Accused Witches
| Accused Witch | Residence | Month of Accusation | Month of Execution | Sort |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abbott, Arthur | Ipswich | 5 |
1 |
|
| Abbott, Nehemiah, Jr. | Topsfield | 4 |
2 |
|
| Alden, John | Boston | 5 |
3 |
|
| Andrew, Daniel | Salem Village | 5 |
4 |
|
| Barker, Abigail | Andover | 9 |
5 |
The Accused Witches Data Set contains information about those who were formally accused of witchcraft during the Salem episode. This means that there exists evidence of some form of direct legal involvement, such as a complaint made before civil officials, an arrest warrant, an examination, or court record. Accused witches were almost always detained in jail to await further action by a grand jury, which had the authority to indict and hold the accused for trial. Trials by a special Court of Oyer and Terminer began in June 1692. In October 1692, this court was discontinued due to mounting criticism of its methods. It was replaced by another court, the Superior Court of Judicature, which held trials from January to May 1693.
There is no scholarly agreement as to how many people were really accused during the Salem outbreak. For example, some people who were named as witches during examinations may not have been formally charged. This data set excludes those who were only named. On the other hand, some of the accused who were jailed but for whom no complaint or examination exists have been included on the assumption that they were jailed as a result of legal proceedings. One case, Martha Sparks of Chelmsford, is included though she was accused sometime in the fall of 1691, preceding by months the first appearance of the outbreak in Salem Village. Since she was retained in jail throughout 1692, her case became sufficiently entangled with the Salem episode to appear in the data set.
The data set records information regarding 152 people who left a clear trace of being officially charged with witchcraft. This number should be considered as the minimum figure for counting Salem's victims. Some appear to have fled before the legal system could sweep them in while others, less fortunate, are simply unaccounted for due to the incompleteness of the historic record. Users of this site can exclude or add cases to the data set as new evidence comes to light or because they differently interpret the historical record.
The data set contains five columns (variables):
- The "Accused Witch" column records the names of the 152 people mentioned in legal records as having been formally accused of witchcraft. Their names are alphabetically arranged. Spelling generally follows that of Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum, Salem Witchcraft Papers but has been sometimes changed in accordance with the newer Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt and other sources.
- "Residence" identifies the community in which the accused person was living when accused of witchcraft. In a few cases, the residence of an accused witch is problematic. For Elizabeth How, for example, some records cite Ipswich while others name Topsfield as her home. In such cases, the most likely residence has been used. In a few instances, the residence entry does not reflect the actual geographic relationship of the accused with the trials. George Burroughs was living in Wells, Maine, in 1692, but he had been a controversial minister in Salem Village in the early 1680s.
- "Month of Accusation" numerically expresses the month of the year in which an alleged witch was accused: "1"=January 1692; "6"=June 1692; and "13"=January 1693. A negative 1 (-1) indicates that the actual month of accusation is not known with sufficient certainty to be included. Some of these "unknowns" can be approximated from available records, and users may choose to substitute their estimate. Users should also recognize an artificial quality to this data: those accused in one month, May (5), for example, may have been charged only a day or two before someone in June (6).
- "Month of Execution" numerically expresses the month in which an alleged witch was executed as a result of the legal process. The data do not include entries for those who died as a result of their incarceration. In one case, Giles Corey, the month of execution does record the month in which he was pressed to death for refusing to plead to the charges against him.
- "Sort" permits data to be easily restored to their original order after a statistical manipulation.
To explore the pattern of accusations and executions in 1692, click Next.