Examples Of What Really Happened In Salem

Michelle Staskauskas

Ms. Scott

Honors US History-HIS 103

6 September 2016

What Really Happened in Salem?

Thesis:

There have been many stressors leading up to the Salem witch trials. There have been The little ice age, the smallpox epidemic and the Indian attacks on the border of Massachusetts at Billerica (Doc 1). For being religious as the puritans are they would often see these bad events as attributes of God’s wrath. In the 1690’s King’s Philips War led to the puritans believing in his being another punishment from God. It was easy for them to believe that the devil was close at hand with the Indian war near them (Linder 1). In the document “The witches of Salem Village” states that “the devil has given up its familiar disguise and he

Also, the Puritans coming to the Americans land created a society of unique culture and distinct ___in the New England colonies.They were strictly a theocracy for the majority of the time they settled there.They believed the church controlled all civil matters including punishment for violations of a spiritual nature” (Scott 1) The combination of a theocracy and the puritans belief in the “existence of an invisible inhabited by God and the angels, including the Devil” did not mix well together(Scott 1). It created a widespread hysteria which led for them creating injusticely trials. If the church believes in witches they can blame anyone and do whatever to them since they are in control the community and people would not against them. Often those who were not religious enough or did not go to church every week were accused because of this theocracy (Linder 2) A priest of Samuel Parris was invited to Salem as the village minister and preached that “Our Lord Jesus Christ knows how many Devils there are in his Church, and who they are” (Doc 7) Now that priest are stating that there are witches among their community and

The most infamous trials were held in Court of Oyers and Terminer. They were a series of hearing and persecutions for the act of witchcraft. Evidence were from gossip, stories and unsupported assertions that if a person who scoffed at the accusation or denied they were a witch became targets themself. (Linder 3)A serperating of accusers and accusing were often over land disputes. Puritans coming over to the Americans had minimum land and with increasing family size this often fueled disputes between neighbors where there economy was based off agriculture(Scott 1). Generally, the more wealth you had the higher chances of you being accused. The accusing families often wanted more land and would gan property through accuring others of witchcraft. Another major division occurred between men and women. Women has always been suppressed in many countries throughout history, this is the same in the patriachial society of the Puritans. By nature they thought that women would more likely follow through the Devils serivce (Scott 1). Which explains why people who were witches were often women who were accused (Doc 13). One of the first accusers were Tituba who is said to tell young girls of voodoos, omens, and witchcraft. More likely then not, Tituba confuessed she was a witch in trial in order to save herself but instead it create more of a reason to hunt for witches. In her confession she