The Witches: Salem, 1692 Part 1

The Witches.

Salem, 1692.

Stacy Schiff.

For Wendy Belzberg.

Cast of Characters.

IN AND AROUND THE PARSONAGE.

BAYLEY, JAMES, Salem village's first minister, 1673 to 1679. Thomas Putnam's brother-in-law; writhing, yelping Ann Putnam Jr.'s uncle.

BURROUGHS, GEORGE, forty-two, Bayley's beguiling, independent-minded successor in the village pulpit, 1679 to 1683. Departs abruptly; in 1692 a minister on the Maine frontier. Father of seven; combative and controlling.

LAWSON, DEODAT, Burroughs's mannerly, smooth-talking successor, village minister from 1684 to 1688.

PARRIS, SAMUEL, thirty-nine, the beleaguered clergyman at the center of the diabolical invasion. Father and uncle of the first bewitched girls; master of the first confessed witch; in the Salem pulpit from 1688 to 1696. Avid, unyielding, tactless.

The Parris family: ABIGAIL WILLIAMS, eleven, a fair-haired niece who interrupts sermons and catapults herself, barking, across rooms. BETTY PARRIS, nine, the sole Parris child to suffer symptoms of enchantment; never attends a trial. TWO ADDITIONAL CHILDREN, a ten-year-old son and a four-year-old daughter; unafflicted and lost to history. t.i.tUBA, a kindly longtime Indian slave, the first to glimpse a diabolical pact and report a flight through the air. JOHN INDIAN, another slave, repeatedly bewitched. Understood to be t.i.tuba's husband. ELIZABETH, the minister's Boston-born wife. About forty-four, afflicted late in the summer.

SOME OTHER SALEM VILLAGERS.

CHEEVER, EZEKIEL, thirty-seven, tailor and farmer, sometime court reporter and accuser.

GRIGGS, WILLIAM, seventy-one, doctor and village newcomer, a Putnam intimate.

HUTCHINSON, BENJAMIN, early twenties, adopted son of tavern owner Nathaniel Ingersoll. Valiantly, blindly impales specters on his pitchfork and rapier.

INGERSOLL, HANNAH, about sixty, the tavern owner's wife and a parsonage neighbor.

INGERSOLL, NATHANIEL, sixty, militia lieutenant, early village deacon, owner of the tavern in which accusations, hearings, judicial conferences, spectral stabbings, and much speculation takes place. A Putnam and Parris confidant.

NURSE, FRANCIS, seventy-four. Worldly-wise, steadfast husband of accused witch Rebecca Nurse. Displeased with his minister well before the crisis.

POPE, BATHSHUA, forty, a bewitched, sermon-interrupting matron. Lobs a shoe at a defendant; levitates in court.

PUTNAM, THOMAS, forty-year-old militia sergeant and veteran of King Philip's War. Court recorder, parish clerk, stout Parris supporter. Lives with four witchcraft victims; presses first charges and initiates nearly half the rest.

PUTNAM, EDWARD, thirty-eight, Thomas's younger brother, a church deacon. Cosigns first witchcraft accusations.

SIBLEY, MARY, a pregnant, concerned thirty-two-year-old parsonage neighbor. Suggests and supervises witch-cake baking in the Parris household.

WALCOTT, JONATHAN, fifty-three. A village militia captain and Putnam brother-in-law; Mary's father.

THE CORE ACCUSERS.

BIBBER, SARAH, a quarrelsome, meddlesome thirty-six-year-old village matron. Stabbed by pins in the courtroom.

CHURCHILL, SARAH, about twenty, a refugee and servant in the Jacobs household. Tries unsuccessfully to recant. Distantly related to Mary Walcott.

HOBBS, ABIGAIL, a headstrong, unruly Topsfield fourteen-year-old, earlier a servant in Maine. Second to confess to witchcraft; an accuser thereafter. Sends both parents to prison.

HUBBARD, ELIZABETH, sixteen, an orphan and a servant in the household of her uncle, Dr. Griggs. Among the five most frequent accusers.

LEWIS, MERCY, nineteen; a two-time refugee and orphan. Previously a Burroughs servant in Maine; in 1692 a Putnam servant in Salem. Reliably identifies invisible attackers and offers most detailed testimony; known as a "visionary girl."

PUTNAM, ANN, Jr., twelve, the eldest of six siblings. Can predict events and recall others that predate her birth. Sole accuser living at home with two parents.

PUTNAM, ANN, Sr., Ann Jr.'s pregnant, pious mother, about thirty. Incapacitated by ghosts and witches. Entranced; at one juncture carried bodily from the courtroom.

SHELDEN, SUSANNAH, an eighteen-year-old, two-time Maine refugee. Witnessed Indian atrocities; recently buried her father. Tends to reveal murders.

WALCOTT, MARY, sixteen, daughter of a village militia captain, living with her Putnam cousins. Also an Ingersoll niece. Charges at least seventy with witchcraft, far more than any other accuser.

WARREN, MARY, twenty, an orphaned refugee and a servant in the Procter household. Afflicted, accused, then afflicted. Strikingly pretty; endures b.l.o.o.d.y, extreme courtroom tortures.

SOME OF THE ACCUSED.

ALDEN, JOHN, midsixties. Shrewd Boston-based fur trader, militia officer, sea captain. Longtime a.s.sociate of Salem merchant Bartholomew Gedney; Willard paris.h.i.+oner; Samuel Sewall friend and neighbor.

BARKER, WILLIAM, forty-six, a silver-tongued farmer in debt.

BISHOP, BRIDGET, a Salem town widow in her early fifties; belligerent, provocative, brash. Confused at trial with Salem village's Sarah Bishop.

CARRIER, MARTHA, an abrasive mother of five in her late thirties; well before 1692 seemed a likely candidate for "queen of h.e.l.l." Scoffs that the afflicted are "out of their wits." First arrested Andover witch.

CARRIER, RICHARD, eighteen, and ANDREW, sixteen. Martha's strapping sons, both tortured, after which Richard names more diabolical confederates than any other confessor.

CARY, ELIZABETH, early forties. Wife of a feisty Charlestown s.h.i.+pbuilder. Sails to Salem to clear her name; leaves in chains.

CLOYCE, SARAH, forty-four. Rebecca Nurse's much younger, ill-starred sister. A village church member; a Dane relative by her first marriage.

COLSON, ELIZABETH, gutsy Reading sixteen-year-old; only teenager to elude arrest, if temporarily.

COREY, GILES, a fearless, pugnacious farmer in his seventies. Initially accuses his wife; ultimately defies the court.

COREY, MARTHA, sixties, Giles's third wife. Straight-spined, stubborn, dogmatic. Makes the tour of Ma.s.sachusetts prisons.

ENGLISH, PHILIP, forty-two, born Philippe l'Anglois, outspoken, sharp-elbowed Jersey native. Immensely successful immigrant entrepreneur; Salem town's richest merchant and a newly elected selectman.

ENGLISH, MARY, about forty, his wife. Daughter of a prominent Salem merchant and of a woman earlier accused of witchcraft. Escapes with her husband.

ESTY, MARY, fifty-eight, kindhearted Topsfield mother of seven, youngest of the three Towne sisters. Charms even her jailers.

FOSTER, ANN, a quiet widow in her seventies. Mother of a murdered twenty-two-year-old; mother-in-law of an executed murderer. Picks up on early hints of flight and connects them to diabolical Sabbaths.

GOOD, SARAH, thirty-eight, local beggar woman, sullen, combative, unkempt. The first to be interrogated on suspicion of witchcraft; mother of an accused five-year-old.

h.o.a.r, DORCAS, a mischief-making, fortune-telling fifty-eight-year-old widow with a gift for petty larceny. Singular-looking; easily frightens children.

HOW, ELIZABETH, early fifties, dutiful wife to a blind Topsfield farmer; a Dane, Carrier, and Nurse relative. Long suspected of witchcraft.

JACOBS, GEORGE, a jaunty, convivial, illiterate, elderly farmer.

JACOBS, MARGARET, seventeen, his articulate, soulful granddaughter. Confesses, recants, sobs mightily in Salem's dungeon.

LACEY, MARY, Jr., eighteen, a self-described disobedient daughter. Highly voluble, with a theatrical bent.

LACEY, MARY, Sr., forty, Mary Lacey Jr.'s mother and Ann Foster's daughter.

MARTIN, SUSANNAH, seventy-one, diminutive Amesbury widow, steely, self-possessed. Accused and cleared of witchcraft charges in 1669.

NURSE, REBECCA, seventy-one, a nearly deaf, sickly, sensitive great-grandmother. Presents the court with its greatest challenge.

OSBORNE, SARAH, about fifty, frail, among the first three suspects. Embroiled in a long-standing dispute with her Putnam in-laws.

PROCTER, ELIZABETH, forty-one, pregnant mother of five and stepmother to six. Temperamental, fond of reading. Granddaughter of a 1669 witch suspect.

PROCTER, JOHN, her older, outspoken husband, a bluff sixty-year-old farmer and tavern keeper. Swears the afflicted should hang. First 1692 man accused of witchcraft.

TOOTHAKER, MARY, forty-four, Billerica widow of an accused wizard. Ruminative, candid, petrified. Martha Carrier's sister; a niece of Reverend Dane.

WARDWELL, SAMUEL, forty-nine. A f.e.c.kless fortune-teller and carpenter, at the bottom of the Andover tax lists. Colorfully confesses; later recants. Father of seven.

WILDS, SARAH, a hay-enchanting Topsfield carpenter's wife in her midsixties. Also accused sixteen years earlier; mother of the town constable.

WILLARD, JOHN, about thirty, village deputy constable, former Putnam farmhand. An abusive husband, reviled by his in-laws.

THE AUTHORITIES.

BRADSTREET, DUDLEY, the forty-four-year-old son of the colony's previous governor. Leading Andover citizen; justice of the peace; selectman, 1692 council member. Orders a slew of witchcraft arrests; flees when accused.

CORWIN, GEORGE, twenty-six, opportunistic high sheriff of Ess.e.x County. Nephew of two witchcraft justices and son-in-law of a third.

CORWIN, JONATHAN, fifty-two, town merchant and liquor retailer. Longtime Hathorne confederate and experienced justice of the peace; a fixture at the hearings. Related by marriage to Winthrop, Hathorne, and Sergeant.

DANFORTH, THOMAS, sixty-nine-year-old Charlestown landowner. Reversed a guilty verdict in an earlier witchcraft case; conducts first 1692 examination of wizards. Elicits initial report of witches' meeting; ultimately opposes trials.

GEDNEY, BARTHOLOMEW, fifty-two. Risk-taking sawmill owner and entrepreneur; a respected town physician, magistrate, militia major. A Corwin relative.

HATHORNE, JOHN, fifty-one, a high-handed, intimidating, prosperous local magistrate. Hails from one of Salem town's first families; a Putnam relative.

HERRICK, GEORGE, well-born, handsome Salem deputy sheriff in his thirties, an upholsterer by trade. Spends 1692 rounding up and transporting witches.

HIGGINSON, JOHN, Jr., forty-six, Reverend Higginson's eldest son, a militia officer, engaged in the fis.h.i.+ng business. Newly appointed justice of the peace; a witch examiner.

PHIPS, Sir WILLIAM, forty-one, unschooled, enterprising, bl.u.s.tery sea captain and adventurer; newly appointed Ma.s.sachusetts governor.

RICHARDS, JOHN, at sixty-seven, eldest member of the court. Related to three colleagues; applies for judicial direction. Boston merchant, Harvard College treasurer, leading Mather patron.

SALTONSTALL, NATHANIEL, fifty-three, a short-lived member of the court. Thought "the most popular and well principled" of Ma.s.sachusetts military officers.

SERGEANT, PETER, a fabulously wealthy forty-five-year-old Boston merchant and witchcraft justice. Loaned Ma.s.sachusetts funds; owner of a palatial home. A Samuel Sewall business partner.

SEWALL, SAMUEL, a round Bostonian of forty, genial, sensitive, sophisticated, devout. Youngest member of the court and its clerk's brother.

SEWALL, STEPHEN, thirty-five-year-old court clerk and keeper of its papers. Salem town merchant and military officer; takes in bewitched Betty Parris.

STOUGHTON, WILLIAM, chief justice of the Court of Oyer and Terminer. A large, starched, small-eyed sixty-year-old. Highly discerning; expertly versed in theology; New England's most trusted judicial authority. A land speculator and lifelong bachelor.

WINTHROP, WAIT STILL, fifty-one, grandson of John Winthrop, Bay Colony founder. A major general and an influential landholder; apolitical, fas.h.i.+on-conscious, a reluctant public servant. Close to Samuel Sewall; a Mather intimate.