Salem - A Bewitching Town

Stephanie and I had planned to take the ferry to Salem, but storms had caused rough water, and the ferry was cancelled that day.  It is a good thing we checked online before leaving!  So, back in the rental car we went.

Salem's big claim to fame or infamy comes from the witch trials that started in 1692.  It was a harsh winter, the people were have hard financial times (recession), there was a major boundary war going on amongst the villagers, and food poisoning (unintentional) may have been involved.  A group of young girls, hearing tales of voodoo, and various other supernatural tales from a slave woman, Tituba, started accusing various villagers of witchcraft. (Puritan version of Mean Girls)

Not knowing much of science, the Puritans believed that anything that could not be explained, like getting sick, was of course, caused by witchcraft. Ironically, witchcraft was not a charge that was covered under the cannons of their religion, but the charges were violations of civil law.  Talk about needing a separation of church and state!

One of the first trials, against an elderly woman, Rebecca Nurse, ended up in a not guilty verdict.  The girls complained, or rather went into convulsions.  When the governor held up the not guilty verdict, they did this again.  Eventually, the verdict was overturned, and Rebecca Nurse would be hanged.

Basically, it came down to this:

1.   A person is accused of witchcraft.  They are imprisoned.  They must find a way of paying their prison costs, including food, blankets, etc.  At least three prisoners died of starvation because they were unable to pay for prison food.
2. A plea of guilty or not guilty needed to be recorded.  Those that pled not guilty would stand trial.  Those that pled guilty would go back to prison.  Everyone who pled guilty would survive. Go figure.  The Puritans believed that guilty meant the Devil had left.  Not guilty meant the Devil was still in charge of a person's soul.
3. Making a plea either way meant that all a person's land, and goods were confiscated.  One man, Giles Corey, refused to plea either way.  He was not about to let his land be taken.  Giles believed in witches, and ironically testified at his wife's trial! (Stephanie and I discussed whether Martha, his wife, accused him after he testified!)  Giles was taken to a nearby field and pressed to death.  He was forced to lie on his back with a slab of door on top of him.  Then heavy rocks were placed on the wood.  Each time he was asked if he pleaded guilty or not guilty.  Seeing the writing on the wall, and not about to give up his land, he would only respond "More weight."  It took him three days to die. His land would stay in the Corey family until the 1980's when it was eventually sold.

The person profiting the most from the pleas was the constable, George Corwin, who was the nephew of Giles and Martha Corey.  He was probably very disapointed at not getting hold of his uncle's holdings.  Corwin's home is the only home still standing from the time, and we did visit it.

The pictures above are the Corwin home.

23 people would die during the witchcraft madness.  19 were hanged, one pressed, and three died of starvation.  The madness would end when the girls doing the majority of the accusing, got a bit overzealous and accused the governor's wife.  The governor then put a stop to the madness.  Although some people remained imprisoned up to seven years to pay off their prison debts.

None of the girls in the original group were ever accused.  One would say that they were doing it "for sport".  Another, several years later, would have a statement read in church on how sorry she was that she had ever taken part in this.

The Salem Witch Museum has an interesting exhibit on various kinds of witch hunts.  It looks something like this:  (Dr. Griggs was the Salem doctor who could find nothing physically wrong with the convulsing girls, so he suggested witchcraft.)

Fear                                   Catalyst                               Accused of Wrongdoing

Witchs                               Dr. Griggs                               150 innocent people
Japanese                           Pearl Harbor                            All Japanese Americans
Communism                      Senator McCarthy                    Many loyal patriotic Americans
Germs/Virus                     AIDS/HIV                                All gay people
Al-Qaida                           9-11                                        All Arab Americans, and    
                                                                                         anyone who looked Arab.

Something to think about.      

Only wealthy people could afford to be buried in cemeteries.  Those who died during the trials were buried on their own land by family members or in pauper's graves.  A memorial to those who died is in the Old Burying Ground in downtown Salem.  The spirit there is very strong.

This is the memorial.

              These are the words of those who died, engraved in stone.  Bridget Bishop was the first to die. George Burroughs was a minister. It was thought that a witch could not say the Lord's Prayer without a mistake.  Rev. Burroughs did just that, and was almost saved except another minister, Cotton Mather, intervened and allowed the hanging.  Cotton Mather is buried in Boston just up the street from Old North Church.  Giles Corey preceeded his wife by four days.  Martha was hanged.

Ironically, modern Salem is home to many practicing witches, who follow the old Druid religion called Wiccan.  Satan is not part of their beliefs.  They consider themselves Pagan and follow an old religious worship.  The term "warlock" means traitor, and is never used.  Both men and women are witches.  J.K Rowling only used the term warlock when discussing Dark Magic in the Harry Potter books.

For those wanting a better understanding of Wiccan, the novel The Mists of Avalon gives an excellent idea of what the ancient religion was like.  This is the story of King Arthur's sister, Morgan Le Fey, who was considered a witch.  She was a Druid priestess.

Salem - Beyond the Witch Trials

Salem was also home to the author Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose ancester, Samuel Hathorne was a judge at the witch trials.  While in college, Nathaniel added the "w" to his last name to distinguish himself apart for the ancestor he was so ashamed of.  Hawthorne spend much time with his cousin at her home.  It was this home that was the basis of the novel The House of Seven Gables.  The house still stands, and has an interesting history in its own right

Salem is also a port town, and at one time was the sixth largest port in the USA.  It was the merchants and sailors of Salem that developed the first import/export business in the USA.  Ships would bring in goods from other countries, and the goods would immediatly be shipped elsewhere.

During WWII, Salem had military units stationed there.  One man, a native of Hawaii, was feeling homesick, and named one of the beaches Waikiki Beach after his beach at home!

All in all, a very interesting visit to this famous town.

Old North Church - North End of Boston

  Today we went to the North End of Boston to see the Old North Church made famous in the poem Paul Revere's Ride. "One if by land and two if by sea", goes the poem.  Revere, himself, came up with this plan.  But he was not the one in the window with the lantern.  He was already heading across the Charles River to begin his part of the ride.  The other rider was William Dawes.  The two in the church had already locked themselves in because they were breaking British curfew by being out after dark.  The British saw the lights as well, and by the time these two, whose names I can't recall, came down, the British were banging on the church door.  The two lantern men managed to escape out a window, which is still part of the church.

   The church has interesting blocks of family pews.  Each family got an enclosed space, and furnished the insides to their liking, chairs, rugs, a loveseat, wallpaper, anything to make it warm and comfortable.  Like their own little condo!  Today, the pews are whitewashed and plain.  This is still a working church, and has a steady Anglican congregation.

  We then walked up the hill to Copp's Hill Burial Ground, the second oldest cemetery in Boston.  The guide we came across told us that back then, you were buried, and your family did not come back to visit the grave.  Cemeteries were not well cared for.  She also told us about the various symbols on the headstones:

    Skull - angel of Death
    Angel - Heaven
    Urn with Weeping Willow - death and mourning

Cotton Mather, the famous puritan minister, is buried here with his father and son. 

Day Two - Plymouth

  Our second day of Plymouth started with cool air and bright sunshine.  We had lucked out the day before and had visited Plimoth Plantation while the weather was good.  Mayflower II has a bit of rain, and we were inside the Plymouth Hall Museum when the downpour came.  The museum has actual items that belonged to a few of the Pilgrims.  I was not allowed to photograph anything.

  The second morning we went to Leyden Street, the oldest continually inhabited street in America.  It was on this street the Pilgrims lived.  The church in the picture is built on the remains of the Pilgrims' fort at the top of the hill.

  The remaining pictures are from Plimoth Plantation.

  We would then head back to Boston with a few shopping trips along the way.

Plymouth Rock

  The  story goes that when the Pilgrims stepped off the Mayflower, the land first under their feet was a rock.  This tradition is sticking around, even though we know the ship was nowhere near the shore.  Plymouth Harbor is quite shallow and the Mayflower was a good mile off.  The Pilgrims came ashore in a small lifeboat.

   The rock was identified in the early 1700s by the 95-year-old Elder Faunce, who, as a child, had known some of the original Pilgrims. The rock has been moved several times, beginning during the Revolutionary War.  It has been split apart, had chunks taken from it, and now is in protective surroundings a good way up off the shore.

The Mayflower

  In 1620, the Mayflower brought 102 passengers and 34 crew members to the New World.  The ship would stay in Plymouth Harbor during the winter of 1620-21.  It would return to England in the spring of 1621.  After the death of its captain, Christopher Jones, in 1624, the Mayflower was lost to history.

  This was a great vessel for its time, but it was a freight vessel, and packing almost 140 people on it was truely amazing.  The ship had to carry barrels of fresh water and wood to heat it with.  There was a brick oven on the ship.

  In the 1950's Mayflower II was built in England.  It sailed across the Atlantic to Plymouth in 1957.  The recreation of the ship is a story in itself, but I will let my pictures do the talking.

Of Plimoth Plantation (Plymouth)

Today Stephanie and I went to the Plimoth Plantation Visitors Center. "Plimoth" is the spelling used by William Bradford, one of the Pilgrims, in his book Of Plimoth Plantation.  Since most of you know the basic history of the Pilgrims, I will skip the history lesson and walk you through this incredible site.

The Wanpanoag People

  The Pilgrims settled in an area belonging to the Wampanoag people (tribe).  The village of Patuxet had been wiped out due to European disease that spread among the various tribes due to exposure to European traders.  The Pilgrims and the Wampanoag had a fairly friendly, but cautious, relationship.  At the visitors center, a typical Wampanoag village has been set up.  Actual members of the tribe dress up and explain the various jobs the people at that time did to maintain a village.  These Wampanoag are dressed as they would be 400 years ago, but they explain everything in modern English.  They are not acting.  In the above pictures, the women are skewering quail and cooking it over a fire.

The Pilgrims

  The 1627 village recreation would show Plymouth as it looked seven years after the Pilgrims arrived.  This time the "interpreters" are not only dressed in 17th century clothing, they speak as if they were the actual Pilgrims.
  The homes are small and stuffy.  They would be hot in the summer and cold in the winter.  The floors are earthen.  The parents slept downstairs and children and servants slept upstairs, via a ladder to the "attic".

  There is a lot of information I am leaving out.  It is just so overwhelming to write about.  The visitors center wants to educate people about the two different cultures that lived on this land.  Equal part is given to the Wampanoag.  This is a place to dispell American mythology.  After the first sucessful harvest in 1621, the remaining Pilgrims had a harvest festival.  Massasoit, and 90 men from his tribe, joined the festivities. This gathering was noted in the journal of William Winslow, a Pilgrim.  The Pilgrims did not consider this a thanksgiving day.  Had it been one, there would have been no food, and an all day religious service.  The first mention of "thanksgiving" was for the rain they received in 1623.