In reality she did have a lot of miscarriages, but she did have seven other living children including Ann. .
The Proctors have many more family members than what is mentioned in the play. Elizabeth was Proctor's third wife and there were other family members living with them from Proctor's other marriages. There was a daughter at the age of fifteen and a son at the age of seventeen from his second marriage and John's thirty three year old son from his first marriage. Eventually, all of the family was charged of witchcraft and hanged, only Elizabeth was spared because she was pregnant.
The ages of many of the people in The Crucible were changed to be made more believable. Abigail William's age at the beginning of the play was boosted from an age of eleven to seventeen. John Proctor's age was sixty and Elizabeth's age was forty-one, a fact that was not mentioned in the play. .
At the beginning of the play, it is revealed that there was a wild dancing ritual in the woods led by Tituba. There was not any dancing ritual of any kind, but there some local girls tried to divine the occupation of their future husbands with an egg in a glass. There are also records that say that Mary Sibley asked Tituba to bake a special "witch cake." This cake was made of rye and the girl's urine. It was then fed to a dog. This white magic was supposed lead to the witch that was afflicting the girls. So actually there was some type of magic, but nothing as serious as what is mentioned in the play.
In historical records, John Indian, Reverend Nicholas Hoyes, Sarah Cloyce, and Cotton Mather have been noted as very important people in the Salem Witch Trials. Miller doesn't mention any of these individuals in his play.
In reality, Ann Putnam was not the first one to become "afflicted," but Abigail Williams and Betty Parris were. The also didn't have a deep sleep in which the could not wake from, but had violent, physical convulsions.