WEBVTT - S1 – 4: The Refugees 0:00:11.080 --> 0:00:15.480 There were a lot of rumors about Abigail. Some were small, 0:00:15.600 --> 0:00:19.280 as you might expect. She was rude, she was unseemly, 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:24.520 she was irreverent. But there were other more specific rumors, 0:00:24.880 --> 0:00:27.200 and those were the kinds that spread like fire in 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:30.640 a dry barn. They whispered that she lay out alone 0:00:30.680 --> 0:00:34.160 in the woods at night, that she was disobedient at home, 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:37.840 that she openly mocked the traditions of the Puritan faith, 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:40.960 even going as far as to use the Lord's name 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:43.840 in vain, That she made a pact with the devil. 0:00:44.720 --> 0:00:50.080 And all of it was true. Abigail's family lived in 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:54.240 the village of Topsfield, roughly five miles north of Salem Village. 0:00:54.720 --> 0:00:57.880 They were part of that larger Salem community in which 0:00:57.960 --> 0:01:01.280 the same way Beverly and over when Um and others were, 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:05.760 But they hadn't always been in Topsfield as far as 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:08.600 I can tell. Abigail was born there, but at the 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:13.759 age of four, ten years before the events of her father, William, 0:01:13.800 --> 0:01:16.880 packed the family up and headed north to Fallmouth, Maine. 0:01:17.440 --> 0:01:20.960 Over the next seven years, though tragedy crashed against her 0:01:21.000 --> 0:01:25.920 family like ocean waves. The Native American attacks on those 0:01:25.959 --> 0:01:31.200 northern frontier communities were brutal and deadly. Abigail lost siblings, 0:01:31.640 --> 0:01:35.400 she lost her mother, and finally her father lost their land, 0:01:35.680 --> 0:01:39.160 forcing them to return to tops Field and defeat. But 0:01:39.240 --> 0:01:44.120 they didn't come alone. William had remarried, so his new wife, Deliverance, 0:01:44.200 --> 0:01:48.800 came home with them. All of this is context. It's 0:01:48.960 --> 0:01:52.680 stage dressing. If we want to understand who Abigail was. 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:55.600 These are stories that we need to hear because they 0:01:55.600 --> 0:01:58.440 help us see her experience. But the one thing they 0:01:58.440 --> 0:02:02.120 don't explain is why she being so hard into these rumors. 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:05.800 You see, These stories of Satanic packs and sleeping in 0:02:05.840 --> 0:02:09.680 the woods weren't rumors told about her. These were things 0:02:09.840 --> 0:02:15.960 she said about herself. Abigail Hobbs was a witch, and 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:53.880 she was proud of it. This is unobscured. I'm Aaron Manky. 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:02.000 To take our next step forward into Salem, we need 0:03:02.040 --> 0:03:07.079 to travel somewhere else Maine. Now I know what you're thinking. 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.680 I'm here for the Salem, which trials, not the history 0:03:10.680 --> 0:03:14.480 of Maine, and I can understand. But as I've often repeated, 0:03:14.639 --> 0:03:19.560 context is everything. No historical event takes place inside a vacuum. 0:03:19.680 --> 0:03:22.200 And if we're ever going to fully understand what happened 0:03:22.200 --> 0:03:25.600 in Salem. We need to cast a wider net. Believe me, 0:03:26.160 --> 0:03:30.359 we'll be better off for it. Maine was founded decades 0:03:30.440 --> 0:03:34.320 before as a separate colony from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:38.840 and the two regions grew differently as well. Massachusetts expanded fast, 0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:42.480 allowing cities to form, which attracted better off families and 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:47.280 people who were less adventurous. Early settlements in Maine, however, 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:50.720 tended to stick to the Rocky Coast. They were less 0:03:50.760 --> 0:03:54.760 city like, functioning more as outposts to gather materials needed 0:03:54.800 --> 0:03:59.120 in the more urban communities around Boston. Here's Marybeth Norton, 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:03.720 professor of an American History at Cornell University. Maine in 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:08.520 the sixteen seventies and sixteen nineties was really where the 0:04:08.560 --> 0:04:12.240 action was as far as profit to be made in 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:17.120 New England. In Boston, people had bought land, they had 0:04:17.120 --> 0:04:20.600 set up sawmills. Boston had a very vigorous ship building 0:04:20.640 --> 0:04:24.800 industry that the sawmills in Maine were providing the timber 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:29.480 for the very well developed pines were perfect for ships. 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:34.640 Mass These early main communities places like Falmouth up in 0:04:34.760 --> 0:04:39.480 Casco Bay and Wells York and Saco all served as 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:43.360 borderland between the safer realm of Massachusetts and the evil 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:47.240 of the frontier up north. More than anywhere else the 0:04:47.279 --> 0:04:53.280 settlers could think of was darkness and danger. Around sixteen 0:04:53.360 --> 0:04:56.080 fifty two, a group of settlers in Maine decided to 0:04:56.120 --> 0:04:59.760 petition parliament back in England for the ability to rule themselves. 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:02.719 But when word of their plans got out, the government 0:05:02.800 --> 0:05:06.440 in Massachusetts became worried. They were getting rich off of 0:05:06.480 --> 0:05:09.600 those Maine frontiersmen, and they didn't want to lose that. 0:05:10.080 --> 0:05:13.240 So they examined their own charter and somehow found a 0:05:13.240 --> 0:05:17.200 loophole that gave them authority over Maine. Convenience I know, 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:22.040 but don't go assuming that the government of Massachusetts rushed 0:05:22.040 --> 0:05:25.359 in to grab control of Maine because they loved the place. No, 0:05:25.520 --> 0:05:28.200 they loved the resources that flowed out of it and 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:31.520 the wealth it pumped into their economy. But Maine itself 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:35.960 was something straight out of their Puritan nightmares. To the 0:05:35.960 --> 0:05:40.119 Puritans in Boston and Salem, Maine was a godless land. 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:44.360 The settlers there rejected English communal order and were less 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:47.120 interested in building the Puritan city on a hill that 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:51.280 was so important to the folks in Salem. Abigail Hobb's 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:54.919 new stepmother was a great example of this. Here was 0:05:55.040 --> 0:05:58.520 an adult woman living in Puritan New England, and she 0:05:58.600 --> 0:06:03.120 had never been baptized by the Church. Maine came with 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:07.120 another challenge as well, proximity to the Native American tribes 0:06:07.160 --> 0:06:11.760 to the north. Not just proximity, but conflict. As you 0:06:11.839 --> 0:06:15.440 might imagine, the English settlers were spreading out, taking over 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:18.039 more and more land that belonged to the people who 0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:21.880 already lived there. They justified it with law and religion too, 0:06:22.080 --> 0:06:24.719 claiming that the Crown had given them authority over every 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:28.440 single person within their territory, whether they were English or not. 0:06:29.480 --> 0:06:32.520 So as the Native Americans watched their lands get swallowed 0:06:32.600 --> 0:06:35.960 up by a hungry colonial enterprise, they felt the need 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:39.120 to do something. Some of them fell in line and 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:42.160 accepted it, believing that being nice to the English would 0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:45.200 benefit them in the long run. Others went looking for 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:48.480 powerful friends to help them, eventually connecting with the French 0:06:48.520 --> 0:06:51.200 settlers far to the north. But there was a third 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:54.000 group that wanted none of that, and they lashed out 0:06:54.040 --> 0:06:59.320 in the only way they could think of, with violence. Now, 0:06:59.400 --> 0:07:02.919 of course, if Massachusetts hadn't rushed in and taken control 0:07:02.960 --> 0:07:06.560 of Maine. Those frontier settlers would have had to defend themselves, 0:07:07.160 --> 0:07:10.920 but that's not how it happened. Massachusetts got greedy, and 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:15.360 because of that they were responsible for that defense. In 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:19.280 sixteen seventy five, war broke out between the English colonists 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:22.000 and the Native Americans around them, who were led by 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:25.000 a man named Meta Coom. He preferred to call himself 0:07:25.000 --> 0:07:27.560 by a more English title, though, so he went by 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:31.200 the name King Philip. The three year conflict then became 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:35.680 known as King Philip's War. It was a bloody, violent 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:40.080 time too. Both sides took hostages, both sides went back 0:07:40.080 --> 0:07:42.720 on their promises that could have ended the fighting. There 0:07:42.720 --> 0:07:45.920 were stories of Native children having their head smashed in 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:50.400 and of pregnant English women being murdered and sculped. Both 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:53.720 sides crossed the line of human decency far too often. 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:58.800 Mary Beth Norton once again. The Indian War then finally 0:07:58.840 --> 0:08:01.640 came to an end more less with a truce in 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:06.000 sixteen seventy eight. It was devastating to the English who 0:08:06.040 --> 0:08:10.760 had settled in Maine and New Hampshire. They had abandoned 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:14.400 their communities in that period. They moved back in and 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:18.560 then the Second War started in six and it all 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:20.960 happened all over again, so it was devastating. It was 0:08:21.040 --> 0:08:25.720 devastating war. Basically, the Indian Wars devastated the economy of 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:28.880 Maine and Maine in a lot of ways never really recovered. 0:08:29.240 --> 0:08:32.319 People didn't come back until the seventeen twenties, and when 0:08:32.360 --> 0:08:35.800 they did a lot of the entrepreneurial energy was gone. 0:08:36.160 --> 0:08:47.720 So it was really very bad. Abigail Hobbs family were 0:08:47.800 --> 0:08:50.960 some of the people displaced by that war. They had 0:08:51.000 --> 0:08:53.760 left hops Field in sixteen eighty two looking for a 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:57.120 better life. Most of the land in and around Salem 0:08:57.200 --> 0:09:00.280 was owned by a small handful of wealthy families like 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:04.439 the Porters, and Putnam's Maine had represented their chance to 0:09:04.480 --> 0:09:06.880 get out from under the thumb of the one percent 0:09:07.200 --> 0:09:11.000 and make a better life for themselves. Elsewhere, the Indian Wars, 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:14.040 as they called them back then, ruined all of that. 0:09:15.720 --> 0:09:19.160 Another person affected by the war was George Burrows. Now 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:22.400 if that name sounds familiar, that's because Burrows served as 0:09:22.440 --> 0:09:25.920 minister of the Salem Village Church years before Samuel Parris, 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:29.320 way back in sixteen eighty one. But he started up 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:32.880 in Falmouth Maine, where he was the minister there. An 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:36.160 attack on Falmouth back in August of sixteen seventy six 0:09:36.440 --> 0:09:39.400 left dozens of settlers dead and sent a wave of 0:09:39.440 --> 0:09:43.840 refugees south to say For territory. Burrows managed to escape 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:46.720 along with a three year old girl named Mercy Lewis, 0:09:46.760 --> 0:09:50.600 whose entire family had been killed. After living and working 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:53.000 for a time in the town of Salisbury, he and 0:09:53.120 --> 0:09:57.520 Mercy traveled farther south, eventually arriving in Salem Village in 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:02.839 sixteen eighty one. After his time serving as the second 0:10:02.840 --> 0:10:06.480 minister of the church in Salem Village, Burrows actually returned 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:09.520 to Maine. The war was over and many people were 0:10:09.559 --> 0:10:12.520 beginning the long journey back north to reclaim their lost 0:10:12.600 --> 0:10:17.000 land and try rebuilding, and George Burrows went along with them. 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:20.319 Money flowed back north as well. Folks in the Salem 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:24.280 area felt safe to reinvest money in Maine, including the Putnams. 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:27.400 And here's the amazing part of it all. If you 0:10:27.440 --> 0:10:29.640 were to look at a list of the people settling 0:10:29.720 --> 0:10:32.760 in or working with those settlers up in Maine, a 0:10:32.840 --> 0:10:35.680 whole slew of Salem names would jump off the page 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:39.160 at you. Heck, when the conflict resurfaced in the late 0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:43.080 sixteen eighties. It was the Salem magistrates John Hawthorne and 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:46.880 Jonathan Corwin who took a trip north to inspect the situation. 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:51.840 People in Salem were fully aware of the danger lurking 0:10:52.000 --> 0:10:56.320 just beyond their borders. Here's Marybeth Norton once again. What 0:10:56.440 --> 0:10:59.320 happened was all the people who had been settling in 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:02.480 Maine had to somewhere if they weren't killed, and so 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:06.480 they filtered down into Massachusetts. They filtered down, especially into 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:09.959 Essex County, which is the northernmost county of Massachusetts, the 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:13.120 northeastern most county, and so a lot of the people 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:16.439 came to live in marble Head, or came to live 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:19.440 in Salem, are came indeed to live in Salem Village. 0:11:20.480 --> 0:11:24.360 All of that is context. You can't understand Sale and 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:28.880 Village in without understanding Maine. In the decades leading up 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:32.240 to it. They weren't too disparate, places that never bumped 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:35.719 into each other. These were sibling communities joined at the 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:40.720 hip through family ties, military service, and economic needs. Every 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:44.199 person inside Sale and Village was acutely aware of what 0:11:44.240 --> 0:11:46.960 was happening to the folks in Maine, even more so 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:51.160 when those refugees began to flood back toward them. Oh 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:54.320 and one last thing I want to point out. On 0:11:54.400 --> 0:12:00.000 January six, just days before Betty Paris and Abigail well 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:02.959 Illiams were about to fall into fits for the first time, 0:12:03.280 --> 0:12:07.480 a Native American raid destroyed another settlement in Maine. Not 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:11.040 Falmouth far to the north though no this raid happened 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:14.439 much closer in the southern town of York. From the 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:18.120 perspective of the people in Salem, the conflict and danger 0:12:18.400 --> 0:12:21.800 was headed right toward them. So keep all of that 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:24.640 in mind as we move forward, because the next events 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:27.439 might very well take place in Salem, but that doesn't 0:12:27.480 --> 0:12:31.000 mean they're isolated. And some historians think that everything that 0:12:31.120 --> 0:12:35.120 was about to happen could be blamed on Abigail Hobbs, who, 0:12:35.120 --> 0:12:37.840 thanks to the wild stories she was telling her friends, 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:42.800 ended up being arrested on April nineteen. Her examination happened 0:12:42.800 --> 0:12:46.520 a short time later, and it came with some interesting revelations. 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:52.160 Standing before the magistrates, Abigail Hobbs spoke before they could 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:56.319 ask her any questions. I will speak the truth, she said. 0:12:57.040 --> 0:13:00.400 I have seen sights and have been scared I have 0:13:00.480 --> 0:13:03.360 been very wicked. I hope I shall be better if 0:13:03.400 --> 0:13:08.160 God will help me. What sights did you see, Hawthorne asked, 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:13.280 I have seen dogs and many creatures. What dogs do 0:13:13.320 --> 0:13:18.680 you mean, Hawthorne asked, ordinary dogs. Abigail shook her head, 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:25.160 I mean the devil. The magistrates pressed on. Where had 0:13:25.240 --> 0:13:28.280 she seen them, they asked, and Abigail replied that her 0:13:28.360 --> 0:13:31.079 encounter had taken place in the woods in the middle 0:13:31.080 --> 0:13:33.480 of the day years ago, back when she lived at 0:13:33.559 --> 0:13:36.800 Casco Bay. That was where she'd put her hand on 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:40.360 his book when they carried her off to jail a 0:13:40.400 --> 0:13:43.760 short while later. The name Cascoe Bay still hung in 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:46.800 the air like a neon sign, pointing at the danger 0:13:46.880 --> 0:13:50.120 that lurked the north, but Abigail had also made it 0:13:50.160 --> 0:13:53.040 clear that it was spreading south and might already be 0:13:53.240 --> 0:13:56.959 among them. She claimed that a shape shifting man had 0:13:57.040 --> 0:14:00.480 visited her at her home here in Tompsfield. He had 0:14:00.480 --> 0:14:03.680 alternated between the form of a cat, a dog, and 0:14:03.720 --> 0:14:07.160 a black man with a black hat, and this man, 0:14:07.240 --> 0:14:11.120 she claimed, had offered her fine clothes and the power 0:14:11.160 --> 0:14:15.559 to harm others in town, a power that she had 0:14:15.600 --> 0:14:26.480 readily accepted. If the news from the frontier was frightening 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:29.240 to the people of Salem Village. It was made even 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:32.240 more so by the actual presence in their homes of 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:34.520 people who had lived through the horrors of it all. 0:14:35.280 --> 0:14:37.200 One of the most prominent of all of them was 0:14:37.240 --> 0:14:40.240 the little girl who George Burrows had rescued from Falmouth 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:45.920 back in sixteen seventy six. Mercy Lewis my sixteen ninety two. 0:14:45.920 --> 0:14:48.320 Though she was a nineteen year old woman living in 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:51.240 the home of Thomas and Ann Putnam along with their 0:14:51.320 --> 0:14:55.240 violently afflicted daughter Annie, it's easy to believe that over 0:14:55.280 --> 0:14:58.600 their time together, Mercy had been filling Annie's head with 0:14:58.640 --> 0:15:01.320 horrifying tales of del buls who attack in the night. 0:15:01.840 --> 0:15:05.280 But she had more to contribute than just tails. Mercy 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:09.480 Lewis was having fits of her own, and one of 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.880 the incidents that was recorded down Mercy claimed the Putnam's 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:15.680 house had become filled with the spirits of witches and 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:17.920 that they were trying to force her to partake of 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:22.440 some twisted red communion. Suddenly, the figure of a white 0:15:22.440 --> 0:15:25.800 man appeared in the room, brightening off the witches and 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:30.800 casting a brilliant light across her face, and Putnam not 0:15:30.960 --> 0:15:33.800 one to be showed up soon had a powerful vision 0:15:33.800 --> 0:15:37.040 of her own. During hers the people around her heard 0:15:37.040 --> 0:15:41.960 her shout, Oh, dreadful, dreadful. Here is a minister. What 0:15:42.280 --> 0:15:47.280 are ministers witches too? Obviously this caught the attention of 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:51.440 the people around her, A minister implicated in assisting the 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:55.560 devil himself. Well, it was unheard of, and yet here 0:15:55.600 --> 0:15:58.240 it was spelled out right in front of them. A 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:03.240 moment later, the minister's invisible spirit conveniently identified itself to 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:06.440 them all as well. It was their former minister and 0:16:06.640 --> 0:16:11.960 hero of Maine, George Burrows. But George Burrows wasn't the 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:16.320 spotless minister we might assume him to be. Here's Stacy Schiff, 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:21.000 Pulitzer Prize winning author of several historical works, including The Witches. 0:16:21.880 --> 0:16:24.920 Burrows is the ex minister who leaves the community on 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:28.160 bad terms and is as much a hero in his 0:16:28.200 --> 0:16:30.520 new community in todays southern Maine as he had been 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:33.240 a persona on grata in Salem. He was clearly a 0:16:33.360 --> 0:16:36.680 very stubborn and difficult man, and possibly an abusive husband 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.320 when he was in Salem. Stories of how he had 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:41.520 mistreated his wives will trail him even when he when 0:16:41.520 --> 0:16:45.360 he moves to Maine with Burrows, there's this terrific, vexed 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:48.320 history with the community. There seems to be a certain 0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:51.080 amount of getting back at him by women who may 0:16:51.120 --> 0:16:54.440 have been friends with his dead wives. The day after 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:58.840 Annie Putnam's vision of George Burrows, original afflicted girl Abigail 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:01.640 Williams and her friend and Mary Walcott, both had a 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:05.359 frightening experience as they sat in Ingersoll's ordinary with a 0:17:05.480 --> 0:17:08.600 number of their neighbors. They claimed that the spirits of 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:13.400 William and Deliverance Hobbs, parents to Abigail Hobbs, were there 0:17:13.440 --> 0:17:16.800 and attacking them. One of the men in the room, 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:21.000 Benjamin Hutchinson, actually drew his sword and started swinging it 0:17:21.080 --> 0:17:23.720 at the empty air in an attempt to kill the spirits. 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:27.520 As he did, the two afflicted girls recounted the blow 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:31.479 by blow action that only they could see. Goody Hobbs 0:17:31.560 --> 0:17:34.840 had been injured, they claimed, and there was blood all 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:39.680 over the floor. Think about this moment from a different perspective, though, 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:42.959 Salem feared that the warfare of the North would spread 0:17:43.000 --> 0:17:46.320 down to their own safe space, that before long, they 0:17:46.359 --> 0:17:49.240 too would be battling with the Devil's forces. The Native 0:17:49.280 --> 0:17:52.520 Americans who plagued their borders. So when you find a 0:17:52.560 --> 0:17:55.399 scene in a public tavern where weapons are drawn and 0:17:55.520 --> 0:17:59.160 flashing through the air, it's their greatest fears come to life. 0:18:00.400 --> 0:18:03.480 Between this highly public display of panic and the new 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:06.919 accusations brought up by Annie Putnam and her friends, the 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:11.120 momentum of the witchcraft panic began to accelerate. Within ten 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:15.520 days of Abigail Hobb's examination, fifteen new names were submitted 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:19.880 as potential witches. Some seemed connected to pass suspects, while 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:24.600 others were more shocking to hear. Giles Corey and Mary 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.959 Warren were taken from their homes and then examined and jailed. 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:31.520 Their connections to Martha Corey and the proctors, both of 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:35.000 whom were already in jail, were just too close to overlook. 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:40.040 Rebecca Nurse's two younger sisters, Mary Etsy and Sarah Klois 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:45.320 were also imprisoned. Nathaniel Putnam had his black slave Mary arrested, 0:18:45.640 --> 0:18:49.040 and another woman who had been acquitted of witchcraft years before, 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:52.600 name Bridget Bishop, was also arrested for a second time. 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:56.840 After a brief examination, she was jailed for trial, along 0:18:56.880 --> 0:19:01.040 with two other members of her family. Ship was married, 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:05.160 so she's not alone in the world. That's Maryland ka Roach, 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:09.760 historian and author of Six Women of Salem. She's been 0:19:09.760 --> 0:19:14.199 suspected before, however, of witchcraft, but she has survived that. 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:17.680 That's not as much paperwork on it as you'd like surviving. 0:19:18.400 --> 0:19:22.240 She was confrontational. Some of the neighbors thought, I'd say 0:19:22.240 --> 0:19:24.919 she stuck up for herself. This is her third husband. 0:19:24.920 --> 0:19:26.919 The second husband would hit her now and then, but 0:19:27.000 --> 0:19:31.480 she hit him back then. The crisis burst beyond the 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:35.159 Salem boundary. Arrests were made throughout Essex County, in the 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:39.639 towns of reading, Amesbury, Beverly, and more over in Topsfield. 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:44.240 Both William and Deliverance Hobbs were arrested. The logic was simple. 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:47.720 If their daughter had consorted with the devil, who could 0:19:47.720 --> 0:19:51.680 be more to blame than they, But the most dramatic 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:55.840 arrest would be the most unexpected. Rather than dismissing the 0:19:55.880 --> 0:20:00.080 accusations against George Burrows, the magistrates all agreed that it 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:02.800 would be best to bring him in for questioning, but 0:20:02.880 --> 0:20:05.600 he was far to the north of them in Wells, Maine, 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:08.960 and they feared that making a public declaration might tip 0:20:09.040 --> 0:20:12.520 him off. And give him the chance to run. So instead, 0:20:13.080 --> 0:20:15.600 they gathered a group of men and gave them their 0:20:15.640 --> 0:20:20.720 assignment in secret. They were to ride north, capture him, 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:26.600 and then bring him back for examination. George Burrows was 0:20:26.640 --> 0:20:39.080 a wanted man. Salem Village didn't sit around waiting for 0:20:39.119 --> 0:20:42.280 Burroughs to arrive before making their minds up about him, 0:20:42.320 --> 0:20:44.640 and we have a number of the locals to thank 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:48.240 for that. One was a young woman named Sarah Churchill 0:20:48.480 --> 0:20:51.399 who worked as a servant in a local household, but 0:20:51.520 --> 0:20:56.040 she was also a refugee from Maine. For a while, 0:20:56.200 --> 0:20:59.240 Churchill experienced some of the same afflictions as the others, 0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:02.840 but her employer beat her until it stopped. That's how 0:21:02.920 --> 0:21:06.680 John Procter had handled Mary Warren, but when her symptoms stopped, 0:21:06.720 --> 0:21:09.199 the judges decided it was because she had given in 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:12.520 to the demands of the devil. When Churchill's afflictions did 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:15.480 the same, she stood at risk of the same assumption. 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:19.480 To help her case, she played along with the magistrates 0:21:19.520 --> 0:21:22.800 and gave them whatever they wanted. In jail across town, 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:26.840 Mary Warren was doing the same. She rolled on her employers, 0:21:26.920 --> 0:21:29.640 the proctors, and said that they threatened to force red 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:33.040 hot fireplace tongs down her throat if she didn't sign 0:21:33.080 --> 0:21:37.200 The Devil's Book. Even Mercy Lewis got back into the spotlight, 0:21:37.640 --> 0:21:40.160 she claimed to have been attacked by the specter of Burroughs, 0:21:40.280 --> 0:21:43.520 who she knew very well. She said that he tortured her, 0:21:43.840 --> 0:21:46.240 that he threatened to kill her, and that he carried 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:48.840 her up to a high mountain and offered to give 0:21:48.880 --> 0:21:52.080 her everything she could see in exchange for her mark 0:21:52.119 --> 0:21:56.119 in the Devil's Book, Mercy claims she refused, echoing the 0:21:56.160 --> 0:21:59.439 willpower of Jesus. In a similar situation in the Bible, 0:22:00.880 --> 0:22:04.080 one young woman, Sarah Morrell, seems to only have been 0:22:04.160 --> 0:22:08.080 arrested because she too was a refugee from Maine. It 0:22:08.160 --> 0:22:11.320 was ironic, really, Salem had been set up as a 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:14.159 place of peace, a city on the hill, as a 0:22:14.200 --> 0:22:17.240 beacon of hope, and yet it was quickly becoming a 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:22.240 dangerous place to live. May nine saw a number of 0:22:22.359 --> 0:22:27.600 arrivals in Salem village. William Stoughton, the Massachusetts Chief Justice, 0:22:27.760 --> 0:22:30.480 and Samuel Sewell, who was a young judge from the 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:34.840 Massachusetts General Court and a dedicated record keeper, Together with 0:22:34.920 --> 0:22:38.800 John Hawthorne and Jonathan Corwin, these four brought the entire 0:22:38.840 --> 0:22:41.840 authority of the colony to bear on the next examination. 0:22:42.840 --> 0:22:46.760 Here's Emerson Baker, professor of American history at Salem State 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:51.760 University and author of A Storm of Witchcraft. Here's the problem. 0:22:51.800 --> 0:22:53.760 I really think the judges like Stowton were filled with 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:56.679 incredible self loathing. Stowton had been a minister, he had 0:22:56.680 --> 0:22:58.919 been a minister in England. He's basically kicked out with 0:22:58.960 --> 0:23:01.040 a restoration because he was a Puritan. And he comes 0:23:01.040 --> 0:23:03.080 back to New England. And he comes back and he's 0:23:03.080 --> 0:23:06.360 he's hailed as this wonderful leading figure the colony. He's 0:23:06.359 --> 0:23:09.280 asked by several towns, please be our minister, please please 0:23:09.320 --> 0:23:11.879 please be our minister. And he says, no, I'm not worthy. 0:23:12.119 --> 0:23:14.920 I'm not worthy of being a minister. I can't do it. 0:23:15.320 --> 0:23:17.400 Samuel sewell as well too. You can see his struggles. 0:23:17.640 --> 0:23:19.040 He doesn't want to become a member of the church 0:23:19.040 --> 0:23:21.320 because it doesn't think he's worthy. My God, the guy 0:23:21.440 --> 0:23:24.000 was brilliant student at Harvard. He could recite the Bible 0:23:24.000 --> 0:23:27.439 backwards and forwards. Read his two volume diary, and you 0:23:27.480 --> 0:23:29.840 know he's an incredibly devout Puritan. But he thinks he's 0:23:29.880 --> 0:23:34.000 not worthy. That examination was of the other new arrival 0:23:34.040 --> 0:23:37.840 in town, George Burrows. By the time he was escorted 0:23:37.880 --> 0:23:41.440 into the Sale and Village meeting house, Stowton, Hawthorne, Corwin 0:23:41.560 --> 0:23:45.400 and Sewell had already questioned him privately. They had focused 0:23:45.400 --> 0:23:48.080 on the last time he had taken communion and where 0:23:48.640 --> 0:23:52.160 George must have understood the seriousness of his situation. When 0:23:52.160 --> 0:23:54.040 he answered that it had been such a long time 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:57.440 that he couldn't remember, it didn't help his case for sure. 0:23:58.920 --> 0:24:03.120 The afflicted girls appeared grievously tortured when Burrows stepped through 0:24:03.160 --> 0:24:06.720 the meeting house door. One girl shouted out that Burrows 0:24:06.760 --> 0:24:09.399 had killed his two wives, and that their spirits had 0:24:09.400 --> 0:24:11.960 appeared right there in the room, with them wrapped in 0:24:12.000 --> 0:24:14.960 their winding sheets, and laying the blame for their death 0:24:15.119 --> 0:24:19.040 on their husband's head. Burrows was offered a chance to 0:24:19.080 --> 0:24:21.560 respond to the girls, but all he would say was 0:24:21.600 --> 0:24:26.640 that he understood nothing of it. After that, testimonies continued. 0:24:27.200 --> 0:24:30.159 Men who had known Burrows in Casco Bay reported that 0:24:30.240 --> 0:24:33.000 he had in human strength that he was able to 0:24:33.040 --> 0:24:36.160 hold a seven foot rifle with one hand while other 0:24:36.200 --> 0:24:39.120 men struggled to hold it with two he was able 0:24:39.160 --> 0:24:42.600 to lift barrels of molasses and cider by himself to 0:24:42.720 --> 0:24:46.560 unload the boats that supplied the coastal town. Of course, 0:24:46.640 --> 0:24:50.640 Burrows tried to defend himself, but his explanations and protests 0:24:50.640 --> 0:24:53.359 fell on deaf ears. The truth of the matter was 0:24:53.400 --> 0:24:56.560 a lot more simple. He had lost his case before 0:24:56.560 --> 0:24:59.439 he even entered the room, and the examination was for 0:24:59.480 --> 0:25:02.119 no other reason then to just go through the motions 0:25:02.160 --> 0:25:07.360 and make it official. When the examination was over, Burrows 0:25:07.480 --> 0:25:10.119 was walked out of the crowded meeting house and into 0:25:10.160 --> 0:25:13.800 an already crowded jail. He was their biggest catch of 0:25:13.840 --> 0:25:17.320 the season, so to speak, and represented a major victory. 0:25:18.160 --> 0:25:21.520 But all of that was about to change. The new 0:25:21.640 --> 0:25:25.359 day would bring a new tragedy, and I'm not sure 0:25:25.440 --> 0:25:37.679 anyone in Salem was prepared. On the day after burrows arrest, 0:25:37.960 --> 0:25:42.960 the crisis claimed its first life. Sarah Osburne, already weak 0:25:43.040 --> 0:25:45.439 with an ongoing illness when she had been jailed on 0:25:45.520 --> 0:25:49.520 March one, died in her Boston jail cell. She had 0:25:49.560 --> 0:25:52.919 been held there in horrible conditions for nine weeks without 0:25:52.960 --> 0:25:57.200 ever getting a trial. The news had to have struck 0:25:57.240 --> 0:26:00.840