A Recent Visit to Salem

    On November 9th, Joel and I attended the wedding of my nephew at the historical Federalist Hamiliton Hall in Salem, Massachusetts.  We arrived well before the designated time for the festivities intentially, in order to visit the Salem Witch Trials Monument on Liberty Street.  I had not been to Salem in many years, and probably not before the monument was dedicated in 1992, some 300 years after the witch trials had ended.

   In December 2018, I submitted a post on this blog about my findings regarding the witch trials and their connection to  certain families living in Maine,the impact of the French and Indian Wars, and attitudes which would continue to govern the way 1st Nation people were dealt with, as well as new immigrants who came to settle in the region with differing religious and political mind sets.  The post for those of you who want to read it for the first time or to refresh your memories is titled:  A Strange Tale.

    The monument is simple and somewhat stark, but I felt it was a solemn place for reflection to remember the 20 victims; fourteen women and five men hanged, and one man, crushed to death.

Four foot high granite walls surround three sides, with granite benches representing each victim cantilevered inward toward the wall.  Etched on each bench is a name, means of execution, and execution date.  One can read on the stone threshold.....words of the accused taken directly from court transcripts.  Visitors willl note that the words....among them, 'God knows I am innocent' - are cut off in mid-sentence, representing lives cut shprt and indifference to the protestations of innocence.

      I was particularily touched by the tokens left,probably by relatives, on some  benches.  I chose to leave one of my own in remembrance of the Rev. George Burroughs, the only Puritan Minister to be executed and who served the small settlement of Casco (Portland) as a preacher.

     

     Here are additional photos from the memorial:

     The Salem Witch Trials Memorial was dedicated on August 5th, 1992 by Nobel Laureate, Holocaust survivor, and author Elie Wiesel.

If I can't stop all of the hate all over the world in all of the people, I can stop it in one place, within me, (adding) We all have our Salems.

     Here is a link to information about the Memorial:  https://salemwitchmusuem.com/locations/witch-trials-memorial

  Did you know that at least forty people, judges, accusers, afflicted and victims have ties to Maine, either directly or by family affiliation or even land ownership.  Mary Beth Norton, noted author of In The Devil's Snare  published this list:

At times, guilt was ascribed by association.  Over 200 people were accused from New England towns, forty had ties to the Northern Frontier, twenty were executed during this period.

 

   In 1711, a Reversal of Attainder was issue by the Massachusetts Court exhonorating some of the victims.  Much later,the state legislature of Massachusetts would exhonorate and include the missing names of all the victims.

 

     Undoubtably, the witch trials will continue to hold a fascination for people, and good scholorship and research will try to make sense of it all, but I'd like to end this brief piece with a reflection from the Memorial designers James Cutler and Maggie Smith:

It is important that people think about real human suffering caused by witchcraft hysteria and the lessons that are to be learned from that dark period in history of this city, and this country.