"Harry Krause" wrote in message
...
Calif Bill wrote:

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...

Practicing that witchcraft, were they?

Historical interruption to Kerry debate:

Everybody put to death in Topsfield and Essex County was innocent.
Without
exception. Many went to their deaths defiantly proclaiming their devout
Christian faith. Others were terrorized into false confessions.

(There are some serious differences between observing old rituals,

practicing

natural healing, revering natural order, and being in league with
Satan).

My ggggg....grandfather, Zaccheus, was one of the original stakeholders
of
Topsfield. Mary Estey, Rebecca Nurse, and Sarah Cloyce (the Towne
sisters)

are

all great aunts.

If you wanted to see the devil at work in 1692, you didn't have to look

any

farther than Inquisitor Hawthorne and his gang of religious zealot
thugs.
Maleus Malificarum indeed. What a crock. Hell of a tragic way to settle

some

festering community disputes as well as squabbles over church doctrine
and

real

estate boundaries.




My relatives were smarter. They immigrated to New Haven, Conn. In the
mid
1600's. Avoided that burning stench.
Bill





Hmmm. I was born in New Haven and spent the first 18 years of my life
there. I did encounter a few pasty-faced, no-necked banjo players...must
have been your relatives, eh?

Those were all the late arrivals.