What is dorcas hoar?

Dorcas Hoar was a Puritan woman who was accused of witchcraft in the Salem witch trials of 1692. She was born in England in 1648 and migrated to Massachusetts with her family in 1652. In 1672, she married Benjamin Hoar and they had five children together.

In 1692, Dorcas was accused of practicing witchcraft by neighbor girls who had experienced fits and claimed to have seen her as a spectral apparition. She was arrested and put on trial along with other accused witches. Although she maintained her innocence, she was found guilty and sentenced to be hanged.

However, before her execution, she was granted a reprieve by the governor of Massachusetts, William Phips, who was beginning to question the methods and fairness of the trials. Dorcas was eventually released from prison and returned to her family.

She lived the rest of her life in quiet obscurity and died at the age of 77. Although she was never officially exonerated, her case is now seen as an example of the hysteria and injustice of the Salem witch trials.