The Salem Witch Trials

In Our Time

BBC

History

4.6 • 9.2K Ratings

🗓️ 26 November 2015

⏱️ 45 minutes

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the outbreak of witch trials in Massachusetts in 1692-3, centred on Salem, which led to the execution of twenty people, with more dying in prison before or after trial. Some were men, including Giles Corey who died after being pressed with heavy rocks, but the majority were women. At its peak, around 150 people were suspected of witchcraft, including the wife of the governor who had established the trials. Many of the claims of witchcraft arose from personal rivalries in an area known for unrest, but were examined and upheld by the courts at a time of mass hysteria, belief in the devil, fear of attack by Native Americans and religious divisions. With Susan Castillo-Street Harriet Beecher Stowe Professor Emerita of American Studies at King's College London Simon Middleton Senior Lecturer in American History at the University of Sheffield And Marion Gibson Professor of Renaissance and Magical Literatures at Exeter University, Penryn Campus. Producer: Simon Tillotson.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Thank you for downloading this episode of In Our Time for more details about In Our Time
0:04.0	and for our terms of use, please go to bbc.co.uk slash radio for.
0:08.9	I hope you enjoy the program.
0:10.7	Hello, in 1692 in the New England Colony of Massachusetts, two young girls Abigail Williams
0:15.9	and Betty Paris had fits were twitching, they wouldn't wake up.
0:19.7	They and their families blamed their behaviour on witchcraft, and the hunt was on for the
0:23.8	supposed witches responsible.
0:25.8	This was Salem Village, the Puritans living there and in the surrounding Essex County
0:30.7	started to find witches wherever they looked, neighbor accusing neighbor, many
0:34.3	confessing in the hope of avoiding the noose.
0:36.6	It was no use onlookers arguing there was no such thing as witchcraft, this was
0:40.7	taken as proof that they themselves are witches.
0:43.6	Once the browser over there were apologies, justification, reparations, but by then
0:47.6	over 100 innocent women and children had been accused and held in jail, 20 had been put
0:52.8	to death most of them women.
0:55.0	With me to discuss what became known as the Salem Witch Trial's R, Susan Castillo Street,
1:00.4	Harriet Beecher Stowe, Professor Emeritor of American Studies at King's College London,
1:04.9	Simon Middleton, Senior Lecturer in American History at the University of Sheffield,
1:08.8	and Marion Gibson, Professor of Renaissance and Magical Literatures at Essex University's
1:13.0	Penrine Campus.
1:14.6	Simon Middleton, who is living in Massachusetts at this time in the area around Salem Village
1:19.2	in particular?
	...

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