WEBVTT - S1 – INTERVIEW 6: Stacy Schiff 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:04.800 Our guest historian today is Stacy Schiff, author of a 0:00:04.920 --> 0:00:08.639 number of historical works. Her book Vera was a Pulitzer 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:11.480 Prize winner, and she was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for 0:00:11.520 --> 0:00:14.960 her book Santa Suberie, and of course, her book The 0:00:15.000 --> 0:00:17.919 Witches was one of the works referenced as we researched 0:00:17.920 --> 0:00:21.200 and wrote on Obscured Season one. Her list of awards 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:24.400 of publications is enough to make any historian jealous, So 0:00:24.760 --> 0:00:27.280 I'll point you toward her full bio on the Unobscured 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:29.920 website if you want to learn more. I had a 0:00:30.000 --> 0:00:32.280 chance to sit down with Stacy Shift this past summer 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:36.159 and we had a fantastic conversation. So without further delay, 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:41.080 let's get on with the show. This is the Unobscured 0:00:41.159 --> 0:01:17.559 Interview series for season one. I'm Aaron Mankey, I'm Stacy Schiff. 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:20.640 I'm the author of The Witches, um in narrative history 0:01:20.680 --> 0:01:23.480 of what Happened at Salem, to which I came because 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:25.760 I was surprised by how little most of us really 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:29.520 know about what happened in Um Salem, which trials seemed 0:01:29.520 --> 0:01:32.160 like a shorthand, but none of us really understands to 0:01:32.319 --> 0:01:34.480 what it is a shorthand. Um. I had written a 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:36.360 book about Cleopatra before this, and it was the same 0:01:36.440 --> 0:01:38.800 kind of dynamic of just a name that a name brand, 0:01:38.880 --> 0:01:42.080 something that everyone recognizes without really having any grasp of 0:01:42.120 --> 0:01:45.640 the actual history. Well, when you talk about the misunderstanding, 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:49.000 I think the place to start here is almost the 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:53.160 most obvious question, what was a witch in Salem? And 0:01:53.200 --> 0:01:55.320 you're right, that's the question over which we stumble because 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:58.000 our definition, the century definition of a witch, is not 0:01:58.440 --> 0:02:01.160 the seventeenth century definition of a itch. So so which 0:02:01.160 --> 0:02:04.280 at the time witchcraft is a Biblical construct and which 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:07.600 at the time has a concrete reality because she's mentioned 0:02:07.600 --> 0:02:09.360 in he or she has mentioned in the Bible, and 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.560 which is understood to be any figure male or female, 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:14.840 but primarily female, who is in league with the devil, 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:18.000 and who works his or her magic by means of 0:02:18.040 --> 0:02:20.320 little imps or a menagerie of little animals, who can 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.000 do his or her bidding. Um. And that was something 0:02:23.040 --> 0:02:25.960 that was imported to the colonies from England. It was 0:02:26.000 --> 0:02:29.480 an extremely rampant It was extremely common concept in in 0:02:29.840 --> 0:02:32.600 the Old World and actually throughout the Old World. Although 0:02:32.600 --> 0:02:36.960 by two the idea of witchcraft has pretty much fallen 0:02:36.960 --> 0:02:40.440 out UM. In Europe. The colonies are in a little 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:42.120 bit of a TimewARP of their own, and they haven't 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:45.680 quite got the message that this this the switchcraft concept 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:48.120 is a little antiquated by now, UM, but you see 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:50.280 it throughout the colonial record there, which is really from 0:02:50.280 --> 0:02:52.840 the very beginning of New England. And the only difference 0:02:53.240 --> 0:02:56.680 with two is that UM is the prosecution is that 0:02:56.720 --> 0:03:00.760 you get this um feverish set of accusing tions and 0:03:00.800 --> 0:03:04.240 you get a relentless prosecution. In earlier cases, UM, there 0:03:04.240 --> 0:03:07.520 had been tremendous leniency. Often someone who brought in a 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:09.880 charge of witchcraft was accused of lying and was sent 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:12.960 home with a whipping. Um. Things were not necessarily taken seriously. 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:17.519 In obviously the opposite happens. Going back to these differences 0:03:17.520 --> 0:03:20.000 in our perception, there's how we imagine it to be 0:03:20.120 --> 0:03:22.480 and there's the reality of it. How do some of 0:03:22.520 --> 0:03:24.680 the common symbols of witchcraft that we have today, like 0:03:25.000 --> 0:03:27.960 flying on a broomstick or black cats, connect with the 0:03:27.960 --> 0:03:31.919 Sandwich trials or do they? One of the one of 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:34.079 the most interesting to meet pieces of this is how 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:37.880 the flight gets into UM. The entire panic, the entire 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:41.560 delusion in there had not been um, there had not 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:45.160 been flying witches in New England before six UM, and 0:03:45.160 --> 0:03:46.840 it would see and they were not flying, which is 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:49.720 an English witchcraft either. So this is really an import 0:03:49.800 --> 0:03:52.360 from the continent. And it would seem that we get 0:03:52.400 --> 0:03:55.560 that idea from a narrative that cotton Mouth, one of 0:03:55.560 --> 0:03:58.400 the most influential ministers at the time, includes in an 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:01.760 earlier text of his and he writes about a Swedish 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:04.720 witchcraft epidemic in which a little girl UM is on 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:07.720 her way to a satanic meeting to two young children 0:04:07.800 --> 0:04:11.000 in fact set off this witchcraft crisis, and a little 0:04:11.000 --> 0:04:13.080 girl falls off her broomstick. He writes about all these 0:04:13.120 --> 0:04:16.240 wonderful details which we will then see transpost to Massachusetts. 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.240 But he writes about things that had never before happened 0:04:18.240 --> 0:04:21.320 in New England. A satanic meeting UM in a meadow 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:24.039 at which people sign satanic pacts into which they fly 0:04:24.400 --> 0:04:27.320 on sticks. UM. And that is really there were French 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:29.919 flight French flying, which is before suct. Ninety two, there 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:33.040 had never really been English flying witches. So that's pretty 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:35.680 pretty much seems to be where that aspect of it 0:04:35.720 --> 0:04:38.479 comes from. Black Cats I spent a lot of time. 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:40.039 I live with a black cat, so I spent a 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:42.160 lot of time on black cats. And they seem to 0:04:42.200 --> 0:04:44.080 have been the devil since antiquity. They've they've had a 0:04:44.080 --> 0:04:46.520 bad wrap all along. And if you look at the 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:50.680 Salem testimony, the court testimony, you see a tremendous number 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:53.200 of cats. They're translucent cats, there are gleaming cats, they're 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:55.359 black cats, they're red cats. They're all over the place. 0:04:55.600 --> 0:04:57.680 And it does it does seem to be it's a 0:04:57.720 --> 0:05:02.000 seductive creature, it's a female, mean creature many many people's minds, 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:04.760 and a black cat will detach itself from the darkness 0:05:04.960 --> 0:05:08.240 without any warning, and it's a cat is unpredictable. So 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:10.200 there's that sense that you can caress a cat and 0:05:10.240 --> 0:05:13.520 be rewarded with scratches, and all of those things seem 0:05:13.560 --> 0:05:15.440 to add up to something that people are very uncertain 0:05:15.480 --> 0:05:18.880 about and often taken aback by. So there are many 0:05:18.960 --> 0:05:21.039 number of theories as to how black cats get get 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:23.000 wrapped up in the witchcraft. But yes, that is a 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:25.919 constant from day one. We talk about uncertainties and and 0:05:26.000 --> 0:05:30.160 the unpredictability of the world around the Puritans. Um tell 0:05:30.240 --> 0:05:32.599 Us about how they viewed the natural world around them, 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:35.559 and you know, in relation to to how they viewed 0:05:35.560 --> 0:05:38.760 God and their mission of this thriving Puritan culture. You know, 0:05:38.800 --> 0:05:41.919 you have things like the weather or um, the economy 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:43.800 or politics in the world around them, and how do 0:05:43.880 --> 0:05:47.400 they view all of those as in relation to their 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:51.160 their safety or their faith. Everything you just mentioned is 0:05:51.200 --> 0:05:53.919 in flux and essentially in so you've just you've just 0:05:53.960 --> 0:05:57.400 given a great overview. Um. They've just a very bloody 0:05:57.400 --> 0:06:00.000 and very tragic war with the Native Americans, with the 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:02.279 Indians they would have called them, has just ended. And 0:06:02.320 --> 0:06:05.479 pretty much everyone UM in New England at this point 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:08.440 has lost a friend or a relative in that conflict 0:06:08.680 --> 0:06:10.640 and in new war where the Indians is about to start. 0:06:10.680 --> 0:06:14.400 So there's a sense of being um under assault certainly 0:06:14.440 --> 0:06:17.640 and under siege, which is very Ums, very much goes 0:06:17.640 --> 0:06:19.359 to the heart of Puritanism. I mean, these people have 0:06:19.400 --> 0:06:22.960 come to America because precisely because they feel persecuted. Um. 0:06:23.279 --> 0:06:25.960 They are at the one the one hand, watchful people, 0:06:26.040 --> 0:06:28.839 always watching for the second coming, of always watching over 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:31.720 each other. There's a great sense of community and they 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:33.719 are in a hostile world. I mean, it's not for 0:06:33.800 --> 0:06:36.919 nothing that they refer constantly to the howling wilderness, and 0:06:36.960 --> 0:06:40.240 that howling wilderness is, when you begin to look at it, UM, 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:43.360 a pretty frightening place. We have wolves, very wolves barking 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.560 in the wolves howling in the distance. UM at all times. 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:50.400 We have obviously the Indians vanishing into the bushes at 0:06:50.440 --> 0:06:52.440 all times with a lot of UM, with a lot 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:54.840 of subsequent trauma for the colonists. We have an economy 0:06:54.880 --> 0:06:57.640 that's in tatters at this point, and I think not 0:06:58.040 --> 0:07:01.840 um unimportantly and actually fun to mentally, there's a political 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:05.520 hiccup at this moment. You're in two the colonies between 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:09.440 governors UM. No one knows they've overthrown the royal governor 0:07:09.560 --> 0:07:11.880 UM in a really sort of preview for the American 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:14.600 Revolution and a military coup a few years earlier, and 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:16.400 they don't know if they're about to be punished for this, 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:18.680 and they don't know what kind of government they can 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:21.360 expect and what kind of governor they can expect. And 0:07:21.400 --> 0:07:24.280 it's in that little interregnum that the witchcraft breaks out. 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:26.480 So there is this sense of being on the precipice, 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:30.200 watching for signs. And this is a religion which gives 0:07:30.200 --> 0:07:33.720 itself very much to watching, making meaning of any little incident, 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:36.080 which of course means that when you see something you 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:39.880 can't explain. Witchcraft is a very good explanation, um. Watching 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:42.840 for this new what this new government will constitute watching 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:45.880 each other, which of course also ends in accusations of 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:48.360 various kinds, um, and trying to make sense of this 0:07:49.080 --> 0:07:52.840 very very hostile, difficult world. You talk about the wilderness, 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:56.000 and I think what I appreciate about what you brought 0:07:56.080 --> 0:07:59.680 to your approach to the Sandwich trials is that it's 0:07:59.720 --> 0:08:02.800 easy for a lot of people to stay in Salem 0:08:03.040 --> 0:08:04.640 in the sale, you know, the town, in the village, 0:08:04.680 --> 0:08:07.840 and leave the focus there. But but what you're bringing 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:10.840 up is that there's this there's an outer conflict going on, 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:13.600 especially to the north in the frontier of Maine on 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:16.040 the edges of what people feel like is they're safe space, 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:21.400 and that conflict is quite literally coming back into Salem village. 0:08:21.400 --> 0:08:24.000 I mean some of these refugees right exactly, and you 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:27.400 have you have both that conflict beginning to approach because um, 0:08:27.440 --> 0:08:30.280 because the border with the Indians is getting closer and closer, 0:08:30.360 --> 0:08:32.880 and you have this influx of refugees and there are 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:35.880 any number of the accusing girls whom we know have 0:08:36.040 --> 0:08:39.200 come from families and what is today southern Maine, um 0:08:39.320 --> 0:08:42.280 who had known Indian attack or who had lost parents 0:08:42.400 --> 0:08:45.000 in Indian attack. I should also just have mentioned, by 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:47.480 the way, the darkness, and this was something that struck 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:50.640 me over and over when reading the court testimony, the 0:08:50.679 --> 0:08:53.720 prior court testimonies. These people were lived in a pitch 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:58.040 black world. And when objects move and and make sounds 0:08:58.080 --> 0:09:00.800 in the dark, you know, we you know what that's like. 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:02.840 And this is a world in which really you can't 0:09:02.880 --> 0:09:05.959 see the shapes, and shapes very often resolve themselves into 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:09.400 something else altogether. Um. In that sense of really being 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:12.400 on edge and having the inexplicable you know right before you, 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:16.720 and not knowing what danger you should anticipate is very raw. 0:09:17.160 --> 0:09:19.120 And you see a lot of it throughout, even things 0:09:19.120 --> 0:09:21.160 which don't concern witchcraft. You see a great deal of that. 0:09:21.160 --> 0:09:23.480 People sneaking into basements, people not being able to make 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:26.520 sense of a creaking beam, people wondering, you know, how 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:30.000 how the roof has suddenly flown off the meetinghouse. Yeah, well, 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:32.400 I just keep thinking back to what you said about 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:35.680 black hats and how they do bleed into the blackness 0:09:35.720 --> 0:09:38.679 of the night or a dark room and just step 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:41.480 out whenever they want, and it's kind of systematic or 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:44.439 symbolic of everything happening around them. My favorites were always 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:47.160 the court testimony. This is prior to the witchcraft years, 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:48.880 of women who would report that they'd come home at 0:09:48.960 --> 0:09:50.640 night and they've crawled into bed to find another man, 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:53.480 not their husband's sleeping there, right, I mean, just anything 0:09:53.520 --> 0:09:55.959 could happen because you couldn't see in the dark, right. 0:09:56.040 --> 0:09:58.439 And also and the length of the winter was unpredictable, 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:01.200 so there was the additional question of do we have 0:10:01.280 --> 0:10:03.000 enough firewood, do we have enough food? Are we going 0:10:03.080 --> 0:10:04.760 to make it through the winter? This is a you know, 0:10:04.760 --> 0:10:08.600 this is a very barren climate in many ways. Um, 0:10:08.800 --> 0:10:10.920 some winters in the winter before sixteen ninety two was 0:10:10.960 --> 0:10:14.880 particularly severe. Some winters were very very horrible. Um, how 0:10:14.920 --> 0:10:15.960 are you going to make it through? Do you have 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:18.720 the firewood? It's going to take? Well? You know, you 0:10:18.720 --> 0:10:21.640 talk about the darkness and the unknown and the propensities 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:25.600 who look for excuses or to play supernatural blame on things. 0:10:26.000 --> 0:10:28.880 Colinists seemed to see the devil everywhere around them. What 0:10:28.960 --> 0:10:31.000 was their view of the devil. Who was the devil 0:10:31.080 --> 0:10:35.000 to them? In two? The devil is I spent a 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:38.040 lot of time on this. The devil is a very um. 0:10:38.080 --> 0:10:41.040 There's a very abstract and inconsistent sense of the devil. 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:43.480 At this point, there's an enormous amount of devil talk, 0:10:43.960 --> 0:10:46.720 both from the both from the pulpit and among the people. 0:10:46.760 --> 0:10:49.400 There are lots of just in day to day discourse, 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:51.080 there are lots of mentions of the devil, and go 0:10:51.160 --> 0:10:52.679 to the devil, and you know you are a devil, 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:55.480 and your wife's, especially your wife's a devil. Um. No 0:10:55.480 --> 0:10:58.160 one really seems all that certain who the devil is. 0:10:58.679 --> 0:11:03.080 He has, however, a very palpable presence, and the sense 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:06.040 that evil is lurking obviously is very close to the 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:07.600 to the mind of many of these many of the 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:11.640 villagers who are at the heart of a story. Ultimately, 0:11:11.640 --> 0:11:13.440 when the witchcraft testimony, when there will be a lot 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:15.560 of witchcraft testimony, you begin to see that people have 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:17.800 a very different vision of who he is. He's sometimes 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:19.440 a tall man, he's sometimes a short man. He has 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:20.840 a club and foot, or he doesn't have a club 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:24.160 and foot. It's there's a very vague sense of who 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:28.520 this sinister creature is, but he's very palpably there. Absolutely 0:11:29.280 --> 0:11:32.320 years before Salem, we have the episode with the Godwin children. 0:11:33.440 --> 0:11:37.400 Can you tell us about how the event with the 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:41.680 Godwin children UM shaped the response like that initial response 0:11:41.720 --> 0:11:44.400 when when Betty and Abigail begin to have these similar 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:46.760 fits in the home of a minister, it would have 0:11:46.800 --> 0:11:51.160 been almost impossible for Samuel Paris, the father and uncle 0:11:51.200 --> 0:11:54.679 of those two girls, not to have known intimately of 0:11:54.760 --> 0:11:57.760 the Godwin case. Um. First of all, the Godwin case 0:11:57.840 --> 0:11:59.880 is included in an earlier book of Cotton Mathers, so 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:01.440 many people would have read of it, and I mean 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:03.640 it was this was sensationalist reading. We would all have 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:06.360 you known of this in a way, um. And he 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:08.680 was friends with one of the he Paris was friends 0:12:09.240 --> 0:12:11.240 with one of the ministers who had observed the girls 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:14.040 in their distress, with those children in their distress, and 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:16.720 it was his congregation which was involved in Boston, So 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:19.040 it would have been a story that he was on 0:12:19.160 --> 0:12:23.439 quite close terms with the symptoms in the Paris household 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:26.959 and in the Godwin whole household are very similar. Um. 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:31.359 He's very Paris is very slow to mention the word witchcraft, 0:12:31.920 --> 0:12:33.280 but the word must have been at the tip of 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:35.839 his tongue because they're such a correlation between the two. 0:12:36.160 --> 0:12:38.480 So in the Godwin case, UM, you have a couple 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:42.080 of afflicted children who begin to um, to writhe and 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:45.520 to roar and to gallop around on imaginary steeds, and 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:48.280 who can't seem to pray and conscrub a clean table 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:50.160 but not a dirty table, and won't do their chores, 0:12:50.280 --> 0:12:53.320 very similar set of symptoms. Conn mother will step in 0:12:53.840 --> 0:12:55.960 and try to make a sort of clinical study of 0:12:55.960 --> 0:12:58.720 what is happening with those children. UM. And in the 0:12:58.760 --> 0:13:01.800 course of that, a washer woman and a laundry woman 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:04.040 in Boston is accused of having bit witched the girls, 0:13:04.080 --> 0:13:06.920 and she actually will hang on Boston Common. And that's 0:13:06.920 --> 0:13:11.280 the most recent UM prosecution for witchcraft before and one, 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:13.640 both in terms of the symptoms and in terms of 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:16.680 the fallout that would have been on many people's minds. 0:13:17.440 --> 0:13:19.600 You mentioned the symptoms. One of the things that I've 0:13:19.640 --> 0:13:24.160 noticed through my work. On my other podcast lore UM 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:27.880 some continental you know you you talked about the broomsticks 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:30.600 and the flying witches and how there were differences between 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:33.160 Europe and England and then and then the New World 0:13:33.200 --> 0:13:38.760 we here, Um, the symptoms seem to be interpreted differently, 0:13:39.120 --> 0:13:41.480 whether it's on the continent or in England or the 0:13:41.480 --> 0:13:42.880 New World. You know. So we have the events of 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:45.679 lu Dunne in France, where a lot of nuns at 0:13:45.679 --> 0:13:47.240 a convent went through a lot of the same symptoms 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:50.280 of convulsions and seizures, but that was viewed as possession. 0:13:50.559 --> 0:13:54.040 And it seems that here in Salem, same symptoms but 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:57.800 viewed as they are being afflicted by a witch who's 0:13:57.840 --> 0:14:00.960 outside somewhere. And why are the differences like that? Is 0:14:00.960 --> 0:14:04.000 that an Anglican versus Catholic difference or is it something deeper? 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:07.680 It's not. And it's something that even in six people 0:14:07.720 --> 0:14:10.520 had trouble passing one from the other. There's a little 0:14:10.520 --> 0:14:13.160 confusion as to where witchcraft ends in possession begins. And 0:14:13.160 --> 0:14:14.880 you see it even in the work of Cotton Mother, 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:18.559 where initially he says it's either witchcraft or possession. Um. 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:20.520 The bottom line, and TI meant to put it baldly, 0:14:20.640 --> 0:14:23.640 is that in possession you are not complicit um. I mean, 0:14:23.840 --> 0:14:25.720 are you are complicit in the witchcraft? You are not 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:28.760 complicit in what's happening, so a case of possession would 0:14:28.800 --> 0:14:32.760 have been preferable. Um in many ways, Um, you see 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:36.400 increased mother cotton, mother's father also a minister grappling with this, 0:14:36.560 --> 0:14:40.280 trying to basically differentiate the two. They sometimes they in 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.040 a way bleed into each other. The differences that with 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:45.840 possession you don't have a guilty party, and in witchcraft 0:14:45.880 --> 0:14:48.320 you have you can point an accusing finger at the 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:51.160 person who is causing this distress. The similarity with with 0:14:51.240 --> 0:14:54.960 Ludon is interesting because um, again you have a case 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:59.120 of women living together in a very cloistered, very sheltered environment, 0:14:59.680 --> 0:15:02.480 very visually monotonous. I mean, there are a lot of 0:15:02.480 --> 0:15:05.840 similarities with a winter, a very white winter in the 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:10.120 cold in Salem, absolutely or Samuel Willard's experienced twenty years 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:14.160 before Salem with exactly exactly who goes on to marry 0:15:14.160 --> 0:15:17.320 a man named Samuel Scripture, which I have always pleasure 0:15:17.320 --> 0:15:19.680 in that she's she's actually a fascinating character because she's 0:15:19.680 --> 0:15:23.640 clearly so enjoying this attention, and I've loved reading about 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:26.320 her because there were so many hints anyway of what 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:28.080 must have been it must have felt like for the 0:15:28.080 --> 0:15:30.440 Salem girls in the sense that you could dismiss the 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:32.400 women around your bedside but ask for the handsome men 0:15:32.480 --> 0:15:34.600 to stay to observe you in your distress. So yeah, 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:38.400 there were many advantages to some of these afflictions. Let's 0:15:38.400 --> 0:15:41.360 shift gears from witchcraft and perceptions of the world and 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:45.560 talk about the trial for a bit. Um in your estimation, 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:49.320 who were the people who are really propelling the trial forward? 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.880 What were the cultural forces who were pressing them into 0:15:53.920 --> 0:15:56.520 this sequence of events. You can't have this kind of 0:15:56.520 --> 0:15:59.880 a prosecution without an inherent belief in the existence of witchcraft. 0:16:00.080 --> 0:16:03.200 So for starters, you have a religious base here, which 0:16:03.560 --> 0:16:08.200 obviously encourages this kind of an examination, if not prosecution. UM. 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:10.680 Everyone has his reasons. In this case, you have local reasons, 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:12.600 and then you have larger cultural reasons, and you have 0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:16.240 political and religious reasons. Locally, you have a minister, and 0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:19.080 this would be Samuel Paris, who was it on with 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:23.400 his community. UM was divisive by nature, was bitter by nature. 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:27.520 UM had had every reason to fall out with certain families. 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:30.920 And in this case it's probably not. It's probably happy 0:16:30.960 --> 0:16:35.600 to encourage something that is going to UM somewhat purge 0:16:35.640 --> 0:16:39.240 the community of auto off some elements. UM. In a 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:42.360 larger way, however, which you really have is a set 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:45.800 of ministers and a set of civic authorities, UM, whoever 0:16:46.000 --> 0:16:50.280 different reasons, are really working in lockstep, working hand in glove. UM. 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:52.760 Each of those groups has a tremendous amount to gain 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:57.080 at this very sort of precarious political moment from a 0:16:57.080 --> 0:17:00.080 witchcraft prosecution. And you can see that most clearly, I 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:03.040 think with Cotton Mother, Um, the young Minister of the 0:17:03.040 --> 0:17:05.600 young sort of great hope of the New England Ministry, 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:08.679 and William Stowton, who's the Chief Justice and the Lieutenant Governor, 0:17:08.960 --> 0:17:12.040 who really is the driving force behind the trials and 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:15.080 was probably the single person who had the power to 0:17:15.119 --> 0:17:17.040 slow them down, if not stop them, and choose and 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:19.199 chooses not to. And in fact when the court, when 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:21.680 the Witchcraft Court will be shut down in the fall 0:17:21.720 --> 0:17:25.040 of two, he will throw a very public temper tantrum 0:17:25.080 --> 0:17:26.600 because he feels that he was, as he puts it, 0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:28.720 on his way to ridding New England of these creatures 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:33.200 and he's been stopped. Stoton Sorry, So Stone is really 0:17:33.200 --> 0:17:37.080 the figure. Insofar as one is tempted to lay blame 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.080 at someone's feet, I would have alas Finger William Stowton, 0:17:40.240 --> 0:17:43.159 who he's very little. Uh. There's very little paper record 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:45.520 for Stone, and it's it's shocking how little there is. 0:17:45.560 --> 0:17:48.040 It's also interesting that after the trials, when he clearly 0:17:48.080 --> 0:17:50.920 is the driving force and the most devout and most 0:17:50.960 --> 0:17:53.520 pious of he really feels he's on a crusade against 0:17:53.520 --> 0:17:57.000 this witchcraft. Um. He will remain in political power. That 0:17:57.080 --> 0:17:59.280 will never be a sense of questioning him, that will 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:02.680 never be a sin of sidelining him. He'll remain in power. UM. 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:05.639 But you see it most clearly because these um, both 0:18:05.640 --> 0:18:08.640 of these forces, the church and the civic authorities, are 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:11.320 trying together to prop up a new government. They have 0:18:11.359 --> 0:18:15.160 William Phipps, the new governor who's arrived. They have um 0:18:15.400 --> 0:18:18.160 not endeared themselves to the mother country, and they're trying 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:20.080 to prove their own a law and order campaign. They're 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:24.280 trying to prove um that they can adjudicate their own affairs, 0:18:24.600 --> 0:18:26.760 that they can um, they don't need any help from 0:18:26.760 --> 0:18:29.160 the old country. There is not utter chaos and disorder 0:18:29.160 --> 0:18:32.200 in the colony as has been reported. And in Stone's case, 0:18:32.240 --> 0:18:35.159 he's really trying to rehabilitate himself. He's a He's a 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:37.480 the ultimate political survivor. He's been a member of many 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:40.760 different governments. He had helped out the previous very prominently, 0:18:40.760 --> 0:18:43.800 had ousted the royal governor. Um, and this is a 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:46.720 case where he can really prove his metal. Um Cotton 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:50.639 Mother will go to him just as the objections to 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:53.160 the trials begin to surface in the fall and say, 0:18:53.240 --> 0:18:55.440 why don't I write something to flatten the fury, as 0:18:55.480 --> 0:18:58.920 he puts it? And Um, when that book is published, 0:18:58.920 --> 0:19:01.920 which we know as Wonders of Invisible World, it will 0:19:01.960 --> 0:19:04.760 come out as if as if Stone had actually asked 0:19:05.200 --> 0:19:07.080 Um Mather to write it. So you begin to see 0:19:07.080 --> 0:19:08.920 a little bit of the of the of the game 0:19:08.960 --> 0:19:11.639 these two are playing together in the most damning statement. 0:19:11.640 --> 0:19:14.720 I guess, Um, and answer to your question, after the trials, 0:19:15.359 --> 0:19:18.240 Um Cotton Mother will write, not not for publication, that 0:19:18.800 --> 0:19:23.040 he felt afterward that Um, these events had really helped God. 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.000 They Christ had got more disciples, God had was more 0:19:26.000 --> 0:19:28.560 closely embraced, This had awakened the sluggish that had filled 0:19:28.600 --> 0:19:31.120 the pews, and the devil had got precisely nothing out 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.119 of the deal. It doesn't mention, of course, the innocent 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:36.000 lives that were lost in the process. Absolutely the cost 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:38.960 of all of that. Um. And a lot of that 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:43.560 began in the meeting house in Salem Village. Um, sort 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:47.120 of that pre trial examination that happened before we moved 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:49.560 to oil and terminer in Salem Town. But what do 0:19:49.600 --> 0:19:52.560 you think the atmosphere was like in that meeting house especially? 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:55.159 You know that first and talking to Richard Trask, he 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:58.120 said that first day there there gonna be fifty people 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:02.720 living in Salem and they were standing out the packed house, 0:20:02.720 --> 0:20:04.800 standing outside the windows in the cold, watching And what 0:20:04.800 --> 0:20:06.520 do you think that was like? If there were five 0:20:07.200 --> 0:20:09.199 people in Salem? And I think Richard's exactly right. They 0:20:09.200 --> 0:20:12.320 were probably more than five packed into that space, which 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.159 I think is by thirty eight or some I mean, 0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:18.840 it's tiny, it's a tiny little space. Um. And we 0:20:18.880 --> 0:20:22.800 know from there too, extremely good accounts of those early examinations, 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:24.480 one from a man whose wife had come to try 0:20:24.520 --> 0:20:26.720 to defend herself and the second from a from a 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:29.560