Sorceress (22 page)

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Historical Notes

Note 1. Elias Cornwell (?1631-1713)

The Reverend Elias Cornwell was a prolific writer. His archive contains many publications, including pamphlets and sermons, although it is the diaries that interest us here. These run to many volumes, spanning the clergyman’s whole life, from his days at Cambridge to his eventual career as an established and well-respected minister in Boston. The entries referring to his time in Beulah are interesting because they provide a very different perspective on Mary’s flight from Beulah, and also offer additional information about the fates of others involved in her story and the fate of the community itself. The relevant passages are included here.

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Excerpt from Elias Cornwell’s journals (from volumes 6 and 7)

November 1st, 1660

I must recount certain doleful and terrible events lately occurring here in Beulah. They concern the orphan Mary Newberrie. This girl (I hesitate to call her by that name, besmirching, as she does, all womankind, not least the spotless maidens, the very flowers of our community, that she has used so cruelly), this girl was welcomed among us with most Christian charity. All unknowingly, we sheltered in our bosom a serpent, a servant of the Evil One Himself. Only God knows what havoc she might have wreaked if she had not been discovered. But He ever watches over us, like to a father, and I truly believe that He sent His servant, Obadiah Wilson, as an holy Angel to deliver us from harm.

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November 2nd, 1660

The wicked flee when no man pursueth (Proverbs, 28, 1) and so it was with her. She has fled the town. And although we have searched most thoroughly, for a night and day ranging far and about, no trace of her has been found.

The men came back from searching. The weather has turned freakishly severe even for this harsh climate, with great cold and snow flying too fast to see anything. The searching parties risked losing men, or dogs, or both. They have found nothing. No trace. No tracks in the snow lying thick on the ground. Some say she brought the snow on in order to hide her flight and filled her tracks as she made them. Others say there are none to find. They say she flew, as her kind are said to be able to do.

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November 3rd, 1660

The snow blew and the wind howled all last night. With daylight the storm at last abated but snow lies to the eaves of the houses. I deem it fruitless to hunt more, but Reverend Johnson sends the men out again and orders them to take every dog they have with them. He is determined that she shall not escape.

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November 5th, 1660

The men come back and report still no sign of her. It is as if she has vanished. The more superstitious hold yet more strongly to the notion that she has flown on a stick or been borne off by devils. The less fanciful are inclined to believe that she lies buried in snow, frozen in the forest, or that she has been taken by wolves or some other of the fierce wild creatures that dwell in its depths. I fervently pray that this is so and that this perfidious creature, this limb of Satan, has indeed perished.

That I ever entertained tender thoughts in her direction! My blood runs chill in my veins to think on it. The Reverend Johnson, wise in so much else, was wise in this also. For he did warn me even as I sought to protect her and protested her innocence, quoting to me from Proverbs, Chapter 5, verses 3 to 5:

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For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:

But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.

Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.

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Those were his words to me, but I was too blind to see. I own that I was a credulous fool to be near ensnared by her wiles, but I must not use myself too harshly. I was cruelly duped. For her words were honeyed, and winning were her smiles. She was indeed fair, and as subtle and beguiling as the very serpent. I have truly escaped a terrible fate and thank God most fervently for delivering me from this female fiend, this very Lilith.

‘And I find more bitter than death the woman, whose heart is snares and nets’ (Ecclesiastes, 7, 26).

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December 2nd, 1660

A thaw came, swift and unexpected, taking much of the snow. This has been followed by a sharp frost, freezing the roads and making it easier to travel. Obadiah Wilson is anxious to be gone, feeling that his work in Beulah is done.

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December 4th, 1660

Obadiah Wilson has been persuaded to stay for a little time longer. There is concern over one of the afflicted girls. Hannah Vane continues to do poorly. It is feared that others in our midst are still busy about the Devil’s business and that they do come upon the unfortunate girl, to the very great impairing of her strength and wasting of her spirits.

My own fear is for Obadiah himself. For this is the season for rheums and colds and he is frequently racked with coughing and daily spits blood.

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December 20th, 1660

The frost holds, turning all to iron. Again I find truth in Proverbs 28, 1, viz. ‘The wicked flee when no man pursueth,’ for Martha Everdale and Jonah Morse are gone. Even though this is not the season for it, they are travelling on. Obadiah Wilson smiles between his coughing. There is no smoke without fire, he says, and witches seldom work alone.

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January 6th, 1661

Perhaps Obadiah Wilson was right, for little Hannah is somewhat recovered. Wilson says that this is a sure sign that the evil has gone from us, and I pray that it is so. He himself is preparing to leave. His work here is done, but he will be needed in other places if the Devil is not to break forth again in our fair New England. Although this is a bad time for travelling, the roads are firm and there is little snow. I have offered to go with him to Salem, for I do not think that he would survive the rigours of the journey if he travels alone. His coughing is no better. He is little more than skin and bone and lately a violent fever racks his body and spots his cheeks. He needs the services of a doctor and we have none here, nor apothecary now, nor any skilled in herbs and healing. If he does not seek help soon, I fear that it will be too late.

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February 9th, 1661

Obadiah Wilson has been taken from us, God rest his soul. He died yestereve, seized with a fit of coughing that would not stop. He died of haemorrhage, choking and gargling, drowning in his own blood.

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March 1st, 1661

At last the year is turning, the thaw has set in now, heralding the Spring. The afflicted girls have all but recovered. The Reverend Johnson has been tending to the Vane sisters, Deborah and Hannah, since the curse of affliction fell heaviest upon them. Deborah, the elder of the two, does especially well. All afflictions left her some time ago and she fairly blossoms in his presence.

I am also most pleased with the progress that I have made with Sarah Garner. She has become my particular responsibility, and I pride myself on how well she does under my care. All fits and afflictions having ceased some time ago, she prospers mightily. Indeed, I would think my work done, except she implores me so to see her still in case the evils come again. She weeps when I am leaving, and her mother says she pines most piteously for my return. For my part, I own that I have grown fond of her. She is a most sweet child, so different from
that other
, as innocent and guileless as the day. As soon as I feel that she is recovered sufficiently to take up wifely duties, I hope that she will make me the happiest of men.

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August 14th, 1661

The weather stays hot and sultry, most unpleasant. My fears grow for the Reverend Johnson. His new young wife has failed to lift his mood and he has become ever more melancholy. He sits in his room and broods. His beard and hair are streaked with white and grow increasingly unkempt. When he does not keep to the house he has taken to wandering far and wide. I fear that he is falling victim to a distemper of the brain. Certainly, he neglects his duties most shamefully. I have to visit the sick on his behalf and have taken Sunday services four weeks in a row.

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September 8th, 1661

Terrible news this day. I hardly have the strength, nor the will to write. The Reverend Johnson has been found drowned. He was discovered this morning, face down in the swamp.

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September 26th, 1661

The Reverend Johnson has been laid in the Burying Ground, next to the wife he lost a year since and those of his children taken unto God, although some do mutter that he has no place there at all and should be put outside the wall. Rumours abound that the melancholy he had lately suffered seized his mind entirely and that he is guilty of self-murder. This is a terrible accusation and one that I have taken care to repudiate most vigorously. How could any man of Reverend Johnson’s virtue commit such a hideous sin? How could he turn his back on our Lord and follow the path of the despised Iscariot out to the Judas tree? It is a double crime against God and Commonwealth; it is not in his nature to do such a thing, but still the rumours persist. He was found in a pool both brackish and shallow, where the water is scarce a foot deep.

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October 5th, 1661

The Reverend Johnson’s death, most especially the manner of it, has come as a very great shock to Beulah. Many have been deeply affected by it. Not least little Hannah Vane. It seems to have turned her wits entirely. She refuses to eat or drink and loses flesh by the day. She has not left her bed since the news of his death, but lies curled with her face to the wall. Sarah thinks her not long for this world.

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October 14th, 1661

Reverend Johnson’s death has thrown all into doubt. Many of the people here came with him from England, crossing the seas at his bidding, following him into the Wilderness, as the Israelites followed Moses. Others came later, as I did, in very great faith and belief in him and his vision of a City on the Hill.

Now many are saying that vision was false. They say now that Reverend Johnson did not choose well when he planted this settlement. He was no farmer and his visions blinded him to the poor quality of the land: the soil is hard to work, every acre must be wrested from the forest, and the presence of the swamp gives off an evil miasma and brings mosquitoes in summer and bothersome flies.

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October 20th, 1661

John Rivers has received news of his brothers, whom he came here to seek. Harvest is done and he prepares to leave. With the Riverses go Tobias Morse and his wife Rebekah, and their little child. I do not know where they go, but have heard that they mean to travel south and west, even as far as Connecticut.

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October 24th, 1661

Reverend Johnson’s widow, Deborah, wastes no time in finding a husband. My good wife, Sarah, tells me that she is to marry Ned Cardwell, a man inferior in station, an erstwhile hireling of Deborah’s uncle. I express my very great surprise. I tell Sarah that Cardwell must be marrying her for money. I know that Reverend Johnson left his wife well provided for. Sarah says that must be so, but I have lately learned that Deborah and Cardwell long had an understanding, perhaps more than that. I would not, of course, repeat this to Sarah. Such talk would offend her modesty and bring the blood rushing to her cheeks.

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October 26th, 1661

Hannah Vane did not live to see her sister’s nuptials. She died this day, wasted away.

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October 27th, 1661

Deborah and Ned Cardwell are married, but Sarah tells me that they plan to leave for Gloucester. Ned is done with farming, so he declares, and wants to use his new-found wealth to open a tavern. Gloucester is a seaport and thus has opportunities for enterprises of that sort.

Others talk of leaving also. A new settlement has grown up to the north where our little river joins a greater. Reverend Johnson frowned upon any intercourse with our neighbours, fearing ungodly influences, but now he has gone and news comes that this other township is seeking for settlers and that good land abounds with fishing aplenty where the river falls and copious meadowland.

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November 1st, 1661

I myself have resolved to leave Beulah. I intend to take Sarah and the babe she expects (for we are blessed!) to Boston and seek for a ministry there. I have ever found the people here to be of a poor sort, ignorant and for the most part uneducated. I wish to live in a community more congenial, which will provide proper sustenance to both mind and spirit. Even so, I would have stayed to do the Lord’s work here in Beulah, had the people seen fit to choose me as their spiritual leader. Instead they seek another. So be it.

Note 2. Deborah Vane

A search of the Essex County records shows that she failed to prosper after she left Beulah. After she married Ned Cardwell, they moved to Gloucester and bought a tavern. It was not long before they began to appear in the court records for violent behaviour, often directed towards each other. Ned was often the complainant.

1. Offered in evidence by Ned Cardwell against Deborah Cardwell on a charge of common assault, Essex court records, 1665: