afflicted, she is not listed as a sufferer in any surviving legal complaint. Sarah Vibber, approximately thirty-six, must have been considerably poorer. She and her husband, John, who was most likely an immigrant from the Channel Islands, did not own land of their own but instead lived in other people’s houses in the neighboring town of Wenham. 22
Through her father’s family Mary Walcott, afflicted during her talk with Lawson on Saturday, was the great-niece of Nathaniel Ingersoll. Her mother, Mary Sibley Walcott, the sister-in-law of the woman who instigated the making of the witchcake, had died in 1683; her stepmother after 1685 was Thomas Putnam’s sister, Deliverance. Thus she and Ann Jr. were stepcousins. Mary’s oldest brother, John, had served as a militia sergeant in the war on the Maine frontier in 1689 and subsequently led a small contingent of Village volunteers northeastward in May 1690, but her family’s roots in Maine went deeper than that. Another great-uncle (Nathaniel’s older brother), George Ingersoll, lived at Casco Bay for many years and would have known members of Mercy Lewis’s natal family well. He relocated to Salem late in 1675, returned to Casco in the 1680s, but then moved his family back to Salem after September 1689 and was still living there in 1692. Although Mary had not herself lived in Maine, she must have heard many stories of the frontier and the Indian war from her brother and her Ingersoll relatives. 23
On Sunday, March 20, Lawson declared, the “several Sore Fits” the afflicted suffered during the morning service “did something interrupt me in my First Prayer; being so unusual.” Following the singing of the first psalm, Abigail Williams boldly demanded, “Now stand up, and Name your Text,” commenting after the clergyman did so that “It is a long Text.” Mistress Pope, too, interjected her opinions into the service, remarking aloud with respect to the sermon, “Now there is enough of that.” During that sermon, Abigail cried out that she saw Goody Corey sitting “on the Beam suckling her Yellow bird betwixt her fingers”—thus indicating that she was well acquainted with the details of Ann Jr.’s vision of Martha six days earlier—and Ann herself remarked that she saw a yellow bird sitting on Lawson’s hat as it hung beside the pulpit, but, he noted with relief, “those that were by, restrained her from speaking loud about it.” Matters evidently went more smoothly during the afternoon service, although Abigail again took the lead, declaring contemptuously, “I know no Doctrine you had, If you did name one, I have forgot it.” 24
The disruptions Lawson described (with what must have been considerable understatement) were indeed “unusual,” to put it mildly. Normally the congregations in Puritan meetinghouses sat quietly and respectfully, often taking notes on the sermons for later study and contemplation. Only during periods of religious ferment, such as the Antinomian crisis of 1636–1637 or Quaker missionizing in the 1660s, had New England clergymen ever been so directly challenged in their pulpits. The afflicted people’s behavior on Sunday, March 20, mimicked their actions during the examinations held in the same meetinghouse almost three weeks earlier. Then their antics nominally supported authority (for the magistrates relied on them to help reveal the guilt of the accused), but on both occasions they in reality turned gender and age hierarchies upside down. Women, especially young women, were not expected to speak unbidden in either court or church—indeed, in the latter, they were often not expected to speak at all. By their intrusions into the normal ordering of Sunday services as well as by their disruptions in the makeshift courtroom, they signaled that reversals in Village life during the witchcraft crisis would not remain confined to individual households, but would extend to public spaces as well. 25
The afflicted people were active
Through her father’s family Mary Walcott, afflicted during her talk with Lawson on Saturday, was the great-niece of Nathaniel Ingersoll. Her mother, Mary Sibley Walcott, the sister-in-law of the woman who instigated the making of the witchcake, had died in 1683; her stepmother after 1685 was Thomas Putnam’s sister, Deliverance. Thus she and Ann Jr. were stepcousins. Mary’s oldest brother, John, had served as a militia sergeant in the war on the Maine frontier in 1689 and subsequently led a small contingent of Village volunteers northeastward in May 1690, but her family’s roots in Maine went deeper than that. Another great-uncle (Nathaniel’s older brother), George Ingersoll, lived at Casco Bay for many years and would have known members of Mercy Lewis’s natal family well. He relocated to Salem late in 1675, returned to Casco in the 1680s, but then moved his family back to Salem after September 1689 and was still living there in 1692. Although Mary had not herself lived in Maine, she must have heard many stories of the frontier and the Indian war from her brother and her Ingersoll relatives. 23
On Sunday, March 20, Lawson declared, the “several Sore Fits” the afflicted suffered during the morning service “did something interrupt me in my First Prayer; being so unusual.” Following the singing of the first psalm, Abigail Williams boldly demanded, “Now stand up, and Name your Text,” commenting after the clergyman did so that “It is a long Text.” Mistress Pope, too, interjected her opinions into the service, remarking aloud with respect to the sermon, “Now there is enough of that.” During that sermon, Abigail cried out that she saw Goody Corey sitting “on the Beam suckling her Yellow bird betwixt her fingers”—thus indicating that she was well acquainted with the details of Ann Jr.’s vision of Martha six days earlier—and Ann herself remarked that she saw a yellow bird sitting on Lawson’s hat as it hung beside the pulpit, but, he noted with relief, “those that were by, restrained her from speaking loud about it.” Matters evidently went more smoothly during the afternoon service, although Abigail again took the lead, declaring contemptuously, “I know no Doctrine you had, If you did name one, I have forgot it.” 24
The disruptions Lawson described (with what must have been considerable understatement) were indeed “unusual,” to put it mildly. Normally the congregations in Puritan meetinghouses sat quietly and respectfully, often taking notes on the sermons for later study and contemplation. Only during periods of religious ferment, such as the Antinomian crisis of 1636–1637 or Quaker missionizing in the 1660s, had New England clergymen ever been so directly challenged in their pulpits. The afflicted people’s behavior on Sunday, March 20, mimicked their actions during the examinations held in the same meetinghouse almost three weeks earlier. Then their antics nominally supported authority (for the magistrates relied on them to help reveal the guilt of the accused), but on both occasions they in reality turned gender and age hierarchies upside down. Women, especially young women, were not expected to speak unbidden in either court or church—indeed, in the latter, they were often not expected to speak at all. By their intrusions into the normal ordering of Sunday services as well as by their disruptions in the makeshift courtroom, they signaled that reversals in Village life during the witchcraft crisis would not remain confined to individual households, but would extend to public spaces as well. 25
The afflicted people were active
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