R E M A R:K S
ON THE
N ARRAGANSET PATENT.
READ BEFORE
W~c Utrarsattt   ~ishwtoiraT cr~Otd,-,IUNE, 1862,
BY THOMAS ASPINWALL.
S ECOND EDITION.
-PROVIDENCE:
SIDNEY S. RIDER & BRO.
1865.
1       — ylXYV       -X        --         \A~  7;II








R E M A R K S
ON THE
NARRAGANSET PATENT.
READ BEFORE
JUNE, 1862,
BY THOMAS ASPINWALL.
SECOND EDITION.
PROVIDENCE:
SIDNEY S. RIDER & BROTHER.
1865.




KINOWLES, ANTHONiY & CO., PRINTERS.




PREFATORY REMARKS.
THE NARRAGANSET PATENT, the subject of the following pages,
is an instrument engrossed on parchment, at present at the
State House, which purports to be a grant, dated Dec. 10, 1643,
from the Parliamentary Commissioners to the Governor, &c.,
of the Colony of Massachusetts, of the territory which substantially at present constitutes the State of Rhode Island.
This patent having been a subject of discussion in the Massachusetts Historical Society on one or two occasions, the author
was induced to inspect the instrument itself. The result of his
examination, made on the 29th of March, 1860, was briefly
stated, in a description which he gave of it in its present condition, at the meeting of the Society in the following May,
accompanied with a few remarks comprising the following
principal heads,-that the patent was invalid, not having been
signed by a majority of the Commissioners, as required by
ordinance; that it therefore afforded no justification of the
severities of our forefathers towards their weaker neighbors;
that it was not mentioned by Winthrop or Hutchinson; that
Roger Williams had asserted, that the patent had been publicly
disavowed by the Lord President of the Board of Plantation
Commissioners; that it was now clear that Roger WTilliams's
account was true; and, finally, that \~inthrop)'s silence was
probably owing to his c     onsci()sii es  of thle Tawotllss chalrlacter
of the instrument.




4                PREFATORY REMARKS.
Nearly two years after, at the February meeting, in 1862, an
official copy of the patent was produced and commented on
by Mr. Deane. In the course of his remarks, he controverted
most of the positions previously taken by the author. He contended that the patent was valid, and would have been so had
it been signed only by the President and any four of the Commissioners; that Roger Williams's testimony in disparagement
of its validity was not altogether to be relied upon. He showed
that it had been once alluded to by Winthrop; and had also,
on that occasion, as he conceived, been treated as genuine and
legal. These counter-statements and some others of less relevancy are answered in the following pages, and some further
considerations are added, which perhaps may serve to elucidate
the character and history of the subject. A summary and two
notes have been appended since the paper was read to the
Society.




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
~Mr. PRESIDENT, —At our last February meeting, our honored colleague, Mr. Deane, gave a commentary, marked with
his accustomed ability and spirit of research, on a copy of the
Narraganset Patent, which had been furnished him from your
own collection of historical and family papers. Towards the
close of his observations, he courteously animadverted upon
some remarks against the validity of that patent, which I had
made here, two years ago, after having inspected the original
document at the State House.
The revival of the subject was wholly unexpected by me;
and although I could hardly, on a sudden, recollect precisely
the remarks I had made so long before, or so clearly discern
the force and tendency of the objections brought against them
as to give a complete answer to each objection, yet I felt desirous to satisfy the Society that I had not lightly obtruded
upon it a crude opinion respecting a subject of historical interest, and likewise that I had sound reason for adopting, and
for continuing to maintain, that opinion: but having given way
to a senior member, who rose at the same moment to speak on
the subject, it so happened that I had not the good fortune
afterwards to obtain a hearing, —a circumstance which I the
more regret, because it deprived me of the opportunity (I will
not say advantage) of having my defence appear in the latest
volume of our Proceedings, side by side with the criticism which
it was intended to answer.
With permission, I will now avail myself of this first regular
return of my section to enter upon the vindication of my opinion
in regard to the patent.




6              THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
In the beginning of Mr. Deane's notice of my remarks, it is
said, that, " in proof of the nullity of the patent, I had alleged
that the document had no seal, public or private, nor any indication of enrolment or registration " (Proceed. HIist. Soc., iii.
404). Now, these words are part of the description I gave of
the document in its present condition; but they form no part
of my argument. On the contrary, my inference, that the
patent was a nullity., was distinctly drawn from the simple fact,
that it did not bear the signatures of so many of the commissioners as the parliamentary ordinance prescribed. (Idem, p. 40;
Hazard, i. 533).
I deemed it useful to mention the absence of seals and indorsements of any kind, that the actual state of the instrument,
at this particular period, might be accurately known.  I may
add, that a knowledge of its state, at different periods, might
shed much light on what is now obscure in its origin and history. Besides, the absence of all indications of enrolment or
registration determined at once the character of the instrument
as an original, and not an enrolment duplicate, nor an exemplification; in both which latter, such indications, as a matter
of course, would have appeared.
Mr. Deane's argument also erroneously assumes, that I had
represented the inscription of some note, or memorandum of
enrolment, as an indispensable prerequisite of a valid charter.
It is true, that, by the laws of England (27 lHen. VIII., c. 11;
B1. Corn., ii. c. xxi. ~ 2), all letters-patent must be enrolled;
and the fact of enrolhnent is sometimes noted upon them.
This I apprehend, however, to be a discretionary act, mostly
professional rather than official, and not enjoined by law or
regulation.
I may here state, that I am not aware of any evidence extant,
nor even of' any pretence, that this indispensable formality of'
enrolment was ever complied with in the case in question.  On
this account alone, the Narrarganset Patent would be fatally
defective from the beginning.
As, under the third headl of Mr. Deane's comment on -nmy
remarks, his argument addresses itself in ftrmn, apparently to




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                   7
the phraseology rather than to the substance of my reasoning,
it may be advisable, for the moment, to consider it in that light.
I had said that the patent was invalid, because it had not the
assent of a majority of the Board of Commissioners, which, by
the ordinance, was required fbr each of its acts. Mr. Deane
seems to think it sufficient to meet this inference by stating, in
effect, that, in consequence of authority given to the president
and any four commissioners to perform certain functions, a
majority was not necessary for all acts whatever; but I was
not speaking of ordinary official details, nor of such current
business, as, in most analogous cases, is transacted by a few out
of the whole body of associates. The subject treated of was a
patent; and my meaning naturally was, that for issuing a
patent, and for each act of that nature, the concurrence of a
majority was requisite.  My expression, " each of its acts," is,
in truth, not scrupulously exact.  Had it been'" such of its
acts," or " acts of this kind," either phrase would have been a
more exact version of the sense of the ordinance, and have been
quite sufficient to embrace the case of the patent under consideration, without extending to other acts with which the subject
was not connected.
But taking it for granted that a logical confutation, and not
a mere verbal criticism, was intended, I proceed to the consideration of Mr. Deane's argument.  He alleges that the patent
is valid, although signed by less than a majority of the commissioners, because a majority is necessary only for certain specific
acts; while, for the transaction of the general business of the
Board, the ordinance requires only the assent of the president
and any four of his associates. To which I reply, that the
grant of a charter, such as that in question, is precisely one of
those exceptional specific acts which could only be legalized
by a majority.
The object of the clause relative to the president and four
commissioners was, primarily, to fix the lowest number by
which any business could be done; but I have failed to discover a single instance in which that mere quorum ever acted.
The perilous aspect of the times would suggest to the commis



8              THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
sioners the obvious expediency of sharing responsibility among
as many as possible. Their practice coincided with this view
of their position. In Winthrop's Journal are four documents
emanating from the Committee of Plantations, and every one
of them is signed by a majority or more of the commissioners
(ii. 272, 280, 318, 320).
Again: the sphere of duty assigned to this smaller quorum
was administrative. It included neither the power of appointment to plantation-offices, nor the authority to change, in any
degree, the existing form or system of territorial government.
Both these subjects were, by subsequent clauses of the ordinance, distinctly placed under the control of the chief governor
and commissioners, or the greater number of them (Hazard, i.
ut supra).
The clause which specially concerns the present question is
as follows: "And whereas, for the better government and
security of the said plantations, islands, owners, and inhabitants,
there may be just and fit occasion to assign over some part of
the power and authority, granted in this ordinance to the chief
governor and commissioners aforenamed, unto said owners,
inhabitants, and others, it is hereby ordained, that the said
governor and commissioners, or the greater number of them,
shall be hereby authorized to assign, ratify, and confirm so
much of their aforenamed authority and power to such persons
as they shall judge fit for the better governing and preserving
of said plantations and islands from open violence and private
disturbances."
By this clause, no transfer of the power and authority vested
in the commissioners could be made without the assent of a
majority. At the date of the ordinance, the power and jurisdiction of the Board of Commissioners extended, and might, at
discretion, have been exercised directly, over the whole territory described in the Narraganset Patent, and over all its internal, intercolonial, and external relations.
A simple cession of the soil, unaccompanied by any express
reservation, if made to a chartered corporation invested with
the powers of civil government, would have carried with it the




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
right of government, at least ad interim, and during the pleasure of the Board.
Such was the construction given by the Connecticut authorities to the Warwick Patent, or rather deed of conveyance, to
Lord Say and Scale and others, of the 19th March, 1631-2;
although Connecticut, at the time of her subsequent purchase
from Fenwick, was only a voluntary association; and although
the deed itself contains no express nor any implied transfer of
civil power beyond what may be gathered from the loose and
general words "jurisdiction, rights," &c., whatever they might
be, of the grantors.  Nor, again, is there in the deed any recital
of title, or even phrase, to explain what rights the Earl of' Warwick had, or whence he obtained them.
The Massachusetts authorities adopted a similar construction
of the Narraganset Patent, in their letter dated the 27th of.
August, 1645, forbidding Roger Williams " to exercise jurisdiction in Providence and the Island of Quiday."  But they
had stronger grounds for this construction.  The Narraganlset
Patent is explicit. The transfer of dominion is clearly set forth
in that clause, which " orders and appoints the governor, assistants, and freemen of Massachusetts to govern " the Narraganset territory in the same manner as was prescribed in their own
royal charter.  This being such an assignment of power and
authority as required the assent of a collective majority of the
chief governor and commissioners, and the Narraganset Patent
having only nine signatures (one less than a majority), is,
therefore, and always was, a nullity, invalid, of no force and
effect whatever; and never could have passed the commissioners' table, unless we resort to the bold assumption, that the
Board deliberately, in the outset of its official career, set at
defiance the organic ordinance to which it owed its existence.
The declaration of the Earl of Warwick, that he was sure
the patent had never passed the table, if made, as asserted by
Roger Williams in his letter to Mason, (1 Mass. Hist. Coll., i.
279), would be conclusive proof of the fact. The patent could
not have passed without his knowledge, because the ordinance
required that he should be present at all meetings, even of that:




10             THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
smaller quorum  by which Mr. Deane supposes it might have
been passed.  If, therefore, it be conceded that the Board
would not illegally confirm an illegal instrument, the question
raised under Mr. Deane's fourth division is narrowed down to
this single point: Did the earl actually utter the declaration as
stated by Williams? Williams himself was thoroughly convinced of the truth of what he repeated; for he introduces it
with the emphatic words, "It is certain."  Mr. Deane also
candidly admits his sincerity so faLr as to say,' that he should
have great confidence that Williams would not assert what he
did not believe to be true;" but still he intimates that it is not
safe to rely upon his statement: 1st, Because the occurrence
took place twenty-five years before the letter to Mason was
written; 2d, Because Williams, not being in England at that
time, must have heard the story from Gorton or some other
person.
Taking these objections, for convenience, in reverse order, I
would observe, that hearsay evidence, here objected to, is admitted, even under the rigid rules of jurisprudence, on historical
points, wherever it is the best evidence attainable. To discard
it from history would leave us only a ghastly skeleton of the
past. But no part of the evidence to which I shall refer, as the
foundation of Williams's belief, was hearsay to him: it was the
testimony of eye and ear witnesses.
I readily agree, that Gorton, in all probability, did relate
the incident in question to multitudes in Rhode Island, and to
Williams among the rest, soon after his return from  England
in May, 1648; and I think his account deserved full credit:
for although unwarrantable attempts were made to disgrace
and destroy him, because, unconsecrated by ordination and not
privileged by a university education, he presumed to exercise
the functions of a scriptural teacher, and because he was as
steadfast as he was extravagant and heterodox in his religious
opinions, insolent under provocation, and too ready to return
railing for railing, yet the whole tenor of his life shows that he
was conscientious, sincere, and, in matters of fact, honest and
truthful.




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  11
If, however, there were any errors in Gorton's story, Williams had, at a later period, ample opportunity to correct them.
F]rom the end of 1651 to the summer of' 1654, he was in England, employed, jointly with John Clarke, as agent of the Colony to procure from  the Council of State the abrogation of
Coddington's Charter, and the confirmation of the ProvidencePlantations Charter, obtained by Williams in 1644. Most of
the distinguished persons, who, in 1644, were commissioners of
plantations, were then living.  Six of them, including three
signers of his charter, were members of the Council of State in
April, 1652, when the petition of himself and Clarke was presented, (Parl. Hist., xx. 78, 79).  Two of these (Cornelius
Holland and Sir Henry Vane) labored with him so zealously,
that they received the thanks of the Colony for their eminent
services in her behalf, (Backus, i. 296). Sir Henry aided in
framing the petition, and exerted all his influence and personal
ability to insure it success.  Williams called him " the sheetanchor of our ship," (id., p. 280). He was on terms of such
intimacy with Sir Henry, as to be, for more than ten weeks, a
guest at Belleau, the country residence of Sir Henry, in Lincolnshire.  Many, if not most, of these ex-commissioners were
personally cognizant of all that had transpired at the Board at
the hearing of Gorton's complaint; and there can be little
doubt that Williams sought, and that they gave him, in the
course of his last visit to England, full and authentic information in regard to the declaration of the Earl of Warwick.
Moreover, Winslow-the agent of Massachusetts and the
other colonies, the old antagonist of Gorton —was still in London, and no doubt would, if he could, have contradicted the
story of the earl's declaration; and as he and Willianms, though
personally friends, were unavoidably often brought into conflict
where this very story would have been alleged as an argument
in support of the Rhode-Island  Charter, Williams's grave
recital of it, sixteen (not twenty-five) years after, is strong presumptive proof, that the story was virtually or expressly confirmed, even by Winslow himself, the arch-enemy of Gorton
and the Providence-Plantations Charter, and the official advo



12            THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
cate of the " pretended " patent denounced by the declaration
in question.
Now, whoever, in this host of competent and credible witnesses, might be his informant, Roger Williams had too much
discernment and circumspection to misunderstand or misjudge,
or to adopt credulously, and without ptoper scrutiny, the accounts they gave him. Nor would he be likely to forget the
report of an incident of such paramount interest to him, so
vitally important to Rhode Island, and so intimately connected
with all his public labors, with the promotion of his longcherished moral purposes, and with the grand achievement of
his political life.
But Mr. Deane, as mentioned before, intimates that it is not
safe to rely upon the statement of Williams, because it was
made twenty-five years after the occurrence; leaving it to be
inferred that Williams's memory was not to be trusted for that
length of time.
This, I apprehend, is altogether a gratuitous surmise; an
assumption not based on alleged facts, nor warranted on general
principles, and specially contradicted by what we know of the
latter years of Williams.
It is almost universally admitted, as a law of our nature,
that, in aged persons, the memory retains its earlier more firmly
than its more recent acquisitions; and that those impressions
which are deepest are also the most permanent. Consequently,
although Williams, at the age of seventy, might find that tame
and ordinary occurrences of the preceding day, week, or month,
were more apt than formerly to escape his recollection, yet he
would not, on that account, be the less sure to remember accurately an incident of very great interest, which had been made
known to him at the age of fifty-fbur, and which had been treasured up for sixteen years after, as a subject of reflection, and a
frequent topic of conversation. Before we are called upon to
disbelieve his account of such an incident, we should have positive proof of an extraordinary decay of his memory.
The facts, however, in his case, are proof to the contrary.
Two years after this period of supposed infirmity, he was in




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  13
such full possession of all his faculties, mental and corporeal, as
to row his boat thirty miles in one day; and on the next, after
a few hours' repose, to engage in a three-days' debate on fourteen propositions against three logical champions of Fox, the
Quaker,-a contest which could have been niaintained by no
one without the, aid of a strong memory and an unimpaired
intellect, (Backus, i. 461; Knowles, p. 338). In 1677, (seven
years after his letter to Mason was written), his memory was
strong enough to enable him to give the world a full account
of this three-days' debate and its sequel at Providence, in his
" George Fox digged out of his Burrowes."  -is letter of the
6th of May, 1682, to Governor Bradstreet, (which is in the
possession of this Society, and in which he solicited the governor's friendly aid towards the printing of Williams's manuscript
discourses), furnishes us with an incident that demonstrates
both that his memory was then good, and that he preserved it,
by keeping it, at the age of eighty-three, in habitual exercise.
He writes, " By my fireside, I have recollected the discourses
which (by many tedious journeys) I have had with the scattered English at Narraganset, before the war and since. I
have reduced them to those twenty-two heads (enclosed), which
is near thirty sheets of my writing."
The confidence of his neighbors, who knew him best, in the
fidelity of his memory, was manifested in various ways, and
continued unabated to the close of his life.  Three or four
months only before his death, he was' called upon to sign an
instrument, intended as a settlement of the long-standing controversy, of which, five years before, he had drawn up a long
andl minute analysis, respecting the Pawtuxet lands.
An additional proof of the slight grounds upon which the
accuracy of Williams has been brought in question is, that the
main fact embraced in Earl Warwick's declaration was asserted
by Williams's former colleague, in London, John Clarke,* and
others, in the second of the reasons for joining the King's Pro* He was not strictly a colleague. He vwas the agelnt of Newport alnd Portsmouth; Williams, of Providence and Warwick.




14             TIHE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
vince to Rhode Island, presented to Lord Clarendon in a petition drawn up five years before the letter to Mason was written.
It is there alleged, that the grant " which Mr. Welles, (Welde),
under-hand, got of the same country, was prohibited, being
never passed the council-table nor registered," (I}. I. PRec., ii.
162; 2 Mass. Hist. Coll., vii. 104).  It may be added, that,
still three years earlier, President Brenton told Edward Hutchinson, (the official agent of Massachusetts), that "the" Narraganset " Patent was not fairly got;" that "' there was no such
thing upon record in any court of England, for he had sent to
search the records;" and says Hutchinson, in his letter to
Secretary Rawson, 2d April, 1662, " find there theirs, but not
ours," (Mass. Archives, ii. 26).
I should not have dwelt at such length on -this particular
head; but besides that, as a septuagenary, I felt bound to
stand by my order, I have been pained to find, in grave history,
the credibility of Roger Williams impeached on the same
ground, for the purpose of shielding the injustice of our predecessors from merited censure.
Under the fifth head, Mr. Deane very justly corrects my
error in stating that the Narraganset Patent is not mentioned
by'Winthrop; and points out an allusion made to it in a preliminary deliberation of the General Court of Massachusetts,
nearly three years after the date of the patent. I beg to apologize for this oversight.
it is a long time-many years before I knew of any Narraganset Patent —since I read Winthrop's Journal continuously;
and when, in 1860, I had occasion to consult it in reference to
the patent, I naturally sought out those particular places where
some notice might be expected of its character and origin; of
the circumstances, agency, and instructions under which it
was procured, or of its reception, and the use made of it here,
especially at the return from England of Williams, of Gorton,
and of his associates; in the instructions of 1646 to'Winslow;
and in those parts of the journal where the orders, letters, and
passports, emanating from the Plantation Commissioners, are
set forth at length: but, in all these places (above a dozen), the




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  15
subject seems to be sedulously avoided, (Winth., ii. 25, 31, 76,
159, 173, 193, 212, 220, 251, 272, 280-283, 095-297, 298, 316,
318, 319, 322, 323).  In mitigation of my fault, I would beg
to say further, that the casual and solitary allusion to it, now
brought to view, does not, in the slightest degree, affect the
justice of my conclusion, that the silence of Winthrop was
probably owing to his consciousness that the patent was worthless.  His conpcarative silence, his carefully abstaining from all
notice of it on so many fitting occasions,-especially when
coupled with his total silence in regard to the letter written to
him by Williams, disparaging the patent, —make it, as I said,
probable, and, as I miay now say, nearly certain, that he did
consider the patent worthless.
At the deliberation just mentioned, the patent was objected
to, because in it, as in others, tihe Parliament " reserved a supreme power in all things."  But the parchment at the State
House contains no such reservation; and, consequently, it is
either not the patent spoken of in AWinthrop, or else the speaker's knowledge of it was too slight and imperfect to give significance or value to any opinion he might have entertained or
expressed concerning it. If we embaace the former branch of
this dilemma, —that the State-House document is not the one
spoken of in Winthrop,-then I was right in saying that it is
"not mentioned in Winthrop," and my apology has been a
mistaken appeal to your clemency.  If, however, we adopt
the latter alternative,-the ignorance of the speaker, (as I fear
we must, there being no other than the State-House Patent
known), —then, whatever he might have thought or said, is not,
as Mr. Deane's language implies, an argument for the genuineness or validity of that instrument.
Having thus answered the several objections noted above,
I would call attention to a further elucidation of the character
of the document at the State House.  It appears to have been
drawn up, as is customary, with blanks for the date. Those
blanks are now filled up with ink of a color, and in handwriting
of a character, different from those of the body of the instrument; showing that they were so filled up at a later period.




16            THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
Regularly, the date of a patent would be the day on which it
finally passed the Board, and was delivered for enrolment. (18
Hen. VI., c. i.) The completion of that formal act would be
the beginning of its legal existence and force. An earlier date,
or an antedate, would be a falsehood and a fraud. If it were
intended to give the patent a retro-active operation, or to grant
a title prior to its date, that must be expressed in the body of
the instrument, but not in such a way as to falsify the execution
of the instrument.
Now, the date inserted in the Narraganset Patent is the 10th
of December, 1643. That day was Sunday,-a day, in those
times, held so sacred, and kept with such strict and reverential
observance, that on it no Parliamentary Board would venture
to assemble for secular business, however earnestly they might
have been importuned by our reverend agents, Thomas Welde
and Hugh Peters, to break the Sabbath. The patent, therefore, bears on its face a falsity, which, while it shows conclusively of' itself, independently of all other proof, that this
instrument never passed the table, also debars it from all those
favorable considerations, which, by law and usage, are justly
extended, prima facie, to instruments in general.
This stain upon its character is deepened by another circuimstance. The second signature in order of place is that of the
Earl of Manchester; and of course it would also be second in
the order of time, if the places indicated the order in which the
signatures were successively written. It is certain that the
order of personal rank was not adhered to, as in 1643 it surely
would have been, had the patent been leisurely signed at the
table; for the signatures of Lord Roberts and Sir Benjamin
Ruddyer follow those'of commoners. Now, there is hardly the
remotest possibility that the Earl of Manchester was in London
at any time between the 2d of November (the day when the
Board of Commissioners was created by ordinance) and the
10th of December, the ostensible date of the patent. At that
time, he was commander of the fourteen thousand cavalry
ordered to be raised on the 26th of the preceding July, and was
actively engaged in the civil and military superintendence of




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                17
the seven associated counties assigned to his command. In his
letter of the 12th of October, giving Parliament an account of
his victory of that day at Horncastle in Lincolnshire, he announced his intention to march immediately to Gainsborough
in the same county, and also to do his best to make a diversion
in favor of Hull, then besieged by the royal forces; an enterprise which, with the heavy duties of his department, continued
to the end of the year: for we learn, from the Lord General
Essex's letter of the 18th of December to the Committee of
Safety, that the greater part of Lord Manchester's horse was
still in Lincolnshire; and from Manchester's own letter of the
22d of December, that the greater part of his force was then
engaged against Gainsborough; and that his own head-quarters
were at that moment at Cambridge, where he was guarding St.
Neots, Huntington, and Cambridge (Parl. Hist., xii. 423, 466,
475). I find no proof of his being in London before the 13th
of the following January;  when, as speaker pro tempore of the
House of Lords, he signed a letter to the Comte D'Harcourt,
the French ambassador. It would, therefore, hardly be possible
that he could have signed the patent in London earlier than
about a month after the false date of the 10th of December
(Parl. Hist., xiii. 25).
On the other hand, supposing the patent to have been sent
to search him out somewhere in his seven counties, in despite
of the various hazards, uncertainties, and delays incident to
times and places of civil conflict, it would then be doubly manifest that the signatures to the patent were obtained, not in the
regular way at the Board, but "under-hand," as imputed, by
personal application, as in the case of a petition or a subscription-list, at different times and places; and hence it would
almost inevitably happen, that, in some instances, it would not
be convenient or practicable for the signer to affix his own particular seal, bearing some distinctive mark (his family crest or
arms), as practiced then and from the time of the Norman
Conquest (Spelman, Eng. Wr., ii. 253; Ruddiman, Introd., p.
97; Black. Comn., ii. 305); and in other instances, though the
signature might be given as a preliminary approval, yet the




18            THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
seal might be withheld from prudential motives, and a conviction of the propriety of awaiting the regular deliberations of
the Board, in order to take time to mature an opinion, and not
precipitately to pledge one's self to a measure which it might
afterwards be desirable to recall.
Under such circumstances, the omission of a seal, or that
wax, with no impression, should remain instead of a genuine
seal, would, in one or more instances, if not in all, be very likely
to occur; and the discovery of such a capital defect would
suggest, to minds of a certain class, the expediency of protecting the instrument against future scrutiny by boldly cutting
off all the tags, whether they had pendent seals or nothing on
them. The credulity of the world would be counted on; for
many persons would consider the remnant of each tag as good
proof that a genuine seal had once been attached to it. That
opinion was avowed and maintained, to my certain knowledge,
in regard to this mutilated document, before it was known that
the copy of it in Mr. Winthrop's collection was in existence.
But those remnants prove nothing: if they do (as there are
eleven remnants of tags, and but nine signatures), what do the
two surplus remnants prove? Just as much as the others:
merely that the parchment on which the document was written
was once prepared for receiving seals, but not at all that seals
were ever actually attached to it.
The Narraganset Patent, in its present state, and tainted as
it is with an original falsity, would very justly fall under Heineccius's fourth class of falsified charters, which, as described
by Ruddiman in his "Introduction to Anderson's Diplomata
Scoti " (~ 46), comprehends such as are " so artfully cut, as
if the seals had dropped from them, when there really never had
been any there." The fact that Heineccius enumerates six
ways in which frauds on seals were committed proves the frequency of the crime, and the cunning with which it was accomplished; and I know of no reason why our forefathers or their
connections should not have shared the common exposure to
such impostures.
We know not when or why the seals, if any, were cut off.




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  19
It is said that the certified Winthrop copy proves that they
were on in 1662. But had it so happened, that nothing but
the present remnants of tags were extant at that period, I ask,
Would not those remnants be as likely to be accepted in 1662,
for ample proof of the original exsitence of the seals, as in 1860,
when we know they were so accepted, although there was only
the mutilated parchment to look at?  That age was surely
more credulous than this. To say nothing of local and personal interests, it is certain that party or sectarian zeal, and the
extravagant prejudices of the time, would all have contributed
more powerfiully then than now to bias the judgment and belief,
even of the officials employed to make the copy.
That copy also departs from the original, both in the order
and in the orthography of the signatures.  It does not indicate
the actual position and places of' the several seals; but on the
contrary, if we took it for an exact copy, we should not know
that the seals were pendent, but should also be led into the
belief, that they were originally placed where certainly no seals
ever were or could be placed in the original at the State House.
It is clear that the copy was first written out with the signatures solely in succession. The insertion of the words, " & a
seale," after each signature, was evidently an afterthought; for
the intervals between the signatures being narrow, although
a smaller size of handwriting, and a character for the word
"and," after all but the first signature, were adopted, in order
to crowd in the words, " & a seale," yet, in several instances,
the interpolation overlaps the initial letter of the succeeding
name, and in one instance is slanted upward to avoid treading
upon the good name of Sir Benjamin Ruddyer, which it does
not avoid after all.
However common and justifiable it may be, at the present
time, in this country, to use, in similar cases, such general
expressions as'"a seal," instead of "his seal," yet, from inexactness, they are always defective, in point of evidence, respecting ancient sealed instruments, and especially so in regard to a
charter, emanating, like that in question, from a Board of Commissioners, who, in their public acts, were enjoined to use their




20              THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
own seals. They are only proof of some seal or other, but not
of a genuine seal; otherwise, supposing George Downing to
have put his crest and arms on wax under each of the signatures alluded to, every one of these counterfeits would be
metamorphosed into a genuine seal, if full faith and credit were
given.to such a certificate as the present.
On full consideration of all these circumstances, can we, on
the strength of this certificate, be sure that Edward Rawson, to
say nothing of some adroit interpolator, did not certify what
he believed, rather than what he saw, of the seals? or that, if
there, when the copy was made, they were the genuine particular seals of the signers? or, in fine, that they were not cut
off, because they were, some or all of them, spurious?
The conduct of the Massachusetts authorities furnishes little
evidence that they really considered the patent to be valid.
A single instance, which at first sight favors such an inference,
and in which that opinion would seem  to be implied, is found
in their letter to Williams of the 27th of August, 1645, (Mass.
Rec., iii. 49). But that letter is cautiously worded. Abstaining from  positive command, it says, in substance, " We think
proper to give you notice of the charter we have lately received,
that you may forbear to exercise jurisdiction, &c.; or else appear at our court, to show by what right you claim jurisdiction;
or, in other words, yield us the jurisdiction quietly, or lose it
by coming into our court." This has very much the air of a
politic device, especially as it was the second attempt made that
year to deter their neighbor colony from establishing a government under her new  charter.  That its main purpose was
intimidation may be inferred from the account given by Winthrop of the first attempt, in which he says, "Although they had
boasted to do great * things by virtue of their charter, yet they
* The warning here alluded to produced the following reply, (M3ass. Arch., ii.
6):" Our much hond friends & country men-Our due respects here premisedHaving lately received a writing from the right -worshipful your counsell deeply
concerning yourselves and us, we pray your honorable attention to our ansrTwers.
" First, A civil government we honor and earnestly desire to live in fbr all




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                        21
dared not to attempt any thing," (Winth., ii. 220).  To make
the letter more formidable before it was despatched, an appointment was made of two commissioners, who were to negotiate
with Parliament about the two conflicting charters (Mass. Rec.,
iii. 48). This auxiliary measure was suffered, and probably
intended, to expire at its birth.   Saltonstall, one of the nominees, never went on the mission; the other (Captain George
Cooke) never acted; and no record exists of any instructions
given them; nor was any thing done, in relation to agencies of
the kind, for more than a year. The Massachusetts authorities well knew that the Rhode-Island or Providence-Plantations
Charter was the only one recognized by Parliament; for that
had been declared to them the year before by twelve members
those good endes, which are attainable thereby, both of public and private
nature.
" This desire caused us humbly to sue for a charter from our mother State &
government, but as we believe your consciences are persuaded to govern our
soules as well as our bodies, and, yourselves will say, we have cause to indeavour to preserve our soules and liberties which your consciences must necessarily deprive us of; and either cause greater distractions and molestations to
yourselves & us at home, or cause our further removal & miseryes.
" Thirdly, Wee cannot but wonder that being now found in a posture of government from the same authority, unto which you & wee equally subject, you
should desire us to forbeare the exercise of such a government, without an
expresse from that authority directed to us.
"_ And we the rather wonder because our charter as it was first granted and
first established, soe it was also expressly signified unto you all, in a letter from
divers Lords & Commons, at the sending out of our charter, out of a loving
respect both to yourselves & us.
" Besides you may please to be informed that his Excellency the Lo: Admiral hath lately divers times bene pleased to owne us under the notion of
Providence Plantations, and that he hath signified unto us (as we can shew
you in writinge) the desire of Plymouth to infringe our Charter, but his own
favorite resolution not only to maintain our charter to his utmost power, but
also to gratify us with any favors &c. In all which respects we see lnot how
we may. dare to yealde ourselves delinquents and lyable to answer in your
courte way, as your writing seems to importe; why we cast not away such
noble favours and grace unto us. It is true that divers amongst us expresse
their desire of composing this controversy between yourselves and us, but considering that we have not only receaved a challenge from yourselves, but also
from lMr. Fenwick and also from Plymouth and also from some in the name
of the Lord Marquis Ha.lmilton (of all which claims we never h]eard until the
arrival of our Charter) we judge it necessary to employ our messengers and




22                THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
of Parliament, peers and Commoners, in the letter brought by
Roger Williams, addressed to the Governor, assistants, and the
rest of their friends in Massachusetts (Winth., ii. 193).  Accordingly, in the instructions to Winslow, who went out the
next year as commissioner, nothing whatever is said of the
Narraganset Patent: and Winslow, so far from claiming any
part of the territory for Massachusetts, claimed for Plymouth
all that Massachusetts had pretended to be hers, and much
more, without regard either to the patent, or to that absurd
figment, the title by  submission  of the English and natives at
Pawtuxet and Shawomet; and also, it must be confessed, without regard to his own personal and official admissions previagents unto the head and fountain of all these streams and there humbly to
prostrate ourselves & cause for a finall sentence & determination-and this we
are immediately preparing to do without any secret reservations or delays not
doubting but yourselves will feel satisfied with this our course: And in the
interim although you have not bene pleased to admit us unto considerations
of what concerns the whole country as you have others of our countrymen, yet
we cannot but humbly professe our readynesse to attend all such friendly and
neighborly courses & ever rest your assured in all services of love.
"HENRY WATSON SeCtrY*''
"The Colonie of Providence Plantations
Assembled at Newport 9th 6mO 1645 "
Address on the outside:-' To the Right Woshpls and their much Honn'd Friends and
Countrymen. The General Court of the Mattachusetts Colonie
assembled at Boston."
It appears from a note on this letter, under Winthrop's signature, that it was
submitted by the magistrates to the consideration of the deputies on the 16th
of the following October,-a fortnight after the session began.
Neither this letter, nor the brief account in WVinthrop's Journal of the warning which occasioned it, contains any reference to the Narraganset Patent. It
is therefore safe to infer that the patent was not known, and did not arrive in
this country, till on or just before the 27th day of August, 1645,-the date of the
letter to Williams; in which it is mentioned as "lately received." If Welde
had believed it to be a good instrument, or of any value, can any satisfactory
reason be given for his withholding it for nearly a year and three-quarters
after its date?
A recent careful examination ot the original document in the office of the Secretary of State,
Boston, shows the name of the Secretary aDpended, is " HIuney Wa.ton,:' " plainly and distinctly
-written," and not Henry Watson.-ED.




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  23
ously made, verbally and in writing (Winth., ii. 295-301; 1
Mass. Hist. Coll., i. 276; Knowles, 405, 406; Clarke, Ill
Newes, ix.; R. I. Rec., 50, 51; Backus, i. 72-74; Wins. Hyp.
Unm. Ep. Ded., 82).
This view of the opinion actually held by the Massachusetts
authorities respecting the unsoundness of the patent is confirmed by their total disregard to its provisions in the grant,
made by the General Court in the month of October following
the date of the letter to Williams, of the land and houses of
Gorton and his companions at Shawomet to the Braintree
petitioners.  That act of spoliation not only trampled the Providence-Plantations Charter under foot, but was a direct contravention of the final clause of the Narraganset Patent, which
" excepted and reserved from the premises granted all lands,
&c., theretofore lawfully granted and in present possession,
held and enjoyed by any of his Majestie's Protestant subjects."
Whether the words "lawfully granted" were construed as
confined to grants by English authority, or as also embracing
Indian grants or purchases, the tenor of that clause was to protect English Protestants in their lawful possessions, and to
exclude those possessions from the jurisdiction of the patentee
colony. If the former, as the strictly legal interpretation, were
adopted, Massachusetts would be bound, by her own previous
acts and judicial decisions, to consider the whole country as
" heretofore lawfully granted " by charter " either to Plymouth
or to Mr. Fenwick," as Winthrop has it (Winth., ii. 143). If
Indian titles or grants were also reckoned lawful grants, then
Rhode Island, Providence, Shawomet, and every English settlement or homestead, within the patent, bought of an Indian
chief, would be protected against all exercise of jurisdiction on
the part not only of Massachusetts, but of the other colonies
likewise.  In fact, these Indian grants or purchases were
recognized as lawful grants by the highest authority (the Commissioners for Foreign Plantations) in the Providence-Plantations Charter of 1644. In the preamble of that charter, they are
mentioned, approved, encouraged, and, moreover, held so allsufficient, as to supersede the necessity of any grant whatever




24             THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
of the soil; and the whole grant in the body of the instrument
is, therefore, actually restricted to the dominion alone. This
charter was enrolled, and accessible to the public; and the
rulers of Massachusetts, who were legally bound to recognize
it, might easily-and, from its importance to them, probably
did, through their friends in England, or even Rhode Islandobtain a copy of it, or full information of its tenor, It could
not have escaped them, that the dispossession of Gorton and
his companions was in direct conflict with the tenor of the
Narraganset Patent: and it is equally clear, that such a violation of its provisions is irreconcileable with the supposition,
that they had any belief in its validity. Accordingly, when
Plymouth, relying upon her imaginary charter-right to Shawomet, withstood this very Braintree grant, they placed the vindication of their contemplated spoliation upon the authority of
a former order of the Commissioners for the United Colonies,
and avoided all reference whatever to the Narraganset Patent.
Indeed, they could hardly fail to see that its final clause reduced it to a mere phantom of a charter, not worth acceptance.
Were the claims of the other colonies extinguished, it would
confer, in the largest sense, nothing beyond a contingent or
reversionary title to such territory, as, being unappropriated by
English settlers, remained in the hands of the aboriginal lords
of the soil. They also well knew that the claims alluded to
had been effectually extinguished by the Providence-Plantations Charter, the only one recognized by Parliament.
The next year (1646), they received, from the Commissioners for Foreign Plantations, an order containing a fresh recognition of that charter, and permanently reinstating Gorton and
his companions in their former possessions. This order was
accompanied with a passport of the same date (15th of May),
in favor of Gorton, Holden, Greene, and other late inhabitants,
&c., signed by WVarwick and nine other commissioners, including M'[Ir. George Fenwick himself, requiring the governor and
assistants to give them  a free and unobstructed  passage
through any part of Massachusetts to their former abode. In
the following year (1647), Winslow, having claimed Shawo



THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                 25
met particularly, as well as the whole territory, for Plymouth,
and having alleged that the proceedings against Gorton were
authorized by the four confederate governments, the Plantation
Commissioners wrote to those governmants two letters, signed,
as before, by Fenwick, in which the charter is again referred
to as granted by themselves; and the injunctions in favor of
Gorton are reiterated, as not to be disregarded until the colonies should prove that Shawomet was within the limits of any
of their charters. This, Plymouth, the only claimant left, never
could do; and accordingly, after waiting four years in the vain
expectation of being furnished with the satisfactory proof required, Winslow indignantly complains of the disgraceful position in which he has been placed by the protracted inattention
shown by his principals at home to the order of the commissioners, and says, " I shall be more wary hereafter how I engage
in business of that nature," (Winth., ii. 272, 280, 318-20; Haz.,
ii. 178; Hutch. Coll., 229).
The magistrates, whether designedly or not, avoid all mention
of the Narraganset Patent in their records. Even the letter to
Williams, undoubtedly drawn up by themselves, appears only
in the records of the deputies. Those of the magistrates contain the order for dispossessing Gorton and his fellow-proprietors, and show, that, in the eagerness of their zeal for expelling
these heretics, they did not wait for the deputies' approval of
the letter, but, virtually abandoning the only ground on which
that letter could be sustained, passed the predatory Braintree
grant six days befbre the deputies' approval was given. The
three kindred subjects-the appointment of new commissioners
for England, the pro-validity letter to Williams, and the antivalidity grant of Gorton's lands-were all, in spite of their
incongruity, simultaneously agreed to by the deputies. The
Narraganset Patent must have been very unacceptable to the
rulers of Massachusetts, because the final clause, above mentioned, stood in the way of their favorite projects of securing an
outlet to the ocean by Narraganset Bay, and of curbing the
Narragansets and their fellow-countrymen (who had fled from
themselves to take refuge in the tenderer mercies of these




26             THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
heathen savages of the wilderness), by the establishment of a
strong plantation at Shawomet, to which they had set up a title
sufficiently colorable to win, for the moment, the compliant
favor of the Commissioners of the United Colonies. But had
the patent been deemed valid, it is very probable that it would
have been so construed or misconstrued as to confer the same
power over Gorton and the rest of the proscribed in Rhode
Island as had been cruelly exercised under the original Massachusetts Charter in the banishment of Williams, Wheelwright,
Mrs. Hutchinson, and others, and atrociously and unlawfully,
once before, on Gorton and his ten fellow-victims.  Authenticated facts indicate that the patent had been an offence in the
eyes of the rulers almost from the first. Before it was actually
brandished as a sceptre of iron over the head of Roger Williams, we find from our records, that, at the first General Court
after it was received, Welde, the reputed father of the patent,
who, six months previous, had so much influence as to obtain
the appointment of Pococke as a colleague, was ordered, with
his fellow-commissioner Peters, to return home. The harshness of this recall was aggravated by the immediate appointment of the two new commissioners, Saltonstall and Cooke;
and by the mention, at the same time, of the two charters for
government, &c., in the lands adjoining Narraganset Bay, as
the special subject of negotiation, which, by implication, the
displaced agents were deemed no longer fit to manage.
Wherever the commissioners are referred to, Pococke is mentioned by name, while Peters and Welds are slighted off anonymously as " other " or " the rest of the commissioners." This
occurs even in the magistrates' vote of thanks, unconfirmed by
the deputies, for " their care and pains in our affairs, and particularly that with Alderman Bartley."  It is significant, that
they were considered less deserving of thanks for the patent
than for an affair which is believed to have been chiefly the
work of Sir Henry Vane, (Winth., ii. 201, 248; Mass. Rec., ii.
137, 1.38; iii. 48).
When Welde and Peters were sent out, in 1641, the Massachusetts authorities were encouraged to expect great advan



TEE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                27
tages from the Parliament, to which the king had just before,
in the language of Winthrop, " left so great liberty," (Winth.,
ii. 25, 42, 98). A confirmation of the Massachusetts Charter
was obtained, and, in 1643, an ordinance also, which relieved
New England from English customs-duties on exports for actual
use, and on imports of New-England growth. But, in that and
the following year, Welde was occupied in polemical labors,his publications concerning the Antinomians of New England,
and William Rathband's censures of the New-England churches.
Peters devoted his chief attention to public affairs, and probably
found his chaplaincy under General Sir Thomas Fairfax often
incompatible with the efficient discharge of his duty as commissioner. In September, 1644, Roger Williams, under the
sanction of the letter, mentioned above, from lords and commoners in Parliament, came to Boston, from which he had been
exiled eight years before; and brought the mortifying proof,
that he had succeeded in obtaining a charter that would protect Rhode Island, as far as law could do it, from the intolerant
antipathies and aggressions of the rulers of her more powerful
neighbor. The bitterness of' this disappointment was naturally
poured out upon the heads of the more supine and unsuccessful
agents of Massachusetts. Some of the censures inflicted on
them are still extant: many more will always remain unknown.
Winthrop accuses Welde of having " lost or forgotten " papers
sent out to him; and the records mention that "we had received great detriment, because we had none in England to
inform Parliament in our behalf," (Winth., ii. 272; Mass. Rec.,
ii. 161). It is probable that Welde, in self-defence at last, and
near the date of the letter to Williams (27th August, 1645),
sent out this abortive patent, not perhaps to be used as a legal
instrument (for he knew its imperfections), but to prove that
he had not been idle, and had nearly succeeded in his efforts to
perfect the patent. Hence, after it had once, as an experiment,
been held up in terrorean, and Williams, in turn, had communicated to Winthrop " what he believed weighty and righteous,"
the authorities were ashamed to make use of it, and wisely
preferred to let it sink into oblivion.




28               THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
Thenceforward, in maintaining their previous pretensions
to jurisdiction in the Rhode Island Colony until this pseudo
patent was brought forward to subserve the purposes of the
Atherton patentees,* they chose to rely upon the alleged titles
* The Winthrop copy of the Narragansett Patent was probably first shown
to President Brenton; and in the following November, with Edward Hutchinson's letter of the 3d of that month, was dispatched to Governor Winthrop in
London, to enable him to put " at rest" Mr. Clarke, the Commissioner of Rhode
Island, who strenuously withstood the efforts of Winthrop to complete the
Connecticut Charter in such a way as to deprive Rhode Island of the Narraganset Country. Hutchinson says, " By Sir Thomas Temple and Captain Scot,
I perceive that Mr. Clarke is not yet at rest. We have a patent from the same
commissioners of an earlier date, which I now send." In the preceding summer, Simon Bradstreet and the Rev. John Norton had been in London as
Commissioners of Massachusetts; and although Bradstreet, both in his public
capacity and from private interest as a co-proprietor in the Atherton Company,
might be expected to defend the rights of this Colony and of the company in
every justifiable way, yet it appears from the same letter that he never mentioned the Narraganset Patent to Winthrop. Hutchinson excuses this extraordinary silence by saying, "Mr. Bradstreet did not speak of it, because it was
in your patent; and, being in the four United Colonies, questioned not a fair
correspondence in it." (Trumb. Papers xxii, No. 33).
Winthrop probably learned from Clarke, that the copy of the patent sent
was not worth the paper it was written on; but it was neither honorable nor
ingenuous in Hutchinson to leave Winthrop blindly to grope his way in the
use of this document, by withholding from him all knowledge of the fact, that
it had been shown by Hutchinson himself to Brenton, the friend of Winthrop,
(id. No. 35; and Mass. Arch. ut supra), and by him pronounced as "not fairly
got," and "not registered in any court in England." But Hutchinson, though
a gallant soldier and adorned with many estimable qualities, was apparently
of the school which adopts for its motto, " All is fair in politics." He was himself the chief manager, in this country, of the affairs of the Atherton Company.
The special agent in England was his correspondent and "unceremonious
friend," Captain John Scot, who, after many great vicissitudes of fortune, had
risen to considerable wealth, and insinuated himself into the good graces of
the "men who steered" both in the four United Colonies and in England.
That Hutchinson himself was not too scrupulous to wink at whatever expedients Scot might make use of in England for the good of the company, may be
inferred from the fact, that eighteen months after this pseudo patent was foisted
upon the pure and unsuspecting Winthrop, and near the day when Scot was
convicted at Hartford of perjury, forgery and many other things, Edward
Hutchinson was fined by the General Court of Massachusetts ten pounds for
putting in more than one vote on the day of election (Mass. Rec. iv pt. ii 108).
From Scot's account of himself, in a petition to the king, (which, if untrue,
was susceptible of speedy disproof,) and from our own records, it appears that
he was the son of an Englishman of some fortune, who aided the king by an
advance of fourteen thousand three.hundred pounds, and lost his life in his
service. For cutting the bridles and girths of the Paliamentary horses at




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                         29
by conquest and submission, although such titles divested
their sovereign, rightful or de facto, of the acknowledged paraTurnham Greene, when the king's forces were at Brentford, (14th November,
1642), he was brought many times before a Parliamentary Committee, to whom
he says a gift of five hundred pounds was paid " to prevent further mischief;"
and was finally sent to New England under the care of Edward Downing,
then in England, of whose treatment of him he complains as perfidious (Hutch.
Coll., 380.) He probably arrived, with other children brought by Mr. Downing,
in the beginning of September, 1643; and for the care of whom a committee of
four was appointed, and required " to dispose of the children, to call for their
beds, and to see that satisfaction be procured and paid in" (Mass. Rec., ii. 45).
The next year, 13th November (id., 89), Mr. Downing was called upon to give
an account of the children taken into the ship, their names, where landed, and
to whom delivered. Funds, and perhaps Scot's five hundred pounds, were
placed in Downing's hands on account of the children, and received by the
committee, as appears from the Court's order to the committee to pay Captain
Cooke, soldiers, &c., who went to seize Gorton's company, out of the Committee's money, which was to be "repaid when it came in."
Scot was placed by Downing with his neighbor Laurence Southwick, who
afterwards, with all his family, suffered imprisonment, whipping, and ruinous
fines, during the Quaker persecution; and, in 1659, was banished with his aged
wife. In May, 1648, the General Court ordered that John Scot should serve
his master so much longer, after his term of service expired, "as should be well
worth thirty-five shillings," or satisfy his master in some other way. After
this, " being," as he says in his petition, "obliged to court any employment to
acquire a livelihood," he went to Long Island, of which, as his petition states,
"he purchased near one-third part."
In 1654, during the war between England and Holland, the Dutch settlements on Long Island, as well as on the main land, having been much harassed
by frequent incursions and robberies committed by nocturnal marauding parties, the Dutch authorities, knowing that such proceedings were not sanctioned
by the Colonies generally, whose interest in an illicit trade with the former led
them to adopt a neutral policy, ordered the arrest of suspected parties; and,
under this order, John Scot and five others were arrested, and sent to New
Amsterdam, where they were examined, and, after a short detention, discharged (Brodhead, 579).
In the same year, Captain Nathaniel Silvester, of Shelter Island, brought an
action of defamation against Scot and his neighbor John Yongs (probably
eldest son of the minister of Southold); but on John Yongs bringing a counteraction of the same sort, in wmrlich John Scot might possibly be a formidable
witness, the action was settled by private agreement (N. Hav. Rec. ii. 89, 92).
I1 1659, his aged master, Laurence Southwick, with his wife Cassandra,
who had both been banished from Massachusetts, (Mass. Rec., iv. pt. i. 367),
in June of that year, took refuge at Shelter Island, then owned by Captain
Silvester, Scot's former antagonist; and there, soon after, exhausted by their
sufferings under a cruel persecution, and their consequent indigence and grief,
they died within three days of each other (Bishop's N. Eng. Judged, pt. i. 89).
In 1660, Oct. 6, Scot " caused much embarrassment to the people of South



30                THE NARRAGANSET PATErNT.
mount right to the  soil and dominion, and arrogated powers
of which  their chartered  corporation  was legally  incapable
ampton." They were originally emigrants from Lynn, Mass.; so near the
scene of Scot's apprenticeship, that he was enabled to give them interesting
news of the persons and places they had left behind. They bought of him
lands, which, he said, he had bought of the Indians; but, after much litigation,
the conveyances were found fraudulent and void (Brodhead, 671).
In 1661, he was in London, and perhaps in the preceding year; drawn thither
with his former fellow-prisoner, George Baxter, by the news of the restoration.
He returned in the autumn of the following year, with Sir Thomas Temple. Hutchinson, in his letter of the 3d November, 1662, mentions him, together
with Sir Thomas, to Vinthrop, as the channel through which he derived the
information, originating, no doubt, with Winthrop, "that" Mr. Clarke "was
not yet at rest." He returned almost immediately to London, and might have
been the bearer of the Winthrop copy of the patent which accompanied that
letter (Trumbull Papers, xxii. No. 33).
From  Scot's letter of the 29th of April following, to Edward Hutchinson
(id., No. 35), we find that he had been laboring in vain to "put Mr. Clarke at
rest," through the instrumentality of Winthrop, who, he says, " was very averse
to my prosecuting your affaires; he having had much trouble with Mr. Clarke
while he remained in England." But, as Winthrop would not be a tool, and
was no longer an obstacle to the prosecution of Hutchinson's Atherton-Company affairs, Scot determined to encounter the task assigned him, by himself
and in his own way.
The grand object was to procure a royal letter, which would place the Nlarraganset lands claimed by the company under the authority and special protection of Massachusetts and Connecticut, to the utter exclusion of Rhode
Island. To obtain this letter, as soon as WVinthrop had left the Downs, " a potent gentleman," as Scot calls him, had been taken "into the Society;" and a
petition had been preferred by Scot "against Clarke, &c., as enimys to the
peace and well-being of his Majestys good subjects;" and, to make more sure of
the royal letter asked for in the petition, curiosities to the value of ~60 had
been brought " to gratify persons that are powerful."
The " potent gentleman" was Thomas Chiffinch,-the " noble Mr. Chiffinch,"
to whom Scot sent his " service" the next year, in his letter to the Secretary
WTilliamsonl (N. Y. Col. Doc., iii. 48); the court pimp; the willing abettor of
every vile court intrigue; the man who, to furnish assurance of the royal sanction, contrived the interviews between Charles II. and Dangerfield, the assassin from Newgate, hired to murder the discarded Premier Shaftsbury; and who
afterwards stealthily admitted the Catholic confessor to the dying monarch
(Life of Shaftsb., 141, ed. 1683; Burnet, O. T., 1685).
Scot's efforts were crowned with complete success.  Chiffinch, and the
" powerful persons" who were gratified with the ~60 worth of curiosities, " accomplished the business" of Hutchinson and his Atherton associates. On the
21st of June, 1663, the expected letter was signed. The king was probably both
ignorant of its import, and indifferent to it; or, as on most other like occasions,
relied upon the account given him by his constant attendants.  The letter was
addressed to the Governors and Assistants of the Massachusetts, Plymouth,
New Haven, and Coriecticut Colonies. In the preanible, the Atherton asso



THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                           81
(Mass. Rec., iv. pt. ii. 174-7).   The lamentable  principle of
intolerance, which too many of them, in the spirit of the age,
ciates, with Thomas Chiffinch at their head, and John Scot next, are represented
as "just proprietors of the Narraganset Country," and as " desirous to improve
it into an English Colony,... to the enlargement of our Empire and the colmmon good of our subjects;" yet " daily disturbed and unjustly molested in their
possession and laudable endeavors by certain unreasonable & turbulent
spirits of Providence Colony,... to the great scandal of justice & government,
and the imminent Discouragement of that hopeful plantation."
The proprietors were " effectually" recommended by the king to the
"neighborly kindness and protection " of the colonial rulers; " to be permitted
peaceably to improve their colony & plantation;"... and, " on all occasions,"
to be assisted " against such unjust oppressions and molestations, that so they
may be secured in the full and peaceable enjoyment of their said country, according to the right and title they have to it."... This extraordinary mandate
was a perversion of the character and facts of the Atherton controversy, as
well as a virtual sanction of the unwarrantable proceedings of Massachusetts
and Connecticut, in regard to lands lying within the chartered limits and sole
jurisdiction of Rhode Island. It not only ignored those proceedings and the
still existing charter of Rhode Island, but the signal and important fact, that
New Haven, included with the other colonies in its address, was, at the time,
a political nonentity, having been absorbed by Connecticut as a part of her
own territory, defined by her charter of the 10th of May in the preceding year.
It also substantially set aside the agreement made between Winthrop and
Clarke, under which the Atherton Company, in the exercise of its stipulated
right of option, had already placed itself under the jurisdiction of Connecticut,
by placing it anew under the special protection of the four colonies (N. Hav.
Rec, ii. 511, 525; Hazard, ii. 498).
This letter was countersigned by Bennet, soon after Lord Arlington, the
enemy, and patron of all the enemies, of Clarendon, who undoubtedly was kept
in profound ignorance that there was such a document in existence. That this
was so, may be inferred from the fact, that, only seventeen days after the date
of the letter in question, Clarendon passed, under the Great Seal, the Royal
Charter of Rhode Island, in which the agreement was recognized, and the injunctions of the letter practically annulled.
That the means by which the letter had been procured were known to the
Atherton associates, was a matter of course; and it was only natural that they
should become known to many. The circumstance that Scot's letter to Hutchinson was placed among the papers in the collection of Governor Trumbull, is
a confirmation of this supposition; which may account in part for the anxiety
displayed, at a later period, by the governments of the other colonies in Scot's
behalf, when arrested by Connecticut. But the royal letter was received, on
Scot's return, with none the less readiness. Nevew Haven made it the foundation
of a renewed but unavailing resistance to the mneasures adopted by Connecticut to enforce the union.  The commissioners of the three orthodox sister
colonies appealed to it, with loyal respect for its authority, even after the arrival of the Rhode Island Charter.
The prayer of Scot's petition in his own behalf, mentioned before, was that




32                THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
gloried in upholding, led them at various periods to the verge
of treason, to tyranny over the consciences of their fellowhe might be appointed Governor of Long Island, or liberty be granted to the
inhabitants to choose a governor and assistants yearly. In the reference of
this petition to the consideration of the Committee of Foreign Plantations,
Bennet premises that the king, " having received good testimony of Scot's loyalty & great sufferings, and being fully satisfyed of his particular abilities to
serve him, was graciously inclined to encourage him in his desires."
To forward his project for obtaining the government he sought, Scot's first
step was to complain to the Committee of Foregn Plantations of the intrusions
of the Dutch into the main land of New England, some islands adjacent, and
in particular on Manhaddoes and Long Islands. In consequence of his representations, the committee, on the 6th of July, ordered " Captain Scot, Mr.
Maverick, and Mr. Baxter, to draw up a brief narrative, showing the King's
title, the Dutch intrusion, their deportment since; management, strength, trade,
and government there; and, lastly, the means to make them acknowledge or
submit to the King's government, or to compel them thereto. or expulse them"
(T. A.'s N. York MSS. Papers, i. fol. 11; N. York Hist. Doc., iii. 46). Maverick's
petition concerning Massachusetts, mentioned in the sequel, and which led to
the appointment, in the following year, of himself and three others, as Royal
Commissioners to the colonies, was probably formed about this time, in co-operation with Scot's plan for subjugating the Dutch colonists; and likewise, that
in order to gain the favor of the Duke of York, and consequently that of Clarendon, for the scheme, suggestions were made in regard to the expediency of
bestowing upon the king's brother the important territory to be recovered from
the Dutch; which was effected by the king's letters-patent, on the 12th day of
March, 1664,-nearly half a year before the actual surrender by the Dutch
Governor Stuyvesant.
Scot, on his return, carried with him the famous letter, and the royal instruc-,tions enforcing the observance of the navigation-laws; which, of course, would
put an end to any open illicit trade with the Dutch colonists. He was received,
on his arrival, with cordial welcome. The great men of the different colonies
who were associated with the Atherton Company were grateful for the efforts
which had secured for it the royal favor, and also effectually placed it under
the broad protection of the Confederated Colonies. Hew Haven proclaimed
her gratitude by her vote, that Scot " had been a good friend to the Colony in
general, and to some persons in particular " (N. Haven Rec., ii. 515). She paid
all his expenses; and furnished him with an armed force, when he soon after
went to Long Island. Connecticut appointed him a commissioner at Setawket
(or Ashford), with magisterial power throughout Long Island. Winthrop
himself administered the oath of office to him and his colleagues, Talcott,
Young, and WVoodhull.
After writing a letter on the 14th December, 1663, to the Secretary Williamsol, to caution him against the Dutch, and to send his " service to noble Mr.
Chiffinch," he proceeded to Long Island; and, on the 31st of that month, addressed a letter to Governor Stuyvesant respecting that island. On the 11th
of January following, he, with Captain Young (Yongs), was at the Dutch village of Midwont, with sixty or seventy horse, and as many foot, with flying




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                          33
men, and to inhumanities that wring the heart of the modern
Christian.   It is not wonderful, therefore, that, through
colors, drums beating, and trumpets sounding. When called upon to show by'what authority lie came in that warlike nanner, he exhibited a letter, drawn
up by the magistrates at Hartford, for him and his colleagues to inquire what
right the Dutch might have to Long Island. He then, as the Dutch report
states, "stuck it back in his pocket, saying,' If Mr. Stuyveysant come over, I
shall speak to him of weightier matters," (N. Y. Hist. Doe., ii. 393-4).
He came ostensibly in pursuance of his instructions to bring the English settlements or villages, which the Dutch had recently at Hartford agreed to relinquish, to accept the jurisdiction of Connecticut. But these communities were
not unanimous in regard to the proposed annexation. The inhabitants who
were in favor of it complained of the indirect and ambiguous language of the
Connecticut authorities; vwhile, on the other hand, all the Quakers, Baptists,,and other heterodox sectaries, dreaded a Puritan thraldom; and no doubt
the deported loyalist Scot cordially sympathized with them (Brodhead 725).
He thought the time had now come when he might drop the mask, and openly
take service under the duke's banner. He therefore announced to the people,
that the king had granted the island to the Duke of York, who would shortly
make his intentions known. A number of the English villages combined in
rejecting the proffered union with Connecticut; and empowered Scot, as their
president, to provide for the public safety and welfare (Brodhead, 726). Under
this independent temporary authority, it appears that, not content with the
English parts of Long Island, about the 28th of February he claimed the whole
of it, and the entire province of New Netherland besides (N. Y. Hist. Doc., ii.
231.)
But his dream of ambition was speedily interrupted. The magistrates of
Connecticut, exasperated at being thus perfidiously baffled in their scheme for
acquiring territory outside their charter limits, ordered his arrest on the 10th of
March. He was soon after apprehended, and brought to the -Iartford prison
for trial. While there, he was dangerously ill; and, as Governor Leete wrote,
likely to die, as Scot conceived, by poison.
Still Scot's condition was not hopeless. He had won the gratitude of New
Haven: and her Governor Leete, who was propably indebted to Scot's friendly
efforts in England for escaping all question in regard to the concealment of the
fugitive regicides, wrote to the magistrates of the Colonies of Plymouth and
Massachusetts, entreating them, "as Confederates of a special interest in the
weale publique & peace of the country,... to do their utmost for the prevention of Captain Scot's ruin, and the hurt that may come thereby to the country; he being reputed his Majesties servant, and upon service now, by letter to
the united Colonies, when thus obstructed;.. and if.., the matter & manner
hozo do come to be narrated, as it is likely to be, no one appearing to prevent it,
all may be damnified." His "thoughts and desires are that the Governor of
Plymouth may advise agreement, and the Commissioners of the United Colonies be called to Hartford to see and appoint what is to be done, & how," in the
matter. He names the 8th of May as the time fixed for Scot's trial (Mass. Arch.,
ii. 183).
Governor Leete had a particular concern for New Haven, which hlie consid



34                THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
agencies to which this noxious principle gave birth, the adjoining heretic colony should be obstructed by many unworthy
ered to be " struck at in the business;" and he had also cause to share, to some
extent, in the apprehensions which his obscure but well-understood and ominous intimations were calculated to excite in the minds of the Massachusetts
rulers (Hutch. Coll., 334).
According to Chalmers, from the Restoration to 1682, when, by Cranston's
advice, the " General Court attempted to bribe the King," they had tampered
with the fidelity of the- king's ministers, and kept in constant pay the clerks of
the Council, in order to learn the' secrets of administration." He does not
specify instances; but he gives several names, and refers to the files of the
State-paper Office (Chalmer's Pol. Ann., 412-13, 461). In the sequel, it will
appear that documents were surreptitiously obtained, and conveyed to the Governor and Council; and, in one instance, by Scot himself. The presumption
that Scot was regularly employed in such service, while in England, is strengthened by the fact, that almost immediately after his return, when they were
called upon to account for their seizure and imprisonment of Saunders and.Burdett, and particularly needed some one to replace him, the magistrate in
council, on the 31st of December, 1663, adverting to the circumstance, that they
had sent to Secretary Morrice by the last ship, a " true narrative of the difference between" them " and Rhode Island, appointed a committee of three
(Willoughbly, Danforth, and Leveret), and empowered them to improve some
friend or friends in England, as they shall judge meete, to make way for the
improvement of our inforimction, &c., and giving us the best advice how our
affairs stand in England, and prevent all inconveniences the best they may; and
the charges...  expended... thereon" should " be repaid seasonably... out
of the publike Treasury" (Mass. Arch., vol. cvi. p. 71.)
On the 18th of the following May, the General Court approved of the measure and appropriated ~400 to carry it out (Mass. Rec. iv. pt. ii. 101).
Governor Leete's letter was brought by Scot's servant; from whose relation,
and from Scot's papers, brought at the same time, a full knowledge might be
gained of " the transactions of a cloudy aspect," which had occasioned "the
extremity of hazards to him and the country. " Five days after the date of
Leete's letter, the Massachusetts magistrates commissioned General Leveret
and Captain Davis to negotiate with the authorities of Connecticut about
Capt. Scot; and the next day, 28th of April, Governor Prence, of Plymouth,
who had been written to already by Secretary Rawson, wrote urging them to
do what they had already done, on the ground that it was " a case in which the
whole might be deeply concerned." He afterwards fulfilled his promise contained in this letter by sending Bradford and Southworth as commissioners to
Hartford (Mass. Arch., ii. 184; Hutch. Coll. 384).
The combined interposition was unavailing. Scot was brought to trial in the
Particular Court at Hartford; and on the 24th of May, 1664, was convicted on
ten charges, among which were usurpation of the king's authority, forgery and
perjury. He was sentenced to pay a fine of ~250; to be imprisoned during
the pleasure of the Court; to give security to the amount of ~500 for his good
behavior; to be degraded from the office of commissioner on Long Island; and
to be disfranchised. His estate was sequestered; and, in 1665, his former col



THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                         35
expedients in her anxious efforts to establish order and a regular government under her charter. To this end, under a preleague, Tacott, and Allen, the Secretary, were empowered to sell his land on
Long Island, to pay his fine (Conn. Rec., ii. 16). They probably found some
difficulty in executing this Connecticut commission, owing to an intermediate
change of circumstances. Scot had escaped from prison; Long Island had
been granted to the Duke of York; the Royal Commissioners (Nicolls, Cartwright, Carr, and his old friend Maverick) had arrived; and Scot placed himself under their protection, so advantageously, that, according to the Dutch
report, on the 25th of August (4th September, N. S.), two days before New
Amsterdam surrendered to Colonel Nicolls, Scot, "who had heretofore summoned Long Island," joined the English force with his horse and foot (N. Y.
Hist. Doc., ii. 393).
It will be recollected, that Scot, in his petition to the king, stated that he had
"purchased near one-third part of Long Island." This might be so, but as the
Indians, of whom he purchased, often sold the same land, over and over again,
to different individuals, who, in turn, often had no written license or confirmation from the agent of Lord Sterling, his title, in common with others, wouild
frequently be brought into question and angry controversy. A great dispute
of this kind between the inhabitants of Jamaica, Long Island, was adjusted
by Colonel Nicolls, as Deputy-Governor, under the duke, of his possessions in
America, on the 2d of January, 1665. Some of Scot's ubiquitous purchases
were very probably among the subjects of this litigation; which proved so
troublesome and embarrassing to Nicolls, as to induce him to ordain, that no
purchase from the Indians, without the Governor's license, executed in his
presence, should be valid (Smith's New York, p. 27).
Hardly was this controversy disposed of, when Nicolls was troubled with a
complaint laid before him by Secretary Allen, on the Ist of February, that
" Scot, according to his wonted course, was creating disturbance among the
people of Sewtawket, by laboring to deprive them of their land, which he
claimed by purchase from Indians " (N. Y. Doe., ii. 86).
About this period, Nicolls appears to have lost all confidence in Scot. He
was well aware that Scot had coveted and expected the government of Long
Island. Nicolls, a wise, upright, and zealous servant of the king and the Duke
of York, preferred to retain it, rather than encounter the hazard of intrusting
it to Scot. In a letter to the duke, written probably in November, 1665 (N. Y.
Hist. Doec., iii. 105), Nicolls says, " Scot, born to work mischief as far as he is
credited or his parts serve him, contrived and betrayed Lord Berkely and Sir
George Carteret into a design of ruining all hope of increase in your royal
highness's territory;" i. e., by the grant to them of all his territory west of
Hudson's river.
This letter, which gave the duke the first information that the names of New
Amsterdam and Aurania had been changed into those of his two titles, York
and Albany was followed on the 24th of October, 1666, by another respecting
Scot, addressed to Secretary Morrice, in which Nicolls says, "I think it my
duty to inform you that a copy of his Majesty's signification to Massachusetts
was sureptitiously conveyed over to them, by some unknown hand, before the
original came to Boston; and formerly the very original of Mr. Maverick's




36               THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
tence of jurisdiction too shallow ever to; be submitted to the
judgment of the Commissioners of Plantations, heathen savages
petition to the Privy Council, concerning Massachusetts, was stolen out of
Lord Arlington's office by Captain John Scot, and delivered to the Governor &
Council at Boston. This I affirm positively to be true; though Scot, when I
questioned him upon the matter, said that a clerk of Mr. Williamson's gave it
him. The same Scot, by a pretended seale, affixed to a writing, in which was
the King's picture drawn with a pen or black lead, with his Majesty's hand,
Charles R., and subsigned H. Bennet, had horribly abused his Majesty's honor
in these parts, and hath fled to Barbadoes. Lord Willoughby sent word that
he would send him toEngland " (id., iv. 136)
Thus terminated the American career of Scot. Of the subsequent events of
his life, nothing certain is known. With all his faults, he had the adroitness
to acquire no small favor with leading men, both in this country and in England, and to be on terms of familiar intercourse with them. H-Is complaint
against the Dutch intrusion, aided, if it did not originate, the design of sending
out the first expedition against the Dutch possessions in this country. It naturally contributed, together with his own suggestions, and those in the narrative drawn up by himself and his colleagues, Maverick and Baxter, to the
royal grant, made to the Duke of York, of those possessions, before they were
actually gained by the English forces; and it paved the way for the duke's subsequent trahnsfer of the Jerseys to Lord Berkeley, the President of the Committee, before whom the complaint was laid, and to Sir George Carteret, the
friend and naval associate of the duke.
Up to the period of his conviction, he appears to have stood well with the
highest public men of this country; and there was no visible reason why it
should not be so. He was not deficient in education: he had raised himself to
considerable wealth, to the rank of captain and of commissioner; and had
been employed confidentially abroad, both by Massachusetts and by the Atherton Company, which comprised some of the dignitaries of the land. If Winthrop had believed him to be unworthy, he would neither have consented to his
appointment as First Commissioner for Long Island, nor have administered to
him the oath of office  Winthrop's objection to Scot's "prosecuting" Hutchinson's Atherton " affairs, while he remained in London," was founded, not on
any personal aversion of his, at that time, to Scot, but obviously on the reason
assigned in Scot's famous letter to Hutchinson; namely, that " lie," Winthrop,
" had had much trouble with Mr. Clarke." That trouble having been amicably
terminated, he was unwilling to revive it in any shape; and least of all, we
may be sure, as no doubt Scot was, would Winthrop be a party to a contrivance
for vitiating his own plighted faith by falsehood and the defamation of Clarke
The plan of Scot, on the other hand, which he probably did not dare to disclose to Winthrop, was to make the ruin of Clarke's reputation the basis of all
his sinister proceedings in behalf of the Atilerton Company.
As these all had at least the tacit sanction of Hutchinson, and means were
furnished for them, it follows, almost unavoidably, that Hutchinson did employ
him, with a latitude of discretion that allowed him to take himself and Chiffinch
" into the Society," and to expend money in bribes as he "might deem meet."
It is a matter of history, that the fruits of Scot's knavery were received with




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                          37
and lawless white men within her chartered limits were upheld
in resistance to the lawful authority in riotous, vicious, and
disorderly practices, in molesting the families, and in depredations upon the defenceless property, of the inhabitants. When
in danger of attack from the Narragansets, Rhode Island, with
her hundred and twenty Christian English families, was refused
the sale of the smallest supply of powder; while' ammunition
gratitude, and without compunction. The letter filched from the king was
vaunted as more authoritative than the Charter of Rhode Island, bearing the
royal sign manual and the Great Seal of England; and likewise as crowning
proof that the charter itself was basely and insidiously obtained, although it is
demonstrable that the charter was known to have been framed openly, and with
unusual deliberation. For that part of it relating to Narragansett, and therefore most unacceptable to its impugners, was founded on the award of five
arbitrators, agreed to and accepted by the Commissioners of Connecticut and
Rhode Island, the colonies most interested in the matter; and another clause,
providing for the freedom of religious opinion, was inserted by the king's special order. Roger Williams, in his letter to Mason, says, "This his Majesty's
grant was startled at by his 3Majesty's high officers of state who were to view
it" (the charter) " in course before the sealing; but, fearing the lions roaring,
they couched, against their wills, in obedience to his Majesty's pleasure."
Can there be, at this day, any ground for believing that the charter was obtained by chicanery, or that the king signed it in ignorance of its purport?
(Haz. ii. 499'3; Bancroft, ii. 64; Arnold, i. 300-9, 383-5; Plyml. Rec., x; Acts of
Com. U. C., 320.)
In regard to the clause in the Connecticut Charter respecting Narraganset,
the truth appears to be, that Winthrop, not having, as the correspondence
shows, very definite notions of the topography of Narragansett, depended too
much upon the representations of Hutchinson, whose agency and frequent and
long visits had made him more familiar with all the localities; and whose unscrupulous subordinate, Scot, had sufficient topical knowledge, as well as art
and shrewdness, to persuade Winthrop, that the estuary at the mouth of Pawcatuck river was called Narragansett Bay, as the Pawcatuck itself, bordering
upon the country of the Narragansett Indians, would naturally often be popularly called the Narragansett River; just as, for the same reason, the same
name, Narragansett, was, so early as 1634, applied to the north branch of the
now Taunton River, which bordered the eastern side of the Narragansett possessions (Wood's N. Eng. Prosp. map; Arnold. ut supra).
It has been mentioned before, that Scot might have been the bearer of the
copy of the Narragansett Patent sent to Winthrop in London. Whether he
were so or not, as confidential agent and co-proprietor of the Atherton Company, he had free access to it, both here and in England. He was quite capable and ready to fabricate any expedient interpolation; and his friend Chiffinch
would have cheerfully brought all the skill of London to his aid. These circumstances throw an additional shade of doubt on the genuineness of the
after-insertions, respecting seals, in the Winthrlop copy.




38             THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
and armed men were, about the same time, promptly sent to
protect the savage Pomham against the very same foe, (Johnson,
107, 111, 231; Welde, Answer to W. R., 61, 67; Hutch. Coll.,
154, 275-283; Shepard N. E. Lament, 3; Cobbet's Civ. Mag.,
81, 82-5; Ward, Simp. Cobl., 5; Winth., ii. 173; Simp. Defence, 5).
It is painful to advert to these things. But our forefathers,
though wise, pious, and sincere, were nevertheless, in respect to
Christian charity, under a cloud; and, in history, truth should
be held sacred, at whatever cost.  We, who are stationed, as
it were, at the portals of history, are peculiarly bound to consider it a solemn, however unwelcome duty, on all occasions,
in defence of truth, to withstand even "' the pure, to whom all
things are pure," as well as the "charity that believeth all
things " and also to enter the lists against that blind zeal,
which is all the blinder and more pernicious because it will not
see; and especially against the narrow and futile patriotism,
which, instead of pressing forward in pursuit of truth, takes
pride in walking backwards to cover the slightest nakedness of
our forefathers.
This paper, intended at first to be restricted to the single
purpose of self-vindication, has been somewhat enlarged, in the
hope, that, by bringing into view the few scattered fragments
of history bearing upon the subject, some light might be thrown
upon the obscurities and doubts which still rested upon it,
merely because it had been only cursorily and not thoroughly
examined.  At the suggestion of a learned and distinguished
friend and associate, I venture, however, to append a sketch of
the principal points embraced in the preceding remarks.
Various accounts concur in ascribing the origin of the Narraganset Patent to the spontaneous unauthorized efforts of the
Massachusetts agent, Mr. Welde.  He apparently obtained,
by personal applications at various times and places, the signatures of nine out of the eighteen Commissioners of Plantations
to the parchment document now at the State tHouse.  Whether
he ever obtained their seals also, is not so clear.  The certified
WVinthrop copy of that document is not conclusive and indubitable proof of the fhct.




THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.                  39
There is no proof whatever that the original was ever submitted to the Board of Commissioners collectively. On the contrary, it was publicly declared, by the Lord President Warwick,
that it had never passed the Board; as, in fact, wanting the
signatures and seals of a majority of the commissioners, as prescribed by ordinance, it never could have done: and hence it is
perfectly certain, that it was not entitled to be either enrolled
or dated. No proof, or even pretence of its enrolment is known;
while official assertions, made within twenty years of the time
when the document was written, that it had never been enrolled,
and that ample and careful search for the enrolment had also
been made, passed at the time, and remain to this day, without
contradiction.  Its present date is a forgery,-a criminal, unauthorized insertion; and, being on a Sunday, a palpable falsehood besides.
Welde knew that it was a worthless instrument.  Had he
thought otherwise, he would neither have wished nor dared to
retain it in his own hands more than a year and a half; for his
writings show that he was no friend to toleration, or to the
tolerant community in Rhode Island; and he would have exulted in the accomplishment of his original purpose of subjecting the whole territory to the " wholesome severity" of the
orthodox colony of which he was agent.  He could not be
ignorant that his hopes were defeated, and his projected charter
virtually annihilated, by the grant, at the instance of Roger
WVilliams, of the Providence-Plantations Charter, on the 14th
of March, 1644. Two charters, grants to different parties of
the same territory, are, of course, incompatible, and cannot
co-exist. The recognition of one is the extinction of the other.
This recognition of the Providence-Plantations Charter was
distinctly announced in the letter from Lords and Commoners
in Parliament, brought by Willialms,,in September, 1644, to
the Massachusetts authorities; and, at various periods afterwards, was officially made by the Commissioners of Plantations
in their letters to Massachusetts.  In all these, that charter is
recognized, while the Narraganset Patent is utterly ignored.
Even the Massachusetts authorities of the time appear to




40            THE NARRAGANSET PATENT.
have had very little real belief in its validity. They did not
hesitate to contravene its provisions; they abandoned their
professed design of negotiating respecting it in England; and
in their controversies with Rhode Island and other colonies,
without adverting to that instrument, they founded their claim
to lands in Rhode Island entirely upon other grounds.
When subsequently brought forward in the name of Massachusetts, at the instigation of Massachusetts speculators in
Rhode-Island lands, the main object in view was, not to claim
the territory, but merely to transfer from Rhode Island to
Connecticut the jurisdiction over certain portions of land in the
former colony, on which, by her charter and laws, they (the
speculators) were intruders and trespassers.  The question
between Massachusetts and Rhode Island, as to the portion of
Southertown east of the Pawcatuck, was essentially one of
mere boundary.  Secretary Rawson's letter of the 8th of
March, 1662, to the Colonial Government of Rhode Island,
claimed Southertown on the ground that it was included in the
Narraganset Patent. But the territory granted being the same
in both patents, and the Narraganset Patent being a nonentity,
it necessarily followed, that Rhode Island, by her charter, was
the rightful owner of the land in controversy. In that sense
was the subject treated in the reply of the Rhode-Island Government of the 22d of the following May, as well as at a later
period by the Royal Commissioners; and I have not discovered
a single instance in which the Welde Patent ever found countenance from the English authorities, either at home or in this
country, (Mass. Arch., ii. 26; R. Isl. Rec., 461, 469; Mass.
Rec., iv., 2d pt., 175, 176; Arnold, i. 316  Hutch. Coll., 382).