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| A witch with her familiars |
Seventeenth-century
folk believed strongly in divine forces beyond their understanding. Though we now
understand earthquakes, lightning, hurricanes, and birth defects to be natural
occurrences, those phenomena were thought to be created – and aimed at humans –
by both God and Satan. Witchcraft was another force believed to be very real,
especially by New England’s Puritans.
The
first accusation of witchcraft in New England occurred in 1638, eight years
after the settlement of Massachusetts. Several months before April 4, 1638,
Mary Dyer of Boston bore a deformed child. The stillborn infant was secretly
buried, but when word leaked out, it was exhumed. Governor John Winthrop
recorded the investigation of this ‘supernatural’ birth in his journal [All of
Winthrop’s accounts are edited here]:
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| Midwives |
The wife of one
William Dyer had been delivered of child some few months before, October 17,
and the child buried, (being stillborn,) and viewed by none but Mrs. Hutchinson
and the midwife, one Hawkins's wife … The midwife, after this discovery, went
out of the jurisdiction; and indeed it was time for her to be gone, for it was
known that she used to give young women oil of mandrakes and other stuff to
cause conception; and she grew into great suspicion to be a witch, for it was
credibly reported, that, when she gave any medicines, she would tell the
patient if she did believe, [Hawkins] could help her.
This
was the first suspicion of witchcraft recorded in New England. Jane Hawkins
sensibly fled to Portsmouth, Rhode Island. If there was ever an accusation of
witchcraft within Rhode Island, it was not given enough credence to enter the
colonial record. Rhode Island’s Puritan
neighbors could not say the same.
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| MA governor John Winthrop |
In
summer 1640, Winthrop mused about a second woman skilled in midwifery. Anne
Hutchinson once dwelt in Boston, but when she began interpreting Scripture to a
large party of followers she was purged, along with any adherents who would not
recant. Much of Anne’s party settled Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Puritans
suspected that Anne Hutchinson used witchcraft to sway others to her beliefs,
and Winthrop’s voiced his thoughts in his journal:
Mr. Collins, a young
scholar full of zeal, and one Mr. Hales (a young man very well conceited of
himself and censorious of others) went to Aquiday [Rhode Island], and so soon as Hales came acquainted with
Mrs. Hutchinson, he became her disciple. These [influences], and others when [Hutchinson] dwelt in Boston, gave suspicion of
witchcraft.
June
4, 1648: This time Winthrop, who still governed over Massachusetts, elaborated
on a woman who was executed for witchcraft in his own colony: At this court one Margaret Jones of
Charlestown was indicted and found guilty of witchcraft, and hanged for it. The
evidence against her was:
1. She was found to have such a malignant
touch, as many men, women, and children whom she stroked or touched with any
affection or displeasure were taken with deafness, or vomiting, or other
violent pains or sickness.
2. Her medicines being such things as were
harmless, as aniseed, liquors, etc., yet had extraordinary violent effects.
3. She would tell
such as would not make use of her medicine that they would never be healed, and
accordingly their diseases and hurts continued, with relapse against the
ordinary course, and beyond the apprehension of all physicians and surgeons.
4. Some things which she foretold came to
pass; other things she could tell of (as secret speeches, etc.) which she had
no ordinary means to come to the knowledge of.
5. She had an
apparent teat in her secret parts as fresh as if it had been newly sucked.
After it had been seen upon a forced search it was withered, and another began
on the opposite side.
6. In the prison
there was seen in her arms, she sitting on the floor, and her clothes up, etc.,
a little child, which ran from her into another room, and the officer following
it, it vanished. The like child was seen in two other places, and one maid that
saw it fell sick and was cured by the said Margaret.
Her behavior at her
trial was very intemperate, lying notoriously and railing upon the jury and
witnesses, and in the like distemper she died. The same day and hour she was
executed, there was a very great tempest at Connecticut, which blew down many
trees, etc.
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| Witch with familiar spirits |
To
17th century Puritans, Margaret Jones exhibited classic signs of a
witch: a familiar spirit by which she communicated with Satan, a witch’s teat
created by suckling the devil (probably a skin tag resulting from childbirth),
supernatural knowledge and skill in medicine, and the ability to sicken and
kill merely by touching.
However,
after the hanging of Margaret Jones, there were no more executions in
Massachusetts during John Winthrop’s life. He was a keen observer of natural –
and supernatural – phenomena, but apparently not a strong believer in
witchcraft. He did not possess the persecuting zeal of Governor John Endecott,
who sent four Quakers to the gallows between 1659 and 1661, including Mary Dyer
of Newport, Rhode Island. Herodias (Long) Gardner of Newport was one of dozens
who stood at the whipping post for preaching or defending Quaker beliefs.
Neither did Winthrop have the credulity of Governor Simon Bradstreet, who
oversaw the Salem witchcraft hangings in 1692.
John
Winthrop died in 1649. He apparently came to regret his earlier persecution of
Anne Hutchinson and her followers, Anabaptists, and other free thinkers. It was
reported that Winthrop was asked to sign an order of banishment while on his
deathbed. He refused, saying, “I have done too much of that work already.”
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| CT governor John Winthrop |
In
1650, his son John Winthrop removed to the fledgling town of New London,
Connecticut. In 1651 he became a magistrate in the Connecticut government, and
on May 21, 1657 John Winthrop, Junior no longer because his father was dead,
was elected Governor of Connecticut.
Before
the notorious 1692 outbreak in Salem, Massachusetts, Connecticut was the hotbed
of New England’s witchcraft. Not every convicted person on this list was
executed, but those known or strongly suspected of having died are in red:
Young, Alice
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1647
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Hanged
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Johnson, Mary
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1648
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Hanged
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Bassett, Mrs.
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1651
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Hanged
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Carrington, Joan
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1651
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Hanged
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Carrington, John
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1651
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Hanged
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Goodman, Elizabeth
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1653, 1655
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Convicted
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Knapp, Goodwife
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1654
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Hanged
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Gilbert, Lydia
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1654
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Hanged
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Mary Staples
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1654
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Accused
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Bailey, Mrs. Nicholas
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1655
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Convicted
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Bailey, Nicholas
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1655
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Convicted
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Meaker, William
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1657
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Convicted
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Palmer, Katherine
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1660, 1672
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Accused
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Jennings, Nicholas
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1661
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Tried, found not guilty
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Jennings, Margaret
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1661
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Tried, found not guilty
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Ayers, William
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1662
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Accused, fled
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Ayers, Goodwife
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1662
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Accused, fled
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Greensmith, Nathaniel
Greensmith, Rebecca
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1662-3
1662-3
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Hanged
Hanged
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Barnes, Mary
Mary Sanford
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1662-3
1662-3
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Hanged
Hanged
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Wakeley, James
Sanford, Andrew
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1662-3, 1665
1662-3
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Accused, fled
Tried, found not guilty
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Seager, Elizabeth
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1662-3, 1665
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Convicted
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Grant, Mrs. Peter
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1662-3
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Accused
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Varleth, Judith
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1662-2
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Tried, found not guilty
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Blackleach, John
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1662-3
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Accused
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Blackleach, Elizabeth
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1662-3
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Accused
|
Connecticut’s
Puritan magistrates and ministers fervently prosecuted alleged witches, and
seven women were executed for witchcraft before 1657. In May of that year, John
Winthrop became Connecticut’s governor. He was elected again in 1659, and
remained governor until his death in 1676. Notice that in the list of witches,
there were no hangings between Winthrop’s election and 1662.
However,
from mid-1662 through much of 1663 there was a major witchcraft outbreak which
resulted in four executions. It began when eight year-old Elizabeth Kelly died
after several days of severe stomach pain. An autopsy determined that the girl
died of ‘preternatural causes,’ and before her death, Betty Kelly repeatedly
accused Goodwife Ayres of witching her to death.
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| Witches' cauldron |
The
evidence against Goody Ayres is scant – she ate broth from a boiling kettle and
shared it with Betty. When the girl fell ill many hours later, her parents no
doubt questioned her closely about who was tormenting her. Betty told them that
Goody Ayres was kneeling on her belly and pinching her. After Betty’s death,
the blood pooled in her arms looked like bruises – evidence that Goody Ayres’
specter had indeed pinched Betty.
Soon
another ‘possessed’ girl, Ann Cole, cried out on Elizabeth Seager, Goodwife Ayres,
Rebecca and Nathaniel Greensmith, Mary Sanford, and others. William Ayres and
his wife saved their lives by fleeing to Rhode Island. The Greensmiths, Mary
Sanford, and Mary Barnes stayed in Hartford, were tried and convicted, then
executed. Accused witches pointed fingers at their neighbors, and a score of
people awaited their fates in jail. It seemed that there would be no end to the
trials and executions.
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| Alchemist - Teniers |
Walter
Woodward, Connecticut state historian, notes that Governor John Winthrop Jr.
“drew on his own fascination with alchemy and magic to save, rather than
condemn, the accused.” Winthrop was a physician and an alchemist. Alchemy is
the study of chemistry and minerals, with an eye to magically transform base
metals to another element – gold. Some alchemists were accused of witchcraft,
but Winthrop was fascinated by the notion. He
was no magician or witch, and he used that knowledge to block trials and
overturn convictions.
So,
what happened to Governor Winthrop’s benign influence during the 1662 outbreak?
John Winthrop had gone to England in 1661 in search of a royal charter for
Connecticut. Though he was elected in absentia, Winthrop did not return until
1663, after four people had already been executed. After Winthrop’s return, the
remaining trials were quickly concluded and convictions dismissed.
The
1662 Hartford witchcraft outbreak is of particular interest to me because Herodias
(Long) Gardner, my favorite obsession, has a Connecticut witch connection.
Herod’s son George was called to court in October, 1662 to answer for
reproaching Rhode Island’s Governor Benedict Arnold a few months earlier.
George was only fourteen, and was found not guilty, no doubt after apologizing
for his rash words.
John
Smith was not so lucky. For the same offense, the Rhode Islander had to pay a
bond of £20 to ensure his future good behavior, and to nail up an apology on the
jail house door. At Smith’s trial, it was revealed that he’d accused governor
Arnold of issuing a “warrant to apprehend the wife of William Ayres who was
sent after from Conneticott for breaking prison, & that having given out
his warrant did send private notice to sayd Smith’s house that the woman might
be convayed away so to escape the said warrant.” I surmise that Governor Arnold did not believe in witchcraft either. While he was duty-bound to arrest a jail-breaker, it appears he warned the Ayreses so they could escape a spurious, and potentially lethal accusation.
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| Trial by Water |
Goodwife Ayres (whose first name I cannot learn) is the same
unfortunate woman accused of witching Betty Kelly to death in 1662. The Ayres
couple may also have been subjected to the ‘swimming test.’ A letter written by
Rev. John Whiting of Hartford to Rev. Cotton Mather of Boston, tells us that, “some had a mind to try whether the stories
of witches not being able to sink under water, were true; accordingly a man and
woman [accused by Ann Cole] had their
hands and feet tied, and so were cast into the water, and they both swam after
the manner of a buoy.’ Fortunately,
that feeble evidence was not deemed legal means to convict the unhappy
couple.
However, Goody Ayres was jailed for trial in Betty Kelly’s death.
A neighbor said he saw her dancing around a steaming cauldron with other
witches. Another testified that Goody Ayres told her she had been courted by
Satan in London.
It looked grim for Goodwife Ayres until her husband William helped
her escape from Hartford’s jail. The unhappy couple fled to Rhode Island, and
with the help of Herodias Gardner and her family, disappeared from New England.
I am featuring this incident in The
Golden Shore, the sequel I am currently writing to Rebel Puritan and The Reputed
Wife, my historical novels about Herodias Long.
Sources:
Witch-Hunting
in Seventeenth-Century New England David
D. Hall 1991
The
Witchcraft Delusion in Colonial Connecticut
John M. Taylor 1908
