Massachusetts -- Church history; Massachusetts -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775; Puritans -- Massachusetts
Although, after the autumn of 1656, whippings, fines, and banishments
became frequent, no case of misconduct is alleged until the 13th of
the second month, 1658, when Sarah Gibbons and Dorothy Waugh broke
two bottles in Mr. Norton’s church, after lecture, to testify to his
emptiness; [Footnote: This charge is unproved.] both had previously
been imprisoned and banished, but the ferocity with which Norton at that
moment was forcing on the persecution was the probable incentive to the
trespass. “They were sent to the house of correction, where, after being
kept three days without any food, they were cruelly whipt, and kept
three days longer without victuals, though they had offered to buy some,
but were not suffered.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 184.]
In 1661 Katharine Chatham walked through Boston, in sackcloth. This was
during the trial of Christison for his life, when the terror culminated,
and hardly needs comment.
George Wilson is charged with having “rushed through the streets of
Boston, shouting: ‘The Lord is coming with fire and sword!’” [Footnote:
_As to Roger Williams_, p. 133.] The facts appear to be these: in 1661,
just before Christison’s trial, he was arrested, without any apparent
reason, and, as he was led to prison, he cried, that the Lord was
coming with fire and sword to plead with Boston. [Footnote: _New England
Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 351.] At the general jail delivery [Footnote:
_Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 19. Order passed 28 May, 1661.] in
anticipation of the king’s order, he was liberated, but soon rearrested,
“sentenced to be tied to the cart’s tail,” and flogged with so severe
a whip that the Quakers wanted to buy it “to send to England for the
novelty of the cruelty, but that was not permitted.” [Footnote: Besse,
ii. 224.]
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