Dated at Boston, the 20th of June,
1664.
Pursuant to this warrant, Edward, (who therein was called a vagabond,
for no other reason but that he was gone from his dwelling-place,) was
led away to the market place, and there being stripped, his arms were
bound to the wheel of a great gun. Then the constable John Loel, bade
the hangman to do his work severely; which he did so cruelly that it
was testified pease might lie in the holes that the knots of the whip
had made in the flesh of his arms and back. And his body was swelled
and very black from the waist upwards. Such was the doings of those,
who to enjoy the free exercise of their worship, had left Old England;
and thus they treated a man that was of good repute, and had lived in
that country above twenty years; and was once by the governor himself
acknowledged to be his friend, when he supplied him with necessaries
in his want, saying then, that if ever it lay in his power he would
requite him; which now he did, but in what an inhuman and barbarous
manner! That this governor Endicot once had been a man of but a mean
condition, appears from a letter written to him shortly after the death
of Mary Dyar, by one John Smith, because he had not only caused his
wife to be whipped severely, but had also kept her prisoner a whole
winter, separate from her children, and had been assisting in the
making of an order that no man or woman should bring any thing to the
imprisoned Quakers, or carry any thing from them, upon the penalty of
five pounds for the first time, and ten pounds for the second. In this
letter John Smith said:
‘O my spirit is grieved for thee, because that the love I did
once see in thee is departed from thee, and there remaineth
in thee a spirit of cruelty, of hard-heartedness to thy poor
neighbours, which thou hast formerly been much beholden to, and
helped by, in time of want, when thou hadst no bread to eat. O
consider of these times, and forget them not, and of the love
thou didst find among poor people in thy necessity, and how
evil thou hast dealt with, and requited some of them now; and
how thou dost walk and act contrary to what thou didst formerly
profess: yea, I have heard thee say that all the armies on earth
cannot subdue one lust in man or woman. And now thou pronouncest
sentence of death upon some, because they cannot submit to your
wills, nor worship as ye do.’
But I return to Edward Wharton, who after his whipping was not led the
direct way to Salem, but by Charlestown, and so about the country,
as if they had a mind to make a show of him: yet at Charlestown the
constable was so compassionate, that he entertained him in his house,
and anointed his stripes; and the next day he was conveyed to his home.
Since that time the said Wharton was whipped again severely; but I pass
by particulars to avoid prolixity. Yet I cannot forbear to say, that
before he was whipped at Boston, as hath been said, it was told him
that if he would promise the governor to come no more to the Quakers’
meeting in Boston, then it was likely the governor would let him have
his liberty: to which Edward returned, ‘Not for all the world. And
friends, I have a back to lend to the smiter, and I have felt your
cruel whippings before now, and the Lord hath made me able to bear
them; and as I abide in his fear, I need not fear what you shall be
suffered to do unto me.’
The case of one Anne Needham being also very remarkable, I will give
a short hint of it. She was fined at Boston for being one of those
called Quakers; but her husband refused to pay the fine, asking
them, seeing the law for adultery was death, whether if his wife had
committed adultery, he must by that law have suffered death. She
then was sentenced to be whipped, which the constable, Thomas Roots,
performed with great cruelty; for seeing she kept silent whilst he
lashed her, he did whatever he could with his tormenting whip, to make
her cry out; but all his endeavours proved in vain; which made him say
that the Quakers were a hard-hearted people: though this epithet much
better fitted himself, and all those cruel persecutors that were really
become hard-hearted to the highest degree, insomuch that they had not
only shaken off humanity, but all true sense of piety, which I shall
prove by instances whereof some are even blasphemous.
One Barlow, who formerly had been a preacher at Exeter, afterwards
turned lawyer, and at length being become a marshal, would boast that
when he went to distrain for fines, he would think what goods were most
serviceable to the Quakers, and then he would take them away. By such
doings he encouraged others to vice; for a certain Indian taking a
knife from an Englishman’s house, and being told he should not steal,
answered that he himself had thought so, but now he saw that Barlow
and the magistrates did so by the Quakers. This Barlow in the days of
Cromwell being grown rich with the spoils of the innocent, grew poor
after king Charles was restored; which made Barlow say that he hoped
for a good time again: and took the shameful liberty to add, he thought
the Quakers would not let him want.
At Hampton, priest Seaborn Cotton, understanding that one Eliakim
Wardel had entertained Wenlock Christison, went with some of his herd
to Eliakim’s house, having like a sturdy herdsmen put himself at the
head of his followers, with a truncheon in his hand. Wenlock seeing
him in this posture, asked him what he did with that club: to which
he answered, he came to keep the wolves from his sheep. Wenlock then
asking whether those he led were his sheep, got no answer, but instead
thereof was led away by this crew to Salisbury. This same Cotton having
heard that major Shapleigh was become a Quaker, said he was sorry for
it, but he would endeavour to convert him. And afterwards drinking in
a house in an isle in the river Piscataway, and hearing the major was
there in a warehouse, he went thither; but going up stairs, and being
in drink, he tumbled down, and got such a heavy fall, that the major
himself came to help this drunken converter.
When Edward Wharton was told once by governor Endicot, that every soul
ought to be subject to the higher power; he thereupon asked whether
that which set up the golden image, and required all to fall down and
worship it, was the higher power: he answered, ‘Yea.’ Then Edward
queried whether the power that required Daniel to be cast into the
lion’s den, for praying to any besides the king for thirty days, was
the higher power: the governor said, ‘Yea.’ The next question Edward
asked, was, whether the three children that were cast into the fiery
furnace for not falling down to, and worshipping the golden image, did
well: and whether Daniel for praying to his God contrary to what the
said higher power did command, did well: the governor replied, ‘Yea,’
also. But secretary Rawson seeing how the governor had talked himself
into a noose, to help him out said, they did obey the higher power by
suffering: to which Edward returned, ‘So do we too.’
Another of these magistrates whose name was Brian Pembleton, was
asked by George Walton and his wife Alice, who was reputed one of the
most godly women thereabout, what the anointing was which the apostle
John exhorted the saints unto in that day: but what a wicked man this
Pembleton was, may appear by the abominable answer he gave, viz. that
John was either a fool or a madman, or else he did not know what he
said. And blasphemous in a very high degree was what he said to the
question, ‘What was that light which shone about Paul?’ For his answer
was, ‘It was the light of the devil for aught he did know.’
Joshua Scotaway, also one of the magistrates, asked Mary Tomkins in the
court at Boston, where she dwelt: to which she answered in the words of
the apostle, ‘In God; for in him we live and move, and have a being.’
To which Scotaway did not stick to say, ‘So doth every dog and cat.’ No
wonder truly, that men thus darkened in their minds, grew also quite
hardened in persecuting, so as to glory in it; as did Thomas Daufort, a
magistrate of Cambridge, who in the governor’s house at Boston, laying
his hand on Wenlock Christison’s shoulder, said to him, ‘Wenlock I am a
mortal man, and die I must, and that ere long; and I must appear at the
tribunal seat of Christ, and must give an account for my deeds done in
the body; and I believe it will be my greatest glory in that day, that
I have given my vote for thee to be soundly whipped at this time.’ This
made Wenlock say, ‘O wicked man, if thou hast nothing to glory in that
day, but in drawing the blood of the innocent, and in laying stripes
upon the servants of the living God, thy glory will be turned into
shame, and wo will be thy portion.’
But no exhortation, how extraordinary soever, seemed to take any hold
on these persecutors: for once a girl of thirteen or fourteen years of
age, called Hannah Wright, whose sister had been banished for religion,
was stirred with such zeal, that coming from Long Island, some hundreds
of miles from Boston, into that bloody town, she appeared in the court
there, and warned the magistrates to spill no more innocent blood. This
saying so struck them at first, that they all sat silent; till Rawson
the secretary said, ‘What, shall we be baffled by such a one as this?
come, let us drink a dram.’
Here we see the religion of these men, who were once so precise that
they would not join with the worship of the church of England. But it
seems not improbable that they fell away to this hardness of heart,
because being convinced in their understandings of some superstitious
ceremonies that were yet remaining in the church of England, they were
not faithful to testify against those things, and to set their light on
the candlestick; but that to shun the cross and avoid sufferings, they
chose to go into a strange country. And yet they were so presumptuous
as to say they were the purest church on earth, and their magistrates
and preachers very godly men, and it may be some of their cruel
executioners seeing how their magistrates, (as hath been said of Thomas
Daufort,) did glory in cruelty, have been foolish enough to persuade
themselves that their excessive whipping was some kind of meritorious
work. But whatever these English people thought, they were worse than
others, for in some places of America lived also Swedes, who in regard
of their worship were no less despised by the English, than were the
old Samaritans by the Jews; and yet these Swedes entertained the
Quakers when they came amongst them, far better than the English did:
and thus they made it appear that they surpassed them in life, if not
in possession. But the precise New Englandmen seemed to place great
virtue in a sturdy severity, of which the following is an instance.
A Dutchman, an Ostender, whose name was John Lawrence, was committed
for adultery, and brought before the court at Boston, where the
governor John Endicot, asked him whether he was guilty or not guilty:
to which the prisoner, who it seems spoke but bad English, said ‘No
guilt.’ On which Endicot said in a scoffing manner, ‘No gelt; there’s
no money:’ for gheld signifies money in Dutch. Thus the Dutchman’s
words and meaning were scoffingly perverted; and though there was no
clear evidence against him, yet he was condemned to be hanged; but he
denying the fact, the execution was deferred; and in the meanwhile
the priests, John Wilson and James Mayo, came to him in prison to see
what they could get out of him; and Mayo told him his time was near at
an end, and that he must shortly die: and therefore he would have him
now confess. To which the prisoner returned, ‘What will you have me to
confess that which I never did?’ But Mayo did not desist, but said,
‘Confess, my son, and give glory to God.’ Yet the prisoner continued in
denying the charge, and affirmed he was clear. But, said the priest,
‘You cannot be clear; for our Lord and Saviour saith. “Whosoever
looketh upon a fair woman, and lusteth after her, he hath committed
adultery with her already in his heart.”’ Truly a very perverse use of
the Scripture for compassing a false end. But the Dutchman seeing how
they came to betray him, was cautious, and at length, after a long and
tedious imprisonment, found means to break prison, and thus escaped
from those who grew accustomed to be merciless; so that sometimes
others as well as Quakers, felt the weight of their severity.
As it happened about the time that William Leddra was put to death,
one Elizabeth Nicholson and her two sons, Christopher and Joseph,
were charged with the death of her husband and their father Edmund
Nicholson, who was found dead in the sea; and information being given
that these people did show love to those they called cursed Quakers,
they were all three fetched from their habitation at Salem and carried
to Boston, and were tried for their lives merely on suspicion; but
nothing of murder was proved against them; yet the mother was fined a
great sum, and her two sons were sentenced to stand under the gallows
certain hours, with ropes about their necks, and to be whipped in the
market place, which was performed accordingly. And because these young
men were not daunted, priest Wilson standing by, said, ‘Ah, cursed
generation.’ And at Salem they were whipped also, which was done so
mercilessly that one of the young men sunk down, or died away under the
torture, though he was raised up and came to life again.
By this we may see how these New England persecutors were become inured
to excessive severity. But before I leave them, I must also mention the
dreadful exit of some of them.
The last act of governor Endicot’s bloody part that occurs, was the
cruel whipping of Edward Wharton at Boston, related before; for the
time was now come that he must go off the stage, to give an account
of his extravagant severity before another tribunal than that of his
sanguinary court. The measure of his iniquity was now filled up, and
he was visited with a loathsome disease, insomuch that he stunk alive,
and so died with rottenness, his name being like to give a bad savour
through ages to come.
Yet more remarkable was the death of major-general Adderton, who when
Mary Dyar was hanged, said scoffingly, and in an insulting way, that
she hung as a flag, for others to take example by; and who also, when
Wenlock Christison being condemned to death, warned the persecutors
because of the righteous judgments of God, presumptuously said, ‘You
pronounce woes and judgments, and those that are gone before you
pronounced woes and judgments; but the judgments of the Lord God, are
not come upon us as yet.’ But how he himself was struck by these
judgments, and served for an example to others, we are to see now.
He, upon a certain day, having exercised his soldiers, and riding
proudly on his horse towards his house, when he came about the place
where usually they loosed the Quakers, so called, from the cart, after
they had whipped them, a cow came and crossed the way, at which his
horse taking fright, threw him down so violently, that he died, his
eyes being started out of his head, his brains out of his nose, his
tongue out of his mouth, and his blood out of his ears. Thus God’s
judgments came upon him suddenly and unawares.
And John Norton, the chief priest of Boston died likewise on a sudden.
It was he who promoted the putting to death of those martyrs that died
at Boston, as hath been related; and when he saw the magistrates paused
upon the execution of W. Robinson and M. Stevenson, he encouraged them
thereto, especially because John Winthrop, governor of Connecticut,
earnestly dissuaded the shedding of innocent blood. He it was also, who
when William Brend was beaten so barbarously with a rope, as hath been
related in its due place, did not stick to say, since William Brend
endeavoured to beat their gospel ordinances black and blue, it was but
just upon him if he was beaten black and blue also. But this Norton
was now struck with a blow that made him sink: for having been at his
worship-house in the forenoon, and intending to go in the afternoon, as
he was walking in his house he fetched a great groan, and leaning his
head against the mantle tree of the chimney, he was heard to say, ‘The
hand, or the judgments of the Lord are upon me.’ These were his last
words, and he sunk down, and had fallen into the fire if he had not
been caught by somebody that was present. More examples of this nature
I could produce, but these may suffice.
What I have related of these cruelties and much more, was published in
print about that time, that so the king and parliament of England might
know what happened there; for those actions were come in public view,
and known there all about the country. All that they did was to set a
false colour upon their severity, and to disguise matters: and it was
their happiness that they had not to do with revengeful people, else
they might have been involved in great straits: but the friends of the
persecuted committed vengeance to God; though some of the great ones
in England advised them to sue the persecutors, which according to law
they might have done.
Richard Bellingham, a fierce persecutor, and governor after John
Endicot, went distracted ten years after, and so died. Not long before,
William Coddington, governor of Rhode Island, wrote a letter to him,
wherein he put him in mind of the former times; for he, (the said
Coddington,) had been one of the first erectors of colonies in New
England, and the first that built a house at Boston, and afterwards
was a magistrate seven years, but when persecution arose he declared
against it; and the case was debated three days in the court, but the
moderate party was the weakest, and was opposed by all the priests,
except one John Cotton, who said he remembered how at their departure
from England he had preached on Acts, iv. 11, and had showed from that
text that there was an inward grace which was to be minded, and that
therefore he would not give his vote for persecuting the asserters
of that doctrine; showing thereby much more sense of religion than
the other persecuting priests. Now though Coddington was one of the
greatest merchants or traders in that country, and in all probability
might have acquired great riches there, yet seeing his good counsel was
not hearkened to, he resolved to depart that place, and to go and live
somewhere else. But whatever he said in his letter to Bellingham, this
man remained hardened like Pharaoh, having showed himself cruel, even
when Mary Fisher and Anne Austin first came to Boston, where he treated
them in a barbarous manner.
Yet one thing remarkable I may mention here, which when I first heard,
I could not fully give credit to; but thinking it worth the while to
make a narrow inquiry into it, I did so, not only by writing, but also
from the mouths of persons that had been eye-witnesses, or had been
informed by such; and from these I got this concurring observation,
viz. that the country about Boston was formerly a very fruitful soil
that produced excellent wheat; but that since the time this town had
been stained with the blood of the Quakers, so called, no wheat, &c.
would grow to perfection within twenty miles, though the ground had
been ploughed and sown several times; for sometimes what was sown was
spoiled by vermin or insects; at other times it grew up, but scarce
yielded more than was sown, and so could not countervail the charge;
and in another year the expected harvest was quashed by another
accident; and these disappointments continuing many years, the people
at length grew weary of making further trial, and so left the ground
untilled; notwithstanding that twenty miles off from Boston the soil
is fruitful, and yields very good corn. But there having been so many
reiterated instances of unfruitfulness nearer the town, ancient people
that are alive still, and remember the first times, generally agree
in their opinion that this is a judgment from heaven, and a curse on
the land, because of the shedding of innocent blood at Boston. This
relation I had from so many credible persons, (though the one knew
nothing of the other, as differing much in time,) yet what they told me
did so well agree in the main, that I could not but believe it, though
I do not use to be credulous; and therefore I have been the more exact
in my inquiry, so that I can no longer question the case; but it seems
to me as a punishment on that blood-thirstiness which now hath ceased
long ago.
In the island of Barbadoes those called Quakers suffered also much by
the people, instigated not a little by the priests, Samuel Graves,
Mathew Gray, Thomas Manwaring, and Francis Smith; for these being
often drunk, gave occasion thereby to be reproved: and one Thomas
Clark coming once into the place of public worship, and exhorting the
auditors to desist from lewdness, and to fear God, was so grievously
beaten with sticks, that he fell down in a swoon; and Graves who had
preached then, went to the house of the said Clark, pulled his wife out
of doors, and tore her clothes from her back. And Manwaring, who had
threatened Clark that he would procure a law to be made, by which his
ears should be cut off, once wrote in a letter to him, ‘I am sorry that
your zeal surpasseth your moderation, and that a club must beat out of
you what the devil hath inspired.’ And this was because Clark had told
him that his conversation was not becoming a minister of the Gospel.
Other rough treatment Clark met with I pass by, though once he was set
in the stocks and imprisoned. But now I leave America, and return to
England.