Execution
Public execution was considered the most severe punishment of the time in Puritan Massachusetts. It is logical then that this severe punishment would come upon those convicted of a most severe crime: witchcraft. Convicted witches were hanged on Gallows Hill. Elizabeth Howe was hanged on July 19, 1692, along with Rebecca Nurse (her sister-in-law), Sarah Good, Sarah Wildes and Susanna Martin.
The execution methods in New England were very similar to those used in England. The condemned would ride to the execution spot with a minister. He would then elaborate on the saving grace of Jesus Christ and repentance. The minster would also preach a sermon to the crowd that had gathered to watch the execution. Historian Louis P. Masur wrote, “The ritual of execution day required that condemned prisoners demonstrate publicly that they were penitent, and the execution sermons repeatedly pounded the chord of penitence”. In an ideal situation the convicted would confess to their crime, alleviating worry from the community that they were sending an unprepared soul to the next life.
Read more about this topic: Elizabeth Howe
Famous quotes containing the word execution:
“Union of Religious Sentiments begets a surprising confidence and Ecclesiastical Establishments tend to great ignorance and corruption, all of which facilitate the Execution of Mischievous Projects.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
“I am gradually drifting to the opinion that this Rebellion can only be crushed finally by either the execution of all the traitors or the abolition of slavery. Crushed, I mean, so as to remove all danger of its breaking out again in the future.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“My weakness has always been to prefer the large intention of an unskilful artist to the trivial intention of an accomplished one: in other words, I am more interested in the high ideas of a feeble executant than in the high execution of a feeble thinker.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)