Worst Thing America Ever Did: The Salem Witch Trials The worst thing to happen in American history was The Salem witch trials. Early in 1692, the witch hunt started in Salem, Massachusetts. During this time there were many stresses in the Massachusetts Bay Colony among Salem Villages, who had a strong belief in the devil. A town not too far from Salem had, had a recent smallpox outbreak, and created fear and suspicion for the Salem Villages. Nine-year old Elizabeth Parris and eleven years old Abigail Williams started having fits, strange behaviors and would scream with anger.
The injustice of the Salem Witch Trials remains in American history forever. The terrible incidents of the trials played out because of personal insecurites, jealousies and teenage boredom. As the event took course and grew to an epedemic, the Town of Salem was uprooted and taken by storm. Through harassment, men and women of Salem were in driven into the witchcraft craze of 1692. The absence of a fair and honest trial for the prosecuted in the small Protestant town is thought to be approached in a different manner today.
This began an outbreak of hysteria that would result in the arrest of over one hundred-fifty people and execution of twenty women and men. The madness continued for over four months. The notorious witch trials of Salem, Massachusetts occurred from June through September. It is a brief, but turbulent period in history and the causes of the trials have long been a source of discussion among historians. Many try to explain or rationalize the bizarre happenings of the witch hunts and the causes that contributed to them.
Historically witchcraft has been thought of as violent horrible things. They tortured and killed many innocent people, although the exact opposite is what happened at the Salem Witchcraft Trials. Nineteen women and five men were hung on Salem’s gallows hill. They were all accused witches, who were all also innocent. How did the witch-hunt in 1692 begin, and why there?
Witchcraft: The Phenomenon, the Executions and the Trials. Witchcraft is often related to folklore and popular superstition; however, in Early Modern European traditions, witches have stereotypically had the characterization of a witch as an evil magic user developed over time. From the late 15th century to the late 18th century, a wave of persecution washed across parts of England. Tens of thousands of people were executed for witchcraft due to the belief of magic . From England and all the way to Scotland, witchcraft became one of the greatest problems.
Gotcha. The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. The trials resulted in the executions of twenty people, most of them women. Despite being generally known as the Salem witch trials, the preliminary hearings in 1692 were conducted in several towns in the Province of Massachusetts Bay: Salem Village (now Danvers), Salem Town, Ipswich and Andover. The most infamous trials were conducted by the Court of Oyer and Terminer in 1692 in Salem Town.
Yarely Covarrubias Pd. 3 What Caused the Salem Witch Trial Hysteria of 1692? The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 are a turning point in history, and is an event that continues to mystify our nation, as well as others. Between the months of june and September of 1692, 19 women and men were accused of witchcraft and hanged because of it. Local magistrates took the initiative when young girls claimed that women in the village were inflicting pain on them, which resulted in all the hangings and overall hype of the Salem Witch Trials.
The actions held in Salem lead to many consequences. The main end result of groupthink in The Crucible is that many innocent people die. Once one person accuses another person of being a witch it is difficult to prove you are innocent because everyone believes what is thought to be right. John Proctor is an example of a guiltless man being hung because of groupthink. Mary Warren betrays John by saying that “he comes at by night and everyday to sign, to sign, to--
Hester Prynne is the poster child of Puritan ideology gone wrong. Before she was condemned for a crime that in today’s society wouldn’t even be given a second thought, she was was probably a great girl. In fact she was an accomplished seamstress before she was branded with the Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne 86). What the Puritan society did to her was horrible and destroyed her as a person. She was forced to wear a public symbol of shame and was shunned to the outskirts of society.
The Crucible as a Dystopia In Arthur Miller's The Crucible we are exposed to many examples of what could be considered a dystopian society. For those accused of and convicted for witchcraft, life in Salem was not at all desirable. Their land and belongings would be taken and their families shunned. I can only imagine how horrifying it would be. Though this play is not futuristic and fictional as many other pieces of dystopian literature tend to be, I think it should not be excluded as an example of one.