Mark Olynciw
My name is Isaac Hempstead. I was born in England 1613 into a poor, landless family; it was assumed that my future would be that of a servant too. I saw no prospect of upward social mobility or improving my circumstances in life. When I was seventeen, I felt no choice but to escape an impoverished existence and leave behind my country to pursue an opportunity to create a better future for myself in America. I heard such opportunities existed in America, but I could not afford the cost of passage. So, like many other similarly motivated, desperate and daring young men and women from the British Isles, I entered into a contract, agreeing to work as an "indentured servant" for seven years, for a "master" who, in exchange, would paid …show more content…
Although she remained loyal, like Mary Rowlandson, to her faith in "the wonderful power of God", my wife found it difficult to process her experience and re-integrate into the community. She had not 'gone native', as some may have suspected, yet she maintained an ambivalent attitude toward those whom Rowlandson calls "our enemies in the wilderness" (Narrative). The violence on the frontier left the colony scared and feeling vulnerable. I believe this general anxiety and distrust toward the Native peoples eventually spread to relations among the colonists themselves and constituted one of the 'causes' of the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. I observed that the individuals accused of witchcraft tended to be those who resisted the strict conformity demanded by the Puritan social order. They were less eager to "submit [their] person and estate to be protected, ordered and governed" by the community, and less willing to suppress their individuality to "the peace and welfare of the… commonwealth" ("Oath"). The trials also gave expression to growing economic and political tensions growing beneath an excessively rigid social
My name is Isaac Hempstead. I was born in England 1613 into a poor, landless family; it was assumed that my future would be that of a servant too. I saw no prospect of upward social mobility or improving my circumstances in life. When I was seventeen, I felt no choice but to escape an impoverished existence and leave behind my country to pursue an opportunity to create a better future for myself in America. I heard such opportunities existed in America, but I could not afford the cost of passage. So, like many other similarly motivated, desperate and daring young men and women from the British Isles, I entered into a contract, agreeing to work as an "indentured servant" for seven years, for a "master" who, in exchange, would paid …show more content…
Although she remained loyal, like Mary Rowlandson, to her faith in "the wonderful power of God", my wife found it difficult to process her experience and re-integrate into the community. She had not 'gone native', as some may have suspected, yet she maintained an ambivalent attitude toward those whom Rowlandson calls "our enemies in the wilderness" (Narrative). The violence on the frontier left the colony scared and feeling vulnerable. I believe this general anxiety and distrust toward the Native peoples eventually spread to relations among the colonists themselves and constituted one of the 'causes' of the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. I observed that the individuals accused of witchcraft tended to be those who resisted the strict conformity demanded by the Puritan social order. They were less eager to "submit [their] person and estate to be protected, ordered and governed" by the community, and less willing to suppress their individuality to "the peace and welfare of the… commonwealth" ("Oath"). The trials also gave expression to growing economic and political tensions growing beneath an excessively rigid social