William Usselinx,[2] a Hollander, born at Antwerp in Brabant,
presented himself to King Gustaf Adolph, and laid before him a
proposition for a Trading Company, to be established in Sweden, and to
extend its operations to Asia, Africa, and Magellan's Land (Terra
Magellanica), with the assurance that this would be a great source of
revenue to the kingdom. Full power was given him to carry out this
important project; and thereupon a contract of trade was drawn up, to
which the Company was to agree and subscribe it. Usselinx published
explanations of this contract, wherein he also particularly directed
attention to the country on the Delaware, its fertility, convenience,
and all its imaginable resources. To strengthen the matter, a charter
(octroy) was secured for the Company, and especially to Usselinx, who
was to receive a royalty of one thousandth upon all articles bought or
sold by the Company.
The powerful king, whose zeal for the honor of God was not less ardent
than for the welfare of his subjects, availed himself of this
opportunity to extend the doctrines of Christ among the heathen, as
well as to establish his own power in other parts of the world. To
this end he sent forth Letters Patent, dated at Stockholm on the 2d of
July, 1626, wherein all, both high and low, were invited to contribute
something to the Company, according to their means. The work was
completed in the Diet of the following year, 1627, when the estates of
the realm gave their assent, and confirmed the measure....
But when these arrangements were now in full progress, and duly
provided for, the German war and the king's death occurred, which
caused this important work to be laid aside. The Trading Company was
dissolved, its subscriptions nullified, and the whole project seemed
about to die with the king. But, just as it appeared to be at its end,
it received new life. Another Hollander by the name of Peter Menewe,
sometimes called Menuet,[3] made his appearance in Sweden.
As a good beginning, the first colony was sent off; and Peter Menewe
was placed over it, as being best acquainted in those regions. They
set sail from Götheborg, in a ship-of-war called the _Key of Colmar_,
followed by a smaller vessel bearing the name of the _Bird Griffin_,
both laden with people, provisions, ammunition, and merchandise,
suitable for traffic and gifts to the Indians. The ships successfully
reached their place of destination. The high expectations which our
emigrants had of that new land were well met by the first views which
they had of it. They made their first landing on the bay or entrance
to the river Poutaxat, which they called the river of New Sweden; and
the place where they landed they called Paradise Point.[4]
A purchase of land was immediately made from the Indians; and it was
determined that all the land on the western side of the river, from
the point called Cape Inlopen or Hinlopen,[5] up to the fall called
Santickan, and all the country inland, as much as was ceded, should
belong to the Swedish crown forever. Posts were driven into the ground
as landmarks, which were still seen in their places sixty years
afterward. A deed was drawn up for the land thus purchased. This was
written in Dutch, because no Swede was yet able to interpret the
language of the heathen. The Indians subscribed their hands and marks.
The writing was sent home to Sweden to be preserved in the royal
archives. Mans Kling was the surveyor. He laid out the land and made a
map of the whole river, with its tributaries, islands, and points,
which is still to be found in the royal archives in Sweden. Their
clergyman was Reorus Torkillus of East Gothland.
The first abode of the newly arrived emigrants was at a place called
by the Indians Hopokahacking. There, in the year 1638, Peter Menuet
built a fortress which he named Fort Christina, after the reigning
queen of Sweden.[6] The place, situated upon the west side of the
river, was probably chosen so as to be out of the way of the
Hollanders, who claimed the eastern side,--a measure of prudence,
until the arrival of a greater force from Sweden. The fort was built
upon an eligible site, not far from the mouth of the creek, so as to
secure them in the navigable water of the Maniquas, which was
afterward called Christina Kihl, or creek.
Peter Menuet made a good beginning for the settlement of the Swedish
colony in America. He guarded his little fort for over three years,
and the Hollanders neither attempted nor were able to overthrow it.
After some years of faithful service he died at Christina. In his
place followed Peter Hollendare, a native Swede, who did not remain at
the head of its affairs more than a year and a half. He returned home
to Sweden, and was a major at Skkepsholm, in Stockholm, in the year
1655.
The second emigration took place under Lieutenant Colonel John Printz,
who went out with the appointment of Governor of New Sweden. He had a
grant of four hundred six dollars for his traveling expenses, and one
thousand two hundred dollars silver as his annual salary. The Company
was invested with the exclusive privilege of importing tobacco into
Sweden, altho that article was even then regarded as unnecessary and
injurious, altho indispensable since the establishment of the bad
habit of its use. Upon the same occasion was also sent out Magister
John Campanius Holm, who was called by their excellencies the Royal
Council and Admiral Claes Flemming, to become the government chaplain,
and watch over the Swedish congregation.
The ship on which they sailed was called the _Fama_. It went from
Stockholm to Götheborg, and there took in its freight. Along with this
went two other ships of the line, the _Swan_ and the _Charitas_, laden
with people, and other necessaries. Under Governor Printz, ships came
to the colony in three distinct voyages. The first ship was the _Black
Cat_, with ammunition, and merchandise for the Indians. Next, the ship
_Swan_, on a second voyage, with emigrants, in the year 1647.
Afterward, two other ships, called the _Key_ and the _Lamp_. During
these times the clergymen, Mr. Lawrence Charles Lockenius and Mr.
Israel Holgh, were sent out to the colony....
The voyage to New Sweden was at that time quite long. The watery way
to the West was not yet well discovered, and, therefore, for fear of
the sand-banks off Newfoundland, they kept their course to the east
and south as far as to what were then called the Brazates. The ships
which went under the command of Governor Printz sailed along the coast
of Portugal, and down the coast of Africa, until they found the
eastern passage, then directly over to America, leaving the Canaries
high up to the north. They landed at Antigua, then continued their
voyage northward, past Virginia and Maryland, to Cape Hinlopen. Yet,
in view of the astonishingly long route which they took, the voyage
was quick enough in six months' time,--from Stockholm on August 16,
1642, to the new fort of Christina, in New Sweden, on February 15,
1643.
The Swedes who emigrated to America belonged partly to a trading
company, provided with a charter, who for their services, according to
their condition of agreement, were to receive pay and monthly wages; a
part of them also went on their own impulse to try their fortune. For
these it was free to settle and live in the country as long as they
pleased or to leave it, and they were therefore, by way of distinction
from the others, called freemen. At first, also, malefactors and
vicious people were sent over, who were used as slaves to labor upon
the fortifications. They were kept in chains and not allowed to have
intercourse with the other settlers; moreover, a separate place of
abode was assigned to them. The neighboring people and country were
dissatisfied that such wretches should come into the colony. It was
also, in fact, very objectionable in regard to the heathen, who might
be greatly offended by it. Whence it happened that, when such persons
came over in Governor Printz's time, it was not permitted that one of
them should set foot upon the shore, but they had all to be carried
back again, whereupon a great part of them died during the voyage or
perished in some other way. Afterward it was forbidden at home in
Sweden, under a penalty, to take for the American voyage any persons
of bad fame; nor was there ever any lack of good people for the
colony.
Governor Printz was now in a position to put the government upon a
safe footing to maintain the rights of the Swedes, and to put down the
attempts of the Hollanders. They had lately, before his arrival,
patched their little Fort Nassau. On this account he selected the
island of Tenaekong as his residence, which is sometimes also called
Tutaeaenung and Tenicko, about three Swedish miles from Fort
Christina. The convenient situation of the place suggested its
selection as also the location of Fort Nassau,[7] which lay some miles
over against it, to which he could thus command the passage by water.
The new fort, which was erected and provided with considerable
armament, was called New Götheborg. His place of residence, which he
adorned with orchards, gardens, a pleasure-house, etc., he named
Printz Hall. A handsome wooden church was also built at the same
place, which Magister Campanius consecrated, on the last great
prayer-day which was celebrated in New Sweden, on the 4th of
September, 1646. Upon that place also all the most prominent freemen
had their residences and plantations.
[1] From Acrelius's "History of New Sweden." Printed in "Old South
Leaflets." Acrelius from 1749 until 1756 was provost over Swedish
Congregations in America and pastor of their church at Christina,
now Wilmington, on the Delaware. His complete work is an exhaustive
one, and covers not only the early but the later years of Swedish
history on the Delaware. It has long been esteemed the best work we
have on the subject.
[2] Usselinx had proposed the formation of a company to trade in
foreign countries, including America, as early as 1604.
[3] Peter Minuit, the Governor of New Amsterdam, who purchased
Manhattan Island from the Indians for goods worth $24, is here
referred to.
[4] Paradise Point was near the present town of Lewes, in the State
of Delaware. The site is near where the Bay merges in the ocean.
[5] This name has been corrupted Into Henlopen. The cape was named
by Captain Cornelius May after a towu in Friesland. May's name was
given to the southern point of New Jersey now known as Cape May.
He visited Delaware Bay in or about 1614.
[6] Ft. Christina was within the limits of the present city of
Wilmington. The ancient Swedish church, built in 1698 and still
standing in Wilmington, marks the site of this, the original
settlement of Swedes in Delaware.
[7] Fort Nassau was on Delaware Bay at the mouth of Timber Creek,
below Gloucester Point, in New Jersey.
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY COLONY
(1627-1631)
BY GOVERNOR THOMAS DUDLEY[1]
Touching the plantacon which wee here haue begun, it fell out thus
about the yeare 1627 some friends beeing togeather in Lincolnesheire,
fell into some discourse about New England and the plantinge of the
gospell there; and after some deliberation, we imparted our reasons by
l'res [letters] & messages to some in London & the west country where
it was likewise deliberately thought vppon [upon], and at length with
often negociation soe ripened that in the year 1628. wee procured a
patent from his Ma'tie for our planting between the Matachusetts Bay,
and Charles river on the South; and the River of Merimack on the North
and 3 miles on ether side of those Rivers & Bay, as allso for the
government of those who did or should inhabit within that compass and
the same year we sent Mr. John Endecott & some with him to beginne a
plantacon & to strengthen such as he should find there which wee sent
thether from Dorchester & some places adioyning [adjoining]; ffrom
whom the same year receivinge hopefull news.
The next year 1629 wee sent diverse shipps over w'th about 300 people,
and some Cowes, Goates & Horses many of which arrived safely. Theis
[these] by their too large comendacons [commendations] of the country,
and the comodities thereof, invited us soe strongly to goe on that Mr.
Wenthropp of Soffolke (who was well knowne in his own country & well
approved heere for his pyety, liberality, wisedome & gravity) comeinge
in to us, wee came to such resolution that in April 1630, wee sett
saile from Old England with 4 good shipps. And in May following 8 more
followed, 2 having gone before in February and March, and 2 more
following in June and August, besides another set out by a private
merchant. Theis 17 Shipps arrived all safe in New England, for the
increase of the plantacon here theis yeare 1630....
Our 4 shipps which sett out in April arrived here in June and July,
where wee found the colony in a sadd and unexpected condicon above 80
of them being dead the winter before and many of those alive weake and
sicke: all the corne & bread amongst them all hardly sufficient to
feed them a fortnight, insoemuch that the remainder of 180 servants
wee had the 2 years before sent over, comeinge to vs for victualls to
sustaine them wee found ourselves wholly unable to feed them by reason
that the p'visions [provisions] shipped for them were taken out of the
shipp they were put in, and they who were trusted to shipp them in
another failed us, and left them behind; whereupon necessity enforced
us to our extreme loss to giue them all libertie; who had cost us
about: 16 or 20 £s [sterling] a person furnishing and sending over.
But bearing theis things as wee might, wee beganne to consult of the
place of our sitting downe: ffor Salem where wee landed, pleased us
not. And to that purpose some were sent to the Bay[2] to search vpp
the rivers for a convenient place; who vppon their returne reported to
haue found a good place vppon Mistick; but some other of us seconding
theis to approoue [approve] or dislike of their judgment; we found a
place [that] liked vs better 3 leagues vp Charles river--And there
vppon vnshipped our goods into other vessels and with much cost and
labour brought them in July to Charles Towne; but there receiveing
advertisements by some of the late arived shipps from London and
Amsterdam of some Ffrench preparations against vs (many of our people
brought with vs beeing sick of ffeavers [fevers] & the scurvy and wee
thereby vnable to car[r]y vp our ordinance and baggage soe farr) wee
were forced to change counsaile and for our present shelter to plant
dispersedly, some at Charles Towne which standeth on the North Side of
the mouth of Charles River; some on the South Side thereof, which
place we named Boston (as wee intended to haue done the place wee
first resolved on) some of vs vppon Mistick, which wee named Meadford;
some of vs westward on Charles river, 4 miles from Charles Towne,
which place wee named Watertoune; others of vs 2 miles from Boston in
a place wee named Rocksbury, others vppon the river of Sawgus betweene
Salem and Charles Toune. And the westerne men 4 miles South from
Boston at a place wee named Dorchester.
This dispersion troubled some of vs, but helpe it wee could not,
wanting abillity to remove to any place fit to build a Toune vppon,
and the time too short to deliberate any longer least [lest] the
winter should surprize vs before wee had builded our houses.... of the
people who came over with vs from the time of their setting saile from
England in Aprill 1630. vntill December followinge there dyed by
estimacon about 200 at the least--Soe lowe hath the Lord brought vs!
Well, yet they who survived were not discouraged but bearing God's
corrections with humilitye and trusting in his mercies, and
considering how after a greater ebb hee had raised vpp our neighbours
at Plymouth we beganne againe in December to consult about a fitt
place to build a Toune [town] vppon, leavinge all thoughts of a fort,
because vppon any invasion wee were necessarily to loose our howses
when we should retire thereinto; soe after diverse meetings at Boston,
Rocksbury and Waterton on the 28th of December wee grew to this
resolution to bind all the Assistants Mr. Endicott & Mr. Sharpe
excepted, which last purposeth to returne by the next ships into
England to build howses at a place, a mile east from Waterton neere
Charles river,[3] the next Springe, and to winter there the next
yeare, that soe by our examples and by removeinge the ordinance and
munition thether, all who were able, might be drawne thether, and such
as shall come to vs hereafter to their advantage bee compelled soe to
doe; and soe if God would, a fortifyed Toune might there grow vpp, the
place fitting reasonably well thereto....
But now haueing some leasure to discourse of the motiues for other
mens comeinge to this place or their abstaining from it, after my
brief manner I say this--That if any come hether [hither] to plant for
worldly ends that canne live well at home hee co[m]mits an errour of
which hee will soon repent him. But if for spirittuall [ends] and that
noe particular obstacle hinder his removeall, he may finde here what
may well content him: vizt: materialls to build, fewell [fuel] to
burn, ground to plant, seas and rivers to ffish in, a pure ayer [air]
to breath[e] in, good water to drinke till wine or beare canne be
made, which togeather with the cowes, hoggs and goates brought hether
allready may suffice for food, for as for foule [fowl] and venison,
they are dainties here a well as in England. Ffor cloaths and beddinge
they must bring them with them till time and industry produce them
here. In a word, wee yett enioy [enjoy] little to bee envyed but
endure much to be pittyed in the sicknes & mortalitye of our people.
[1] From Dudley's letter to the Countess of London. Printed in
Hart's "Source Book of American History." Dudley came over with
Winthrop, and at one time was governor of the Colony.
[2] Boston Harbor is here referred to.
[3] The place was alterward called Newtown, and is now Cambridge.
HOW THE BAY COLONY DIFFERED FROM PLYMOUTH
BY JOHN G. PALFREY[1]
The emigration of the Englishmen who settled at Plymouth had been
prompted by religious dissent. In what manner Robinson, who was
capable of speculating on political tendencies, or Brewster, whose
early position had compelled him to observe them, had augured
concerning the prospect of public affairs in their native country, no
record tells; while the rustics of the Scrooby congregation, who fled
from a government which denied them liberty in their devotions, could
have had but little knowledge and no agency in the political sphere.
The case was widely different with the founders of the Colony of
Massachusetts Bay. That settlement had its rise in a state of things
in England which associated religion and politics in an intimate
alliance....
Winthrop, then forty-two years old, was descended from a family of
good condition, long seated at Groton, in Suffolk, where he had a
property of six or seven hundred pounds a year, the equivalent of at
least two thousand pounds at the present day. His father was a lawyer
and magistrate. Commanding uncommon respect and confidence from an
early age, he had moved in the circles where the highest matters of
English policy were discust, by men who had been associates of
Whitgift, Bacon, Essex, and Cecil. Humphrey was "a gentleman of
special parts, of learning and activity, and a godly man"; in the home
of his father-in-law, Thomas, third earl of Lincoln, the head in that
day of the now ducal house of Newcastle, he had been the familiar
companion of the patriotic nobles.
Of the assistants, Isaac Johnson, esteemed the richest of the
emigrants, was another son-in-law of Lord Lincoln, and a landholder in
three counties. Sir Richard Saltonstall of Halifax, in Yorkshire, was
rich enough to be a bountiful contributor to the company's operations.
Thomas Dudley, with a company of volunteers which he had raised, had
served, thirty years before, under Henry IV of France; since which
time he had managed the estates of the Earl of Lincoln. He was old
enough to have lent a shrill voice to the huzzas at the defeat of the
armada, and his military services had indoctrinated him in the lore of
civil and religious freedom. Theophilus Eaton, an eminent London
merchant, was used to courts and had been minister of Charles I in
Denmark. Simon Bradstreet, the son of a Non-conformist minister in
Lincolnshire, and a grandson of "a Suffolk gentleman of a fine
estate," had studied at Emanuel College, Cambridge. William Vassall
was an opulent West India proprietor. "The principal planters of
Massachusetts," says the prejudiced Chalmers, "were English country
gentlemen of no inconsiderable fortunes; of enlarged understandings,
improved by liberal education; of extensive ambition, concealed under
the appearance of religious humility."
But it is not alone from what we know of the position, character, and
objects of those few members of the Massachusetts Company who were
proposing to emigrate at the early period now under our notice, that
we are to estimate the power and the purposes of that important
corporation. It had been rapidly brought into the form which it now
bore, by the political exigencies of the age. Its members had no less
in hand than a wide religious and political reform--whether to be
carried out in New England, or in Old England, or in both, it was for
circumstances, as they should unfold themselves, to determine. The
leading emigrants to Massachusetts were of that brotherhood of men
who, by force of social consideration as well as of the intelligence
and resolute patriotism, molded the public opinion and action of
England in the first half of the seventeenth century. While the large
part stayed at home to found, as it proved, the short-lived English
republic, and to introduce elements into the English Constitution
which had to wait another half-century for their secure reception,
another part devoted themselves at once to the erection of free
institutions in this distant wilderness.
In an important sense the associates of the Massachusetts Company were
builders of the British, as well as of the New England, commonwealth.
Some ten or twelve of them, including Cradock, the Governor, served in
the Long Parliament. Of the four commoners of that Parliament
distinguished by Lord Clarendon as first in influence, Vane had been
governor of the company, and Hampden, Pym, and Fiennes--all patentees
of Connecticut--if not members, were constantly consulted upon its
affairs. The latter statement is also true of the Earl of Warwick, the
Parliament's admiral, and of those excellent persons, Lord Say and
Sele and Lord Brooke, both of whom at one time proposed to emigrate.
The company's meetings placed Winthrop and his colleagues in relations
with numerous persons destined to act busy parts in the stirring times
that were approaching--with Brereton and Hewson, afterward two of the
Parliamentary major-generals; with Philip Nye, who helped Sir Henry
Vane to "cozen" the Scottish Presbyterian Commissioners in the
phraseology of the Solemn League and Covenant; with Samuel Vassall,
whose name shares with those of Hampden and Lord Say and Sele the
renown of the refusal to pay ship-money, and of courting the suit
which might ruin them or emancipate England; with John Venn, who, at
the head of six thousand citizens, beset the House of Lords during the
trial of Lord Strafford, and whom, with three other Londoners, King
Charles, after the battle of Edgehil, excluded from his offer of
pardon; with Owen Rowe, the "firebrand of the city"; with Thomas
Andrews, the lord mayor, who proclaimed the abolition of royalty....
He who well weighs the facts which have been presented in connection
with the principal emigration to Massachusetts, and other related
facts which will offer themselves to notice as we proceed, may find
himself conducted to the conclusion that when Winthrop and his
associates prepared to convey across the water a charter from the King
which, they hoped, would in their beginnings afford them some
protection both from himself and through him from the powers of
Continental Europe, they had conceived a project no less important
than that of laying, on this side of the Atlantic, the foundations of
a nation of Puritan Englishmen, foundations to be built upon as future
circumstances should decide or allow. It would not perhaps be pressing
the point too far to say that in view of the thick clouds that were
gathering over their home, they contemplated the possibility that the
time was near at hand when all that was best of what they left behind
would follow them to these shores; when a renovated England, secure in
freedom and pure in religion, would rise in North America; when a
transatlantic English empire would fulfil, in its beneficent order,
the dreams of English patriots and sages of earlier times....