What really happened to the real Abigail Williams after the trials? Did she become a prostitute, like Miller claims?
No one knows for sure what happened to the real person. We don’t even really know where she came from before or exactly how she was related to Reverend Parris — the term “niece” could have applied to any younger female relative, sort of like “cousin” can be used today for someone who’s even remotely related. In other places she is only refered to as his “kin.” Some of the possibilities include an early death, which is not entirely unlikely, considering the times and the fact that neither of Betty Parris’s two siblings apparently lived to adulthood, or Abigail could have married and her maiden name was lost to us. We really do not know.
