LETTERS OF GOVERNOR PHIPS
Letter
When I first arrived I found this Province
miserably harrassed with a most Horrible witchcraft or Possession of Devills
which had broke in upon severall Townes, some scores of poor people were taken
with preternaturall torments some scalded with brimstone some had pins stuck in
their flesh others hurried into the fire and water and some dragged out of their
houses and carried over the tops of trees and hills for many Miles together; it
hath been represented to mee much like that of Sweden about thirty
years agoe,[88]
and there were many committed to prison upon suspicion of Witchcraft before my
arrivall. The loud cries and clamours of the friends of the afflicted people with
the advice of the Deputy Governor and many others prevailed with mee to give
a Commission of Oyer and Terminer for discovering what witchcraft might be at
the bottome or whether it were not a possession. The chief Judge in this
Commission was the Deputy Governour and the rest were persons of the best
prudence and figure that could then be pitched upon. When the Court came to sitt
at Salem in the County of Essex they convicted more than twenty persons of
being guilty of witchcraft, some of the convicted were such as confessed their
Guilt, the Court as I understand began their proceedings with the accusations of
the afflicted and then went upon other humane[89] evidences to strengthen that. I
was almost the whole time of the proceeding abroad in the service of Their
Majesties in the Eastern part of the Country and depended upon the Judgement
of the Court as to a right method of proceeding in cases of Witchcraft but when
I came home I found many persons in a strange ferment of dissatisfaction which
was increased by some hott Spiritts that blew up the flame,[90] but
on enquiring into the matter I found that the Devill had taken upon him the name
and shape of severall persons who were doubtless inocent and to my certain
knowledge of good reputation for which cause I have now forbidden the
committing of any more that shall be accused without unavoydable necessity, and
those that have been committed I would shelter from any Proceedings against
them wherein there may be the least suspition of any wrong to be done unto the
Innocent. I would also wait for any particular directions or commands if their
Majesties please to give mee any for the fuller ordering this perplexed affair. I
have also put a stop to the printing of any discourses one way or other, that may
increase the needless disputes of people upon this occasion, because I saw a
likely-hood of kindling an inextinguishable flame if I should admitt any publique
and open Contests and I have grieved to see that some who should have done
their Majesties and this Province better service have so far taken Councill of
Passion as to desire the precipitancy of these matters, these things have been
improved by some to give me many interuptions in their Majesties service and in
truth none of my vexations have been greater than this, than that their Majesties
service has been hereby unhappily clogged, and the Persons who have made soe
ill improvement of these matters here are seeking to turne it all upon
mee,
[91] but
I hereby declare that as soon as I came from fighting against their Majesties
Enemyes and understood what danger some of their innocent subjects might be
exposed to, if the evidence of the afflicted persons only did prevaile either to the
committing or trying any of them, I did before
any application was made unto me about it put a stop to the proceedings of the
Court and they are now stopt till their Majesties pleasure be known. Sir I beg
pardon for giving you all this trouble, the reason is because I know my enemies
are seeking to turn it all upon me and I take this liberty because I depend upon
your friendship, and desire you will please to give a true understanding of the
matter if any thing of this kind be urged or made use of against mee. Because the
justnesse of my proceeding herein will bee a sufficient defence. Sir
I am with all imaginable respect Your most humble Servt
William Phips.
Letter
Dated at Boston the 12th
of october 1692.
[92] Mem'dm
That my Lord President be pleased to acquaint his Ma'ty in Councill with
the account received from New England from Sir Wm. Phips the Governor there
touching Proceedings against severall persons for Witchcraft as appears by the
Governor's letter concerning those matters.
Letter
Boston in
New England Febry 21st, 1692/3.
May it please yor. Lordshp.
By the Capn. of the Samuell and Henry I gave
an account that att my arrivall here I found the Prisons full of people
committed upon suspition of withcraft and that continuall complaints were made
to me that many persons were grievously tormented by witches and that they
cryed out upon severall persons by name, as the cause of their torments. The
number of these complaints increasing every day, by advice of the Lieut Govr.
and the Councill I gave a Commission of Oyer and Terminer to try the suspected
witches and at that time the generality of the People represented the matter to me
as reall witchcraft and gave very strange instances of the same. The first in
Commission was the Lieut. Govr. and the rest persons of the best prudence and
figure that could then be pitched upon and I depended upon the Court for a right
method of proceeding in cases of witchcraft. At that time I went to command the
army at the Eastern part of the Province, for the French and Indians had made
an attack upon some of our Fronteer Towns. I continued there for some time but
when I returned I found people much disatisfied at the proceedings of the Court,
for about Twenty persons were condemned and executed of which number some
were thought by many persons to be innocent. The Court still proceeded in the
same method of trying them, which was by the evidence of the afflicted persons
who when they were brought into the Court as soon as the suspected witches
looked upon them instantly fell to the ground in strange agonies and grievous
torments, but when touched by them upon the arme or some other part of their
flesh they immediately revived and came to themselves, upon [which] they made
oath that the Prisoner at the Bar did afflict them and that they saw their shape or
spectre come from their bodies which put them to such paines and torments:
When I enquired into the matter I was enformed by the Judges that they begun
with this, but had humane testimony against such as were condemned and
undoubted proof of their being witches, but at length I found that the Devill did
take upon him the shape of Innocent persons and some were accused of whose
innocency I was well assured and many considerable persons of unblameable life
and conversation were cried out upon as witches and wizards. The Deputy Govr.
notwithstanding persisted vigorously in the same method, to the great
disatisfaction and disturbance of the people, until I put an
end to the Court and stopped the proceedings, which I did because I saw many
innocent persons might otherwise perish and at that time I thought it my duty to
give an account thereof that their Ma'ties pleasure might be signifyed, hoping that
for the better ordering thereof the Judges learned in the law in England might
give such rules and directions as have been practized in England for proceedings
in so difficult and so nice a point; When I put an end to the
Court
[93] there were
at least fifty persons in prison in great misery by reason of the extream cold and
their poverty, most of them having only spectre evidence against them, and their
mittimusses being defective, I caused some of them to be lett out upon bayle and
put the Judges upon considering of a way to reliefe others and prevent them from
perishing in prison, upon which some of them were convinced and acknowledged
that their former proceedings were too violent and not grounded upon a right
foundation but that if they might sit againe, they would proceed after another
method, and whereas Mr. Increase Mathew
[94] and severall other Divines did give
it as their Judgment that the Devill might afflict in the shape of an innocent
person and that the look and the touch of the suspected persons was not sufficient
proofe against them, these things had not the same stress layd upon them as
before, and upon this consideration I permitted a spetiall Superior
Court
[95] to be
held at Salem
in the County of Essex on the third day of January, the Lieut Govr. being Chief
Judge. Their method of proceeding being altered, all that were brought to tryall
to the number of fifety two, were cleared saving three, and I was enformed by
the Kings Attorny Generall that some of the cleared and the condemned were
under the same circumstances or that there was the same reason to clear the three
condemned as the rest according to his Judgment. The Deputy Govr. signed a
Warrant for their speedy execucion and also of five others who were condemned
at the former Court of Oyer and terminer, but considering how the matter had
been managed I sent a reprieve whereby the execucion was stopped untill their
Maj. pleasure be signified and declared. The Lieut. Gov. upon this occasion was
inranged and filled with passionate anger and refused to sitt upon the bench in a
Superior Court then held at Charles Towne,
[96] and indeed hath from the beginning
hurried on these matters with great precipitancy and by his warrant hath caused
the estates, goods and chattles of the executed to be seized and disposed of
without my knowledge or consent. The stop put to the first method of proceedings
hath dissipated the blak cloud that threatened this Province with destruccion; for
whereas this delusion of the Devill did spread and its dismall effects touched the
lives and estates of many of their Ma'ties Subjects and the reputacion of some of
the principall persons here,
[97] and indeed unhappily clogged and interrupted their
Ma'ties affaires which hath been a great vexation to me, I have no new
complaints but peoples minds before divided
and distracted by differing opinions concerning this matter are now well
composed.
I am Yor. Lordships most faithfull humble Servant
William Phips
[Addressed:] To the Rt. Honble the Earle of Nottingham att Whitehall
London
[Indorsed:] R [
i. e., received] May 24, 93
abt. Witches
[98]
Notes
[[88].]
The famous case at Mohra in 1669-1670. Cotton Mather had appended
to his Wonders an account of it.
[[90].]
He thinks perhaps of the Baptist preacher, William Milborne, one of the
leaders in the later revolution, who on June 25 was called before the Council
because of two papers subscribed by him and several others, “containing
very high reflections upon the administration of public justice within this their
Majesty's Province” (Moore, Notes on
Witchcraft, p. 12; Final Notes, p. 72). What
seems one of these papers, addressed “to the Grave and Juditious the
Generall Assembly of the Province,” has been found (see it in
N. E. Hist. and Gen. Register, XXVII. 55, and reprinted
by Moore in American Antiquarian Society,
Proceedings, n. s., V. 246) and proves a protest against
the conviction “upon bare specter testimonie” of “persons
of good fame and of unspotted reputation.” It must have been in
circulation before the detection of its author, and was very possibly the reason for
the consultation of the clergy.
[[91].]
It must be remembered that the new charter, by opening the suffrage to
those who were not church members, had greatly strengthened the party opposed
to the theocracy — and to the theocracy's governor. More than once it has
been said, too, that the Salem witchcraft was the rock on which the theocracy
shattered.
[[92].]
This letter, with its memorandum, has been printed in the
Essex Institute Historical Collections, IX. 86-88, from
a copy made in the British archives (“Colonial Entry Book, vol. 62, p.
414,” now C. O. 5: 905, p. 414). It has since been printed also in the
Calendar of State Papers, Colonial, 1689-1692 (no.
2551, p. 720), which uses not only this MS. (mistakenly called “an
extract”) but another (“Board of Trade, New England, 6, no.
7,” now C. O. 5: 857, no. 7); but the editor has corrected and
paraphrased. The last-named MS. (C. O. 5: 857, no. 7) is, however, the original
letter; and the present impression has been carefully collated with it at London,
many corrections resulting. October 14, in the Essex Institute's reprint, is only
a printer's error for October 12. The letter was addressed to William Blathwayt,
clerk of the Privy Council, and it is he who added the memorandum (to the Entry
Book copy).
[[93].]
It was on October 29, three days after the passage by the General Court
of the bill calling for a fast and a convocation of ministers for guidance
“as to the witchcrafts,” and, as Judge Sewall tells us (see p. 186,
note 1, above) in such “season and manner” that “the Court
of Oyer and Terminer count themselves thereby dismissed,” that in the
Council, when “Mr. Russel asked whether the Court of Oyer and Terminer
should sit, expressing some fear of Inconvenience by its fall,” the
“Governour said it must fall.” (Sewall's
Diary, I. 368.)
[[94].]
Mather. Undoubtedly an error of the English copyist. The advice meant
was that of the twelve ministers of Boston and vicinity on June 15. See
introduction.
[[95].]
The Superior Court was created by act of the General Court of the
province — of course with the concurrence of the governor — on
November 25, 1692; but its session at Salem would, under the law, have come
in the next November, and a supplementary act was passed on December 16,
providing, “upon consideration that many persons charged capital
offenders are now in custody within the county of Essex,” for a court of
assize and general jail delivery there on January 3.
[[96].]
For this episode see pp. 382-383.
[[97].]
A “letter from Boston” printed in the British
Calendar of State Papers, Colonial, 1693-1696, p. 63,
says that “The witchcraft at Salem went on vigorously... until at last
members of Council and Justices were accused”; and the Boston merchant
Calef in 1697 wrote: “If it be true what was said at the Counsel-board in
answer to the commendations of Sir William, for his stopping the proceedings
about Witchcraft, viz. That it was high time for him
to stop it, his own Lady being accused; if that Assertion were a truth, then
New-England may seem to be more beholden to the accusers for accusing of her,
and thereby necessitating a stop, than to Sir William”
(More Wonders, p. 154). Lady Phips had earned an
accusation by daring, in Sir William's absence, herself to issue a warrant for the
discharge of an accused woman. The keeper lost his place. (MS. letter quoted by
Hutchinson, II. 61, note; the writer had it from the keeper himself and had seen
the document.)
[[98].]
This letter is here reprinted from the Massachusetts Historical Society's
Proceedings, second ser., I. 340-342, where the
original, in the British archives, is described as “America and West Indies,
No. 591” and “also in Colonial Entry Book, No. 62, p.
426”; but the Calendar of State Papers,
Colonial, 1693-1696, which again prints it, though in abridged form,
ascribes it to “America and West Indies, 561, nos. 28, 29,” and
mentions the duplicate as “Col. Entry Bk., Vol. LXII, pp.
426-430,” and as “entered as addressed to William
Blathwayt.” It may also be found in G. H. Moore's Final Notes on Witchcraft in Massachusetts
(New York, 1885), pp. 90-93, with his annotations. Examination at the
British Public Record Office shows that the original letter (formerly America and
West Indies, 561, no. 28) is now C. O. 5: 51, no. 28, and is plainly addressed
to the Earl of Nottingham.