USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Municipal history of Essex County in Massachusetts, Volume II > Part 53
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Lodge No. 178, West Newbury, was organized June 29, 1909. The first officers included: chancellor commander, Charles F. Brown; vice-commander, Ernest E. Chaplin; master of work, Sherman T. Davis; keeper of records and seals, Parker H. Nason; master of finance, Stephen H. Brown; master of exchequer, Hiram R. Poore; master at arms, Harold W. Winchester. Present membership, 166. The order owns its hall built in 1914 at a cost of $2,500; now the property is valued at $5,000. The 1921 officers are: Chancellor commander, Leslie E. Marshall; vice-commander, J. Fred Tarleton; master of work, Benjamin N. Gile; keeper of records and seals, Parker H. Nason; prelate, Harry Carty; master of finance, Warren G. Davis; master of exchequer, Charles A. Frazier master at arms, William W. Bond.
Abraham Lincoln Lodge, No. 127, Lynn, was organided April 28, 1896; now has a total membership of 181. Present officers: A. C. Cornish, chancellor commander; C. L. Williams, vice-commander; G. E. Sanders, prelate; George S. Bowser, master of work; L. C. Sargent, master of finance; W. F. Smith, master of exchequer.
Abraham C. Moody Lodge, was organized October 14, 1892, and now has a total membership of 389. Its officers include: H. E. Cogswell, chancellor com-
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mander; Charles Whitehead, vice-chancellor; Joseph Stewart, prelate; Frank E. Bishop, master of work; Lewis P. Grant, keeper of records and seals; Charles A .. Learned, master of exchequer.
Palestine Lodge, No. 26, Haverhill, was organized March 3, 1870. Its first officers were as follows: V. P. Thomas, A. Northcross, A. J. Gilman, John M. Lunt, A. S. Noyes, William B. Stone. Present membership is 532. Present officers are: Charles E. Bickum, chancellor commander; Charles R. Dunn, vice-chancellor; Wil- liam C. Schluker, prelate; William E. Austin, keeper of records and seals; Walter A. Noyes, master at arms. There are two ladies' auxiliaries to these lodges in Haverhill-Whittier and Rathbone Sisters. Of the original charter membership here in the K. of P. lodge, only two survive-Samuel S. Corliss and James A. Mc- Intire.
Peabody Lodge, No. 96, was organized April 29, 1892. The present elective officers are: H. K. E. Millbury, chancellor commander; Edward F. Larrabee, vice- commander; Harold D. Thomas, keeper of records and seals; Jonathan S. Brown, master of finance; H. P. Luekee, master of exchequer; T. Fred Young, prelate.
Phintias Lodge, No. 65, Amesbury, was organized October 23, 1874. It now has a membership of 203. Present officers include: "David L. Courier, chancellor commander; Joseph H. Gale, prelate; Willard L. Blanchard, master of work; J. Homer McQuillian, keeper of records and seals.
Paul Revere Lodge, No. 156, Lynn, was organized April 20, 1904, and now has a membership of 348. The 1921 officers are: E. L. Dunbar, chancellor commander; William J. Gosse, vice-commander; J. John Hooker, prelate; Everett E. Lang, mas- ter of work; Henry S. Brown, keeper of records and seals; O. R. Dushuttle, master of finance; Bertie E. Ham, master of exchequer.
Rowley Lodge, No. 34, at Rowley, was organized November 27, 1920, and now has a membership of seventy. The present officers are C. F. Haley, Francis D. Peabody, Irving P. Johnson, Jesse W. Chase, Elmer H. Brown, keeper of records and seals.
Sampson Lodge, No. 21, Lynn, was organized May 6, 1920, and now has a mem- bership of 134. Its present officers include M. Gilburg, chancellor commander; A. J. Selloway, vice-commander; Benjamin Hershburg, prelate; D. Zamchleck, master of work; L. J. Goldman, master of finance; Samuel Zamchleck, master of ex- chequer.
Saugus Lodge, No. 94, at Saugus, was organized February 15, 1892, and now has a membership of 186. The present officers include, Joseph Gunnison, chancel- lor commander; Morley Marsh, vice-commander; Fred Pilz, prelate; Harry H. Watson, master of work; J. G. Holmes, keeper of records and seals.
Starr King Lodge, No. 81, Essex, was organized May 13, 1890, and now has a. membership of 216. Its 1921 officers are: Frank O. Riggs, chancellor commander; Elias Jenkins, vice-commander; Edward F. Merars, prelate; Daniel B. Riggs, master of work; Fred W. Andrews, keeper of records and seals.
Syracuse Lodge, No. 30, Ipswich, was organized November 1, 1888, with forty- five charter members. The first officers included: Chancellor-Commander, James. Graffun; vice-commander, George Beaucroft; prelate, Ernest Reed; keeper of rec- ords and seals, W. B. Richards; master of finance, Edward Haskell; master of exchequer, W. H. Russell; master at arms, George Schofield. The present mem- bership is 171. This order leases a hall from the Red Men's Order on Central street. It also has an auxiliary, Pythian Sisters' Temple No. 64. The present officers are: Chancellor-Commander, Thomas Horsman; vice-commander, George W. Brown; prelate, Alton Langmaid; master of exchequer, W. H. Goditt; master of finance, E. B. Bambford; keeper of records and seals, V. E. Ruse; master at arms, Arthur W. Manzers.
Peter Woodland Lodge, No. 72, Lynn, organized March 28, 1889, has now a.
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membership of 741. Its present officers include: Robie S. Brown, chancellor- commander; George B. Shields, vice-commander; George W. Truesdale, prelate; Ernest B. Frye, keeper of records and seals; Charles W. Wilson, master of ex- chequer.
Besides Pythian lodges above named, there are lodges at the follow- ing points: Grecian Lodge, No. 154, at Haverhill, instituted May 25, 1903, has a membership of 281; North Star Lodge No. 38, at Salem, in- stituted April 14, 1870, has 132 members; General Cogswell Lodge No. 122, instituted September 6, 1895, and Uniform Rank No. 39, organized May 22, 1902. The order also has lodges at Essex, Andover, Danvers, Methuen, Ipswich and Marblehead.
CHAPTER XLIX.
WITCHCRAFT IN ESSEX COUNTY
No history of Essex county, whatever limitations might enter into plans as to choice and treatment of topics, could hardly be regarded as rounding out a measure of completeness were there failure to dwell upon the witchcraft delusion. We need not dilate upon the voluminous pro- portions to which discussion of this subject has contributed. It has pro- vided material in abundance for the commentator, the historian, the author and the student. In this opening year of the second decade of the twentieth century, Salem is yet the Mecca of tourists from all sec- tions of the Union, and even from European countries, to whom the story of the witchcraft craze and the relics preserved in that city are at once a lure and a study. And right at this point we should like to advert to a blunder on the part of many travelers and writers, who persist, contrary to all truth, in the statement that witches were burned at the stake in Salem. Some of this perversion is due to ignorance, some to forgetful- ness, but in greater part among certain correspondents to downright care- lessness. However, oft-told the story of the witchcraft delusion, with its terrible accompaniments, in Essex county, the scope of this "Muni- cipal History of Essex County" demanded that at the least there should be that succinct recital, in association with a careful weighing of all the factors involved, which would enable readers properly to inform them- selves, if not to refresh their memories. The following story, fully answering to these standards, is from the pen of Mr. Winfield S. Nevins of Salem:
"Salem Witchcraft" was a unique and interesting episode in the his- tory of the settlement of New England .* Witchcraft had raged in such differing countries as England and Spain. It had been a recognized crime in Great Britain many generations before the people of this country began to settle America. It was nearly three-quarters of a century after the settlement was begun in earnest at Plymouth (1620) and at Salem (1626), that the outbreak occurred in Salem Village. There had been sporadic cases, here and there, previously, it is true, but nothing serious.
The early cases on this side of the water were not in Salem, nor very near it. Hutchinson, the historian, says there were several cases in Springfield in 1645, but our information on that point is uncertain and unsatisfactory. In 1651, Mary Parsons, wife of Hugh Parsons, was charged with witchcraft, tried before the General Court, and acquitted. Subsequently she was convicted of murdering her own child, and sen-'
*In this article I make no claim to originality of material. That was exhausted years ago by the many writers upon this subject. I have drawn, to con- siderable extent, from my own works upon it, more particularly "Witchcraft in Salem Village," 1892 and "The North Shore," in 1891 .- W. S. N.
Essex-56
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tenced to be hanged. Whether sentence was executed, the records do not disclose. There were witchcraft charges in 1652 against John Brad- street of Rowley; in 1655, against Ann Hibbins, of Boston; in 1659, against John Godfrey, of Essex county; in 1662, against Ann Cole, of Hartford, and a Greensmith woman; in 1671, against Elizabeth Knapp, of Groton, Massachusetts; in 1688, against Mary Glover, of Boston, a laundress in the house of John Goodwin, and who was convicted and executed. Of these cases, Bradstreet was convicted of telling a lie, and was fined twenty shillings, "or else to be whipped." Ann Hibbins was convicted and hanged. There is no record that Godfrey was ever tried for witchcraft. Ann Cole, of Hartford, and the Greensmith woman, were executed. Mrs. Greensmith's husband was condemned, but not hanged.
The first Essex county witchcraft case was that of William Morse, of Newbury, in 1679, still far from Salem. In this connection it is inter- esting to note that not a case of witchcraft ever occurred among the Plymouth colonists or their descendants. Yet, in Salem, comers from the same English race, the same English soil, the same English government, prosecuted if not persecuted their most worthy and honored citizens for witchcraft. They hanged nineteen of them after elaborate and painstak- ing examinations and trials, and pressed Giles Corey to death in a vain effort to wring a confession from him.
Let it be understood at the very outset of this story, that these twenty people in Essex county in 1692 were arrested on warrants issued in the usual way by the magistrates, that these cases were heard by a grand jury and indictments found as in all other cases, and, finally, the testimony was presented to a jury of trials presided over by six of the wisest and most discreet men in the colony. Many were found guilty, some pleaded guilty, and others were discharged. These men and women were tried under laws which had been in operation in Great Britain for generations, and which remained on the statute books for a full generation after having been discarded on this side of the Atlantic.
Many complaints were made by children, it is true, but the majority were from fully-grown people-God-fearing, high-minded men and women. Why this unusual outbreak in Essex county, and more particu- larly in and about Salem, no one can explain satisfactorily. Efforts have been made to convey the impression that it was due to family feuds, and at one time that was quite generally believed; but the historic facts do not sustain the charge. That the people were intelligent, fairminded and discriminating, is manifested by their final refusal to convict on the same sort of evidence that had been effective at first, which refusal resulted ultimately in the death of belief in witchcraft as a crime, not alone in this country, but in the world, although it was many years before England repealed its witchcraft laws. Essex county men in Essex county courts struck the deathblow to witchcraft in all the world. All honor to them. How we would like to know what they were thinking and saying during that last court session when they refused to convict !
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The first execution for witchcraft on this continent was in Charles- town, Massachusetts, in 1648, when Margaret Jones was hanged. Her offense appears to have been like that of Rebekah, the Jewess, in Scott's story of "Ivanhoe,"-practicing "irregular." Ann Hibbins, of Boston, was found guilty of witchcraft in 1655, but the court would not receive the verdict. She was then tried before the General Court and convicted. Governor John Endicott sentenced her to be hanged, and hanged she was.
There had been rumors of witchcraft practices during the winter of 1692 in the household of Rev. Samuel Parris, pastor of the church at Salem Village, located in what is now Danvers. Parris had in his house- hold a West Indian servant named Tituba, and a daughter and niece, aged respectively nine nd eleven. It is thought that Tituba practiced some Indian tricks and incantations for the amusement of the children and others during the winter. Gradually stories of these performances spread abroad. Dr. Gibbs said the girls were bewitched. Mr. Parris called a meeting of neighboring ministers to investigate and they said it was witchcraft. The children told the ministers that Tituba bewitched them, and they also named Sarah Goode and Sarah Osborne. These women were old, the former melancholy, and the latter bed-ridden. How- ever, complaint was lodged against them in February, 1692, and on the 29th of that month warrants were issued for their arrest by Magistrates Jonathan Corwin and John Hathorne. The examinations were begun on March 1st in the Salem Village Meeting House. Sarah Goode was the first to be examined. She was the wife of William Goode, a "laborer," about seventy years of age and not of good repute. I give here in full the indictment found against Goode by the grand jury. Most of the subsequent ones were substantially the same:
The jurors for our sovereign Lord and Lady, the King and Queen, present that Sarah Goode, wife of William Goode of Salem Village, husbandman, the second day of May in the fourth year of the reign of our sovereign Lord and Lady, William and Mary, by the grace of God, of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, King and Queen, defenders of the faith, etc., and divers other faiths and times, as well before as after, certain detestable acts called witchcraft and sorceries, wickedly and feloni- ously hath used, practiced and exercised at and within the township of Salem within the county of Essex aforesaid, in, upon and against one Sarah Vibber, wife of John Vibber, of Salem aforesaid, husbandman, by which said wicked acts she, said Sarah Vibber, the second of May in the fourth year above aforesaid and divers other days and times as well before as after, was and is afflicted, pained, consumed, wasted and tormented, and also for sundry other acts of witchcraft by said Sarah Goode committed and done, before and since that time, against the peace of our sovereign Lord and Lady, the King and Queen, their crown and dignity and against the forme of the statute in this case made and provided.
Dorcas Goode, five years of age, was a witness in this case against her own mother. She said that her mother "had three birds-one black, one yellow, and these birds hurt the children and afflicted persons." The color of the other bird is not mentioned. Dorcas herself was later charged with bewitching Mary Walcott and Ann Putnam. Sarah Goode
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was convicted, and executed on July 19. At the execution Rev. Mr. Noyes told her she was a witch, to which she replied, "You are a liar!" Sarah Osborn was sixty years of age, and Osborn was her third husband. She died in jail in Boston while awaiting trial.
Martha Corey was arrested soon after Goode and Osborn were. She was a woman of intelligence and judgment for those days; she did not believe in witchcraft, and talked against it, and she urged her husband, Giles to keep away from the examination, but he did not heed her advice and soon found himself in the meshes of the law.
During the trial of Sarah Goode, a witness by name of Hobbs cried out that Goode had stabbed her and had broken the knife blade in doing it. On examination the point of the blade was found in her clothes, to the great consternation of the court and the spectators. Then a young man in court said that that was the point of a knife which he had broken off the previous day and thrown away.
After the trial of Bridget Bishop, the court asked advice of the min- isters. The answer, written by Cotton Mather, was a calm, judicious document. It urged "a very critical and exquisite caution." That "all proceedings be managed with an exceeding tenderness toward those who may be complained of, especially if they had been persons formerly of un- blemished reputation." The ministers decidedly cautioned against con- viction on spectre evidence alone. Nevertheless, they urged prosecution of all who had rendered themselves obnoxious according to the laws of God and man.
Giles Corey was pressed to death for refusing to plead to a charge of witchcraft, in accordance with an ancient English law. This was the first and only case of the kind in New England as far as it is known. The reason for the refusal is supposed to have been to avoid forfeiture of his property and attaint of his family if he were found guilty. It was a horrible punishment. The victim was laid on his back and a heavy weight placed on his chest, so that he died after a long time and in great agony. Only the stoutest heart could possibly endure the ordeal, and Corey begged for "more weight," that the end might be hastened.
Bridget Bishop was the first actual victim of the frenzy, although she was not the first one arrested. As we have seen, Sarah Goode was the first person accused and was arrested on February 29, but she was not executed until July 19. Bishop was arrested April 19, and hanged June 10, being the only person executed on that day. She had been arrested and tried on a witchcraft charge in 1680, and found not guilty. Samuel Gray, her accuser on this occasion, long after, on his deathbed, expressed his regret and admitted that his complaint had been wholly groundless. The Bishops did not bear a good reputation. They had been before the courts previous to 1692 on various complaints. Bishop was Bridget's third husband; he himself married again nine months after her execution.
We have on the court files in the office of the clerk of courts in
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Salem the original warrant issued for Bridget's execution, together with the sheriff's return that he had obeyed the command of the court. As this is the only case in which the warrant was preserved ,it is reproduced here in full, verbatim. The others were undoubtedly couched in the same terms. The words in brackets were written in and then crossed out, the sheriff evidently concluding that "burial" was not enjoined in the war- rant and not required in the return.
To George Corwin gentm. High Sheriff of the county of Essex greeting:
Wheras Bridget Bishop, als Oliver, the wife of Edward Bishop of Salem in the county of Essex, sawyer, at a special court of Oyer and Terminer held at Salem the second day of this instant month of June, for the countyes of Essex, Middlesex and Suffolk, before William Stoughton, Esq. and his associate justices of the said court was in dicted and arraigned upon five several indictments for using, practicing and exercising on the 19th day of April last past and divers other days and times before and after certain acts of witchcraft on and upon the bodyes of Abigail Williams, Ann Putnam junr,, Mercy Lewis, May Walcott and Elizabeth Hubbard of Salem Village, single women whereby their bodyes were hurt, afflicted, pained, consumed, wasted and tormented contray to the form of the statute in that case made and provided.
To which endictment the said Bridget Bishop pleaded not guilty and for tryal thereof put herself upon God and her country whereupon she was found guilty of felonyes and witchcraft whereof she stood indicted and sentence of death accord- ingly passed agt her as the law directs. Execution whereoff yet remains to be done. These are therefore in the name of their maj (es) ties William and Mary now King and Queen over England etc., to will and command you that upon Friday next being the 10th dy of this instant month of June, between the hours of 8 and 12 in the aforenoon of the same day you safely conduct the sd Bridget Bishop als Oliver from their majties goal in Salem aforesaid to the place of execution and there cause her to be hanged by the neck until she be dead and of your doings herein make return to the clerke of the sd court and precept, and hereof you are not to faile at your perial and this shall be your sufficient warrant given under my hand and seal at Boston the 8th dy of June in the fourth year of the reign of our sovirgne Lord and Lady William and Mary now King and Queen over England etc, annogr dom 1692.
WILLIAM STOUGHTON.
According to the within written precept I have taken the body of the within named Bridget Bishop out of their majesties goal in Salem and safely conveyed her to the place provided for her execution and caused ye sd Bridgett to be hanged by the neck untill she was dead [and buried in the place] all which was according to the time within required and so I make return by me,
GEORGE CORWIN, Sheriff.
Rev. George Burroughs was a noted victim of the frenzy. He had been pastor of the Salem Village church from November, 1680, to some time in 1683, when he withdrew and went to Portland, where he had pre- viously preached. He was a Harvard graduate. When he terminated his pastorate in Danvers, the parish owed him some money on his salary, and he lacked funds wherewith to pay the funeral expenses of his wife, who had just died. When arrested on the witchcraft warrant, he was living and preaching in Wells, Maine. The testimony against Burroughs
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was given by the same group of young girls that had testified against the other accused persons. There was also much testimony as to his physi- cal strength. Samuel Webber told how he had seen Burroughs put his fingers in the bung of a barrel of molasses and lift it. He was found guilty, and executed on August 19, this occasion being memorable for the attendance of ministers, among them being Cotton Mather, Rev. Mr. Noyes, Rev. Mr. Hale, Rev. Mr. Cheever, Rev. Mr. Sims. Robert Calef tells us that when Burroughs' body was cut down, it was denuded of most of its clothing, and dragged to a hole, or a grave and put in, with one of his hands and an arm sticking out.
Rebecca Nurse, wife of Francis Nurse, was one of the most inter- esting figures in this history. She was seventy-one years of age in 1692, when arrested on March 23. The complainants were Thomas and Ed- ward Putnam, who had made complaint against Sarah Goode. Four in- dictments were found against her for bewitching Ann Putnam, Elizabeth Hubbard, Mary Walcott and Abigail Williams. A verdict of "not guilty" was returned June 28, whereupon the accused were taken in violent fits, rolling and tumbling about. The judge sent the jurors out again. Still they could not agree, and returned to court seeking further explanations by the accused, but she made no answer, and the jury returned a verdict of "guilty." The accused woman, on being informed later that her silence had been construed as a confession, explained that by reason of old age and deafness she had not understood. She was sentenced to be hanged. The governor granted a reprieve, but she was excommunicated from the church-the First Church of Salem. Then the accusers re- newed their charges, and the governor recalled the reprieve, and July 19 the venerable woman was hanged on the summit of Witch Hill. The house in which the Nurses lived in 1692 is still standing in Danvers Centre, and is owned by the Rebecca Nurse Association. She is rep- resented to have been a most exemplary woman, and she was the mother of eight children.
The Jacobs family received harsh treatment at the hands of the authorities and their neighbors. George, senior, seventy years of age, George, Jr., and his wife Rebecca and daughter Margaret, were all ac- cused. The old man and the young Margaret were arrested first, May 10. Young Jacobs and his wife were summoned four days later. When the constable took Rebecca away, four young children followed some distance, but finally the neighbors took them in. Her husband escaped. George, Sr., was tried, found guilty, and hanged on August 19. Rebecca was brought to trial in January, 1693, and acquitted. Margaret con- fessed to being a witch, and testified against her grandfather. Later, she retracted these confessions and eventually was released.
Other victims were John Willard, of Salem Farms; arrested May 17, tried in August, and hanged on August 19. Martha Carrier, of An- dover, arrested May 28, examined on the 31st, tried and executed August
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19. She was forty years of age, and was the mother of a large family, four of her children being taken into custody with her. Sarah Carrier, aged eight years, confessed herself a witch and testified against her mother. Elizabeth How, wife of John How of Topsfield, was arrested May 29 and examined the 31st. She was tried and hanged in July. Her husband was blind, and was left with two young motherless daughters.
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