In seven pages this paper examines the 1692 Salem witch trials in an overview of key players and important events. Five sources are cited in the bibliography.
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What appeared to be started by several young girls acting childishly against the restrictions imposed on them in their village ended in hundreds of people being accused, jailed and many
executed for witchcraft. In Puritan Salem however, components of the religion did not allow for childish behavior as children were expected to act as piously as adults but did allow
for the existence of witches; a combination which proved to be fatal for those accused and the community itself. The Salem Witch Trials
of 1692 actually occurred in the modern town of Danvers which was a parish of Salem Town known then as Salem Village. From June through September of 1692 nineteen men
and women were all convicted of witchcraft and taken to Gallows Hill for hanging. Another man, Giles Corey, was pressed to death with stones for refusing to go on trial
and in all, 24 people were executed or died either by the gallows or in jail (Salem, 2001; Linder, 2000). The background
of the trials began with the arrival of a new minister, Samuel Parris with his wife Elizabeth, their six-year-old daughter Betty, niece Abigail Williams, and Indian slave Tituba, into the
Puritan village in 1688. While the Parris family settled in over the next several years, the town leaders the Putnams and the Porters continued to compete for control over the
village and the church in addition to the debate over whether or not Salem Village should be considered independent over the larger Salem (Linder, 2000; Gribben, 2002).
In February 1692, Betty Parris became very ill and started acting strangely such as contorting in pain, diving under furniture and complaining of fever. The modern