How the Salem Witch Hysteria Began
By Hannah, Portia, and Alex
The Salem witch hunt hysteria began in February of 1692.  The Puritans were already nervous because of their surrounding environment.  They were worried that Indians would attack them, and the war between the English and the French had cut off the Puritans from their resources.  The Puritans were also nervous because they each wanted to be in God's elect, and to get a place in heaven.  They were in God’s elect, but the tiniest mistake would send them to the underworld. They had to be perfect.  Because the Puritans were so nervous, it was easy for the idea of the existence of witches to make them frantic.
The witch frenzy started when Abigail Williams, age eleven, and her cousin Elizabeth Parris, age nine, started having fits.  Doctors could find nothing wrong with the girls physically, and assumed that they must be under the effect of unnatural power.  The girls screamed, threw things around, made strange sounds, sat in peculiar positions and such.  The girls also said that they were being pinched and poked with pins.  Later on, other women began acting the same.  They even acted strangely in church by doing things like interrupting sermons.  The girls were said to have started acting strangely soon after they heard stories from their servant, Tituba. 

Elizabeth's father, Reverend Samuel Parris, met Tituba when he was in the Barbados Islands.  Because he was a reverend, she was told never to talk about dark magic or anything like dark magic.  She traveled back to the New World with him as his slave.  Abigail and Elizabeth made Tituba tell them stories behind Reverend Parris’s back.  She told them stories of dark magic and voodoo, and taught them how to make strange animal noises.

One day the girls began mumbling names, and screaming that ghosts were attacking them.  One of the names they mentioned was Tituba.  They also named Sarah Good and Sarah Osbourne.  People began believing Abigail's, Elizabeth's, and the other girls' accusations.  It made sense that these women would be accused.  Neither Sarah Osbourne nor Sarah Good ever attended church which was said to be almost the worst possible sin.  Plus, Tituba even admitted to using black magic and flying on a broom at night.  Also none of these women were important people in the colony.  Sarah Osbourne, Sarah Good, and Tituba were sent to jail. 

Soon more and more people were accused of witchcraft by the girls.  People who they didn’t like, people who were just very low in society, or just anybody. Those people included Sarah Dustin, Ann Sears, Bethiah Carter Sr., Bethiah Carter Jr., George Jacobs, Sr., Margaret Jacobs, John Willard, Alice Parker, Ann Pudeator, Abigail Soames, George Jacobs, Jr., Daniel Andrew, Rebecca Jacobs, Sarah Buckley, Mary Witheridge, Elizabeth Colson, Elizabeth Hart, Thomas Farrar, Sr., Roger Toothaker, Sarah Proctor, Sarah Bassett, Susannah Roots, Mary DeRich, Sarah Pease, Elizabeth Cary, Martha Carrier, Elizabeth Fosdick, Wilmot Redd, Sarah Rice, Elizabeth Howe, Capt. John Alden, William Procter, John Flood, Mary Toothaker, Margaret Toothaker, Arthur Abbott, and more. The people of Salem started to get scared.  What if they were attacked by a witch?  What if these girls said that they were a witch?  The hysteria grew and grew.  The slightest mistake or odd behavior could make people suspect that a person was a witch.  The accused people were sent to the Salem Witch Jail located near the north river to await their trial.

On May 27, 1692, the court of Oyer and Terminer was ordered to be created by Governor William Phips.  Oyer and Terminer means to hear and determine.  In this court, people accused of witchcraft were put on trial.  If they were declared guilty, which they usually were, then they would be hanged.

A total of one hundred twenty people and two dogs died during the Salem Witch Trials. The Puritans apologized for their awful deed, but who knows, some say that in the distant future history will repeat itself.

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