Thomas Oliver (Salem witch trials) the second charge in 1692 as the result of which she was hanged. When he left the colony for England he had a considerable amount of real property to which he returned after his first wife Mary's death. His estate included a house and sometime tavern in Salem, Massachusetts near the meeting house where after his death his widow Bridget Oliver Bishop was known for staying up late into the night entertaining her guests with playing shovelboard. During the scholarly reexaminations of the Salem witch trials during the 19th century, Bridget Bishop's claims on this estate were posited as the
Salem witch trials in 1692, although dated 1693, with an introductory letter of endorsement by William Stoughton, the Chief Magistrate. The book included accounts of five trials, with much of the material copied directly from the court records, which were supplied to Mather by Stephen Sewall, his friend and Clerk of the Court. Mather's father, Increase Mather, published "Cases of Conscience Concerning Evil Spirits", dated October 3, 1692, after the last trials by the Court of Oyer and Terminer. (The title page mistakenly lists the publication year as "1693".) In it, Increase Mather repeated his caution about the reliance on spectral evidence, stating