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The 1970s Witchcraft Trial and Other Oddities in Witch History

Khalid Elhassan March 15, 2022 25 min

17. The Spread of Mass Hysteria About Witchcraft

Witchcraft Facts - Tituba — Tituba, in a 1902 illustration. Houghton Mifflin

Tituba’s confession triggered mass hysteria, and in subsequent months, a flood of accusations poured in. The more farfetched they were, the more they solidified the populace’s belief in the potency of witchcraft and enhanced the panic. When the godly and regular churchgoer Martha Corey was accused of witchcraft, it did not give the good people of Salem pause.

Instead, it reinforced their fears: if solid citizen Martha Corey could be a witch, then anybody could be a witch. On May 27^th, 1692, the colony’s governor ordered the establishment of a special court to try the accused. Its first victim was Bridget Bishop, an older woman known as a gossip and with a reputation for promiscuity. Her protestations of innocence did her no good. She was convicted, sentenced to death, and hanged on June 10^th in what became known as Gallows Hill.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.