Ann Putnam fell onto the floor, doubled up and screaming for help.

  Before anyone could come to Ann’s assistance, the whole group of afflicted children were screaming and rolling on the floor and dashing themselves blindly against the benches and walls.

  “She is pulling my arm,” Ann Putnam was yelling, “pulling my arm and biting me because I told on her!”

  At last the minister was able to raise his voice above the noise. “Turn her away!” he shouted to the constables who waited helplessly near Sarah Goode. “Turn her eyes away so that she cannot look upon them.”

  Copyright © 1956 by Shirley Jackson. Copyright renewed 1984 by Barry Hyman, Sarah Elias, Joanne Schnurer, and Laurence Hyman. Cover art courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Mass. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

  www.randomhouse.com/teens

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Jackson, Shirley, 1914–1965. The witchcraft of Salem village. SUMMARY: Describes the social and religious conditions surrounding the Salem witch hunts, the extensive trials and executions, and the aftermath of the hysteria. 1. Witchcraft—Massachusetts—Salem—Juvenile literature. 2. Salem (Mass.) History—Juvenile literature.

  [1. Witchcraft—Massachusetts—Salem. 2. Trials (Witchcraft)—Massachusetts—Salem. 3. Salem (Mass.)—History.] I. Title. BF1576.J3 1987 974.4’502 87-4543

  eISBN: 978-0-307-77988-5

  RANDOM HOUSE and colophon and LANDMARK BOOKS and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  v3.1

  For my son Barry

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Note

  1. The Uneasiness of Salem Village

  2. The Devil Comes Closer

  3. A Black Man from Boston

  4. Great Noises by the Afflicted

  5. The Road to Gallows Hill

  6. The Devil Departs

  AFTERWORD

  NOTE

  Salem, Massachusetts, and Salem Village, Massachusetts, were two separate places in 1692. Although only a few miles apart, they differed a good deal. Salem, where the witchcraft trials were held, was a large town, busy and active. Salem Village was a small community, self-centered and frequently almost isolated in the winter, although one of the main highways of Massachusetts ran, and still runs, past the site of Ingersoll’s inn. The witchcraft cases began in Salem Village, although Salem has had to accept full responsibility. Salem Village no longer exists. Even the ghosts of George Burroughs’s two wives would have trouble finding it today.

  Goodwife, shortened to Goody, and Goodman were the usual forms of address during this period.

  Shirley Jackson

  1

  THE

  UNEASINESS OF

  SALEM VILLAGE

  Building a new life in a wilderness is a job for strong and heroic people. The Puritans of the Massachusetts colony had to surmount unbelievable difficulties in order to stay alive. Their first years, of course, were spent in setting up houses and clearing enough ground to plant crops.

  In order to clear a space of land for farming it was necessary to plan for years ahead, and the work required a strong back and a strong faith. The trees were cut down by hand with an axe in such a manner that they would all fall inward upon one another. This was done early in the spring. The trees lay where they had fallen all summer, so that they would dry out, and in the fall they were burned. The result was a burned-over patch of land, filled with stumps and charred embers. When the embers were carted away, a crop of sorts—usually barley or corn—could be planted between the stumps, and the area used for grain for several years. Then, when the stumps were enough decayed to be drawn out by oxen and chains, the rocks must be removed. Thus, after several years, the land was ready for farming. It could be plowed and a real field of grain planted.

  The Indians were a constant danger, and a man working alone in a field was easy prey for them. It was necessary for the farmers to keep weapons by them always. There had been killings by Indians around many of the small villages nearly every year, and as late as 1691 it had been necessary for the county of Essex to establish a corps of twenty-four scouts for protection.

  Although it was part of the Puritan plan for each man to have a voice in government through his standing in the church, all did not prosper equally. Some were natural leaders and gradually acquired more land and consequently more influence. Some were, unfortunately, lazy. At a Salem town meeting in 1644 it was ordered that two people be appointed every Sunday to walk about the town and take note of those backsliders who did not attend church services, or who “lye at home or in the fields without giving good account thereof.” In addition, these patrols were to watch out for Indian attacks and fires.

  Travel was, naturally, a hazardous and unpopular activity. Roads were not so necessary as houses and food, and the original custom was to blaze trees to show a track from one farm to another. As these tracks became paths, the underbrush was gradually cleared from them until they became wide enough to permit a horse and rider to pass. After enough traffic the path became hardened and widened until it might almost have been called a road.

  Boston was the most important settlement in the colony. By 1690 it was a busy city, the center of government and education. Its people tended to be broader in their views than those in the smaller villages, although their religious discipline was almost as severe. In the smaller places, however, the church was the meeting house, the center of all village activity. In Boston there were government houses, Harvard College, shops, and taverns. People in Boston did not have to gather in the meeting house on Sunday to hear all the news, as people did in Salem Village.

  By the late seventeenth century the people of the Massachusetts colony—especially in Boston—had already shown strong tendencies toward independence. Because they were so far away from England and the English government, they grew impatient with English ways. The English Book of Common Prayer had been outlawed in the Puritan church, and banishment or death was the punishment for difference of opinion over religion. Massachusetts required its officials to take an oath of allegiance to Massachusetts, but no longer were they required to take an oath of allegiance to the English government. The colony coined its own money, and arbitrated its own disputes.

  In an effort to stamp out this growing feeling of independence, a new English governor named Sir Edmund Andros was sent to Massachusetts in 1686. He tried to enforce the English laws. He levied new taxes and declared that many land titles determined by the colonists were invalid, or at least doubtful until they had been confirmed in England.

  When the colonists realized that their right to the land they had farmed and cleared was going to be questioned, they rebelled and put Andros into prison, where he was kept for several months until he was sent back to England. As a result, their charter as a colony was revoked, and it was necessary for Massachusetts to send some of its most important men to England in an attempt to get a new charter and establish land rights.

  By the year 1692, the whole Massachusetts colony was disturbed and uneasy. In addition to the revoked charter, a calamity which affected every resident of the colony, there were rumors of war with France. The Indians still represented an immediate danger. Taxes were almost unbearably heavy, and attacks by pirates had damaged the growing commercial traffic of the colony.

  In addition, the clergy were crying out against heresies and the inroads the devil had made among the people. Cotton Mather, in particular, was playing an important part in making the question of witchcraft a vital issue. Mather, a popular, passionate preacher in Boston, felt that his own war with the devil was being carried on constantly, and that the devil had marked him as a particularly desirable prey.

  Cotton Mather was called in to wrestle with the devil in several cases of possession, when the devil spoke through a human body which he had entered. Mather and the possessing demons had bitter and furious quarrels, but Mather was usually victorious. He published accounts of some of his battles with the devil, citing the devil’s own words and his threats against godly people, and these publications were widely circulated. People regarded Mather as a hero for doing battle personally with the devil.

  In Salem Village the winter of 1692 was hard and all news brought along the dangerous lonely road from Boston was discouraging. In addition, Salem Village had its own troubles. Quarrels among its people were frequent, and there were even family feuds which had been carried on for two or three generations. Moreover, the village was getting a reputation for mistreatment of its ministers.

  One minister had left the town because he was involved in constant bickering. Another minister had been almost starved out when the parishioners refused to pay the money and goods owed him. And now Samuel Parris, the only minister the people had been able to find to take their church, was supported by only half the town. The other half, although they came to church, made a point of disagreeing with the minister on all town issues. Some of the residents of Salem Village who lived close enough to other towns changed their church affiliations to the churches in those towns. Samuel Parris made efforts to reconcile the different groups in the village, but without much success. He was not a very tactful or generous man. Before he accepted the positio
n of minister, he had insisted that the people of the town guarantee his payments. He had, in addition, asked for more than the other ministers had received.

  Life in Salem Village was not easy at the best of times. Gaiety and merrymaking were regarded as irreligious, and the people of the village were somber and severe. Their lives were spent in hard work and religious observance. Even their relaxation was associated with the meeting house. On the Sabbath there was a long service in the morning, and another in the afternoon. Village residents who came from outlying farms were not able to get home between the services, and it gradually became a regular practice for the time between the services to be spent in visiting and conversation. This was the time when gossip and news were spread from one to another.

  Occasionally there was a simple celebration held in the village. There were sometimes boating parties and even a hayride for the young people. Dancing was not permitted, but people enjoyed visiting one another and singing together, although of course their choice of songs was limited. They could not sing anything frivolous or any song (like so many of the songs they had left behind in England) which praised earthly love or mocked at any sacred institution.

  Although many of the original settlers had been educated people, the education which the children received in Salem Village was not very thorough. It was believed that so long as the children were taught correct religious doctrine they would grow up to be good citizens. Their teaching, of course, was from the Bible, and the children were told over and over again that only the greatest piety would save them from eternal damnation.

  The Puritans did not celebrate Christmas or Easter, because they felt that these holidays derived from pagan ideas and were not truly religious. The occasional holidays from school were given for a practical purpose, such as getting in the harvest. Any little girl who was caught making or playing with a doll would have been punished and taken to Mr. Parris for a long, serious talking-to. The Puritans thought that toys were in general frivolous and time-wasting, and that dolls in particular were harmful. Witches were supposed to use dolls and small copies of people to work magic.

  Twice a week, on Sunday and on Wednesday, the children accompanied their parents to the meeting house. There they sat on hard benches and listened to Mr. Parris’s three-hour sermons, which always warned them of the extreme caution they must use against temptation. Of course, Mr. Parris knew the names of everyone in the village, and any child who wriggled, or fell asleep, or showed signs of impatience, was sure of encountering Mr. Parris’s displeasure.

  Mr. Parris had not had any experience with witchcraft in Salem Village, although there had been rumors of witches in nearby towns. One neighboring minister had dealt with a case of witchcraft simply by sending both accused and accuser back home, with instructions to behave themselves. But many people felt that this was too lenient. Had not Cotton Mather told them of the joy among the demons whenever a Puritan succumbed to temptation? Some people whispered that when a minister was that gentle with the devil, it might mean that his secret feelings were much too sympathetic toward the forces of evil. Clergymen, they said, had been known to be witches before. Much of this gossip died away naturally, but people did not forget the incident.

  Moreover, this incident demonstrated an attitude toward witchcraft which has contributed enormously to every witchcraft epidemic in history. Anyone who defended or sympathized with or said a good word for a witch was automatically suspected. It was felt that no one would help a witch without a good reason, and the reason could only be that the suspect’s defender was also in league with the devil. It is this attitude which makes it so difficult for intelligent and thoughtful people to stop a great popular hatred like the hatred toward the witches.

  2

  THE DEVIL

  COMES CLOSER

  In Salem Village in the early days of the year 1692, people were gossiping about the charter, about the Indians, and about the scarlet bodice that Bridget Bishop had made for herself. Everyone thought that Mr. Parris should be chided for permitting his West Indian slave to wear a colored turban, but no one seemed to be paying much attention to what the younger girls of the village were doing.

  A group of girls, ranging in age from nine to nineteen, had formed an informal club. Nearly every day they would gather in the big cheerful kitchen of Mr. Parris’s house to talk to Tituba, the West Indian slave who wore the bright turban. If any of their elders noticed this, or cared, it must have seemed to them that the girls could get into very little trouble in the home of the minister of the town. They were quiet and seemed well behaved, and perhaps the elders thought that Tituba was instructing them in the various duties of housework and cooking.

  Little Elizabeth Parris was the youngest, and the older girls disliked having her tagging along. She was only nine years old, and her cousin Abigail Williams, who lived in the Parris house, was eleven. Abigail’s closest friend in the village was Ann Putnam, who was twelve. Although Ann was always very polite and sweet when grownups were around, she could be very rude and cruel to other children. Elizabeth Parris, and even some of the older girls, were afraid of her. Mary Walcott, for instance, seemed to copy whatever Ann did, even though Mary was five years older. And Elizabeth Hubbard and Elizabeth Booth and Susannah Sheldon, who were all seventeen and eighteen years old, let Ann order them around just as she pleased. The only one who ever stood up to Ann was Mercy Lewis, and even she never dared quarrel openly with Ann.

  All of these girls spent as much time as possible in the Parris kitchen. Sometimes the older ones even sneaked in for a few minutes when they were supposed to be running an errand or finishing up their work at home. Several of the older girls worked as servants in village homes, and of course it was even more difficult for them to come. But somehow they all managed to spend a good deal of time in the Parris kitchen with Tituba.

  Mostly, Tituba told them stories. Although she had been brought up in the Spanish West Indies in what the Puritans considered a heathen voodoo faith, Tituba had been converted to Christianity, and was now as sincere a churchgoer as any of the rest of the villagers. Somehow, though, when Tituba told the girls about Adam in the Garden of Eden, or Noah and the ark, the stories sounded different, more interesting than when Mr. Parris told them from the pulpit. Tituba did not want to do these girls any harm, but she could not forget the magic and superstition she had known in her youth, and slowly the girls began to learn more about magic than they did about Noah.

  Then the girls began to realize that what they were listening to was wrong by all the teachings of their church. Several of them, particularly little Elizabeth Parris, even felt that they could be punished, although she probably could not have explained why she felt that she was doing what her father would have called sinning. The other girls told Elizabeth that she was silly to worry about sin when all she did was let Tituba tell her fortune from the lines in her palm. Anyway, they pointed out, it was done, and nothing could change it now.

  Ann Putnam made it very clear to little Elizabeth that the other girls had no desire to get into trouble just because Elizabeth was acting like a baby. And, she warned, if Elizabeth told her father or anyone else, they would see that she regretted it for the rest of her life. Ann shook her fist in Elizabeth’s face, and scowled at her horribly, and said she would do something terrible to Elizabeth if she said one single word. Elizabeth was too frightened to speak, but night after night she lay in her bed awake, wondering if she had condemned herself to eternal damnation when she let Tituba read her palm.

  The other girls were excited by these forbidden games, and if they felt any fear of eternal damnation, they kept it to themselves after what had happened to Elizabeth. None of them dared to defy Ann Putnam. Besides, Tituba knew charms for catching a young man’s fancy, and making hair curl, and she could tell the real meaning of dreams. The winter months were long and gloomy, and Tituba herself loved to remember the warm days of her youth, and try to forget the snow and cold wind outside. The girls went through their dreary tasks more cheerfully, thinking about the exciting fortunes Tituba had promised lay ahead for them. One of them was going to travel, another was going to have three husbands, another was going to marry a rich man, perhaps from as far away as Boston.