Chapter Summaries

As the Salem witch trials expanded, Hassan tested the accusers by having them identify Captain Alden, a stranger to Salem, but their accusations instead led to Alden’s arrest. The trials continued amid growing fear and political maneuvering, with the governor’s suspension of arrests still far off.

• Samuel Parris began walking to Salem Town each week to conduct hearings, while Cotton Mather became Increase Mather’s theological adviser.
• Danforth established a witch court, which issued eleven arrest warrants before the jurors had assembled, including one for John Alden.
• Hassan had Alden hide among the crowd and asked the girls to identify the person tormenting them, but they first pointed to another soldier.
• After the judge ordered Alden outside, the girls accused him of selling military supplies to the enemy, sleeping with Native American women, and torturing them, and guards disarmed him.
• Elizabeth Parris neared collapse as Abigail screamed at home, while Chief Justice Stoughton sought to end the trials quickly despite weakening evidence.
• Andros reported New England’s situation to Britain, while Increase Mather claimed the people were satisfied with the new charter; the arrests continued.

Elizabeth Cary went to Salem to clear her name, but Abigail Williams and the other girls accused her, and she was arrested and confined in Cambridge Prison. The chapter ended with Salem still obeying the witch-hunt authorities as Paris called another public fast.

• Sarah Osborne died in prison, while Boston Prison remained overcrowded and harsh for the accused witches.
• Nathaniel and Elizabeth Cary sailed to Salem to seek a chance to clear Elizabeth's name, and John Hale arranged for them to meet Abigail Williams at Ingersoll Tavern.
• Abigail Williams grew close to Benjamin Hutchinson by claiming to see evil spirits and directing him to attack them.
• John Indian told Nathaniel Cary that Edward Bishop had bound and beaten him, not Tituba.
• The girls accused Elizabeth Cary of tormenting them, and officials arrested her; Nathaniel arranged for her to be held in Cambridge Prison instead of Boston Prison.
• Francis Nurse gathered thirty-nine signatures supporting Rebecca Nurse, while Paris called for another public fast.

The Salem witch trials expanded as old land disputes and family feuds helped drive accusations against the Towne sisters, Sarah Wildes, and John Conrad. John Conrad fled after being accused of Daniel Wilkins’s death, but he was caught within a week, while the political struggle over Salem’s leadership continued.

• Elizabeth Howe and Mary Esty were described as enduring accusations and imprisonment, while Sarah Wildes was arrested after the Hobbs family accused her.
• Governor Phips proposed pardoning Rebecca Nurse because the evidence against her remained inconclusive.
• Susanna Sheldon accused Philip English of threatening Governor Phips, while the account connected Andros’s return to New England’s loss of order.
• Giles Corey became the first male wizard accused, and John Conrad was accused by Ann Putnam of killing villagers and bewitching Daniel Wilkins.
• John Conrad fled after the accusation but was caught after only a week.

Philip and Mary English fled Salem for New York after Reverend Moody urged them to escape, while accusations against them continued. The chapter contrasted their survival and the Salem accusers’ choices with the rise of clergy and the changing promise of the American Dream, ending on the idea that fallen people would keep trying to succeed.

• Philip English hid in Boston after Mary was arrested, while Susanna Sheldon accused the couple of witchcraft and Philip threatened her.
• Philip and Mary consulted Reverend Moody and Samuel Willard, and Moody urged Philip to flee with Mary before the authorities could reach them.
• The English couple escaped toward New York, where Governor Benjamin Fletcher had promised refuge, as new accusations against them reached the grand jury.
• The chapter described how Salem’s wealthy and clergy held power, and how Abigail Hobbs and Susanna Sheldon faced different risks within the witchcraft proceedings.
• The narration compared the American Dream to a new aristocratic system that tied education and income to success, then ended by invoking Philip English’s struggle to rise again after losing everything.

Five women, including Rebecca Nurse and Sarah Good, were hanged at Gallows Hill, and the executions were followed by new fits and accusations. In Andover, Richard Carrier accused his mother, Martha Carrier, of witchcraft and claimed that about eighty people had attended a Satanic baptism.

• On July 19, Herrick and his deputies escorted Sarah Good, Rebecca Nurse, Susanna Martin, Elizabeth Howe, and Sarah Wildes to Gallows Hill.
• Father Noyes questioned the condemned women, Sarah Good cursed him, and the executioner hanged all five.
• After the executions, Elizabeth Parris began convulsing, and new prisoners confessed to witchcraft and described conspiracies.
• Noyes traveled to Andover to investigate Ann Foster's claim that she had flown to Salem on a wooden pole.
• Richard Carrier told Noyes that his mother, Martha Carrier, had made him hurt the minister's wife and promised she would become the Queen of Hell.
• Richard accused his younger brother of joining a Satanic baptism and claimed about eighty people had taken part.

The chapter described the coercive confessions and alleged Devil’s gathering in Andover, then followed John Proctor’s appeal for a fair trial as ministers debated the Salem witch trials. It left the legitimacy of the court and the pursuit of fugitives under question.

• Andover women were pressured into confessing to witchcraft, and Cotton Mather investigated the village and the alleged baptism site.
• Andrew Carrier and other witnesses described a gathering where the Devil offered rewards in exchange for help overthrowing the church and abolishing judgment and guilt.
• John Proctor wrote to five Boston ministers, reporting torture and injustice and asking them to ensure he and the other prisoners received a fair trial.
• Ministers met at Harvard University on August 1 and discussed the possibility that innocent people had been implicated in the trials.
• Constables hunted for fugitives including Elizabeth Colson, while the chapter questioned the authority of the court and the morality of resisting arrest.

The chapter recounts Plymouth’s declining fur trade, conflicts with Massachusetts Bay and the Dutch, and the later Salem witch trials involving John Alden and George Burroughs. It ends with young Alden overhearing news of brutal raids in Gloucester and slipping away from the Harvard graduation festivities.

• Isaac Allerton’s mismanagement left Plymouth’s fur traders in debt, while competition, alcohol-driven trade, and land claims strained relations with Native Americans.
• John Hocking’s killing on the Kennebec led Massachusetts Bay to arrest John Alden, and Plymouth officials later judged Hocking responsible for provoking the fatal dispute.
• Standish’s failed attempt to retake the Penobscot post and Massachusetts Bay’s competition helped drive Plymouth traders out of Maine by the late 1630s.
• Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay both sought access to the Connecticut River Valley, prompting Winthrop to confront the Dutch over their claims there.
• During the Salem witch trials, John Alden and George Burroughs faced accusations, while Alden’s son endured his father’s imprisonment and his brother’s capture.
• At Harvard’s 1692 graduation, young Alden overheard Stoughton receive news of axe murders and repeated night raids near Gloucester, then blended into the celebrating crowd.

Severus reflected on the history of witchcraft persecution, prejudice, and the forces that shaped the wizarding and Muggle worlds. He recalled losing his home, wife, and unborn child, then saving his wife and keeping painful truths from her, before considering Harry Potter’s powerful Patronus.

• The narrator contrasted Andover’s divisions over Indians with the Salem witch persecutions and argued that Muggles’ denial of magic helped end such atrocities.
• The narrator described how prejudice and unequal alliances shaped history, from the expulsion of Huguenot craftsmen to the Roman Empire’s military rule.
• Severus remembered returning from drinking and fighting to find his home destroyed and his wife and unborn child gravely harmed.
• Severus saved his wife and withheld the history of Salem and other painful truths from her.
• The narrator recalled Harry Potter driving away Dementors with a brilliant stag Patronus and wondered which fortunate memory had powered it.

The chapter traced the decline of the Dutch and French fur trades, the British takeover of New Amsterdam, and the spread of smallpox and witchcraft accusations in New England. In Andover, accusations threatened the Dane family and other ministers, and the conflict was left to be decided in court.

• Van den Bogaert won back Mohawk trade for the Dutch, but on a later visit found the village devastated by Iroquois raids and smallpox.
• Massachusetts settlers and troops drove the Pequot people from their land, while the Dutch lost their Connecticut River trading foothold.
• Van den Bogaert persuaded Peter Stuyvesant to surrender New Amsterdam to the British, who renamed it New York in exchange for Suriname.
• Elizabeth Cary escaped prison, while Thomas Brattle recorded the Salem trials and questioned the accusations against Alden and others.
• Onesimus taught Cotton Mather an inoculation method, but Boston residents opposed it and attacked Mather’s house.
• Witchcraft accusations continued to imperil the Carrier family and Francis Dane’s household, and the dispute was set for court.

Alden was spared execution, while George Burroughs, John Willard, John Proctor, George Jacobs, and Martha Carrier were taken to Gallows Hill. Burroughs was hanged despite reciting the Lord’s Prayer, and the aftermath left Salem facing the deaths, ruined families, and damaged religious authority caused by the trials.

• Alden challenged the witchcraft evidence and proclaimed his innocence, but Bartholomew Gedney turned against him; Alden was left off the August 19 death list.
• Margaret Jacobs recanted her confession and was sent to the dungeon, where Burroughs comforted her as she grieved for her family.
• Officials led Burroughs, John Willard, John Proctor, and George Jacobs to execution, and Martha Carrier joined them along the way.
• Burroughs calmly recited the Lord’s Prayer at the scaffold, but Cotton Mather defended the verdict and the executioner hanged him.
• The trials left families devastated, including Francis Nurse and Elizabeth Proctor, while Ann Putnam Jr. later confessed publicly to her role in the accusations.

The ministers destroyed evidence tied to the Salem witchcraft accusations and prayed for John Alden, while the trials continued to claim lives. Philippe English returned to Salem after the turmoil, and George Jacobs was convicted despite mocking the accusations and insisting he had caused no harm.

• The ministers removed witchcraft-related evidence from Alden's home and joined Boston's prominent figures in fasting and prayer for his case.
• On July 20, Alden's friends prayed through the afternoon, and a storm brought heavy rain that night.
• Nine months after the turmoil, Philippe English returned to Salem, restored his looted house, and resumed his business while attending church in Marblehead.
• George Jacobs laughed at Abigail Williams's testimony, struggled to recite the Lord's Prayer, and was convicted of witchcraft.
• Sarah Churchill later admitted that she had lied about Jacobs after judges threatened to imprison her with Burroughs.
• Sarah Osborne died of illness in Boston prison on May 10, becoming the first witchcraft death.

The witch trials devastated Massachusetts as accusations, imprisonment, and seizures of property spread, culminating in Giles Corey’s execution by pressing and Martha Corey’s hanging. The chapter ended with hope for Martha’s mixed-race son to escape and find someone who would accept him.

• Reports of the Massachusetts trials reached New York, while Nathaniel Saltonstall faced imprisonment and Samuel Willard came under suspicion for helping fugitives.
• Constables plundered the property of accused people, leaving families destitute as Stoughton’s court continued convicting and executing suspects.
• Stoughton sentenced Giles Corey to pressing after Corey refused to confess or accuse anyone, and Corey died beneath stones on September 17.
• George Corwin seized Corey’s property, but one of Corey’s sons-in-law paid a fine and recovered his body on September 19.
• Martha Corey and seven others were hanged at Gallows Hill on September 22, and the chapter ended imagining her son escaping into the fields.

The chapter described the colonies’ rivalries over trade, taxation, and military power, then examined how local residency rules and charity could be used to exclude outsiders. It left Elizabeth Proctor with a possible path to protect her children and inheritance by claiming local status and seeking justice for her husband.

• Massachusetts and New York competed over trade, river taxes, and influence, while New York avoided Stoughton's proposed attack on Montreal.
• Townspeople rejected many outsiders seeking aid, and John Indian’s position inside Ingersoll Tavern offered a way to undermine the tavern’s owners.
• The chapter explained how shell beads could serve as currency and how Massachusetts collected taxes along the Delaware River despite New York’s proximity.
• Elizabeth Proctor could secure her children’s inheritance by asserting local residency, relying on Martha Corey's boy for protection, and turning away her husband’s nonlocal relatives.
• Elizabeth could pursue compensation for John Proctor and attend Ann Putnam Jr.'s confession with the Nurse family.

Protests over the witch trials forced Governor Phips and the colonial assembly to confront whether the court and its judges should be held accountable. After an immunity bill passed despite fierce opposition, Phips dissolved the Court of Oyer and Terminer while Stoughton was delayed by a flooded road.

• People in Ipswich and Reding protested the trials, and a young man withdrew his accusation against Elizabeth Proctor.
• Phips and the Council planned a colony-wide Thanksgiving as protests and questions about the trials and taxes grew.
• The colonial assembly debated an immunity bill for the judges and false accusers, which passed by thirty-three votes to twenty-nine; Samuel Sewall and Stoughton voted against it for different reasons.
• Stoughton traveled regularly to Boston to learn whether Phips would continue the trials.
• On October 28, flooding forced Stoughton to turn back from his journey, and Phips formally dissolved the Court of Oyer and Terminer in his absence.

The chapter traced how European trade, colonial expansion, religious arguments, and political upheavals shaped New England and New York before returning to the Salem witch trials. It left Phips facing the trials with ministers as advisers instead of Harvard’s scientists.

• Dutch settlers turned wampum into currency, and its overproduction caused inflation before merchants reduced the circulating supply by burying beads.
• European powers competed for furs and weapons, while captured Europeans were enslaved and later ransomed through officials such as John Alden.
• Anne Hutchinson challenged Massachusetts’s religious authorities, was exiled, and later died in a Native American uprising; her grandson Benjamin worked beside John Indian at a tavern.
• The Glorious Revolution and colonial conflicts removed Andros from power, while Jacob Leisler briefly seized New York before his execution deepened political divisions.
• The chapter returned to the Salem trials and questioned why Phips had chosen ministers rather than Harvard scientists as advisers.

The chapter traced Isaac Newton’s alchemical studies and secret ties to Robert Boyle and the Hartlib Circle, then recounted the Goodwin children’s afflictions and growing disputes over witchcraft accusations in Massachusetts. It ended by revealing Newton’s secret name, Jehovah Sanctus Unus, as an anagram meaning “the one holy spirit.”

• Newton met Robert Boyle, who introduced him to alchemy, advanced experimental chemistry, and the Hartlib Circle.
• Newton observed the 1682 comet while European scholars debated the paths comets followed.
• The Goodwin children began suffering strange convulsions after Martha accused a laundress, who was tried and hanged as a witch.
• An anonymous book argued over whether the afflicted girls’ testimony could justify witchcraft prosecutions, as Philip English and John Alden were suggested as possible sponsors.
• The chapter revealed that Newton used the secret name Jehovah Sanctus Unus, an anagram of his Latinized name meaning “the one holy spirit.”

The chapter examined the aftermath of the Salem witch trials, the suffering of the accused and their families, and the lives of the judges, ministers, and accusers. It ended with reflections on belief, scientific theories, alchemy, and the difficulty of finding a true kindred spirit.

• Newton took charge of the Royal Mint, required workers to swear secrecy about coin-making, and focused first on counterfeiting.
• The chapter described how records and family histories were lost or altered, while Mary Tusek and her daughter suffered after the destruction of Billerica.
• As doubts spread, Minister Paris softened his sermons, suspects' families sought bail, and Andover residents petitioned to bring their starving relatives home.
• The chapter recounted the later hardships of James Bailey, Deodat Lawson, and Samuel Parris, while many accusers faced isolated or troubled lives.
• Martha Taylor was released after her family received financial help to pay her bail, though she had been mentally tortured and had chosen prison.
• The chapter connected Pythagoras's study of musical ratios to Newton's theory of gravitation, then reflected on belief, scientific change, alchemy, and twin flames.

The chapter recounts the Mount Shasta creation legend and contrasts Native American nature worship with European claims of civilization, equality, and religious authority. In Boston, Cotton Mather visited imprisoned Baptist minister William Milbourne and gave him a new book to read, hoping he might later help him.

• The heavenly god created Mount Shasta, its wildlife, and a people descended from his daughter and a grizzly bear; he later cursed the bears and took his daughter back to the heavens.
• The chapter described Iroquois, Achomawi, and Algonquin creation myths and the spiritual meanings Native Americans assigned to animals and nature.
• The narrator questioned American independence, equality, Christianity, and the intolerance shown toward Native Americans and their customs.
• John Alden escaped Massachusetts in mid-September after his friends' efforts to protect him from trial proved insufficient to make staying safe.
• Cotton Mather visited shackled prisoner William Milbourne, a lawyer and Baptist minister accused of inciting rebellion, and asked him to read a new book.
• Milbourne began reading Mather's book by candlelight while Mather watched.

Milburn told Cotton Mather that Martha Carrier’s spirit may have protected her daughter and criticized the colonists’ hostility toward Native Americans, prompting Mather to have him gagged. Meanwhile, Severus reflected on the Declaration of Independence, nature’s power, and the darkness hidden beneath human civilization as Lucius Malfoy waited for him to get ready.

• Cotton Mather questioned Milburn about strange events in prison, and Milburn said Sarah Carrier’s story about her mother becoming a black cat might be true.
• Milburn described Hopi beliefs about nature and civilization, and condemned Mather’s sermons against Native Americans.
• Mather left after ordering the jailer to keep Milburn gagged and considered using the governor’s act to sentence him to death.
• Lucius Malfoy asked Severus if he was ready, while Severus remained distracted by his thoughts.
• Severus considered revisions to the Declaration of Independence and reflected on the destructive and protective power of nature.

The chapter examined the legal, economic, and social forces that shaped the conflict between the wizarding and Muggle worlds, arguing that idealistic reforms and meritocratic systems could also leave people exposed and powerless. It ended by connecting the Scourers’ hunt for young witches to the persistent fear and instability facing people like Elizabeth Colson.

• The chapter explained how the International Statute of Secrecy left the small wizarding population dependent on the Muggle economy and vulnerable to collective impulses.
• It argued that legal remedies and meritocratic ideals could fail to protect the disadvantaged, and noted that Draco had been forced to accept the task of assassinating Albus Dumbledore after his family was shunned.
• The chapter contrasted ideals of equality with social inequalities, arguing that the pursuit of success could strip losers of dignity and consolation.
• It described how patriotic rhetoric and economic interests shaped American policy, including the response to 9/11 and the threatened takeover of France’s Danone.
• The chapter linked the wizarding population’s vulnerability to witch hunts and noted that sixteen-year-old Elizabeth Colson had been evading capture since May.
• The chapter concluded that young witches remained hunted by the Scourers, whose power grew as the dark season of witch-hunting endured.