Sewall, Samuel

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Sewall, Samuel

Born: March 28, 1652
Hampshire, England

Died: January 1, 1730
Boston, Massachusetts

Businessman and public official

Samuel Sewall was a prominent businessman and judge in Boston, Massachusetts, during a time of social and political upheaval in the New England colonies. He is known today for making a dramatic public apology for the role he played as a judge in the Salem witch trials, which resulted in the executions of twenty people. Sewall is equally famous for his diary, a remarkable work that spans more than fifty years and provides modern historians with a vivid picture of life in Puritan New England. The diary offers an eyewitness account of the role of the Puritan elite in manipulating evidence in order to eliminate accused witches (see Diary Entries and Apology of Samuel Sewall in the Primary Sources section). After the Salem trials, Sewall went on to be a vocal advocate (supporter) of slaves' rights and tried to improve the living conditions of Native Americans.

Becomes Massachusetts judge

Samuel Sewall was born in Hampshire, England, on March 28, 1652, the son of Henry and Jane (Dummer) Sewall. When he was nine years old his parents moved to Newbury, Massachusetts, where he was educated at a private school. In 1671 he graduated from Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with a bachelors degree and three years later earned a masters degree from the same institution. Sewall was then ordained a minister, but he left the church to go into business when he married Hannah Hull in 1675. Sewall's father-in-law, John Hull, was the master of the mint (a government agency that prints money) for the Massachusetts Bay Colony and therefore had extensive connections in the business community. At Hull's urging, Sewall moved to Boston in 1681 to take over management of the colony's printing press. By the early 1690s he was a prominent figure in Boston business and political circles. He was a banker, publisher, international trader, and member of the colonial court. Although Sewall had no formal legal training, he also served as a judge (at that time a law degree was not required).

Sewall began his long career as a public official in 1683, when he was appointed to the Massachusetts General Court. The following year he was elected to the Massachusetts Council (governing body). While visiting England on business in 1684, he became involved in unsuccessful efforts to maintain the Massachusetts Bay Colony charter in its present form. Massachusetts Bay was the only self-governing English colony in America. Finally Britain revoked (canceled) the charter because Massachusetts Bay officials were illegally operating a mint. They were also basing voting rights on religious affiliation instead of property ownership and discriminating against Anglicans (members of the Church of England; the majority of the Massachusetts colonists were Puritans).

Presides at Salem trials

In 1691 Britain forced the Massachusetts Bay Colony to accept a charter that united it with Plymouth and Maine to form the Massachusetts colony. Under the new charter, church membership could no longer be a requirement for voting, although Congregationalism (a branch of Puritanism organized according to independent church congregations) remained the official church. Sewall was named a councilor (advisor) in the new royal government, a position he held until 1725, when he decided not to seek reelection. Historians note that the loss of the original charter led to widespread anxiety in Massachusetts, resulting in witchcraft hysteria. Puritan officials believed the colony was under an evil spell cast by witches (people, usually women, with supernatural powers) who had signed a compact (agreement) with the devil (the ultimate evil force). Witches were supposedly seeking revenge on particular members of the community. According to the Puritans, the compact empowered a witch to perform such acts as causing the death of a child, making crops fail, preventing cream from being churned into butter, or producing sterility (inability to conceive offspring) in cattle. They also believed witches inhabited the bodies of animals such as cats and dogs and became beings called "familiars," who could then prowl around and commit evil acts. The prominent Puritan leader Increase Mather wrote Remarkable Providences, a handbook on how to identify a witch, in 1684 (see primary source entry). He actively supported holding trials to rid the colony of witches.

In June 1692, when the Puritans decided to hold formal witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts, Governor William Phipps (1651–1695) appointed Sewall as a special commissioner (judge) on the court. Meeting in July and August, Sewall and the other judges interrogated (questioned) suspected witches and gave them a chance to reject their compact with the devil. If the suspects opened themselves to God, they would be reaccepted into the community. But many did not repent (feel regret for one's actions). The court ultimately sentenced twenty people, most of whom were women, to death. The executions were carried out in September: nineteen were hanged and a man was crushed to death. Almost immediately Sewall began to regret the role he played in this tragedy, and the guilt weighed increasingly upon his conscience. In fact, he felt he had greater responsibility in the matter than any of the other judges.

The Selling of Joseph

Samuel Sewall regretted his role as a judge in the Salem trials. Although he made a public apology in 1697, his involvement in sending innocent people to their deaths continued to weigh on his mind for the rest of his life. After the trials he appeared to develop a social conscience. He had long been troubled by the practice of slavery in the American colonies, but he had never taken the time to act on his views. Then, while he was serving as a judge in the Massachusetts General Court, he had to make a decision on a petition to free an African couple who were illegally held in bondage. Sewall therefore resolved to issue a public statement against the holding of African slaves. The result was The Selling of Joseph (1700), which is considered one of the earliest expressions of the abolitionist cause. The Joseph in the title is one of the heroes in the Book of Genesis in the Old Testament of the Bible. The favorite son of Jacob and Rachel, Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers. They were jealous of his ambitions and the coat of many colors that Jacob had given to him.

In the opening of The Selling of Joseph Sewall argued that:

originally, and naturally, there is no such thing as slavery. Joseph was rightfully no more a slave to [his brothers] than they were to him; and they had no more authority to sell him than they had to slay him. . . . 'Tis pity there should be more caution used in buying a horse, or a little lifeless dust, than there is in purchasing men and women.

Sewall went on to compare Joseph's situation with that of African slaves:

It is likewise most lamentable to think how, in taking negroes out of Africa and selling of them here, that which God has joined together men do boldly rend asunder; men from their country, husbands from their wives, parents from their children. How horrible is the uncleanness, immorality, if not murder, that the [slave] ships are guilty of that bring great crowds of these miserable (unhappy) men and women [to America]. (From Giles Gunn, editor, Early American Writing, pp. 254–57.)

Develops a social conscience

By 1697 Massachusetts officials realized that the trials had been a terrible mistake, so the legislature designated January 14 as a special day of atonement (expression of regret and request for forgiveness). Taking this opportunity to make a public confession of his sins, Sewall wrote an admission of error and guilt. Then he stood and faced the congregation in the Old South Church at Boston as the Reverend Samuel Willard read the statement aloud. As reprinted in Early American Writing, in the apology Sewall said he was taking "the blame and shame of it [the trials], asking pardon of men, and especially desiring prayers that God, who has an unlimited authority, would pardon that sin and all his other sins." Sewall was the only judge who publicly admitted his own guilt. Increase Mather and his son Cotton Mather (see biography and primary source entries), who were motivating forces behind the witch-hunts, eventually were instrumental in bringing the trials to an end. Yet the Mathers expressed their doubts only in published written works. Sewall continued to be troubled by his involvement in sending innocent people to their deaths. For the rest of his life he set aside a day of fasting a year to atone for his sins.

After Sewall made his public repentance he developed a social conscience, becoming active in abolitionist (antislavery) efforts. In 1700 he published The Selling of Joseph, an essay in which he argued against the keeping of African slaves (see box). Now considered one of the earliest antislavery statements, it is frequently reprinted in American history and literature texts. Sewall extended his concern to Native Americans, advocating that they be placed on reservations (lands set aside by the federal government solely for the use of different Native American peoples) and taught the language and customs of the English colonists. Colonial governments had been adopting this policy since the mid-1600s. Sewall's well-intentioned efforts were misguided, however, for the reservation system eventually resulted in the near extinction of the Native American way of life by the early nineteenth century.

Writes famous diary

Sewall wrote numerous historical and religious works as well as unpublished poetry during his lifetime. He is best known, however, for his diary, in which he gives a vivid picture of Puritan life in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century New England. (The diary spans the period from 1674 to 1729; there were no entries from 1677 to 1685.) Sewall was married three times. Hannah Hull Sewall, with whom he had fourteen children, died in 1717. In 1719 he wed Abigail Melyen, who died the following year. One of the most amusing passages in Sewall's diary is his account of courting (seeking to marry) Katherine Winthrop, whom he hoped would become his third wife. He wrote that he gave her such gifts as sermons, ginger-bread, and sugared almonds. Yet she would not be won over unless he promised to wear a wig and buy a coach. Finally unable to reach a marriage agreement with Winthrop, Sewall turned his affections elsewhere and, at age seventy, took Mary Gibbs as his third wife. He died eight years later, in 1730.