Bicentennial envisioning of the trial of
Rebecca (Towne) Nurse from the 1890s
One of my far flung cousins is Clarissa Harlowe Barton, better known as Clara, founder of the American Red Cross. She is a third cousin, four times removed. Our common ancestor is a woman born Hannah Bridges in 1669, at what's now known as Danvers, Massachusetts.
Danvers used to be Salem Village (not to be confused with the adjacent port city of Salem), but they changed the name in 1752, wanting to put some of their unsavory history aside. Danvers (Salem Village) is where the actual Salem witch trials took place in 1692. In this diary, when I say "Salem", it refers to Salem Village, aka present day Danvers.
HANNAH BRIDGES
Hannah's paternal grandfather, Edmund Bridges, arrived from England in 1635 during the Great Migration. His first child, Hannah's father Edmund Jr., was born 2 years later. The immigrant was a blacksmith by trade, an important skill needed in every town. Blacksmiths were sometimes offered incentives to relocate to a town in need of their services; perhaps that's why Edmund is recorded as living in several towns near the coast north of Boston throughout his life. He died in Ipswich in 1685 when Hannah was 16.
Edmund, Jr. was married to Sarah Towne in nearby Topsfield, inland from the coast, in 1660. Their first several children were born there, but they moved in 1668 to a new farm at Salem. Hannah was the first of their offspring born at Salem, 1669. Hannah's father Edmund Bridges died in 1682 when she was 13. Her mother remarried the next year. Sarah & her new husband Peter Cloyes had 3 more children over the next few years. Cloyes also brought 6 of his own children to the marriage. It was a a large family. (The name Cloyes has also been recorded as Cloyce, as Clayes.)
At the age of 21, Hannah Bridges was married in Salem. Her firstborn, named after his father Samuel Barton, arrived October 1691. She was a newlywed, nursing her first baby, when the accusations of witchcraft began. It hit like an earthquake, leaving devastation in its wake.
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