England in America, 1580-1652 Part 22

One of the results of the Pequot War was to make known the country west of Fort Saybrook, and in the fall of 1637 Theophilus Eaton and some others went on a trip to explore for themselves the coasts and lands in that direction. They were so much pleased with what they saw at "Quinnipiack" that in March, 1638, the whole company left Boston to take up their residence there, and called their new settlement New Haven. Soon after their arrival they entered into a "plantation covenant," preliminary to a more formal engagement.[21] This agreement pledged the settlers to accept the teachings of Scripture both as a civil system and religious code.

Having no charter of any kind, they founded their rights to the soil on purchases from the Indians, of which they made two (November and December, 1638).[22] The next summer they proceeded to the solemn work of a permanent government. June 4, 1639, all the free planters met in a barn, and Mr. Davenport preached from the text, "Wisdom hath builded her home; she hath hewn out her seven pillars." He then proposed a series of resolutions which set forth the purpose of establis.h.i.+ng a state to be conducted strictly according to the rules of Scripture.

When these resolutions were adopted Davenport proposed two others designed to reduce to practice the theory thus formally approved. It was now declared that only church-members should have the right of citizens.h.i.+p, and that a committee of twelve should be appointed to choose seven others who were to be the const.i.tution-makers.[23]

These articles were subscribed by one hundred and thirteen of the people, and after due time for reflection the twelve men chosen as above elected the "seven pillars," Theophilus Eaton, Esq., John Davenport, Robert Newman, Matthew Gilbert, Thomas Fugill, John Punderson, and Jeremiah Dixon, who proceeded in the same solemn and regular manner to reorganize the church and state. First they set up the church by a.s.sociating with themselves nine others, and then after another interval, on October 25, 1639, a court was held at which the sixteen church-members proceeded to elect Theophilus Eaton as governor for a year and four other persons to aid him as "deputies," who were thereupon addressed by Davenport in what was called a charge.

Under the government thus formed a general court of the freemen was held every year for the election of governor and a.s.sistants, and to these officers was confided the entire administration of affairs.

There was no body of statutes till many years later, and during this time the only restriction on the arbitrary authority of the judges was the rules of the Mosaic law. The body of the free burgesses was very cautiously enlarged from court to court.

Hardly had the people of New Haven settled themselves in their new government before two other towns, Guilford, seventeen miles north, and Milford, eleven miles south, sprang up in their neighborhood.

Though practically independent, their const.i.tution was modelled after that of New Haven.[24] Besides Guilford and Milford another town called Stamford, lying west of the Connecticut territory and loosely connected with New Haven, was also settled.[25] In the political isolation of these towns one sees the principle of church independence, as held by Davenport and his followers.

In April, 1643, apprehension from the Indians, the Dutch, and their neighbor Connecticut caused a union of these towns with New Haven. The new commonwealth was organized just in time to become a member of the greater confederation of the colonies founded in May, 1643. It was not, however, till October 27, 1643, that a general const.i.tution was agreed upon.[26] It confined the suffrage to church-members and established three courts--the plantation court for small cases, consisting of "fitt and able" men in each town; the court of magistrates, consisting of the governor, deputy governor, and three a.s.sistants for weighty cases; and the general court, consisting of the magistrates and two deputies for each of the four towns which were to sit at New Haven twice a year, make the necessary laws for the confederation, and annually elect the magistrates. Trial by jury was dispensed with, because no such inst.i.tution was found in the Mosaic law.

In 1649 Southold, on Long Island, and in 1651 Branford, on the main-land, were admitted as members of the New Haven confederacy; and in 1656 Greenwich was added. And the seven towns thus comprehended gave the colony of New Haven the utmost extent it ever obtained.

[Footnote 1: Winthrop, _New England_, I., 146.]

[Footnote 2: Winthrop, _New England_, I., 176, 177.]

[Footnote 3: Ibid., 225, 226; Gardiner, _Pequot Warres_ (Ma.s.s. Hist.

Soc., _Collections_, 3d series, III.), 131-160.]

[Footnote 4: Gardiner, _Pequot Warres_; Winthrop, _New England_, I., 231-233, 238, 259.]

[Footnote 5: Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 1st series, I., 175.]

[Footnote 6: Winthrop, _New England_, I., 234-236.]

[Footnote 7: Ibid., 267, 312; Mason, _Pequot War_ (Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 2d series, VIII.), 132.]

[Footnote 8: _Conn. Col. Records_, I., 9.]

[Footnote 9: Mason, _Pequot War_ (Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 2d.

series, VIII.), 134-136.]

[Footnote 10: Ibid.; Underhill, _Pequot War_ (Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 3d series, VI.), 25.]

[Footnote 11: Mason, _Pequot War_ (Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 2d series, III.), 144.]

[Footnote 12: Ibid.; Winthrop, _New England_, I., 268, 278-281.]

[Footnote 13: Trumbull, _Connecticut_, I., 92.]

[Footnote 14: Mason, _Pequot War_ (Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 2d series, VIII.), 148.]

[Footnote 15: _Conn. Col. Records_, I., 20-25, 119.]

[Footnote 16: The same rule prevailed in Ma.s.sachusetts. For the result, see Baldwin, _Early History of the Ballot in Connecticut_ (Amer. Hist. a.s.soc. _Papers_, IV.), 81; Perry, _Historical Collections of the American Colonial Church_, 21; Palfrey, _New England_, II., 10.]

[Footnote 17: Winthrop, _New England_, I., 368.]

[Footnote 18: Trumbull, _Connecticut_, I., 507-510.]

[Footnote 19: Palfrey, _New England_, II., 377.]

[Footnote 20: Winthrop, _New England_, I., 283, 312, 484.]

[Footnote 21: _New Haven Col. Records_, I., 12.]

[Footnote 22: Trumbull, _Connecticut_, I., 98.]

[Footnote 23: _New Haven Col. Records_, I., 11-17.]

[Footnote 24: Trumbull, _Connecticut_, I., 107; Doyle, _English Colonies_, II., 196.]

[Footnote 25: _New Haven Col. Records_, I., 69.]

[Footnote 26: Ibid., 112.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MAINE IN 1652]

CHAPTER XVI

NEW HAMPs.h.i.+RE AND MAINE

(1653-1658)

After the charter granted to the Council for New England in 1620, Sir Ferdinando Gorges and Captain John Mason procured, August 10, 1622, a patent for "all that part of y^e maine land in New England lying vpon y^e Sea Coast betwixt y^e rivers of Merrimack & Sagadahock and to y^e furthest heads of y^e said Rivers and soe forwards up into the land westward untill threescore miles be finished from y^e first entrance of the aforesaid rivers and half way over that is to say to the midst of the said two rivers w^ch bounds and limitts the lands aforesaid togeather w^th all Islands and Isletts w^th in five leagues distance of y^e premisses and ab.u.t.ting vpon y^e same or any part or parcell thereoff."[1]

Mason was a London merchant who had seen service as governor of Newfoundland, and was, like Gorges, "a man of action." His experience made him interested in America, and his interest in America caused him to be elected a member of the Council for New England, and ultimately its vice-president.[2] The two leaders persuaded various merchants in.

England to join them in their colonial projects; and in the spring of 1623 they set up two settlements within the limits of the present state of New Hamps.h.i.+re, and some small stations at Saco Bay, Cas...o...b..y, and Monhegan Island, in the present state of Maine.

Of the settlements in New Hamps.h.i.+re, one called Piscataqua, at the mouth of the river of that name, was formed by three Plymouth merchants, Colmer, Sherwell, and Pomeroy, who chose a Scotchman named David Thompson as their manager. They obtained a grant, October 16, 1622, for an island, and six thousand acres on the main, near the mouth of Piscataqua; and here Thompson located in the spring of 1623.

He remained about three years, and in 1626 removed thence to an island in Boston harbor, where he lived as an independent settler.[3] The other plantation, called Cocheco, was established by two brothers, Edward and William Hilton, fish-mongers of London, and some Bristol merchants, and was situated on the south side of the Piscataqua about eight miles from the mouth of the river.[4]

November 7, 1629, Captain Mason obtained a patent[5] from the Council for New England for a tract extending sixty miles inland and lying between the Merrimac and Piscataqua rivers, being a part of the territory granted to Gorges and himself in 1622. He called it New Hamps.h.i.+re in honor of Hamps.h.i.+re, in England, where he had an estate.

Seven days later the same grantors gave to a company of whom Mason and Gorges were the most prominent merchants, a patent for the province of Laconia, describing it as "bordering on the great lake or lakes or rivers called Iroquois, a nation of savage people inhabiting into the landward between the rivers Merrimac and Sagadahoc, lying near about forty-four or forty-five degrees." And in 1631 Gorges, Mason, and others obtained another grant for twenty thousand acres, which included the settlement at the mouth of the Piscataqua.

Under these grants Gorges and Mason spent upward of 3000[6] in making discoveries and establis.h.i.+ng factories for salting fish and fur trading; but as very little attention was paid to husbandry at either of the settlements on the Piscataqua, they dragged out for years a feeble and precarious existence. At Piscataqua, Walter Neal was governor from 1630 to 1633 and Francis Williams from 1634 to 1642, and the people were distinctly favorable to the Anglican church. At Cocheco, Captain Thomas Wiggin was governor in 1631; and when, in 1633, the British merchants sold their share in the plantation to Lord Say and Sele, Lord Brooke, and two other partners, Wiggin remained governor, and the transfer was followed by the influx of Puritan settlers.[7]

After the Antinomian persecution in Ma.s.sachusetts some of Mrs.

Hutchinson's followers took refuge at Cocheco, and prominent among them were Captain John Underhill and Rev. John Wheelwright. Underhill became governor of the town in 1638, and his year of rule is noted for dissensions occasioned by the ambitious actions of several contentious, immoral ministers. Underhill was the central figure in the disturbances, but at the next election, in 1639, he was defeated and Roberts was elected governor of Cocheco. Dissensions continued, however, till in 1640 Francis Williams, governor of Piscataqua, interfered with an armed force. Underhill returned to Boston, and by humbly professing repentance for his conduct he was again received into the church there.[8] He then joined the Dutch, but when Connecticut and New Haven were clamorous for war with the Dutch in 1653 he plotted against his new master, was imprisoned, and escaped to Rhode Island,[9] where he received a commission to prey on Dutch commerce.

Meanwhile, Mr. Wheelwright left Cocheco, and in 1638 established southeast of it, at Squamscott Falls, a small settlement which he and his fellow-colonists called Exeter.[10] In October, 1639, after the manner of the Rhode Island towns, the inhabitants, thirty-five in number, entered a civil contract to "submit themselves to such G.o.dly and Christian lawes as are established in the realm of England to our best knowledge, and to all other such lawes which shall, upon good ground, be made and enacted among us according to G.o.d." This action was followed in 1641 by their neighbors at Cocheco, where the contract was subscribed by forty-one settlers; and about the same time, it is supposed, Piscataqua adopted the same system.[11]