Massachusetts Formally Exonerates Last ​‘Witch’ Wrongfully Condemned During Salem Hysteria. Will Connecticut Follow Suit?

As Massachusetts for­mal­ly exon­er­at­ed the last per­son con­demned for witch­craft in the colony, efforts are under way to clear the names of the 46 peo­ple wrong­ful­ly charged with witch­craft in neigh­bor­ing Connecticut dur­ing the 17^th cen­tu­ry Puritan witch hunts.

329 years after she was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death, the Massachusetts state sen­ate amend­ed the state’s bud­get to include a pro­vi­sion to exon­er­ate Elizabeth Johnson Jr., the last of the peo­ple con­vict­ed dur­ing the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 and 1693 to be legal­ly vin­di­cat­ed of the false charges. The exon­er­a­tion pro­vi­sion was includ­ed in the final state bud­get bill that passed both hous­es of the leg­is­la­ture and was signed into law by Governor Charlie Baker on July 28, 2022.

Johnson, who his­to­ri­ans believe was intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled, con­fessed to witch­craft in 1693 and was sen­tenced to death. She lat­er was grant­ed a reprieve and lived to be 77 years old. Her case had large­ly been over­looked until Carrie LaPierre, an eighth-grade civics teacher at North Andover Middle School, took up her cause. LaPierre used Johnson’s case to teach her stu­dents about his­tor­i­cal research, how a bill becomes a law, and how to peti­tion their rep­re­sen­ta­tives. ​“I’m excit­ed and relieved,” LaPierre told The New York Times, ​“but also dis­ap­point­ed I didn’t get to talk to the kids about it,” as they are on sum­mer vaca­tion. ​“It’s been such a huge project.” 

“These stu­dents have set an incred­i­ble exam­ple of the pow­er of advo­ca­cy and speak­ing up for oth­ers who don’t have a voice,” said State Senator Diana DiZoglio (pic­tured), who rep­re­sents the area where Johnson lived, and intro­duced the exoneration legislation. 

“While we’ve come a long way since the hor­rors of the Witch Trials, women today still all too often find their rights chal­lenged and con­cerns dis­missed,” DiZoglio told the Massachusetts State House News Service. ​“There con­tin­ue to be great injus­tices, with attacks on women and on the rights of mar­gin­al­ized pop­u­la­tions. It was unac­cept­able then and remains unac­cept­able now that she and oth­er women have been con­sid­ered unwor­thy of the dig­ni­ty and respect they deserve.”

Though the Salem Witch Trials are often seen as an iso­lat­ed instance of mass hys­te­ria, Johnson’s case mir­rors some of the inequities still present in today’s death penal­ty. She was like­ly intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled – her own grand­fa­ther called her ​“sim­plish at the best,” and, accord­ing to Courthouse News, ​“Boston mer­chant Robert Calef, who opposed the witch pros­e­cu­tions, described Johnson and fel­low defen­dant Mary Post as ​‘two of the most sense­less and igno­rant crea­tures that can be found.’” She was polit­i­cal­ly pow­er­less, not only as an unmar­ried woman, but also as a mem­ber of a dis­fa­vored fam­i­ly: at least 20 of her rel­a­tives were accused of witchcraft. 

Why Johnson’s case lin­gered is unclear, though two pos­si­ble expla­na­tions have been offered. Johnson nev­er mar­ried or had chil­dren, so she didn’t have any direct descen­dants to work on clear­ing her name. She also shares a name with her moth­er, Elizabeth Johnson Sr., also wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed as a witch but lat­er exon­er­at­ed, so there may have been administrative confusion.

Johnson’s exon­er­a­tion also sheds light on the move­ment to posthu­mous­ly exon­er­ate the eleven peo­ple wrong­ful­ly exe­cut­ed and at least 46 wrong­ful­ly charged with witch­craft in neigh­bor­ing Connecticut between 1647 and 1697. Connecticut state law cur­rent­ly has no mech­a­nism to issue posthu­mous par­dons, but a group called the Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project, which includ­ed descen­dants of peo­ple exe­cut­ed for witch­craft, is seek­ing to change that. 

State Rep. Jane Garibay has indi­cat­ed that she will spon­sor a bill to autho­rize posthu­mous par­dons and hopes, ​“if there is a path for­ward,” that it will be enact­ed in the 2023 leg­isla­tive ses­sion. In a July 15, 2022 edi­to­r­i­al, The Hartford Courant said that ​“Connecticut has been a lit­tle slow to rec­og­nize its place in the his­to­ry of injus­tice that brought about the hang­ings here.” Creating a posthu­mous par­don process, the news­pa­per wrote, is ​“the right thing for Connecticut to do.” 

Johnson’s case has ​“par­al­lels today to peo­ple who don’t look or sound like us or have char­ac­ter­is­tics that might make peo­ple val­ue them as wor­thy and impor­tant,” DiZoglio said. Despite its age, the case remains rel­e­vant because ​“we see folks tar­get­ed all the time for polit­i­cal pur­pos­es or agendas.”

There have been numer­ous posthu­mous exon­er­a­tions in recent years, most involv­ing young Black defen­dants false­ly accused of offens­es against white vic­tims. On August 31, 2021, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam posthu­mous­ly par­doned the ​“Martinsville Seven,” sev­en young Black men who were wrong­ful­ly exe­cut­ed in Virginia in 1951 on charges of rap­ing a white woman. On June 13, 2022, a Pennsylvania court exon­er­at­ed Alexander McClay Williams, a 16-year-old Black teen who was wrong­ful­ly exe­cut­ed in Pennsylvania in 1931 on charges that he had mur­dered a white woman. George Stinney, a 14-year-old Black boy, was wrong­ful­ly exe­cut­ed in South Carolina in 1944 for the mur­der of two young white girls. He was posthu­mous­ly exon­er­at­ed in 2014. 

All ten defen­dants were sen­tenced to death by all-white juries after per­func­to­ry tri­als. Stinney was the youngest per­son exe­cut­ed in the United States in the 20^th cen­tu­ry. Williams is the youngest per­son exe­cut­ed in Pennsylvania.