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The Witch Hunt That Broke Salem: The Final Chapter of the Trials · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Maybe so. Picture this. It's sixteen ninety two and Salem, Massachusetts,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: has officially lost its collective mind. At this point, half
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: the town has accused the other half of witchcraft, and
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: the accusations are flying faster than the gossip. At a
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: PTA meeting, a respectable eighty one year old farmer named
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Giles Corey is dragged into this madness. But instead of
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: going quietly, he decides to stage a silent protest. Like
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: literally silent, he refuses to speak, which turns out to
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: be a bad idea when your punishment involves being crushed
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: under a pile of rocks. Thing is it wasn't just
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: about witches and black cats now it was personal, with
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: local politics, family feuds, and some questionable leadership thrown in.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: The Salem witch Trials were the ultimate small town drama
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: on steroids, and in this episode we'll explore how a
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: chaotic mix of religious fervor, fear, and one man's refusal
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: to say anything at all led to one of the
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: most disturbing moments in American history. Trust me, if you
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: think your town has drama, Salem would have eaten it
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: for breakfast. Listen as we dig into the twisted end
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: of the Salem witch trials. Welcome to ten minute murder.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: Before Giles Corey found himself facing accusations of witchcraft, the
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: Salem courts had already seen their share of unlikely defendants,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: George Burrows, a Puritan preacher with some serious political baggage,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: and Bridget Bishop, a tough as Nail's tavern owner. But
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: for Giles, the trial hit even closer to home. Just
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: a few months earlier, his own wife, Martha had been
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: accused of witchcraft and stood on the very same spot
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: in court. Now it was Giles's turn to face the hysteria,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: and things were about to get a whole lot darker.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: By then, Giles was eighty one years old and had
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: lived a life as one of the earlier settlers in Salem.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Giles was well liked, but he still had a bit
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: of a reputation. As a younger man. He'd been in
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: trouble a few times with the law for petty thievery
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: or for breaking procedure when it was his turn on
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: the watch. Giles had formerly been accused of and later
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: confessed to, falling asleep on the watch multiple times, and
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: on one occasion his weapon was even stolen from him
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: while he slept. He'd also at one point abandoned his
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: post to go and collect firewood instead. A bit of
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: a rule breaker, but still a respected member of the community.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: There had only been one time in Giles's life where
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: he found himself facing the potential ire of his community.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: Over a decade before the trials, Giles was in court again,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: only this time he was charged with murder. Giles had
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: beaten one of his indentured farm workers for stealing, and
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: had only allowed him to seek medical attention ten days after.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: By then, it was already too late, and his servant
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: ended up dying as a result of the injuries. Giles
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: then faced the courts, only to find himself spared from
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: the same fate. Corporal punishment amongst indentured servants was completely
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: legal at that historic point in time, so Giles was
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: only found guilty of using excessive force and given a fine.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: It was in that very same courthouse that Giles then
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: watched his wife Martha be accused of being a witch
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: after she questioned whether the girls Betty and Abigail were
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: telling the truth about being afflicted by dark magic. Swept
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: up in the frenzied paranoia of the trials. Giles had
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: first believed that his wife was a witch until another
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: of the accused pointed the finger at him. Next. In
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: an instant, Giles realized how quickly people were being tried
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: and found guilty of witchcraft with little to no evidence.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: His estate and assets were seized, and Giles was thrown
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: into jail awaiting a trial of his own. But he
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: wasn't about to go quietly. Only Giles did mean to
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: do just that. In a more literal sense, when Giles
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: was asked how he would plead, he refused to speak.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: This wouldn't mean much by today's standards, but in sixteen
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: ninety two, it meant that the trial could not proceed.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: This was Giles' silent protest, and it was his appeal
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: to the people in the courts of Salem to end
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: the persecution of innoc and people. Faced with a dilemma
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: and needing Giles to enter a plea before they could
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: find him guilty of his charges, the courts then ordered
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: that Giles be taken outside and tortured Onlookers watched as
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  Speaker 1: the elderly man was escorted outside the courthouse and laid
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: on the ground. A door was then placed over him
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: to provide ample space to stack and balance large stones.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: Giles would then be asked to enter a plea, and
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: he would refuse. More stones were added, making it impossible
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: for him to breathe. He endured two days of this
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: torture before passing away. Instead of taking a moment to
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: question themselves, the courts then continued in the same lot
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: as Giles. Four others would plead guilty, and eleven others
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: were found guilty at trial. Over two hundred people would
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: find themselves accused at one point or another over the
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  Speaker 1: course of the witch hunt, twenty of which would be
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: found guilty and were executed. Giles, as we know, died
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: from torture, and at least five other people died from
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: diseases and the appalling conditions that they were subjected to
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: while in jail. For those who were forced to the gallows,
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: like respectable church going women like Rebecca Nurse and Giles's
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: own wife, Martha Corey, they were not only killed, but
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: excommunicated from their church. For many at the time, this
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: alone was a fate worse than death. They were denied
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: proper Christian burials and were instead buried in shallow mass graves.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: Although oral history claims that family members would return to
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: these graves under the cover of darkness to rebury their
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: loved one's remains. The pivotal key figure to Tuba, who
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: I mentioned in the previous episode, who had only added
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: fuel to the fire by confessing not only to being
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: a witch, but that there were others living among them,
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  Speaker 1: was left to rot behind bars because her owner refused
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: to pay her jail fee. It was years later that
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: ownership of Totuba was sold for forward at the cost
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: of her jail fee, and she disappeared from the history books.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: And it is Tituba's original owner who would prove to
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: be a highly controversial figure, although at this time of
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: the trials there were few others who stood above him.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: His name was Samuel Parris, and he was the local
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: parish minister. Yes, not only did that place him in
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: a highly strategic advantage when it came to deciding who
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: among the community was a witch, but from the very
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: beginning of the trials, Samuel Parris was able to control
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: the narrative. Not only was it his slave who would
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: go on to provide testimony against the other so called
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: witches living in Salem, but it was his very own daughter,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: Betty Paris, and his very own niece Abigail Williams, who
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: would kickstart the whole proceedings by being afflicted with witchcraft.
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: If you're looking for one main villain in this whole story,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: Samuel Paris might be it. And it's maybe no surprise
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  Speaker 1: that men like George Burroughs, who posed a political and
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: spiritual threat to Samuel and his position within the community,
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: but women like Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good, who rarely
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: attended Samuel's church services, who found themselves the victims of
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: increasingly nefarious witch hunts. But there was also more to
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: the story. Salem was a notoriously difficult place to live
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: at the time, not just because it was an early
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: settlement or because the conditions were worse off than the
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: other settlements, but because of the people in Salem. Those
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: living there very rarely got along with other nearby villages
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: and communities, and they also very rarely got along with
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: each other. At the time, there was a painfully nasty
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: feud between two prominent families, the Putnams and the Porters,
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: both of which would lose members to the witch trials
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: that would follow. The feud was so strong that it
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: had completely divided the community of Salem, and fights between
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  Speaker 1: the sides would break out daily. Samuel Paris, acting as
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: the local parish reverend, would often be called in to
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: handle these disputes and would often find himself in a
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: lose lose situation. It was only with the threat of
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: a common enemy, in this case, the theoretical threat of witches,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: that allowed the community of Salem to put aside their
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: differences and finally ban together. Many believed that the initial
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: idea of witches and witchcraft had been Samuel Parris's attempt
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: to end the feud altogether, or that had been a
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: sweeping political move on his end to solidify his position
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  Speaker 1: in a growing contentious and difficult community. What happened afterwards
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: had been the result of a dangerous group think fueled
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: by religious zealotry and bigotry. But it could have, of course,
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: also been fueled by the emotional aftermath of the British
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: War with France that had taken place across the American colonies,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: coupled with fears of attacks from Native American tribes, a
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: recent smallpox epidemic, or the possibility of poisoning brought on
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: by a fungus found in their food, and of course,
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: like Martha Corey, we cannot discredit the theory that the
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: girls were simply making it all up. Both Betty and
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Abigail had allegedly tried their hands at divining their futures,
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: and it was after that that they began to display
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: suspicious symptoms. Betty was also known to have these fits
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: and outbursts, and to quickly break down into tears. She
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: would often tell her family that she was damned, something
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  Speaker 1: that she would have believed from her own father's teaching
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  Speaker 1: about witchcrafts and divination. Was it possible that all of
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: this had been Betty and Abigail acting out against their
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: parental figures. Desperate to save her child and to spare
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: her daughter from the fate of being used as a
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: witch finder, Betty's mother sent her away to live with
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: distant relatives. There, Betty's symptoms quickly faded away, and she
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: made a full recovery. Was distance all that Betty needed
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: to be free of the religious fervor of Salem? Or
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: had it been the distance from her reverend father. Had
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: the move spared her from the influence of poisoned wheat,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: Or had Betty simply been a young girl, sick and
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: tired of the confined and small minded, puritanical future that
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: awaited her in Salem. It's hard to say, but looking
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: at historical records, we can see that it was mainly
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: marginalized women and members of the community who found themselves
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: targeted by the witch hunt and ongoing trials. All it
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: took was one accusation, especially from an already accused member
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  Speaker 1: of the community attempting to save their own neck, and
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: a person could find themselves on the way to the gallows.
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  Speaker 1: Evidence wasn't particularly needed, not in a modern sense type
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: of way. An afflicted person could simply say that they
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: had seen the image of a person while experiencing an attack,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: and that more often than not, would be enough to
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: lead to a conviction. It was this hysteria and paranoia
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  Speaker 1: that allowed men like Samuel Parris and clergymen Cotton Mather
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  Speaker 1: to rise to power and sway the masses, further adding
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: fuel to the fire and removing any political opponents they
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: may have had. It wasn't long after the trials that
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: people began questioning the legitimacy of the whole proceedings. The
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: victims and their families were posthumously declared innocent and awarded
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: some level of compensation, but to Tuba was perhaps not
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: surprisingly not among them. That is ten minute Murder for Today,
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: brief and binge able True Crime. I'm Joe, I'm the host,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: and thank you for taking the time to listen. And
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: I need to say this. I need to get it
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: off my chest right now, because if I don't, I'll explode.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: I use the double negative right there, at the very
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: last of that, the very last sentence. Double negative came
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: right out of my mouth. And I know you may
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: not even have call that. If you're my high school
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: English teacher, you definitely caught that. And I hope you
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: don't go back into my records and change my grades,
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: because I know better. I promise I know better. And
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: I usually don't let grammar and punctuation play a big
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: part in what I'm talking about here. I mean, I
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: just talk and sometimes I don't say the words right,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: and that's fine, I guess, But that one, I don't
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: know why. It just jumped on me all of a sudden.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: It's like, oh my gosh, that's a double negative. And
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: now it's just gonna be there. It's just gonna live
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: right there, and Joe, isn't this recorded? You could go
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: back and re record that line. I'm not going to
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: that feels disingenuous. I'm just gonna leave the mistake as
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: it is. Anyway, if you're a new listener to this podcast,
• 13:38
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• 13:41
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• 14:02
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• 14:04
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• 14:07
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• 14:10
  Speaker 1: your episode today, and that is the conclusion of the
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Salem witch Trials. I feel like I've been talking about
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: this forever. If you follow me on TikTok, you know
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: I did a ten part quick little series on the
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: Salem witch Trials which included some of this information, but
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: also a lot of information that I didn't cover here
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: in the podcast, so if you want to go check
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: that out, you can go find my TikTok. All right,
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: that's it. That's your episode for today. Thank you so
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: much for listening to ten minute Murder