Date of Award

2012

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Goff, Brendan

Keywords

Witch-Hunts, Salem wth Trials, American History

Area of Concentration

History

Abstract

This thesis compares the atmosphere of the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 to the trial of Ethel Rosenberg in the period of McCarthyism. The thesis considers how they both resulted in witch-hunts. To explain the parallel process, I use the trials and the circumstances of George Burroughs, a seventeenth century New England minister accused of working with the Devil, to Ethel Rosenberg, a housewife with ties to the Communist Party who was convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage and was, along with her husband, the first American civilians to be executed for treason in 1953. This thesis analyzes and connects the two incidents, despite the many difference between Burroughs and Rosenberg and the two hundred and fifty year gap between the Salem Witch-Hunts and the Cold War. By comparing the two, the thesis concludes that Burroughs and Rosenberg were executed because both were considered to be failing in the roles that society demanded they fill.

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