Portrait of Nathaniel Hawthorne by Charles Osgood, 1840 (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA, Gift of Professor Richard C. Manning, Acc#121459)

Excerpts Related to Salem Witchcraft from "Alice Doane's Appeal"

Wood-Wax Passages from "Alice Doane's Appeal"
In "Alice Doane's Appeal" Hawthorne gives symbolic significance to a yellow-flowering weed, which grows aggressively on Gallows Hill. This local wildflower is called "Wood Wax."

Excerpt from "Alice Doane's Appeal": Leonard Doane's Memory of His Dead Father.
In this important passage, we that Leonard Doane's murder of Walter Brome awakens in him the memory of his father's violent death during an Indian raid. When Leonard looks at Walter's face and sees his father's, Hawthorne reveals one of the dark themes explored in "Alice Doane's Appeal."

Full Text of "Alice Doane's Appeal"

The Witch Tree Tradition (courtesy of the Peabody Essex Museum)
The story of the Witch Tree from S. Perley's History of Salem, vol. 3. p. 285, reprinted in the Essex Institute Historical Collections, vol. LVII, p. 17)

[list of executed witches]

[From John Winthrop's Journal: An Account of the Execution of Margaret Jones of Charleston, June 1648

Mary Easty, Petition of an Accused Witch 1692

The Trial of Rev. George Burroughs of Wells, Maine, formerly of Salem Village, August, 1692. From C. Mather's Wonders of the Invisible World.

In this selection from The American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge, Hawthorne write about the superstition of the martyr's path. [link to MMD text 2196]

Page citation: http://www.hawthorneinsalem.org/page/10356/