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In 1692 Puritan Samuel Sewall sent twenty people to their deaths on trumped-up witchcraft charges. The nefarious witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts represent a low point of American history, made famous in works by Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne (himself a descendant of one of the judges), and Arthur Miller. The trials might have doomed Sewall to infamy except for a courageous act of contrition now commemorated in a mural that hangs beneath the golden dome of the Massachusetts State House picturing Sewall's public repentance. He was the only Salem witch judge to make amends.
But, remarkably, the judge's story didn't end there. Once he realized his error, Sewall turned his attention to other pressing social issues. Struck by the injustice of the New England slave trade, a commerce in which his own relatives and neighbors were engaged, he authored "The Selling of Joseph," America's first antislavery tract. While his peers viewed Native Americans as savages, Sewall advocated for their essential rights and encouraged their education, even paying for several Indian youths to attend Harvard College. Finally, at a time when women were universally considered inferior to men, Sewall published an essay affirming the fundamental equality of the sexes. The text of that essay, composed at the deathbed of his daughter Hannah, is republished here for the first time.
In Salem Witch Judge, acclaimed biographer Eve LaPlante, Sewall's great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaughter, draws on family lore, her ancestor's personal diaries, and archival documents to open a window onto life in colonial America, painting a portrait of a man traditionally vilified, but who was in fact an innovator and forefather who came to represent the best of the American spirit.
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Steve Seno
reviewed Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall on August 21, 2015
Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall
RATHER TEDIOUS.
"Calvinism is founded on the belief that humanity is totally depraved (Samuel and contemporaries often used the word vile). . ."'page 25
"He [Samuel] was not a man of the Enlightenment, nor would he ever be. […] he displayed irritation at the burgeoning sciences."'page 205
Steeped in an overabundance of names, dates and relationships; begats, begots and bedieds; slipping and sliding all over the timeline, between 1630 and 1729'backward, forward and sideways; Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall, by Eve LaPlante was a disjointed, confusing, and tedious read. One of the few books I've read that I could't wait to be finished. At times, it seemed like that might never happen.
Both the "life and repentance of Samuel Sewall," seemed extremely self-serving, to me. I know we're supposed to congratulate his ghost for his having had the fortitude to be the only one, of the nine Salem witch judges, to ever apologize for his part in condemning twenty innocent people, so called witches, to death, in 1692 Salem, Massachusetts. Somehow, though, his rectitude and contrition come across as very shallow, indeed. I, for one, would never stand in line to shake his hand.
That said, this story does offer some interesting perspectives of the time, place and hysteria. If you can only figure out just what time, and which place, La Plante is writing about.
Too late smart: Not until the Also by Eve La Plante page at the end of the book did I realize that I had read her American Jezebel: The Uncommon Life of Anne Hutchinson, the Woman Who Defied the Puritans some seven years ago, and liked it as little as I liked this book; and for basically the same reasons'poorly written and mostly a tedious read.
Recommendation: Very weak and tepid at best.
His sincere interest in medicine and science led Cotton Mather in the summer of 1721 to pioneer the use of inoculation against smallpox, for which he received much public ridicule. For most educated men of Boston, including Samuel Sewall, such medical advancements were almost as frightening as witchcraft.'page 252
Kindle edition, 270 pages
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Add Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall, In 1692 Puritan Samuel Sewall sent twenty people to their deaths on trumped-up witchcraft charges. The nefarious witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts represent a low point of American history, made famous in works by Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne (himse, Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall to the inventory that you are selling on WonderClubX
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Add Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall, In 1692 Puritan Samuel Sewall sent twenty people to their deaths on trumped-up witchcraft charges. The nefarious witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts represent a low point of American history, made famous in works by Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne (himse, Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall to your collection on WonderClub |
