Gallows Hill Park

This public park sits on the hill once thought to be the witch trial execution site — before historians pinpointed Proctor's Ledge. The condemned were marched through here on their way to the gallows.

Ghost tour guides used to bring visitors up the steep slopes. Most have stopped. They say something malevolent lingers among the trees, and the guides do not want to be responsible for what happens to people who stay too long after dark.

Gallows Hill sits on the outskirts of Salem. For centuries, this rocky outcropping was believed to be where nineteen innocent people were hanged during the 1692 witch trials, their bodies left to swing before being dumped into shallow crevices between the rocks. The Gallows Hill Project confirmed in 2016 that the actual executions happened at nearby Proctor's Ledge — but the hill itself remains a center of strange activity, perhaps because the condemned were dragged up its slopes on their way to die.

The victims included Bridget Bishop, hanged June 10, 1692. Rebecca Nurse, Sarah Good, and three others on July 19. Reverend George Burroughs and John Proctor among five on August 19. Eight more on the final execution date of September 22, including 77-year-old Margaret Scott. The Puritans refused to build proper gallows, believing such labor would insult God. They strung the accused from a gnarled tree and let them die slowly. Families who dared retrieve the bodies did so at night, risking accusations themselves. Benjamin Nurse reportedly rowed up the North River to pull his mother Rebecca from the rocky crevice where she had been thrown.

Today, Gallows Hill is a public park with baseball diamonds and playgrounds. The land has never been quiet. Visitors report sudden waves of dread and despair — some burst into tears upon entering without understanding why. At night, the woods produce knocking, thumping, and shrieking that wakes nearby residents. People have seen figures walking among the trees, most often a woman in white who materializes briefly before vanishing.

Local historian Tim Maguire of Salem Night Tour documented that Gallows Hill became a common site for suicides in later centuries, which paranormal researchers believe created a self-reinforcing cycle of negative energy. In October 1992, for the 300th anniversary of the trials, nearly two hundred people from area churches gathered atop the hill for a spiritual cleansing. The Salem Evening News reported they formed a tight circle, raised their arms, and chanted "The curse over Salem with witchcraft is broken" before performing a laying on of hands on the hilltop water tower, which bears the image of a witch. Whether the exorcism worked is an open question.

Bone fragments have allegedly been found on the grounds, though the Peabody Essex Museum notes their origin cannot be confirmed. The air stays cold in patches year-round. Photographs taken at Gallows Hill frequently capture shadows, figures, and mists that were not visible when the shutter clicked. Those who walk the grounds at twilight sometimes glimpse the condemned — including, some say, Giles Corey, the 81-year-old farmer crushed under stones for refusing to enter a plea, who cursed Salem and its sheriffs with his last breath. In 2017, CBS News listed the location among "America's 5 Most Haunted Places." The nineteen victims are now properly memorialized at Proctor's Ledge below, where granite stones bear their names and execution dates. But the spirits still wander the hill where their final journey began.