Salem trials: accusations, evidence, and the change of court
The Salem trials turned allegations about invisible acts into criminal cases. Witnesses claimed that apparitions of their neighbors had appeared to them, and magistrates treated these accusations as evidence. This testimony became known as spectral evidence. During 1692, accusations spread from a small group in Salem Village to communities across colonial Massachusetts. A special court prosecuted the cases through the summer. After Governor William Phips dissolved that court in October, a replacement rejected spectral evidence and acquitted most of the people brought before it.
Salem Village, now Danvers, was distinct from the nearby port of Salem Town. The village included farming families whose interests differed from those connected to the port's commercial wealth. King William's War, beginning in 1689, sent refugees from northern areas into Essex County. The arrivals added pressure to local resources. Disagreements also surrounded Samuel Parris, who became the village's ordained minister in 1689. In early 1692, accusations began in his household, where his daughter Elizabeth Parris and niece Abigail Williams lived.
The first formal cases concerned Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba, a woman enslaved in Parris's household. A warrant dated February 29 ordered Osborne and Tituba brought before magistrates John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin. It also directed that the young accusers and anyone else able to give evidence attend. The constable reported that he had apprehended the women and searched for images associated with the accusation but had found none. The process combined a complaint, an arrest order, a search, and examination before the magistrates.
Questioning began on March 1. Good and Osborne denied the allegations. Tituba initially denied wrongdoing, then confessed and accused the other women. Her testimony described supernatural figures and a book associated with the devil. Repeated examinations followed over several days. On March 7, the three women were sent to the jail in Boston. The proceedings placed their denials and confessions alongside the accusers' accounts, and the magistrates considered the examinations sufficient grounds to keep all three in custody.
The widening accusations reached people with very different positions in the community. Martha Corey was a respected church member. Her implication undermined the idea that church standing offered protection from suspicion. More than 200 people were eventually accused. Phips established the Court of Oyer and Terminer on May 27 to hear cases from Suffolk, Essex, and Middlesex counties. Bridget Bishop was the first defendant tried there. The Salem trials continued using spectral testimony despite warnings about the danger of relying on it.
Opposition to that evidence grew during the year. Cotton Mather cautioned the court, and Increase Mather also denounced reliance on spectral claims. Phips dissolved the special court on October 29. The Superior Court of Judicature subsequently heard the remaining cases without admitting spectral evidence. Most defendants were acquitted. By May 1693, the governor had pardoned those still imprisoned on witchcraft charges.
The Salem trials had caused distinct kinds of fatal harm. Nineteen people were hanged. Giles Corey was pressed to death with heavy weights after refusing to submit to trial, a separate death described by the Law Library of Congress. Smithsonian's account also records at least five accused people who died in jail. Those prison deaths belong alongside the hangings and Corey's pressing when describing the crisis, while remaining a separate category from executions.
The January 1693 proceedings show the replacement court conducting individual trials. Rebecca Jacobs pleaded not guilty and accepted trial by a jury whose members were named. The jury returned a verdict of not guilty. Margaret Jacobs also pleaded not guilty to the indictments brought against her. Her evidence was read, the case was committed to a jury, and she too was acquitted. In each case, the court ordered discharge on payment of fees. An acquittal therefore did not eliminate the financial obligations attached to confinement.
Other cases ended before a trial jury considered them. Grand juries returned findings that charges against some accused people lacked sufficient basis. The replacement court also heard cases outside Salem, including proceedings in Charlestown, Boston, and Ipswich. Its surviving business includes acquittals, rejected indictments, and orders for release. These were separate decisions about named defendants, made over several months. The legal machinery that had sustained accusations in 1692 was now producing very different outcomes.
Public acknowledgment of the injustice of the Salem trials developed slowly. Massachusetts observed a day of fasting on January 14, 1697. Samuel Sewall, one of the judges, publicly acknowledged his part in the proceedings. In 1711, the legislature reversed convictions and restored the rights of a number of accused people. A December 17 payment order authorized £578 12s in restitution, to be distributed among surviving claimants and the legal representatives of those who had died. Elizabeth Johnson Jr., whose conviction had remained uncleared, was formally exonerated in 2022. The original court documents include petitions, examinations, warrants, and invoices, preserving both the accusations and their consequences. At Salem's memorial, dedicated by Elie Wiesel in 1992, remembrance returned attention to the individuals whose lives had been overwhelmed by the proceedings.
- Smithsonian Magazine, A Brief History of the Salem Witch Trials — www.smithsonianmag.com
- University of Virginia, Salem Witch Trials Documentary Archive, Tituba case file — salem.lib.virginia.edu
- University of Virginia, Superior Court of Judicature records, January–May 1693 — salem.lib.virginia.edu
- Nathan Dorn, Law Library of Congress, The Crushing Death of Giles Corey of Salem, 1692 (2020): nineteen hangings and Corey’s separate death by pressing — blogs.loc.gov
- University of Virginia, Salem Witch Trials Documentary Archive, SWP No. 173.47–48: 1711 reversal of attainders and December 17 restitution order for £578 12s — salem.lib.virginia.edu