LHMP #486 Oaks 1978 Things Fearful to Name

As with several other articles I’ve blogged in this run of American-themed publications, this one covers material that I’ve already discussed in more detail in a previous entry. (Godbeer, Richard. 1995. “"The Cry of Sodom": Discourse, Intercourse, and Desire in Colonial New England” in <em>The William and Mary Quarterly</em>, Vol. 52, No. 2: 259-286)

As the title notes, the general subject is the legal and social treatment of sodomy (generally defined as same-sex relations) and buggery (most often applied to bestiality) in 17th century New England. Oaks notes that court records are the most important data source for this topic, but that this can skew our understanding as it only tells us about cases where offenses were identified and prosecuted. Even so, the legal records is valuable at the very least to correct myths, such as that sodomy usually received the death penalty.

The article notes that sodomy laws only applied to men, except for one New Haven code briefly for ten years starting in 1655 when female same-sex relations were included. Despite the theoretical harshness of the laws, the actual case outcomes show that sodomy was not punished more severely than other types of sex crimes, and that the death penalty was applied very rarely (and never to women). This leniency increased toward the end of the 17th century.

In relating the most commonly cited f/f case, that of Mary Hammon and Sara Norman for “leude behavior each with other upon a bed,” the article adds that Norman was also accused of “divers Lasivious speeches,” which may explain why her sentence required a public confession while Hammon was “cleared with admonision” which I read as telling her not to do it again. If the lascivious speeches were specifically in connection with this incident, then we may imagine that they may have specifically concerned f/f sex, though a later note indicates that Norman was also brought before the law for m/f sexual offenses in at least one case.

The latter part of the article is focused in great detail on accusations of bestiality.