By Sorcery, Charm, or Enchantment

Salem, Page 3

Like so many of the women charged in Salem, Bridget Bishop was middle-aged. Somewhere between 55 and 60 at the time of her trial, she had first been accused of witchcraft a decade and a half earlier, in her early forties. Of note, a significant number of the accused were also in their forties and early fifties when first suspected of witchcraft, or at the very least been the subject of gossip; for Bishop and others there was repetitive speculation that antedated their indictment in Salem.[14]

Bishop also had her marital status in common with many of the other accused; it was not uncommon at all for accusations to be levied against women who had no son or brother to inherit, shortly after they were widowed. Bishop’s first husband, Thomas Oliver, had died in 1679, and she was charged with witchcraft within a year. Like her age, a woman’s marital status was significant in determining her value in Puritan society.[15]

Given Bishop’s unpopularity with her neighbors, her quarrelsome personality, and her previous record of being accused of witchcraft, it was no coincidence that magistrates selected her as the first to go to trial. Numerous witnesses testified to events spanning some twenty years past, claiming that she had been nearby when a pig died, or a child became ill. Some claimed to have seen her shadowy image in their rooms after dark, when she was known to be physically elsewhere. Although the verdict against her could only be found upon the crimes for which she was indicted in 1692, the inclusion of spectral evidence against Bishop and her subsequent conviction set the stage for the rest of the Salem trials.[16]

During Bishop’s 1692 trial, several witnesses, including Samuel Grey and Ann Putnam, told the court that Bishop’s apparition had appeared to them in the night, causing them physical torment. Reverend John Hale told the court that many of his parishioners had pointed to Bishop as the cause of wickedness among them. A jury of elderly matrons performed a physical examination of Bishop, and found lumpy growths of excess flesh on her body, which they claimed were not natural in women, and which were known to be a sign of demonic possession.[17]

When Bridget Bishop was brought into the courtroom, several of the accusers “fell into fits,” clawed at their own garments, and were rendered speechless. Mary Walcott claimed that her brother had struck at a spectral image of Bishop with a sword, cutting her clothing. Upon examination, a tear in Bishop’s clothing was found that matched Walcott’s description.[18]

Witness John Louder told the Salem jury that after a disagreement with Bishop, an all-black creature that looked like a monkey, with a man’s face and a rooster’s feet, had accosted him. The creature told Louder, according to his testimony, that it was a demon that had come to offer him everything he wanted in the world, if only Louder would accept the creature’s rule. Louder claimed that he shouted at it to drive it away, and after vanishing and reappearing several times, it finally flew away over an apple tree.[19]

Other neighbors had plenty to say about Bishop as well. Mary Warren and Deliverance Hobbs, who had already confessed to witchcraft, swore under oath that Bishop was part of their coven. Warren testified in a deposition on June 1, 1692, that on numerous occasions after April 19 – the date Bishop was imprisoned – that Bishop had appeared to her at night, attempting to coerce her (Warren) to sign her name in the Devil’s book.[20]

John Cooke testified on June 2 that he had seen Bishop cause an apple to fly out of his hand, and straight into his mother’s lap. Immediately afterwards, he claimed, Bishop had walked directly through his mother. Cooke also swore that although others were present, only he had been able to see Bishop.[21]

During her examination, Justice Jonathan Harthorn, asked Bishop what sort of contract she had signed with the Devil, and she responded that she had never signed any contract at all. Later, he continued questioning her, and claimed that an evil spirit must have performed the many actions with which she was charged, acting as her likeness, and with her explicit consent. Bishop rejected the allegations, and emphatically denied being a witch. In fact, she claimed to not even know what a witch was.[22]

The spectral evidence given against Bishop was alarming, and convinced the court that was a witch in league with the Devil. On the strength of this evidence, she was hanged on July 10, 1692. However, this disturbed a number of the local ministers; their concern was not because they doubted the existence of the supernatural, but instead because the spectral evidence forced them to reconsider the power of Satan. If the Devil was as powerful as the evidence suggested, it was time for clergy to recognize he was more powerful than they’d ever given him credit for.[23]

The last of the executions took place in the early fall, when five women and two men were hanged on a single day in September. In November 1692, the Massachusetts colonial legislature met to take on the arduous task of setting up the colony’s brand new judicial system. Among their tasks, they had to determine how to deal with the numerous people in Salem still awaiting trial for witchcraft. Increase Mather, although certainly acknowledging the existence of Satan, also argued that spectral evidence might not be completely reliable, because the Devil could use his tricks to make the blameless appear guilty. However, the legal codes in the Massachusetts colony were part of British law, and a precedent had been set for the use of spectral evidence at trial. In 1662, an English trial in Bury St. Edmunds resulted in the indictment, conviction, and eventual execution of two women. The justice in the Bury St. Edmunds case was none other than Sir Matthew Hale, the Chief Justice for the King’s Bench. Had anyone challenged Hale’s findings, or setting of legal precedence, they would have been challenging the authority of the Crown itself.[24]

Although they passed a new law regarding the practice of witchcraft in December, the legislature also examined some of the Salem cases, and determined that several of the accused had been convicted based upon questionable testimony. Irregularities in many of the examinations compelled the legislature to reconsider whether spectral evidence could be admitted in court. In particular, Increase Mather wrote that the Devil could appear in the shape of someone who was in fact innocent, and that an apparition in the form of such a person was not sufficient proof as to the individual’s guilt. More strict procedural guidelines were put into place, and although spectral evidence was not completely ruled out after 1692, there was also a good deal less emphasis placed upon it.[25]

In 1693, the legislature passed a bill specifically addressing how to deal with the matter of witchcraft in the colony. By the bill’s parameters, witchcraft was defined very broadly as the use of “any Invocation or Conjuration of any evil and wicked Spirit, Or shall consult, covenant with Entertain, Employ, feed or reward any evil and wicked Spirit to or for any intent or purpose; Or take up any dead man woman or Child, out of his, her, or their grave, or any other place where the dead body resteth, or the Skin, bone or any other part of any dead person to be Employed or used in any manner of Witchcraft, Sorcery, Charm or Inchantment, Or shall use, practice or Exercise any Witchcraft, Inchantment charm or Sorcery, whereby any person shall be killed, destroyed, wasted, consumed, pined or lamed in his or her body, or any part thereof.” However, despite these numerous qualifications for what could have constituted witchcraft, the punishment for first-time offenders under the 1693 bill was now to be one year’s imprisonment along with a regular visit to the town pillory. It was only to be upon the second conviction for witchcraft that punishment would be execution.[26]

Ultimately, twenty people lost their lives in Salem that year, and still dozens more were irrevocably changed for the rest of their lives. In 1695, William Phips, who had been governor during the trial, passed away. His replacement, William Stoughton, signed a law offering $600 in reparations to the surviving heirs of each of the accused. Later, a court found that the trials themselves had been conducted unlawfully, and in 1957, all of the accused were posthumously pardoned.

The Salem witch trials were not the first to take place in the North American colonies, but they were certainly the most notable in scope and outcome. While their European cousins were enjoying the age of reason and enlightenment, the Puritan religious outlook, and corresponding view of God and the Devil, led to a willingness to accept religious dogma and spectral evidence as damning in a court of law. The Puritanical view of good, evil, sin, and salvation, was a direct cause of the conviction, sentencing, and eventual execution of Bridget Bishop and nineteen other men and women of Salem.