Carroll, who on her way back from Iraq forcefully refuted her own words critical of the United States in videos recorded by her captors just as she was being released, was shown in a photograph hugging her twin sister, Katie, while her parents Jim and Mary Beth Carroll smiled broadly.
Her flight from Germany touched down shortly after noon US time, the paper said.
In a statement issued by her newspaper on Saturday, Carroll said that she was forced to cooperate in a 'propaganda video' still to be released. Immediately after her release to an insurgent-linked political party, she gave another interview with the group in which she 'did not speak freely'.
In those videos, Carroll said that she was well treated and never threatened since her January 7 Baghdad abduction, in which gunmen killed her Iraqi translator, Alan Enwiya. She described Iraqi insurgents as defending their country and criticized US involvement in Iraq.
US Senator John McCain, a Vietnam veteran who was held captive for years in Vietnam, said in a morning television talk show that 'when you're held captive in that kind of situation that you do things under duress.'
Saturday's statement was issued during Carroll's stopover at Ramstein Airbase in Germany on her way to Boston, Massachusetts, headquarters of the Christian Science Monitor, the newspaper for which she works as a freelance reporter.
'During my last night in captivity, my captors forced me to participate in a propaganda video,' said Carroll, 28. 'They told me they would let me go if I cooperated. I was living in a threatening environment, under their control, and wanted to go home alive. I agreed.'
She emphasized that the videos do not reflect her genuine views, and she described her time in captivity as a 'horrific experience' for herself and her family.
'The people who kidnapped me and murdered Alan Enwiya are criminals, at best,' she said. 'I was, and remain, deeply angry with the people who did this.'
She said that claims that she refused to cooperate with the US military or discuss her captivity with US officials were untrue.
'I want to be judged as a journalist, not as a hostage. I remain as committed as ever to fairness and accuracy - to discovering the truth - and so I will not engage in polemics,' Carroll said.
'But let me be clear: I abhor all who kidnap and murder civilians, and my captors are clearly guilty of both crimes.'
Monitor editor Richard Bergenheim also released a linked statement Saturday thanking those involved in gaining Carroll's release.
In her statement, Carroll asked 'for the time to heal.'
'This has been a taxing 12 weeks for me and my family. Please allow us some quiet time alone, together,' she said.
