Petition for Bail from Accused Witches. 1692. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/mcc.003/
This primary source offers an often unheard perspective of the women who were accused of witchcraft and imprisoned in the Ipswich jail. This would be a valuable resource for teaching any units or texts involving Puritan America or the Salem Witch Trials as the mainstream historical accounts rarely give voice to the women of the time period, especially primary sources by those who were accused and asking for mercy from those in power.
The petition was written by ten women in the Ipswich prison who were accused of witchcraft and had been imprisoned for many months. The appeal details their request to be released due to the winter weather, as some were pregnant and others were sick, and all were worried about dying in prison during the cold winter months. The women asked to be released on bail and return for trial in the spring so that they could ensure that they didn’t die in the cold.
This petition is dated back to the winter of the Salem Witch Trials in what is known today as Ipswich, Massachusetts. Many people, predominantly women, were accused of witchcraft in Massachusetts in the seventeenth century, and this text was written by ten of those accused.
- Why and in what ways have witch hunts repeated themselves over time?
- How can people repair harm they’ve caused individuals or society at large?
- What are effective ways to persuade others through a petition or letter?
- How does this petition help to shed light on the accused and the power dynamics of society at the time?
- What methods or rhetorical devices do they use to appeal to their audience?
- What does this petition show us about the Salem Witch Trials and the conditions of those who were accused and imprisoned?
NCTE Standards & Common Core State Standards
NCTE-1. Students read a wide range of print and nonprint texts to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world; to acquire new information; to respond to the needs and demands of society and the workplace; and for personal fulfillment. Among these texts are fiction and nonfiction, classic and contemporary works.
- Students will examine this petition and will see how language has changed over time. They can make comparisons to other famous letters such a “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King Jr.
NCTE-2. Students read a wide range of literature from many periods in many genres to build an understanding of the many dimensions (e.g., philosophical, ethical, aesthetic) of human experience.
- This primary source not only sets the context for an historical event like the Salem Witch Trials but also helps establish the mindset of those accused at the time. Students can draw conclusions about how the accused were treated based on the language of this petition.
L.9-10.3: Apply knowledge of language to understand how language functions in different contexts, to make effective choices for meaning or style, and to comprehend more fully when reading or listening.
- Students can examine this bail petition and compare with written and video bail requests in current times.
- This would pair well with any unit on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, or units related to Puritan New England, the Salem Witch Trials, and/or McCarthyism in America. This petition could provide more context for nonfiction historical texts about the Salem Witch Trials and those who were accused without much agency in Puritan society, such as Tituba or Goody (Sarah) Osbourne.
- This source could help students work on a character portrait assignment for The Crucible, such as part of this unit from ReadWriteThink, or teach more about the allegorical nature of a play like The Crucible. A teacher could ask students to decipher the language as a class and pose questions about the petition and their wonderings at the outset of the unit. Alternatively, this could be a text introduced after learning about the Salem Witch Trials, the Red Scare, and the Lavender Scare. Teaching about these overlapping time periods would call attention to the fear those accused felt, as well as how those with less social capital suffered at the hands of leaders willing to use fear to scapegoat the most vulnerable in society. Therefore, this text could help students use critical thinking to uncover the truth about modern examples of scapegoating and mass hysteria through thoughtful questions and discussion about journalistic techniques.
- This source could also serve as a model for persuasive writing and provide an opportunity to encourage students to practice applying persuasive appeals.
- This source could be challenged as it highlights the power differentials between those who accused others of witchcraft and those who were accused. People may challenge this source because it underscores the cruelty inflicted by predominantly white men in power on women, pregnant people, BIPOC citizens, and women of lower social standing. This could lead to conversations about how these power differentials continue in society today, as well as how The Library of Congress notes that some “recent historians [ . . . ] suggest that charges of witchcraft were a way of controlling women who threatened the existing economic and social order.” In short, some may object to this source due to misogyny, classism, and/or racism. Some educators or community members might also be concerned about detailing the inhumane conditions inflicted on many of those accused and imprisoned.
Links to resources for approaching those topics
- To support the need for this petition, one could share excerpts from the Salem Witch Trials: Documentary Archive and Transcription Project. More specifically, important testimony can be found in the Examination of Tituba, as recorded by Ezekiell Chevers, to show how an Indigenous woman was threatened to confess or face physical punishment.
- Cotton Mather was one of the perpetrators of the Salem Witch Trials. This title page of a pamphlet could give a different context to the trials.
- Another item could be a “Confession” document that is a report of “strange phenomena” surrounding the Salem Witch Trials.
- For more guidance on teaching about the Salem Witch Trials, educators can refer to these resources from the Salem Witch Museum, or for more guidance teaching a unit related to The Crucible, more specifically, see here for additional unit resources from NEH and Fishtank Learning.