No one checked facts during the Salem witch trials for a reason

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
January 9, 2025

Everything old...is back again!

If you're wondering about Facebook no longer having fact-checkers, they didn't have social media back then, but look at what they managed to pull off! 

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” – George Santayana proved he was either a genius or was paying attention. Those paying attention in our time are freaking out, and for good reason. It requires us to do whatever is in our power to prevent it from worsening.

There was a time in our history when we were under British rule. Freedom in 1692 meant remaining free from being thrown into the dungeon because someone held a grudge against them or coveted what they had. 

Those in charge knew they had to get their ducks in a row to pull off one of the biggest crime sprees in our history. There were many researchers over the decades trying to find reasons why what happened in Salem caused 20 to be murdered and hundreds thrown into the dungeon. No matter how many reasons you may have seen, there is only one plausible explanation...they lied. Sounds like they would know what #PTSD was?

When thinking about the Salem Witch Trials, the story of Martha Carrier, the "queen of hell," has many examples of how, after the trials ended, the trials of those falsely charged never ended.

In late July, as the witchcraft accusations in Andover swelled, Martha’s two eldest sons, Richard and Andrew, were arrested and brought to Salem. Initially claiming innocence of witchcraft, they were tortured into confessing (fellow prisoner John Proctor said they were “tied neck and heels till the blood was ready to come out of their noses”). They were soon joined in jail by ten-year-old Thomas and seven-year-old Sarah, who also confessed. Sarah testified that she had been a witch since she was six and that her mother “made me set my hand to a book.” Her baptism, she said, was in “Andrew Foster’s pasture.” Brother Thomas claimed to have been baptized in the Shawsheen River. One can only imagine the level of fear Martha’s young children experienced that would convince them to testify against her.

A tremendous amount of testimony was brought against Martha Carrier at her trial on August 2, with many agreeing that Goody Carrier was offered the role of “Queen in Hell” by the Devil himself. Although she claimed her innocence to the end (she was the only family member who did not confess), Carrier was hanged, along with Reverend George Burroughs, George Jacobs Sr., John Proctor, and John Willard on August 19, 1692, on Proctor’s Ledge at Gallows Hill. It is not known where her remains lie. Her children were eventually released from jail, although their guilt about testifying against their mother must have remained with them for life.

Imagine your children going through all of that and then having to live the rest of their lives knowing their mother was put to death after they accused her, confessed to also being witches, and sent to prison. While pondering that, think of what Thomas, her husband, went through with four of his children in a dungeon after his wife was put to death. 

Thomas Carrier petitioned for restitution on behalf of his executed wife and for the expenses incurred during his children’s incarceration. On October 17, 1711, Martha Carrier’s name was cleared of all charges, nearly twenty years after her death. By that time, the Carrier family had moved to Colchester, CT where they were among the earliest settlers of the area. Thomas operated iron works on the Salmon River. He died in 1735 at the reported age of 109. (The gravestone that stands in the Marlboro Cemetery in Connecticut, memorializing Thomas and several of his children and grandchildren, erroneously lists his death year as 1739. This stone, and three other Carrier family stones beside it, were reportedly moved to this cemetery from a family plot at the Carrier homestead in Colchester.) The New England Journal dated June 9, 1735 said, “His head in his last years was not bald nor hair gray. Not many days before his death he traveled on foot six miles to see a sick friend, and the day before he died he was visiting his neighbors. His mind was alert until he died, when he fell asleep in his chair and never woke up.”

In 1999, Billerica’s Board of Selectmen unanimously voted to rescind the 1676 banishment of the Carrier family.

And this points to the conspiracy against Martha Carrier, but also how the trials for them rest of them went.

Lacey Jr’s examination was held on July 21 during which she accused Martha Carrier of being a witch, stating that she had murdered several children by stabbing them in the heart with pins and knitting needles and also added that “Goody Carrier told me the Devil said to her she should be a queen in hell” (SWP No. 87.2).

A lesson in why the suffering never ended, topped off with garnished guilt laced with the poison of those who reaped the rewards. Be vigilant.