Salem Massachusetts – Witches and Ghosts

Posted by
Jill Stefko
Oct 3, 2009

What happened in Salem intrigues me. I knew there was enough information for more than one article and was pleasantly surprised to write eight. I’m not sure when I first learned about Salem and its “witches.” I learned facts about James I, King of England. I wasn’t taught that he detested witches and was responsible for the North Berwick Witches' Persecution during the Burning Times, the height of witch hunts and executions.

When I learned about Salem’s “witches,” I wasn’t told a minister, the Rev. George Burroughs, was hanged because he was a convicted witch. I didn’t learn that Cotton Mather was rabid in discovering, persecuting and convicting suspected “witches.” All I was taught was that he was a Puritan minister. I didn’t know that his father, Increase Mather, the most respected minister in Massachusetts, wrote a paper about the dangers of accepting ghosts as evidence in witch trials. He denounced spectral visits and argued they might be the Devil’s ruse to fool people.

Respected publications state Giles Corey was pressed to death by stones because he was a convicted witch. This happened because he refused to acknowledge the court’s right to try him for practicing witchcraft.

I decided to write an article about Salem’s ghosts and did extensive research, referencing and cross referencing. I wrote about documented haunters in

Haunted_Witch_Capital_Salem_Massachusetts. When I wrote Salem_Massachusetts_Ghosts_Fact_or_Fiction, I was suspicious about the website’s veracity. It looked like a child wrote it and it was clear the hauntings were intended to scare people, a sign of made-up ghostly tales. I delved deeper into the site and saw the writers created the blurbs and invited people to email their contrived ghosts du jour.

These are the articles about Salem’s witch hysteria: