The Rev. Mr. George Whitefield, in one of his sermons, gave them the

following character: “I have found,” said he, “the people of

Connecticut the wisest of any upon the continent; they are the best

friends and the worst enemies; they are hair-brained bigots on all

sides, and they may be compared to the horse and mule, without bit and

bridle. In other colonies I have paid for food and lodging, but could

never spend one penny in fruitful Connecticut, whose banks flow with

milk and honey, and whose sons and daughters never fail to feed and

refresh the weary traveller, without money and without price.”

On Saturday evenings the people look sour and sad; on the Sabbath they

appear to have lost their dearest friends, and are almost speechless;

they walk softly; they even observe it with more exactness than did

the Jews. A Quaker preacher told them, with much truth, that they

worshipped the Sabbath, and not the God of the Sabbath. These

hospitable people, without charity, condemned the Quaker as a

blasphemer of the holy Sabbath, fined, tarred, and feathered him, put

a rope about his neck, and plunged him into the sea; but he escaped

with life, though he was about seventy years of age.

In 1750 an episcopal clergyman, born and educated in England, who had

been in holy orders above twenty years, once broke their sabbatical

law by combing a discomposed lock of hair on the top of his wig; at

another time, for making a humming noise, which they called whistling;

at a third time, by walking too fast from church; at a fourth, by

running into church when it rained; at a fifth, by walking in his

garden and picking a bunch of grapes: for which several crimes he was

complained of by the Grand Jury, had warrants granted against him, was

seized, brought to trial, and paid a considerable sum of money. At

last, overwhelmed with persecution and vexation, he cried out: “No

Briton, nay, no Jew, should assume any public character in Connecticut

till he has served an apprenticeship of ten years in it; for I have

been here seven years, and strictly observed the Jewish law concerning

the Sabbath, yet find myself remiss in respect to the perfect law of

liberty!”

The people are extremely fond of strangers passing through the colony,

but very averse to foreigners settling among them; which few have done

without ruin to their characters and fortunes, by detraction and

lawsuits, unless recommended as men of grace by some known and revered

republican protestant in Europe. The following story may be amusing:

An English gentleman, during a short residence in a certain town, had

the good luck to receive some civilities from the Deacon, Minister,

and Justice. The Deacon had a daughter, without beauty, but sensible

and rich. The Briton (for that was the name he went by), having

received a present from the West-Indies of some pineapples and

sweetmeats, sent his servant with part of it to the Deacon’s daughter,

to whom, at the same time, he addressed a complimentary note, begging

Miss would accept the pineapples and sweetmeats, and wishing he might

be able to make her a better present. Miss, on reading the note, was

greatly alarmed, and exclaimed, “Mamma, mamma! Mr. Briton has sent me

a love-letter.” The mother read the note and shewed it to the Deacon,

and, after due consideration, both agreed in pronouncing it a

love-letter. The lawyer, justice, and parson were sent for, who in

council weighed every word in the note, together with the golden

temptation which the lady possessed, and were of opinion that the

writer was in love, and that the note was a love-letter, but worded so

carefully that the law could not punish Briton for attempting to court

Miss without having obtained her parents’ consent. The parson wrung

his hands, rolled up his eyes, shrugged up his shoulders, groaned out

his hypocritical grief, and said, “Deacon, I hope you do not blame me

for having been the innocent cause of your knowing this imprudent and

haughty Briton. There is something very odd in all the Britons; but I

thought this man had some prudence and modesty however, Deacon,”

putting his hand on his breast, and bowing, with a pale, deceitful

face, “I shall in future shun all Britons, for they are all strange

creatures.” The lawyer and justice made their apologies, and were

sorry that Briton did not consider the quality of the Deacon’s

daughter before he wrote the letter. Miss, all apprehension and tears,

at finding that no punishment could reach Briton in the course of law,

cried out to her counsellors, “Who is Briton? Am I not the Deacon’s

daughter? What have I done, that he should take such liberties with

me? Is he not the natural son of some priest, or foundling? Ought he

not to be exposed for his assurance to the Deacon’s daughter?”

Her words took effect. The council voted that they would show their

contempt of Briton by neglecting him for the time to come. On his

return home, the parson, after many great signs of surprise, informed

his wife of the awful event which had happened by the imprudence of

Briton. She soon communicated the secret to her sister-gossips,

prudently cautioning them not to report it as from her. But, not

content with that, the parson himself went among all his acquaintance,

shaking his head, and saying, “O sirs! have you heard of the strange

conduct of friend Briton--how he wrote a love-letter, and sent it, with

some pineapples, to the Deacon’s daughter? My wife and I had a great

friendship for Briton, but cannot see him any more.”

Thus the affected parson told this important tale to every one except

Briton, who, from his ignorance of the story, conducted himself in his

usual manner towards his supposed friends, though he observed they had

a show of haste and business whenever he met with any of them. Happily

for Briton, he depended not on the Deacon, minister, or colony, for

his support. At last a Scotchman heard of the evil tale, and

generously told Briton of it, adding that the parson was supposed to

be in deep decline merely from grief and fatigue he had endured in

spreading it. Briton thanked the Scotchman, and called on the friendly

parson to know the particulars of his offence. The parson, with sighs,

bows, and solemn smirkings, answered, “Sir, the fact is, you wrote a

love-letter to the Deacon’s daughter without asking her parents’

consent; which has given great offence to that lady, and to all her

acquaintance, of whom I and my wife have the honour to be reckoned a

part.” Briton kept his temper. “So, then,” said he, “I have offended

you by my insolent note to the Deacon’s daughter! I hope my sin is

venial. Pray, sir, have you seen my note?” “Yes,” replied the parson,

“to my grief and sorrow. I could not have thought you so imprudent,

had I not seen and found the note to be your own handwriting.” “How

long have you known of this offence?” “Some months.” “Why, sir, did

you not seasonably admonish me for this crime?” “I was so hurt and

grieved, and my friendship so great, I could not bear to tell you.”

Mr. Briton then told the parson that his friendship was so fine and

subtle, it was invisible to an English eye; and the Gospel ministers

in England did not prove their friendship by telling calumnious

stories to everybody but the person concerned. “But I suppose,” added

he, “this is genuine New-England friendship, and merits thanks more

than a supple-jack.” The parson, with a leering look, sneaked away

towards his wife; and Briton left the colony without any civil or

ecclesiastical punishment, telling the Scotchman that the Deacon’s

daughter had money, and the parson faith without eyes, or he should

never have been accused of making love to one who was naturally so

great an enemy to Cupid. Of such or worse sort being the reception

foreign settlers may expect from the inhabitants of Connecticut, it is

no wonder that few, or none, choose to venture among them.

The custom of settling and dismissing a sober dissenting minister is

very singular. All the parishioners meet and vote to apply to the

Association for a candidate, and one is accordingly sent. If he

pleases, the people vote to give him a call; if he accepts the call,

the actual communicants, and they alone, make the covenant between him

and them as Christ’s Church, and thus they are married to him. After

the candidate is ordained, others, by acknowledging and swearing to

support the covenant, become married to him also. (N. B. Baptism is

not sufficient to take them out of their natural state.) The call is

an invitation from the parishioners to the candidate to take upon him

the ministerial office of their Church, on condition that he be

allowed 300_l._ or 400_l._ settlement, and perhaps 100_l._ salary,

besides wood, &c. &c. during his residence among them in that

capacity. The candidate, after looking round him and finding no better

terms offered from any other parish, answers in this manner: “Brethren

and friends, I have considered your call, and, after many fastings and

prayers, I find it to be the call of God, and close with your offer.”

The Church then appoints a day for his ordination, and the ministers

who shall assist in the ceremony, which is as follows:

1. The meeting is opened with a hymn. 2. Some one makes a prayer. 3.

Another hymn succeeds. 4. A sermon. 5. Another prayer. 6. The covenant

is read. 7. The prayer of consecration, with imposition of hands by

the minister. 8. The right hand of fellowship, which conveys that half

of ministerial power which I have already spoken of as communicated by

the Churches. 9. The charge--that is, to behave well in the office

whereto God has called him. 10. Prayer. 11. Another hymn. 12. The

young minister dismisses with his benediction. Numerous as the

ceremonies are in a minister’s ordination, there are but few judged

necessary in dismissing him; a majority of the Church is enough to

turn the minister from bed and board, or, in their language, “to

divorce him”--which happens more frequently than is decent. The

minister has no remedy but in appealing to the Association, which step

entitles him to his salary till dismissed by that powerful body.

Incontinency, intemperance, lying, and idleness, are the common

accusations brought against the minister, but seldom founded in truth,

and yet always proved by knights of the post. However, the minister

carries off his settlement in case he is dismissed for immoralities,

but not if he turns Churchman; then his old parishioners are mean

enough to sue for the settlement. A recent instance of this kind

happened at New-London, where the minister, Doctor Mather Byles,

desired a dismission, which was given him; but, finding the Doctor’s

design was to become a Churchman, the people demanded the settlement

given him twelve years before. The Doctor, with a spirit worthy of

himself and his venerable ancestors, returned the money, with, “You

are welcome to it, since it proves to the world that you could not

accuse me of anything more agreeable to ungenerous minds.”

The manner of visiting the sick in this province is more terrible than

charitable. The minister demands of the sick if he be converted, when,

and where. If the answer is conformable to the system of the minister,

it is very well; if not, the sick is given over as a non-elect, and no

object of prayer. Another minister is then sent for, who asks if the

sick be willing to die--if he hates God--if he be willing to be damned,

if it please God to damn him? Should he answer No, this minister quits

him, as the former. Finally, the sick man dies, and so falls out of

their hands into better.

Amidst all the darkness of superstition that surrounds the State, the

humanity it shows to poor strangers seized with sickness in the

colony, or to such persons as are shipwrecked upon its coasts, shines

with distinguished lustre. These unfortunate sufferers are immediately

provided with the necessaries of every kind, by order of the

selectmen, whose expenses are reimbursed out of the colony Treasury.

Thus is laudably employed a part of the money allowed for

contingencies; but another part is consumed in a very different

manner. It frequently happens that, whenever the episcopalians become

so numerous in a parish as to gain the ascendency over the _Sober

Dissenters_, and the latter cannot, by their own strength, either

destroy the episcopal or support their own Church, the Governor and

Council, with the advice of the Consociation, kindly relieve them with

an annual grant out of the public Treasury, sometimes to the amount of

the whole sum paid into it by every denomination of the parish. An act

of charity of this kind lately took place at Chelsea, in Norwich,

where the _Sober Dissenters_ were few and poor, and without a

meeting-house or minister, so that they were obliged to walk a mile to

a meeting, or go to church. The young people chose the latter, which

alarmed the _Sober Dissenters_ to such a degree that they applied for

and obtained from the generous Governor and his virtuous Council

300_l._ per annum out of the Treasury, besides the duties on the

vessels of the Churchmen of that port. This largition enabled them to

build a meeting-house and settle a minister. When the Churchmen

complained of this abuse of the public money, the Governor answered,

“The Assembly has the same right to support christianity as the

Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, or the

Parliament of Great Britain.”

The murmurs of the people on the collection of the revenue bespeak

embezzlements of another kind. It should seem that they believed the

General Assembly to be in the same predicament as the devil thought

Job was, when he said, “Doth Job serve God for nought?”

Estates in Connecticut pass from generation to generation by

gavelkind; so that there are few persons, except of the labouring

class, who have not freeholds of their own to cultivate. A general

mediocrity of station being thus constitutionally promoted, it is no

wonder that the rich man is despised, and the poor man’s blessing is

his poverty. In no part of the world are _les petits_ and _les grands_

so much upon a par as here, where none of the people are destitute of

the conveniences of life and the spirit of independence. From infancy,

their education as citizens points out no distinction between

licentiousness and liberty; and their religion is so muffled with

superstition, self-love, and provincial enmity, as not yet to have

taught them that humanity and respect for others which from others

they demand. Notwithstanding these effects of the levelling plan,

there are many exceptions to be found in the province of gentlemen of

large estates and generous principles.

The people commonly travel on horseback, and the ladies are capable of

teaching their neighbours the art of horsemanship. There are few

coaches in the colony, but many chaises and whiskeys. In winter the

sleigh is used--a vehicle drawn by two horses, and carrying six persons

in its box, which hangs on four posts standing on two steel slides or

large skates.

Dancing, fishing, hunting, skating, and riding in sleighs on the ice,

are all the amusements allowed in this colony.

Smuggling is rivetted in the constitution and practice of the

inhabitants of Connecticut, as much as superstition and religion, and

their province is a storehouse for the smugglers of the neighbouring

colonies. They conscientiously study to cheat the King of those duties

which, they say, God and Nature never intended should be paid. From

the Governor down to the tithing-man, who are sworn to support the

laws, they will aid smugglers, resist collectors, and mob informers.

This being a popular Government, all the officers are appointed by the

freeholders. There are very severe laws against bribery. The

candidates are not suffered to give a dinner, or a glass of cider, on

the day of the election, to a voter. Indeed, bribery is the next

greatest crime to a breach of the Sabbath; yet open bribery, as

established by custom immemorial in Rhode-Island, is more praiseworthy

than the practice of Connecticut. I will give the reader some idea of

the mode in which an election is managed in Connecticut.

All the voters in a township convene in the town meeting-house. One of

the ministers, after prayers, preaches from some such text as, “Jabez

was more honourable than his brethren.” The people keep their seats,

while the constables take their votes in a box; and if a voter has not

his vote written, the constable gives him one. So Jabez is elected;

and the meeting is concluded with a prayer of thanks to the Lord God

of Israel for “turning the hearts of his people against the enemies of

Zion, and for uniting them in Jabez, the man after his own heart.” The

manner in which the preacher treats his text will more particularly

appear from the animadversion of a certain Quaker on one of these

occasions. “Friend,” said he to the pedagogue, “I do thee no wrong in

telling thee that thou hast prayed and preached against bribery, but

forgot to keep thy tongue from speaking evil against thy neighbour.

Dost thou think the Lord will regard thy preaching so much as the

voters whom thou dost call freemen? If thou believest it, thou hast

bribed not only the people, but the Lord also, to reject Ebenezer and

Benjamin.” The preacher called upon the constable to take away this

babbler and open the meeting; which was done, and Ebenezer and

Benjamin were rejected by the voters.

The men in general throughout the province are tall, stout, and

robust. The greatest care is taken of the limbs and bodies of infants,

which are kept straight by means of a board--a practice learnt from the

Indian women, who abhor all crooked people--so that deformity is here a

rarity.

Another custom derived from the Indians is, to welcome a new-born

infant into the world with urine and honey, the effects of which are

wonderful; and hence it is that at groanings there are always a little

hog and a rattle-snake’s skin, the latter of which prevents numbness

and the cramp. The women are fair, handsome, genteel. They have,

indeed, adopted various customs of the Indian women, but cannot learn,

like them, how to support the pains of child-bearing without a groan.

Naturalists and surgeons have not been able to assign the reason why a

negro woman should have a hundred pains, a white woman ten, and an

Indian none. Some have said that the fatigues and hardships which

negroes endure are the cause; but the Indians undergo many more:

others have said it was owing to the change of climate; but this is

suppletory: while the enthusiastic divines attribute it to the sin of

Eve, and to the curse laid on the Canaanites. The deists ask these

divines if Eve was not the common mother of the white, black, and

copper-coloured women, and how it appears that negroes are the

descendants of Canaan? Their answer is, that all Nature is mystery.

The women of Connecticut are strictly virtuous, and to be compared to

the prude rather than the European polite lady. They are not permitted

to read plays; cannot converse about whist, quadrille, or operas, but

will freely talk upon the subject of history, geography, and

mathematics. They are great casuists and polemical divines; and I have

known not a few of them so well skilled in Greek and Latin as often to

put to the blush learned gentlemen.

Notwithstanding the modesty of the females is such that it would be

accounted the greatest rudeness for a gentleman to speak, before a

lady, of a garter, knee, or leg, yet it is thought but a piece of

civility to ask her to bundle--a custom as old as the first settlement

in 1634. It is certainly innocent, virtuous, and prudent, or the

puritans would not have permitted it to prevail among their offspring,

for whom, in general, they would suffer crucifixion. Children brought

up with the chastest ideas, with so much religion as to believe that

the omniscient God sees them in the dark, and that angels guard them

when absent from their parents, will not--nay, cannot--act a wicked

thing. People who are influenced more by lust than a serious faith in

God, who is too pure to behold iniquity with approbation, ought never

to bundle. If any man, thus a stranger to the love of virtue, of God,

and the christian religion, should bundle with a young lady in

New-England, and behave himself unseemly towards her, he must first

melt her into passion, and expel heaven, death, and hell, from her

mind, or he will undergo the chastisement of negroes turned mad; if he

escapes with life, it will be owing to the parents flying from their

beds to protect him.

The Indians, who had this method of courtship when the English arrived

among them in 1634, are the most chaste set of people in the world.

Concubinage and fornication are vices none of them are addicted to,

except such as forsake the laws of Hobbomockow and turn christians.

The savages have taken many female prisoners, carried them back three

hundred miles into their country, and kept them several years, and yet

not a single instance of their violating the laws of chastity has ever

been known. This cannot be said of the French, or of the English,

whenever Indian or other women have fallen into their hands. I am no

advocate for temptation, yet must say that bundling has prevailed 160

years in New-England, and, I verily believe, with ten times more

chastity than the sitting on a sofa. About the year 1756, Boston,

Salem, Newport, and New York, resolving to be more polite than their

ancestors, forbade their daughters bundling on the bed with any young

man whatever, and introduced a sofa, to render courtship more

palatable and Turkish. Whatever it was owing to, whether to the sofa

or any uncommon excess of the _feu d’esprit_, there went abroad a

report that the _raffinage_ produced more natural consequences than

all the bundling among the boors with their _rurales pendantes_

through every village in New-England besides.

In 1766, a clergyman from one of the polite towns went into the

country and preached against the unchristian custom of young men and

maidens lying together upon the same bed. He was no sooner out of the

Church, than attacked by a shoal of good old women, with, “Sir, do you

think we and our daughters are naughty because we allow bundling?”

“You lead yourselves into temptation by it.” They all replied at once,

“Sir, have you been told thus, or has experience taught you?” The

Levite began to lift his eyes and to consider his situation, and,

bowing, said, “I have been told so.” The ladies, _una voce_, bawled

out, “Your informants, sir, we conclude, are those city ladies who

prefer a sofa to a bed. We advise you to alter your sermon by

substituting the word sofa for bundling, and, on your return home,

preach to them: for experience has told us that city-folks send more

children into the country without father and mother to own them, than

are born among us; therefore, you see, a sofa is more dangerous than a

bed.” The poor priest, seemingly convinced of his blunder, exclaimed,

“_Nec vitia nostra, nec remedia pati possumus_,” hoping hereby to get

rid of his guests; but an old matron pulled off her spectacles, and,

looking the priest in the face like a Roman heroine, said, “_Noli

putare me hæc auribus tuis dares_.” Others cried out to the priest to

explain his Latin. “The English,” he said, “is this: Woe to me that I

sojourn in Meseck, and dwell in the tents of Kedar!” One pertly

replied, “_Gladii decussati sunt gemina presbytericalvis_.” The priest

confessed his error, begged pardon, and promised never more to preach

against bundling, or to think amiss of the custom; the ladies

generously forgave him, and went away.

It may seem very strange to find this custom of bundling in bed

attended with so much innocence in New-England, while in Europe it is

thought not safe, or scarcely decent, to permit a young man or maid to

be together in private anywhere. But, in this quarter of the Old

World, the viciousness of the one and the simplicity of the other are

the result merely of education and habit. It seems to be a part of

heroism, among the polished nations of it, to sacrifice the virtuous

fair one whenever an opportunity offers, and thence it is concluded

that the same principles actuate those of the New World. It is

egregiously absurd to judge of all countries by one. In Spain,

Portugal, and Italy, jealousy reigns; in France, England, and Holland,

suspicion; in the West and East-Indies, lust; in New-England,

superstition. These four blind deities govern Jews, Turks, christians,

infidels, and heathen. Superstition is the most amiable. She sees no

vice with approbation, but persecution, and self-preservation is the

cause of her seeing that. My insular readers will, I hope, believe me,

when I tell them that I have seen in the West-Indies naked boys and

girls, some fifteen or sixteen years of age, waiting at table and at

tea, even when twenty or thirty virtuous English ladies were in the

room; who were under no more embarrassment at such an awful sight in

the eyes of English people who have not travelled abroad, than they

would have been at the sight of so many servants in livery. Shall we

censure the ladies of the West-Indies as vicious above their sex on

account of this local custom? By no means; for long experience has

taught the world that the West-Indian white ladies are virtuous

prudes. Where superstition reigns, fanaticism will be minister of

state; and the people, under the taxation of zeal, will shun what is

commonly called vice with ten times more care than the polite and

civilized christians who know what is right and what is wrong from

reason and revelation. Happy would it be for the world, if reason and

revelation were suffered to control the minds and passions of the

great and wise men of the world, as superstition does that of the

simple and less polished! When America shall elect societies for the

promotion of chastity in Europe, in return for the establishment of

European arts in American capitals, then Europe will discover that

there is more christian philosophy in American bundling than can be

found in the customs of nations more polite.

I should not have said so much about bundling had not a learned divine

(Dr. Burnaby) of the English Church published his Travels through some

parts of America, wherein this remarkable custom is represented in an

unfavourable light, and as prevailing among the lower class of people.

The truth is, the custom prevails among all classes, to the great

honour of the country, its religion, and ladies. The virtuous may be

tempted; but the tempter is despised. Why it should be thought

incredible for a young man and young woman innocently and virtuously

to lie down together in a bed with a great part of their clothes on, I

cannot conceive. Human passions may be alike in every region; but

religion, diversified as it is, operates differently in different

countries. Upon the whole, had I daughters now, I would venture to let

them bundle upon the bed, or even on the sofa, after a proper

education, sooner than adopt the Spanish mode of forcing young people

to prattle only before the lady’s mother the chit-chat of artless

lovers. Could the four quarters of the world produce a more chaste,

exemplary, and beautiful company of wives and daughters than are in

Connecticut, I should not have remaining one favourable sentiment for

the province. But the soil, the rivers, the ponds, the ten thousand

landscapes, together with the virtuous and lovely women which now

adorn the ancient kingdoms of Connecticut, Sassacus, and Quinnipiog,

would tempt me into the highest wonder and admiration of them, could

they once be freed of the skunk, the moping-owl, rattle-snake, and

fanatic christian.

My readers will naturally be desirous of information in what manner

the people of Connecticut conduct themselves in regard to the Stamp

Act, which has proved the subject of so much speculation and

controversy both in America and Europe. I will, therefore, give a

particular account of their proceedings concerning it, which will,

perhaps, appear to have been of far greater consequence than is

generally supposed in England.

The American colonists were no sooner extricated from all danger of

Gallic depredations by the peace of 1763, than they began to manifest

symptoms of ingratitude and rebellion against their deliverers.

Connecticut, on several accounts, particularly that of its free

constitution in Church and State, which prevented every interruption

from a King’s Governor, was fixed upon as the fittest site for raising

the first-fruits of jealousies and disaffection. Nor did the hatred

which kept the province at eternal strife within itself on all other

occasions, prevent its political coincidence upon this. In 1764,

delegates from every dissenting association in America convened at

Newhaven and settled the plan of operations. They voted that the

American Vine was endangered by the encroachment of the English

Parliament and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in

Foreign Parts; that episcopacy was established in Nova-Scotia, and

missionaries maintained by the English Government, while New-England

and other American States were taxed to support that same Government;

that a league and covenant ought to be made and signed by all good

protestants against the machinations of their enemies, and in defence

of their civil and religious liberties; that it was the duty of all

good protestants to stand upon their guard, and collect and send every

kind of interesting intelligence to the Moderator at Hertford, whose

business would be to communicate the same in his circular letters to

the true friends of protestant liberty. In my opinion, whoever does

not perceive the spirit of civil as well as religious independence in

this convention, and these resolutions of dissenting divines, must be

politically blind. Whilst Mr. Grenville was exerting his fanatical

faculties for the relief of the Mother Country; ready to sink under

the load of expense brought upon her by that war which had opened an

avenue to highest exaltation for her American offspring, Connecticut

was early advertised by merchants, divines, and ladies, in England,

that the Parliament was about to give the colonies a specimen of

English burthens. The Consociation ordered a fast, to deprecate the

threatened judgments. This fast was served up with sermons pointing

out the reigns of wicked kings, lords, and bishops, in the last

century; and concluded with, “One woe is past, and, behold, there come

two woes more hereafter!”

A requisition having been made, in 1763, that each colony in America

should raise a revenue to assist Great Britain in discharging the

national debt, which had been partly incurred at their request and for

their preservation, the General Assembly was instructed by Dr.

Franklin and others how to act. Accordingly, the Assembly resolved not

to raise any money towards the national debt, or any national

expenses, till the Parliament should remove the Navigation Act, which,

they said, was advantageous to Great Britain and disadvantageous to

America; and, therefore, Great Britain, in defraying the whole of the

national expense, did nothing more than justice required, so long as

that act should be continued. Such were the arguments and resolutions

of the General Assembly, although their agent in England had informed

them that, if they refused to comply with the requisition of the

minister, the Parliament would tax them.

The agent’s intelligence proved to be well founded. In 1765 the Stamp

Act passed, because the colonies had refused to tax themselves. News

so important soon arrived in America, and the Consociation of

Connecticut appointed another fast, and ordered the angels to sound

their trumpets, and great plagues followed. Thomas Fitch, the

Governor, shewed some dislike to the proceedings of the Consociation,

but was given to understand that Christ’s ministers acted by an

authority superior to that of the Governor or a king. The

episcopalians, and many sects, saw no reason for keeping the fast; but

the Governor observed it with a view of securing his election the next

year, and was successful. The episcopalians were rewarded for their

disobedience with what is called “a new religious comic Liturgy,”

which was printed and circulated through the colony as the performance

of Doctor Franklin, and acted in many towns by the young people on

evenings by way of sport and amusement. The litany was altered in many

places, especially in the paragraphs respecting the King, nobility,

&c.; and instead of “We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord!” was

substituted, “We beseech thee, O Cromwell, to hear (our prayers) us.”

“O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity!” was altered thus, “O Chatham,

Wilkes, and Franklin, have mercy upon us!” “From plague, pestilence,

famine,” &c. was followed by “O Cromwell, deliver us!” An episcopal

clergyman had courage enough to complain of these blasphemous

proceedings, and the Grand Jury indicted the comic actors; but the

magistrate to whom the complaint was made refused to grant a warrant,

using worse maledictions against the King than were contained in the

ludicrous litany. Hereupon the Grand Jury indicted the magistrate for

high treason; but no magistrate could be found of resolution enough to

grant a warrant against the traitor. However, the comic liturgy was

acted but privately afterwards, and, upon the repeal of the Stamp Act,

was suppressed as far as they could do it.

This second fast was sanctified with preaching on this and similar

texts, “And there arose a new king in Egypt who remembered not

Joseph,” and with praying God to grant the King a heart of flesh, and

to remove popery out of the British Parliament.

The Stamp Act was to take place in November, 1765; some months before

which the stamp-master, Jared Ingersoll, Esq. who had been the

colony’s agent in England, arrived at Newhaven in Connecticut. In

September a special Assembly was convened at Hertford, for the purpose

of considering what steps to take. As if to avoid the supremacy of the

British Parliament, they determined not to apply themselves for the

repeal of the act, but secretly encouraged a number of lawyers,

merchants, and divines to meet, by their own authority, at New-York,

for that purpose. In the mean time three mobs were raised, under

Durgy, Leach, and Parsons, who by different routes marched into

Newhaven to seize the stamp-master. They succeeded; and, having

brought their prisoner before the Assembly-house at Hertford, they

gave him the alternative to resign or die. Mr. Ingersoll appealed

several times by confidential messengers to the Assembly then sitting,

but, finding them inclined to countenance the mob, he was forced to

resign, and authenticate the same by whirling first his hat, and next

his wig, three times round his head, and then into the air; whilst the

General Assembly and Consociation (which last venerable body never

fails to be ready with its counsel and assistance on all salutary

occasions) shouted with the multitude, from their windows, at the

glorious achievement.

This special Assembly, having sufficiently manifested the part they

wished the colony to take, broke up, leaving further proceedings to

the mob, who continued to act up to the specimen already given, and

the Congress of New York, which met then accordingly, agreed upon and

transmitted to England a petition for a repeal of the obnoxious

act.[39]

The October session of the General Assembly is always holden at

Newhaven: there and then they were informed by Mr. Dyer,[41] who had

made one of the petitioners at New York, that it was recommended by

the Congress for the colonial governors to take the oath prescribed by

the Stamp Act.

The General Assembly, however, voted that the Governor of Connecticut

should not take it; and, moreover, determined to continue Mr. Fitch in

his office, notwithstanding the disfranchisement incident on his

refusal, if he would be guided by their advice: the Rev. Mr. Ebenezer

Devotion, one of the Representatives, and Eliphalet Dyer (above

mentioned), one of the Council, offered to pay the imposed fine of

1,000_l._ However, the Governor presented himself before the Council,

whose business it was to administer the oath, but which, it is

thought, Mr. Fitch presumed would be denied, and therefore artfully

devised this means at once of avoiding the oath and shifting the

penalties from himself upon them. Seven out of the twelve, suspecting

the Governor’s design, put their fingers in their ears, shuffled their

feet, and ran groaning out of the house; the other five stayed, and

administered the oath, with a view to saving themselves and the

Charter and direct the wrath of the people against the Governor; but

in this they were mistaken, incurring in common with him the odium of

the patriots. The Stamp Act having thus gained footing, the Assembly

broke up. Legal proceedings also were discontinued, and the courts of

justice shut. The Consociations and Associations kept frequent fasts

of their own appointment, prayers, and preaching against Roman

Catholic rulers, Arminian governors, and false-hearted councillors and

episcopizing curates. Hereupon the mobs became outrageous; sedition

was law and rebellion gospel. The stamp-master was called a traitor to

his country, and the episcopalians enemies to Zion and liberty.

The fastings, prayers, and riots brought about a revolution in the

colony. Fitch, who had taken, and the five assistants who had

administered, the oath, as well as many officers, both civil and

military, who declined to take a rebellious part, were dismissed from

their posts; and a new Governor, other councillors, &c. were chosen,

and the people fitted for every kind of mischief--all, however, under

the pretence of religion and liberty. The patriotic Mr. Dyer

distinguished himself by furnishing the fasting ministers with proper

materials to inflame the minds of the people against the just demands

of the King. One of his Machiavellian dogmas was, that the King

claimed the colonies as his patrimony, and intended to raise a revenue

in each province; and that, having gained this point, his purpose was

to govern England by America and America by England, and thereby

subvert liberty and establish tyranny in both, as the kings of France

had done by means of the various parliaments in that country. Mr. Dyer

declared he had this information from the best authority in England,

and added, that the liberties of both countries depended on America

resisting the Stamp Act, even unto blood. These and such like reveries

supplied the ministers of the Gospel with a great body of political

divinity, and the mob with courage to break Churchmen’s windows, and

cry out, “No bishops! no popery! no kings, lords, and tyrants!”

Everything but decency and order overran the colony. Indeed, the

General Assembly kept up their meetings, but it was only to transact

such business as was not affected by the Stamp Act. The mobs of the

fasting ministers continued their lawless proceedings, without further

interruption and impediment than what they met with from the strenuous

exertions of the King’s friends, who had repeatedly saved the lives of

the stamp-master, Governor Fitch, the five rejected councillors, the

episcopal clergy, and many good subjects, at the hazard of their own,

though they could not preserve them from daily abuse and insult.

The mob, having been spirited up and trained to violence and outrage

for several months, began to make some alarm even to the instigators,

especially as they were hitherto disappointed in their expectations of

the act being repealed. The Governor and Council, therefore, directing

their attention to the dangerous consequences of the lawless state and

refractory temper the people were in, and being struck with the

foresight of their own perilous situation, resolved, early in 1766, to

open the courts of law under the Stamp Act, if the very next packet

did not bring certain advices of its repeal; and all parties who had

causes depending in any court were to be duly notified by the

Governor’s proclamation. This determination was no less mortifying to

the mob than gratifying to the King’s friends, who were convinced that

the Stamp Act ought, both in policy and justice, to be enforced, and

therefore had risked their lives, fortunes, characters, and colonial

honours in its support. The patriots, now apparently sickened with

licentiousness, became very complaisant to the loyalists, declaring

that, in all their opposition to the Stamp Act, they had meant nothing

personal, and desiring to have past animosities buried in oblivion.

All things thus settled, tranquillity seemed to be returning; when,

lo! the packet arrived with the fatal news of the repeal of the Stamp

Act. Then a double portion of madness seized the patriots, who, in

their excess of joy “that victory was gained over the beast, and over

his mark,” utterly forgot their late penitential and tranquil

professions, branding the King’s friends with the appellations of

tories, Jacobites, and papists. The Gospel ministers left off their

fastings, and turned mourning into joy and triumph. “Now we behold,”

they said in their pulpits, “that Great Britain is afraid of us; for

the Stamp Act is repealed, even upon the petition of an illegal body

of men. If, therefore, we stand fast in the liberties wherein Christ

has made us free, we need not fear in future the usurpations of the

kings, lords, and bishops of England.” The accompanying claim of

Parliament to the power of binding America in all cases whatsoever

was, indeed, a thorn which galled them much; but they found a salvo in

ordering a copy of the repeal to be burnt under the gallows by the

common hangman. The General Assembly also stepped forward, and voted

the populace several barrels of powder, and puncheons of rum, together

with 100_l._ in money, to celebrate the festival. A tremendous mob met

together at Hertford and received their present. The powder was placed

in a large brick school, and the rum on the common square. While each

one was contending for his share, the powder took fire and blew up the

school, killing fifteen or sixteen persons, and wounding many. This

disaster shook the house where the Consociation was sitting; upon

which they resolved that Heaven did not approve of their rejoicings

because the repeal was but partial! They therefore ordered a new fast,

to do away the iniquities of that day, and to implore the Supreme to

direct them in what manner to guard against the machinations of “the

locusts who had a king over them, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is

Abaddon, but in the Greek Apollyon!”

This fast was cooked up with a favourite text in New-England, viz. “He

reproved even kings for their sake.” From these words the preachers

proved that the King’s power lay in his mouth, and in his tail, which,

like “a serpent, did hurt for a month and a year;” and that God would

protect his people against “the murderers, the sorceries, the

fornication, the thefts” of bishops, popes, and kings, “and make

nations angry, and give them power to judge and destroy those who

would destroy his prophets and his saints.” In this day of great

humiliation the prophets entertained the saints with a spice of

rejoicing, because “victory was gotten over the beast, and over his

image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name.”

“Therefore,” said they, “rejoice, O inhabitants of the earth and of

the sea, because we can get, buy, and sell, without the mark, or the

name of the beast, or the number of his name.”

This bombastic declamation against the authority of Great Britain

raised the passions of a great portion of this multitude higher than

was intended. They had lately been tutored to form high notions of

their own consequence, had been intoxicated with a life of confusion

in a lawless country, and had now no relish for a government of any

kind whatever; accordingly, inflamed by the rhapsodies of the

preachers, they set themselves against that of the colony; arguing

that if the Lord would reprove kings, lords, and bishops, for their

sake, he would also reprove governors, magistrates, and consociations,

for their sakes.

This revolt of a part of the people was encouraged and strengthened by

the adherents of Governor Fitch, the five discarded councillors, and

the loyalists; so that very formidable bodies soon appeared in divers

towns, threatening destruction to the General Assembly, Consociation,

Associations, executive courts, &c. &c. Colonel Street Hall, of

Wallingford, a loyalist, was appointed governor over these supreme

multitudes. They soon acquainted the General Assembly and Consociation

that, by the authority that England had been reformed, by the same

authority should Connecticut be reformed; and Mr. Hall sent a letter

to the Judges of the County Court, then sitting at Newhaven,

purporting that it was not agreeable to the people for them to

continue their proceedings, or that any executions should be granted,

and concluding thus: “Ye that have ears to hear, hear what is said

unto you; for we shall quickly come.” The judges, without hesitation

or adjournment, ran out of court and went home as privately as

possible. The merchants, the Gospel ministers, the lawyers, and

judges, who had with great zeal inculcated the divine right of the

people to resist kings, found themselves in a starving condition under

the exercise of their boasted right. The General Assembly and

Association, however, again convened, and, after much fasting and

prayer, resolved that the conduct of Street Hall, Esq. and his

associates, was seditious and treasonable; and ordered the

Attorney-General, Colonel Elihu Hall, to indict his nephew, Street

Hall, for treasonable practices. The Attorney-General refused to

comply with this mandate, whereupon he was dismissed, and James

Hillhouse, Esq. appointed in his place, who indicted Street Hall; but

no sheriff dared serve the warrant. Street Hall ordered his people to

prepare for battle and to be ready at a minute’s warning, and rode

about with one servant, in defiance of the General Assembly, who

likewise prepared to support their power. It is most likely that

Street Hall would have prevailed had an engagement taken place; for

the episcopalians, and all the friends of Mr. Fitch and the five

dismissed councillors, would have supported Mr. Hall. But a battle was

prevented by the interposition of the Consociation, with this curious

Gospel axiom, viz. that it was legal and politic in the people to

oppose and resist the foreign power which was unjustly claimed by the

King of Great Britain; but it was neither politic nor right to oppose

the magistrates and laws made by themselves. They prevailed on Street

Hall to condescend to write to the General Assembly to this effect:

“That he was a friend to the laws and constitution of the colony, and

wished to support both; and should do it, on condition that they would

rescind their vote, and that no one should be prosecuted for what had

been done by him and his associates.” The Assembly very gladly voted

this overture of Street Hall to be satisfactory; and thus peace was

re-established between the Assembly and Street Hall. Nevertheless, Mr.

Hall was greatly censured by his partisans for this compromise; and he

lived in constant expectation of their hanging him, till he softened

them by this remarkable address in vindication of his conduct: “We

have done,” said he, “everything in our power to support the authority

of the British Parliament over the colonies. We have lost our

property, local reputations, and all colonial offices and respect

among our countrymen, in defence of that King and Parliament who have

not shed a tear for our sufferings, nor failed to sacrifice their own

dignities and their best friends to please a party that never will be

easy until another Oliver arise and extirpate kings, lords, and

bishops. By heavens!” added Street Hall, with great energy, “I will

rest my life upon this single question, Who would stand up in defence

of a king who prefers his enemies to his friends? If you acquit me, I

shall more fully declare my principles.”

The mob, after much consideration, declared their approbation of Mr.

Hall’s conduct; upon which he resumed his address nearly as follows:

“Gentlemen, we have once been betrayed and forsaken by the King and

Parliament of Great Britain; no dependence, then, ought henceforth to

be placed upon either. It is plain to me, that if we had extirpated

the General Assembly and all the avowed enemies of the constitution of

Great Britain, yet that very Parliament would have been the first of

all the creation to honour us with a gallows for our reward. I

therefore swear by Him who controls the wheels of time, that in future

I will support the laws and dignity of the colony, and never more put

any confidence in princes or British Parliament. The Saviour of the

world trusted Judas but once; and it is my opinion that those who

betray and forsake their friends ought to experience the wrath and

indignation of friends turned enemies. In this case, baseness is

policy, ingratitude loyalty, and revenge heroic virtue!”

Colonel Street Hall spoke with great vehemence, and might be censured

for rashness by people who were not in America at the time; but his

sentiments reached the hearts of half of the King’s friends there; for

the repeal of the Stamp Act had fixed in their breasts an everlasting

hatred to the fickle temper of Britons.

Few people, hereafter, will advance a sixpence in support of any acts

of the Parliament of Great Britain over her colonies. Prior to the

year 1766 such a public spirit prevailed in America over private

interest as would naturally have led the people to conform to any acts

of the British Parliament, from a deep-rooted confidence that the

requisitions of Britain would be no other than the requisitions of

wisdom and necessity. Two-thirds, I may say with safety, of all the

people in America thought there was wisdom and justice in the Stamp

Act, and wished to have it continued: first, because they were

sensible of being greatly indebted to the generosity and protection of

Britain; secondly, because they had rather be subject to the control

of Parliament in regard to a revenue, than have it raised by the

authority of their own Assemblies, who favour the rich and oppress the

poor; and thirdly, because the Stamp Act would have prevented

innumerable suits at law, the costs of which, in Connecticut, have

during the last forty years amounted to ten times as much as all

others for war, gospel, physic, the poor, &c. &c. It is impossible to

describe the disappointment and mortification they suffered by the

repeal of that act; it exposed them to calumny, derision, and

oppression; it disheartened all, and occasioned the defection of many,

while their adversaries triumphed in the encouragement it had given

them to prosecute their malicious schemes against the Church, King,

laws, and commerce of England. However, in regard to the question of

raising a revenue in America, I have never met with one American who

would not allow (though unwillingly) the reasonableness of it, with

certain conditions and provisos.

Thus: 1. The judges and lawyers required the tax to be imposed by the

General Assembly of each province. 2. The merchants, whose conscience

is gain, and who commonly constitute more than half of the Assembly,

declared that, before any revenue was raised, the Navigation Act

should be repealed, and the East India Company, and all the

monopolies, dissolved. 3. The Gospel ministers, whose power in

New-England is terrible to flesh and spirit, would contribute to a

revenue after the King and Parliament had dropped their claim to

supreme authority over America, and secured the American Vine against

the domination and usurpations of bishops. To these sources may be

traced all the objections made against a revenue in America, which

sprung from three orders of men of the least real benefit to the

country, and whose proportion to all others there is not one to a

hundred; though they have had the art and address, by imposition and

delusion, to involve them in their tumultuous contentions and ruinous

projects and undertakings. Indeed, the clergy, lawyers, and merchants

of European countries have been represented as the worst enemies of

society--the great promoters of discord, war, insurrections, and

rebellions; but the heathen have not yet given us an example how

depraved mankind would be without them. However, supposing the

crimination to have foundation, there is one good reason to be offered

in palliation of it. Most governments are too apt to adopt the maxim

of rewarding prosperous opposing zealots, whilst the exertions of

oppressed friends are passed over, if not with contempt at least with

silent neglect. Hence, men will naturally be induced, in defiance of

law and gospel, to head parties, to become consequential in the world.

[1] Commonly denominated the London and Plymouth Companies.

[2] About two years after, he made a second voyage to the

river, in the service of a number of Dutch merchants; and,

some time after, made sale of his right to the Dutch. The

right to the country, however, was antecedently in King

James, by virtue of discovery which Hudson had made under

his commission. The English protested against this sale; but

the Dutch, in 1614, under the Amsterdam West India Company,

built a fort, nearly on the same grounds where the city of

Albany now is, which they called Fort Aurania. Sir Thomas

Dale, Governor of Virginia, directly after dispatched

Captain Argall to dispossess the Dutch, and they submitted

to the King of England, and under him to the Governor of

Virginia.

[3] November 3, 1620, just before the arrival of Mr.

Robinson’s people in New England, King James I., by

letters-patent, under the great seal of England,

incorporated the Duke of Lenox, the Marquises of Rockingham

and Hamilton, the Earls of Arundel and Warwick, and others,

to the number of forty noblemen, knights, and gentlemen, by

the name of “the Council established at Plymouth, in the

county of Devon, for the planting, ruling, and governing of

New England in America … and granting unto them, and their

successors and assigns, all that part of America lying and

being in breadth from forty degrees of north latitude, from

the equinoctial line, to the forty-eighth degree of said

north latitude inclusively, and in length of and within all

the breadth aforesaid, through the mainland from sea to

sea.”

The patent ordained that this tract of country should be

called New England in America, and by that name have

continuance forever.

[4] The same year in which the patent of Massachusetts

received the royal confirmation, Mr. John Endicott was sent

over with about three hundred people by the patentees, to

prepare the way for the settlement of a permanent colony in

that part of New England.

They arrived at Naumkeak in June, and began a settlement,

which they named “Salem.” This was the first town in

Massachusetts, and the second in New England.

[5] Mather, Neal, Hutchinson, and other writers of New

England history, have uniformly deviated from the truth in

representing Connecticut as having been first settled by

emigrants from their darling Massachusetts Bay.

[6] Nearly at the same time, October 8, 1635, Mr. John

Winthrop, son of Governor Winthrop, of Massachusetts,

arrived at Boston with a commission from Lord Say and Seal,

Lord Brook, and other noblemen and gentlemen interested in

the Connecticut patent, to erect a fort at the mouth of the

Connecticut River. Their lordships sent over men, ordnance,

ammunition, and two thousand pounds sterling, for the

accomplishment of their design.

Mr. Winthrop was directed by his commission, immediately on

his arrival, to repair to Connecticut with fifty able men,

and to erect the fortifications and to build houses for the

garrison, and for gentlemen who might come over into

Connecticut. They were first to build houses for their own

present accommodation, and after that such as should be

suitable for the reception of men of quality. The latter

were to be erected within the fort.

It was required that the planters at the beginning should

settle themselves near the mouth of the river, and set down

in bodies, that they might be in a situation for intrenching

and defending themselves. The commission made provision for

the reservation of a thousand or fifteen hundred acres of

good land for the maintenance of the fort, as nearly

adjoining it as might be with convenience.

Mr. Winthrop, having intelligence that the Dutch were

preparing to take possession of the mouth of the river, as

soon as he could engage twenty men and furnish them with

provisions, dispatched them in a small vessel of about

thirty tons, to prevent their getting command of the river,

and to accomplish the service to which he had been

appointed.

But a few days after the party sent by Mr. Winthrop arrived

at the mouth of the river, a Dutch vessel appeared off the

harbor from New Netherlands, sent on purpose to take

possession of the mouth of the river and to erect

fortifications. The English had by this time mounted two

pieces of cannon and prevented their landing; thus,

providentially, was this fine tract of country preserved for

our venerable ancestors and their posterity.

Mr. Winthrop was appointed Governor of the Connecticut River

and the ports adjacent for the term of one year. He erected

a fort, built houses, and made a settlement, according to

his instructions. One David Gardiner, an expert engineer,

assisted in the work, planned the fortifications, and was

appointed lieutenant of the fort.

Mr. Davenport and others, who afterward settled New Haven,

were active in this affair, and hired Gardiner, in behalf of

their lordships, to come to New England and assist in this

business.

As the settlement of the three towns on Connecticut River

was begun before the arrival of Mr. Winthrop, and the design

of their lordships to make plantations upon it was known, it

was agreed that the settlers on the river should either

remove upon full satisfaction being made by their lordships,

or else sufficient room should be found for them and their

companions at some other place.

While these plantations were forming in the southwestern

part of Connecticut, another commenced on the west side of

the mouth of the Connecticut River. A fort had been built

here in 1635-’36, and preparations had been made for the

reception of gentlemen of quality; but the war with the

Pequots, the uncultivated state of the country, and the low

condition of the colony, prevented the coming of any

principal character from England to take possession of a

township and make settlement in this tract.

Until this time there had been only a garrison of about

twenty men in the place. They had made some small

improvements in the lands, and erected a few buildings in

the vicinity of the fort; but there had been no settlement

of a plantation with civil privileges. But about midsummer

Mr. George Fenwick, with his lady and family, arrived in a

ship of two hundred and fifty tons; another ship came in

company with him. They were both for Qunnipiack.

Mr. Fenwick and others came over with the view to take

possession of a large tract upon the river in behalf of

their lordships, the original patentees, and to plant a town

at the mouth of the river. A settlement was soon made, and

named Saybrook, in honor of their lordships, Say and Seal,

and Brook.

Mr. Fenwick, Mr. Thomas Peters, who was the first minister

in the plantation, Captain Gardiner, Thomas Leffingwell,

Thomas Tracy, and Captain John Mason, were some of the

principal planters.

[7] In July, 1638, Mr. Winslow and Mr. Bradford, therefore,

made a journey to Boston to confer with Governor Winthrop

and his Council on the subject. Governor Winslow and Mr.

Bradford proposed to them to join with Plymouth in a trade

to Connecticut for hemp and beaver, and to erect a house for

the purpose of commerce. It was represented as necessary to

prevent the Dutch from taking possession of that fine

country, who, it was reported, were about to build upon the

river. But Governor Winthrop declined the motion; he

considered it was not proper to make a plantation there,

because there were three or four thousand warlike Indians

upon the river, and small pinnaces only could enter at high

water; also, because that seven months in the year no

vessels could go into it, by reason of the ice and the

violence of the stream.

The Plymouth people, therefore, determined to undertake the

enterprise at their own risk. Preparations were made for

erecting a trading-house and establishing a small company on

the river. In the mean time, the master of a vessel from

Massachusetts, who was trading at New Netherlands, showed to

Walter Van Twiller, the Dutch Governor, the commission which

the English had to trade and settle in New England, and that

his Majesty the King of England had granted all these parts

to his own subjects. He, therefore, desired that the Dutch

would not build at Connecticut.

This appears to have been done at the direction of Governor

Winthrop, for, in consequence of it, the Dutch Governor

wrote a very complaisant letter to him, in which he

represented that the lords, the States-General, had granted

the same country to the West India Company. He requested,

therefore that the English would make no settlements in

Connecticut until the affair should be determined between

the court of England and the States-General.

This appears to have been a piece of policy in the Dutch

Governor to keep the English still until the Dutch had got a

firm footing upon the river.

Several vessels this year went to Connecticut River to

trade. John Oldham, from Dorchester, and three men with him,

also traveled through the wilderness to Connecticut, to view

the country and trade with the Indians. The sachem upon the

river made him most welcome, and gave him a present in

beaver. He found that the Indian hemp grew spontaneously in

the meadows in great abundance. He purchased a quantity of

it, and upon trial it appeared much to exceed the hemp which

was grown in England.

William Holmes, of Portsmouth, with his company, having

prepared the frame of a house, with boards, and materials

for covering it immediately, put them on board of a vessel

and sailed for Connecticut. Holmes had a commission from the

Governor of Plymouth and a chosen company to accomplish his

design.

When he came into the river he found that the Dutch had got

in before him, made a light fort, and planted two pieces of

cannon: this was erected at the place called Hartford.

The Dutch forbade Holmes going up the river, stood by their

cannon, and ordered him to strike his colors or they would

fire upon him; but he was a man of spirit, assured them that

he had a commission from the Governor of Plymouth to go up

the river, and that he must obey his orders. They poured out

their threats, but he proceeded, and, landing on the west

side of the river, erected his house a little below the

mouth of the small river in Windsor. The house was covered

with the utmost dispatch, and fortified with palisadoes. The

sachems who were the original owners of the soil had been

driven from this part of the country by the Pequots, and

were now carried home on board of Holmes’s vessel. Of them

the Plymouth people purchased the land on which they erected

their house. “This,” Governor Wolcott says, “was the first

house erected in Connecticut.” The Dutch about the same time

erected a trading-house at Hartford, which they called the

“Hirse of Good Hope.”

It was with great difficulty that Holmes and his company

erected and fortified their house, and kept it afterward.

The Indians were offended at their bringing home the

original proprietors and lords of the country, and the Dutch

that they had settled there, and were about to rival them in

trade and in possession of these excellent lands upon the

river. They were obliged, therefore, to combat both, and to

keep a constant watch upon them.

The Dutch, before the Plymouth people took possession of the

river, had invited them in an amicable manner to trade in

Connecticut; but, when they were apprised that they were

making preparations for a settlement there, they repented

the invitation, and spared no exertion to prevent them.

On the 8th of June the Dutch had sent Jacob Van Curter to

purchase lands upon the Connecticut. He made a purchase of

about twenty acres at Hartford, of Nepuquash, a Pequot

captain. Of this the Dutch took possession in October, and

on the 25th of the month Curter protested against William

Holmes, the builder of the Plymouth house. Some time

afterward the Dutch Governor, Walter Van Twiller, of Fort

Amsterdam, dispatched a reënforcement to Connecticut,

designing to drive Holmes and his company from the river. A

band of seventy men, under arms, with banners displayed,

assaulted the Plymouth house, but they found it so well

fortified, and the men who kept it so vigilant and

determined, that it could not be taken without bloodshed;

they therefore came to a parley, and finally returned in

peace.

About the beginning of June, 1636, Mr. Hooker, Mr. Stone,

and about one hundred men, women, and children, took their

departure from Cambridge, and traveled more than one hundred

miles through a hideous and trackless wilderness to

Hartford. They had no guide but their compass; made their

way over mountains, through swamps, thickets, and rivers,

which were not passable but with difficulty. They had no

cover but the heavens, nor any lodgings but what simple

Nature afforded them. They drove with them one hundred and

sixty head of cattle, and by the way subsisted upon the milk

of their cows. Mrs. Hooker was borne through the wilderness

upon a litter. The people generally carried their packs,

arms, and utensils. They were nearly a fortnight on their

journey.

[8] While the planters of Connecticut were thus exerting

themselves in prosecuting and regulating the affairs of that

colony, another was projected and settled at Quinnipiack,

and afterward called New Haven. On the 26th of July, 1637,

Mr. John Davenport, Mr. Samuel Eaton, Theophilus Eaton, and

Edward Hopkins, Esquires, Mr. Thomas Gregson, and many

others of good character and fortune, arrived in Boston.

Mr. Davenport had been a famous minister in the city of

London, and was a distinguished character for piety,

learning, and good conduct. Many of his congregation, on

account of the esteem which they had for his person and

ministry, followed him to New England.

Mr. Eaton and Mr. Hopkins had been merchants in London,

possessed great estates, and were men of eminence for their

abilities and integrity.

The fame of Davenport, and the reputation and good estates

of the principal gentlemen of his company, made the people

of Massachusetts exceedingly desirous of their settlement in

that Commonwealth.

Great pains were taken not only by particular persons and

towns, but by the General Court, to fix them in the colony.

Charlestown made them large offers, and Newbury proposed to

give up the whole town to them. The General Court offered

them any place which they should select. But they were

determined to plant a distant colony. By the pursuit of the

Pequots to the westward, the English became acquainted with

that fine tract along the shore from Saybrook to Fairfield,

and with its several harbors. It was represented as

fruitful, and happily situated for navigation and commerce.

The company, therefore, projected a settlement in that part

of the country.

In the fall of 1637 Mr. Eaton and others who were of the

company made a journey to Connecticut to explore the lands

and harbors on the sea-coast. They pitched upon Quinnipiack

for the place of their settlement. They erected a poor hut,

in which a few men subsisted through the winter.

On the 30th of March, 1638, Mr. Davenport, Mr. Prudden, Mr.

Samuel Eaton, and Theophilus Eaton, Esquire, with the people

of their company, sailed from Boston to Quinnipiack. In

about a fortnight they arrived at their desired port.

On the 14th of April they kept their first Sabbath in the

place.

The people assembled under a large, spreading oak, and Mr.

Davenport preached to them from Matthew v. 1. He discoursed

on the temptations of man, and made such observations as

were pertinent to the then present state of his hearers. He

left this remark, that he enjoyed a good day.

[9] “New England Records,” A., p. 201.

[10] While the colonists were thus prosecuting the business

of settlement in New England, the Right Honorable James,

Marquis of Hamilton, obtained a grant from the Council of

Plymouth April 20, 1635, of all that tract of country which

lies between Connecticut River and Narraganset River and

harbor, from the mouth of each of said rivers northward

sixty miles into the country.

However, by reason of its interference with the grant to

Lords Say and Brook, and others, or for some other reason,

the deed was never executed.

The marquis made no settlement on the land, and the claim

became obsolete.

[11] Such numbers were constantly emigrating to New England,

in consequence of the persecution of the Puritans, that the

people of Dorchester, Watertown, and Newtown, began to be

much straitened by the accession of new planters.

By those who had been in Connecticut they had received

intelligence of the excellent meadows on the river; they

therefore determined to remove, and once more brave the

dangers and hardships of making settlements in a dreary

wilderness.

Upon application to the General Court for the enlargement of

their boundaries, or for liberty to remove, they at first

obtained consent for the latter. However, when it was

afterward discovered that their determination was to plant a

new colony in Connecticut, there arose a strong opposition;

so that, when the Court convened, in September, there was a

warm debate on the subject, and a great division between the

Houses. Indeed, the whole colony was affected with the

dispute.

Mr. Hooker, who was more engaged in the enterprise than the

other ministers, took up the affair and pleaded for the

people. He urged that they were so straitened for

accommodations for their cattle, that they could not support

the ministry, neither receive nor assist any more of their

friends who might come over to them. He insisted that the

planting of towns so near together was a fundamental error

in their policy. He pleaded the fertility and happy

accommodations of Connecticut; that settlements upon the

river were necessary to prevent the Dutch, and others, from

possessing themselves of so fruitful and important a part of

the country; and that the minds of the people were strongly

inclined to plant themselves there, in preference to every

other place which had come to their knowledge.

On the other side, it was insisted that, in point of

conscience, they ought not to depart, as they were united to

Massachusetts as one body, and bound by oath to seek the

good of the Commonwealth; and that, on principles of policy,

it could not by any means be granted. It was pleaded that

the settlement in Massachusetts was new and weak; they were

in danger from an assault from their enemies; that the

departure of Mr. Hooker, and the people of those towns,

would not only draw off many from Massachusetts, but prevent

others from settling in the colony. Besides, it was said

that the removing of a candlestick was a great judgment;

that, by suffering it, they should expose their brethren to

great danger, both from the Dutch and the Indians. Indeed,

it was affirmed that they might be accommodated by the

enlargements offered them by other towns.

After a long and warm debate, the Governor, two assistants,

and a majority of the representatives, were for granting

liberty for Mr. Hooker and the people to transport

themselves to Connecticut. The Deputy-Governor, however, and

six of the assistants, were in the negative, and so no vote

was obtained.

The next May the Newtown people determined to settle at

Connecticut, renewed their application to the General Court,

and obtained liberty to remove to any place which they

should select, with the proviso that they should continue

under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts.--ED. NOTE.

[12] Dominion, in New England, signifies a sovereign,

independent state, uncontrollable by any other earthly

power.

[13] The Indian mode of counting is from one to twenty.

Every year they cut a notch in a stick, and when the stick

is full, or has twenty notches on it, they lay it up and

take another. When they have thus cut twenty sticks, they

reckon no more; the number of twenty times twenty with them

becomes infinite, or incomprehensible.--ED. NOTE.

[14] It was the opinion of the principal divines who settled

in New England and Connecticut that in every church

completely organized there was a pastor, teacher, ruling

elder, and deacons.

Three distinct offices, they said, were clearly taught in

those passages.--Romans xii. 7: “Or ministry, let us wait on

our ministering; or he that teacheth on teaching.” 1 Timothy

v. 17: “Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of

double honor, especially they who labor in the word and

doctrine.” 1 Corinthians xii. 28: “And God has set some in

the Church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly

teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healing, helps,

governments, diversities of tongues.” And Ephesians iv. 11:

“And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some,

evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers.” From these

they argued the duty of all churches which were able to be

thus furnished. In this manner were the churches of

Hartford, Windsor, New Haven, and other towns, organized.

The churches which were not able to support a pastor and

teacher had the ruling elders and deacons.

The ruling elders were ordained with no less solemnity than

their pastors and teachers. When no teacher could be

obtained, the pastor performed the duty of both pastor and

teacher.

It was the general opinion that the pastor’s work consisted

principally in exhortation, in working upon the will and

affections of the people. To this the whole force of his

study was to be directed, that by his judicious, powerful,

and affectionate addresses he might win his hearers to the

love and practice of the truth. But the teacher was _Doctor

in Ecclesia_, whose business was to teach, and explain, and

defend the doctrines of Christianity. He was to inform the

judgment, and advance the work of illumination.

The business of the ruling elder was to assist the pastor in

the government of the church. He was particularly set apart

to watch over all its members; to prepare and bring forward

all cases of discipline; to visit and pray with the sick;

and, in absence of the pastor and teacher, to pray with the

congregation and expound the Scriptures.

The pastors and churches of New England maintained with the

reformed churches in general that bishops and presbyters

were only different names for the same office; and that all

pastors regularly elected to the gospel ministry were

Scripture bishops. They also insisted, agreeably to the

primitive practice, that the work of every pastor was

confined principally to one particular church and

congregation, who could all assemble in one place, whom he

could inspect, and who could all unite together in acts of

worship and discipline. Indeed, the first ministers of

Connecticut and New England at first maintained that all the

pastor’s office power was confined to his own church and

congregation, and that the administering of baptism and the

Lord’s Supper in other churches was irregular.

With respect to ordination, they held that it did not

constitute the essentials of ministerial office; but the

qualifications for office were the election of the church,

guided by the rule of Christ, and the acceptance of the

pastor-elect. Says Mr. Hooker, “Ordination is an approbation

of the officer, and solemn setting and confirmation of him

in his office by prayer and laying on of hands.”

It was viewed by the ministers of New England as no more

than putting the pastor-elect in office, or a solemn

recommending of him and his labors to the blessing of God.

It was the general opinion that elders ought to lay on hands

in ordination if there were a presbytery in the church, but,

if there were not, the church might appoint some other

elders, or a number of the brethren, to perform that

service.--ED. NOTE.

[15] On the 4th of June, 1689, all the free planters at

Quinnipiack convened in a large barn of Mr. Newman’s, and,

in a very formal and solemn manner, proceeded to lay the

foundations of their civil and religious polity.

Mr. Davenport introduced the business by a sermon from the

words of the royal preacher, “Wisdom has builded her house,

she has hewn out seven pillars.”

His design was to show that the church, the house of God,

should be formed of seven pillars, or principal brethren, to

whom all the other members of the church should be added.

After a solemn invocation of the Divine Majesty, he

proceeded to represent to the planters that they were met to

consult respecting the settlement of civil government,

according to the will of God, and for the nomination of

persons who, by universal consent, were in all respects the

best qualified for the foundation-work of a church. He

enlarged on the great importance of the transactions before

them, and desired that no man would give his voice in any

matter until he fully understood it, and that all would act

without respect to any man, but give their vote in the fear

of God.

He then proposed a number of questions, in consequence of

which the following resolutions were passed:

1. That the Scriptures hold forth a perfect rule for the

direction and government of all men in all duties which

they are to perform to God and man, as well in families

and commonwealth as in matters of church.

2. That as in matters which concerned the gathering and

ordering of a church, so likewise in all public offices

which concern civil order, as the choice of magistrates

and officers, making and repealing laws, dividing

allotments of inheritance, and all things of like nature,

they would all be governed by those rules which the

Scripture held forth to them.

3. That all those who had desired to be received as free

planters had settled in the plantation with a purpose,

resolution, and desire, that they might be admitted into

church-fellowship, according to Christ.

4. That all free planters held themselves bound to

establish such civil order as might best conduce to the

securing of the purity and peace of the ordinance to

themselves and their posterity, according to God.

When these resolutions had been passed, and the people had

bound themselves to settle civil government according to

the divine word, Mr. Davenport proceeded to represent to

them what men they must choose according to the divine

word, that they might most effectually secure to

themselves and their posterity a just, free, and peaceable

government.

Time was then given to discuss and deliberate upon what

had been proposed. After full discussion and deliberation,

it was determined:

5. That the church-members only should be free burgesses,

and that they should choose magistrates, among themselves,

to have power of transacting all the public civil affairs

of the plantation, of making and repealing laws, dividing

inheritances, deciding of differences that may arise, and

doing all things and business of a like nature.

That civil officers might be chosen and government proceed

according to these resolutions, it was necessary that a

church should be formed. Without this there could be

neither freedmen nor magistrates. Mr. Davenport thereupon

proceeded to make proposals relative to forming it, in

such a manner that no blemish might be left on the

“beginnings of church work.” It was then resolved to this

effect--

6. That twelve men should be chosen, that their fitness

for the foundation-work might be tried, and that it should

be in the power of those twelve men to choose seven to

begin the church.

It was agreed that if seven men could not be found among the

twelve qualified for the foundation-work, that such other

persons should be taken into the number, upon trial, as

should be judged more suitable. The form of a solemn charge,

or oath, was drawn up and agreed upon at this meeting, to be

given to all the freemen.

Further, it was ordered that all persons who should be

received as free planters of that corporation, should submit

to the fundamental agreement above related, and, in

testimony of their submission, should subscribe their names

among the freemen. Sixty-three subscribed on the 4th of

June, and soon after fifty other names were added.

After a proper term of trial, Theophilus Eaton, Mr. John

Davenport, Robert Newman, Matthew Gilbert, Thomas Fugill,

John Punderson, and Jeremiah Dixon, were chosen for the

seven pillars of the church.

October 25, 1639, the Court, as it is termed, consisting of

these seven persons only, convened, and after a solemn

address to the Supreme Majesty, they proceeded to form a

body of freemen, and to elect civil officers. The manner

was, indeed, singular and curious.

In the first place, all former trust for managing the public

affairs of the plantation was declared to cease, and be

utterly abrogated. Then all those who had been admitted to

the church after the gathering of it in the choice of the

seven pillars, and all the members of other approved

churches who desired it, and offered themselves, were

admitted members of the Court.

A solemn charge was then publicly given them, to the same

effect as the freemen’s charge, or oath, which they had

previously adopted. The purport of this was nearly the same

with the oath of fidelity at the present time.

Mr. Davenport expounded several scriptural texts to them,

describing the character of civil magistrates given in the

sacred oracles. Theophilus Eaton, Esq., was chosen Governor;

Mr. Robert Newman, Matthew Gilbert, Nathaniel Turner, and

Thomas Fugill, were chosen magistrates; Mr. Fugill was also

chosen secretary, and Robert Seeley, marshal.

Mr. Davenport gave Governor Eaton a charge, in open Court,

from Deuteronomy i. 16, 17.

It was decreed by the freemen that there should be a General

Court annually in the plantation, on the first week in

October. This was ordained a court of election in which all

the officers of the colony were to be chosen. This Court

determined that the word of God should be the only rule for

ordering affairs of government in that Commonwealth.

This was the original fundamental Constitution of the

government of New Haven. All government was originally in

the church, and the members of the church elected the

Governor, magistrates, and other officers. The magistrates

at first were no more than assistants of the Governor; they

might not act in any sentence or determination of the Court.

No Deputy-Governor was chosen, nor were any laws enacted,

except the general resolutions which have been noticed; but

as the plantation enlarged, and new towns were settled, new

orders were given; the General Court received a new form,

laws were enacted, and the civil polity of this jurisdiction

gradually advanced, in its essential parts, to a near

resemblance of the government of Connecticut.

Upon these resolutions were based the “Blue Laws” which will

appear in the work.--ED. NOTE.

[16] William, Thomas, and Hugh Peters were brothers, and

born in Fowery, in Cornwall, in Old England. Their father

was a merchant of great property, and their mother was

Elizabeth Treffry, daughter of John Treffry, Esq., of a very

ancient and opulent family in Fowery. William was educated

at Leyden, Thomas at Oxford, and Hugh at Cambridge

Universities. About the year 1610 and 1620, Thomas and Hugh

were clergymen in London, and William was a private

gentleman. About 1628 Thomas and Hugh, rendered obnoxious by

their popularity and Puritanism, were silenced by the Bishop

of London. They then went to Holland, and remained there

till 1633, when they returned to London. The three brothers

sold their landed property, and went to New-England in 1634.

Hugh settled at Salem, and became too popular for Mather and

Cotton. He was soon appointed one of the Trustees of the

College at New-Cambridge. He built a grand house, and

purchased a large tract of land.--The yard before his house

he paved with flint-stones from England; and, having dug a

well, he paved that round with flint-stones also, for the

accommodation of every inhabitant in want of water. It bears

the name of Peters’s Spring to this day.--He married a second

wife, by whom he had one daughter named Elizabeth. The

renown of this zealot increasing, he received an invitation

to remove from Salem to Boston, and, complying with it, he

there laid the foundation-stone of the great Meeting-House,

of which the Rev. Dr. Samuel Cooper, one of the most learned

of the Literati in America, is the present minister. Mather

and Cotton ill brooked being out-rivalled by Hugh; yet,

finding him an orthodox fanatic, and more perfect than

themselves, they seemingly bowed to his superiority, at the

same time that they laid a snare for his destruction. In

1641 those envious pastors conspired with the Court at

Boston to convert their Bishop Hugh into a Politician, and

appoint him agent to Great Britain.--The Plot succeeded; and

Hugh assumed his agency under colour of petitioning for some

abatement of customs and excise; but his real commission was

to foment the civil discontents, jars, and wars, then

prevailing between the King and Parliament.--Hugh did not see

into the policy of Mather and Cotton; and he had a strong

inclination to chastise the Bishops and Court, who had

turned him out of the Church for his fanatical conduct. On

his arrival in London, the Parliament took him into their

service.--The Earls of Warwick and Essex were also his

patrons.--In 1644, the Parliament gave him Archbishop Laud’s

library; and soon after made him Head of the Archbishop’s

Court, and gave him his estate and palace at Lambeth:--all of

which Hugh kept till the Restoration, when he paid for his

zeal, his puritanism, and rebellion, on a gibbet at

Charing-Cross.--His daughter married a merchant in Newport,

Rhode-Island, and lived and died with an excellent

character.--Her Father having met with so tragical an end, I

omit to mention her Husband’s name, whose Posterity live in

good reputation.--Governor Hutchinson reports, that the widow

of Hugh Peters was supported, till 1671, by a collection at

Salem, of 30_l._ per ann. Were this report true, it would be

much to the reputation of Salem for having _once_ relieved

the unfortunate. Mr. Hutchinson might have pointed out the

cause of the unhappy widow’s necessity; but he has left that

part to me, and here it follows:--After Hugh’s Death, the

selectmen of Salem were afraid that the King [Charles II.]

would seize on his estate in Salem, as had been the case in

regard to what the Parliament had given him in England. They

therefore trumped up a debt, and seized and sold the said

estate to the families of Lyndes and Curwin, who possess it

to the present time;--and the selectmen of Salem allowed the

widow 30l. per ann. for the wrong they had done her and her

daughter. It is not likely that the widow was supported by

any charitable collection; for William Peters was a man of

great property, and had a deed of the whole peninsula

whereon Boston stands, which he purchased of Mr. Blaxton,

who bought it of the Plymouth Company; though Mr. Hutchinson

says Blaxton’s title arose merely from his sleeping on it

the first of any Englishman.[17]--This was well said by Mr.

Hutchinson, who wanted to justify the people of Salem in

seizing the land and expelling Mr. Blaxton from his

settlement in 1630, because he said he liked Lords-Brethren

less than Lords-Bishops.--Moreover, Thomas Peters, at the

same time, was living at Saybrook, and was not poor.--Those

two Gentlemen were able and willing to support the widow of

an unfortunate brother whom they loved very tenderly.--They

took great care of his daughter, and left her handsome

legacies.--From these considerations, I am induced to

believe, that the widow of Hugh Peters never subsisted on

any contributions, except what she received from her

brothers William and Thomas Peters.--Mr. Hutchinson makes a

curious remark, viz., If Hugh Peters had returned to his

parish, he would not have suffered as he did.--He might have

said, with greater propriety, that, if Hugh Peters had not

been a fanatic and a rebel more zealous than wise, he never

would have left his Parish for the agency of the people of

New-England, who never paid him the stipulated allowance for

his support in England, tho’ he gave them thanksgiving-days,

instead of fasting, for the space of twenty years, and

procured, in 1649, from Oliver Cromwell, a charter for the

Company for propagating the Gospel in New-England, which, by

contributions raised in England, have supported all the

missionaries among the Indians to the present time;--yet Mr.

Hutchinson and Neal write largely about the vast expense the

Massachusets-Bay have been at in spreading the Gospel among

the poor savages!