Men and Devils
Before Salem, there was Windsor, Wethersfield, and Hartford. Thirty years before the famous witch trials of 1692, Connecticut became the first colony in New England to execute a convicted witch. In this episode, we explore the stories of New England's earliest convicted witches and the modern legislation that seeks to exonerate them. When injustice is clear, what do we owe the past?
Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben, with the voice talents of Jack Krause and Lenny Scovel and original music by Purple Planet.
Music
Purple Planet - Alone
Purple Planet - Silent Tears
Purple Planet - Atmospheric Piano Backing
Purple Planet - Reverie
Purple Planet - Running with the Horses
Purple Planet - Sense of Loss
Purple Planet - Shadowlands
Sources
Primary
Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project.
“Damned Yankees: Why Connecticut is Exonerating Witches.” The Economist. March 2, 2023.
Grant, Matthew. Diary, 1637–1654. Connecticut State Library. 95b.
Massaro, Mike. “Exoneration of Witchcraft Crimes Being Considered.” NBC Connecticut. March 1, 2023.
Mather, Cotton. Memorable Providences, Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions. Boston: 1689.
Polansky, Rob. “Public hearing today over Connecticut witchcraft exonerations.” WFSB. Mar. 1, 2023.
Resolution Concerning Certain Witchcraft Convictions in Colonial Connecticut. HJ34. Connecticut General Assembly (2023).
The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut [1636-1776]. Vol 1. 15 vols. Hartford: Press of the Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co., 1850.
Winthrop, John. The History of New England from 1630 to 1649, vol. II, edited by James Savage. 2 vols. Boston: Thomas B. Wait and Son, 1826.
Winthrop, John. Winthrop's Journal. Vol. II.
Secondary
Burr, George Lincoln. Narratives of the Witchcraft Cases, 1648-1706. New York: C. Scribner's sons, 1914.
Butler, Jon. Awash in a Sea of Faith: Christianizing the American People. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992.
Caruso, Beth M. One of Windsor: The Untold Story of America’s First Witch Hanging. Tustin, MI: Lady Slipper Press, 2015.
Delayed Justice: Windsor Atones for its Witch Trial History. Dir. Beth Caruso. YouTube. 2017. https://youtu.be/9rydddpvIzM
Games, Alison. Witchcraft in Early North America. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2010.
Godbeer, Richard. The Devil’s Dominion: Magic & Religion in Early New England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
Hall, David D., ed. Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History 1638-1693. Second Edition. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005.
Karlson, Carol F. The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1987; reprint 1998.
Woodward, Walter W. “New England's Other Witch-Hunt: The Hartford Witch-Hunt of the 1660s and Changing Patterns in Witchcraft Prosecution.” OAH Magazine of History 17:4 (Jul., 2003): 16-20.
Woodward, Walter W. Prospero’s America: John Winthrop, Jr., Alchemy, and the Creation of New England Culture, 1606-1676. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010.
