CONTENTIONS IN MARYLAND
(1633-1652)
The delay in the constitutional adjustment of Maryland, while mainly
attributable to the proprietors, was partially due to the prolonged
struggle with Virginia, which for years absorbed nearly all the
energies of the infant community. The decision of the Commissioners
for Foreign Plantations in July, 1633, disallowing the Virginia claim
to unoccupied lands, was construed by the Virginians to mean that the
king at any rate intended to respect actual possession. Now, prior to
the Maryland charter, colonization in Virginia was stretching
northward. In 1630, Chiskiack, on the York River, was settled; and in
August, 1631, Claiborne planted a hundred men on Kent Island, one
hundred and fifty miles from Jamestown.[1]
Though established under a license from the king for trade, Kent
Island had all the appearance of a permanent settlement. Its
inhabitants were never at any time as badly off as the settlers in the
early days at Jamestown and Plymouth, and the island itself was
stocked with cattle and had orchards and gardens, fields of tobacco,
windmills for grinding corn, and women resident upon it. Had it,
however, been only a trading-post, the extension over it of the laws
of Virginia made the settlement a legal occupation. And we are told of
Kent that warrants from Jamestown were directed there. "One man was
brought down and tried in Virginia for felony, and many were arrested
for debt and returned to appeare at James City."[2] In February, 1632,
Kent Island and Chiskiack were represented at Jamestown by a common
delegate, Captain Nicholas Martian.[3] The political existence of the
whole Virginia colony, and its right to take up and settle lands, the
king expressly recognized.
Accordingly, when Leonard Calvert, on his arrival at Point Comfort in
February, 1634, called upon Claiborne to recognize Baltimore's
paramount sovereignty over Kent Island, because of its lying within
the limits of his charter, the council of Virginia, at the request of
Claiborne, considered the claim, and declared that the colony had as
much right to Kent Island as to "any other part of the country given
by his majesty's patent" in 1609.[4] After this, acquiescence in
Baltimore's wishes would have been treason, and Claiborne declined to
acknowledge Lord Baltimore's authority in Kent Island, and continued
to trade in the bay as freely as formerly.
Calvert's instructions[5] had been, in case of such a refusal, not to
molest Claiborne for at least a year. But Captain Fleet, Claiborne's
rival in the fur trade, started a story that Claiborne was the
originator of the rumor which so greatly alarmed the Indians at the
time of the arrival of the emigrants at St. Mary's. Though Claiborne
promptly repelled the calumny, Baltimore, in September, 1634, sent an
order to his brother Leonard to seize Kent Island, arrest Claiborne,
and hold him prisoner.[6] As this mandate was contrary to the order in
July, 1633, of the lords commissioners, which enjoined the parties to
preserve "good correspondence one with another," Claiborne's partners
petitioned the king against it.
Thereupon the king, by an order[7] dated October 8, 1634, peremptorily
warned Lord Baltimore, or his agents, "not to interrupt the people of
Kent Island in their fur trade or plantation." Nevertheless, April 5,
1635, Thomas Cornwallis, one of the Maryland councillors, confiscated
a pinnace of Claiborne's for illegal trading, and this act brought on
a miniature war in which several persons on both sides were killed.[8]
Great excitement prevailed in both colonies, and in Virginia the
people arrested Harvey, their governor, who upheld Cornwallis's
conduct, and shipped him off to England; while two of the councillors
were sent to Maryland to protest against the violent proceedings
affecting Claiborne.[9]
These measures induced a truce, and for nearly three years there were
no further hostilities in the bay. Claiborne brought his case before
the king, who referred it to the Lords Commissioners for Plantations;
then, as his partners feared to take further risk, he carried on the
trade in the bay almost solely with his own servants and resources. In
December, 1636, these partners, becoming dissatisfied at their loss of
profit, made the capital mistake of sending, as their agent to Kent
Island, George Evelin, who pretended at first to be an ardent
supporter of Claiborne, but presently, under a power of attorney,
claimed control over all the partnership stock.
Claiborne, naturally indignant and not suspecting any danger, sailed
for England in May, 1637, to settle accounts with his partners, having
just previously established another settlement on Palmer's Island at
the mouth of the Susquehanna River, believed by him to be north of the
Maryland patent. After he was gone, Evelin tried to persuade the
inhabitants to disown Claiborne and submit to Lord Baltimore; and when
they declined he urged Governor Calvert to attempt the reduction of
the island by force. After some hesitation the latter consented, and
while the assembly was sitting at St. Mary's, in February, 1638,
Calvert made a landing at night with thirty men, and, taking the
inhabitants by surprise, succeeded in reducing the island to
submission.[10]
Calvert's after-conduct reflects little credit upon his reputation for
leniency. In March, 1638, he caused Claiborne to be attainted by the
assembly as a rebel and his property confiscated, and Thomas Smith,
who commanded one of Claiborne's pinnaces in the battles three years
before, was tried and hanged for murder and piracy.[11] In England, in
the mean time, Claiborne and Baltimore were contending zealously for
the favor of the king. Both had powerful interests behind them, but
Baltimore's were the stronger. At last the Commissioners for Foreign
Plantations rendered a report (April 4, 1638), giving Kent Island and
the right of trade in the bay wholly to Lord Baltimore, leaving all
personal wrongs to be redressed by the courts.
The question of title at least seemed settled, and in October, 1638,
Sir John Harvey, now restored as governor of Virginia, issued a
proclamation recognizing the validity of the decision. Claiborne
submitted, and, being left to "the course of the law," empowered
George Scovell to recover, if possible, some of the confiscated
property in Maryland; but Scovell was told that the law-courts of
Maryland were closed against such a rebel as Claiborne.[12] The
justice of the English decision depends on the impartiality of the
board which made it, and of any board with Bishop Laud at the head
only partisanship could be expected.
While these turbulent proceedings were going on, the Jesuit priests
introduced into the colony by Lord Baltimore were performing a work of
peace and love. They visited the Indian tribes and made many Christian
converts. Tayac, chief of the Piscataquas, received baptism, and his
example was followed by the chiefs and inhabitants of Port Tobacco.
The main trouble came from the Nanticokes on the eastern shore, and
the fierce Susquehannas to the north of the settlements, and at
different times armed expeditions were sent out against them; but
there was nothing like a war.
For sixteen years the only clergy in the colony were priests, who were
so zealous in their propaganda that nearly all the Protestants who
came in 1638 were converted to Catholicism and many later conversions
were made.[13] Nevertheless, the Catholic governor and council acted
up to the spirit of the instructions given by Baltimore to his brother
on the sailing of the first emigrants from the port of London, and
would permit no language tending to insult or breach of peace. Not
long after the arrival at St. Mary's a proclamation to this end was
issued, of which only two violations appear in the records; in both
cases the offenders were Roman Catholics, and they were arrested and
promptly punished.[14]
Baltimore would not even exempt the Jesuit priests in Maryland from
the ordinary laws as to lands and taxes, and by the "Conditions of
Plantations," published in 1648, he prohibited any society, temporal
or spiritual, from taking up land.[15] In 1643 his liberality carried
him so far as to induce him to extend, through Major Edward Gibbons,
an invitation to the Puritans of Massachusetts to emigrate to
Maryland, with a full assurance of "free liberty of religion"; but
Winthrop grimly writes, "None of our people had temptation that
way."[16]
In the year of this invitation the possibility of a new shuffle of the
political cards occurred through the breaking out of the war so long
brewing in England between the king and Parliament. The struggle of
party made itself strongly felt in Maryland, where, among the
Protestants, sympathy with Parliament was supplemented by hatred of
Catholics. In 1643, Governor Leonard Calvert repaired to England,
where he received letters of marque from the king at Oxford
commissioning him to seize ships belonging to Parliament. Accordingly,
when, three months later, in January, 1644, Captain Richard Ingle
arrived in his ship at St. Mary's and uttered some blatant words
against the king, he was arrested by Acting Governor Brent, for
treason. The charges were dismissed by the grand jury as unfounded,
but Brent treated Ingle harshly, and fined and exiled Thomas
Cornwallis for assisting the captain in escaping.[17]
In September, 1644, when Calvert returned to Maryland, there were
strong symptoms of revolt, which came to a head when Ingle came back
to St. Mary's with a commission from Parliament in February, 1645.
Chaotic times ensued, during which Catholics were made victims of the
cruel prejudices of the Protestants. The two Jesuit priests, Father
Andrew White and Father Philip Fisher, were arrested, loaded with
irons,[18] and sent prisoners into England, while Leonard Calvert
himself was driven from Maryland into Virginia.[19]
During these tumults so many persons went over from Virginia to
Maryland that the Virginia assembly sent Captain Edward Hill and
Captain Thomas Willoughby to compel the return of the absentees,[20]
with curious result. As the province was without a governor, some of
the council of Maryland issued, in the name of the refugee Calvert, a
commission to Hill to act as governor of Maryland. The revolutionists
flattered themselves that a stable government under a Protestant
governor was now at hand. But the unexpected came to pass, when, in
December, 1646, Governor Calvert suddenly appeared with a strong body
of soldiers furnished by Sir William Berkeley and re-established his
authority by capturing both Hill and the Protestant assembly then
sitting at St. Mary's.
These two years of civil war in Maryland are called the "plundering
time." Claiborne again appears, though there is no evidence that he
had any part in Ingle's spoliations.[21] He did visit Kent Island
about Christmas, 1645, and put Captain Brent, to whom Governor Calvert
had assigned his house and property, in a terrible fright. One year
later he visited the island a second time, when he offered to aid the
Kent Islanders in marching upon St. Mary's with a view of reinstating
Hill. When the men of Kent declined to take the risk, Claiborne
returned to Virginia, and Kent Island fell once more under the
government of Lord Baltimore.[22] On this visit Claiborne, instead of
posing as a friend of the Parliament, showed a commission and letter
from the king, by whom he appears to have stood till the king's death
in 1649. Charles I., in his turn, who deposed Lord Baltimore as a
"notorious parliamentarian," appointed Claiborne, in 1642, treasurer
of Virginia;[23] and Charles II. included his name among the list of
councillors in the commission issued by Sir William Berkeley in
1650.[24]
While Maryland was thus convulsed with civil war an ordinance settling
the Maryland government in Protestant hands passed the House of Lords.
Before the Commons could concur, Lord Baltimore appeared and asked for
time to inquire into the charges. This was after the battle of Marston
Moor, and perhaps marks the moment when Lord Baltimore, conceiving the
king's cause desperate, began to trim his sails to the parliamentary
side. His request was granted, and Parliament, diverted from immediate
action, left Baltimore's authority unaffected for several years.[25]
In this interval Baltimore busied himself in reorganizing his
government on a Protestant basis. Leonard Calvert died in June, 1647,
not long after his _coup d'état_ at St. Mary's, and upon his deathbed
he appointed Thomas Greene, a Catholic and royalist, as his successor.
Lord Baltimore removed him and appointed in his stead a Protestant,
Captain William Stone, of Northampton County, Virginia, giving him a
Protestant secretary and a Protestant majority of councillors. Yet
Baltimore took care not to surrender the cardinal principle of his
government. Before Stone and his chief officers were allowed to take
office they were required to swear not to "molest any person in the
colony professing to believe in Jesus Christ for or in respect of his
or her religion, and in particular no Roman Catholic."[26]
The famous Toleration Act of 1649 was passed at the first assembly
succeeding Stone's appointment. It was very probably in great part a
copy of a bill in the code of sixteen laws which Baltimore sent over
at this time, and it very nearly repeated the provisions of the oath
required of Governor Stone. While the terms of the act did not place
the right on that broad plane of universal principle stated later in
the Virginia Declaration of Rights, it proclaimed toleration, even if
it was a toleration of a very limited nature.[27]
Stone had recommended himself to Calvert by promising to lead five
hundred persons of British or Irish descent[28] into Maryland; and
this engagement he was soon able to perform through the Puritans,
whose story of persecution in Virginia has been already related. The
new emigrants called the country where they settled "Providence," from
feelings akin to those which led Roger Williams to give that
comforting name to his settlement on Narragansett Bay. They were to
prove a thorn in Baltimore's flesh, but for the moment they seemed
tolerably submissive. In January, 1650, soon after their arrival,
Governor Stone called an assembly to meet at St. Mary's in April, and
to this assembly the colony at "Providence" sent two representatives,
one of whom was made speaker.
Apprehension of William Claiborne was still felt, and the assembly,
though dominated by the new-comers, declared their readiness to resist
any attempts of his to seize Kent Island.[29] Only in one particular
at this time did they oppose Lord Baltimore's policy. The oath of
fidelity required them to acknowledge Lord Baltimore as "absolute
lord" and his jurisdiction as "royal jurisdiction."[30] The Puritans,
having scruples about these words, struck them out and inserted a
proviso that the oath "be not in any wise understood to infringe or
prejudice liberty of conscience."[31] About this time Charles II.,
although a powerless exile, issued an order deposing Baltimore from
his government and appointing Sir William Davenant as his successor,
for the reason that Baltimore "did visibly adhere to the rebels in
England and admit all kinds of schismatics and sectaries and
ill-affected persons into the plantation."[32]
Thus when Parliament soon after took up his case again, Lord Baltimore
came full-handed with proofs of loyalty to the commonwealth. His
enemies produced evidence that Charles II., in 1649, was proclaimed in
Maryland, but Baltimore showed that it was done without his authority
by Thomas Greene, who acted as governor a second time during a brief
absence of Captain Stone from Maryland. When they accused him of being
an enemy of Protestants he produced the proclamation of Charles II.,
deposing him from the government on account of his adherence to them.
Finally, he exhibited a declaration in his behalf signed by many of
the Puritan emigrants from Virginia, among whom were William Durand,
their elder, and James Cox and Samuel Puddington, the two burgesses
from Providence in the assembly of 1650.[33]
Nevertheless, Baltimore played a losing game. At heart the Puritans in
England were unfriendly to him because of his religion; and, when
persistent rumors reached Maryland that Baltimore's patent was doomed,
some of the men of Providence appeared in England and urged that it be
revoked.[34] At length, October 3, 1650, Parliament passed an
ordinance authorizing the Council of State to reduce to obedience
Barbadoes, Antigua, Bermudas, and "Virginia," the last being a term
which in England was often used to include Maryland. Baltimore
struggled hard to have Maryland left out of the instructions drawn up
afterwards by the Council of State; but though he was apparently
successful, a descriptive phrase including his province was inserted,
for the commissioners, Curtis, Claiborne, and Bennett, with an armed
fleet, were instructed "to use their best endeavors to reduce _all the
plantations within the Bay of Chesopiack_ to their due obedience to
the Parliament of England."[35]
After the commissioners had reduced Virginia, they found even less
resistance in Maryland. The commissioners landed at St. Mary's, and,
professing their intention to respect the "just rights" of Lord
Baltimore, demanded that Stone should change the form of the writs
from the name of Lord Baltimore to that of Parliament. Stone at first
declined to comply, and the commissioners, March 29, 1652, put the
government into the hands of a council of leading Protestants. Stone
then reconsidered his action, and Claiborne and Bennett, returning to
St. Mary's, restored him to the government, June 28, 1652, in
conjunction with the councillors already appointed. The ascendency of
Claiborne seemed complete, but beyond renewing his property claim to
Kent and Palmer islands, he did not then further interfere.[36]
Maryland consisted at this time of four counties: St. Mary's, erected
in 1634, Kent, 1642, and Charles and Anne Arundelin 1650, and
contained a population perhaps of eight thousand. The settlements
reached on both sides of the bay, from the Potomac to the Susquehanna.
Society was distinctly democratic, for while there were favored
families there was no privileged class, and the existence of African
slavery and the temporary servitude of convicts and redemptioners
tended to place all freemen on an equality. As there was no state
church, educational opportunities in the province were small, but it
was a land of plenty and hospitality, and charity in religion made the
execution of the criminal law singularly mild. In spite of turmoils
and dissensions, Maryland prospered and flourished. A home feeling
existed, and there were many even among the recent exiles from
Virginia who looked with hope to its future and spoke of it as "a
country in which I desire to spend the remnant of my days, in which I
covet to make my grave."[37]
[Footnote 1: _Md. Archives_, III., 32.]
[Footnote 2: _Md. Archives_, V., 158.]
[Footnote 3: Hening, _Statutes_, I., 154. ]
[Footnote 4: _Md. Archives_, III., 33. ]
[Footnote 5: Browne, _George and Cecilius Calvert_, 49.]
[Footnote 6: _Md. Archives_, V., 164-168.]
[Footnote 7: Ibid., III., 29.]
[Footnote 8: Neill, _Founders of Maryland_, 51.]
[Footnote 9: _Md. Archives_ III., 37.]
[Footnote 10: Browne, _George and Cecilius Calvert_, 69.]
[Footnote 11: _Md. Archives_, V., 187.]
[Footnote 12: _Md. Archives_, III., 42-93.]
[Footnote 13: White, _Relation_ (Force, _Tracts_, IV., No. xii.).]
[Footnote 14: _Md. Archives_, I., 119, IV., 38.]
[Footnote 15: _Calvert Papers_ (Md. Hist. Soc., _Fund Publications_,
No. 35), 166, 216, 217; _Md. Archives_, III., 227.]
[Footnote 16: Winthrop, _New England_, II., 179.]
[Footnote 17: _Md. Archives_, IV., 246-249.]
[Footnote 18: Neill, _Founders of Maryland_, 75; _Md. Archives_, III.,
165, 177.]
[Footnote 19: Bozman, _Maryland_, II., 293.]
[Footnote 20: Hening, _Statutes_, I., 321.]
[Footnote 21: Bozman, _Maryland_, II., 296.]
[Footnote 22: _Md. Archives_, IV., 281, 435, 458, 459.]
[Footnote 23: Hazard, _State Papers_, I., 493.]
[Footnote 24: _Cal. of State Pap., Col._, 1574-1660, p. 340.]
[Footnote 25: _Md. Archives_, III., 164, 180, 187.]
[Footnote 26: _Md. Archives_, III., 211, 214.]
[Footnote 27: Ibid., I., 244-247.]
[Footnote 28: Ibid., III., 201.]
[Footnote 29: _Md. Archives_, I., 261, 287.]
[Footnote 30: Ibid., III., 196.]
[Footnote 31: Ibid., I., 305.]
[Footnote 32: Neill, _Terra Mariæ_, 88.]
[Footnote 33: Bozman, _Maryland_, II., 672.]
[Footnote 34: _Md. Archives_, III., 259.]
[Footnote 35: _Md. Archives_, III., 265.]
[Footnote 36: Ibid., 271-277.]
[Footnote 37: Hammond, _Leah and Rachel_ (Force, _Tracts_, III., No.
xiv.).]