Salem Witch Trials Essay

In Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem, author Rosalyn Schanzer discusses the outbreak of the Salem witch trials and tells about the murderous colonial period of 1692. The trials took place in Salem, Massachusetts when the Puritans of England migrated to New England. The accusations of witches started when two girls began having fits, and a doctor tried to use elixirs and everything he could to cure them. He then diagnosed the two girls of being plagued by witches. After these events, the first 3 accused witches were arrested on February 29,1692, and the Salem witch trials began. When the accused were tried at the courthouse, they were already walking into death’s gate. Exodus 22:18 says, “ Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” This scripture set the tone for the Salem witch trials..The Salem Witch trials indirectly helped change the American legal system due to moral and ethical issues with spectral evidence, lack of legal representation, and how the accusers only
In Shanzer’s book it says, “To be sure, a number of people had always been leery about the use of spectral evidence, and a few brave souls were not afraid to say it out loud. But when the court of Oyer and Terminer was formed, these skeptics were in minority. The majority still agreed with Willard; to the spectral evidence provided unvarnished proof that someone was a witch,”(77). The people of Salem used this kind of evidence to make sense of what was happening to their children, neighbors, livestock, and the people around them. It says in Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem, “ As early as the 1640’s, about 50 years ago Betty and Abigail first got sick, settlers in New England had begun to suffer