposition to rule harshly over his parish and
individuals, if not resentfully and even maliciously, are made too
manifest in the records for us to hold him in high esteem.
As servants of God and Christ, which they professed and believed
themselves to be, the prosecutors entered upon and long followed up war,
bloody war,--not against neighbors and men, but against the Devil--the
great enemy of God, Christ, and all good Christians. They were true,
earnest, resolute, strong, fearless men, waging their fight in good
conscience.
The community at large, in which those men lived and held prominent
position, was not below most, if below any other of equal numbers on the
continent. Intellect there was keen, and morality high. Upham's "History
of Salem Village," admirable for its research, its thoroughness, its
prevailing accuracy, and its extensive charms, clearly shows that the five
hundred people, more or less, residing there in 1692, could scarcely be
surpassed by the residents of any other locality in intelligence, mental
keenness, moral strength, personal courage, and firmness of purpose and
resolve to live up to their convictions of truth, right, and duty. Salem
witchcraft was born in the homes of intelligent, brave, honored men,--who,
in co-operation with their wives, children, and domestics, contributed to
its growth, and elicited its vast and awful power to startle, frenzy, and
desolate the region round about. The world at large has never been kept
well instructed as to the circumstances amid which that great _delusion_
made its entrance on the field of human vision, nor as to the high
standing, intelligence, and character of its first escorts and sponsors.
Its victims, too, as a whole, were very respectable. Some of them, it is
true, were not high on the social scale, but the most of them were well
up, and quite a number ranked high among the intelligent, virtuous, and
saintly. The wide-spread and long prevalent notion that the dark doings
there were little else than outgrowths from tricks played by a few artful
and mischievous girls upon some low-lived and bed-ridden old women, has no
foundation on the facts in the case. This most monstrous child of
Christendom's creed had begetting and birth, in 1692, amid as reputable
circumstances and people, and as religious opponents of Satan, as any
marked revival of religion which has anywhere transpired since that
memorable day when the leading men of Salem Village, being challenged to
defense of their homes, armed themselves with civil law, and bravely,
long, and forcefully fought for God and His against the Devil.