During the Salem witch trials many women were accused of practicing witchcraft. The accusation of the women who were thought to be witches was the result of many deaths in Salem, Massachusetts. The trials began with two young girls, Elizabeth “Betty” Parris and her cousin Abagail Williams, who began having violent contortions and random outbursts of screaming. The girls were thought to have been under an evil hand or suffering from a witch’s curse. The girls began giving the names of the witches that were harming them beginning with the Parris family slave Tituba. Along with Tituba many others were accused of practicing witchcraft. The witchcraft trials were the reasoning behind many deaths; nineteen hangings, one crushed to death, and seven …show more content…
The women who were accused of practicing witchcraft were given a chance to confess and had their trial presented in front of a jury. These people at the time did not know much about illnesses at the time to explain what exactly was going on with the two young girls. The actions that they took were to keep the devil from coming after them in order to protect themselves. However, there is a stronger argument that the trials were not at all justified. Many believe the trials were not justified simply because innocent people were killed because of the accusations of two young girls. There was never any solid evidence to prove that these women were actually witches or practicing witchcraft. The evidence that was used included dreams and visions which cannot be established as hard evidence. The only ones who could validate the evidence of these visions were the ones that were afflicted; there were no true witnesses throughout the trials. No one could prove that the women who were accused were the ones afflicting the two young girls. This however goes back to an earlier point that in the 1600s there was not much knowledge on mental illnesses such as the ones
As we suspected, the majority of female defendants were accused of inflicting their sorceries on only female victims. Out of twenty cases (the gender of the victims was unclear in one of our selected cases, so the population is reduced for this figure), nine female defendants had only female victims. Five were accused of attacking only men, and the other six were accused of affecting members of both gender. Because there were so few values for this particular variable, we did not find it relevant to graph or chart this information. We did, however, feel it necessary to create a frequency chart for this set of data, as it directly addresses one of our hypotheses.
Sarah Goode and Sarah Osborne were the other two girls they were the first three girls in Salem to be accused of witchcraft. Many people were accused mostly middle-aged women and some men but even a four-year-old boy was. In March some girls in the village accused Martha Corey. Martha Corey was different from the rest of the others that were accused she was upstanding in the puritan congregation which meant that the devil could reach to the core of the village which scared many people. During fall of March many were examined and sentenced with death.
In the May of 1692, Increase Mather returned to New England with Sir William Phipps. By the time of their arrival, the witch trials were already taking place, having started a few months prior in February. As the witch hunt in Salem escalated, the prison cells started to fill up with individuals accused of witchcraft. The confusing political situation following the ascension on William and Mary and the new charter allowed for a court Oyer and Terminer to be put in place on the 27th of May 1692. The lieutenant governor, William Stoughton, became the chief magistrate for this newly appointed court.
Though it seems that the defendants and accusers were only young girls and women, there were some men involved in the trials. One of these men that were involved was Samuel Wardwell. He confessed in doing witchcraft soon after he was arrested. He then claimed that his confession was fake and should die of perjury. His confession could have been to protect himself or out of fear.
The Innocence of People During The Salem Witch Trials why did so many people during the colonial era devote their time to witchcraft? where they falsely accused or did they actually make a deal with a devil? The people that had to die or suffer were either witches or innocent peopIle. The colonial people back in 1692 were unaccepting of differences in people; therefore, they killed anyone they believed practiced witchcraft whether it was true or not. Court Trials
In the Summer months of 1692, twenty-four innocent alleged witches and wizards had been hung, pressed to death, or died in jail in Salem, Massachusetts. However, what caused the mass hysteria known as the Salem Witch Trials? Puritans based their life strictly on religion and the Bible in which they had no free time, education, and felt pressured just to be alive; the citizens were fearful of their future, causing their religion to overpower scientific and mathematical reasoning. In June 1692, two young Salem girls, Betty Parris and Abigail Williams, accused slave woman Tituba and two other white women of practicing witchcraft after Betty and Abigail began to exhibit strange behavior. Tituba confessed to practicing witchcraft and exclaimed that
Three Puritan girls who lived in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 began to act strange; they would cry out in pain, start screaming, and stop speaking for a long time. Doctors could not find out what was wrong with them and jumped to the conclusion that the cause was supernatural. The Puritan girls accused three other women of witchcraft, but only one of them confessed. The only one to come forward and admit to witchcraft was a slave named Tituba. Tituba stated that the Devil came to her and made her write in his book.
The Salem witch trials were a big event in American history, but no one knows for sure why they started. The people at the time could have been very tense and paranoid because of the weather, indian attacks, and because of the war that had occurred prior. The girls that started the accusations could have been sick from a disease or infection that causes tremors, hallucinations, and paranoia. At the same time, the girls in that time period were very repressed. Children, especially, were treated strictly at this time.
While the witch trials were said to get rid of witches, who were bewitching people and ruining lives, it was unfair and cruel because they killed 19 innocent men, women, and children, 144 people were thrown in jail under harsh
Many executions were performed during this time and most of the executions were performed on innocent people who were just accused of being a witch and were not actually proven to be witches. The girls were executed because they failed the tests to prove that they are not witches there are many cases of witchcraft such as the case of mary cotton where becaused she may have wanted the attention or simply believed she was a witch that she thought the devil came to town and was attempting to try to curse all of the townspeople. she also seemed to believe that "the devil was going to blow up and bring down all the churches in the county" and make all of the people become possessed and plunge the world into a fiery like
Many people are the victim of the witchcraft trials by the court of law. For example, “The Salem witch trials occurred in colonial Massachusetts between 1692 and 1693. More than 200 people were accused of practicing witchcraft — the Devil's magic — and 20 were executed” (Blumberg). Many people died without evidence but they could not
Salem, Massachusetts, USA and occurred between February 1692 and May 1693. Over 150 people were arrested and imprisoned and even more accused; but not pursued by the authorities. 29 were convicted of witchcraft but only 19 were hanged. The best known trials were in the Court of Oyer and Terminer.
The Salem witch trial hysteria of 1692 may have been instigated by religious, social, geographic and even biological factors. During these trials, 134 people were condemned as witches and 19 were hanged. These statistics also include 5 more deaths that occurred prior to their execution date. It is interesting to look into the causes of this stain on American History, when as shown in document B, eight citizens were hanged in only one day.
One cause of the witch trial hysteria was the story of Betty Parris and Abigail Williams, the two were cousins, they decided to visit a fortune teller. This occurred on February 29, 1692, shortly after receiving their fortunes Parris’s father, who was a priest, began to notice that his daughter was acting strange, he eventually found out about the session with the teller and was
Not many people know much about what actually happened in the Salem Witch Trials. Maybe someone would think that it was just about witchcraft and crazy people being hanged, but it is a lot more than that. The Salem Witch Trials only occurred between 1692 and 1693, but a lot of damage had been done. The idea of the Salem Witch Trials came from Europe during the “witchcraft craze” from the 1300s-1600s. In Europe, many of the accused witches were executed by hanging.