Self-GuidedSalem Tour

Head west along Essex Street about four blocks, roughly 7 minutes, to the corner of North Street.

The only building still standing with a direct tie to the 1692 trials: home of Judge Jonathan Corwin, who examined dozens of the accused. Its steep gables and small leaded windows are pure First Period architecture.

Look for
The overhanging second story and diamond-paned casement windows.

Continue one block west on Essex Street — about 2 minutes.

Behind this Georgian colonial hides a formal garden laid out in 1912, free to enter. Hocus Pocus used it for the party scene in 1993, and it has been a pilgrimage stop ever since.

Look for
The central bed and sundial at the heart of the garden.

Double back east on Essex, then north on Brown Street to Washington Square — about 10 minutes.

A former church turned dramatic retelling of 1692, fronted by the brooding bronze of Roger Conant, the man who founded Salem in 1626 — and who is very often mistaken for a witch.

Look for
Conant's cloaked figure and staff, and the rose window of the old Romanesque church.

The green is directly across the street from the museum steps.

Eight acres of open ground where militia once drilled and where Halloween crowds now gather. The cast-iron arch at the western entrance has framed Salem's parades since 1850.

Look for
The Washington Arch and the bandstand at the center of the green.

Head south on Brown Street to Essex Street, then east to Hawthorne Boulevard and down to Derby Street — about 12 minutes.

Built in 1668, this dark-shingled mansion is the oldest surviving 17th-century wooden mansion in New England. Hawthorne's cousin lived here, and his novel turned its gables and hidden staircase into American myth.

Look for
Count all seven gables from the seaside garden lawn.

Head back west along Derby Street to Derby Wharf — about 6 minutes.

The original Friendship sailed fifteen voyages to Asia, Europe, and the Caribbean before being captured in 1812. Derby Wharf reaches nearly half a mile into the harbor, once lined with warehouses full of imported goods.

Look for
The small brick Derby Wharf Light Station at the very tip of the wharf.

Cross back over Derby Street to 160 Derby — about 2 minutes.

Sea captains once climbed these steps to pay duties on pepper, silk, and porcelain. Nathaniel Hawthorne worked upstairs as Surveyor of the Port from 1846 to 1849, and the boredom of the job gave him time to imagine The Scarlet Letter.

Look for
The gilded eagle perched above the entrance and the cupola on the roofline.

Continue west along Derby Street to the wharf plaza — about 4 minutes. A good coffee or chowder stop.

This marina village was built in the 1970s atop the site of Salem's colonial-era shipyards, where vessels for the East India trade were framed and launched.

Look for
Masts in the marina and the drawbridge view up the South River channel.

Walk up Congress and Central streets to Liberty Street — about 5 minutes.

Twenty stone benches cantilever from a granite wall, one for each person executed in 1692. Words of protest carved at the threshold are deliberately cut off mid-sentence: testimony the court refused to hear.

Look for
The bench for Giles Corey, pressed to death for refusing to plead.

The cemetery adjoins the memorial — step through the low granite gate.

Established in 1637, this is the second-oldest burying ground in the country. Among the slate stones lie a Mayflower passenger and Judge John Hathorne, one of the 1692 magistrates.

Look for
Winged skulls carved into the oldest slate markers near the back wall.

Walk north on Charter Street to Essex Street, then east along the pedestrian mall to the museum — about 5 minutes.

One of the oldest continuously operating museums in the United States, founded on curiosities that Salem captains carried home from every ocean. Its collection includes an entire 200-year-old Chinese house reassembled on site.

Look for
Yin Yu Tang, the Qing-dynasty merchant house in the courtyard wing.

Head south on Central Street into Derby Square — about 3 minutes.

Salem's oldest surviving municipal building, a red-brick Federal hall of 1816 standing above a cobbled market square that still hosts artisans, farmers, and film crews.

Look for
The arched brick facade and the granite market stalls below the hall.