October 1, 2025 • 47 mins
This October, we're diving into the fascinating story of Margaret Jones—the first woman tried for witchcraft in Massachusetts—through Andrea Catalano's debut novel The First Witch of Boston. Josh and Sarah explore this gripping historical fiction that sheds light on a witch trial that happened decades before Salem, in 1648. Discover why this lesser-known story deserves your attention and hear from the author herself about bringing Margaret Jones's tale to life.
October Witchcraft Season: Josh and Sarah kick off the spookiest month with increased witchcraft content
Pre-Salem History: Learn about Massachusetts witch trials that occurred 44 years before the famous Salem trials
Margaret Jones's Story: The 1648 execution that changed colonial history
Author Interview: Exclusive conversation with debut novelist Andrea Catalano
Chart-Topping Success: How this historical fiction novel reached the top of Amazon charts
Historical Accuracy Meets Fiction: Why Margaret Jones's story was "ripe for telling"
First Massachusetts witch trial (1648)
Margaret Jones execution
Pre-Salem witchcraft persecution
Colonial Boston history
Historical fiction as a vehicle for forgotten women's stories
Andrea Catalano's research and writing process
The First Witch of Boston by Andrea Catalano
Genre: Historical Fiction
Subject: Margaret Jones, executed for witchcraft in 1648
Amazon bestseller with positive critical reception
If you're interested in:
Witch trial history beyond Salem
Colonial American history
Women's forgotten stories
Historical fiction
October/Halloween content
Witchcraft history
Witch trials, Massachusetts history, Salem witch trials, Margaret Jones, 1648, colonial America, witchcraft history, historical fiction, Andrea Catalano, The First Witch of Boston, Boston history, pre-Salem witch hunts, Halloween podcast, October episodes, women's history, forgotten history
Join Josh Hutchinson and Sarah Jack every week for your dose of witchcraft history. Subscribe to The Thing About Witch Hunts for more fascinating stories about persecution, superstition, and the women who were accused.
Perfect listening for October, Halloween season, or anytime you want to explore the darker corners of American colonial history.
Buy the book: The Last Witch of Boston, Andrea Catalano
Halloween Episodes on The Thing About Witch Hunts Podcasts
The Thing About Salem Patreon
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the thing about witchhunts.
I'm Josh Hutchinson. I'm Sarah Jack.
Happy October. Happy October, the season of
witchcraft interest is here and we are ready.
Your weekly dose of witchcraft just got turned up a notch for
October. We begin October with a look at
a wonderful new debut novel that's topped the Amazon charts.
(00:23):
It's about the first woman triedfor witchcraft in Massachusetts.
Spoiler It wasn't Salem, the First Witch of Boston is the new
historical fiction novel by Andrea Catalano.
It's the story of Margaret Jones, who was executed in 1648.
This gripping book quickly received very positive reviews
(00:47):
and it brings needed attention to a lesser known witch trial.
Yes, it really does. So I am pleased to bring this
wonderful author talk to you, our loyal supporters, so you can
hear just why this story was ripe for telly.
Welcome to the Thing about WitchHunts podcast.
(01:07):
Andrea Catalano. Today we get to talk with you
about your new novel, The First Witch of Boston.
Please tell us a little bit about you and your work.
Thank you. Thanks so much for having me
both. I've really enjoyed your podcast
for quite a while now, so it's really nice to be here.
So my book is called The First Witch of Boston, and it is a
(01:28):
fictional narrative of Margaret Jones, who was the first woman
tried and executed for witchcraft in the Massachusetts
Bay Colony in 1648. It's written from 2 points of
view. The first half of the novel is
written from her husband Thomas's point of view.
He was also arrested on charges of witchcraft and sorcery, but
(01:48):
the charges didn't stick and he was soon freed afterwards.
So the first half of the novel is told from his point of view,
and the second-half is from Margaret's point of view.
And that's mostly detailing the trial.
And as you both know, the only primary source we have on the
trial is based on John Winthrop's personal journal.
(02:09):
Since he was governor at the time and was one of the nine
members of the Assembly, he served on the trial as a judge.
So we don't have any court records of the trial that have
survived. So all we have is his basically
retelling of the trial, all the charges that were brought
against Margaret Jones and how it proceeded.
(02:31):
So yeah, that's the basis for the novel.
And then I filled in the blanks with both just historical fact
in my imagination. So there we go.
The first Witch of Boston is. From my perspective it looks
like it's a great success. You have 12,000 reviews on
(02:54):
Goodreads already, very highly rated.
I've seen it in the top seller lists on Kindle and Amazon
Books. How does it feel to have such
success with your debut work? It's pretty wild, I'm not going
to lie. Like most writers, you know,
(03:15):
this is a labor of love for the most part.
And you just put your work out into the universe and hope for
the best. And it's a lot of rejection and
a lot of closed doors. And so everything just seemed to
align, like the stars aligned orwhatever you want to say.
That's maybe what they would have said in the 17th century.
And it's just been, I've had a really fortunate experience with
this book. It seems to have really taken
(03:37):
hold of people's fancy, their imaginations.
I think that timing wise, the fact that here we are in late
September and October is upon us.
Everybody loves to read a witchybook at this time of year.
But I also think that the stories of witchcraft and witch
trials and which accusations I think are Evergreen.
(04:00):
I think that people are fascinated, just super curious
as to how it all could have unfolded.
It just seems to modern Western readers, it seems like so
foreign and so much as somethingin the past.
And they would, they want to know how something so crazy
(04:20):
could have unfolded such injustice.
So I think those are the reasonsprobably why that would be my
guess as to why it seems to havereally taken hold of people.
Yeah, I just think that and maybe also because it's about a
witch trial that took place 40 something years before Salem.
(04:40):
I think most people when they think witch trials, they think
Salem. Of course, for obvious reasons,
not many people are aware of thefact that there were trials that
took place in in America before that They might be aware of the
things that happened when in England and Scotland maybe.
But so I think the fact that it was something that happened
(05:01):
before Salem in America, it catches people's imagination as
well, their interest, yeah. Congratulations.
And did you pick her story? Because of the era, What was it
about Margaret Jones that you picked her?
Couple of reasons. First, I guess I should give a
little bit of background as to how I even came across her
(05:23):
story. I did my master's degree in 17th
century British and American history.
My master's dissertation was called Seeking and Following the
Indentured Servant in Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1630
to 1700. So while I was doing research
for my dissertation, that was when I stumbled across the story
of Margaret Jones like in in theProbate Records and saw it
(05:44):
mentioned. And of course that immediately
caught my imagination and pulledme out of the work I was
supposed to be doing. Started researching Margaret
Jones and just thought the storywas fascinating because John
Winthrop, who was a very interesting person on many
different levels, seemed to really have a fixation on
(06:05):
Margaret Jones. He dedicates quite a bit of time
in in his personal diary to talking about her trial.
So that in itself was interesting to me.
I'm like, why would this one woman, like, really be so, you
know, of importance to John Winthrop?
Like, what was it about this trial?
What was it about this woman that really seems to have
preoccupied him? Also, when you read his account
(06:28):
of the trial, he really seems tospeak with, speak about her with
a lot of disdain. And so that, of course, caught
my fancy as well. Like, why?
What would cause him to have such a reaction to this woman?
So yeah, I came across her storyas a grad student, thought it
was really interesting and thought, OK, someday I'm going
to come back to that, I'll research it again someday, maybe
(06:50):
do something with that story, maybe write the novel I've
always wanted to write. So put it aside.
And then 20 something years later, after writing three other
books, I decided to come back tothe story again, I think because
it had always been a source of fascination for me.
But also, my godmother had recently passed at the time when
(07:12):
I started this novel, and I was inspired to write about a woman
who was very unhindered by social norms and was outspoken
and really kept true to herself.Somebody like who my aunt was.
She was somebody I really admired growing up because she
very much walked her own beat. And so that was that, that
(07:34):
spirit, that that kind of free spirit and bold spirit that
inspired me to go back to the story of Margaret Jones and
flesh it out and make her a realperson for the modern leader.
Yeah. Thank you so much for bringing
her to life. She is one of those under told
stories. We've talked about her on the
podcast before, but when you mentioned that there were witch
(07:58):
trials in Boston, people are like, what?
Where? When they don't understand
because every American witch trial, like you said, is Salem.
But I really appreciate that youinclude the passages from John
Winthrop and John Hale, the primary sources that we have
available to us for the case. Why do you think John Winthrop
(08:23):
was so nasty about her? That's a great question and it's
one that I still think about a lot.
She didn't fit into a box, the box that he wanted her to fit
into, so to speak. That really riled him up.
And I don't need to explain to you both.
You're very familiar with John Winthrop, and he was a very
certain personality, a very, very judgmental, very strong
(08:47):
type A personality. And I think that he was a woman
who was a very strong Type A personality.
And that just really riled him up.
It just really rubbed him the wrong way, just plainly
speaking. Yeah.
And it just really seemed as though John Winthrop was all
about, as, you know, keeping order in this society perched at
(09:12):
the edge of the known world. And to have a woman like this so
knowledgeable, and he even admits it in the diary, like,
one of the charges brought against her is that she was a
woman who made tinctures for people who requested them for
one ailment or another. And they worked really well, so
(09:32):
well that there must be something supernatural at work
here. So obviously this is a woman who
knew her craft, she knew her skill, she was very versed in
apothecary herbalism of the time.
And that knowledge was frightening, I believe, to a man
who wanted to keep order in society and have a certain
(09:54):
patriarchal order. And she with her knowledge and
as well as her willingness to speak out and defend herself and
not be put into a corner, I think both those things just
that didn't work for John Winthrop.
He wasn't shelling that. Yeah, listening, having read his
(10:15):
journal, having read your amazing story and then listening
to you talk, I'm thinking about how she was rising with these
little successes that were meeting people's needs.
And I don't know, I mean, he, there was a lot going on around
him. His own family had losses so.
(10:37):
Yes, yeah. What else?
Besides being extraordinary, what else was she accused of?
So she was accused of, there waslike 5 charges brought against
her before and that was of course before they did the
actual physical examination and watch.
So the charges were that she made tinctures that worked
really well that she was able toforesee people becoming I'll
(11:02):
before they did. That was an interesting charge
to me. So the way I portray that in the
novel is somebody comes to her or mentions to her that they
have a certain ailment and she says if she recommends, oh, you
might want to try this method oruse this herb or this oil, this
tincture to help yourself with that.
(11:23):
And for whatever reason, they decided not to take her advice.
And then she probably said, well, if you don't take my
advice, you're going to get worse.
And they did. So then that was a charge
brought against her that she could foresee people becoming
ill. And so in my mind, that's how I
pictured it to be, rather than it being some supernatural kind
(11:47):
of intuition at hand. I do believe that there are some
people who work in healthcare who are intuitive about people.
They can sense what it is that'sailing them or just observe
what's ailing them before the person speaks about it.
I guess that's a certain intuition or empathy, and she
(12:07):
probably had that, being a midwife and a healer and an
apothecary, and people were disconcerted by that ability.
Perhaps they saw it as somethingelse at work.
And thinking about the charges before her examination, I think
also somebody said that she cursed their cow and the cow
died. That was one of the charges, I
(12:27):
believe. OK, there's a lot of hemlock in
Essex County. Had a lot of hemlock growing by
streams and wetlands. Josh and I, yeah, Josh and I
have actually brought that up a while ago in a Connecticut One O
1 episode. We did that.
That stuff was growing and it looks like other wonderful
(12:48):
things. It does.
I mean, some of it looks like Queen Anne's lace.
Yeah. It's very likely that the cow
got into something that it shouldn't have.
I think in the story, I make a comical scene out of it.
There's this kind of cantankerous neighbor who was
upset that the cow got into the next door pasture by following a
goat and the cow ate some onions.
(13:11):
And of course people believed back then.
And then it's cow eat onions andit would sour the milk, make it
taste like onion. And so he's very upset that the
cow got into the pasture and is eating the onions.
And I portrayed as Margaret Jones basically turning around
and saying to him, it's not my fault that your cow is stupid
and followed a goat. And then he misconstrued that as
a curse. That's the way I kind of
(13:32):
depicted it in the book. I love how good you are at
taking those charges that are basically just a few words in
Winthrop's writing and elaborating on based on other
witch trials, what happened and just other things that, you
know, to turn that into a story is just so amazing from such a
(13:59):
little bit of information. Yes, and I'm glad that you
mentioned the incorporation of the small details that we have
from other contemporary which accusations and which trials of
the time. I mentioned in my author's note
that I had read the story of Alice Lake from Dorchester.
(14:19):
Who Cotton Mather or I can't remember if it was Cotton or
increase one of the two, which one was the President of
Harvard? It's an increase.
Thank you. I always get them confused.
He wrote in correspondence to somebody else about the trial of
Alice Lake many, many years afterwards and mentions, oh, she
was a woman who lost her child. And she claimed that like, she
(14:41):
was visited by the child's spirit.
And that always just that story just stuck with me.
And I just thought to myself, that's so tragic, that this was
probably how this woman dealed with her immense guilt.
And so then I took that element of that story and incorporated
it into Margaret Jones's story because it was I wanted to
(15:05):
really think about how would a woman at this point in time in
history deal with such immense grief?
How would it affect her psyche in this little corner of the
edge of the world that is a verystrict society where religion
guides every moment of the day, but religion can only do so much
(15:28):
for grief. Yeah, it was.
I was very much influenced by that story of Alice Lake.
And because that always struck me as so sad for many, many
years. And so I I incorporated that
aspect of her into Maggie Jones's story.
Yeah, I have loved that, that part.
I don't want to give anything away because as the story
unfolds, it's like walking through these doors, the doors
(15:49):
of her life. And I really love how you
incorporated that, that that whole piece.
I think it's very meaningful. I think that it's very
understandable. And Margaret Jones, there's the
Margaret Jones will never know. Then there's the Margaret Jones
that John Winthrop and Reverend Hale told us she was.
(16:11):
And then there's this beautiful story you created for her in
your novel. And it could be any one of us
who who doesn't just submit, butit could be any one of us.
Do you feel like it makes her more human and her story more
human for breeders and. That's my hope.
That was really my hope and intention in writing it.
(16:33):
Also as a historical fiction writer, I think this what most
of us hope to do is to find the common threads of humanity
throughout history that you and I can relate to. 405 hundred,
800 years later. There are common, There's common
themes that are just common to humanity no matter what area you
live in. Love, loss, jealousy, fears,
(16:56):
desires, all these things we've always been as humans, we've
always been motivated by these things, and they greatly
influence the choices that we make in life and our paths in
history. So yeah, I really wanted to show
Margaret as an imperfect person.Like all of us are very human.
And I wanted people to be able to step in her shoes or Thomas's
(17:19):
shoes to see what it would have been like to live in a society
that was so easily manipulated into thinking a certain way.
And I, again, I think that's a common thread as well that we
still have today in some way. Yeah.
Yeah, I love that you pointed out how timeless and Evergreen
(17:41):
this kind of story is, because witch hunts really revealed to
us a lot about ourselves and what are our fears and what
drives us to take action againstthose fears.
I really wanted to show that wasone of my aims with the novel
was to show that these not just Maggie Jones.
(18:04):
But I would my assumption would be that most people charged with
witchcraft obviously were innocent.
That's a given. But I wanted to show that they
didn't just bow their heads and acquiesce.
As we know, historical record shows that people didn't just
bow down. They were people who who stood
up for themselves and knew that by standing up for themselves,
(18:26):
they were jeopardizing themselves even further.
But they were they just were being righteous and wanted to
preserve their name. And so that was something I
wanted to show through Maggie Jones as well.
Like, people didn't just bow down and say, yes, OK, I guess
you found me guilty of witchcraft.
John Winter makes very plain in his diary.
(18:49):
She rails against the court. And she was most intemperate, so
much so that on the day that shewas executed, a great storm went
through Connecticut and felled many trees.
He's likening her rage to being a force of nature, which is
awesome. But like, ridiculous at the same
time. So I really wanted to show that
(19:10):
this is a person who would not back down despite knowing the
fact that she was in a corner and there was no way of getting
out of it. She was not going to back down.
She was going to go down fist flailing, so to speak, going
down fighting. Yeah.
She fought for her innocence andwas brave before the court to
(19:35):
battle to keep her name clear. Like you said, she has not been
exonerated by legislation like the Salem convicted people have.
Do you feel like she needs to have her name cleared?
Yes, I think all the women preceding Salem like in
Connecticut, was that a year or two ago that they were
(19:56):
exonerated by Connecticut court?Yes, there there seems to be no
reason otherwise. I did actually look at the
Change.org petition. I was, I was looking at that
recently and there's only about 2000 something signatures.
I don't maybe I need to use this, this moment that I've got
to push that out there more and I'll link it on my social media
(20:18):
because I was actually shocked to see that there were so few
signatures on this petition. I think most people wouldn't
agree that these women need to be exonerated.
Is there anybody who would be like, I don't think so.
I would hope not. I don't know.
Who knows? Yeah, Thank you so much for
bringing up the petition. I'm just going to give the short
(20:42):
link for that while we're talking.
So people can go up right now ifthey want.
And it's change.org/witch trials.
And that gets you to the petition.
And there'd be 8 names that would be cleared through this
proposed resolution. And those eight did get
convictions out of Boston. And Margaret, of course, was the
1st. Yep, right.
(21:05):
I'm glad you knew it to to shareit.
Thank you. Yeah.
Thank you. Yeah, we have a little
organization that is working with the legislator out of
Cambridge and Watertown to get that done.
Yeah, Steve Owens proposed that and author Marilyn Roach is one
of his constituents. So he proposed that for her, for
(21:28):
the accused, for her. So we got to get it to the
committee, though. That is the trick.
The General Court in Massachusetts made that real
difficult. All these centuries, maybe not
that committee, but this centurythey've, they haven't
necessarily felt compelled. So more signatures.
We'll show them that people are paying attention and we know she
(21:52):
was innocent. And yeah, let's, let's fix the
let's fix the record that John Winthrop has set for her turn.
It around. I think we can.
I think we can do this. Do this.
Yeah. It's interesting that the Rep is
from Watertown and he representsCambridge and Watertown.
There's 2 characters in the novel, Samuel and Alice
(22:12):
Stratton. Who?
Were living in Charlestown at the time of Margaret Jones's
execution and not long after moved to Watertown and they were
considered founders of Watertown.
So that's ironic. Or.
And Alice Stratton also was accused of witchcraft about
three years following Margaret Jones's execution because she
was constantly defending her best friend's name, which Jimmy
(22:36):
is like. If that isn't the true
definition of the ultimate best friend, I don't know what is.
That she just went to bat for her friend even after she was
executed, knowing that she was risking her own life and safety
by doing so. So interesting to me to see
that. That was very interesting when I
was going through the records inMassachusetts Historic Society
(22:58):
to see the handwritten record ofAlice and Samuel Stratton being
fined by the court for slandering the court by saying
that they had the blood of an innocent woman on their hands
and they were fined by the court.
And it was so amazing to see that in the written record, the
actual written record, and then a few months following to see
that they were written up again for not paying the fine.
(23:20):
And that that was the part I love best.
I was like, can you just picturethem?
They're like, Oh yeah, sure, we'll pay the fine.
And then they're like, I'm not paying that fine.
I love it. That is true.
Friendships to the end. If we could all have friends
like that, right? I just love how you portray her
personal relationships, how strong these bonds are that
(23:40):
Margaret forms in your work. I just such an important part of
the story. Yeah, and having had at least 4
grandmothers that found themselves in court, like
Margaret Jones, Mary Hale was inBoston and she was accused and
she was like known for her pocket theory treatments as
(24:02):
well. And So what I wanted to say was
on this relationship thing, I haven't read every book that's
out there that portrays a witch trial in New England, but some
of them that I've read don't really go into the court
situation because man, that is hard.
Maybe it was, I don't want to say it was harder, not hard for
(24:25):
you to write, but I not, I can'timagine what that was like
putting yourself in her shoes, although it was you raising your
voice for her, giving her, giving us her court voice.
But on the relationship side, when people came in, Margaret.
(24:46):
Had. The shred of hope, or you really
show that she was hopeful that someone would put their foot
down, that her friends would be there for her.
And there were ones that you thought were gonna have her
back. They don't.
And then yet there were other people who stuck their neck out
like Alice and then others. I just think that was a really
(25:09):
important aspect. I think all these little
details. You did really, really help us
understand the fears and the anger and the guts that she had
going through this alone. And she possibly wasn't the
first one in Massachusetts to betried.
We don't have all the records, but it's what if nobody had and
(25:34):
she was the first. So to be going through that,
it's really hard to think about what that must have been like.
And especially going into the examination, the witch
examination, which we know did happen because John Winthrop
details it, and also that is theonly surviving court document.
The constable's record does mention that the woman lately
(25:56):
accused of witchcraft will be watched for 24 hours.
That is a surviving constable's record.
So we know it did transpire. I believe like May 18th was what
it was dated. And then we know that at the
time they were still using English law and English law at
the time prescribed Matthew Hopkins method that he used
throughout E Anglia, the discovery of witchcraft where a
(26:20):
woman's body or man whoever was being accused, but it was mostly
women. Her body would be fully examined
for any sign or mark of the devil, which it could have been
anything out of the ordinary. It could have been a freckle, A
birthmark, 1/3 nipple, anything.A scar that would be used
against these accused and then they would be watched overnight
(26:43):
and they would not be allowed tosleep.
They had to sit cross legged on a floor and they were watched
the whole night through to make sure that one of Satan's Imps or
Satan himself didn't come and visit them to suckle upon her
witch's teat or whatever it was.So to write that scene was
pretty wild because that is justwhen people hear that that was
(27:03):
the method, they're just like wow, that is just bananas.
Like that's just crazy. So it was interesting to write
that scene out and with the physical examination, it is
mentioned in John Winthrop's diary that she was found to have
a witch's teat freshly suckled on the inside of her right
thigh. And that after they discovered
(27:25):
that one started to grow on the left side.
And I was like, OK, so how do I,how does one explain that in in
a novel? Like, how would you write that?
So I just said that she had the unfortunate luck of having a
freckle or a mole on the inside of her thigh and that when they
were examining her, they were holding on roughly to her other
thigh and left a mark with theirfinger or nail or whatever on
(27:49):
the inside of the other thigh and claimed, oh, look, there's
another one growing. Because it served their
narrative. It served their purposes.
The other thing that I mentionedin there is the use of a witch
pricker, which I don't know thatwas used in Massachusetts Bay
Colony. That's something that I took
from the research that I did. I didn't do a ton of extensive
research on the Scottish witch trials, but I did have some
(28:10):
information on them. And it seems like even into the
early 18th century there were witch finders in Scotland who
would use these devices, as you probably know, called witch
prickers. And they were actually like
little spring loaded, like bladekind of things that would
basically look like they were puncturing the skin but would
retract. And then they would pull it away
(28:32):
and say, oh, look, she's not bleeding.
So she's a witch because a person who isn't a witch would
bleed. And it was actually a device of
trickery that was used in some Scottish witch trials.
So I decided I was like, that isso wild.
And there's still some that survive.
I've seen pictures of the actualdevices and I took some liberty
there by saying it was used in this trial, but I do know that
(28:54):
it there were things similarly used contemporarily in Scotland,
so it wasn't out of the realm ofpossibility.
Yeah. Yeah.
We, we do know in the Salem witch trials that they did test
some of those marks that they found to see if they drained
blood or if they caused pain to the person.
(29:15):
And if you didn't feel any pain and no blood was coming out,
then that was it. Yep, that was it.
Yep, another strike against you.Also, I thought it would be an
interesting point in the novel. Not to give too much away of the
story, but the examination was fascinating to me that they
(29:36):
would make a person stay awake all night long, and she had
already been in prison for abouta week or so before the
examination. She might very well be ill from
being in a prison cell and then to be made to stay awake all
night. That would cause some people to
get more sick or delirious with fever or something.
(29:57):
So I can incorporate that element.
And then it was a cool way for me to introduce a character who
seems somewhat rational within this whole storm of irrational
fear and chaos. And I create this fictional
character of Constable Baldwin, who was actually, he was a
veteran from some of the earlierbattles in the English Civil War
(30:20):
in Scotland. So he's had this very traumatic
experience of being a veteran, and then he's bringing it with
him, this trauma that he himselfsuffered.
And so they have this, these moments of understanding and
empathy for each other because they both have suffered trauma.
Yeah. So I thought it was a good way
(30:41):
for me to bring in the crazinessthat was going on beyond
Massachusetts in the 1640s were very tumultuous time in the
world, not just in Massachusetts.
It's one of my favorite scenes. Just it's not my favorite that
she was suffering, of course, but the storytelling of that
night and it's like a slippery slope.
(31:04):
It's like everything's fine and then it's not.
I loved it. So yeah, that was great.
So I wanted to touch on the Puritans and you're mentioning
what a tumultuous time things were.
But how come we have these misconceptions?
And why are we digging for truthright now on this time period?
(31:30):
It's true. We are, aren't we?
And we keep discovering things more and more.
There's been some amazing scholarship done, historical
scholarship over the last 20-30 years.
It's just really given us new insight into these founders of
America. I think we all come from a
generation where we grew up watching the Peanuts
Thanksgiving special with the retelling of the Mayflower with
(31:53):
Miles Standish with his huge handlebar mustache.
And it's just been so glossed over and glamorized as being
these godly people who came overand wanted to build a city upon
a hill with religious freedom. Yeah, that didn't really play
out as planned. On the religious freedom aspect,
(32:14):
I bring up in the novel the caseof Governor Bellingham, Richard
Bellingham, who was an interesting guy.
I should preface this by saying I grew up outside of Boston in
Chelsea, MA. And in Chelsea, MA, still stands
Governor Bellingham's house, andit was his hunting lodge when he
was governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony.
(32:35):
And so that was always a source of fascination for me as a
little kid, to see this beautiful little late 17th
century house in the middle of all these tenements and
apartment buildings. It just really stood out.
So Bellingham was always of interest to me even as a kid.
And then to learn the story of his marriage to his second wife
is a crazy story. She was a guest at his house.
(32:59):
She was the fiance of some youngman who was staying with him.
And the young man just disappears and then 2-3 months
later, Bellingham conducts his own wedding ceremony to this
woman, goes against the laws of the time, which stated that you
needed to have your marriage announced for the three weeks
leading up to it In churches. This is law in England.
(33:21):
This is law everywhere else. And he just, no, I'm going to
conduct my own marriage ceremonyand I'm not going to go by any
of the laws that exist. This is a man motivated by
obviously some desire or eagerness to get married.
So to me that speaks to his, thehuman side of him, the side
motivated by by love and passion.
(33:43):
And these are the sides that we never were taught about the
founders. So I wanted to really bring that
to light. These men were they were men,
they were fallible and they had their own self interests at hand
for whatever reason. And I think there's been
scholars who have done a lot of work on especially sexuality in
the Puritan era. I think of Richard Goodbeer, who
(34:06):
wrote about sexual revolution and American colonial times.
These folks were not as pious and pure, so to speak, as
Victorian era historians. And, you know, early 20th
century historians would have liked us to believe they were
human. They made mistakes.
They were driven by their own passions and desires, just like
the rest of us. So.
(34:27):
You definitely gave voice to female sexuality and power in
your story. Yeah, that was, again, because I
think we're taught in schools about these people who attended
service every Sunday and lived these very godly lives, and they
did it. I mean, religion was.
There's no denying that religiongreatly influenced these
(34:49):
People's Daily lives, but let's not forget also that they were
still human. And even though religion tries
to control sexuality, it can only do so much.
It's a force to be reckoned with.
And you can even see that in some of the research that's been
done on Puritan marriages. There are instances of divorce
(35:10):
in Massachusetts Bay Colony because a husband wasn't doing
his husbandly duty, AKA he wasn't having sex with his wife.
That was grounds for divorce. I think that's pretty
interesting and more forward thinking than we give the time
credit for. So it was important to me to
show that. It's so important to show that
these are normal people like us.These weren't spectacular people
(35:36):
in some some way that had a whole different range of
emotions or feelings. They had our emotions and our
feelings and our needs and goalsand desires.
Yeah, I just think it's so important for us to understand
both, of course, the accused person as a human and what they
(35:59):
suffered, but also even to understand the accusers and what
motivated them to make the accusations.
Because I think that's where we get the lessons on how not to
have a witch hunt. And I think, as I think both of
you have discussed many times inthe past in your podcast, women
(36:20):
accused of witchcraft, I think could often be put into 3
categories. In 17th century Massachusetts,
you had women who were purveyorsof knowledge.
They were healers like Margaret Jones, midwives, healers,
herbalists. They were women who had a lot of
knowledge and that was seen as athreat.
They didn't sit into the order of things because they had this
knowledge. And then you had women who were
(36:41):
outliers. They were homeless or perhaps
emotionally unstable or destitute.
They didn't fit into a neat box either.
And then thirdly, and probably most importantly, as you well
know, wealthy widows were seen as a major threat in
Massachusetts Bay Colony becausethey weren't under the control
of any man. They didn't have a husband.
(37:02):
They didn't have a dad to tell them what to do, yet they
possessed wealth, either monetary wealth or usually land
that somebody else coveted. These seems to be the three
categories that women accused ofwitchcraft always fell into in
Massachusetts. And so I guess I bring that up
because you mentioned what motivated people to be accusers.
(37:24):
And you look at the cases of these wealthy widows.
Oh, right. They had something somebody else
wanted. Yeah.
Yeah, Anne Hibbens was one of those from Boston.
That's why I bring her up. I really wish I knew more about
her story, because did she have descendants back in England
'cause she had sons there? They had adult sons that weren't
(37:45):
in the colonies, and they were. Did they try to get there in
time? Did they miss it?
Did they find out you know she'sgone before they even knew she
was in trouble, or never find out?
I don't know. I would like to know.
I would like to know also, and Ibelieve one of the judges, one
(38:06):
of the nine members of the General Assembly, and it's
invading me now. I write his name in the book,
but I'm not remembering right now.
But one of the members of the trial was related to Anne
Hibbens and later served on her trial.
I can't remember which one it was.
Was it Dudley, perhaps? Or remember, I know in the
(38:26):
Scarlet Letter she's presented as being related to Governor
Bellingham being a sister-in-lawof him, but that's a Hawthorne
invention. But yeah, but the real relations
because her husband was Anne Hibbens husband was a member of
the Court of Assistance. So he it makes sense that she
(38:50):
would have had relations in thatclass of people.
Yeah. And then?
But even her with that status doesn't save her.
Right, right. Which speaks a lot about
people's motivations to accuse. There was something to be gained
(39:12):
there. And we'll probably know, we'll
never know all the details, but definitely there was something
there to be gained. And fear, There was so much
fear. And you were able to really tell
that story, too. I also, when I wrote the book, I
tried to think about what it would have been like to live in
Massachusetts at that time. These people were they lived
(39:32):
with fear. Let you know, let's be honest,
here they are again, not to keeprepeating the same phrase, but
they were living at the edge of the known world.
It wasn't out of the ordinary for conflict to occur with the
Indigenous people who lived around them, sometimes nearby
within the communities. I think it's Mary Beth Norton
who writes that her theory aboutsome of the young women involved
(39:55):
in the Salem Witch Trials were victims of Post Traumatic Stress
disorder from witnessing the wars that transpired along the
frontier of the time. Like York and Kittery, ME, some
of the young women came from that and witnessed horrible war
atrocities between the colonistsand the Indigenous people
nearby. So that was a real fear at the
(40:16):
time. So these were people living with
daily fear of the unknown. And that can really, I think,
mess with people's heads and make them act irrationally out
of fear. Yeah, fear's so powerful.
It's hard to stop somebody from being afraid once they are as
(40:40):
well. I just was thinking of that but.
Yeah. On the subject of widows, I was
just thinking so much of witch hunts that are going on today,
the widows are are targeted precisely because people want
their land. This especially happens in
India, the widow targeting, but I know in Kenya it's widowers
(41:05):
that are targeted. So it's people just wanting what
those people have and they're vulnerable.
They're you're isolated. You don't have maybe a lot of
family with you. You definitely don't have a
spouse to support you come to your defense.
Yeah, easy. Your target when they're all
alone, right, With nobody to back them up.
(41:28):
It's very unfortunate. Yeah, that was what happened
with Anne Hibbens, was she was suspected of some things for
years, apparently. But after her husband passed
away, that's when she was accused.
And we see that with Catherine Harrison in Connecticut had
(41:48):
owned a tremendous amount of property and people were
vandalizing her. They called it vandalizing her
livestock to get at her because a woman with this kind of
control is a threat at that time.
A. Threat to the order of things.
Yeah. And I, I, when I discussed, you
(42:11):
know, the fear factor with people, like we were just saying
it was a very real fear that they lived with on the daily.
And then I think about the General Court, people like John
Winthrop, who were very much aware of what transpired 20-30
years before in Jamestown, wherethings just became mutinous
because of a lack of order. And the idea of having order was
(42:37):
religious. It was.
And it was like it was somethingthat was vital in his mind, in
their minds, to the survival of this community was to have order
no matter what, at whatever cost, to preserve the order of
things. It was a safety mechanism.
Yeah, I think that's a good point too, because sometimes we
(42:58):
get the idea that these colonialwitch hunts were hysteria and
everyone just suddenly they're all at her door banging it down
and dragging her out. But they were even really
orderly about the process of convicting a witch.
Yes, they were, although most women accused were not allowed a
(43:19):
lawyer or a barrister, which is interesting because in other
cases accused were allowed barristers, but not when it came
to witchcraft. Yeah, you had to defend
yourself, and the judges were supposed to act as counsel to
you, to give you advice, but they were clearly on the other
(43:41):
side in all of these. Which trial cases?
They had their own biases baked into the process.
You know, yeah, absolutely. Yes.
Thank you. So much for this book.
What's next for you? Well, first of all, thank you so
much. I really appreciate that and I'm
(44:02):
so glad that you both enjoyed it, especially knowing your
knowledge background. It is, it's very nice to hear
that coming from you both that you enjoyed the book.
But coming up next for me, I do have a book coming out in late
March from Lake Union. It's titled The Lacemaker's
Fortune, and it's actually set in an entirely different
setting. There are no witches involved or
witchcraft accusations. It's set in 1879 New York City
(44:25):
and it's the story of a young Irish immigrant woman who works
in a factory making lace and herlife collides with two very
unlikely men and then they all travel W to Leadville, Co during
the silver boom of 1880 and craziness ensues up at 11,000
feet in the Wild West of Leadville, Co.
(44:47):
It's really an immigrant story at its heart, and again, I feel
as though that's important to tell those stories right now
given the current climate. Yeah, I'm really looking forward
to that book as well. I love stories of the West being
I'm in Arizona, Sarah's in Colorado.
So Leadville, that's something that we both know about.
(45:09):
So that, that sounds pretty amazing as well.
Crazy history in Leadville. I lived in the Denver area for
eight years and was very much involved with Rocky Mountain
Fiction Writers. It's a great organization.
So yeah, lots of little trips upto Leadville to get a sense of
things when I was researching. So yeah, that's what's next.
(45:33):
Was there anything else that youwanted to speak to before we
wrap up? I think we covered quite a bit
here. Yeah, which is great.
This is really a great conversation.
Thank you both. So much welcome.
I do hope and again, want to saybefore we we end our discussion
that everybody should check out the Change.org petition.
(45:54):
And I'm going to actually link that to my social media because
it's a little bit shocking to me.
Again, I went and I figured there'd be a couple 100,000
signatures and I was like, holy cow, so few signatures.
And I think that maybe when people read my story of Margaret
Jones, you'll see the injustice involved in how the fact that
(46:14):
these are still people who are not exonerated will motivate
them. Ella Stratton would sign this
petition too. Al Stratton would have gone out
in front of the State House in Massachusetts with a sign and
she would have shouted it as loud as she could have.
So yes, agreed. Very true.
(46:38):
If you enjoy diving into the social history of Halloween,
then our podcasts are definitelygoing to deliver what you're
looking for this month. Be sure you are subscribed to
us, it's free wherever you enjoypodcasts so you get 2 doses of
Halloween fun every week. But that's not all.
(46:58):
We're not new to this season andyou can enjoy our previous two
Years of October episodes now, which were chock full of
fantastic guests, culture, history, holiday and myth.
Spooky morsels. And there is still more to enjoy
because we have a free live webinar October 26th before the
(47:19):
candygetthosedetails@endwitchhunts.org/events.Will you join us?
We have more witch trial contentfor you on The Thing About
Salem, which brings a different aspect of the Salem Witch Trials
to you every week. That's at About salem.com.
We look forward to chatting withyou at patreon.com/about Salem.
(47:43):
That's free, and Josh surprises us with fun extra goodies every
week. I do have a great today and a
beautiful October.
Welcome to the thing about witchhunts.
I'm Josh Hutchinson. I'm Sarah Jack.
Happy October. Happy October, the season of
witchcraft interest is here and we are ready.
Your weekly dose of witchcraft just got turned up a notch for
October. We begin October with a look at
a wonderful new debut novel that's topped the Amazon charts.
(00:23):
It's about the first woman triedfor witchcraft in Massachusetts.
Spoiler It wasn't Salem, the First Witch of Boston is the new
historical fiction novel by Andrea Catalano.
It's the story of Margaret Jones, who was executed in 1648.
This gripping book quickly received very positive reviews
(00:47):
and it brings needed attention to a lesser known witch trial.
Yes, it really does. So I am pleased to bring this
wonderful author talk to you, our loyal supporters, so you can
hear just why this story was ripe for telly.
Welcome to the Thing about WitchHunts podcast.
(01:07):
Andrea Catalano. Today we get to talk with you
about your new novel, The First Witch of Boston.
Please tell us a little bit about you and your work.
Thank you. Thanks so much for having me
both. I've really enjoyed your podcast
for quite a while now, so it's really nice to be here.
So my book is called The First Witch of Boston, and it is a
(01:28):
fictional narrative of Margaret Jones, who was the first woman
tried and executed for witchcraft in the Massachusetts
Bay Colony in 1648. It's written from 2 points of
view. The first half of the novel is
written from her husband Thomas's point of view.
He was also arrested on charges of witchcraft and sorcery, but
(01:48):
the charges didn't stick and he was soon freed afterwards.
So the first half of the novel is told from his point of view,
and the second-half is from Margaret's point of view.
And that's mostly detailing the trial.
And as you both know, the only primary source we have on the
trial is based on John Winthrop's personal journal.
(02:09):
Since he was governor at the time and was one of the nine
members of the Assembly, he served on the trial as a judge.
So we don't have any court records of the trial that have
survived. So all we have is his basically
retelling of the trial, all the charges that were brought
against Margaret Jones and how it proceeded.
(02:31):
So yeah, that's the basis for the novel.
And then I filled in the blanks with both just historical fact
in my imagination. So there we go.
The first Witch of Boston is. From my perspective it looks
like it's a great success. You have 12,000 reviews on
(02:54):
Goodreads already, very highly rated.
I've seen it in the top seller lists on Kindle and Amazon
Books. How does it feel to have such
success with your debut work? It's pretty wild, I'm not going
to lie. Like most writers, you know,
(03:15):
this is a labor of love for the most part.
And you just put your work out into the universe and hope for
the best. And it's a lot of rejection and
a lot of closed doors. And so everything just seemed to
align, like the stars aligned orwhatever you want to say.
That's maybe what they would have said in the 17th century.
And it's just been, I've had a really fortunate experience with
this book. It seems to have really taken
(03:37):
hold of people's fancy, their imaginations.
I think that timing wise, the fact that here we are in late
September and October is upon us.
Everybody loves to read a witchybook at this time of year.
But I also think that the stories of witchcraft and witch
trials and which accusations I think are Evergreen.
(04:00):
I think that people are fascinated, just super curious
as to how it all could have unfolded.
It just seems to modern Western readers, it seems like so
foreign and so much as somethingin the past.
And they would, they want to know how something so crazy
(04:20):
could have unfolded such injustice.
So I think those are the reasonsprobably why that would be my
guess as to why it seems to havereally taken hold of people.
Yeah, I just think that and maybe also because it's about a
witch trial that took place 40 something years before Salem.
(04:40):
I think most people when they think witch trials, they think
Salem. Of course, for obvious reasons,
not many people are aware of thefact that there were trials that
took place in in America before that They might be aware of the
things that happened when in England and Scotland maybe.
But so I think the fact that it was something that happened
(05:01):
before Salem in America, it catches people's imagination as
well, their interest, yeah. Congratulations.
And did you pick her story? Because of the era, What was it
about Margaret Jones that you picked her?
Couple of reasons. First, I guess I should give a
little bit of background as to how I even came across her
(05:23):
story. I did my master's degree in 17th
century British and American history.
My master's dissertation was called Seeking and Following the
Indentured Servant in Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1630
to 1700. So while I was doing research
for my dissertation, that was when I stumbled across the story
of Margaret Jones like in in theProbate Records and saw it
(05:44):
mentioned. And of course that immediately
caught my imagination and pulledme out of the work I was
supposed to be doing. Started researching Margaret
Jones and just thought the storywas fascinating because John
Winthrop, who was a very interesting person on many
different levels, seemed to really have a fixation on
(06:05):
Margaret Jones. He dedicates quite a bit of time
in in his personal diary to talking about her trial.
So that in itself was interesting to me.
I'm like, why would this one woman, like, really be so, you
know, of importance to John Winthrop?
Like, what was it about this trial?
What was it about this woman that really seems to have
preoccupied him? Also, when you read his account
(06:28):
of the trial, he really seems tospeak with, speak about her with
a lot of disdain. And so that, of course, caught
my fancy as well. Like, why?
What would cause him to have such a reaction to this woman?
So yeah, I came across her storyas a grad student, thought it
was really interesting and thought, OK, someday I'm going
to come back to that, I'll research it again someday, maybe
(06:50):
do something with that story, maybe write the novel I've
always wanted to write. So put it aside.
And then 20 something years later, after writing three other
books, I decided to come back tothe story again, I think because
it had always been a source of fascination for me.
But also, my godmother had recently passed at the time when
(07:12):
I started this novel, and I was inspired to write about a woman
who was very unhindered by social norms and was outspoken
and really kept true to herself.Somebody like who my aunt was.
She was somebody I really admired growing up because she
very much walked her own beat. And so that was that, that
(07:34):
spirit, that that kind of free spirit and bold spirit that
inspired me to go back to the story of Margaret Jones and
flesh it out and make her a realperson for the modern leader.
Yeah. Thank you so much for bringing
her to life. She is one of those under told
stories. We've talked about her on the
podcast before, but when you mentioned that there were witch
(07:58):
trials in Boston, people are like, what?
Where? When they don't understand
because every American witch trial, like you said, is Salem.
But I really appreciate that youinclude the passages from John
Winthrop and John Hale, the primary sources that we have
available to us for the case. Why do you think John Winthrop
(08:23):
was so nasty about her? That's a great question and it's
one that I still think about a lot.
She didn't fit into a box, the box that he wanted her to fit
into, so to speak. That really riled him up.
And I don't need to explain to you both.
You're very familiar with John Winthrop, and he was a very
certain personality, a very, very judgmental, very strong
(08:47):
type A personality. And I think that he was a woman
who was a very strong Type A personality.
And that just really riled him up.
It just really rubbed him the wrong way, just plainly
speaking. Yeah.
And it just really seemed as though John Winthrop was all
about, as, you know, keeping order in this society perched at
(09:12):
the edge of the known world. And to have a woman like this so
knowledgeable, and he even admits it in the diary, like,
one of the charges brought against her is that she was a
woman who made tinctures for people who requested them for
one ailment or another. And they worked really well, so
(09:32):
well that there must be something supernatural at work
here. So obviously this is a woman who
knew her craft, she knew her skill, she was very versed in
apothecary herbalism of the time.
And that knowledge was frightening, I believe, to a man
who wanted to keep order in society and have a certain
(09:54):
patriarchal order. And she with her knowledge and
as well as her willingness to speak out and defend herself and
not be put into a corner, I think both those things just
that didn't work for John Winthrop.
He wasn't shelling that. Yeah, listening, having read his
(10:15):
journal, having read your amazing story and then listening
to you talk, I'm thinking about how she was rising with these
little successes that were meeting people's needs.
And I don't know, I mean, he, there was a lot going on around
him. His own family had losses so.
(10:37):
Yes, yeah. What else?
Besides being extraordinary, what else was she accused of?
So she was accused of, there waslike 5 charges brought against
her before and that was of course before they did the
actual physical examination and watch.
So the charges were that she made tinctures that worked
really well that she was able toforesee people becoming I'll
(11:02):
before they did. That was an interesting charge
to me. So the way I portray that in the
novel is somebody comes to her or mentions to her that they
have a certain ailment and she says if she recommends, oh, you
might want to try this method oruse this herb or this oil, this
tincture to help yourself with that.
(11:23):
And for whatever reason, they decided not to take her advice.
And then she probably said, well, if you don't take my
advice, you're going to get worse.
And they did. So then that was a charge
brought against her that she could foresee people becoming
ill. And so in my mind, that's how I
pictured it to be, rather than it being some supernatural kind
(11:47):
of intuition at hand. I do believe that there are some
people who work in healthcare who are intuitive about people.
They can sense what it is that'sailing them or just observe
what's ailing them before the person speaks about it.
I guess that's a certain intuition or empathy, and she
(12:07):
probably had that, being a midwife and a healer and an
apothecary, and people were disconcerted by that ability.
Perhaps they saw it as somethingelse at work.
And thinking about the charges before her examination, I think
also somebody said that she cursed their cow and the cow
died. That was one of the charges, I
(12:27):
believe. OK, there's a lot of hemlock in
Essex County. Had a lot of hemlock growing by
streams and wetlands. Josh and I, yeah, Josh and I
have actually brought that up a while ago in a Connecticut One O
1 episode. We did that.
That stuff was growing and it looks like other wonderful
(12:48):
things. It does.
I mean, some of it looks like Queen Anne's lace.
Yeah. It's very likely that the cow
got into something that it shouldn't have.
I think in the story, I make a comical scene out of it.
There's this kind of cantankerous neighbor who was
upset that the cow got into the next door pasture by following a
goat and the cow ate some onions.
(13:11):
And of course people believed back then.
And then it's cow eat onions andit would sour the milk, make it
taste like onion. And so he's very upset that the
cow got into the pasture and is eating the onions.
And I portrayed as Margaret Jones basically turning around
and saying to him, it's not my fault that your cow is stupid
and followed a goat. And then he misconstrued that as
a curse. That's the way I kind of
(13:32):
depicted it in the book. I love how good you are at
taking those charges that are basically just a few words in
Winthrop's writing and elaborating on based on other
witch trials, what happened and just other things that, you
know, to turn that into a story is just so amazing from such a
(13:59):
little bit of information. Yes, and I'm glad that you
mentioned the incorporation of the small details that we have
from other contemporary which accusations and which trials of
the time. I mentioned in my author's note
that I had read the story of Alice Lake from Dorchester.
(14:19):
Who Cotton Mather or I can't remember if it was Cotton or
increase one of the two, which one was the President of
Harvard? It's an increase.
Thank you. I always get them confused.
He wrote in correspondence to somebody else about the trial of
Alice Lake many, many years afterwards and mentions, oh, she
was a woman who lost her child. And she claimed that like, she
(14:41):
was visited by the child's spirit.
And that always just that story just stuck with me.
And I just thought to myself, that's so tragic, that this was
probably how this woman dealed with her immense guilt.
And so then I took that element of that story and incorporated
it into Margaret Jones's story because it was I wanted to
(15:05):
really think about how would a woman at this point in time in
history deal with such immense grief?
How would it affect her psyche in this little corner of the
edge of the world that is a verystrict society where religion
guides every moment of the day, but religion can only do so much
(15:28):
for grief. Yeah, it was.
I was very much influenced by that story of Alice Lake.
And because that always struck me as so sad for many, many
years. And so I I incorporated that
aspect of her into Maggie Jones's story.
Yeah, I have loved that, that part.
I don't want to give anything away because as the story
unfolds, it's like walking through these doors, the doors
(15:49):
of her life. And I really love how you
incorporated that, that that whole piece.
I think it's very meaningful. I think that it's very
understandable. And Margaret Jones, there's the
Margaret Jones will never know. Then there's the Margaret Jones
that John Winthrop and Reverend Hale told us she was.
(16:11):
And then there's this beautiful story you created for her in
your novel. And it could be any one of us
who who doesn't just submit, butit could be any one of us.
Do you feel like it makes her more human and her story more
human for breeders and. That's my hope.
That was really my hope and intention in writing it.
(16:33):
Also as a historical fiction writer, I think this what most
of us hope to do is to find the common threads of humanity
throughout history that you and I can relate to. 405 hundred,
800 years later. There are common, There's common
themes that are just common to humanity no matter what area you
live in. Love, loss, jealousy, fears,
(16:56):
desires, all these things we've always been as humans, we've
always been motivated by these things, and they greatly
influence the choices that we make in life and our paths in
history. So yeah, I really wanted to show
Margaret as an imperfect person.Like all of us are very human.
And I wanted people to be able to step in her shoes or Thomas's
(17:19):
shoes to see what it would have been like to live in a society
that was so easily manipulated into thinking a certain way.
And I, again, I think that's a common thread as well that we
still have today in some way. Yeah.
Yeah, I love that you pointed out how timeless and Evergreen
(17:41):
this kind of story is, because witch hunts really revealed to
us a lot about ourselves and what are our fears and what
drives us to take action againstthose fears.
I really wanted to show that wasone of my aims with the novel
was to show that these not just Maggie Jones.
(18:04):
But I would my assumption would be that most people charged with
witchcraft obviously were innocent.
That's a given. But I wanted to show that they
didn't just bow their heads and acquiesce.
As we know, historical record shows that people didn't just
bow down. They were people who who stood
up for themselves and knew that by standing up for themselves,
(18:26):
they were jeopardizing themselves even further.
But they were they just were being righteous and wanted to
preserve their name. And so that was something I
wanted to show through Maggie Jones as well.
Like, people didn't just bow down and say, yes, OK, I guess
you found me guilty of witchcraft.
John Winter makes very plain in his diary.
(18:49):
She rails against the court. And she was most intemperate, so
much so that on the day that shewas executed, a great storm went
through Connecticut and felled many trees.
He's likening her rage to being a force of nature, which is
awesome. But like, ridiculous at the same
time. So I really wanted to show that
(19:10):
this is a person who would not back down despite knowing the
fact that she was in a corner and there was no way of getting
out of it. She was not going to back down.
She was going to go down fist flailing, so to speak, going
down fighting. Yeah.
She fought for her innocence andwas brave before the court to
(19:35):
battle to keep her name clear. Like you said, she has not been
exonerated by legislation like the Salem convicted people have.
Do you feel like she needs to have her name cleared?
Yes, I think all the women preceding Salem like in
Connecticut, was that a year or two ago that they were
(19:56):
exonerated by Connecticut court?Yes, there there seems to be no
reason otherwise. I did actually look at the
Change.org petition. I was, I was looking at that
recently and there's only about 2000 something signatures.
I don't maybe I need to use this, this moment that I've got
to push that out there more and I'll link it on my social media
(20:18):
because I was actually shocked to see that there were so few
signatures on this petition. I think most people wouldn't
agree that these women need to be exonerated.
Is there anybody who would be like, I don't think so.
I would hope not. I don't know.
Who knows? Yeah, Thank you so much for
bringing up the petition. I'm just going to give the short
(20:42):
link for that while we're talking.
So people can go up right now ifthey want.
And it's change.org/witch trials.
And that gets you to the petition.
And there'd be 8 names that would be cleared through this
proposed resolution. And those eight did get
convictions out of Boston. And Margaret, of course, was the
1st. Yep, right.
(21:05):
I'm glad you knew it to to shareit.
Thank you. Yeah.
Thank you. Yeah, we have a little
organization that is working with the legislator out of
Cambridge and Watertown to get that done.
Yeah, Steve Owens proposed that and author Marilyn Roach is one
of his constituents. So he proposed that for her, for
(21:28):
the accused, for her. So we got to get it to the
committee, though. That is the trick.
The General Court in Massachusetts made that real
difficult. All these centuries, maybe not
that committee, but this centurythey've, they haven't
necessarily felt compelled. So more signatures.
We'll show them that people are paying attention and we know she
(21:52):
was innocent. And yeah, let's, let's fix the
let's fix the record that John Winthrop has set for her turn.
It around. I think we can.
I think we can do this. Do this.
Yeah. It's interesting that the Rep is
from Watertown and he representsCambridge and Watertown.
There's 2 characters in the novel, Samuel and Alice
(22:12):
Stratton. Who?
Were living in Charlestown at the time of Margaret Jones's
execution and not long after moved to Watertown and they were
considered founders of Watertown.
So that's ironic. Or.
And Alice Stratton also was accused of witchcraft about
three years following Margaret Jones's execution because she
was constantly defending her best friend's name, which Jimmy
(22:36):
is like. If that isn't the true
definition of the ultimate best friend, I don't know what is.
That she just went to bat for her friend even after she was
executed, knowing that she was risking her own life and safety
by doing so. So interesting to me to see
that. That was very interesting when I
was going through the records inMassachusetts Historic Society
(22:58):
to see the handwritten record ofAlice and Samuel Stratton being
fined by the court for slandering the court by saying
that they had the blood of an innocent woman on their hands
and they were fined by the court.
And it was so amazing to see that in the written record, the
actual written record, and then a few months following to see
that they were written up again for not paying the fine.
(23:20):
And that that was the part I love best.
I was like, can you just picturethem?
They're like, Oh yeah, sure, we'll pay the fine.
And then they're like, I'm not paying that fine.
I love it. That is true.
Friendships to the end. If we could all have friends
like that, right? I just love how you portray her
personal relationships, how strong these bonds are that
(23:40):
Margaret forms in your work. I just such an important part of
the story. Yeah, and having had at least 4
grandmothers that found themselves in court, like
Margaret Jones, Mary Hale was inBoston and she was accused and
she was like known for her pocket theory treatments as
(24:02):
well. And So what I wanted to say was
on this relationship thing, I haven't read every book that's
out there that portrays a witch trial in New England, but some
of them that I've read don't really go into the court
situation because man, that is hard.
Maybe it was, I don't want to say it was harder, not hard for
(24:25):
you to write, but I not, I can'timagine what that was like
putting yourself in her shoes, although it was you raising your
voice for her, giving her, giving us her court voice.
But on the relationship side, when people came in, Margaret.
(24:46):
Had. The shred of hope, or you really
show that she was hopeful that someone would put their foot
down, that her friends would be there for her.
And there were ones that you thought were gonna have her
back. They don't.
And then yet there were other people who stuck their neck out
like Alice and then others. I just think that was a really
(25:09):
important aspect. I think all these little
details. You did really, really help us
understand the fears and the anger and the guts that she had
going through this alone. And she possibly wasn't the
first one in Massachusetts to betried.
We don't have all the records, but it's what if nobody had and
(25:34):
she was the first. So to be going through that,
it's really hard to think about what that must have been like.
And especially going into the examination, the witch
examination, which we know did happen because John Winthrop
details it, and also that is theonly surviving court document.
The constable's record does mention that the woman lately
(25:56):
accused of witchcraft will be watched for 24 hours.
That is a surviving constable's record.
So we know it did transpire. I believe like May 18th was what
it was dated. And then we know that at the
time they were still using English law and English law at
the time prescribed Matthew Hopkins method that he used
throughout E Anglia, the discovery of witchcraft where a
(26:20):
woman's body or man whoever was being accused, but it was mostly
women. Her body would be fully examined
for any sign or mark of the devil, which it could have been
anything out of the ordinary. It could have been a freckle, A
birthmark, 1/3 nipple, anything.A scar that would be used
against these accused and then they would be watched overnight
(26:43):
and they would not be allowed tosleep.
They had to sit cross legged on a floor and they were watched
the whole night through to make sure that one of Satan's Imps or
Satan himself didn't come and visit them to suckle upon her
witch's teat or whatever it was.So to write that scene was
pretty wild because that is justwhen people hear that that was
(27:03):
the method, they're just like wow, that is just bananas.
Like that's just crazy. So it was interesting to write
that scene out and with the physical examination, it is
mentioned in John Winthrop's diary that she was found to have
a witch's teat freshly suckled on the inside of her right
thigh. And that after they discovered
(27:25):
that one started to grow on the left side.
And I was like, OK, so how do I,how does one explain that in in
a novel? Like, how would you write that?
So I just said that she had the unfortunate luck of having a
freckle or a mole on the inside of her thigh and that when they
were examining her, they were holding on roughly to her other
thigh and left a mark with theirfinger or nail or whatever on
(27:49):
the inside of the other thigh and claimed, oh, look, there's
another one growing. Because it served their
narrative. It served their purposes.
The other thing that I mentionedin there is the use of a witch
pricker, which I don't know thatwas used in Massachusetts Bay
Colony. That's something that I took
from the research that I did. I didn't do a ton of extensive
research on the Scottish witch trials, but I did have some
(28:10):
information on them. And it seems like even into the
early 18th century there were witch finders in Scotland who
would use these devices, as you probably know, called witch
prickers. And they were actually like
little spring loaded, like bladekind of things that would
basically look like they were puncturing the skin but would
retract. And then they would pull it away
(28:32):
and say, oh, look, she's not bleeding.
So she's a witch because a person who isn't a witch would
bleed. And it was actually a device of
trickery that was used in some Scottish witch trials.
So I decided I was like, that isso wild.
And there's still some that survive.
I've seen pictures of the actualdevices and I took some liberty
there by saying it was used in this trial, but I do know that
(28:54):
it there were things similarly used contemporarily in Scotland,
so it wasn't out of the realm ofpossibility.
Yeah. Yeah.
We, we do know in the Salem witch trials that they did test
some of those marks that they found to see if they drained
blood or if they caused pain to the person.
(29:15):
And if you didn't feel any pain and no blood was coming out,
then that was it. Yep, that was it.
Yep, another strike against you.Also, I thought it would be an
interesting point in the novel. Not to give too much away of the
story, but the examination was fascinating to me that they
(29:36):
would make a person stay awake all night long, and she had
already been in prison for abouta week or so before the
examination. She might very well be ill from
being in a prison cell and then to be made to stay awake all
night. That would cause some people to
get more sick or delirious with fever or something.
(29:57):
So I can incorporate that element.
And then it was a cool way for me to introduce a character who
seems somewhat rational within this whole storm of irrational
fear and chaos. And I create this fictional
character of Constable Baldwin, who was actually, he was a
veteran from some of the earlierbattles in the English Civil War
(30:20):
in Scotland. So he's had this very traumatic
experience of being a veteran, and then he's bringing it with
him, this trauma that he himselfsuffered.
And so they have this, these moments of understanding and
empathy for each other because they both have suffered trauma.
Yeah. So I thought it was a good way
(30:41):
for me to bring in the crazinessthat was going on beyond
Massachusetts in the 1640s were very tumultuous time in the
world, not just in Massachusetts.
It's one of my favorite scenes. Just it's not my favorite that
she was suffering, of course, but the storytelling of that
night and it's like a slippery slope.
(31:04):
It's like everything's fine and then it's not.
I loved it. So yeah, that was great.
So I wanted to touch on the Puritans and you're mentioning
what a tumultuous time things were.
But how come we have these misconceptions?
And why are we digging for truthright now on this time period?
(31:30):
It's true. We are, aren't we?
And we keep discovering things more and more.
There's been some amazing scholarship done, historical
scholarship over the last 20-30 years.
It's just really given us new insight into these founders of
America. I think we all come from a
generation where we grew up watching the Peanuts
Thanksgiving special with the retelling of the Mayflower with
(31:53):
Miles Standish with his huge handlebar mustache.
And it's just been so glossed over and glamorized as being
these godly people who came overand wanted to build a city upon
a hill with religious freedom. Yeah, that didn't really play
out as planned. On the religious freedom aspect,
(32:14):
I bring up in the novel the caseof Governor Bellingham, Richard
Bellingham, who was an interesting guy.
I should preface this by saying I grew up outside of Boston in
Chelsea, MA. And in Chelsea, MA, still stands
Governor Bellingham's house, andit was his hunting lodge when he
was governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony.
(32:35):
And so that was always a source of fascination for me as a
little kid, to see this beautiful little late 17th
century house in the middle of all these tenements and
apartment buildings. It just really stood out.
So Bellingham was always of interest to me even as a kid.
And then to learn the story of his marriage to his second wife
is a crazy story. She was a guest at his house.
(32:59):
She was the fiance of some youngman who was staying with him.
And the young man just disappears and then 2-3 months
later, Bellingham conducts his own wedding ceremony to this
woman, goes against the laws of the time, which stated that you
needed to have your marriage announced for the three weeks
leading up to it In churches. This is law in England.
(33:21):
This is law everywhere else. And he just, no, I'm going to
conduct my own marriage ceremonyand I'm not going to go by any
of the laws that exist. This is a man motivated by
obviously some desire or eagerness to get married.
So to me that speaks to his, thehuman side of him, the side
motivated by by love and passion.
(33:43):
And these are the sides that we never were taught about the
founders. So I wanted to really bring that
to light. These men were they were men,
they were fallible and they had their own self interests at hand
for whatever reason. And I think there's been
scholars who have done a lot of work on especially sexuality in
the Puritan era. I think of Richard Goodbeer, who
(34:06):
wrote about sexual revolution and American colonial times.
These folks were not as pious and pure, so to speak, as
Victorian era historians. And, you know, early 20th
century historians would have liked us to believe they were
human. They made mistakes.
They were driven by their own passions and desires, just like
the rest of us. So.
(34:27):
You definitely gave voice to female sexuality and power in
your story. Yeah, that was, again, because I
think we're taught in schools about these people who attended
service every Sunday and lived these very godly lives, and they
did it. I mean, religion was.
There's no denying that religiongreatly influenced these
(34:49):
People's Daily lives, but let's not forget also that they were
still human. And even though religion tries
to control sexuality, it can only do so much.
It's a force to be reckoned with.
And you can even see that in some of the research that's been
done on Puritan marriages. There are instances of divorce
(35:10):
in Massachusetts Bay Colony because a husband wasn't doing
his husbandly duty, AKA he wasn't having sex with his wife.
That was grounds for divorce. I think that's pretty
interesting and more forward thinking than we give the time
credit for. So it was important to me to
show that. It's so important to show that
these are normal people like us.These weren't spectacular people
(35:36):
in some some way that had a whole different range of
emotions or feelings. They had our emotions and our
feelings and our needs and goalsand desires.
Yeah, I just think it's so important for us to understand
both, of course, the accused person as a human and what they
(35:59):
suffered, but also even to understand the accusers and what
motivated them to make the accusations.
Because I think that's where we get the lessons on how not to
have a witch hunt. And I think, as I think both of
you have discussed many times inthe past in your podcast, women
(36:20):
accused of witchcraft, I think could often be put into 3
categories. In 17th century Massachusetts,
you had women who were purveyorsof knowledge.
They were healers like Margaret Jones, midwives, healers,
herbalists. They were women who had a lot of
knowledge and that was seen as athreat.
They didn't sit into the order of things because they had this
knowledge. And then you had women who were
(36:41):
outliers. They were homeless or perhaps
emotionally unstable or destitute.
They didn't fit into a neat box either.
And then thirdly, and probably most importantly, as you well
know, wealthy widows were seen as a major threat in
Massachusetts Bay Colony becausethey weren't under the control
of any man. They didn't have a husband.
(37:02):
They didn't have a dad to tell them what to do, yet they
possessed wealth, either monetary wealth or usually land
that somebody else coveted. These seems to be the three
categories that women accused ofwitchcraft always fell into in
Massachusetts. And so I guess I bring that up
because you mentioned what motivated people to be accusers.
(37:24):
And you look at the cases of these wealthy widows.
Oh, right. They had something somebody else
wanted. Yeah.
Yeah, Anne Hibbens was one of those from Boston.
That's why I bring her up. I really wish I knew more about
her story, because did she have descendants back in England
'cause she had sons there? They had adult sons that weren't
(37:45):
in the colonies, and they were. Did they try to get there in
time? Did they miss it?
Did they find out you know she'sgone before they even knew she
was in trouble, or never find out?
I don't know. I would like to know.
I would like to know also, and Ibelieve one of the judges, one
(38:06):
of the nine members of the General Assembly, and it's
invading me now. I write his name in the book,
but I'm not remembering right now.
But one of the members of the trial was related to Anne
Hibbens and later served on her trial.
I can't remember which one it was.
Was it Dudley, perhaps? Or remember, I know in the
(38:26):
Scarlet Letter she's presented as being related to Governor
Bellingham being a sister-in-lawof him, but that's a Hawthorne
invention. But yeah, but the real relations
because her husband was Anne Hibbens husband was a member of
the Court of Assistance. So he it makes sense that she
(38:50):
would have had relations in thatclass of people.
Yeah. And then?
But even her with that status doesn't save her.
Right, right. Which speaks a lot about
people's motivations to accuse. There was something to be gained
(39:12):
there. And we'll probably know, we'll
never know all the details, but definitely there was something
there to be gained. And fear, There was so much
fear. And you were able to really tell
that story, too. I also, when I wrote the book, I
tried to think about what it would have been like to live in
Massachusetts at that time. These people were they lived
(39:32):
with fear. Let you know, let's be honest,
here they are again, not to keeprepeating the same phrase, but
they were living at the edge of the known world.
It wasn't out of the ordinary for conflict to occur with the
Indigenous people who lived around them, sometimes nearby
within the communities. I think it's Mary Beth Norton
who writes that her theory aboutsome of the young women involved
(39:55):
in the Salem Witch Trials were victims of Post Traumatic Stress
disorder from witnessing the wars that transpired along the
frontier of the time. Like York and Kittery, ME, some
of the young women came from that and witnessed horrible war
atrocities between the colonistsand the Indigenous people
nearby. So that was a real fear at the
(40:16):
time. So these were people living with
daily fear of the unknown. And that can really, I think,
mess with people's heads and make them act irrationally out
of fear. Yeah, fear's so powerful.
It's hard to stop somebody from being afraid once they are as
(40:40):
well. I just was thinking of that but.
Yeah. On the subject of widows, I was
just thinking so much of witch hunts that are going on today,
the widows are are targeted precisely because people want
their land. This especially happens in
India, the widow targeting, but I know in Kenya it's widowers
(41:05):
that are targeted. So it's people just wanting what
those people have and they're vulnerable.
They're you're isolated. You don't have maybe a lot of
family with you. You definitely don't have a
spouse to support you come to your defense.
Yeah, easy. Your target when they're all
alone, right, With nobody to back them up.
(41:28):
It's very unfortunate. Yeah, that was what happened
with Anne Hibbens, was she was suspected of some things for
years, apparently. But after her husband passed
away, that's when she was accused.
And we see that with Catherine Harrison in Connecticut had
(41:48):
owned a tremendous amount of property and people were
vandalizing her. They called it vandalizing her
livestock to get at her because a woman with this kind of
control is a threat at that time.
A. Threat to the order of things.
Yeah. And I, I, when I discussed, you
(42:11):
know, the fear factor with people, like we were just saying
it was a very real fear that they lived with on the daily.
And then I think about the General Court, people like John
Winthrop, who were very much aware of what transpired 20-30
years before in Jamestown, wherethings just became mutinous
because of a lack of order. And the idea of having order was
(42:37):
religious. It was.
And it was like it was somethingthat was vital in his mind, in
their minds, to the survival of this community was to have order
no matter what, at whatever cost, to preserve the order of
things. It was a safety mechanism.
Yeah, I think that's a good point too, because sometimes we
(42:58):
get the idea that these colonialwitch hunts were hysteria and
everyone just suddenly they're all at her door banging it down
and dragging her out. But they were even really
orderly about the process of convicting a witch.
Yes, they were, although most women accused were not allowed a
(43:19):
lawyer or a barrister, which is interesting because in other
cases accused were allowed barristers, but not when it came
to witchcraft. Yeah, you had to defend
yourself, and the judges were supposed to act as counsel to
you, to give you advice, but they were clearly on the other
(43:41):
side in all of these. Which trial cases?
They had their own biases baked into the process.
You know, yeah, absolutely. Yes.
Thank you. So much for this book.
What's next for you? Well, first of all, thank you so
much. I really appreciate that and I'm
(44:02):
so glad that you both enjoyed it, especially knowing your
knowledge background. It is, it's very nice to hear
that coming from you both that you enjoyed the book.
But coming up next for me, I do have a book coming out in late
March from Lake Union. It's titled The Lacemaker's
Fortune, and it's actually set in an entirely different
setting. There are no witches involved or
witchcraft accusations. It's set in 1879 New York City
(44:25):
and it's the story of a young Irish immigrant woman who works
in a factory making lace and herlife collides with two very
unlikely men and then they all travel W to Leadville, Co during
the silver boom of 1880 and craziness ensues up at 11,000
feet in the Wild West of Leadville, Co.
(44:47):
It's really an immigrant story at its heart, and again, I feel
as though that's important to tell those stories right now
given the current climate. Yeah, I'm really looking forward
to that book as well. I love stories of the West being
I'm in Arizona, Sarah's in Colorado.
So Leadville, that's something that we both know about.
(45:09):
So that, that sounds pretty amazing as well.
Crazy history in Leadville. I lived in the Denver area for
eight years and was very much involved with Rocky Mountain
Fiction Writers. It's a great organization.
So yeah, lots of little trips upto Leadville to get a sense of
things when I was researching. So yeah, that's what's next.
(45:33):
Was there anything else that youwanted to speak to before we
wrap up? I think we covered quite a bit
here. Yeah, which is great.
This is really a great conversation.
Thank you both. So much welcome.
I do hope and again, want to saybefore we we end our discussion
that everybody should check out the Change.org petition.
(45:54):
And I'm going to actually link that to my social media because
it's a little bit shocking to me.
Again, I went and I figured there'd be a couple 100,000
signatures and I was like, holy cow, so few signatures.
And I think that maybe when people read my story of Margaret
Jones, you'll see the injustice involved in how the fact that
(46:14):
these are still people who are not exonerated will motivate
them. Ella Stratton would sign this
petition too. Al Stratton would have gone out
in front of the State House in Massachusetts with a sign and
she would have shouted it as loud as she could have.
So yes, agreed. Very true.
(46:38):
If you enjoy diving into the social history of Halloween,
then our podcasts are definitelygoing to deliver what you're
looking for this month. Be sure you are subscribed to
us, it's free wherever you enjoypodcasts so you get 2 doses of
Halloween fun every week. But that's not all.
(46:58):
We're not new to this season andyou can enjoy our previous two
Years of October episodes now, which were chock full of
fantastic guests, culture, history, holiday and myth.
Spooky morsels. And there is still more to enjoy
because we have a free live webinar October 26th before the
(47:19):
candygetthosedetails@endwitchhunts.org/events.Will you join us?
We have more witch trial contentfor you on The Thing About
Salem, which brings a different aspect of the Salem Witch Trials
to you every week. That's at About salem.com.
We look forward to chatting withyou at patreon.com/about Salem.
(47:43):
That's free, and Josh surprises us with fun extra goodies every
week. I do have a great today and a
beautiful October.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Cardiac Cowboys
The heart was always off-limits to surgeons. Cutting into it spelled instant death for the patient. That is, until a ragtag group of doctors scattered across the Midwest and Texas decided to throw out the rule book. Working in makeshift laboratories and home garages, using medical devices made from scavenged machine parts and beer tubes, these men and women invented the field of open heart surgery. Odds are, someone you know is alive because of them. So why has history left them behind? Presented by Chris Pine, CARDIAC COWBOYS tells the gripping true story behind the birth of heart surgery, and the young, Greatest Generation doctors who made it happen. For years, they competed and feuded, racing to be the first, the best, and the most prolific. Some appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, operated on kings and advised presidents. Others ended up disgraced, penniless, and convicted of felonies. Together, they ignited a revolution in medicine, and changed the world.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.