Reverend Nicholas Noyes [55446]

  General Notes:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~chute/gp1215.htm#head2


Reverend Nicholas Noyes:

Was minister in Salem, Massachusetts at the time of the Salem Witch Trials. Was considered by others, even his contemporaries, to have contributed in part to the frenzy by being being gullible, irrational, excessively harsh and lacking knowledge of accepted legal practices. He judged Rebecca Nurse guilty for not answering questions posed to her despite knowing she was partially deaf and unable to hear him, dismissed vital evidence in favor of the accused as irrelevant, and made his decisions based almost entirely upon "spectral evidence" which could not be proven or denied. The hangings ended only when "spectral evidence" was deemed inadmissable by Governor Phips.
"Officially he was only second pastor of the First Church, but its senior pastor, John Higginson, was old now, and more and more left practical details to his younger colleague. This was a circumstance which was to have important results, for Noyes, that rarity among Puritan ministers, a bachelor, was of a fiercer, more unforgiving temper than the older, mellower man. Noyes could indeed be gentle with the sinner who repented and renounced his sin, but for the sinner who denied his guilt, he would have no mercy."

The Devil in Massachusetts: A Modern Enquiry into the Salem Witch Trials, Marion L. Starkey, 1949, Anchor Books, pp. 43-44. <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=41626167&bfpid=0385035098&bfmtype=book>


The Devil in Massachusetts: A Modern Enquiry into the Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=41626167&bfpid=0385035098&bfmtype=book>
Was apparently the victim of a curse leveled at him by one of the women falsely accused of witchcraft in 1692:
"At her hanging, the Rev. Nicholas Noyes asked accused witch Sarah Good to confess to being a witch. Her famous response to him was: "I am no more a witch than you are a wizard, and if you take away my life God will give you blood to drink." Twenty-five years later, Noyes died of a hemorrhage, choking on his own blood."

http://www.salemwitchtrials.com/biographies.html

Additional Sources on the Salem Witch Trials:

The Devil in Massachusetts: A Modern Enquiry into the Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=0385035098&bfmtype=book>
Delusion of Satan: The Full Story of the Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=0306807971&bfmtype=book>
A Fever in Salem: A New Interpretation of the New England Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=1566633095&bfmtype=book>
The Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=0822548895&bfmtype=book>
The Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=1560065443&bfmtype=book>
The Salem Witch Trials <http://service.bfast.com/bfast/click?bfmid=2181&sourceid=39545480&bfpid=156006272X&bfmtype=book>