This Salem Witch Trials video is an episode of the In Search Of series from The History Channel. It offers a look into what happened during the notorious trials of many men and women accused of witchcraft in the early days of settling the new continent in an area that would eventually become the United States. It runs about 50 minutes long.

I’ve always been curious about the trials and wondered what really happened during that time period. What made them so tragic is that many of the people who came to this country left Europe because of all the political and religious hoo-ha going on over there. It’s crazy that they ran right into the same kind of mess on the other side of the world, but I guess religious practices got taken along with everything else when folks picked up and moved.

According to this video, the Salem witch trials all started with a woman from Barbados who was like a nanny to some young daughters of a preacher. She was, in reality, a slave. I can’t spell or pronounce her name. This woman began to share tales of voodoo and witchcraft with the girls, and pretty soon those young girls started bringing their friends over. A half dozen or so came around to hear these forbidden stories, and their reactions set off a firestorm.

The young girls would go into hysterics and claim to be afflicted by demons and witches, and that’s when the accusations started. They would name a few people and those poor folks had basically no way of defending themselves. The Puritan jugheads running things back then were all the more eager to get rid of any witches they could find, and pretty soon they had dozens of people locked up waiting to be strung up.

One of the historians interviewed for this documentary pointed out that the young girls making the accusations were like the Lindsay Lohans or Paris Hiltons of their time. They made news up and down the settlements and were huge celebrities for their ability to recognize a witch. Although the historian didn’t say so outright, it is implied that the girls were doing this all for attention. Keep in mind that this was a period of time where a woman’s value was more like livestock rather than seen as a human being.

An interesting fact about these trials was that detailed records were kept with names of the accused, but no records of the actual trials were documented. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were destroyed in some way. The video does show some handwritten notes with lists of names but doesn’t say if that’s the real thing or just a copy. For visual references, this relies heavily on sketches and paintings that depict the time period.

This video concludes with how the trials finally came to an end and also covers some of the aftermath. I thought it was a good way to complete the story. Overall, this is a fascinating subject that reflects on a brief but scary period of time in the early beginnings of this country. I think there are people around who still believe in some of this stuff.

Recommended: Yes