The body of Bridget Bishop was left hanging from the gallows for days. It was standard

practice for the execution of felons. By leaving the results of their crime out in the

public for everyone to see, it was thought that fewer people would be tempted to follow

the same immoral path. We don't have any records about when Bridget's body was cut down,

or where it was buried, but executed criminals were usually buried near the place of death.

It wasn't respectful or sacred, and that was the point. In the Puritan mind, people

evil enough to do horrible things that didn't deserve a proper burial.

This death might not have left a physical trace, but it certainly had a social impact.

In the two weeks that followed her execution, reports of afflictions almost stopped entirely.

Yes, there were a handful of exceptions, but the overall effect was like pulling the

emergency brake on a speeding car. People took notice of how deadly the game had become.

But nothing lasts forever. However nice it would have been for everything to grind to a permanent

halt. I think all of us are very aware that no such thing was about to happen. In one

of the few instances where people still reported afflictions from a witch, a community even

deepens its roots into the soil of insanity in chaos. They find themselves a witch detective.

Weeks earlier, when Bray Wilkins and his grandson Daniel were sick and witchcraft was suspected,

Mercy Lewis offered to come and help. She was the refugee from Maine that had moved to

Salem Village years before, along with George Burrows. But in 1692, she lived and worked in one

of the Putnam households. And if you remember, it was she who pointed the finger at John Willard,

the village deputy constable and husband of Wilkins granddaughter, as the suspect.

So when new afflictions were reported inside a Putnam house, Mercy Lewis was called in to

offer her observations. She immediately identified two witches at work, Rebecca Nurse and Martha

...