The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials

The Witch (2015) and Salem Witch Trials Testimony: Caleb’s Scene Through 1692 Court RecordsWe compare Robert Eggers’ 2015 film The Witch to 17th-century New England witchcraft folklore and the 1692 Salem Witch Trials court transcripts, showing how Caleb’s climactic deathbed scene reflects the content of witness testimony. From hag-riding to animal familiars and a folk test for witchcraft, this scene is packed with elements straight from witch trials.We link Caleb's final words and actions with accounts from figures such as Tituba, Abigail Hobbs, Mary Warren, and Susannah Sheldon.

Chapters00:00 Film Meets Salem00:58 Caleb Returns Afflicted02:36 Satanic Familiars03:44 Pointing at Specters05:08 Courtroom Fits Evidence07:09 Poison Apple Blood09:02 Violence and Black Phillip12:37 Catatonia Folk Remedies14:53 Rapture and Election18:38 Lord's Prayer Test20:59 Death by Bewitchment21:49 Wrap Up and Where Next

Links

Salem Witch-Hunt Facebook Page: https://facebook.com/salemwitchhunt

Salem Witch Trials History YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

Salem Witch Trials Daily: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

Project 1692: Beverly’s Hidden Salem Witch Trials Story with Descendant Tour Guide Roger Herson

Crowds flood Salem, Massachusetts each October, but across the river, Beverly holds key Salem Witch Trials history—home to Reverend John Hale’s later writing and to figures and events often mislabeled as “Salem” stories. We talk with lifelong North Shore guide and 12th-generation Massachusetts native Roger Herson, a descendant of the trials (including Thomas Oliver, husband of Bridget Bishop), who leads visitors through court records to replace folklore with documented truth. Roger shares how DNA research revealed multiple ancestral ties to the accused, why original documents matter, and what common misconceptions persist—about Bridget Bishop, Sarah Bishop, alleged stepchild accusers, and John Hale’s influence. He highlights Beverly’s overlooked roles, from William Griggs’s residence to Dorcas Hoar’s complex story, and previews Historic Beverly’s Thursday-night Project 1692 walking tours as a quieter, research-grounded alternative to Salem’s October crush.

00:00 Beverly Beyond Salem

02:06 Meet Roger Herson

02:42 DNA Discovery Story

05:26 Bridget Bishop Myths

09:23 Beverly Role in 1692

12:28 John Hale Reckoning

18:20 Dorcas Hoar Legend

19:35 Project 1692 Tour

24:42 How to Visit

25:22 Closing Thanks 

Links

Historic Beverly: https://historicbeverly.net

Ancestry Tour Agents: https:// ancestrytouragents.com 

Salem Witch Trials History YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

Salem Witch Trials Daily: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

Andover’s Witch Hunt: Coerced Confessions, Family Betrayals, and the Touch Test

45 of the total 150–200 accused witches in the Salem Trials came from a single town that bordered Salem—Andover, where nearly 10% of the town population was accused of witchcraft and a lethal rumor spread: confess and live. Grounded in the real1692 examination transcripts and contemporary accounts from writers like Robert Calef, we trace how Martha Carrier’s May 1692 arrest ignited a wider dragnet, then how Elizabeth Ballard’s sudden illness brought Ann Putnam Jr. and Mary Walcott to Andover and triggered the infamous meetinghouse touch test rooted in beliefs about effluvia. As coerced confessions multiplied, family networks collapsed under pressure—from Ann Foster and the Mary Laceys to the torture-driven confessions of Carrier’s sons—and accusations surged through Reverend Francis Dane’s kin, fueling sensational claims of diabolical plots.

00:00 Welcome and Andover Focus

02:01 Martha Carrier Accused

02:37 Defiant Courtroom Exchange

04:41 Ballard Illness and Touch Test

06:33 Confess and Live Rumor

07:22 Lacey Family Interrogations

09:37 Carrier Children Tortured

10:50 Dane Family Targeted

12:35 Sabbaths and Hell Crowns

13:43 Mather Versus Carrier

14:15 Elizabeth Johnson Testimony

15:13 Execution and Closing .

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

Salem Witch Trials History YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

Salem Witch Trials Daily: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/

People Accused of Witchcraft in 1692: http://www.17thc.us/primarysources/accused.php

Bernard Rosenthal, ed., Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781107689619

Emerson W. Baker, A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Trials and the American Experience: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780190627805

Marilynne K. Roach, The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-by-Day Chronicle of a Community Under Siege: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781589791329

Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780375706905

Richard Hite, In the Shadow of Salem: The Andover Witch Hunt of 1692: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781594164378

Why Did Ann Putnam Jr. Accuse? Evolutionary Behavioral Reconstruction and the Human Story Behind SalemWe welcome producer-director Tom Phillips and evolutionary anthropologist Dr. Hogan Sherrow to explore the psychological research informing Phillips’ project Aftermath and to confront a question that has lingered for more than 330 years: why 12-year-old Ann Putnam Jr., a central accuser in the Salem witch trials and the only known accuser to publicly apologize, did what she did. Using Sherrow’s “evolutionary behavioral reconstruction,” they examine Ann as a human being shaped by life history, Puritan cultural context, family pressures, possible mental or behavioral conditions, and the community’s belief in the devil as an everyday reality. They discuss how children’s networks, prior witchcraft cases, and Samuel Parris’s library may have supplied models to imitate, how grief and household instability may have acted as triggers, and how Ann’s courtroom influence helped reverse Rebecca Nurse’s verdict, while weighing whether Ann was deluded, mistaken, manipulated, or lying and scrutinizing the language and signature of her 1706 apology.00:00 Welcome and Setup00:27 Why Ann Putnam01:35 Project and Method03:55 Reconstruction Basics06:03 Age and Puritan Context08:17 Witchcraft Idea Spreads13:50 Triggers and Family Grief17:24 Courtroom Power19:29 Mental Health Possibilities21:52 The 1706 Apology24:33 Signature Doubts27:31 Aftermath Monologue29:50 Closing and Call to Share

New England Pilgrimage: Salem Witch Trials Sites, History Camp Boston, and Connecticut Witch & Culture Fest

We share highlights from our New England trip for The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials, including visiting key Salem Village and Danvers sites with our colleague Mary Louise Bingham, paying respects at the Danvers Witch Trial Victims Memorial, and standing together as descendants of Mary Esty at her home site. We reflect on places central to 1692, such as the Samuel Parris parsonage site, the meetinghouse replica at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead, Ingersoll’s Tavern property, Essex Street, the Salem 400 exhibit, Charter Street Cemetery, and the Salem Witch Trials Memorial. We also recount presenting at sold-out History Camp Boston on how English witch-hunting manuals shaped deliberate New England legal proceedings, and staffing a history and remembrance booth at the Connecticut Witch and Culture Festival with tribute cloth signings, remembrance ceremonies, volunteer presentations, and connections to World Day Against Witch Hunts and modern anti-witch-hunt advocacy.

00:00 New England Trip Intro

01:06 Danvers Memorial Visit

02:04 Meetinghouse Replica

03:53 Parsonage Site Tour

06:56 Pastors Pasture Stories

08:28 Tituba Tribute Brick

10:14 Salem Streets And Exhibit

12:20 Charter Street Memorial

14:37 History Camp Talk

16:38 Meeting Fellow Historians

21:13 Other History Camp Sessions

22:43 Hartford Festival Booth

23:57 Tribute Cloth Remembrance

24:55 Festival Highlights

27:19 Alice Young Play News

28:42 World Day Against Witch Hunts

30:40 Modern Witch Hunts Today

32:17 Wrap Up And Dates 

Links:

World Day Against Witch Hunts:  https://endwitchhunts.org/day 

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

Salem Witch Trials History YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

Salem Witch Trials Daily: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/

Hexenverfolgung heute | missio: https://www.missio-hilft.de/informieren/wofuer-wir-uns-einsetzen/gegen-hexenverfolgung/  

Where the Salem Witch Trials Records Really Come From (and What’s Missing)

We dig into the biggest surprise at the heart of the 1692 Salem Witch Trials: the official Court of Oyer and Terminer record book is gone, and what people call “trial records” are mostly pretrial examinations, warrants, depositions, bills, diaries, and printed observers’ accounts. We explain how magistrates like John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin shaped the surviving dialogue-style transcripts, why those documents get mistaken for trial proceedings, and what sparse trial records typically looked like by comparing to the surviving 1693 Superior Court files. We trace how writers such as Cotton Mather, Robert Calef, Thomas Brattle, John Hale, Increase Mather, and others preserved competing narratives, and how Samuel Sewall’s diary fills crucial gaps. We spotlight the decade-long scholarly effort behind the 2009 Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt, the myths it overturns (including confessors being tried and executed), and how New England and even Scotland show how missing records can distort history for centuries.

00:00 What Records Survive

01:09 Examinations Not Trials

03:07 How Trials Worked

04:31 Published Accounts Clash

06:31 Proving Records Existed

08:37 Where Records Went Missing

09:52 Scribes Shape History

11:38 Records of the Salem Witch Hunt

13:58 Myths the Paperwork Busts

14:44 Beyond Salem and Abroad

16:59 Other Sources and Daily Paper

18:20 The Devil’s Book That Never Was

19:50 Voices of the Accused

20:26 Why Records Matter 

End Witch Hunts: https://www.endwitchhunts.org

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

Connecticut Witch Trials History: https://connecticutwitchtrials.org

Watch us on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

Samuel Wyllys Papers (CT State Library): https://ctdigitalarchive.org/node/3907524

Samuel Wyllys Papers (Brown University): https://www.riamco.org/render?eadid=US-RPB-mswyllys&view=inventory#ref15

Salem Witch Trials Documents - High Quality Scans: https://pem.quartexcollections.com/collections/salem-witch-trials-collection

Buy Books from our Bookshop: https:/bookshop.org/shop/endwitchhunts

The Toothaker Family: Folk Magic, Witchfinding, and Tragedy in the Salem Witch TrialsA folk healer known as “Dr. Toothaker,” Roger Toothaker was the only male healer/physician accused of witchcraft in 17th-century New England, and his story pulls our Salem Witch Trials podcast into a web of witchfinding, fear, and family fallout. After leaving his wife Mary Allen Toothaker and their children behind in Billerica, Roger was arrested in May 1692 for allegedly afflicting Salem Village girls and died in Boston jail; testimony linked him to diagnosing victims under an “evil hand” and to a “witch bottle” said to kill a witch. Soon Mary Toothaker and their young daughter Margaret were accused, and daughter Martha Toothaker Emerson was jailed after dramatic examinations and spectral allegations, while son Allen testified against aunt Martha Carrier. Though Mary and Martha were ultimately cleared, war violence later killed Mary and took Margaret captive, underscoring how folk magic, Andover/Salem Village accusations, and ties to Carrier made the Toothakers prime targets.

00:00 Meet the Toothakers

00:13 Roger's Early Life

01:05 Healer Turned Accused

01:51 Testimony and Witch Bottle

03:05 Mary and Margaret Accused

04:07 Roger Dies in Jail

05:01 Martha Emerson Arrested

06:59 Specters and Confession

08:04 Mary Toothaker Confesses

09:25 Allen Testifies Against Carrier

10:20 Acquittals and Release

10:54 War and Aftermath

11:47 Legacy and Reading List

We dig into original Salem Witch Trials documents to map, step by step, how Bridget Bishop moved from first mention to execution—and how “evidence” worked in 1692. Using the arrest warrant (April 18, 1692), competing examination records by Ezekiel Cheever and Samuel Parris, and a trail of statements, depositions, and jail paperwork, we trace the case built on spectral evidence, old grievances framed as supernatural harm, and accusations drawn from other prisoners’ confessions. We follow Bridget through transfers between Salem and Boston jails, the June 2 physical search for “witches’ teats,” five indictments for afflicting the core afflicted girls, and the death warrant ordering her hanging on June 10. We also track the long aftermath, from missed restitution efforts to her eventual naming in Massachusetts’ 2001 exoneration act.

00:00 Anatomy of a Trial

01:02 Arrest Warrant Breakdown

02:47 Preliminary Examination

05:19 Spectral Evidence Claims

06:49 Past Harm Testimony

08:52 Confessions Implicate Bridget

09:31 Jail Transfers and Records

10:43 Witch Marks and Indictments

12:42 Death Warrant and Execution

16:39 Costs and Restitution

17:53 Exoneration in 2001

19:06 Subscribe and Closing 

Links:

• Salem Witch-Hunt Facebook Page: https://facebook.com/salemwitchhunt

• High Quality Scans of Original Court Documents - Peabody Essex Museum Salem Witch Trials Collection: https://pem.quartexcollections.com/collections/salem-witch-trials-collection

• Bernard Rosenthal, ed., Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781107689619⁠

• Salem Witch Trials History YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCliis4vjMIUgg3wcA0pXeYQ/

• ⁠Salem Witch Trials Daily Hub: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/⁠

• ⁠The Thing About the Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com⁠

• ⁠The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com⁠

• ⁠Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780375706905⁠

• ⁠Emerson W. Baker, A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Trials and the American Experience: 

• https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780190627805⁠

• ⁠Marilynne K. Roach, The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-by-Day Chronicle of a Community Under Siege: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781589791329⁠

Step into Salem in 1692 as we follow Bridget Bishop from her life in Salem Town to the courtroom that condemned her. She was the first person executed in the Salem Witch Trials, convicted on testimony about specters, poppets, an “unnatural mark,” and long-running neighborhood quarrels—despite insisting she had never harmed the accusers and did not even know them. We trace her documented history from England to Massachusetts, her three marriages, earlier accusations that faded for lack of evidence, and the legal machinery that made her case the opening death sentence for the Court of Oyer and Terminer. We also confront how Bridget has been misremembered, explore modern portrayals like Cry Innocent and screen adaptations, and highlight memorials, exoneration, and the living legacy of her descendants.

00:00 Bridget Bishop Introduced

00:40 Life Before 1692

02:24 Arrest And Examination

04:47 Spectral Evidence Piles Up

06:08 Trial And Execution

07:04 Myths And Mixups

07:36 Remembering Bridget Today

09:02 Stage And Screen Portrayals

09:57 Memorials And Exoneration

10:49 Legacy And Descendants 

End Witch Hunts:  https://endwitchhunts.org 

The Thing About The Salem Witch Trials: https://aboutsalem.com

The Thing About Witch Hunts: https://aboutwitchhunts.com

Salem Witch Trials History: https://youtube.com/@aboutwitchhunts

Buy A Book About The Salem Witch Trials: https://bookshop.org/lists/the-salem-witch-hunt-collection-curated-by-the-thing-about-salem-podcast

⁠Salem Witch Trials Daily Hub: https://aboutsalem.com/salem-witch-trials-daily/⁠

⁠Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780375706905⁠

Bernard Rosenthal, ed., Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781107689619⁠

⁠Emerson W. Baker, A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Trials and the American Experience: 

https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9780190627805⁠

⁠Marilynne K. Roach, The Salem Witch Trials: A Day-by-Day Chronicle of a Community Under Siege: https://bookshop.org/a/90227/9781589791329⁠

High Quality Scans of Original Court Documents - Peabody Essex Museum Salem Witch Trials Collection: https://pem.quartexcollections.com/collections/salem-witch-trials-collection

Why did the 1692 Salem witch trials require an entirely new court, and how did that court reach a 100 percent conviction rate? This episode examines the Court of Oyer and Terminer, the special tribunal that prosecuted witchcraft accusations across colonial Massachusetts, and lays out the legal machinery, the magistrates, and the evidentiary standards that decided who lived and who died.

When Sir William Phips took office, the province faced overcrowded jails, an invalidated court system, and dozens of pending witchcraft charges with no legal venue to resolve them. The court he created relied on spectral evidence and a bench of prosperous, legally untrained men, a combination that shaped one of the most consequential criminal proceedings in early American history.

Chapters

00:00 Welcome and Overview

00:32 Why a Special Court

02:06 Meet the Judges

03:43 Earlier Witch Trial Experience

05:10 Spectral Evidence Explained

06:26 Ministers Weigh In

06:49 Oyer and Terminer Results

08:01 Superior Court Replaces It

11:04 Reprieves and Stoughton Fury

12:29 Aftermath and Next Episode

What you will learn:

• Why a special court became necessary in 1692

• How the new Massachusetts charter dismantled the old court system

• Who sat on the bench

• What legal training the magistrates actually possessed

• How spectral evidence functioned as proof

• Why Connecticut had foreclosed spectral evidence decades earlier

• How conviction rates differed under the two successive courts

• Which condemned prisoners avoided execution

Hosted by Josh Hutchinson and Sarah Jack.

End Witch Hunts

The Thing About The Salem Witch Trials

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