John the Indian, one of these accusers, was husband to Tituba the first witch complained of. She confessed and was committed to prison. Her husband, no doubt, was convinced he should stand a better chance among the afflicted than the accused. It is most probable some of the women acted from the same principle. As the afflicted increased, so did the accused, of course. Great pains were taken to bring some of them to confess; but in general the accused persisted in their innocency until the prisons were filled. At length the friends of some of the accused urged them to a confession, although they knew they were innocent, the magistrates declaring that confessing was the way to obtain mercy. The first confession, which remains upon the files, is of Deliverance Hobbs, May 11th, 1692, being in prison. She owned everything she was required to do. The confessors, like the accusers, multiplied, the witches having always company with them, who were immediately sent for and examined. No wonder if they were affrighted to the last degree; they owned whatever their friends and magistrates would have them. Thus more than an hundred women, many of them of the most sober, virtuous livers, some of them of very reputable families in the towns of Salem, Beverly, Andover, Billerica, Newbury, were apprehended and examined, and generally committed, although most of them who confessed, after three or four months imprisonment, were admitted to bail. These confessions were all very much of the same tenor. One of them may serve as a specimen. 8th Sept. ’92. The examination and confession of Mary Osgood, wife of Capt. Osgood, of Andover, taken before John Hathorne, Esq. and other their Majesty’s justices.