Witchcraft in Topsfield
Topsfield, located just to the north of Salem Village, was one of the nine communities with significant involvement in 1692; six of its residents were accused of witchcraft. Select the "Topsfield" column data as "Input Range" and the "Bin" column data for the "Bin Range."
Topsfield's histogram illustrates the pattern and rhythm of accusations seen in other centers of the outbreak. Its cases occurred exclusively within one wave of accusations and its cases were concentrated in a short period of time. All six Topsfield victims were charged in April, during the first wave of the Salem outbreak before the the Court of Oyer and Terminer resumed sessions at the end of June 1692. The witch hunt erupted and quickly subsided. (Further investigation into these cases would reveal an even tighter chronological concentration than one month. Users can identify the names of the accused by filtering the "Residence" column in the Accused Witches Data Set and then searching the Salem Witchcraft Trial's online legal records to establish their dates of arrest or examination.)
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