Mary (Bridges) Wheeler (1678)

Born 27 Jan 1678 in Andover, Essex, Massachusetts

Ancestors

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Kyle Dane [send private message]

Biography

Mary (Bridges) Wheeler was accused of witchcraft in witch trials

Birth Record: BRIDGES, Mary, d. John and Mary, Jan 27, 1678 ^[1]

Mary Bridges was 13 years old when she was accused during the Salem Witch Trials. She confessed and accused others. She remained jailed for eight months before being found not guilty on May 12, 1693^[2]

Marriage Record: WHEELER, Nathaniel and Mary BRIDGES; 9 Nov 1697; Boston.^[3]

I have not confirmed with certainty that this Mary Bridges is the same one that married Nathaniel Wheeler in 1697 but she looks the most likely so I'm including that information here - Kyle Dane, 31 Jan, 2015.

Massachusetts Remediation

1. 17 October 1710, Convictions Reversed, The General Court of Massachusetts Bay, An act, the several convictions, judgments, and attainders be, and hereby are, reversed, and declared to be null and void.^[4]
2. 17 Dec 1711, Compensation to Survivors, Governor Dudley, GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY, approved compensation to such persons as are living, and to those that legally represent them that are dead
3. 28 Aug 1957, No Disgrace to Descendants, General Court of Massachusetts, ...such proceedings, were and are shocking, and the result of a wave of popular hysterical fear of the Devil in the community, and further declares that, as all the laws under which said proceedings...have been long since abandoned and superseded by our more civilized laws, no disgrace or cause for distress attaches to the said descendants or any of them by reason of said proceedings.^[5]
4. 31 Oct 2001, Additional Victims Included, Massachusetts Senate and House of Representatives in General Court, AN ACT RELATIVE TO THE WITCHCRAFT TRIAL OF 1692, chapter 145 is hereby further amended by adding Bridget Bishop, Susannah Martin, Alice Parker, Margaret Scott and Wilmot Redd.^[6]

Sources

1. ↑ Vital records of Andover, Massachusetts, to the end of the year 1849, Volume I; Andover Births; Page 79
2. ↑ The Witches of New England, Legends of America website
3. ↑ New England Marriages Prior to 1700; Clarence Torry, page 801, viewed at Ancestry.com
4. ↑ “Salem Witchcraft : with an Account of Salem Village, and a History of Opinions on Witchcraft and Kindred Subjects : Upham, Charles Wentworth, 1802-1875, Author : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming.” Internet Archive, January 1, 1970. page 480.
5. ↑ https://www.mass.gov/doc/resolves-of-1957-chapter-145/download
6. ↑ https://malegislature.gov/Laws/SessionLaws/Acts/2001/Chapter122

• The Salem Witchcraft Papers (Scholars' Lab, University of Virginia Library, 2018) SWP No. 018.