Jackson Wood
Ms Armstrong
ENG 3U
October 21, 2013
Reverend Hale: A Memoir
I have taken a brief break from my journey home to remember the events that have happened in Salem. No matter how hard I bargained with Governor Danforth there is no way he would excuse John Proctor, Rebecca Nurse, and Martha Corey. I tried my hardest to convince them to confess so their lives would be spared from the rope but they would not tarnish their good names. I tried to wipe the blood off my hands so I would not feel guilty before I left but there was no correcting the court’s mistakes. I would hope God will forgive me for my absence from the court. I only acted how I thought appropriately. I tried to redeem myself for the mistakes I had made when working for the court. I realize how foolish it was to blame the devil for the strange behavior in the village. I also apologize for my outburst of anger when I slammed the door on governor Danforth. I was just doing what I thought I had to do. There was evil in the town but not in the form of witchcraft, in the form of humans. I went to the town to try to fix things but I may have made it worse and for that I am truly sorry. For the people of Salem who lost somebody for accused witchcraft I am deeply sorry. I let myself get persuaded by the courts even thought in my soul I knew they were mistaken to take innocent people from their families. I am sorry for the orphans we left waiting, for the stink of the rotten crops and for the abandoned cattle on the highroads. I am sorry I did not realize the shape of the devil sooner. If I did, Ms Abigail Williams would been struck down for her sins before it spun out of hand. I was at my lowest when the day was announced for the hangings to commence. Every time I witnessed one of those falsely accused citizens get strangled in front of me it felt like I could not breathe and the wind had been knocked right out of me. Each person reminded me of the corrupt court that I had spent my life supporting and that thought poisoned my mind again and again.
I could not escape it.
I was originally a reverend in Beverly but when I heard about the trials starting to happen I headed to Salem. When I arrived in Salem I was introduced with a problem very soon. I was brought to the Reverend Parris house to examine his daughter Betty. Parris mentioned to me that he found Betty and Abigail dancing earlier in the forest. I demanded to talk to Abigail and I started a discussion about what they were doing in the woods dancing around a cauldron with a frog in the middle of the night. I tried to get Abigail to confess about what they were doing in the forest and she finally gave me the name Tituba. Tituba was Reverend Parris’s slave. That is when the first person was falsely accused. Tituba was a black women from Barbados so no
