[52] The documents which Gov. Hutchinson printed belong with the court
files at Salem, which have been very carefully arranged and mounted
by Mr. William P. Upham. These papers, or such of them as remain,
were printed (with many errors) by Mr. W. E. Woodward, in _Records of
Salem Witchcraft_, Roxbury, 1865, 2 vols. sm. 4to. Among these the
papers which Gov. Hutchinson printed do not appear. They were doubtless
borrowed by him, and never returned. In the Massachusetts archives is a
volume of witchcraft papers (vol. cxxxv.), but these documents are not
among them.
In 1860, Mr. N. I. Bowditch presented a collection of original papers
relating to Salem witchcraft, which once belonged to the Salem court
files, to the Massachusetts Historical Society. More than sixty
years ago these papers came into possession of the late Hon. John
Pickering; who, says Mr. Bowditch, “as he was a sworn officer of the
court, had some scruples of conscience about retaining them himself;
and therefore, after examining them, gave them to my late father [Dr.
Nathaniel Bowditch]. (Proceedings, 1860-62, p. 31).” The collection
has been arranged and elegantly bound at the expense of Mr. Bowditch.
The volume does not contain the papers printed by Gov. Hutchinson. As
Gov. Hutchinson printed only portions of these papers, and doubtless
took others which he did not print, it is a matter of some historical
interest to know the present location (if they exist) of the original
papers which he used.