Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II / With an Account of Salem Village and a History of Opinions on Witchcraft and Kindred Subjects

by Charles Wentworth Upham

John Putnam had gone out and settled lands between the "six-mile extent" of Salem and Ipswich River. Some of his sons had gone with him. They had two dwelling-houses, cultivated meadows, orchards, &c. Isaac Burton says, that, one day, when near John Nichols's house, he heard a tree fall in the woods; and that he went to see who was chopping there. It seems that Jacob Towne and John How, Topsfield men, had come in defiance of John Putnam, and cut down a tree before his face. As they were two to one, Putnam had to swallow the insult; but he was not the man to let it rest so. He went out shortly after, accompanied by an adequate force of sons and nephews, and proceeded to fell the trees. The sound of the axes reached the ears of the Topsfield men; and Isaac Easty, Sr., John Easty, John Towne, and Joseph Towne, Jr., undertook to put a stop to the operation. On reaching the spot, they warned Putnam against cutting timber. He replied, "The timber now and here cut down has been felled by me and my orders;" and he proceeded to say, "I will keep cutting and carrying away from this land until next March." They asked him, "What, by violence?" He answered, "Aye, by violence. You may sue me: you know where I dwell;" and, turning to his company, he said, "Fall on." The Putnams were evidently the stronger party; and the Topsfield men, counting forces, concluded, in their turn, that discretion, at that time, was the better part of valor. Such scenes occurred on the disputed ground for a whole generation. It is not wonderful that all sorts of animosities were kindled. The fact will be borne in mind, that Isaac Easty and son, with John Towne and son, constituted the Topsfield force on this occasion.

It cannot be doubted, that these controversies with the surrounding towns, the mother-church, and the General Court itself, gradually engendered a very bad state of feeling. The people were deeply impressed with a conviction that they had been wronged all around and all the way through. They felt that the whole world was against them; and when, by a train of mischievous influences, hell itself seemed to be let loose upon them, it is not strange that they were driven to distraction.

We come, at last, to that chapter in the history of Salem Village which will lead us directly to the witchcraft delusion. Its religious organization was somewhat peculiar; and, although instituted by a particular arrangement made by the General Court, was, in one or two features, a complete departure from the ecclesiastical polity elsewhere rigidly enforced. It was a congregation forbidden, for the time being, to have a church. It was a society for religious worship, administered, not by professors of religion or by persons regarded at all in a religious light, but by householders. The people of the village liked it, perhaps, all the better for this; and they took hold of it with a will. Joseph Houlton gave to the parish five and a half acres of land, in the centre of the village, for the use of the minister. A parsonage-house was built, "forty-two feet in length, twenty feet broad, thirteen-feet stud, four chimneys, and no gable-ends." It was the custom to have a leanto attached to their houses, generally on the northern side; and one was finally added to the parsonage. There was a garden within the enclosure. Joseph Hutchinson gave an acre out of his broad meadow as a site for the meeting-house and it was erected; "thirty-four feet in length, twenty-eight feet broad, and sixteen feet between joints." Two end galleries were added, and a "canopy" placed over the pulpit. The mother-church, having about the same time built a new meeting-house, voted to give "the farmers their old pulpit and deacons' seats," which were brought up and duly installed. In the course of these proceedings, some slight differences arose among them about matters of detail, but not more than is usual in such cases. In order to despatch at once all that may be required to be said about the meeting-houses of the village, it may be allowable here to mention, that the original building did not survive the century. In 1700, partly because the growth of the society began to require it, but mainly, no doubt, to escape from the painful associations which had become connected with it, a new meeting-house was built on another site. The old one was dismantled of all its removable parts, and the site reverted to Joseph Hutchinson. It is supposed that he removed the frame to the other side of the road, and converted it into a barn; and that it was used as such until, in the memory of old persons now living, it mouldered, crumbled into powder-post, and sunk to the ground. It stood, after being converted into a barn, on the south side of the road, nearly in front of Joseph Hutchinson's homestead. Hutchinson's dwelling-house was probably some distance further down in the field, where the remains of an old cellar are still to be seen. Nathaniel Ingersoll gave the land for the new meeting-house. The records contain the vote, that it "shall stand upon Watch-House Hill, before Deacon Ingersoll's door." The meeting-houses of the society have stood there ever since. At that time, it was an elevated spot, probably covered with the original forest; for the work of clearing, levelling, and preparing it for occupancy was so considerable as to require a special provision. The labor and expense of the operation were put on that portion of the congregation brought nearer to the meeting-house by the change of the site.

In urging their petition to be set off as an independent parish, distinct from the First Church in Salem, the people of the village declared, that, if they could not have a ministry established among them, they would soon "become worse than the heathen around them." Little did they foresee the immediate, long-continued, and terrible effects that were to follow the boon thus prayed for. The establishment of the ministry among them was not merely an opening of Pandora's box: it was emptying and shaking it over their heads. It led them to a condition of bitterness and violence, of confusion and convulsion, of horror and misery, of cruelty and outrage, worse than heathen ever experienced or savages inflicted.

James Bayley of Newbury, born Sept. 12, 1650, a graduate of Harvard College in the class of 1669, was employed to preach at the village. In October, 1671, he transferred his relations from the church in Newbury to the First Church in Salem. It seems that several persons of considerable influence in the village were dissatisfied with the manner in which he had been brought forward, and became prejudiced against him. The disaffection was not removed, but suffered to take deep root in their minds. The parish soon became the scene of one of those violent and heated dissensions to which religious societies are sometimes liable. The unhappy strife was aggravated from day to day, until it spread alienation and acrimony throughout the village. A majority of the people were all along in favor of Bayley; but the minority were implacable. His engagement to preach was renewed from year to year. At length, the controversy waxed so warm that some definite action became necessary. On the 10th of March, 1679, both parties applied to the mother-church for advice. A paper was presented by his opponents, with sixteen, and another from his friends, with thirty-nine signers. There was still another, also in his favor, signed by ten persons living near, but not within the village line. Although the number of his opponents was so much less than of his friends, they included persons, such as Nathaniel Putnam and Bray Wilkins, of large estates and families, and much general influence; and it is evident that the First Church was not inclined wholly to disregard them. The record of that church says, "There was much agitation on both sides, and divers things were spoken of by the brethren; but the business being long, and many of the brethren gone, we could not make a church act of advice in the case; therefore it was left to another time." At a meeting on the 22d of April, the Salem Church advised the minority "to submit to the generality for the present;" but, when a church should be formed there, "then they might choose him or any other." This advice does not appear to have satisfied either party; and the quarrel went on with renewed vehemence on both sides. At length, it reached such a pitch that it became necessary to carry it up to the General Court. The whole affair was investigated by that body, and all the papers that had passed in relation to it were adduced. They are quite voluminous, and on file in the office of the Secretary of State, in Boston. These interesting and curious documents illustrate the energy of action of both parties; and give, it is probable, the best picture anywhere to be found of a first-rate parish controversy of the olden times.

The General Court came down upon the case with a strong hand. They decided in favor of Bayley, whom they pronounced "orthodox, and competently able, and of a blameless and self-denying conversation;" and they "do order, that Mr. Bayley be continued and settled the minister of that place, and that he be allowed sixty pounds per annum for his maintenance, one-third part thereof in money, the other two-thirds in provisions of all sorts such as a family needs, at equal prices, and fuel for his family's occasions; this sum to be paid by the inhabitants of that place." This was thirteen pounds a year more than Bayley's friends had ever voted for him. To make the matter sure, the General Court required the parish to choose three or five men among themselves to apportion every man's share of the tax to secure the sixty pounds: and, if any difficulty should occur in getting men among themselves to perform this duty, they appointed to act, in that event, Mr. Batter, Captain Jonathan Corwin, and Captain Price, of the old parish of Salem, to make the rate; and gave ample power to the constable of the village or the marshal of the county, to enforce the collection of it, by distress and attachment, if any should neglect or refuse to pay the sum assessed upon him. To make it still more certain that Mr. Bayley should get his money, they ordered "that all the rate is to be paid in for the use of the ministry unto two persons chosen by the householders to supply the place of deacons for the time, who are to reckon with the people, and to deliver the same to the said minister or to his order." The arrangement as to the agency of deacons was "to continue until the Court shall take further order, or that there be a church of Christ orderly gathered and approved in that place." This procedure of the Court was a pretty high-handed stretch of power even for those days; and giving the appointment of officers, with the title and character of deacons to mere householders, and where there was no church or organized body of professed believers, was in absolute conflict with the whole tenor and spirit of the ecclesiastical system then in force and rigidly maintained elsewhere throughout the colony. The Court seems itself to have been alarmed at the extent to which it had gone in forcing Mr. Bayley upon the people of Salem Village, and fell back, in conclusion, upon the following proviso: "This order shall continue for one year only from the last of September last past." The date of the order was the 15th of October, 1679. It had less than a year to run. In fact, the order, after all, before it comes to the end, is diluted into a mere recommendation of Mr. Bayley. "In the mean while, all parties," it is hoped, will "endeavor an agreement in him or some other meet person for a minister among them;" but the General Court takes care to wind up by demanding "five pounds for hearing the case, the whole number of villagers equally to bear their proportion thereof."

While the power thus incautiously conceded to householders was duly noted, the apparently formidable action of the Court did not in the least alarm the opposition, or in the slightest degree abate their zeal. The householders continued, as before, to manage all affairs relating to the ministry in general meetings of the inhabitants. They proceeded at once to elect their two deacons. "Corporal Nathaniel Ingersoll" was one of them; and he continued to hold the office, in parish and in church, for forty years.

As no attention was paid to the order of the General Court, so far as it attempted to fasten Mr. Bayley upon the parish; as the church in Salem would not take the responsibility of recommending his ordination in the face of such an opposition; and as it was out of the question to think of reconciling or reducing it, Mr. Bayley concluded to retire from the conflict and quit the field; and his ministry in the village came to an end. As evidence that the heat of this protracted controversy had not consumed all just and considerate sentiments in the minds of the people, I present the substance of a deed found in the Essex Registry. It will be noticed, that the most conspicuous of Mr. Bayley's opponents, Nathaniel Putnam, is one of the parties to the instrument.

"Thomas Putnam, Sr., Nathaniel Putnam, Sr., Thomas Fuller, Sr., John Putnam, Sr., and Joseph Hutchinson, Sr. Deed of gift to Mr. James Bayley. Whereas, Mr. James Bayley, minister of the gospel, now resident of Salem Village, hath been in the exercise of his gifts by preaching amongst us several years, having had a call thereunto by the inhabitants of the place; and at the said Mr. Bayley's first coming amongst us, we above-named put the said Bayley in possession of a suitable accommodation of land and meadow, for his more comfortable subsistence amongst us. But the providence of God having so ordered it, that the said Mr. Bayley doth not continue amongst us in the work of the ministry, yet, considering the premises, and as a testimony of our good affection to the said Mr. Bayley, and as full satisfaction of all demands of us or any of us, of land relating to the premises, do by these presents fully grant, &c., to said Bayley" twenty-eight acres of upland, and thirteen acres of meadow in all. The several lots are described in the deed, and constitute a very valuable property. The instrument bears date May 6, 1680. Mr. Bayley's residence is indicated on the [map]. The land on which it stood belonged to the part contributed by Nathaniel Putnam, with some acres in front of it contributed by Joseph Hutchinson. He continued to own and occasionally occupy his property in the village for some years after the witchcraft transactions. He left the ministry, and prepared himself for the profession of medicine, which he practised in Roxbury. He died on the 17th of January, 1707.

It is not very easy to ascertain from the parish records, or from the mass of papers in the State-house files, the precise grounds of the obstinate controversy in reference to him. It is evident that it began in consequence of some alleged irregularity in the proceedings that led to his first engagement to preach at the village. There are intimations, that, in the tone and style of his preaching, he did not quite come up to the mark required by some. The objection does not seem to have been against his talents or learning, but, rather, that he did not take hold with sufficient vehemence, or handle with sufficient zeal and warmth, points then engrossing attention. One or two expressions in the papers which proceeded from his opponents seem to hint that he had not the degree of strictness or severity in his aspect or ways thought necessary in a minister. Papers in the files of the County Court bring to light, perhaps, precisely the shape in which the charges against him had currency. On the 4th of April, 1679, complaint was made by Thomas and John Putnam, Srs., Daniel Andrew, and Nathaniel Ingersoll, against Henry Kenny "for slandering our minister, Mr. Bayley, by reporting that he doth not perform family duties in his family." This was an expression then in use for "family prayers." One young woman testified as follows: "Being at Mr. Bayley's house three weeks together, I never heard Mr. Bayley read a chapter, nor expound on any part of the Scripture, which was a great grief to me." On the other hand, three men and one woman depose thus: "Having, for a year, some more, some less, since Mr. Bayley's coming to Salem Farms, lived at his house, we testify to our knowledge, that he hath continually performed family duties, morning and evening, unless sickness or some other unavoidable providence hath prevented." Two of the above witnesses depose more specifically as follows: "We testify,—one of us being a boarder at Mr. Bayley's house, at times, for two or three years, and the other having lived there about a year and a quarter,—that Mr. Bayley did not only constantly perform family prayers twice a day, except some unusual providence at any time prevented, but also did sometimes read the Scriptures and other profitable books, and also repeat his own sermons in his family that he preached upon the Lord's Days; always endeavoring to keep good order in his family, carrying himself exemplarily therein." The evidence against Bayley was afterwards found to be unworthy of credit, and was wholly overborne at the time by unimpeachable testimony in his favor. The conclusion seems to be safe, from all the papers and proceedings, that Mr. Bayley was, as the General Court had pronounced him, "of a blameless conversation." A letter from him to his people, relating to the disaffection of some, and expressing a willingness to relinquish his position, if the interests of the society would thereby be promoted, is among the papers. It is creditable to his understanding, temper, and character.