Salem, Mass

Salem, Mass
We arrived at our campsite in Salem after a somewhat circuitous route. What that means is that we were lost most of the time and the GPS was of no help and the maps were of little help. But we finally arrived at Winter Island which is just outside Salem. Now getting around these towns is just so much fun in a large vehicle towing a small vehicle that you just someday must experience it yourself.
Once settled in our campsite we decided on a tour of the city by night. That is when most of the witch’s tours are given.
There were 20 poor souls who were hanged as witches in the 1600’s in Salem and another 194 were incarcerated waiting for their trials before the whole thing was stopped. All of these people died because the sheriff and his uncle the judge at the time it seems were making a great deal off of selling off the deceased’s property which the sheriff could confiscate after they had been found guilty of being a witch.
Here also lie the remains of Nathanial Hawthorne the great American novelist who wrote about these horrific times.
Salem was also a great shipping port second only to New York until larger ships were being built which the towns harbor could not support due to the shallowness of its rivers. Therefore all of that collapsed in a very short time.
It was at this time that a jeweler named Lowe (Sp?) came across the idea of the modern mythical witch and began making and selling spoons with a witch’s emblem on them. That then caught the public’s fancy and the rush was on to make Salem (which now needed the tourist dollars) the witch capital of America. So there you have it folks the story of Salem and it’s witches which were really all innocent people.
Possibly not all of the ghost stories a stories are fiction but actual accounts but they do seem to make for interesting nighttime stories. Such as the little girl who was lost in a fire and now seems to be walking the streets of Salem looking for her parents. Or the story of Mr. Crowley who was killed by the sheriff by placing stones on his chest till he died but before he did he placed a curse on the sheriff and the town. To this day he has been seen three times and each time the next morning a tragedy has befallen the city. Or the ghost of the sheriff himself whom it is said still haunts the building upon whose foundation his house was on.