Salem
Salem was a shipping port and, for a few months in 1692, the site of a witch hunt that killed twenty people. Nathaniel Hawthorne was born there in 1804 into a family that had been involved in both the trials and the trade, and the guilt of that inheritance runs through his fiction.
The Phillips Library holds the largest collection of Salem's documentary record, including trial material and shipping records. The House of the Seven Gables, which Hawthorne used as the setting for his novel, is a separate historic site and should not be confused with the archive.
A library to check
- Phillips Library, Peabody Essex Museum — catalogues and digital collections, open to readers online
Books connected to Salem
- The House of the Seven Gables — Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1851. Hawthorne's Salem novel: a haunted house, a family curse, and a sharp eye for genteel poverty.
- Twice-Told Tales — Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1837. The best introduction to Hawthorne's shorter fiction, and to his habit of leaving the moral unresolved.
A note on accuracy
We describe literary connections and public collections, not street addresses, opening hours or ticket prices. Those change and we cannot verify them for every reader. Follow the institution's own site for current visiting information.