The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 and 1693 were devastating to the town and its people. Over 200 people were accused, somewhere between 140 and 185 people were formally charged, 30 were found guilty and 20 were executed. An additional 5 died while awaiting trial or sentencing. All of this happened between January 1692 and May 1693.
We know now that the people accused of witchcraft were innocent. Although people in Salem might have practiced folk magic in the 17th Century, they were not making deals with evil spirits to harm children. In fact, one of the most surprising pieces of evidence of magic came from the home of a family that accused more than 100 people.
Who were the Putnams?
Thomas Putnam, Jr. was born in 1651 or 1652 (the calendar was different back then) and married his wife, Ann Carr, in 1675. They had 12 children including Ann Jr., who was one of the first girls in Salem to accuse someone of witchcraft. Thomas served in the military and was employed as the parish clerk.
The Putnam family was wealthy and powerful, but Thomas Jr. did not inherit much of his father’s money, which left him feeling resentful of neighbors who had more. Perhaps that’s why, in 1692, he and his family accused dozens of witchcraft.
“He wrote over 100 depositions of accusations against people,” said Dan Lipcan, the Ann C. Pingree Director of the Peabody Essex Museum’s Phillips Library.
Some of those accusations were against the Porter family, a rival family Thomas Putnam’s stepbrother had married into. The Putnams were responsible for the accusations of at least two of the people who were executed, including Rebecca Nurse, an elderly woman at their church, and George Burroughs, a former village minister and another Putnam family rival.
Ann Putnam, Sr., Thomas’s wife, might have had a different reason. She’d had a difficult life, losing siblings as a young girl and losing two of her own children. This also was a difficult time to live in Salem, and Ann might have been afraid of attacks by the French and indigenous people in the area. We can only speculate about why, but we do know that she encouraged her daughter, Ann Jr., to point the finger at people who might be practicing witchcraft. Ann Jr. accused 18 of the 20 who were eventually executed.
The curious object at the museum
The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem has many artifacts on display from 1692, including a curious piece from the Putnam home. And it raises an interesting question: Was the Putnam family practicing witchcraft themselves?
“One of the objects we have is a tape loom. You used it to weave fabric tapes that you would then use to reinforce curtains or clothing,” Lipcan said. “And this tape loom was owned by the Putnam family.”
According to the museum’s documents, the loom was owned by Rebecca Putnam, whose father John was a relative of Thomas Putnam. On the loom are some folk magic symbols such as daisy wheels, which people sometimes would carve above a fireplace, for example, believing it would help prevent evil spirits from entering their home.
The apology
Thomas and Ann Putnam, Sr., both died in 1699, leaving Ann, Jr. to raise her siblings. In 1706, she made a public apology at her church and asked for foregiveness.
“Ann Putnam gave a speech to the congregation,” Lipcan said. “She basically got up and apologized.”
Ann Putnam, Jr., died in 1716.