Shortly before his death in 1700, John Hale, a Puritan reverend from Beverly, Massachusetts, decided to document a dark historical moment. His posthumously published work, A Modest Inquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft, is one of the few written records from someone present at the Salem Witch Trials. Whether or not Hale is a reliable narrator, he certainly had the credentials to write such a text. At the age of 12, he saw his first execution of a convicted “witch.” As an adult, Hale was a pivotal figure in the…
