CHAPTER V
"It was not to be expected of the colonists of New England that they
should be the first to see through a delusion which befooled the whole
civilized world, and the gravest and most knowing persons in it. The
colonists in Connecticut and New Haven, as well as in Massachusetts,
like all other Christian people at that time--at least with extremely
rare individual exceptions--believed in the reality of a hideous crime
called witchcraft." PALFREY'S _New England_ (Vol. IV, pp. 96-127).
"The truth is that it [witchcraft] pervaded the whole Christian Church.
The law makers and the ministers of New England were under its
influences as--and no more than--were the law makers and ministers of
Old England." _Blue Laws--True and False_ (p. 23), TRUMBULL.
"One ---- of Windsor Arraigned and Executed at Hartford for a Witch."
WINTHROP'S _Journal_ (2: 374, Savage Ed., 1853).
Here beginneth the first chapter of the story of the delusion in
Connecticut. It is an entry made by John Winthrop, Governor of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony, in his famous journal, without specific date,
but probably in the spring of 1647.
It is of little consequence save as much has been made of it by some
writers as fixing the relative date of the earliest execution for
witchcraft in New England, and locating it in one of the three original
Connecticut towns.
What matters it at this day whether Mary Johnson as tradition runs, or
Alse Youngs as truth has it, was put to death for witchcraft in Windsor,
Connecticut, in 1647, or Martha Jones of Charlestown, Massachusetts, was
hung for the same crime at Boston in 1648, as also set down in
Winthrop's Journal?
"It may possibly be thought a great neglect, or matter of partiality,
that no account is given of witchcraft in Connecticut.
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