Hour of the Witch

Hour of the Witch analyzes domestic and social violence against women in colonial America and the patriarchal Puritan beliefs that justify and obscure it. In a stern religious world filled with stories of hellfire and eternal damnation, Mary Deerfield’s petition for divorce is regarded as a scandalous upending of a “natural order” which demands a woman’s subservience to her husband and other men. Mary’s subsequent trials reveal the rampant misogyny within her society, exploring how such misogyny shapes both gender roles and the violence she experiences.

During Mary’s trial, she is often blamed for not fulfilling her role as a good and dutiful wife. Even one of her defenders, Reverend John Norton, frames his defense of her in terms that reinforce the gender hierarchy instead of questioning it: “We expect a man’s government of his wife to be easy and gentle and, when it is not, something is amiss. Something needs to be remedied. A husband should rule in such a fashion that his wife submits joyfully” (183, emphasis added). Words like “government,” “rule,” and “submit” reveal that the Puritans’ strict ideas about gender roles subjugate women to a role of servitude and submission. Mary defies this “natural order” to escape Thomas’s violence, and while Reverend Norton does allude to Thomas’s guilt, the Court of Assistants rejects her petition because they believe that Mary should bend to her husband’s will no matter what—and if he does beat her, it is likely Mary’s fault for failing or displeasing Thomas in some way.

Thomas openly uses the “natural order” of gender roles in Puritan society to justify his violence, telling Mary his methods are to both discipline her and save her soul. Before Thomas stabs Mary with the Devil’s tine, he says to her, “Thou dost not appreciate or abide by the places the Lord God has allotted to us. To a man and his wife” (76, emphasis added). After wounding her hand, he adds, “I hope this lesson is a seed that takes root. Because it is discipline applied as a lesson. It is pain applied with reason” (77, emphasis added). Such passages reflect Thomas’s consistent use of religious gender ideals to excuse his violence and justify his brutality against Mary. Since Thomas knows that his wider community subscribes to the same ideals, he abuses Mary with impunity, believing that his own reputation and status as a man will protect him from any punishment—which is exactly what happens during the divorce trial. Hour of the Witch thus exposes the dangers of misogynistic beliefs, drawing clear links between individual cases of abuse and a wider social system that seeks to justify and perpetuate female subservience.