Massachusetts one hundred and seventy years ago. The persecutions our
ancestors had undergone in their own country, and the privations,
altogether inconceivable by us, they suffered during the early years of
their residence here, acting upon their minds and characters, in
co-operation with the influences of the political and ecclesiastical
occurrences that marked the seventeenth century, had imparted a gloomy,
solemn, and romantic turn to their dispositions and associations, which
was transmitted without diminution to their children, strengthened and
aggravated by their peculiar circumstances. It was the triumphant age
of superstition. The imagination had been expanded by credulity, until
it had reached a wild and monstrous growth. The Puritans were always
prone to subject themselves to its influence; and New England, at the
time to which we are referring, was a most fit and congenial theatre
upon which to display its power. Cultivation had made but a slight
encroachment on the wilderness. Wide, dark, unexplored forests covered
the[i.7] hills, hung over the lonely roads, and frowned upon the
scattered settlements. Persons whose lives have been passed where the
surface has long been opened, and the land generally cleared, little
know the power of a primitive wilderness upon the mind. There is
nothing more impressive than its sombre shadows and gloomy recesses.
The solitary wanderer is ever and anon startled by the strange,
mysterious sounds that issue from its hidden depths. The distant fall
of an ancient and decayed trunk, or the tread of animals as they prowl
over the mouldering branches with which the ground is strown; the
fluttering of unseen birds brushing through the foliage, or the moaning
of the wind sweeping over the topmost boughs,—these all tend to excite
the imagination and solemnize the mind. But the stillness of a forest
is more startling and awe-inspiring than its sounds. Its silence is so
deep as itself to become audible to the inner soul. It is not
surprising that wooded countries have been the fruitful fountains and
nurseries of superstition.
"In such a place as this, at such an hour,
If ancestry can be in aught believed,
Descending spirits have conversed with man,
And told the secrets of the world unknown."
The forests which surrounded our ancestors were the abode of a
mysterious race of men of strange demeanor and unascertained origin.
The aspects they presented, the stories told of them, and every thing
connected with them, served to awaken fear, bewilder the imagination,
and aggravate the tendencies of the general condition of things to
fanatical enthusiasm.[i.8]
It was the common belief, sanctioned, as will appear in the course of
this discussion, not by the clergy alone, but by the most learned
scholars of that and the preceding ages, that the American Indians were
the subjects and worshippers of the Devil, and their powwows, wizards.
In consequence of this opinion, the entire want of confidence and
sympathy to which it gave rise, and the provocations naturally incident
to two races of men, of dissimilar habits, feelings, and ideas, thrown
into close proximity, a state of things was soon brought about which
led to conflicts and wars of the most distressing and shocking
character. A strongly rooted sentiment of hostility and horror became
associated in the minds of the colonists with the name of Indian. There
was scarcely a village where the marks of savage violence and cruelty
could not be pointed out, or an individual whose family history did not
contain some illustration of the stealth, the malice or the vengeance
of the savage foe. In 1689, John Bishop, and Nicholas Reed a servant of
Edward Putnam; and, in 1690, Godfrey Sheldon, were killed by Indians in
Salem. In the year 1691, about six months previous to the commencement
of the witchcraft delusion, the county of Essex was ordered to keep
twenty-four scouts constantly in the field, to guard the frontiers
against the savage enemy, and to give notice of his approach, then
looked for every hour with the greatest alarm and apprehension.
Events soon justified the dread of Indian hostilities[i.9] felt by the
people of this neighborhood. Within six years after the witchcraft
delusion, incursions of the savage foe took place at various points,
carrying terror to all hearts. In August, 1696, they killed or took
prisoners fifteen persons at Billerica, burning many houses. In October
of the same year, they came upon Newbury, and carried off and
tomahawked nine persons; all of whom perished, except a lad who
survived his wounds. In 1698, they made a murderous and destructive
assault upon Haverhill. The story of the capture, sufferings, and
heroic achievements of Hannah Dustin, belongs to the history of this
event. It stands by the side of the immortal deed of Judith, and has no
other parallel in all the annals of female daring and prowess. On the
3d of July, 1706, a garrison was stormed at night in Dunstable; and
Holyoke, a son of Edward Putnam, with three other soldiers, was killed.
He was twenty-two years of age. In 1708, seven hundred Algonquin and
St. Francis Indians, under the command of French officers, fell again
upon Haverhill about break of day, on the 29th of August; consigned the
town to conflagration and plunder; destroyed a large amount of
property; massacred the minister Mr. Rolfe, the commander of the post
Captain Wainwright, together with nearly forty others; and carried off
many into captivity. On this occasion, a troop of horse and a foot
company from Salem Village rushed to the rescue; the then minister of
the parish, the Rev. Joseph Green, seized his gun and went with them.
They pursued the flying Indians for[i.10] some distance. So deeply were
the people of Haverhill impressed by the valor and conduct of Mr. Green
and his people, that they sent a letter of thanks, and desired him to
come and preach to them. He complied with the invitation, spent a
Sunday there, and thus gave them an opportunity to express personally
their gratitude. On other occasions, he accompanied his people on
similar expeditions.
These occurrences show that the fears and anxieties of the colonists in
reference to Indian assaults were not without grounds at the period of
the witchcraft delusion. They were, at that very time, hanging like a
storm-cloud over their heads, soon to burst, and spread death and
destruction among them.
There was but little communication between the several villages and
settlements. To travel from Boston to Salem, for instance, which the
ordinary means of conveyance enable us to do at present in less than an
hour, was then the fatiguing, adventurous, and doubtful work of an
entire day.
It was the darkest and most desponding period in the civil history of
New England. The people, whose ruling passion then was, as it has ever
since been, a love for constitutional rights, had, a few years before,
been thrown into dismay by the loss of their charter, and, from that
time, kept in a feverish state of anxiety respecting their future
political destinies. In addition to all this, the whole sea-coast was
exposed to danger: ruthless pirates were continually prowling along the
shores. Commerce was nearly[i.11] extinguished, and great losses had
been experienced by men in business. A recent expedition against Canada
had exposed the colonies to the vengeance of France.
The province was encumbered with oppressive taxes, and weighed down by
a heavy debt. The sum assessed upon Salem to defray the expenses of the
country at large, the year before the witchcraft prosecutions, was
£1,346. 1_s._ Besides this, there were the town taxes. The whole
amounted, no doubt, inclusive of the support of the ministry, to a
weight of taxation, considering the greater value of money at that
time, of which we have no experience, and can hardly form an adequate
conception. The burden pressed directly upon the whole community. There
were then no great private fortunes, no moneyed institutions, no
considerable foreign commerce, few, if any, articles of luxury, and no
large business-capitals to intercept and divert its pressure. It was
borne to its whole extent by the unaided industry of a population of
extremely moderate estates and very limited earnings, and almost
crushed it to the earth.
The people were dissatisfied with the new charter. They were becoming
the victims of political jealousies, discontent, and animosities. They
had been agitated by great revolutions. They were surrounded by
alarming indications of change, and their ears were constantly assailed
by rumors of war. Their minds were startled and confounded by the
prevalence of prophecies and forebodings of dark and dismal[i.12]
events. At this most unfortunate moment, and, as it were, to crown the
whole and fill up the measure of their affliction and terror, it was
their universal and sober belief, that the Evil One himself was, in a
special manner, let loose, and permitted to descend upon them with
unexampled fury.
The people of Salem participated in their full share of the gloom and
despondency that pervaded the province, and, in addition to that, had
their own peculiar troubles and distresses. Within a short time, the
town had lost almost all its venerable fathers and leading citizens,
the men whose councils had governed and whose wisdom had guided them
from the first years of the settlement of the place. Only those who are
intimately acquainted with the condition of a community of simple
manners and primitive feelings, such as were the early New-England
settlements, can have an adequate conception of the degree to which the
people were attached to their patriarchs, the extent of their
dependence upon them, and the amount of the loss when they were
removed.
In the midst of this general distress and local gloom and depression,
the great and awful tragedy, whose incidents, scenes, and characters I
am to present, took place.
[i.13]
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PART FIRST.
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[i.14]
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SALEM VILLAGE.
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[i.15]
Salem Village, 1866.
PART FIRST.
SALEM VILLAGE.
IT is necessary, before entering upon the subject of the witchcraft
delusion, to give a particular and extended account of the immediate
locality where it occurred, and of the community occupying it. This is
demanded by justice to the parties concerned, and indispensable to a
correct understanding of the transaction. No one, in truth, can
rightly appreciate the character of the rural population of the towns
first settled in Massachusetts, without tracing it to its origin, and
taking into view the policy that regulated the colonization of the
country at the start.
"The Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England"
possessed, by its charter from James the First, dated Nov. 3, 1620, and
renewed by Charles the First, March 4, 1629, the entire sovereignty
over all the territory assigned to it. Some few conditions and
exceptions were incorporated in the grant, which, in the event, proved
to be merely nom[i.16]inal. The company, so far as the crown and
sovereignty of England were concerned, became absolute owner of the
whole territory within its limits, and exercised its powers
accordingly. It adopted wise and efficient measures to promote the
settlement of the country by emigrants of the best description. It gave
to every man who transported himself at his own charge fifty acres of
land, and lots, in distinction from farms, to those who should choose
to settle and build in towns. In 1628, Captain John Endicott, one of
the original patentees, was sent over to superintend the management of
affairs on the spot, and carry out the views of the company. On the
30th of April, 1629, the company, by a full and free election, chose
said Endicott to be "Governor of the Plantation in the Massachusetts
Bay," to hold office for one year "from the time he shall take the
oath," and gave him instructions for his government. In reference to
the disposal of lands, they provided that persons "who were
adventurers," that is, subscribers to the common stock, to the amount
of fifty pounds, should have two hundred acres of land, and, at that
rate, more or less, "to the intent to build their houses, and to
improve their labors thereon." Adventurers who carried families with
them were to have fifty acres for each member of their respective
families. Other provisions were made, on the same principles, to meet
the case of servants taken over; for each of whom an additional number
of acres was to be allowed. If a person should choose "to build on
the[i.17] plot of ground where the town is intended to be built," he
was to have half an acre for every fifty pounds subscribed by him to
the common stock. A general discretion was given to Endicott and his
council to make grants to particular persons, "according to their
charge and quality;" having reference always to the ability of the
grantee to improve his allotment. Energetic and intelligent men, having
able-bodied sons or servants, even if not adventurers, were to be
favorably regarded. Endicott carried out these instructions faithfully
and judiciously during his brief administration. In the mean time, it
had been determined to transfer the charter, and the company bodily, to
New England. Upon this being settled, John Winthrop, with others,
joined the company, and he was elected its governor on the 29th of
October, 1629. On the 12th of June, 1630, he arrived in Salem, and held
his first court at Charlestown on the 28th of August.
There was some irregularity in these proceedings. The charter fixed a
certain time, "yearly, once in the year, for ever hereafter," for the
election of governor, deputy-governor, and assistants. Matthew Cradock
had been elected accordingly, on the 13th of May, 1629, governor of the
company "for the year following." He presided at the General Court of
the company when Winthrop was elected governor. There does not appear
to have been any formal resignation of his office by Cradock. In point
of fact, the charter made no provision for a resignation of office, but
only for cases where a vacancy might be occasioned[i.18] by death, or
removal by an act of the company. It would have been more regular for
the company to have removed Cradock by a formal vote; but the great and
weighty matter in which they were engaged prevented their thinking of a
mere formality. Cradock had himself conceived the project they had met
to carry into effect, and labored to bring it about. He vacated the
chair to his successor, on the spot. Still forgetting the provisions of
the charter, they declared Winthrop elected "for the ensuing year, to
begin on this present day," the 20th of October, 1629. By the language
of the charter, he could only be elected to fill the vacancy "in the
room or place" of Cradock; that is, for the residue of the official
year established by the express provision of that instrument, namely,
until the "last Wednesday in Easter term" ensuing. All usage is in
favor of this construction. The terms of the charter are explicit; and,
if persons chosen to fill vacancies during the course of a year could
thus be commissioned to hold an entire year from the date of their
election, the provision fixing a certain day "yearly" for the choice of
officers would be utterly nullified. Whether this subsequently occurred
to Winthrop and his associates is not known; but, if it did, it was
impossible for them to act in conformity to the view now given; for, in
the ensuing "last Wednesday of Easter term," he was at sea, in mid
ocean, and the several members of the company dispersed throughout his
fleet. When he arrived in Salem, he found Endicott—who, in the records
of the[i.19] company before its transfer to New England, is styled "the
Governor beyond the seas"—with his year of office not yet expired. The
company had not chosen another in his place, and his commission still
held good. It was so evident that the vote extending the term of
Winthrop's tenure to a year from the day on which he was chosen, Oct.
20, 1629, was illegal, that when that year expired, in October, 1630,
no motion was made to proceed to a new election. In the mean time,
however, Endicott's year had expired; and, for aught that appears,
there was not, for several months, any legal governor or government at
all in the colony. When the next "last Wednesday of Easter term" came
round, on the 18th of May, 1631, Winthrop was chosen governor, as the
record says, "according to the meaning of the patent;" and all went on
smoothly afterwards. If the difficulty into which they had got was
apprehended by Winthrop, Endicott, or any of their associates, they
were wise enough to see that nothing but mischief could arise from
taking notice of it; that no human ingenuity could disentangle the
snarl; and that all they could do was to wait for the lapse of time to
drift them through. The conduct of these two men on the occasion was
truly admirable. Endicott welcomed Winthrop with all the honors due to
his position as governor; opened his doors to receive him and his
family; and manifested the affectionate respect and veneration with
which, from his earliest manhood to his dying day, Winthrop ever
inspired all men in all circumstances. Winthrop per[i.20]formed the
ceremony at Endicott's marriage. They each went about his own business,
and said nothing of the embarrassments attached to their official
titles or powers. After a few months, Winthrop held his courts, as
though all was in good shape; and Endicott took his seat as an
assistant. They proved themselves sensible, high-minded men, of true
public spirit, and friends to each other and to the country, which will
for ever honor them both as founders and fathers. They entered into no
disputes—and their descendants never should—about which was governor,
or which first governor.
The disposal of lands, at the expiration of Endicott's delegated
administration, passed back into the hands of the company, and was
conducted by the General Court upon the policy established at its
meetings in London. On the 3d of March, 1635, the General Court
relinquished the control and disposal of lands, within the limits of
towns, to the towns themselves. After this, all grants of lands in
Salem were made by the people of the town or their own local courts.
The original land policy was faithfully adhered to here, as it probably
was in the other towns.
The following is a copy of the Act:—
"Whereas particular towns have many things which concern only
themselves, and the ordering of their own affairs, and disposing of
businesses in their own towns, it is therefore ordered, that the
freemen of any town, or the major part of them, shall only have power
to dispose of their own lands and woods, with all the privileges and
appurtenances of the[i.21] said towns, to grant lots, and make such
orders as may concern the well ordering of their own towns, not
repugnant to the laws and orders here established by the General Court;
as also to lay mulcts and penalties for the breach of these orders, and
to levy and distress the same, not exceeding the sum of twenty
shillings; also to choose their own particular officers, as constables,
surveyors of the high-ways, and the like; and because much business is
like to ensue to the constables of several towns, by reason they are to
make distress, and gather fines, therefore that every town shall have
two constables, where there is need, that so their office may not be a
burthen unto them, and they may attend more carefully upon the
discharge of their office, for which they shall be liable to give their
accounts to this court, when they shall be called thereunto."
The reflecting student of political science will probably regard this
as the most important legislative act in our annals. Towns had existed
before, but were scarcely more than local designations, or convenient
divisions of the people and territories. This called them into being as
depositories and agents of political power in its mightiest efficacy
and most vital force. It remitted to the people their original
sovereignty. Before, that sovereignty had rested in the hands of a
remote central deputation; this returned it to them in their primary
capacity, and brought it back, in its most important elements, to their
immediate control. It gave them complete possession and absolute power
over their own lands, and provided the machinery for managing their own
neighborhoods and making and[i.22] executing their own laws in what is,
after all, the greatest sphere of government,—that which concerns
ordinary, daily, immediate relations. It gave to the people the power
to do and determine all that the people can do and determine, by
themselves. It created the towns as the solid foundation of the whole
political structure of the State, trained the people as in a perpetual
school for self-government, and fitted them to be the guardians of
republican liberty and order.
Large tracts were granted to men who had the disposition and the means
for improving them by opening roads, building bridges, clearing
forests, and bringing the surface into a state for cultivation. Men of
property, education, and high social position, were thus made to lead
the way in developing the agricultural resources of the country, and
giving character to the farming interest and class. In cases where men
of energy, industry, and intelligence presented themselves, if not
adventurers in the common stock, with no other property than their
strong arms and resolute wills, particularly if they had able-bodied
sons, liberal grants were made. Every one who had received a town lot
of half an acre was allowed to relinquish it, receiving, in exchange, a
country lot of fifty acres or more. Under this system, a population of
a superior order was led out into the forest. Farms quickly spread into
the interior, seeking the meadows, occupying the arable land, and
especially following up the streams.
I propose to illustrate this by a very particular enumeration of
instances, and by details that will give[i.23] us an insight of the
personal, domestic, and social elements that constituted the condition
of life in the earliest age of New England, particularly in that part
of the old township of Salem where the scene of our story is laid. I
shall give an account of the persons and families who first settled the
region included in, and immediately contiguous to, Salem Village, and
whose children and grandchildren were actors or sufferers in, or
witnesses of, the witchcraft delusion. I am able, by the map, to show
the boundaries, to some degree of precision, of their farms, and the
spots on or near which their houses stood.
The first grant of land made by the company, after it had got fairly
under way, was of six hundred acres to Governor Winthrop, on the 6th of
September, 1631, "near his house at Mystic." The next was to the
deputy-governor, Thomas Dudley, on the 5th of June, 1632, of two
hundred acres "on the west side of Charles River, over against the new
town," now Cambridge. The next, on the 3d of July, 1632, was three
hundred acres to John Endicott. It is described, in the record, as
"bounded on the south side with a river, commonly called the Cow House
River, on the north side with a river, commonly called the Duck River,
on the east with a river, leading up to the two former rivers, known by
the name of Wooleston River, and on the west with the main land." The
meaning of the Indian word applied to this territory was "Birch-wood."
At the period of the witchcraft delusion, and for some time afterwards,
"Cow House River" was[i.24] called "Endicott River." Subsequently it
acquired the name of "Waters River."
This grant constituted what was called "the Governor's Orchard Farm."
In conformity with the policy on which grants were made, Endicott at
once proceeded to occupy and improve it, by clearing off the woods,
erecting buildings, making roads, and building bridges. His
dwelling-house embraced in its view the whole surrounding country, with
the arms of the sea. From the more elevated points of his farm, the
open sea was in sight. A road was opened by him, from the head of tide
water on Duck, now Crane, River, through the Orchard Farm, and round
the head of Cow House River, to the town of Salem, in one direction,
and to Lynn and Boston in another. A few years afterwards, the town
granted him two hundred acres more, contiguous to the western line of
the Orchard Farm. After this, and as a part of the transaction, the
present Ipswich road was made, and the old road through the Orchard
Farm discontinued. This illustrates the policy of the land grants. They
were made to persons who had the ability to lay out roads. The present
bridge over Crane River was probably built by Endicott and the parties
to whom what is now called the Plains, one of the principal villages of
Danvers, had been granted. The tract granted by the town was popularly
called the "Governor's Plain." By giving, in this way, large tracts of
land to men of means, the country was opened and made accessible to
settlers who had no pecuniary ability to incur large[i.25] outlays in
the way of general improvements, but had the requisite energy and
industry to commence the work of subduing the forest and making farms
for themselves. To them, smaller grants were made.
The character of the population, thus aided at the beginning in
settling the country, cannot be appreciated without giving some idea of
what it was to open the wilderness for occupancy and cultivation. This
is a subject which those who have always lived in other than frontier
towns do not perhaps understand.