Samuel Sewall's Diary

Newburyport, MA: Parker River Researchers, 1989 Hard cover, 16mo., (measuring 5 x 7 1/2 inches) in gray buckram with silver titles, 272 pp. This is the reprinted, abridged version of the 1927 Macy-Masius Publishers issue. The Rev. Samuel Sewall (1652-1730) kept a diary for more than fifty years, detailing life as a printer, minister and judge of in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. His family settled in Newbury, Massachusetts in 1661. His main claim to fame, however, was as a member of the Court of Oyer and Terminer, which in 1692 oversaw the Salem witch trials, acts of which he later came to repent. The diary is compared to that of Samuel Pepys by the editor, and is certainly filled with mention of some of the big names of the day: Governor Winthrop, Cotton Mather et al. But equally fascinating are his observations of the everyday hardships, illnesses and early death, child mortality, and spiritual struggles of his own family and those of his neighbors. " His relations with his wife and their fifteen children, his journeys to towns outside of Boston, his business observations, his devotions, and especially his full account towards the close of his famous courtship of Madame Winthrop--these ...are the materials of a rich and appealing narrative." (p. 6) Condition: Near Fine. Former owner name in ballpoint to ffep. and one pencil notation to a preliminary page. . Abridged Reprint of 1927 edition. Hard Cover. Near Fine.