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4. The Accusers
4.1. Cotton Mather
Cotton Mather was a respected clergyman in Puritan Massachusetts. He believed that certain people used magic to help the Devil do his evil work. Most colonial New Englanders felt this way. He did warn that the evidence against a person suspected of using black magic needed to be weighed carefully. There is always the chance that an innocent person might be accused of witchcraft (Levack, 1987, p. 76).
4.2. Samuel Parris
The people of Salem Village elected Rev. Samuel Parris to be the pastor. He was only 25 years old at this time in 1689 and had no experience as a clergyman (Levack, 1987, p. 133). Most of his sermons were about good and evil. Many of the people were fighting between themselves about the new generation of New Englanders and how they were less God fearing and thought that God might let bad deeds happen to punish them.
4.3. Accusations Begin
In 1692 Elizabeth Parris, Rev. Parris’s 9-year-old daughter, and Abigail Williams, his 12-year-old niece, started to have fits that were uncontrollable (Boyer and Nissenbaum, 1977, p. 63). Then 11 year old Anne Putman, daughter of Thomas Putman, Samuel Parris’s supporter, and her cousin 17 year old Mary Walcott started having the same type of fits.
The local Doctor, William Griggs, was brought in to decide just what was wrong with them. Because he could not find anything physicial wrong with them, he claimed it was the result of “bewitchment” (Boyer and Nissenbaum, 1977, p. 63). Now all the adults were pressuring the children to tell them who cast the spell on them. After a lot of pressure the first two girls named the witches that were tormenting them.