June 4, 1715: Margaret Gaulacher
Boston, Massachusetts
The news that week includes a lyonefs
displayed, attacking Fowls and Catts.  They watched
her feeding time, remarked on her mercilefs
cruelty.  Meanwhile, Cotton Mather preached
against Hard-hearted Sinners, and Hardnefs of Heart.
He helped with her confession, which reflects
on attempts to destroy her unborn child, a part
of her Wicked crime, completed through Neglect.
Now hers is a Stony Heart, of Flint.  Ah!  Poor
Margaret, behold: the congregation calls 
on your wondrous Industry, Agony, your death four
days off. Pray for a Clean, and a Soft Heart; don’t fall 
from this fresh gallows to the Mouths of Dragons,
unconcerned, adamant, so little broken.

Notes:

Not much is known about Gaulacher; her name is sometimes recorded as “Callahan.”

Quotations:

The Boston Newsletter

Mather, Cotton. A sorrowful spectacle: in two sermons, occasioned by a just sentence of death, on a miserable woman, for the murder of a spurious offspring. Boston : Printed by T. Fleet & T. Crump, for Samuel Gerrich, 1715

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