The Rebecca Nurse Homestead is a historic colonial house built ca. 1678 [1] located at 149 Pine Street, Danvers, Massachusetts. It had many additions through the years, eventually being historically restored and turned into a museum in 1909. Today it is owned and operated by the Danvers Alarm List Company, a volunteer non-profit organization of Revolutionary War reenactors, and is part of the Salem Village Historic District.
The house was built circa 1678 as a two-story First Period structure with central entrance and chimney. A lean-to with kitchen was added sometime before 1720; additional extensions were made in approximately 1750, 1850, and in the early 1900s. The house remained a private residence until 1907, when it was acquired and extensively restored by the Rebecca Nurse Memorial Association. In 1926 the Association donated the house to the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. In 1981 it was transferred to the Danvers Alarm List Company, an organization for the reenactment of colonial period history.
Rebecca Nurse, convicted and executed in the Salem Witch Trials (1692), was the most notable resident of the property, though Nurse did not live in the current house. She was 71 years old at death. Her great-grandson Francis Nurse later occupied the house, marching from it to the Battle of Lexington and Concord in Captain John Putnam's Danvers militia. Francis had married Eunice Putnam in the 1750s and later the Putnam family purchased the property in 1784, and remained residents until 1905.
Today four of the older rooms in the house are open to the public, including the original "great hall", sleeping "chamber", "lean-to" and "parlor". They have been historically restored and are augmented with period furnishings.
The grounds (27 acres) also contain a variety of outbuildings. One contains the internal structure salvaged from the circa 1681 home of Dr. Zerubabel Endecott, son of Governor John Endecott, before it was demolished in 1973. Details of its internal construction may be readily seen. A good reconstruction of the earliest Salem Village Meetinghouse is also on the grounds and may be toured. It was built in 1984 for the film Three Sovereigns for Sarah.
The grounds also contain the Nurse Burial Ground, a shoemaker's shed, and a dairy shed.
In 1885, Nurse's descendants, members of the First Church of Danvers (originally known as The Church of Christ in Salem Village), and local townspeople, dedicated the Rebecca Nurse Monument in her memory. The first memorial to anyone accused of witchcraft in North America, the granite obelisk bears an inscription by poet John Greenleaf Whittier, who lived nearby at that time. [2] At a ceremony related to the 300th anniversary of the trials in 1992, the remains of George Jacobs were reinterred in the Nurse Burial Ground. [3] He was another victim of the accusations who was executed and lived a short distance away.
Gagnon, Daniel A., A Salem Witch: The Trial, Execution, and Exoneration of Rebecca Nurse. Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2021.
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, nineteen of whom were executed by hanging. One other man, Giles Corey, died under torture after refusing to enter a plea, and at least five people died in the disease-ridden jails.
Danvers is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, located on the Danvers River near the northeastern coast of Massachusetts. The suburb is a fairly short ride from Boston and is also in close proximity to the beaches of Gloucester, Ipswich and Revere. Originally known as Salem Village, the town is most widely known for its association with the 1692 Salem witch trials. It was also the site of Danvers State Hospital, one of the state's 19th-century psychiatric hospitals. Danvers is a local center of commerce, hosting many car dealerships and the Liberty Tree Mall. As of the 2020 United States Census, the town's population was 28,087.
John Hathorne was a merchant and magistrate of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Salem, Massachusetts. He is best known for his early and vocal role as one of the leading judges in the Salem witch trials.
John Proctor was a landowner in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He and his wife Elizabeth were tried and convicted of witchcraft as part of the Salem Witch Trials, whereupon he was hanged.
The North Shore is a region in the U.S. state of Massachusetts, loosely defined as the sea coast between Boston and New Hampshire. Its counterpart is the South Shore region extending south and east of Boston.
Ann Putnam was a primary accuser, at age 12, at the Salem Witch Trials of Massachusetts during the later portion of 17th-century Colonial America. Born 1679 in Salem Village, Essex County, Massachusetts Bay Colony, she was the eldest child of Thomas (1652–1699) and Ann Putnam (1661–1699).
Elizabeth Proctor was convicted of witchcraft in the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. She was the wife of John Proctor, who was convicted and executed.
Samuel Parris was a Puritan minister in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Also a businessman and one-time plantation owner, he gained notoriety for being the minister of the church in Salem Village, Massachusetts during the Salem witch trials of 1692. Accusations by Parris and his daughter against an enslaved woman precipitated an expanding series of witchcraft accusations.
Thomas Putnam was a member of the Putnam family, a resident of Salem Village and a significant accuser in the notorious 1692 Salem witch trials.
The Judge Samuel Holten House is a historic house located at 171 Holten Street, Danvers, Massachusetts. It is currently owned by the Daughters of the American Revolution, and open by appointment.
The General Israel Putnam House in Danvers, Massachusetts, United States, is a historic First Period house recorded in the National Register of Historic Places. The house is also sometimes known as the Thomas Putnam House after Lt. Thomas Putnam (1615–1686), who built the home circa 1648. His grandson, Israel Putnam, the famous general of the American Revolution, was born in the house. Lt. Thomas Putnam was the father of Sgt. Thomas Putnam Jr.,, a notorious figure in the Salem witch trials. The Putnam House is now owned by the Emerson Family, the same owners of Putnam Pantry.
Rebecca Nurse was a woman who was accused of witchcraft and executed by hanging in New England during the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. She was fully exonerated fewer than twenty years later.
Cultural depictions of the Salem witch trials abound in art, literature and popular media in the United States, from the early 19th century to the present day. The literary and dramatic depictions are discussed in Marion Gibson's Witchcraft Myths in American Culture and see also Bernard Rosenthal's Salem Story: Reading the Witch Trials of 1692
George Jacobs Sr. (1609–1692) was an English colonist in the Massachusetts Bay Colony who was accused of witchcraft in 1692 during the Salem witch trials in Salem Village, Massachusetts. He was convicted and hanged on August 19, 1692. His son, George Jr., was also accused but evaded arrest. Jacobs' accusers included his daughter-in-law and granddaughter, Margaret.
Sarah Wildes was wrongly convicted of witchcraft during the Salem witch trials and was executed by hanging. She maintained her innocence throughout the process, and was later exonerated. Her husband's first wife was a member of the Gould family, cousins of the Putnam family, the primary accusers, and court records document the family feuds which led to her persecution.
The Salem Village Historic District encompasses a collection of properties from the early center of Salem Village, as Danvers, Massachusetts was known in the 17th century. The district includes an irregular pattern of properties along Centre, Hobart, Ingersoll, and Collins Streets, as far north as Brentwood Circle, and south to Mello Parkway. It includes several buildings notable for their association with the 1692 Salem witch trials, which were mostly centered on individuals who lived in Salem Village. Included in the village are the Rebecca Nurse Homestead, now a house museum, and the remains of the local parsonage, both places of relevance to the witch hysteria.
The Endicott Pear Tree, also known as the Endecott Pear, is a European Pear tree, located in Danvers, Essex County, Massachusetts. It is believed to be the oldest living cultivated fruit tree in North America.
Sarah Cloys/Cloyce was among the many accused during Salem Witch Trials including two of her older sisters, Rebecca Nurse and Mary Eastey, who were both executed. Cloys/Cloyce was about 50-years-old at the time and was held without bail in cramped prisons for many months before her release.
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