TIMELINE

Connecticut Witch Hysteria

1636: English Puritans come to New England for religious freedom, settling the Connecticut Colony. They bring with them a staunch faith in God and laws created through a strict and literal translation of the King James Bible, which in Deuteronomy states: “There shall not be found among you [one who]…useth divination…[or is] an enchanter or a witch.” Exodus admonishes, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.”

1642: Connecticut Colony lawmakers release a list of “Capitall Lawes” and crimes punishable by death. Practicing witchcraft is number two.

1647: Magistrates find Alse Youngs of Windsor guilty of witchcraft and hang her at the gallows at Meeting House Square in Hartford, now the location of the Old State House. Alse’s death as a witch is the first to occur in Connecticut, New England and the New World, and it marks the start of Connecticut’s witch hysteria.

1651: The first of several couples to be accused of witchcraft, John and Joan Carrington of Wethersfield, are convicted and hanged.

1655: John Winthrop Jr., a respected physician and alchemist, becomes a consultant to the magistrates deciding the trials.

1657–76: Winthrop is Connecticut’s governor and chief magistrate. He believes in witchcraft but also that people are too quick to attribute “natural misfortunes” to Satan or the occult.

1662–63: While Winthrop is away in England obtaining the official royal charter from King Charles II that establishes Connecticut as an independent colony, the colony’s witch panic reaches its peak. There are eight trials in eight months. Four accused witches are hanged, and at least five run away in fear of execution.

1662: The Royal Charter of the Connecticut Colony takes effect, granting Winthrop the right, as governor, to “impose, alter, change or annul any penalty” and to “pardon any of fender [sic].” He uses this new power to overturn the witchcraft conviction of Elizabeth Seager of Hartford, and for the first time in Connecticut, a convicted witch does not hang. His actions encourage other magistrates to not be so aggressive with witchcraft convictions and to adopt a policy of judicial skepticism. Many residents, however, are enraged and outspoken against this moderate stance.

1663–88: Witch hysteria fades; twenty-five years pass without a single witchcraft execution.

1668: Massachusetts’ execution of confessed witch Mary Glover reignites fear about Satan’s influence and the threat of witchcraft in the Connecticut Colony.

1669: Winthrop leads efforts to define “diabolical magic.” At his request, fellow physician and alchemist Gershom Bulkeley heads a committee charged with reforming evidence needed for a witchcraft conviction. Changes include that two witnesses must simultaneously observe the act of witchcraft, following the belief that while God might allow Satan to appear in the guise of an innocent person before one witness, he would not allow it to occur before two or more. The new standards also acknowledged that predictions about future events made through “human skill in Arts” and reason were different from those made through diabolical divination.

1692: A second period of witch hysteria strikes Connecticut, leading to accusations in Fairfield, Stratford and Wallingford, among other locations. What becomes known as the “Fairfield Witch Panic” coincides with that of Salem, Massachusetts.

1692: The only mother and daughter in Connecticut to be accused, Winifred and Winifred Benham of Wallingford, are said to be “afflicting people by witchcraft” but are released on insufficient evidence. Theirs is the last witchcraft trial to ever take place in Connecticut.

1724: Last recorded witchcraft charge on state records is made against Sarah Spencer of Colchester. Magistrates reject the claim; accuser Elizabeth Ackley pleads insanity and is fined by the court.

1750: The Connecticut General Assembly releases an updated list of capital offenses, and witchcraft is no longer on the list.

2008: A resolution to pardon those convicted and executed as witches in the 1600s is introduced in the General Assembly but doesn’t make it out of committee.

2012: Members of the Connecticut Wiccan and Pagan Network ask governor Daniel Malloy to sign a nonbinding proclamation acknowledging colonial lawmakers wrongly accused and put to death innocent people during Connecticut’s witch trials. Malloy says it’s not appropriate for him to condemn previous government leaders’ decisions.