Course Dates: February 9-15, 2026 Historical Period: Winter 1691-1692, with context spanning the full timeline of the Salem Witch Trials
Welcome to Week 7
This week’s Salem Witch Trials daily episodes and The Thing About Salem weekly podcast widen the frame. The daily episodes cover Andover’s ministers, some afflicted persons and their backgrounds, English Minister William Perkins’ grounds for examining a suspected witch, the geography of the Salem Witch Trials, the accused witches who refused to confess, the pulpit pounding sermons of Samuel Parris, and the suffering of the extended family of Martha Carrier. The weekly podcast episode tells the story of Candy, an enslaved woman from Barbados who confessed to witchcraft in a Salem courtroom, brought cheese and grass as her instruments of magic, and told the magistrates that Massachusetts, not Barbados, made her a witch.
This Week’s Content
Daily Videos (Salem Witch Trials Daily YouTube Playlist)
- February 9: Andover’s Ministers
- February 10: Afflicted Servants
- February 11: Grounds to Examine a Suspected Witch
- February 12: Salem Witch Trials Geography
- February 13: Refusing to Confess
- February 14: Samuel Parris Sermons
- February 15: Martha Carrier’s Family
Weekly Podcast
The Thing About Salem: “Magic in the Courtroom: The Story of Candy, A Woman Accused of Witchcraft in 1692”
The Week in Review
Andover: Not the Story We Expected (February 9)
Andover saw the highest number of witchcraft accusations of any community in 1692, with about 45 individuals accused. Because the town had two ministers sharing a pulpit, the senior Francis Dane and the junior Thomas Barnard, it was tempting for historians to assume a factional split drove the accusations. The logic seemed tidy: two ministers, two factions, accusations flying between them.
Historian Richard Hite dismantled this theory by examining the actual numbers. Of the 45 accused, 24 came from the north end and 21 from the south end. Among accusers, 12 came from the north end and 11 from the south end. There was no geographical divide driving the crisis. The accusations cut across the entire community.
Both ministers also signed petitions defending the accused. Thomas Barnard’s reputation as a possible witch-hunt collaborator largely stems from a misunderstanding: he led a prayer before a touch test in the Andover meetinghouse, which was his ministerial duty, not evidence of orchestrating the test. Prayers or messages before civil events were common.
Twenty-eight members of Reverend Francis Dane’s extended family were accused of witchcraft. Martha Carrier, his niece, was the first person from Andover to be accused and was alleged to be a witchcraft ringleader and witch recruiter.
The Afflicted: More Than “Girls” (February 10)
The phrase “afflicted girls” persists in popular imagination, but more than 70 people claimed to be bewitched during the Salem Witch Trials. They were of all ages, male and female, married and single, servants and children of prosperous families.
Several of the afflicted were servants or orphans living in someone else’s household. Abigail Williams served her uncle Samuel Parris. Elizabeth Hubbard served her uncle by marriage, Dr. William Griggs. Mary Warren worked for alleged witch John Proctor, who threatened to thrash her for her role in the trials. Mercy Lewis served Thomas Putnam and had previously worked for George Burroughs; she was an orphan and war refugee who likely witnessed the deaths of family members. Sarah Churchill served George Jacobs Sr. and made only one accusation, against her own employer, before being accused herself.
Others among the core afflicted came from their own families. Betty Parris, one of the first two afflicted and the daughter of Reverend Parris, was relocated by her parents and did not participate in legal proceedings. Ann Putnam Jr. and her mother, Ann Carr Putnam, both claimed affliction, making theirs one of the few households where the crisis struck across generations. Mary Walcott was connected to multiple important village families. Susannah Sheldon was a war refugee whose brother had been killed in King William’s War.
Daniel Wilkins, a teenage grandson of Bray Wilkins, is a reminder that men and boys were among the afflicted too. He died on May 16, 1692, and Mercy Lewis and Mary Walcott claimed that the specter of John Willard, Daniel’s uncle by marriage, choked him at his deathbed. John Willard was executed.
One common theory about the afflicted is that servants with poor marriage prospects had something to gain from the attention the trials gave them. But the evidence resists that kind of generalization. Elizabeth Hubbard and Sarah Churchill have recorded marriages in their thirties and forties, though whether these were first or second marriages is unknown. Others, like Mary Warren and Susannah Sheldon, disappeared entirely from the historical record. Among those from their own families, Betty Parris married well as a minister’s daughter, while Ann Putnam Jr. never married at all, raising her siblings after both parents died when she was about 19. What is true for one afflicted person is not necessarily true for any other.
The Rulebook: William Perkins and Grounds for Examination (February 11)
English Puritan theologian William Perkins offered standards for witchcraft evidence in his book A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft, published in 1608. Boston ministers cited his criteria in their June 1692 advice to the Salem court. Connecticut magistrates invoked his standards in 1693 to justify reprieving Mercy Disborough.
Perkins outlined seven grounds for examining someone suspected of witchcraft: being publicly defamed as a witch, being accused by a confessed witch, cursing followed by death or mischief, enmity or quarreling followed by mischief, association with alleged witches, discovery of a witch mark on the body, and giving contradictory answers under questioning.
He also listed proofs he considered insufficient for conviction: the ordeal of holding a hot iron or plunging a hand into boiling water, the scratching test (drawing blood from a suspected witch to relieve affliction), counter-magic such as burning bewitched objects or parts of a bewitched person or animal, and the swimming test. Perkins himself noted that some of these “proofs” amounted to practices of witchcraft. The Magistrates of the Court of Oyer and Terminer burned objects of alleged witchcraft in court.
The proofs Perkins considered sufficient for conviction were: a free and voluntary confession obtained after due examination based on legitimate presumptions, evidence that the defendant entertained a familiar spirit, and testimony under oath from witnesses who observed the defendant performing acts consistent with a covenant with Satan.
The gap between examination standards and conviction standards mattered. What justified suspicion was not supposed to justify a death sentence. In practice, that distinction often collapsed.
A Bird’s Eye View: Geography of 1692 (February 12)
On February 12, 1692, Cotton Mather turned 29 and began a new journal volume, writing about his desire to see reformation in the churches and an easier path to church membership for his own congregation.
The geography of the Salem Witch Trials is often misunderstood. Salem Town was a bustling, cosmopolitan port. Salem Village was an agrarian farming community roughly five miles inland. The examinations began in the rustic Salem Village meetinghouse, but once the Court of Oyer and Terminer was established in June, the proceedings moved to the more affluent setting of Salem Town.
The afflicted persons were not next-door neighbors. Historian Marilynne K. Roach mapped the area and confirmed that while Betty Parris and Abigail Williams lived at the parsonage in the center of the village, Ann Putnam Jr. lived miles to the west in what is now Middleton, and Elizabeth Hubbard lived miles to the east on the Beverly line. This was not a single neighborhood clique; it was a phenomenon spanning miles of farmland.
Accusations spread to 25 different communities, from Boston in the south to Wells, Maine in the north. Maine is central to understanding the geography of 1692. The Frontier War with the Wabanaki Confederacy was raging there, and that trauma migrated south into Essex County with refugees. George Burroughs, former Salem Village minister, was arrested at his home in Wells and transported back to Salem for trial.
Land disputes created friction that fueled accusations, but the trials were not a government land grab. The heirs of executed persons still inherited their property.
The Gallows Hill Project, including Marilynne Roach and Emerson Baker, confirmed through viewshed analysis that executions took place not at the summit of Gallows Hill but at a lower rocky ledge known as Proctor’s Ledge.
Standing Firm: Those Who Refused to Confess (February 13)
On February 13, 1692, Cotton Mather wrote to Major John Richards, who would later serve on the Court of Oyer and Terminer, requesting approval for a covenant renewal service. Richards disagreed with the necessity.
Of the 19 people hanged for witchcraft in Salem, 18 refused to confess. The 19th, Samuel Wardwell, recanted his confession.
Rebecca Nurse stated, “I am as innocent as the child unborn.” George Jacobs Sr. challenged the magistrates: “You tax me for a wizard? You might as well tax me for a buzzard.” Susannah Martin declared, “I dare not tell a lie if it would save my life.” John Willard insisted, “If it was the last time I was to speak, I am innocent.”
In earlier New England trials, Goody Knapp remained silent in 1653 and refused to name Mary Staples despite pressure. Margaret Jones, the first person executed for witchcraft in Massachusetts, maintained she was “wholly free” of the charges.
At least 54 people did confess in 1692, for many reasons. Samuel Wardwell initially confessed to making a pact with “a prince of the air” but recanted before the grand jury on September 13, 1692, declaring his previous statements false. Despite his retraction, magistrates used his original confession to convict him. He was the only confessor executed. It is written that at his hanging on September 22, smoke from the executioner’s pipe choked him during his final protest of innocence, and his accusers interpreted this as the devil silencing him.
Physical coercion played a role. Martha Carrier’s sons, Andrew and Richard, were tortured until they testified against their mother and confessed themselves.
Mary Esty, sister of Rebecca Nurse, wrote an eloquent petition after being condemned. She accepted her own fate but begged the governor and judges to examine the afflicted persons separately, confident that many confessors were innocent people lying to save their lives. She wrote, “the Lord above knows my innocency then and likewise does now, as of the great day will be known to men and angels.”
Giles Cory refused to stand trial and was killed by pressing under stones, the method called Peine Forte et Dure. He knew by that point in the trials that everyone who had gone to court had been convicted and condemned.
From the Pulpit: Samuel Parris Sermons (February 14)
Tracking Samuel Parris’s sermons from winter 1691 through late 1692 reveals a progression from general theological grievance to targeted spiritual warfare.
On November 22, 1691, Parris preached on Psalm 110:1, with its language of making enemies into footstools. By January 3, 1692, he declared God was “incensed and angry.” That afternoon, he introduced the devil as an active threat and named “wicked and reprobate men” as assistants of Satan. Midway through, his notes record that “by reason of the cold, so much shall suffice.” The town had not supplied adequate firewood. His physical misery was feeding the spiritual narrative of persecution.
On February 14, 1692, before formal accusations had begun, Parris told the congregation to “war a good warfare.” By March 27, with the crisis fully underway, he addressed the “dreadful witchcraft” directly and turned to the story of Judas. He told the congregation that one of them was a devil. His list of sins mirrored his personal grievances: slanderers, accusers of the godly, opposers of godliness, and “envious persons as witches.” That same day, he publicly chastised Mary Sibley for the witch cake, calling it “going to the devil for help against the devil.”
The sermon record goes silent for June and July. Parris’s notebook reads “see loose papers,” and those papers are lost to time. In August, with executions underway, Parris noticed empty seats. The families of Peter Cloyce, Samuel Nurse, and John Tarbell had stopped attending. They had understandable reason: Parris was testifying against their wives and mothers.
On September 11, after six more people were condemned, including church member Martha Cory, Parris preached that the devil had “found assistants from amongst us.” That same day, the church voted to excommunicate Martha Cory. Three days later, Parris visited her in prison, called her “obdurate,” pronounced the sentence of excommunication, and noted that she refused to pray with him.
On October 23, with the bloodiest period winding down, Parris preached on kisses. He said, “Kisses are very sweet among true friends after some jars and differences.” He used the word “absent” to describe those missing from the congregation, the same families whose loved ones had been condemned and executed.
The Queen in Hell: Martha Carrier’s Family (February 15)
Cotton Mather famously called Martha Carrier “a rampant hag,” and Mary Lacey Jr. gave her the title “Queen in Hell,” casting her as a ringleader who recruited other witches for the devil. But Martha Carrier was a real woman with a real family, and the accusation against her tore that family apart.
Martha was born Martha Allen in the early 1650s and married Thomas Carrier in 1674. When the family moved to Andover around 1690, they were not welcomed. Martha was blamed for a smallpox outbreak that killed 13 people in town. That reputation followed her. On May 28, 1692, Joseph Holton and John Walcott filed a formal complaint alleging she was afflicting Mary Walcott, Abigail Williams, and Ann Putnam Jr. She was arrested and examined on May 31, indicted on July 1, tried on August 3, and executed on August 19.
But Martha’s execution was not the end of it. Her accusation became the entry point for a wave of accusations that swept through her extended family and nearly every branch of her family tree. Martha’s mother, Faith Allen, was an Ingalls. At least 15 descendants of Faith’s parents, Edmund and Ann Ingalls, were accused of witchcraft, along with two of their spouses. Martha’s sister, Mary Allen Toothaker, was accused. Mary’s husband, Roger Toothaker, was arrested and died in jail without ever seeing trial. Their daughter confessed. Mary’s son, Allen Toothaker, testified against his own aunt.
Martha’s children suffered the worst of it. Her sons Andrew, Richard, and Thomas Jr. and her young daughter Sarah were all arrested. Andrew and Richard were bound neck and heels until the blood was ready to gush from their noses. Only then did they confess and testify against their own mother.
The accusations also spread through Martha’s connection to Reverend Francis Dane, the senior minister of Andover, whose wife was Martha’s aunt. Daughters, granddaughters, and in-laws were arrested one after another. Some confessed and recanted. Some were found not guilty. Francis Dane’s granddaughter Elizabeth Johnson Jr. was convicted and condemned before being reprieved by the Governor in 1693. His niece Elizabeth How was not so fortunate; she was tried, convicted, and hanged. In all, 28 members of Francis Dane’s extended family were accused of witchcraft.
This was not an attack on one woman. It was the systematic destruction of an entire kinship network: the Allens, the Carriers, the Toothakers, the Danes, and the Johnsons. Once Martha Carrier was labeled the Queen in Hell and accused of recruiting witches, everyone connected to her was in danger.
Podcast: Candy of Barbados
This week’s podcast episode tells the story of Candy, an enslaved woman from Barbados held in bondage by Margaret Hawkes. On July 4, 1692, Candy was examined by magistrates Bartholomew Gedney and John Hawthorne, with Reverend Nicholas Noyes present.
Candy confessed to witchcraft, but she shaped her confession on her own terms. Speaking in third person, she stated: “Candy no witch in her country. Candy’s mother no witch. Candy no witch, Barbados. This country, mistress give Candy witch.” In a colony that styled itself a godly society, an enslaved woman from Barbados testified that Massachusetts, not her homeland, was the corrupting influence.
When asked to produce instruments of her witchcraft, Candy left the courtroom and returned with household items. Sources describe knotted cloths, rags, a piece of cheese, and a piece of grass. The magistrates conducted folk magic experiments in the courtroom: burning the rags, which caused the afflicted to choke and gasp; putting the rags in water, which caused two of the afflicted to choke while another ran toward the river; and compelling Candy to eat the grass, after which she reported a burning sensation.
Candy also implicated her enslaver, Margaret Hawkes, claiming Hawkes brought a book, pen, and ink and made her write in it. In a courtroom controlled by powerful colonial men, an enslaved woman had turned the accusation against the woman who owned her.
Candy was indicted for afflicting Ann Putnam Jr. and Mary Walcott, imprisoned for months, and tried on January 6, 1693. The verdict was not guilty on both counts. Even acquittal came with a cost: she had to pay for her own imprisonment before being released. After her release, Candy disappears from the historical record.
This Week’s Key Players
Francis Dane: Senior minister of Andover; 28 members of his extended family were accused; signed petitions defending the accused
Thomas Barnard: Junior minister of Andover; also signed petitions defending the accused; unfairly blamed for the touch test
Martha Carrier: First person from Andover accused; called “Queen in Hell”; executed August 19, 1692
William Perkins: English Puritan theologian whose A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft (1608) established evidence standards cited in Salem and Connecticut
Samuel Parris: Salem Village minister whose sermons tracked from general grievance to targeted accusations; testified against his own parishioners
Mary Esty: Sister of Rebecca Nurse; wrote a petition after being condemned, asking the court to prevent the shedding of more innocent blood
Giles Cory: Killed by pressing under stones after refusing to stand trial
Samuel Wardwell: The only confessor executed; recanted his confession before the grand jury
Candy: Enslaved woman from Barbados; examined July 4, 1692; acquitted January 6, 1693; testified that Massachusetts made her a witch
Marilynne K. Roach: Historian who mapped the geography of 1692 and helped confirm the execution site at Proctor’s Ledge
Richard Hite: Historian whose research on Andover dismantled the minister-faction theory
Vocabulary Spotlight
Touch Test: A folk magic practice where blindfolded afflicted persons were touched by suspects to see if their fits would cease; performed in the Andover meetinghouse
Peine Forte et Dure: Literally “strong and hard punishment”; the method of pressing to death by piling stones on a board placed on the accused’s body; used to compel Giles Cory to enter a plea
Spectral Evidence: Testimony that the accused’s spirit or specter appeared to the witness to harm them; central to the trials and deeply controversial
Viewshed Analysis: A geographic technique that determines what can be seen from specific locations; used by the Gallows Hill Project to confirm the execution site
Court of Oyer and Terminer: Literally “to hear and to determine”; the special court established by Governor Phips to try the witchcraft cases
Oomancy: Divination using an egg, sometimes called the Venus glass; referenced in connection with the afflicted girls attempting to see their future husbands’ occupations
Excommunication: Formal exclusion from church membership and communion; the church voted to excommunicate Martha Cory on September 11, 1692
Familiar Spirit: A demon or supernatural entity believed to serve a witch; evidence of entertaining a familiar was one of Perkins’ proofs sufficient for conviction
Quote of the Week
“I dare not tell a lie if it would save my life.” Susannah Martin, when asked if she would confess
Consider what this statement reveals about the position of the accused. For those who maintained their innocence, the choice was between spiritual integrity and physical survival. Those who confessed lived. Those who refused were condemned. Susannah Martin chose truth over survival.
Four Weekly Challenges
1. Predict What Happens Next
The sermons of Samuel Parris have escalated from vague warnings to direct accusations. The Carrier family network has been devastated. The geography of accusation has spread across 25 communities. Based on patterns observed this week, what happens when the authorities try to wind down the trials? What complications arise from having 54 confessors and devastated family networks?
2. Citation Practice
This week’s claim: “The accusations in Andover were evenly distributed across the community, not driven by factional loyalty to either minister.” Find the specific evidence in the February 9 transcript that supports this claim. Cite the numbers.
3. Character Journal
Write 5-7 sentences from the perspective of one of Martha Carrier’s sons, Andrew or Richard, after being bound neck and heels and pressured to confess and testify against their mother. What are they thinking? What are they feeling? What choice are they making and why?
4. Share What Learned
This week covered topics that connect to broader questions about justice, geography, family, and power. Share one insight that surprised or challenged a previous assumption. Use course hashtags to connect with other learners.
YOUR PROGRESS
Week 7 of ~75 weeks | ~9% Complete | January 2026 – May 2027
Where we are: February 9-15, 1692. The structures are visible now. The family networks, the geography, the theology, the sermons, the evidence standards. The machinery is assembled. The first formal examinations of the accused are approaching.
Coming next week: The crisis escalates. More accusations, more examinations, and the community fractures deepen.
BADGE TRACKER
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Great work this week. The Salem Witch Trials were not an abstraction. They happened to real families in real places, driven by real systems of belief and power. Every week brings that reality into sharper focus.
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Join the Conversation
The systems are visible. The family networks are mapped. The sermons show the escalation. The geography shows the reach. And an enslaved woman from Barbados told the magistrates that Massachusetts made her a witch.
What patterns are emerging? What questions do these systems raise?
Drop thoughts in the comments.
See you next week.
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The Thing About Salem Podcast: Weekly episodes exploring Salem Witch Trials topics
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Further Reading
Richard Hite, In the Shadow of Salem: The Andover Witch-Hunt of 1692
Marilynne K. Roach, The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-by-Day Chronicle
Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare
Bernard Rosenthal, Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt
Emerson W. Baker, A Storm of Witchcraft
Stacy Schiff, The Witches: Salem, 1692
John Hale, A Modest Enquiry into the Nature of Witchcraft (1702)
William Perkins, A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft (1608)
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