Margaret Jones was hanged in Boston on June 15, 1648, becoming the first person executed for witchcraft in Massachusetts and the first woman executed for witchcraft in New England.
On June 15, 1648, Margaret Jones was led to the gallows in Boston and hanged, becoming the first person executed for witchcraft in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the first woman put to death for witchcraft anywhere in New England. Her execution came just two days after the General Court formally condemned her, following a trial in which testimony described her supposed supernatural knowledge of medicines, sudden afflictions suffered by those who angered her, and physical marks interpreted by examiners as evidence of a pact with the Devil.
Contemporary accounts, including notes attributed to then-Governor John Winthrop, describe how Jones's skill as a midwife and healer, combined with her reportedly confrontational personality, made her a target of suspicion in a community deeply anxious about unseen spiritual forces. Her execution predates the infamous Salem witch trials of 1692 by 44 years, making her case a foundational and often overlooked episode in the broader history of witchcraft persecution in colonial America.
Jones's death illustrates the perilous position occupied by female healers and midwives in Puritan society: women whose specialized knowledge of the body and natural remedies could just as easily be construed as evidence of diabolical power as of legitimate skill. Her case set an early precedent for how accusations of witchcraft could be weaponized against women who defied social expectations, and it remains a significant marker in the historical study of gender, medicine, and religious persecution in early America.