Were the American colonists drugged during the Salem witchcraft trial?
Salem Village in late winter of 1692 was a grey, bleak place. Between the immense forests inland and the vast, featureless sea, it felt like the world was closing in on the Puritan colonists who inhabited the area. Two tribes of Native Americans warred nearby. Smallpox had recently made its way through the population of about 500 people. “It was easy to believe in 1692 in Salem … that the devil was close at hand,” writes historian Douglas Linder. “Sudden and violent death occupied minds.” The social structure, too, was under strain. Three new generations had been born into the village since the original colonists had arrived, each seemingly further from th
