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 THE 
 
 LANDING AT CAPE ANNE.
 

 
 THE 
 
 LANDING AT CAPE ANNE; 
 
 OR 
 
 THE CHARTER 
 
 OF THE 
 
 FIRST PERMANENT COLONY ON THE TERRITORY 
 OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COMPANY. 
 
 NOW DISCOVERED AND FIRST PUBLISHED FROM 
 
 €^t (li)rtgiiial HanuHrrift. 
 
 WITH AN INQUIRY INTO ITS AUTHOBITY AND 
 
 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY. 
 
 1624-1628. 
 ROGER CONANT, GOVERNOR. 
 
 JOHN WINGATE THORNTON, 
 
 "OBSCURA PRO MENS." 
 
 BOSTON: 
 GOULD AND LINCOLN 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 SUELDON, LAMPORT, AND BLAKE MAN. 
 
 1854. 
 
 ^^
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by 
 GOULD AND LINCOLN, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 TBDRSTON AND TOKRT, PRINTbKS.
 
 " Apollos watered, but Paul planted ; he that begun the worke was 
 
 THE GREATER MAN. . . . YoU SHALL HAVE MADB THIS ISLAND, [EnGLANU] 
 WHICH IS but as the SUBURBS OF THE OlD WoRLD, A BrJDGE, A GaLLERY TO 
 
 THE New ; to joyne all to that world that shall never grow old, the 
 KiNGDOME OF Heaven. You shall add persons to this Kingdome, and to the 
 
 KlNGDOiME OF HeAVEN, AND NAMES TO THE BOOKES OF OUR CHRONICLES, AND TO 
 THE BOOKE OF LiFE." 
 
 Dr. John Donne's Sermon to the "Honorable Virginian Company, '' Nov. 13, 1C22. 
 
 "Let IT NOT BE GRIEVOUS TO YOU, THAT YOU HAVE BEEN INSTRUMENTS TO 
 BREAK THE ICE 70R OTHERS WHO COME AFTER WITH LESS DIFFICULTY : THE HONOR 
 SHALL BE YOURS TO THE WORLD'S END." 
 
 Letter to the Plymouth Planters. — 1623. 
 
 " Small things in the beginning op natural or politic bodies are as 
 remarkable as greater in bodies pull grown." 
 
 Dudley's Letter to Lady Bridgett, Countess o^f Lincoln, March 12, 1C31. 
 
 "My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows FROM 
 COMMON NAMES, FROM KINORED BLOOD, FROM SIMJLAR PRIVILEGES AND EQUAL 
 
 PROTECTION. These are ties which, though light as air, are as strong as 
 
 LINKS of iron." 
 
 Burke's Speech on Conciliation with j.iinerica, 1773.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 As the geologist discovers vestiges of the primitive globe and its 
 inhabitants in the pebble and the fossil, as the geographer explores 
 great rivers back to mountain rivulets, so the historian finds eloquent 
 witnesses of former generations in crumbling monuments and obscure 
 parchments, and traces national greatness to its beginning. Thus the 
 incidents in the early lives of the good and great are gleaned with 
 interest and veneration, and the events in the dawn of a nation's 
 existence are clothed with dignity and importance, proportionate to its 
 after intelligence and greatness. 
 
 The distinct and authentic history of the planting and growth of 
 the American colonies, peculiar to us, in contrast with the legendary 
 and obscure origin of many nations in the Old World, has ever 
 afforded satisfaction to the philosopher and historian, and whatever 
 tends to its completeness, will be received with interest. 
 
 The following pages prove that Massachusetts begins her history 
 not at Salem, nor under the patronage of the organization which 
 obtained the charter of March, Anno 1627-8, but in the spring of 
 the year 1624, at Cape Anne, where the colony was established 
 under the authority of this her first charter the very initial of her 
 annals — now first presented to the public. 
 
 It is venerable, as the historical foundation of the Society or State, 
 which, continuing under various charters and titles, in the year 1780, 
 adopted the name of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
 
 "V'ln PREFACE. 
 
 It is remarkable as guaranteeing the principles of free government 
 vindicated in the Revolutionary struggle; that tiie government is of, 
 from and for the individual, the people, the body politic, and not 
 they for the government. From the recognition or denial of this 
 principle, results freedom, or despotism. 
 
 This venerable instrument opens to the mind a vision of the past, 
 and in the quiet depths of thought, those obscure but mighty men, 
 now men of renown, rise from their tombs ; and we feel as it were 
 that our lives are united with theirs, while we study the privileges 
 that encouraged their hearts, lighted their future with hope, and 
 supported their onward steps. This tract relates to the first colonial 
 lustre — the period commenced under the authority of this, the first* 
 or Cape Anne charter, and embraced in the years 1624 to 1629. 
 
 The parchment was in the possession of the Hon. Paul Dudley, 
 F. R. S., Chief Justice of Massachusetts, son of the younger Governor 
 Dudley, who may have received it from his father. Gov. Thomas 
 Dudley. The narrative, written more than a year since, has been 
 enlarged, developing more fully the authority on which the char- 
 ter was issued. 
 
 My thanks are due to Rev. Joseph B. Felt, for his aid and for 
 valuable original documents in the Appendix. Several of the scarce 
 works cited, were from the library of my friend, Charles Deane, Esq., 
 whose familiarity with this period of American history, has been 
 of much service in editing the charter. 
 
 J. WINGATE THORNTON. 
 Boston, October, 1854.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 RIGHT BY DISCOVERY EARLY VOYAGES COLONIES PROJECTED 
 
 TINSUCCESSFUL THE VIRGINIA COMPANY CREATED 1606 KING 
 
 JAMES' ILL BEHAVIOR VIEWS OF THE ADVENTURERS. . 1-7 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 REASONS FOR CREATING A NEW COMPANY THE PLYMOUTH COUNCIL 
 
 INCORPORATED IN 1620 ITS POWERS ITS POLITICAL IMPOR- 
 TANCE — PARLIAMENTARY DIFFICULTIES PROPOSED DIVISION OF 
 
 TERRITORY AMONG THE PATENTEES PLAN OF DIVISION PRO- 
 PRIETORS' NAMES ROYAL SANCTION OBTAINED LORD SHEFFEILD's 
 
 TITLE 8-16 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 WRIOTHESLEY, EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON, THE PATRON OF BARTHOLO- 
 MEW GOSNOLU GOSNOLD SAILS FOR NORTH VIRGINIA, IN BIAY, 
 
 1602 DISCOVERS CAPE ANNE NAMES CAPE COD VISITS MAR- 
 
 TIJa's VINEYARD — BUILDS A pOUT AT ELIZABETH'S ISLAND CAP-
 
 C O N T E N T S . 
 
 TAIN JOHN SMITH VISITS AND NAMES NEW ENGLAND, IN 1614 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS ESTEEMED A PARADISE IT IS VISITED BY THE 
 
 PLYMOUTH COLONISTS SOME OF THE COLONISTS REMOVE TO 
 
 NANTASKET ROGER CONANT BAD CONDUCT AND DISGRACE OF 
 
 LYFORD AND OLDHAM 17-27 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 PLYMOUTH COLONY SENDS WINSLOW AS AGENT TO ENGLAND FAME 
 
 OF THE COLONY IN ENGLAND REV. JOHN WHITE OF DORCHESTER. 
 
 LORD SHEFFEILD BECOMES INTERESTED GRANTS A PATENT FOR 
 
 CAPE ANNE COPY OF THE CHARTER CAPE ANNE OCCUPIED 
 
 FAILURE OF EFFORTS AT CAPE ANNE DISAFFECTION OF THE LONDON 
 
 MERCHANT ADVENTURERS LEVETT's ACCOUNT OF PLYMOUTH AND 
 
 CAPE ANNE IN 1624 28-38 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PURITANISM IN ENGLAND BISHOP LAKE AND REV. JOHN WHITE FAVOR 
 
 NEW ENGLAND REASONS FOR COLONIZING THE DORCHESTER COM- 
 PANY THEY ESTABLISH A COLONY AT CAPE ANNE UNDER THE SHEF- 
 FEILD CHARTER ROGER CONANT APPOINTED GOVERNOR HOSTILITY 
 
 OF LONDON MERCHANTS THEIR AGENT HEWES MAKES REPRISALS OF 
 
 PLYMOUTH PROPERTY AT CAPE ANNE GOVERNOR CONANT EFFECTS 
 
 PEACE 39-47 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 REVERSES AT CAPS ANNE LOSSES THE MERCHANTS ABANDON THE 
 
 COLONY THE COLONY PURGED OF ITS WORTHLESS MEMBERS 
 
 GOV. CONANT PREVENTS ITS DISSOLUTION THE COLONY REMOVED 
 
 TO NAUMKEAG INDIAN HOSPITALITY -^ GOV. CONANt's FIRMNESS 
 
 SAVES THE COLONY JOHN WOODBERY SENT AS AGENT TO ENG- 
 LAND 48-53
 
 CONTENTS. XI 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE COLONY IN 1627 GOV. CONANt's CHARACTER AND SERVICES 
 
 WOODBERy's mission to ENGLAND FINDS MEMBERS OF THE OLD 
 
 DORCHESTER COMPANY A NEW COMPANY ORGANIZED A PATENT 
 
 OBTAINED THOMAS DUDLEY, ESQ. AND HIS FRIENDS BECOME INTER- 
 ESTED THE COMPANY HAD NO DEFINITE NAME HUMBLE BEGIN- 
 NING OF THE STATE RECORDS WOODBERY's RETURN TO THE COL- 
 ONY CHARACTER OF THE COMPANY IN ENGLAND JOHN ENDECOTT 
 
 ARRIVES AT SALEM AND SUPERSEDES CONANT NEW IMPULSE TO 
 
 COLONIZATION 54-60 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 REASONS FOR OBTAINING THE KING's AFFIRMATION OF THE PATENT 
 
 DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE COMPANY IN ENGLAND AND THE 
 
 COLONY CRADOCK NOT GOVERNOR OF THE COLONY CHARTER 
 
 SENT TO ENDECOTT UNION OF THE OLD AND NEW PLANTERS 
 
 NAMES OF THE PIONEERS DISPUTES BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW 
 
 COLONISTS DANGERS OF THE COLONY OLDHAm's INTRIGUES 
 
 gorges' CONFLICTING PATENT GOVERNOR CONANT RESTORES PEACE 
 
 INJUSTICE TO CONANT AND HIS ASSOCIATES ALLEVIATING CON- 
 SIDERATIONS CHARACTERS OF CONANT AND ENDECOTT COBIPANy's 
 
 VINDICATION HARDSHIPS OF THE OLD PLANTERS. . . 61-68 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 KECAPITULATION — THE HISTORICAL IDENTITY OF THE COLONY — SERIES 
 
 OF GOVERNORS AND CHARTERS CHARACTER OF THE NEW ENGLAND 
 
 COLONISTS THE FATHERS QUOTED NEW ENGLAND SETTLED BY 
 
 FUGITIVES FROM OPPRESSION PRELACY DRIVEN FROM PLYMOUTH 
 
 AND FROM SALEM ITS BANISHMENT NECESSARY TO THEIR SELF- 
 PRESERVATION — VIEWS OF THE FOUNDERS OF NEW ENGLAND 
 
 TOLERATION NOT PROFESSED DANGER FROM POPERY THE PURI- 
 TANS ESTABLISHED THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION AND THE AMERICAN 
 REPUBLIC 6U-76
 
 Xll CONTENTS. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. Notice of lord Sheffield 77 
 
 II. Deposition* OF richakd brackenbury 79 
 
 III. Deposition of -^\-illiam dixy 81 
 
 IV. Deposition of Humphry woodbery 81 
 
 V. John j. babson, esq , on the locality of the colony at 
 
 cape ANNE 83
 
 TH E 
 
 LANDING AT CAPE ANNE 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 EIGHT BY DISCOVERY EARLY VOYAGES COLONIES PROJECTED 
 
 UNSUCCESSFUL THE VIRGINIA COMPANY CREATED 1606 KING 
 
 JAMES's ILL BEHAVIOR VIEWS OF THE ADVENTURERS. 
 
 A GLANCE at the earlier attempts at northern coloni- 
 zation, and the several divisions and grants of the 
 American coast, will show the proximate sources of 
 authority whence the charter of Cape Anne was de- 
 rived. 
 
 Upon the discovery of America, the European govern- 
 ments established the principle that 
 
 " All a man sail'd by or saw was his own ; " 
 
 that the nation discovering the territory should have 
 the exclusive right to acquire the soil from the natives, 
 which title might be consummated by possession.^ 
 
 Under this international law, Henry VII. on the fifth 
 of March, in the year 1496, authorized^ John Cabot and 
 
 » Chief Justice Marshall's opinion in Johnson ». IM'Intosh, — a historical summary, 
 "so clear and exact," tliat Judge Story adopted it as the preliminary chapter, 
 (§§ U to 38,) of his " Commentaries on the Constitution." AVlieaton's " Ekments 
 of International Law," ch. iv. §§ 1-5. 
 
 ' Ryraer's Foedera, xii. folios 595, 5U6, contains this first English patent for dis- 
 covery. 
 
 1
 
 Z CABOT S FIRST VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 
 
 his sons Lewis, Sebastian, and Sancius, to sail under the 
 English banners to the East, the West, and the North, to 
 seek out lands unknown to any Christian people. In 
 the next year, on the twenty-fourth of June, about five 
 of the clock, early in the morning, Sebastian Cabot, in 
 the ship "Matthew" of Bristol,^ first touched the shores 
 of America, and in that voyage he acquired for England, 
 by the right of discovery, her title to all that territory 
 between the point of his first landing, in the thirty-eighth 
 degree of north latitude, southward to sixty-seventh de- 
 gree.^ A poet of the day thus alludes to it : — 
 
 " What an honorable thynge, 
 Both to the Realme and to the Kynge, 
 To have had his doniynyon extendynge 
 There into so far a grounde 
 Whiche the noble Kynge of late memory. 
 The most wyse prynce the VII. Kerry 
 Caused furst to be founde." ^ 
 
 A second patent to John Cabot, from Henry VII. issued 
 on the third of February, in the year 1498, j)ermitted 
 him to transport such of his majesty's subjects as might, 
 in the language of the patent, " of their owen free will 
 goo and passe with him," " to the londe and isles of late 
 found." Three hundred men embarked in this ex- 
 pedition, whose object was to find out "what manner of 
 landes those Indies* were to inhabite." The particulars 
 
 ' The name of the other vessel is not recorded. They sailed from the port of 
 Bristol. Corry's Hist, of Bristol, 1816, i. 213. 
 
 "^ " The ancieht discovferies, contracts, and agreements, -which our Englishmen have 
 long since made in those parts, together with the acknowledgement of the histories 
 and chronicles of other nations who profess the land of America from the Cape de 
 Florida unto the Bay of Canada (which is south and north three hundred leagues 
 and upwards ; and east and west further than hath yet been discovered) is proper 
 to the King of England." Mourt's Relation, 16i!2. 
 
 3 Quoted in Biddlc's Memoir of Sebastian Cabot. London, 1832 ; 2d ed., p. 77, 
 note. 
 
 •* The "West Indies" once designated the whole of America. Herrera treats 
 " of the vast Continent and Islands of America, commonly called the West Indies."
 
 CABOT. RALEIGTI. GILBERT. 6 
 
 of this voyage are not preserved. It certainly was un- 
 successful, but is memorable as England's first attempt 
 in the mission of civilization to America. 
 
 Thus it seems that Cabot, who ranks second only to 
 Columbus, has the honor of being the first Englishman 
 who jn'ojected settlements in America, an historical 
 dignity sometimes assigned to Sir Walter Raleigh, but 
 oftener and nearer the truth, yet erroneously, to Sir Hum- 
 phrey Gilbert,^ who has been styled the " Father of North- 
 ern and North- Western Civilization." This precedence 
 belongs to Cabot, though his projects were unsuccessful." 
 Settlements of briefs duration were efi'ected by Gilbert 
 and Raleigh. 
 
 After nearly a century of public apathy, the English 
 mind was again directed to the Western world. The 
 British Constitution vests all vacant lands exclusively in 
 the sovereign, whose sole prerogative* it is to dispose of 
 them to whom and on such conditions as the monarch 
 thinks best. In the exercise of this prerogative, in the 
 year 1578, on the eleventh of June, Queen Elizabeth 
 gave to the illustrious knight. Sir Humphrey Gilbert, 
 authority" to discover any territory not occupied by any 
 
 India is supposed to be modified from Hindoo, wliose land Hindoatan, the East, 
 Columbus supposed he had reached when he discovered America. 
 
 1 Holmes' Annals, i. 92, 100, 155 ; N. Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., Julj', 1850, 
 226, 227. 
 
 2 Cabot's second patent -was first published in Biddle's " Memoir of Sebastian 
 Cabot," to which I am much indebted. I commend it to the stijdent's special 
 attention as a very able critical examination of the authorities on the history of 
 maritime discovery. Holmes' Annals, i. note vi. 90, 97, 104, 105. There is a 
 learned review of the volume in the Appendix to Harper's Family Library, 
 No. 53. 
 
 3 Mr. Nicholas Thorne, a Bristol merchant, in 152ii, sent an invoice of armor 
 and merchandise to T. Tison, factor of a commercial settlement in the West Indies. 
 Holmes' Annals, i. 57.- 
 
 ■* Johnson v. M'Intosh ; 8 Wheaton's U. S. Rep. 
 * The patent is in Stith'a History of Virginia, p. 4-
 
 4 NEW FOUNDLAND. THE LONDON COMPANY. 
 
 Christian power, and to grant it, according to the laws 
 of England, to snch of her majesty's subjects, as he 
 might induce to remove thither. Failing at the outset 
 of his first voyage, which involved him in debt, he sailed 
 from the port of Plymouth in Devonshire, and on the 
 fifth of August took possession of the port of St. John 
 in New Foundland, and the adjacent parts, for the 
 English crown.^ Thus a period of nearly three genera- 
 tions intervened between the first and second attempts of 
 the English to colonize America. Sir Humphrey being 
 lost at sea, his patent was renewed to his brother, Sir 
 Walter Kaleigh, the founder of Virginia. These illus- 
 trious men, Cabot, Gilbert, and Raleigh were the founders 
 of the naval and commercial grandeur of England. 
 
 The titles under the before mentioned grants or patents 
 from the English sovereign, having by forfeiture or 
 the default of the patentees reverted to the crown, the 
 monarch, James I. in the year 1606, created the first 
 corporate association for colonizing America, authorizing 
 two councils ^ of control, of the first of which most of the 
 members resided m London, and of the second, chiefly in 
 Plymouth. Three years after, the former council re- 
 ceived a new charter of incorporation by the name of 
 " The Treasurer and Company of Adventurers and Plan- 
 ters of the City of London for the first Colony in 
 Virginia," the name then given to nearly the whole 
 coast.^ The first council projected settlements in the 
 southern portion of the territory, and was popularly 
 
 * Holmes' American Annals, i. 96-101. 
 
 * Two companies are sometimes spoken of, but improperly, as they had but one 
 patent, creating one company, acting under two councils. 
 
 3 The Plymouth colonists in their compact, 1G'20, said they had undertaken •• to 
 plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia."
 
 SIR THOMAS SMITH. SIR EDT\IN SANDYS. 5 
 
 known as the South Virginia Company. Among its 
 members were some of the king's courtiers, and in the 
 illegal and arbitrary exercise of the royal power in their 
 favor, he excited a spirit of mutual hostility between 
 himself and the company,^ the more irritating, as every 
 resistance to his despotic interference became politically 
 important. 
 
 An incident illustrative of this is here worthy of 
 notice, as one of the difficulties which determined ^ the 
 royal mind in favor of the new organization of the 
 northern colonial interests in 1620. 
 
 By their charter the Virginia Company had the right 
 to choose their officers. Sir Edwin Sandys, their treas- 
 urer in the year 1619, was the first in the list of 
 candidates for that office in the next year. After the 
 nomination of Sandys, and as they were proceeding to 
 the election, a message was received from the king, that 
 it was his " pleasure not to have Sir Edwin Sandys 
 chosen, and nominating for the office Sir Thomas Smith, 
 and one or two others, one of whom they might elect." 
 Smith was a royal favorite. He was appointed Treasurer 
 by the king at the organization of the company, and 
 held the office till being "notoriously^ infamous and 
 utterly detested and cursed by the whole company" for 
 his peculations and malfeasance in their aiFairs, he was 
 superseded by Sandys. Upon this, Sir Edwin ^ withdrew 
 
 ' Stith's Hist, of Virginia, 168-170, 178, 179, 
 
 ' Spauish influence was the true cause of James's conduct. Peckard's Life of 
 Ferrar, 85, 8'.) - 168. 
 
 3 Stith's Hist, of Virginia, 178, 182, 185, 186 ; Peckard's Life of Ferrar. A 
 portrait of Smith is in Thane's British Autography, i. 27. 
 
 * Soon after Sir Edwin, •' being found too daring and factious in Parliament," was 
 placed under arrest by the king, for a month. He was the second son of Edwin 
 Sandys, Archbishop of York, was Prebend of York, 1581, kniglifed in 1(503, 
 author of "A View of the State Religion in tlie Western Quarter of tiie World," 
 1629, and died at Northbourn, Kent, in October, 1G2'J. Tliia family was friendly
 
 6 SOUTHAMPTON. MOTIVES TO COLONIZATION. 
 
 his name, and the company, consisting of nearly five 
 hundred persons, proceeded to ballot, when of the king's 
 candidates, it was found that one of them had only one 
 ball and the other two, while Henry, the Earl of South- 
 ampton, who was not the king's nominee, and no less 
 odious to him than Sandys, had all the rest. The suc- 
 cessful candidate was one of the most influential patriots 
 in the House of Lords. 
 
 That distinguished pioneer and most ardent friend of 
 colonization, Captain John Smith, said, " I am not so 
 simple as to think that ever any other motive than 
 wealth will ever erect there a commonwealth, or draw 
 company from their ease and humors at home." ^ The 
 expectations of those engaged in the earlier attempts to 
 colonize America, were almost as irrational as those 
 cherished a century later by the adventurers in the 
 South Sea Bubble or the Mississippi Scheme. Sudden 
 and extraordinary profits were looked for, and golden 
 visions allured men of all ranks ! Among the adven- 
 turers and patentees were many of the great peers of the 
 realm, of the most eminent knights, gentlemen and 
 wealthy merchants ; men of almost every degree of 
 nobility, and of every profession and occupation, from the 
 merchant to the humblest artisan, are named in the 
 charter. 
 
 to the Pilgrims. John Robinson's Works, 1851, i. xxii., xxxix.; Hunter's Tract. 
 "The Court and Times of James the First," London, 1848, 2 vols., contains inter- 
 esting cotemporary notices of Sandys ; in vol. i. 61, 314, 320, 325 ; in vol. ii. 222, 
 224, 238, 252, 258, 261, 2C6, 412, 444. 
 
 ^ Shakspeare's " Comedy of Errors," T^ritten probably about 1591, and printed 
 in 1623, hands down the popular impression of Auierioa, the "form and pressure 
 of the time." Dromio describes Nell's form as " spherical, like a globe," so that 
 *' he could find out countries in her." Autipholus inquires " Where's America ? 
 the Indies ? " Dromio replies, " Oh, sir, upon her nose, all o'er embellish'd with 
 rubies, carbuncles, sapphires, declining their rich aspect to the hot breath of Spain, 
 ■who sent whole armadoes of carracks to be ballasted at her nose."
 
 DISAPPOINTMENTS. SIR FERDINANDO GORGES. 7 
 
 The brothers, Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter 
 Raleigh, and their kindred. Chief Justice Popham, Sir 
 Ferdinando Gorges, and their families, and others, had 
 pursued the design of colonizing these Western Atlantic 
 coasts, with a perseverance and assiduity worthy of better 
 success. 
 
 Extravagant hopes,^ the charms of title and office,^ the 
 allurements of gain, well supplied ships, plentiful stores 
 for the colonists, and all the appliances of wealth and 
 power combined, yet proved ineifectual in their attempts; 
 death removed some of the most zealous and influential 
 patrons, and disappointment waited on every effort. 
 
 But there was one who would not yield, and who, 
 during these disastrous years, with untiring diligence and 
 labor, collected from every source information respecting 
 the geography, climate, productions, and inhabitants of 
 the new world ; and this only suggested bolder views 
 and stimulated him to more comprehensive measures. 
 Next to Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Sir Ferdinando Gorges 
 stands out the most conspicuous in the history of northern 
 colonization. 
 
 1 Stith's Virginia, 43, 77, 81, 82, 101, 149 ; Smith's Description of New Eng- 
 land, 1G16, p. 1; Smith's Virginia, ii. 178, 239. "The destruction of most 
 plantations hath been the base and hasty drawing of profits in the first years." 
 Bacon, " Of Plantations." 
 
 2 " Captain-General, Lieutenant-General, Admiral, High Marshal, General of 
 Horse, were among the ofiices conferred in 1609 ; and the like ambitious titles 
 were given by the Northern Company." Belknap's Amcr. Biog. ii. 99, 154; Stith, 
 101, 137; " Brief Relation " of tiie Council, Mass. Hist. Coll., xix. 21, 23.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 REASONS FOR CREATING A NEW COMPANY THE PLYMOUTH COUNCIL 
 
 INCORPORATED IN 1620 ITS POWERS ITS POLITICAL IMPOR- 
 TANCE PARLIAMENTARY DIFFICULTIES PROPOSED DIVISION OF 
 
 TERRITORY AMONG THE PATENTEES PLAN OF DIVISION PRO- 
 PRIETORS' NAMES ROYAL SANCTION OBTAINED LORD SHEFFEILD'S 
 
 TITLE. 
 
 Differences ^ having arisen between the councils of 
 Northern and Southern Virginia, Sir Ferdinando turned 
 the royal dissatisfaction to the service of the North. Ir- 
 ritated against the London Company, by their election of 
 the Earl of Southampton, as their treasurer, in bold de- 
 fiance of his will, the jealous monarch was not unwilling 
 to promote a rival to the refractory company,- and readily 
 
 ^ See " order in council on tlie difference between tlie Northern and Southern 
 Plantations," June 18, 1621, and another, Sept. 28, 1621, " relative to encroach- 
 ments on the grant to the New England Company," both published in "Docu- 
 ments " of " Colonial History of New York," 1853, toI. iii- pp. 4, 6. 
 
 ^ Nor was his revenge — steadily pursued under the forms of law — consummated 
 until full four years had passed. One of Sir Thomas Wentworth's newsmongers, 
 Mr. Wendesford, wrote to him on the 17th of June, 1624, " Yesterday Virginia pa- 
 tent was overthrown at King's Bench, so an end of that plantation's saving. Me- 
 thinks I imagine the fraternity have before this had a meeting of comfort and 
 consolation, stirring up each other to bear it courageously, and Sir Edwin Sandya 
 in the midst of them, sadly sighing forth, Oh! the burden of Virginia!" Straf- 
 ford Papers, i. 21. Nicholas Ferrar caused a certified copy of the records to be 
 made; Stith says that they hand down " the full conviction of King James' arbitra- 
 ry and oppressive proceedings against the company, and of his having acted with 
 such mean arts and frauds, and such little tricking, as h-ghly misbecoming majes- 
 ty." Hist, of Virginia, vi. vii. The secret of James' hostility was the Spanish 
 jealousy and intrigue, through Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, whose influence 
 over the king was almost absolute. This appears in Peckard's Life of Ferrar, 
 Cambridge, 1791, pp. 85, 8',)- 168, a work indispensable to the history of that 
 company. Read also note 1, p. 101, vol. i. Holmes' Annals.
 
 THE PLYMOUTH COUNCIL, ITS OBJECTS, ETC. 9 
 
 listened to the suggestions of his " trusty and well-beloved 
 servant, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Knight, Captain of our 
 Fort and Island by Plymouth, and by certain, the princi- 
 pal knights and gentlemen adventurers " of the second 
 colony, who had lost much " in seeking to lay the foun- 
 dation of a hopeful plantation," ^ and had also taken ac- 
 tual possession of that territory " to his name and use as 
 Sovereign Lord thereof" They assured him that there 
 were no subjects of any other Christian power having any 
 title or possession in America, between the fortieth and for- 
 ty-eighth degrees of north latitude, and that the country had 
 been recently nearly depopulated by a wonderful plague. 
 " Thankful for the divine favor of this prior discovery 
 and occupancy," and for an opportunity for the " conver- 
 sion of such savages ^ as remained wandering in desolation 
 and distress, to civil society and Christian religion," and 
 probably not less grateful for a plea for enlarging his do- 
 minions, his majesty granted the absolute property of that 
 vast territory, extending from sea to sea, to Gorges and 
 his associates, whom he incorporated under the title of 
 " The council established at Plymouth, in the county of 
 Devon, for the planting, ruling, ordering, and governing 
 of New England, in America." 
 
 The order for the patent was issued by the king in coun- 
 cil, on the third of November, in the year 1620. It was 
 passed under the great seal, on the third of July following, 
 
 ^ The old term for Colonies. Bacon's Essays, " Of Plantations," xxxiii. In the 
 " Tempest," IG23, act 2, scene i., " Plantations of this Isle ; " so used by Milton, 
 about 1650. Prose works, Bohn's edition, 3il, 344, 345, 347, and in the state pa- 
 pers generally. 
 
 ^This was generally assigned in the early charters, as a prominent design; it 
 was in the Virginia charter. The enemies of the Puritans often reproach thera 
 with delay and indiflerence in the work of civilizing and Christianizing the In- 
 dians, but if this were just, which it is not, the charge comes with an ill grace 
 from those who prefer it. What colony out of New England can show an Eliot, 
 a Mayhew, a Brainard, or a Kirkland ? 
 2
 
 10 
 
 VIRGINIA COMPANY. 
 
 and was the only ^ civil basis ^ of all the subsequent pa- 
 tents and plantations which divided this country. 
 
 This charter conferred the usual powers of corporations, 
 and special authority to make laws and ordinances ; to dis- 
 pose of their lands ; to appoint and remove governors and 
 other officers of the plantations ; to establish all manner of 
 order, laws, and directions, instructions, forms, and cere- 
 monies of government and magistracy, not contrary to the 
 laws of England ; to rule all inhabitants of the colony by 
 such laws and ordinances, and, in cases of necessity, ac- 
 cording to the good discretion of their governors and 
 officers respectively, in capital, criminal, or civil cases, as 
 near as conveniently might be agreeably to the laws of 
 England. The charter further gave extraordinary powers 
 as in cases of rebellions and hostile invasions. 
 
 By this movement the infatuated and unwary king 
 opened a new source of complaints against himself, for no 
 sooner had the patent been executed, than the members 
 of the London, or Virginian Company, took various ex- 
 ceptions to it, ^ and their objections were willingly enter- 
 tained by the patriots in both Houses of Parliament, 
 between whom and the king were gathering the contro- 
 versies, which were bequeathed by James to his son 
 Charles — a fatal legacy. 
 
 It is remarkable that, under this charter, the creature 
 of absolutism, and intended as one of its supports, grew 
 up those colonies which were the very nurseries of re- 
 
 * Except De Mont's, from Henry IV. of France, 1G03; Ilaliburtou's Nova Sco- 
 tia, i. 11 -29; Hazard's Hist. Coll. i. 45. 
 
 2 Belknap's Hist, of New Hampshire, ed. 1831, p. 3; Holmes' Annals, i. 164. 
 
 3 The Patent for New England was the first named in the list of " Publick 
 Grievances of the Kingdome." See also the "Declaration" in Mass. Hist. Coll. 
 xis.; Purchas' Pilgrims, iv. 1827-1832; Hazard, i. 390.
 
 MONOPOLIES. OPPOSED BY PARLIAMENT. 11 
 
 ligious and civil liberty, affording refuge and security even 
 to the regicides. ^ 
 
 While the injustice of the king toward the Virginia 
 Company gained for it the popular favor, ^ his rigid en- 
 forcement of the most odious exclusive privileges ^ of the 
 New England Company, was to the latter a prolific source 
 of legal and parliamentary difficulties and popular dislike, 
 seriously embarrassed its proceedings at home, impaired its 
 authority in the colonies, and ultimately led to the sur- 
 render of the royal patent, in the year 1635.^ 
 
 Among the reasons assigned by the council for the 
 resignation of their charter, they said that, " At home 
 they were assaulted with sharp litigious questions before 
 the Lords of his Majesty's most Honorable Privy Coun- 
 cil, by the Virginian Company, and that in the very in- 
 fancy thereof, who finding they could not prevail in that 
 way, they failed not to prosecute the same in the House 
 of Parliament, pretending our said Plantation to be a 
 grievance to the Commonwealth, and for such presented 
 it unto King James of blessed memory, who, although 
 his justice and royal nature could [not] so relish it, but 
 
 ' President Stiles' History of Whalley, Goffe and Dixwell. Hartford, 1794. 
 
 2 Even the king's fivorite Dean of St. Paul's, Dr. John Donne, preached a ser- 
 mon before "the Honorable Company of the Virginian Plantation, 13th Novem- 
 ber, 1G22," commending it to the public favor. This discourse is omitted in the 
 folio collection of his sermons. 
 
 3 As, a monopoly of fishing and curing fish, or of cutting timber and wood for the 
 use of the fishing vessels on the New England shores; but the Virginia Company 
 was not less grasping in its claims; indeed their similar claims furnished an argu- 
 ment for the creation of the N. E. Company. The charter of the Northern Company 
 recites that one of the reasons for its incoi'poration was the " differences between 
 themselves, and those of the said first colony." I suppose this Avas a principal 
 procuring cause of the enactment of the Statute of Monopolies, 21 James, 1623. 
 Gorges' Brief Relation, pp. 11, 12, 14. It is a curious fact, that to exclude all in- 
 truders, the Massachusetts Company voted, July 28, 1629, to solicit the king to 
 renew the proclamation of Nov. 6, 1622, enfoi'cing the monopolies. 
 
 ^ Commons' Journals, 1, 673, 6S8; Gorges' Brief Narration, chap. xvi. in Maine 
 Hist. Coll. ii. 31, 32; Rymer's Feed. xvii. 41G, 490.
 
 12 CONFLICT OF GRANTS. DIVISION OF TERRITORY. 
 
 was otherwise pleased to give his gracious encourage- 
 ment, for prosecution thereof, yet such was the times, 
 as the affections of the multitude were thereby dis- 
 heartened." ^ 
 
 These facts furnish some apology for the loose and im- 
 methodical transactions of the company, and, in a degree, 
 for the confusion and conflict of their grants. This sub- 
 ject has been involved in deep obscurity. Dr. Belknap 
 says, " That either from the jarring interests of the mem- 
 bers, or their indistinct knowledge of the country, or their 
 inattention to business, or some other cause which does 
 not fully appear, their afl'airs were transacted in a con- 
 fused manner from the beginning, and the grants which 
 they made were so inaccurately described, and interfered 
 so much with each other, as to occasion difficulties and 
 controversies, some of which are not yet [1784] ended. 
 
 As the collisions with the Virginia Company, the ele- 
 ments of political discord involved in the granting of this 
 charter, and the direct attacks of the House of Commons, 
 discouraged any considerable action of the council in their 
 corporate capacity, they perhaps sought to avoid this by a 
 division of the territory among the individual members, 
 with all the incidental privileges requisite to the estab- 
 lishment and government of colonies. 
 
 Though the charter created a corporation, one of its 
 provisions seems to have contemplated, at the option of 
 the patentees, a division of the territory " as well among 
 Adventurers as Planters," reserving merely a general su- 
 pervisory authority in the council. They were authorized 
 from time to time, under their common seal, to distribute 
 among themselves or others, the lands " by these presents 
 
 ^ This important pnper is in Hazard's Hist. Coll. i. 390. Compare it with the 
 " Brief Relation," 1G22, in Mass. Jligt. Coll. xix.
 
 POWER OF GOVERNMENT CLAIMED. 13 
 
 formerly granted unto each our loving subjects." This 
 was to be done by the company " upon a commission of 
 survey and distribution executed and returned for that 
 purpose," respect being " had as well to the proportion^ of 
 the adventurers, as to the special service, hazard, exploit, 
 or merit of any person so to be recompensed, advanced, 
 or rewarded." 
 
 Preliminary to a division, they, in the year 1622,^ pub- 
 lished and dedicated to Prince Charles, their proposed 
 " Platform of the government and division of the territo- 
 ries in general." In this they assumed to hold under the 
 royal patent, a relation to the American territory, and 
 proposed colonies, like that of the king to his dominions. 
 Adopting the language of sovereignty, they resolved " that 
 of this our realm, two parts ^ of the whole territory is to 
 be divided between the patentees into several counties, to 
 be by themselves or their friends planted at their pleasure 
 or best commodity." These were to be subdivided into 
 baronies, hundreds, cities or towns, as might be deemed 
 expedient. Their deputies convened in general assembly, 
 by the order of the council, might enact laws, subject to 
 the approval of the council, who were " to give life to the 
 laws so to be made as to those to whom of right it best 
 belongs,"* according to his majesty's royal grant in that 
 
 ^ Some of them agreed, in 1G22, " to disburse a hundred pounds apiece." Mass. 
 Hist. Coll. xix. 13. Four years before, in IGIS, the Virginia Company directed a 
 division of the Somer Isles, — a share to every adventurer. Smith's General His- 
 toric, Book 5, pp. 187, 189. 
 
 * After "almost two years" of disputes -with their enemies. Mass. Hist. Soc. 
 xix. 12. 
 
 3 The other third part " to be reserved for publick uses." Mass Hist. Coll. xix. 
 1,2, 3, 11-15. 
 
 ^ That the Massachusetts Colony "wholly excluded themselves from y<^ publick 
 government of y" council authorized for those affairs and made y" selves a free 
 people, and for such liuM themselves at y" present," was one of the reasons for tlie 
 resignation of the patent, in 1635. Hazard, i. S'JO, 3;I2.
 
 14 PORTIONS AND NAMES OF PROPRIETORS. 
 
 behalf:" and further, these "lords of counties may of 
 themselves subdivide their said counties into manors and 
 lordships, as to them shall seem best." They also de- 
 clared, that cities and inferior towns " shall be incorporate 
 and made bodies politic to govern their affairs and peo- 
 ple." 
 
 The king tacitly approved of this scheme. , Captain 
 John Smith, the first topographer of the New England 
 coast, says in his " Generall Historic," published in the 
 year 1624, that it was " at last engrossed by twenty ^ pat- 
 tentees, that divided my map into twenty parts and cast 
 lots for their shares." It affords curious evidence of the 
 interest felt respecting this country among geographers 
 and men of science, at that early period, that in the 
 fourth volume of Puchas' " Pilgrims," published only a 
 few months afterwards, is a map of New England, repre- 
 senting this distribution of the territory, and showing 
 portions and names of the several proprietors ; a fact 
 creditable to the author's diligence and accuracy. The 
 map, • a fac-simile of a portion of which is here given, 
 suggests, at a glance, their very imperfect knowledge of 
 the country, and how imaginary were the lines of this 
 territorial division. 
 
 The names on the map are in the following order, 
 beginning at the north-east, the abbreviations being omit- 
 ted. 
 
 [Thomas] Earl of Aiiundel, Lord KEErsR, 
 
 Sir Ferdinando Gorges,^ Sir William Belasis, 
 
 Earl of Carlile, Sir Ro. Mansell, 
 
 1 Many of the patentees " quittcil their interests " during the troubles in Par- 
 liament. Gorges, chap. xxi. 
 
 2 Sir Ferdiniindo Gorges' life and services have been commemorated by the lion. 
 George Folsom, in his Discourse before tlie ftlaine Historical Society, Sept. (), 18-16, 
 published in their collections, vol. ii. pp. 3 - 71).
 
 THE KING APPROVES. CHARLES P"^'^ PLAN. 15 
 
 Earl of Holderness, [Robert] Earl of Warwick,^ 
 
 [William] Earl of Pembrock, Duke of Richmond,^ 
 [EDMUND] Lord SHEFFEILD, Mr. [Abram] Jennings, 
 SirHe. Spelman, Dr. [Mathew] Sutcliffe, 
 
 Sir Will. Apsley, [Dean of Exeter,] 
 
 Captain Loue, [Edward] Lord Gorges, 
 
 [George] Duke of Buckingham, Sir Sam. Argall, 
 Dr. Bar. Gooch. 
 
 However liberal, or even extravagant, their interpre- 
 tation of the charter may have been, all exceptions ^ to 
 these proceedings were precluded, when on the third of 
 February, 1624-5, in the presence of King James, the 
 patentees of the council of New England " had their 
 portion assigned unto them by lot, with his Highness' 
 approbation, upon the sea-coast, from east to "west, some 
 eighty and one hundred leagues long.^ " The king died 
 soon after, and his son, Charles I. on the thirteenth of 
 the next May, issued a proclamation"* that, to the end 
 there might be one uniform course of government through 
 all his dominions, the government of the colonies should 
 depend immediately on himself, and not be committed to 
 any company or corporation whatever. Probably this 
 was a plan devised by the high church party, to frustrate 
 
 ' The Earl of Warwick's nephew, Capt. Thomas Cammock, was the founder of 
 the town of Scarborough, Maine. Maine Hist. Coll. iii. 
 
 *lt is not improbable that " Richmond's Island," on the coast of iMaine, derived 
 its name from the Duke of Richmond, who, in virtue of this allotment, may have 
 given a patent, or verbal right of occup.>tion there, and from its narrow bounds, 
 both the grant and the grantor might soon be forgotten, while the island still re- 
 tains the name. 
 
 3 " Then followed y'' claims of y'^ French ambassadour, taking advantage at y'' di- 
 visions made of y" sea coast between o-'selves to whom we made a just and satis- 
 factory answer." Reasons of Resignation, 1635; Gorges' Description of N. E. 
 " Briefe Narration." 
 
 3 Hubbard's Hist, of N. E., Appendix iii., quoted in Harris' full and valuable 
 note. 
 
 < Roger White's Letter to Governor Bradford, Dec. 1, 1025 ; Mass. Hist. Coll. iii.
 
 16 LORD SHEFFEILD's TITLE. 
 
 the success of Puritanism, but his majesty's attention was 
 soon diverted to more important issues. 
 
 The council's transactions being thus ratified by the 
 crown, the several patentees of the territory of New 
 England, became each ^ a lord proprietor of his portion, 
 with an absolute title thereto, clothed with all the powers 
 of government, originally in the king, and by him vested 
 in them. 
 
 Thus was derived the title and authority of Lord Shef- 
 feild, in the exercise of which he issued the charter ^ for 
 Cape Anne,^ under whose authority the colony was found- 
 ed, in the year 1624, which is now expanded into the 
 Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 
 
 ' In the year 1623, Mr. David Tompson occupied " Tompson's Island " in Boston 
 Harbor, but Hubbard says, " he could pretend no other title than a promise or a gift, 
 to be conferred on him, in a letter of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, or some other member 
 of the council." Tompson seems to have been one of the council's ofiicials. See 
 Robert Gorges' Charter of Dec. 30, 1623. 
 
 - A precedent for this was established by Sir AValter Haleigh, who, in 1587, 
 incorporated " the Borough of Virginia," and appointed John White Governor, 
 ■with a council of twelve. Holmes' Annals, i. 104, 105, 
 
 ^ The location and boundaries of the several portions were necessarily vague and 
 contingent. Shefifeild, in addition to his title as patentee, held also by purchase 
 from the company. The Rev. Joseph B. Felt, in 1845, found in the archives of the 
 British Government a volume marked " Journal of Council of Trade," apparently 
 the original record of the council for New England. In it was this entry, *• Nov. 
 27, 1622, Lord Sheffeild and Abram Jennings, £110 each, for their lands in ^iew 
 England," but without any other description. In 1621 and 1622, Mr. Ambrose Jeur 
 nings, of London, and Mr. Abraham Jennings, of Plymouth, employed ships in the 
 fishing business on this coast. I\ew England's Trials, p. 17, in Force's Tracts, 
 vol. ii. ; Sullivan's Maine, 392; George Folsom's History of Saco and Biddeford, 
 lU; Williamson's Maine, i.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 WRIOTHESLEY, EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON, THE PATRON OF BARTHOLO- 
 MEW GOSNOLU GOSNOLD SAILS FOR NORTH VIRGINIA, IN MAY, 
 
 1602 DISCOVERS CAPE ANNE NAMES CAPE COD VISITS MAK- 
 
 THa's VINEYARD — BUILDS A FORT AT ELIZABETH'S ISLAND CAP- 
 TAIN JOHN SMITH VISITS AND NAMES NEW ENGLAND, IN 1614 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS ESTEEMED A PARADISE IT IS VISITED BY THE 
 
 PLYMOUTH COLONISTS SOME OF THE COLONISTS REMOVE TO 
 
 NANTASKET ROGER CONANT BAD CONDUCT AND DISGRACE OF 
 
 LYFORD AND OLDHAM. 
 
 The following information respecting Cape Anne, the 
 birth-place of Massachusetts, has been gleaned from the 
 accounts of the early navigators on the coast of New 
 England, and the manuscripts of the first settlers, which 
 furnish the history of the discovery and occupation of 
 this region by the English. 
 
 The misfortunes of the Virginia planters discouraged 
 for a while any further efforts at colonization, till the 
 spirit of enterprise was revived by the young and accom- 
 plished noble, Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, 
 distinguished as the first to appreciate Shakspeare's ge- 
 nius,^ his " especial friend," and his munificent patron. 
 
 ^ He was scarcely twenty years of age when Shakspeare dedicated to him his 
 " Venus and Adonis." He was liberated and restored on the accession of James 
 the First. He died in the Netherlands, on the lOlh November, 1624, and was 
 buried at Titchfield. Charles Knight's Biography of Shakspeare, 223, 239, 268; 
 riclorial Hist, of England, i. 658, 661, 664; iii. 388j Lodge's Portraits, iii. 158, 
 165; Eapin's Hist, of England, ii. 208. His memory was honored by the authors 
 of the day, whose Poems were collected and published, in 1625, in a volume entitled, 
 The Teares of the Isle of Wight, shed on the Tombe of Henrie, Earle of SOUTH- 
 AMPTON, and James, Lord AVRIOTHESLEY. The volume is now a rarity so 
 highly prized, that it has been sold for upwards of £15. 
 
 3
 
 18 LORD SOUTHAMPTON. BARTHOLOMEW GOSNOLD. 
 
 His character and position at the time, invest this inci- 
 dent with peculiar interest. The companion in arms and 
 in misfortune of the unfortunate Earl of Essex, Lord 
 Southampton, now less than thirty years of age, held his 
 life only by the clemency of Elizabeth. As Selden, 
 Eliot, and Raleigh found in the Tower the leisure of the 
 scholar, philosopher, and historian, so in the solitude of 
 his prison, he enjoyed the resources of a noble mind. 
 Some of the leisure hours of his long imprisonment were 
 beguiled by romantic accounts of the new found world, 
 which the adventures of Columbus, Cabot, Gilbert and 
 Raleigh had brought only within the limits of reality, 
 and whose outlines were almost as dim as those of the 
 ancient Atlantis. Musing on the mysteries of the obscure 
 regions far beyond the usual confines of navigation, 
 where the sun sat in darkness, and inspired with the gran- 
 deur of the discoveries, he generously contributed to, and 
 perhaps originated, an expedition for the new world, there 
 " to discover convenyent place for a new colony." It was 
 placed under the command of Captain Bartholomew Gos- 
 nold, and Captain Bartholomew Gilbert. 
 
 Captain Gosnold, an intrepid and experienced mariner 
 of the West of England, is distinguished in history as 
 the first Englishman who acquired 
 
 " a local habitation and a name " 
 
 within the borders of that territory, years afterwards 
 denominated New England. 
 
 On the 26th of March, 1602, with a company of 
 thirty-two men, consisting of a corps of twelve for dis- 
 covery and observation, twelve to found a colony, and 
 eight mariners, they set sail from Falmouth in a small 
 and frail " bark of Dartmouth, called the Concord." On 
 the l4th of May, after a passage of forty-nine days —
 
 CAPE ANNE, AND CAPE COD DISCOVERED. 19 
 
 the first ever accomplished in a direct course to this part 
 of America — they discovered land, which, from their 
 description, is supposed to have included what was after- 
 wards named Cape Anne, " an out point of woodie 
 ground, the trees whereof were very high and straight." 
 They laid at anchor for a few hours, and were visited 
 by the natives, who, "in bark shallops, came boldly 
 abourd them, aj)parelled with wastcoats and breeches, 
 some of black serdge, some of bleu cloth, made after the 
 sea fashion, with hose and shooes on their feet ; a people 
 tall of stature, broad and grym visaged ; their eye browes 
 paynted white ; and yt seemed by some words and signs 
 which they made, that some barks of St. John de Luz, 
 had fished and traded in this place. But the ship riding 
 here in noe good harborow, and with all the weather 
 doubted, the master stood off againe into the sea south- 
 wardly, and soon after found himself imbayed with a 
 mighty head land, where, coming to an anchor within a 
 league of the shoare. Captain Gosnold commanded the 
 shallop to be turned out, and went ashore, when he 
 perceived this headland to be parcell of the mayne, and 
 sundry islands lying almost round about yt ; w^hereupon, 
 thus satisfied, he repaired abourd againe, where, during 
 the tyme of his absence, which was not above six bowers, 
 he found the ship so furnished with excellent codfish, 
 which they hauled, that they were compelled to through 
 nombers of them overbourd agayne." ^ 
 
 This headland they called Cape Cod, the first name 
 bestowed by an Englishman on any part of the coast, a 
 harbinger of one of the most important interests of the 
 future colonies and states, a History and a Poem in 
 itself. Thus do 
 
 " Coming events cast their sliadows before." 
 
 * Chap. 5, 6, of Strachey's " Ilistorie of Travaile into Virginie," edited by R. H. 
 Major, Esq. London, 1850.
 
 20 Martha's vineyard. — Elizabeth island. 
 
 It is a name, says Mather, which I suppose it will never 
 lose till shoals of codfish be seen swimming on the tops 
 of its highest hills. 
 
 " Plonorable and worthy countrymen," said Captain 
 John Smith,^ "let not the meanness of the word fish 
 distaste you ; for it will afl"ord as good gold as the mines 
 of Guiana or Potassie, with less hazard and charge, and 
 more certainty and facility." 
 
 After doubling the Cape, Captain Gosnold discovered 
 " many faier islands." One he called " Marthse's Viniard, 
 being stored with such an incredible nombre of vynes, as 
 well in the woody parte of the island, where they run 
 upon every tree, as on the outward parts, that they could 
 not goe for treading upon them; the second, full of 
 deare and fowle, and glistering minerall stones, he called 
 by his own name, GosnolFs Island ; the third, about 
 some sixteen miles in compasse, contayning many peeces 
 and necks of land little difi"eringe from several islands, 
 saving that certaine bancks of small breadth, like bridges, 
 seemed to joyne them to this island." ^ And on the 24th 
 of May, they anchored at the north-west of the last 
 named island, which was covered with the stately oak, 
 ash, beech, walnut, cedar, sassafras, and other trees, and 
 a luxuriant growth of grape vines, eglantine, honey- 
 suckle, hawthorn, gooseberry, and raspberry. He named 
 it Elizabeth, in honor of his Queen, but it has ever 
 retained its Indian name of Cutty-Hunk,^ while to the 
 whole group of islands, of which it is a member, belongs 
 
 • In "a perfect description of Virginia," 1649, it is said " that New England is 
 in a good condition for livelyhood, but for matter of any great hopes but fishing, 
 there is not much in that land." 
 
 2 Purchas' Pilgrims, iv. 1(547-1050; Belknap's Am. Biog. Art. "Gosnold;" 
 Bancroft, i. ; Iliklreth, i.; Stith's Virginia, 31. 
 
 3 « A contraction of Poo-cut-oh-hunk-un-noh, wliich signifies a thing that lies 
 out of water." Belknap's Am. Biog. Art. " Gosnold,"
 
 GOSNOLD's plantation. FIRST EXPORTS. 21 
 
 the name suggested by Gosnold's loyalty. On this island, 
 hardly thirty yards from the shore, on the north-^vest 
 side, was a lake of fresh water, abounding in tortoise, 
 and the resort of birds, in the western end of which 
 " was a rocky ilet, contayning neere an acre of ground, 
 full of wood, on which they began a fort and place of 
 abode." They built a punt, or flat-bottomed boat, to 
 pass to and from the islet, and were occupied three weeks 
 or more in building a house there, which they covered 
 with the sedge growing abundantly about the shores of 
 the lake. 
 
 After nearly two centuries, on the 20th day of June, 
 1797, the Rev. Dr. Belknap visited the spot, and had the 
 supreme satisfaction to find the cellar of Gosnold's store- 
 house ; and a half century later, on the 22d of August, 
 1848, the writer^ examined the locality described with 
 minute exactness in the journals of Gosnold's voyage, 
 and the outlines of their works were then distinctly 
 visible. The ship returned to England with a load of 
 sassafras roots, the panacea of the day, which, with furs 
 and other productions of the country, was the first cargo 
 exported from New England. 
 
 The next special notice of Cape Anne is from the 
 travels of the illustrious voyager. Captain John Smith. 
 On the 3d day of March, 1614, he^ sailed from the 
 Downes on a voyage to " North Virginia," and he then 
 gave it the name of New England.^ To him we are 
 
 ' In company -with the Hon. George Folsom, of New York, and F. W. Sawyer, 
 Esq., of Boston. 
 
 * Then thirty-five years of age. 
 
 3 In Thevet's " Singularitez de la France Antarctique," published at Paris in 
 1558, ch. 74, fol. 148, it is said that " Sebastian Habate [Cabot], an Englishman," 
 proposed to Henry VIII. of England, " to go to Peru and America to people the 
 country with new inhabitants, and lo establisk there a J\i"ew Etiglcaid, which he did 
 not accomplish:" quoted in "A Memoir of Sebastian Cabot," 2d ed. London, 
 1832. 8vo. p. 80. The council for the second colony " in the North Partes of
 
 22 smith's map presented to prince CHARLES. 
 
 indebted for the first tolerable outline of our coast. 
 Before sailing, he had collected all the information to be 
 obtained from Gosnold, Weymouth, and the fishermen 
 who had been on the coast ; but it was so imperfect, that 
 he declared it was " even as a coast unknown and undis- 
 covered. I have had six or seven severall plotts of those 
 northern parts, so unlike each to other, and most so 
 differing from any true proportion or resemblance of the 
 country, as they did me no more good than so much 
 waste paper, though they cost me more. It may be it 
 was not my chance to see the best ; but lest others may 
 be deceived as I was, or through dangerous ignorance 
 hazard themselves as I did, I have drawn a map from 
 Point to Point, He to He, and Harbor to Harbor, with 
 the sounding, sands, rocks, and land marks, as I passed 
 close aboard the shore in a little boat." ^ 
 
 Captain Smith presented his map and account of the 
 country to Prince Charles, requesting him "• to change 
 the Barbarous names for such English as Posterity may 
 say Prince Charles was their God-father." The Prince 
 approved the name of " New England," and called " the 
 faire headland" Cape Anne, in honor of his mother, 
 Anne of Denmark, in preference to the less euphonious 
 name of Smith's lady love, Charatza Tragabigzanda, so 
 gallantly remembered by him in his wanderings in the 
 new world. She had become enamored of him while he 
 was a prisoner in Turkey, and through her influence 
 with one of the chief officers of State, the hardships of 
 
 Virginia in America," petitioned li!" Mniesty that their territory " may be called 
 (as by the Prince His Highness it hatli biu uanied) New England, that the 
 boundes thereof may be settled from 40 to 45 degrees of northerly latitude, and soe 
 from sea to sea through the maine as the coast lyeth." The petition, 3 March, 
 1620, is published in " Documents of Colonial History " of New York. 1853. Vol. 
 iii. pp. 2, 3. 
 
 ' Description of New England, 1C24, p. 205.
 
 MASSACHUSETTS THE PARADISE OF NEW ENGLAIMD. 23 
 
 his captivity were much alleviated. The Prince likewise 
 conferred his father's name on Cape Cod,^ but so appro- 
 priate was the latter, that it never yielded even to royal 
 claims. 
 
 Captain Smith published his " Description of New 
 England " — for several years the only guide of voyagers 
 to this coast — in the year 1616, and he^ passed that 
 summer in distributing copies of it among the gentry of 
 the principal towns of Cornwall and Devonshire, the 
 maritime counties of England, in order to excite a new 
 impulse in favor of colonization. 
 
 Of " the coast of Massachusetts " he said, " of all the 
 four parts of the world I have yet^ seen uninhabited, 
 could I have but means to transport a colony, I would 
 rather live here than any where else ; " and in another 
 place he calls " the country of the Massachusetts '' the 
 Paradise of all those parts." Some years later Admiral 
 Levett was on the coast, and found that by common 
 consent " Massachusetts was called the Paradise of New 
 England." 
 
 The Plymouth colonists, " hearing a great fame there- 
 of," early in the next fall after their arrival, dispatched 
 a boat with a company^ of ten men, under Captain 
 Standish, to explore the country, conciliate the natives, 
 
 ^ In 1632 its popular name was Cape Cod. Hist. Doc. New York, iii. 17. New 
 Foundland, discovered by the Portuguese navigator about the year 146;5, was, at 
 first, called Terra de Baccalhaos or land of cod-tish. 
 
 2 Horatio G. Somerby, Esq., has discovered in the Parish Register of AVil- 
 loughby, County of Lincoln, England, the record of Smith's baptism. " 157'j, 
 John, the son of George Smith, was baptized tlie sixth day of January." 
 
 3 A critical examination of Smith's account of this region is in the History of 
 Dorchester, " number one," pp. 1-4, but its strictures must be received with great 
 caution. 
 
 •• The Indians told Roger Williams that " the Massachusetts were called so from 
 the Blue Hills," in Milton ; and the learned llev. John Cotton dehucd it us " an 
 hill in the form of an arrow head." 
 
 * Hubbard, 1U2 ; Prince, 112, 113.
 
 24 NANTASKET. ROGER CONANT. 
 
 and " procure their truck." " They returned with some 
 beaver, a good report of the place, and wishing they had 
 been settled there." Having built " something like a 
 habitation " ^ at Nantasket, they probably trafficked with 
 the natives for their peltry, and became familiar with the 
 coast and its advantageous points. 
 
 Among the London merchants who aided the Ply- 
 mouth colonists, and who were commonly called the 
 "merchant adventurers," were many adherents of the 
 established church, having no sympathy with the Pil- 
 grims, and who viewed the enterprise only as a source 
 of pecuniary profit. They introduced into the colony 
 persons of opinions similar to their own, and of course 
 unfriendly to the Pilgrims. Among them, John Lyford 
 and John Oldham became unhappily conspicuous. 
 
 The Pilgrims were of that section of the Puritans 
 who dissented from the establishment, and were stig- 
 matized as " Separatists." There w^ere in the colony a 
 few Puritans of more moderate views, who resided there 
 for a while, but " out of dislike of their principles of 
 rigid separation," voluntarily withdrew with their fami- 
 lies to Nantasket, where Captain Standish had built a 
 house, in his tour of observation in the month of Sep- 
 tember, 1621. Mr. Roger Conant, the principal person 
 of the company at Nantasket, was " a pious, sober, and 
 prudent gentleman," who had come to New England as 
 early as the fall of the year 1622, or in the next spring. 
 
 As the serious charges against Lyford rest on the 
 eoj parte statements of Bradford and Morton, they may 
 
 1 Hubbard, the authority ou this point, says, that after the dismissal of Oldham 
 and Lyford, "some religious and well afl'ected persons," of whom " Mr Roger 
 Conant was one," "were [had] lately removed out of New Plymouth." He has 
 been erroneously understood as representing others beside Oldham and Lyford, to 
 have been expelled. Hubbard, hi'2, I'M, 116 ; Young's Chrou. of Massachusetts, 
 'S3, note 4.
 
 BAD CONDUCT OF LYFORD AND OLDHAM. 25 
 
 be received with caution ; but as the former wrote of his 
 own personal knowledge, and Morton himself was a 
 youth of about thirteen years of age at the time, and 
 was also a prominent man in the colony, and both w^ere 
 men of known integrity, their positive testimony can be 
 questioned only on the gravest considerations. Hubbard, 
 the historian, passes lightly over the difficulties at Ply- 
 mouth, but Prince^ suggests that "he is sometimes in 
 the dark about the affairs of Plymouth, and especially 
 those which relate to Lyford and Oldham, as also to 
 Mr. Robinson." 
 
 If Bradford's testimony is to be believed, Lyford was 
 the evil genius of New England. He had absconded 
 from Ireland for acts of the vilest criminality ; but before 
 his true character was known, the Episcopal faction of 
 the adventurers in London selected him for the ministry 
 at Plymouth, from hostility to Mr. Robinson, who, with 
 a portion of his church, was yet ^ at Leyden. At New 
 Plymouth, he affected admiration of their order in church 
 and state, and with tears and confessions sought admis- 
 sion to their fellowship, into which he was received. So 
 zealously did he approve their doings, that the Governor 
 advised with him on affairs of importance. Lyford found 
 in the colony a dishonorable person, one John Oldham, 
 described by Governor Bradford as " a private instrument 
 of the factious part of the adventurers in England, 
 whom we had also called to council in our chief affairs 
 without distrust." These congenial fellows at once 
 united in seditious proceedings, endangering the public 
 interests. The very ship which brought Lyford, on her 
 
 » Prince, 146, 148; Morton's Memorial, 53-60; Robinson's Letter, December 20, 
 162o, Works, i. Ivii. 
 
 * Anno 1621, " Master Layford was at the merchant's charJge sent to Plimoth 
 plantation to be their pastor." — New English Canaan. 
 
 4
 
 26 THEIR TREASON EXPOSED. 
 
 return voyage to England in July, carried about twenty 
 letters from him, and some from Oldham, filled with 
 slanders and false accusations of the colonists, tending to 
 their utter subversion and ruin. Soon after, their mutin- 
 ous behavior obliged the Governor to bring them before a 
 court in the presence of the whole company, where their 
 falsehood and guilt were proved by their intercepted 
 correspondence. They were banished the colony. Old- 
 ham returned in the spring of 1625, without leave, and 
 by his violence provoked a second expulsion with peculiar 
 ignominy. 
 
 Bradford's quaint account of it is as follows: He 
 " openly comes, and in so furious a manner reviles us, 
 that even his company are asham'd of his outrage. Upon 
 which we appoint him to pass thro' a Guard of Sol- 
 diers, and every one with a musket to give him a blow 
 on his hinder part, is then conveyed to the water side, 
 where a boat is ready to carry him away," "with this 
 farewell," says Morton,^ " Go and mend your manners." 
 
 " While this is doing, Mr. Winslow and Mr. William 
 Peirse ^ land from England, and bid them spare neither 
 him nor Lyford: for they had play'd the villains with 
 us ; and their Friends in England had the like bickerings 
 with ours there about Lyford's calumnious letters, &c. 
 After many meetings, and much clamour against our 
 agents, for accusing him; the controversy was referred 
 to a further meeting of most of the adventurers to hear 
 and decide the matter. Mr. Lyford's party chose Mr. 
 White, a counsellor at Law ; the other chose the Rev. 
 Mr. Hooker, Moderator ; and many friends on both sides 
 
 ' Morton's Memorial, 58 ; Prince, 153. Running the gauntlet was a statute punish- 
 ment as late as 1676. Plymoutli Colony Laws, p. 179. 
 
 2 Mr. Savage has a note about Peirse, Winthrop, i. 29,3 jq y^lijch add p 110, 
 vol. viii. of the N. E. Hist. Gen. Reg., April, 1854.
 
 LYFORD EXPELLED FROM THE MINISTRY. 27 
 
 coming in, there was a great assembly; in which Mr. 
 Winslow made so surprising a discovery of Lyford's car- 
 riage when minister in Ireland, for which he had been 
 forced to leave that kingdom, and coming to England 
 was unhappily lit on and sent to New Plymouth, as 
 struck all his friends mute, made 'em asham'd to defend 
 him: and the Moderators declared, that as his carriage 
 with us gave us cause enough to do as we did, so this 
 new discovery renders him unmeet to bare the ministry 
 more." ' 
 
 The character and relations of these persons, as here 
 developed, will account for their part in the transactions 
 at Cape Anne, as it appears in the course of the follow- 
 
 ing narrative. 
 
 * Prince, 153.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 I'LYMOUTH COLONY SENDS WINSLOW AS AGENT TO ENGLAND FAME 
 
 OF THE COLONY IN ENGLAND REV. JOHN WHITE OF DORCHESTER. 
 
 LORD SHEFFEILD BECOMES INTERESTED GRANTS A PATENT FOR 
 
 CAPE ANNE COPY OF THE CHARTER CAPE ANNE OCCUPIED 
 
 FAILURE OF EFFORTS AT CAPE ANNE DISAFFECTION OF THE LONDON 
 
 MERCHANT ADVENTURERS LEVETT's ACCOUNT OF PLYMOUTH AND 
 
 CAPE ANNE IN 1624. 
 
 After two years of colonial life and observation, the 
 pilgrims deputed^ Edward Winslow, Esquire, to the 
 merchant adventurers in England, to report the con- 
 ditions and prospects of the colony, and to procure the 
 needed supplies. He sailed from Plymouth in the ship 
 Ann, on the eighteenth of September, 1623 ; and, on his 
 arrival in London, conferred with Mr. Robert Cushman, 
 of whom Governor Bradford says, " He was our right 
 hand with the adventurers, and for divers years managed 
 all our business with them." About this time, and 
 probably through the agency of Winslow and Cushman, 
 and the correspondence of Mr. Roger Conant, before 
 named, the fame of the successful plantation at New 
 Plymouth^ was spread throughout the western parts of 
 England, especially in the counties which Smith had 
 visited a few years before. The Rev. John White, of 
 
 » Ptincc, 1 10. 2 Hubb.inl, lUfi.
 
 CUSHMAN AND WINSLOW INTEREST LORD SHEFFEILD. 29 
 
 Dorchester, loyal to the church, yet distinguished as a 
 Puritan, took a zealous interest in these enterprises, and 
 afterward exerted a most important influence in the 
 colonizing of New England. 
 
 In about sixty or eighty days, supplies were provided 
 for the colony, and preparations made to extend their 
 fisheries and to transport more persons " further to plant 
 at Plymouth, and in other places in New England," 
 especially "in a known place there commonly called 
 Cape Anne." ^ 
 
 Among those whose interest was gained by Cushman 
 and Winslow, the first colonial agents from New England 
 to Old England, was Edward, Lord Sheff'eild, then one of 
 the leading statesmen of England, and a prominent 
 member of the Council for New England. The creation 
 of this company, its corporate powers, the distribution of 
 the territory among its members, and the sanction of this 
 by the king in council, establishing the title and right of 
 government over the various portions, in the several 
 proprietors, as emanating directly from the crown, have 
 been already stated. In the exercise of this delegated 
 authority, Lord Sheff'eild granted the charter which is 
 now presented to the reader. 
 
 It displays a political wisdom, superior to that of 
 Locke, or any theorist, probably the fruit of colonial 
 experience as suggested by Winslow and Cushman. No 
 elaborate system was created. A few concise but com- 
 prehensive sentences, embodied the essentials of a free 
 government. The necessities of society creates laws, 
 suited to its j)osition and character in its primitive con- 
 
 ' " How great a ilifference there is between tlie theoretical and practical part of 
 an enterprise. The Utopian fancy of any projector may easily, in imagination, 
 frame a Hourisliing plantation in such a country as was New England." — Hub- 
 bard, 87.
 
 30 POLITICAL PRIVILEGES OF THE CHARTER. 
 
 dition, few and simple, and in its progress becoming 
 more complicated and minute ; and thus the charter 
 wisely left the polity of the colony, to be developed by 
 and in itself. It establishes, as the basis of the body 
 politic, institutions whose design and legitimate fruits are 
 intelligence and virtue ; it secures to all, by fundamental 
 laws, the opportunity of instruction, and of education in 
 the principles of morality and religion ; and, thus pre- 
 pared for the rights and duties of Christian freemen, it 
 guarantees to them the exercise of those rights and 
 duties in self-legislation, and the election of their own 
 officers and magistrates.
 
 THE CHARTER. 
 
 VU^IB JnUrntlirB ^ade the ffirst day of January Anno Dni 
 1623, And in the Yeares of the Raigne of o"" Soveraigne Lord James 
 by the grace of God King of England fTrance and Ireland Defender of 
 the ffaith &;c the One and Twentyth And of Scotland the Seaven and 
 ffyftyth 33ftiDCene the right honorable Edmond Lord Shefleild Knight 
 of the most noble Order of the Garter on thone part And Robert 
 Cushman and Edward Winslowe for themselves, and theire Associats 
 and Planters at Plymouth in New England in America on thother part. 
 2i2tl^tnCSSCti) that the said Lord Sheffeild (As well in consideracon 
 that the said Robert and Edward and divers of theire Associats haue 
 already adventured themselves in person, and have likewise at theire 
 owne proper Costs and Charges transported dyvers persons into New 
 England aforesaid And for that the said Robert and Edward and their 
 Associats also intend as well to transport more persons as also further 
 to plant at Plymouth aforesaid, and in other places in New England 
 aforesaid As for the better Advancement and furtherance of the said 
 Planters, and encouragement of the said Vndertakers) Hath Gyven, 
 graunted, assigned, allotted, and appointed And by these pnts doth 
 Gyve, graunt, assigne, allott, and appoint vnto and for the said Robert 
 and Edward and their Associats As well a certaine Tract of Ground in 
 New England aforesaid lying in fforty-three Degrees or thereabout of 
 Northerly latitude and in a knowne place there comonly called Cape 
 Anne, Together with the free vse and benefitt as well of the Bay 
 comonly called the Bay of Cape Anne, as also of the Islands within the 
 
 * The council's grant of Massachusetts was by " indenture; " so recited in that 
 of March 4, 1(528-9. The abbreviations and orthograpiiy of the original have 
 been retained as far as tlie modern type will allow. The reader will be enabled to 
 detect any discrepancies, by consulting the fac-similc.
 
 32 " SCHOOLS, CHURCHES, HOSPITALS. 
 
 said Bay And free liberty ,i to ffish, fowle, hawke, and hunt, truck, and 
 trade in the Lands thereabout, and in all other places in New England 
 aforesaid; whereof the said Lord ShefTeild is, or hath byn possessed, 
 or which haue byn allotted to him the said Lord ShefTeild, or within 
 his Jurisdiccon (not nowe being inhabited, or hereafter to be inhabited 
 by any English) Together also with ffyve hundred Acres of free Land 
 adioyning to the said Bay to be ymployed for publig vses, as for the 
 building of aTowne, Scholes,^ Churches, Hospitalls, and for the mayn- 
 tenance of such Ministers, Officers, and Magistrats, as by the said 
 vndertakers, and theire Associats are there already appointed, or which 
 hereafter shall (with theire good liking,^ reside, and inhabitt there And 
 also Thirty Acres of Land, over and beside the ffyve hundred Acres 
 of Land, before menconed To be allotted, and appointed for every 
 perticuler person,^ Young, or old (being the Associats, or servants of 
 the said vndertakers or their successo" that shall come, and dwell at 
 the aforesaid Cape Anne within Seaven^ yeares next after the Date 
 hereof, which Thirty Acres of Lande soe appointed to every person as 
 aforesaid, shall be taken as the same doth lye together vpon the said 
 Bay in one entire place, and not stragling^ in dyvers, or remote 
 parcells not exceeding an English Mile, and a halfe in length on the 
 Waters side of the said Bay "JTciyflUiJ SUtl i))aginfi for ever yearely 
 vnto the said Lord ShefTeild, his heires, successo'% Rent gatherer, or 
 assignes for every Thirty Acres soe to be obteyncd, and possessed by 
 
 ^ This and all the provisions of this charter are carefully conformed to the charter 
 of the Council of New England, and of the "Platform" of 1622. There is a 
 remarkable resemblance between most of the early charters. 
 
 ^ Here is the embryo of New England — schools, churches, hospitals — laws and 
 elections, controlled by the people — to be only " with theire good liking," that is, 
 " a major part of them." The first in order as in importance are the school.s, sup- 
 ported and controlled by the public; not separate, not dissentient, not sectarian, 
 free, open to all, secular ; the benefits and the burdens to be shared alike by all — 
 tliis is necessary to the perpetuity of the rest. " For such as are truly pious, shall 
 find here the opportunity to put in practice the works of piety, both in building of 
 churches, and raising of colleges for the breeding of youth, or maintenance of 
 divines and other learned men." — The Council's " Brief llelation," etc. 1G22. 
 
 3 The germ of a Republic. 
 
 * Every man a landholder. 
 
 * This was the time named in Gilbert's and other charters, within which the 
 patentees must avail themselves of their privileges. 
 
 6 The intent was " the building of a towne," a compact population, thus 
 avoiding many of the evils incidental to a thinly scattered population in a new 
 country.
 
 TENURE. POWERS OF GOVERNMENT. 33 
 
 the said Robert & Edward theire hcircs, successo", or Associats 
 Twelve Pence of lawful! English money At the ffeast of St. Michaell 
 Tharchaungell only (if it be lawfully demaunded) The first payment 
 thereof To begynne ymediatly from and after thend and expiracon of 
 the first Seaven yeares next after the date hereof ^U^ ti)t Stlltf Lord 
 SheflTeild for himself his heires, successo", and assignes doth Covenant, 
 promise, and graunt to and with the said Robert Cushman, and Edward 
 Winslow their heires, associats, and assignes That they the said 
 Robert, and Edward, and such other persons as shall plant, and 
 contract^ with them, shall freely and quyetly, haue, hold, possesse, 
 and enioy All such profitts, rights, previlidges, benefits, Comodities, 
 advantages, and preheminences, as shall hereafter by the labo", search, 
 and diligence of the said Vndertakers their Associats, servants, or 
 Assignes be obteyned, found out, or made within the said Tract of 
 Ground soe graunted vnto them as aforesaid ; Reserving vnto the said 
 Lord Sheffeild his heirs, successors, and assignes The one Moyety of 
 all such Mynes as shall be discovered, or found out at any tyme by the 
 said Vndertakers, or any their heires, successo", or assignes vpon the 
 Grounds aforesaid ^UtT further That it shall and may be lawfuU to 
 and for the said Robert Cushman, and Edward Winslowe their heires, 
 associats, and assignes from tyme to tyme, and at all tymes hereafter 
 soe soone or they or their Assignes haue taken possession, or entred 
 into any of the said Lands To forbyd, repell, repulse and resist by 
 force of Armes^ All and every such persons as shall build, plant, or 
 inhabitt, or which shall offer, or make shew to build, plant, or inhabitt 
 within the Lands soe as aforesaid graunted, without the leave, and 
 licence of the said Robert, and Edward or theire assignes ^Xlti ti)Z 
 SaitJ Lord Sheffeild doth further Covenant, and graunt That vpon a 
 
 1 This as well as other parts of the instrument provide for the admission of new 
 associates, or even of tlie assignment of the charter. The Dorchester Company may 
 have "held" of the Plymouth people in either manner; perhaps the latter mode 
 may be conjectured from the fact that the charter was in the possession of a 
 Massachusetts Governor, the son of a Governor, and principal founder of the 
 State. 
 
 - Under this prerogative of sovereignty Governor Conant would have ample 
 authority to repel the iuvasoin of his territory. See chap. v. This authority is cun- 
 tained in Gilbert's charter, 1578 ; it is also in the royal charter, which authorizes 
 the Colonial Governors " to encounter, expulse, repel and resist by force of 
 arms as well by sea and land " all persons not licensed to inhabit there. Here, as 
 in all the authority granted. Lord Sheffeild has conformed his charter to the 
 language and authority of the royal charter, and no where exceeds it. 
 5
 
 35 POPULAR LEGISLATION. ELECTIVE OFFICERS. 
 
 lawfull survey ^ hadd, and taken of the aforesaid Lands, and good 
 informacon gyven to the said Lord Sheffeild his heires, or assigncs, of 
 the Meats, Bounds, and quantity of Lands which the said Robert, and 
 Edward their heires, associates, or assignes shall take in and be by 
 them their Associats, Servants, or Assigns inhabited as aforesaid ; he 
 the said Lord Sheffeild his heires, or assigns, at and vpon the reason- 
 able request of the said Vndertakers, or theire Associats, shall and will 
 by good and sufficient Assurance in the Lawe Graunt, enfeoffe, confirm 
 and allott vnto the said Robert Cushman and Edward Winslowe theire 
 Associats, and Assigns All and every the said Lands soe to be taken 
 in within the space of Seaven yeares next after the Date hereof in as 
 larg,' ample, and beneficiall manner, as the said Lord Sheffeild his 
 heires, or assignes nowe haue, or hereafter shall have the same Lands, 
 or any of them graunted unto him, or them ; for such rent, and vnder 
 such Covenants, and Provisoes as herein are conteyned (mutatis 
 mutandis) Mtiii shall and will also at all tymes hereafter vpon reason- 
 able request made to him the said Lord Sheffeild his heires, or assignes 
 by the said Edward and Robert their heires, associats, or assignes, or 
 any of them graunt, procure, and make good, lawfull, and sufficient 
 Letters, or other Graunts of Incorporacon^ whereby the said Vnder- 
 takers, and their Associats shall haue liberty and lawfull authority from 
 tyme to tyme to make and establish Lawes, Ordynnces, and Consti- 
 tucons for the ruling, ordering, and governing of such persons as now 
 are resident, or which hereafter shalbe planted, and inhabitt there And 
 in the meane tyme vntill such Graunt be made It shalbe lawfull for the 
 said Robert^ and Edward theire heires, associats and Assignes by 
 consent of the greater part^ of them to Establish such Laws, Provisions 
 
 ' The royal charter, 1G20, provides for " a commission of survey and distri- 
 bution " of the hvnds. 
 
 ^ '* It is likewise provided, that all the cities in that territory, and other inferior 
 towns where tradesmen are in any numbers, sliall be incorporate and made bodies 
 politic, to govern tlieir atfairs and people as it shall be found most behoveful for the 
 public good of the same" — Council's "Platform of the Government." 1622. 
 This is in exact conformity with the ample provisions of tlicir charter. 1620. 
 
 3 " And for that all men by nature are best pleased to be their own carvers, and 
 do most willingly submit to those ordinances, or orders whereof themselves are 
 authors, it is therefore resolved, that the general laws whereby that State is to be 
 governed, shall be tirst framed and agreed upon by the general assembly of the 
 States of those parts, both spiritual and temporal." — Ibid. 
 
 " And there is no less care to be taken for the trade and public commerce of 
 merchants, whose government ought to be within themselves, in respect of the 
 several occasions arising between them, the tradesmen and other the mechauicks.
 
 SUBORDINATION TO THE CROWN AND COUNCIL. 35 
 
 and Ordynncea as are or shalbe by them thought most fitt, and con- 
 venient for the governement of the said plantacon which shall be from 
 tyme to tyme executed, and administred by such Officer, or Officers, 
 as the said Vndertakers, or their Associats or the most part of them 
 shall elect, 1 and make choice of 3|5col)^»J0lJ allvvaies That the said 
 Lavves, Provisions, and Ordynnces which are, or shall be agreed on, 
 be not repugnant to the Lawes of England, or to the Orders, and 
 Constitucons^ of the President and Councell of New England ^CO- 
 tjDtlCtr further That the said Vndertakers theire heires, and suc- 
 cesso"^" shall fore' acknowledg the said Lord Sheffeild his heires and 
 successo", to be theire Chiefe Lord,^ and to answeare and doe service 
 vnto his Lo^P or his Successo", at his, or theire Court when upon his, 
 or theire owne Plantacon The same shalbe established, and kept Kit 
 iUgtnCS whereof the said parties to these present Indentures Inter- 
 chaungeably have putt their Hands and Seals The day and yeares first 
 aboue written. 
 
 SHEFFEYLD. 
 
 i^Seal pendent,^ 
 
 On the back of the parchment is the following attes- 
 tation : " Sealed * and del'd in the presence of John 
 BuLMER, Tho : Belweeld, John Fowller," — an exact 
 copy of which is inserted in the left-hand margin of the 
 fac-simile of the charter. 
 
 The strip of parchment at the foot of the instrument, 
 to which the seal was pendent, yet remains as represented 
 
 with •whom they have most to do, and who are generally the chief inhabitants of 
 great cities and towns in all parts." — Ibid. 
 
 1 Their officers or ministers, whom they employ, and whom they may be bold to 
 question or displace, as to themselves shall seem most fitting." — Ibid. 
 
 • This is a recognition of the Council, as the original source of the title, and as an 
 appellate power, agreeably to the plan of the Council, as published in IG'22. 
 
 '' "These lords of counties may of themselves subdivide their said county into 
 manors and lordships, as to them shall seem best, giving to the lords thereof power of 
 keeping of courts, and leets, as is here used in England," etc. — Ibid. Hi22. 
 
 * All the auciciit legal furuuilaa v/crc here complied with. Blackstone, Book II, 
 chap. 2 ).
 
 36 CAPE ANNE OCCUPIED UNDER THE CHARTER. 
 
 in the fac-simile. By the law and usage of that day the 
 original instrument was executed by the grantor only, 
 which accounts for the omission, on this parchment, of 
 the names of the grantees whose signatures would be 
 affixed to the counterpart remaining in the hands of 
 ShefFeild.1 
 
 Mr. Winslow returned to Plymouth in March, in the 
 ship Charity,^ after an absence of about six months. 
 Among the abundant supplies for the colonists, brought 
 in this ship, were several Devonshire cattle, perhaps the 
 first introduced into New England, unless the colonists 
 in Maine and New Hampshire had imported them. 
 
 To us the most interesting result of Winslow's mission 
 was the charter for Cape Anne, with the new company 
 and materials for the colony there. The ship was soon 
 discharged at Plymouth, and was sent thence to Cape 
 Anne,^ taking a few Plymouth planters to aid in building 
 fishing stages. They erected " a great frame house " for 
 the various purposes of the fishery, and during the sum- 
 mer of the next year made further improvements. 
 
 New Plymouth, in the fourth year of her settlement, 
 having a population of about one hundred and eighty 
 persons, extended the limits of her commercial enterprise, 
 and endeavored to found a new plantation, a scion from 
 the parent colony, a visible aggression of the Anglo 
 Saxon race on American soil ; perhaps the first instance 
 of our territorial expansion — " annexation." 
 
 From this acquisition, so full of promise, Plymouth 
 reaped only bitter disappointments and reverses; their 
 
 » Blackstone, Book II. ch. 20, § 1. 
 
 2 Judge Davis thinks that Winslow and Lyfbrd came in the Ann, though Prince 
 says he came in the Charity. Winslow went to England in the Jinn the 10th of 
 September before. Davis' Morton, 111; Prince, 146, 147. 
 
 3 Prince, 140, 147.
 
 PLYMOUTH AND CAPE ANNE IN 1C24. 37 
 
 agent proved inefficient, the salt works were injured, the 
 house burnt, and a series of difficulties embarrassed the 
 enterprise. The disastrous loss of property sundered the 
 only bond of interest between the Pilgrims and the "mer- 
 chant adventurers " in London, who dissolved their asso- 
 ciation and discontinued their assistance to the Plymouth 
 Colony. But a portion of the members, either with some 
 lingering interest in the settlement, or, more probably, 
 with the hope of retrieving their losses, wrote to the colo- 
 nists, encouraging them that they were " the people that 
 must make a plantation in those remote parts when all 
 others failed,"^ and consigned to them another cargo of 
 goods, but at unreasonable and oppressive prices.^ 
 
 At the very time of these occurrences, the summer of 
 the year 1624, Christopher Levett, Admiral of New Eng- 
 land, was on this coast, and from him we have the obser- 
 vations of a mere looker-on. He says, " neither was I at 
 New Plymouth, but I fear that place is not so good as 
 many others ; for if it were, in my conceit, they would 
 content themselves with it and not seek any other, hav- 
 ing ten times so much ground as would serve ten times 
 so many people as they have now amongst them. But it 
 seems they have no fish to make benefit of, for this year 
 they had one ship fish at Pemoquid and another at Cape 
 Ann, where they have begun a new plantation, but how 
 long it will continue I know not. * * * I fear there 
 hath been too fair a gloss set on Cape Ann. I am told 
 there is a good harbor which makes a fair invitation, but 
 when they are in, their entertainment is not answerable, 
 for there is little good ground,^ and the ships which fished 
 
 1 Prince, 14G, 147, 148 ; Ibid. 133. 
 
 "^ During the earlier years tliese merchants advanced goods at an interest of oO to 
 50 per cent. Holmes' Annals, i. 190, note 1. 
 3 'i"he Gloucester records fix the exact locality of the settlement, and from per-
 
 38 THE FISHING BUSINESS. 
 
 there this year, their boats went twenty miles to take 
 their fish, and yet they were in great fear of [not] making 
 their voyages, as one of the masters confessed unto me 
 who was at my house." ^ The conclusion of this attempt 
 to colonize Cape Anne, and the tracing of the current of 
 events to the establishment of a colony under Mr. Roger 
 Conant, will occupy the next chapter. 
 
 sonal examination, I can testify to the accuracy of Levett's description ; there is a 
 " little good ground " surroumled by barren granite hills, covered with clumps of 
 pine : it is now cultivated as a farm. See Appendix V. 
 1 In Maine Hist. Coll. ii. t)S, 99.
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 PURITANISM IN ENGLAND BISHOP LAKE AND REV. JOHN WHITE FAVOR 
 
 NEW ENGLAND REASONS FOR COLONIZING THE DORCHESTER COM- 
 PANY THEY ESTABLISH A COLONY AT CAPE ANNE TJNDER THE SHEF- 
 
 FEILD CHARTER ROGER CONANT APPOINTED GOVERNOR HOSTILITY 
 
 OF LONDON MERCHANTS THEIR AGENT HEWES MAKES REPRISALS OF 
 
 PLYMOUTH PROPERTY AT CAPE ANNE GOV. CONANT EFFECTS PEACE. 
 
 The Puritan portion of the Church of England, opposed 
 to the court maxim of unUmited power, and to the grow- 
 ing favor to its natural ally — Popery — began to feel the 
 heavy pressure of its discipline. The law was claimed 
 and administered by the court hirelings. The friends of 
 civil and religious liberty were execrated as rebels and 
 traitors, and their cause made the occasion of derision 
 and reproach. 
 
 One of the prelates, Arthur Lake, Bishop of Bath and 
 "Wells, and his friend, the Rev. John "White, before re- 
 ferred to, men of quiet and excellent lives, were of this 
 party. They looked towards New England as a refuge 
 from the impending storms of persecution. The venera- 
 ble dignitary professed to Mr. White, that but for the 
 infirmities of age he would go thither with him.^ 
 
 ^ The fact that a Prelate of the Church of England was one of the earliest friends 
 of New England, has been, I believe, hitherto unnoticed. Hugh Peters' " Lust 
 Legacy to his Daughter." Boston, 1717, p. 77. Bishop Lake was born at South- 
 ampton, sou of Almeric Lake or du Lake, and brother of Sir Thomas, Secretary of
 
 40 REASONS FOR COLONIZING NEW ENGLAND. 
 
 The advantages of a permanent settlement on the coast 
 of New England were early brought to the attention of 
 those engaged in the western fisheries/ but without any 
 effect, for the reason, it may be, that they were the sug- 
 gestions of men of liberal pursuits who would contemplate 
 the ultimate results of colonization, not less than the im- 
 mediate gains of trade. In the year 1585, a " student of 
 the middle temple," Richard Hackluyt, wrote a tract on 
 the subject ; it was urged by Edward Hayes,^ in the year 
 1602, and by Edward Winslow, in a pamphlet, entitled 
 " Good Newes from New England," published in the year 
 1624. He says, "what may the planters expect when 
 once they are seated, and make the most of their salt 
 there, and employ themselves at least eight months in 
 fishing ; whereas the others fish but four, and having 
 their ship lie dead in the harbour all the time, whereas 
 such shipping as belong to plantations may take freight 
 of passengers or cattle thither, and have their lading pro- 
 vided against they come." 
 
 These views commended themselves to Mr. White.^ 
 
 State, elevated to the See of Bath and Wells in 1616, and died in 1626. A thick folio 
 volume of his sermons was published in 1G2'J. Laud was liis immediate successor 
 in his bishopric. Rev. John AVhite, A. M., born at Stanton, St. John, in Oxford- 
 shire, 1576, was Rector of Trinity Church, in Dorchester, 1606 - 1648, with little 
 interruption. The Prelate Laud persecuted him for preaching against popish cere- 
 monies. Prince Rupert plundered his house, and robbed him of his library. He 
 was eminent in the assembly of divines. He died July 21, 1648, aged 72, and lies 
 buried in the porch of St. Peter's Church, Dorchester, but, <proh pudor! without any 
 monumental inscription. •' By his wisdom and ministerial labors," says Fuller, 
 " Dorchester was much enriched with knowledge, piety, and industry." He was 
 called the " Patriarch of Dorchester." Brook's Lives, iii. 89, 90. 
 
 * In 1620, the Virginia Company had expended £6000 on the fisheries at Cape 
 Cod. Stith's Virginia, 185. 
 
 2 In 1620, Captain Richard Whitbourne, of Exmouth, published " A Discourse 
 and Discovery of New-found-land, with many reasons to proove how worthy and 
 beneficiall a Plantation may there be made." A copy of this rare volume is in 
 Charles Deane, Esq. 's Library. 
 
 3 Hubbard, 106.
 
 THE DORCHESTER COMPANY FORMED. 
 
 41 
 
 Some of his parishioners and friends, merchants of that 
 town and the vicinity, had prosecuted the cod fisheries 
 and beaver trade on these shores for several successive 
 years. The fishermen being usually upon their voyages 
 nine or ten months, during which time they were without 
 religious instruction, Mr. White suggested to the mer- 
 chants that it might benefit their own men, as well as 
 others frequenting these coasts, to maintain a minister 
 here. He further suggested that a colony on this coast 
 would facilitate their business by employing many hands 
 during the fishing season, a portion of whom could be left 
 in the country until the next season, and in the mean 
 time might employ themselves in building houses and 
 planting corn, which, with the fish, fowl, and venison, 
 -would afford them abundant occupation and support. 
 Upon these considerations the merchants organized them- 
 selves into a joint stock company, with a capital of more 
 than £3000,^ to be paid in by assessments in the course 
 of five years, appointed John Humphrey,^ brother-in-law 
 of the Earl of Lincoln, their treasurer, and were known as 
 the Dorchester Company. During this time, the honest 
 chronicler. Captain John Smith, w^as preparing his account 
 of " New Plimouth," in which he says, " there hath beene 
 afishing this yeere vpon the Coast, about 50. English 
 ships : and by Cape Anne, there is a Plantation a begin- 
 ning by the Dorchester men, ivhich they hold of those of 
 New Plimoth, who also by them haue set vp a fishing 
 worke ; some talke there is of some other pretended Plan- 
 tations, all whose proceedings the eternal God protect 
 and preserve." ^ 
 
 The Dorchester merchants, in their fishing business, 
 
 ' Planters' Plea, chap 7, 8. 
 
 « HuhbarJ, lOli. 
 
 3 -'Gciicrall Historic," 247 ; Prince, 151. 
 
 6
 
 42 CAPE ANNE " HELD OF THOSE OF NEW rLYMOUTH." 
 
 may or may not previously have had stages on Cape Ann, 
 but this their first attempt to plant or colonize, coincident 
 in time and place with the Plymouth " patent " and plan- 
 tation, corroborates beyond any reasonable doubt. Captain 
 Smith's accuracy, that they " held of those of New Ply- 
 mouth," whose charter, as we have seen, authorized the 
 residence at Cape Anne of any planters, being the " asso- 
 ciates " of the patentees, " or their successors," and of any 
 ministers, officers, or magistrates, whom the patentees 
 might approve of. 
 
 The Plymouth planters being in possession of Cape 
 Anne, under a legal title, would admit to its occupa- 
 tion only those who acknowledged their right ; and 
 this affords a legal presumption that any others in the 
 peaceable enjoyment of its privileges, were so by agree- 
 ment with them under their charter, for it seems to 
 have been drawn with the most liberal views as to the 
 admission of future parties to its benefits. 
 
 The statement of Captain Smith that the Dorchester 
 Company " held of those of New Plymouth," is made 
 in the folio edition of his General History, first pub- 
 lished in 1624 ; it is under the head of " the present estate 
 of the plantation at New Plimoth, 1624," which occu- 
 pies less than a page and a half on the last leaf of 
 his book — and this information he doubtless obtained 
 in England, the very latest accounts he could collect 
 before sending his concluding sheet to the press ; to 
 this it may be added, that the author s personal knowl- 
 edge of New England, and his prominence and zeal in 
 promoting colonial enterprises, involved an intimacy 
 with the leading adventurers and colonists, which pre- 
 cludes doubt of the responsible source of his information.^ 
 
 ' The learned and discriminating historian of Virginia, Stith, whose judgment of 
 Smith is valuable beyond that of any other writer, says lie is of " unquestionable
 
 COLONY ESTABLISHED AT CAPE ANNE. 43 
 
 The history of this, the first permanent colony on the 
 territory, afterwards included in the Massachusetts 
 grant, is for the first two or three years, drawn chief- 
 ly from Hubbard, who, without doubt, obtained his 
 knowledge from Governor Conant's own lips. 
 
 Having concluded the agreement with the Plymouth 
 colonists, the Dorchester Company adopted immediate 
 and efficient measures for the establishment of a plan- 
 tation. A company of husbandmen was sent to Cape 
 Anne, well furnished with the implements of farming, 
 and supplies for the new settlement. They selected 
 the lands within the bosom of the Cape,^ the site of 
 the present town of Gloucester. The spring and sum- 
 mer of the year 1624 were diligently employed in prepa- 
 ration for those who should pass the next winter there, 
 fourteen in number.^ The plantation was stocked wdtli 
 cattle, a house was built, salt works, stagings, and the 
 structures usually pertaining to the fisheries were erect- 
 ed. 
 
 They appointed Mr. Thomas Gardner overseer of the 
 plantation, and Mr. John Tylly to manage the fisheries. 
 Mr. John AVoodbery, of Somersetshire, was also one of 
 the principal men of the settlement. About the close 
 of the first year,^ Mr. White received such favorable 
 information about Mr. Roger Conant,^ named in the 
 
 authority for what is related while in the country, and I take him to have been a 
 very honest man, and a strenuous lover of truth." Stith's Virginia. Williams- 
 burg, 1747. Preface, iv. 
 
 ' Gorges. 
 
 " Planters' Plea, oh. 7, 8. 
 
 3 Hubbard, 106. Hutchinson says t'lat Conant left Cape Anne in the fall of 
 1626 ; the Planters' Plea says, the Planters " stood us in two years and a halfe in 
 well nigh a thousand pounds,'' wliiuh would make their occupation to have begun 
 early iu 1624. 
 
 ■' Then about 33 years of age ; born lo'Jl, died Nov. 19, 1679. See his Dcpo- 
 eition published by Rev. J. B. Felt in the New England Hist. Gen. Ilcg Ib-iS 
 p. 333.
 
 44 ROGER CONANT CHOSEN GOVERNOR. 
 
 previous narative, that he and the rest of the adventur- 
 ers were so well assured of Mr. Conant's qualifications, 
 that they decided to employ him " for the managing and 
 government of all their affairs at Cape Anne ; " and Mr. 
 White " was so well satisfied therein, that he engaged 
 Mr. Humphrey, the treasurer of the joint adventurers, to 
 write to him in their names, and to signify that they had 
 chosen him to he their governor in that placed and would 
 commit unto him the charge of all their afiairs, as well 
 fishhig as planting." They also invited Mr. Lyford to 
 be the minister of the new colony, and Oldham to trade 
 for them with the Indians. At that time they dwelt at 
 Nantasket. Lyford accepted, and went to Cape Anne 
 with Governor Conant, but Oldham preferred " to stay 
 where he was, for a while, and trade for himself, and 
 not become liable to give an account of his gain or 
 loss." 
 
 Of this, Prince says, " it seems as if the Rev. Mr. 
 "White and the Dorchester gentlemen had been imposed 
 upon with respect to Lyford and Oldham, and had sent 
 invitations to them before the discovery " of their wick- 
 edness. 
 
 Governor Conant may have allowed Lyford's presence 
 at Cape Anne, from commiseration for his family, or 
 upon his repentance. The only occurrence of note 
 during Governor Conant's administration at Cape Anne 
 was the case of the aggression on the property of the 
 Plymouth planters, wherein he displayed a moderation 
 
 ' The charter expressly authorizes civil officers, and the maintenance of a minis- 
 ter and there can be no reasonable doubt that these appointments were under its 
 provisions. In point of prudence and interest, the Dorchester merchants would 
 avail themselves of all the charter privileges, and nothing appearing to the contrary, 
 there can be no reasonable doubt that the appointments of the various officers were 
 made by virtue of the charter. Sec also the " Declaration," in Mass. Hist. 
 Coll. xix.
 
 A SHARP CONTEST AT CAPE ANNE. 45 
 
 and address appropriate to his position. Some of the 
 " adventurers," who had deserted the colonial interests, 
 sent " one Hewes," to make reprisal of the Plymouth 
 possessions at the Cape. This was probably done at 
 the suggestion of those bad men, Lyford and Oldham. 
 
 Hubbard represents this incident with much humor, 
 at the expense of the Plymouth people: but Prince's 
 suggestion that he was " sometimes in the dark about 
 the affairs of Plymouth, and especially those which 
 relate to Lyford and Oldham," in connection with the 
 preceding relation, will be a caveat to the reader. 
 
 His account contains incidentally some interesting 
 details, and shows that they were inclined to a literal 
 interpretation of that clause of their patent, which 
 authorized them " to forbyd, repell, and repulse by 
 force of armes," all intruders on their territory. The 
 story runs thus : " In one of the fishing voyages 
 about the year 1625, under the charge and command 
 of one Mr. Hewes, employed by some of the west 
 country merchants, there arose a sharp contest between 
 the said Hewes and the people of New Plymouth, about 
 a fishing stage, built the year before about Cape Anne 
 by Plymouth men, but was now, in the absence of the 
 builders, made use of by Mr. Hewes' company, which 
 the other, under the conduct of Captain Standish, very 
 eagerly and peremptorily demanded : for the company of 
 New Plymouth, having themselves obtained a useless 
 patent^ for Cape Anne, about the year 1623, sent some 
 of the ships, which their adventurers employed to trans- 
 port passengers over to them, to make fish there ; for 
 which end they had built a stage there, in the year 1624. 
 
 ^ Prince, p. 153, note 41. 
 
 2" Useless," not from want of authority in the patent, but the unfitness of the 
 territory for a colony.
 
 46 CAPTAIN STANDISH. GOV. CONANT's PRUDENCE. 
 
 The dispute grew to be very hot, and high words passed 
 between them which might have ended in blows, if not 
 in blood and slaughter, had not the prudence and mod- 
 eration of Roger Conant, at that time there present, 
 and Mr. Peirse's ^ interposition, that lay just by with his 
 ship, timely prevented. For Mr. Hewes had barricadoed 
 his company with hogsheads on the stage head, while 
 the demandants stood upon land, and might easily have 
 been cut off; but the ship's crew, by advice, promising 
 to help them to build another, the difference was thereby 
 ended. Captain Standish ^ had been bred a soldier in 
 the Low Countries, and never entered the school of our 
 Saviour Christ, or of John Baptist, his harbinger, or, if 
 he was ever there, had forgot his first lessons, to oifer 
 violence to no man, and to part with the cloak rather 
 than needlessly contend for the coat, though taken away 
 without order. A little chimney is soon fired; so was 
 the Plymouth Captain, a man of very little stature, yet 
 of a very hot and angry temper. The fire of his passion 
 soon kindled and blown up into a flame by hot words, 
 might easily have consumed all, had it not been season- 
 ably quenched." 
 
 As the Plymouth colonists and the Dorchester adven- 
 turers had, under the patent, a unity of interests, touching 
 all intruders,^ and Mr. Peirse was their tried friend. Cap- 
 tain Standish could with propriety listen to their advice. 
 He demanded the possession of the property of his 
 government, withheld without right, or the pretence of 
 
 * The influence of Mr. Wm. Peirse should not be overlooked ; he had been a firm 
 friend to the planters — had aided in detecting the treachery of Lyford and Old- 
 ham, and his advice would have great weight with Standish. Prince, 149, 153 ; 
 Hubbard, 110, 111. 
 
 ^ Kliot has a good notice of Standish. Biog. Diet. 
 
 3 " To forbyd, repcU, repulse and resist by force of armes," was authorized by 
 the charter.
 
 CAPTAIN STANDISH JUSTIFIED. 47 
 
 right, and wrested from them, doubtless, by the machi 
 nations of Lyford. These circumstances, and the charac- 
 ter of the actors, might well disturb milder tempers than 
 that of Standish, and he deserved praise rather than 
 Hubbard's censure, for his Christian endurance, forbear- 
 ing even a blow under such an outrage. He had the 
 approval of Bradford, who says they " refused to restore 
 it without fighting, upon which we let them keep it, and 
 our Governor sends some planters to help the fishermen 
 build another." ^ 
 
 ' Prince, 15-1.
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 REVERSES AT CA^E ANNE LOSSES THE MERCHANTS ABANDON THE 
 
 COLONY THE COLONY PURGED OF ITS WORTHLESS MEMBERS 
 
 GOV. CONANT PREVENTS ITS DISSOLUTION THE COLONY REMOVED 
 
 TO NAUMKEAG INDIAN HOSPITALITY GOV. CONANt's FIRMNESS 
 
 SAVES THE COLONY JOHN WOODBERY SENT AS AGENT TO ENG- 
 LAND. 
 
 One who had witnessed several unfortunate attempts 
 to establish plantations on this coast, enumerated as one 
 of " three things " which were " the overthrow and 
 bane " of these enterprises, " the carelessness of those 
 that send over supplies of men unto them, not caring 
 how they be qualified," and he besought " such as had 
 the care of transporting for the supply and furnishing of 
 plantations, to be truly careful in sending such as might 
 further and not hinder so good an action." ^ 
 
 Lord Bacon, in his essay on "plantations" says that " it 
 is a shameful and unblessed thing to take the scum to be 
 the people with whom you plant ; and not only so, but it 
 spoileth the plantation ; for they will ever live like rogues 
 and not fall to work, but be lazy and do mischief, and 
 spend victuals, and he quickly weary ^ and then certify over 
 to their country to the discredit of the plantation ; " and 
 this was verified in less than fifty years after it was writ- 
 
 ' W'inslow's " Good Newcs," 1G24.
 
 CAUSES OF DISASTER AT CAPE ANNE. 49 
 
 ten, in the colony at Cape Anne. The " Planters' Plea " 
 itself complains that " the ill carriage of our men at 
 land," in two years and a half had cost " well nigh one 
 thousand pounds charge, and never yielded one hundred 
 pounds profit." 
 
 Governor Conant found it difficult to repress insubor- 
 dination among the ill-chosen men sent to Cape Anne. 
 They "fell into many disorders and did the company 
 little service," which, added to the losses by fishing and 
 the great depreciation in the value of their shipping, " so 
 far discouraged the adventurers, that they abandoned the 
 further prosecution of the design, and took order for the 
 dissolving of the company on land, and sold away the 
 shipping and other provisions." 
 
 There is no discrepancy in the narratives of Hubbard, 
 on the autliority of Conant and some of his associates, 
 and of White in the " Planters' Plea," though each fur- 
 nishes details omitted by the other. White dwells upon 
 the results as affecting the pecuniary interests of the 
 parties in England, while Hubbard relates the social in- 
 cidents in the colony, so that both are necessary to the 
 completeness of the history. The one knew the history 
 of the causes, whose effects only interest the other. 
 
 The former says the " land-men were ill commanded," 
 but the only facts which we have are in Hubbard, and 
 they reflect great credit on Conant's administrative talent 
 and his public spirit. 
 
 The adventurers in England honorably paid the wages 
 of the planters whom they had employed at Cape Anne, 
 and offered them a passage home if they desired to re- 
 turn, which was accepted by the ill-behaved, thriftless or 
 weak-minded portion, at once relieving the infant colony 
 of the incubus of misrule and waste, so depressing to 
 all its interests. Thus happily freed from the drones and 
 7
 
 50 THE COLONY RELIEVED OF ITS BURDEN. 
 
 scum of their society, the colony, though greatly lessen- 
 ed in numbers, yet really gained in strength, and now 
 consisted only of the honest and industrious, who were 
 resolved to remain faithful to the great object. 
 
 The author of the " Planters' Plea " indulges in reflec- 
 tions appropriate to this stage of the history, when the 
 location of the colony was about to be changed, and 
 Cape Anne, the scene of the first act in the history of Mas- 
 sachusetts, was about to be abandoned. " Experience," 
 he saith, "hath taught us that in building houses the 
 first stones of the foundation are buried underground and 
 are not seen, so in planting colonies the first stocks em- 
 ployed that way are consumed, although they serve for a 
 foundation to the work." 
 
 The abandonment of the colony by the " adventurers " 
 in England, involved merely a withdrawal of any further 
 pecuniary aid to the planters, and a relinquishment of 
 such interests as they may have had in the charter. 
 Whenever, by non-fulfilment of its conditions, that be- 
 came void, the colonists would still possess all the rights, 
 assured by the common law to every Englishman. " Had 
 they emigrated with the consent of the state, but without 
 a charter, they would have been fully entitled to enjoy 
 their former immunities, as completely as they could ex- 
 ercise them where they freely placed themselves." ^ The 
 colonists were, from that date, free of any obligation or 
 control of the adventurers. The trials, temptations, and 
 hardships at Cape Anne, had purged the company of all 
 but a brave and resolute few. With these faithful com- 
 panions, Governor Conant, " as one inspired by some su- 
 perior instinct," frustrated the ^' order for the dissolving 
 of the company on land," and secured to it the honor of 
 
 * Chalmer's Political Annals, i. 14L
 
 DESIGNED AS A REFUGE FROM RELIGIOUS OPPRESSION. 51 
 
 being the first permanent colony on the soil of the Mas- 
 sachusetts Company. 
 
 Cape Anne had been chosen as the seat of the colony, 
 for its supposed combination of facilities for both fishing 
 and planting ; but Governor Conant, not finding it adapt- 
 ed to the wants of a plantation, had in the meanwhile ^ 
 inquired respecting, and perhaps visited, a more commo- 
 dious place four or five leagues distant to the south-west, 
 on the other side of a creek called Nahum-keike,^ or 
 Naumkeag, better adapted to the purpose. 
 
 Hubbard says that Conant, " secretly conceiving in his 
 mind, that in following times (as hath since fallen out) it 
 might prove a receptacle for such, as upon the account of 
 religion, would be willing to begin a foreign plantation in 
 this part of the world, he gave some intimation of it to 
 his friends in England. Wherefore that Reverend person, 
 Mr. White, (under God, one of the chief founders of the 
 Massachusetts colony in New England,) being grieved in 
 his spirit that so good a work should be sufiered to fall to 
 the ground by the adventurers thus abruptly breaking off", 
 did write to Mr. Conant not so to desert the business, faith- 
 fully promising that if himself,^ with three others, (whom 
 he knew to be honest and prudent men, viz. John Wood- 
 bery, John Balch, and Peter Palfreys, employed by the 
 adventurers,) would stay at Naumkeag, and give timely 
 notice thereof, he would provide a patent for them, and 
 likewise send them whatever they should write for, either 
 men or provision, or goods wherewith to trade with the 
 
 1 Hubbard, 108. 
 
 ^ JVaumkeag retained its Indian name until about Jul}', 1020, -when it was called 
 Salem. As this is tlie history of events prior to that period, the aboriginal title 
 will be used. Rev. John Higginson's Letter. 
 
 3 The whole negotiation contemplates Governor Conant's remaining at the hrad 
 of the colony.
 
 52 REMOVAL TO NAUMKEAG. THE COMPACT. 
 
 Indians. Answer was returned that they would all stay 
 on those terms/ entreating that they might be encouraged 
 accordingly." On the faith of this engagement, Governor 
 Conant and his associates, in the fall of the year 1626, 
 removed to Naumkeag, and there erected houses, cleared 
 the forests, and prepared the ground for the cultivation of 
 maize, tobacco,^ and the products congenial to the soil. 
 In after years, one of the planters in his story of the first 
 days of the colony, said, " when we settled, the Indians 
 never then molested us, * * * but shewed themselves 
 very glad of our company and came and planted by us, 
 and often times came to us for shelter, saying they were 
 afraid of their enemy Indians up in the country, and we 
 did shelter them when they fled to us, and we had their 
 free leave to build and plant where we have taken up 
 lands." ^ The curious inquirer may be guided to the 
 exact locality, the tongue of land which they first occu- 
 pied at Salem. 
 
 " Yet it seems," Hubbard continues, " before they re- 
 ceived any return, according to their desires, the three 
 last mentioned began to recoil, and repenting of their en- 
 gagement to stay at Naumkeag, for fear of the Indians 
 and other inconveniences, resolved rather to go all to 
 Virginia ; especially because Mr. Lyford, their minister, 
 upon a loving invitation, was thither bound. But Mr. 
 Conant, though never so earnestly pressed to go along 
 with them, peremptorily declared his mind to wait the 
 providence of God in that place where now they were, 
 
 * How far these terms were complied with, will appear presently. 
 
 ^ " Tobacco may there be planted, but not with that profit as in some other places; 
 neither were it profitable there to follow it though the increase were equal, because 
 fish is a better and richer commodity," to be had in "great abundance." Wins- 
 lowe's " Good Newes." 1624. 
 
 a Felfs Salem, i. 46, 78, 101.
 
 GOVERNOR CON ant's FIRMNESS AND FAITH. 53 
 
 yea, though all the rest should forsake him : not doubt- 
 hig, as he said, but if they departed, he should soon 
 see more company." The other three, observing his con- 
 fident resolution, at last concurred with him, and soon 
 after sent John Woodbery to England, to procure neces- 
 saries for a plantation. At this period, as Dr. Cotton 
 Mather accurately observes, " the design for awhile al- 
 most fell unto the ground." 
 
 Mr. Hubbard's idea that Governor Conant was " as 
 one inspired by some superior instinct," seems to be the 
 only just view of his course at this crisis. " Like Abra- 
 ham when he was called to go out into a place, which he 
 should after receive for an inheritance," so " he sojourned 
 in the land of promise, in a strange country." He seems 
 to have felt that it was God's own plantation.^ With the 
 eye of faith he saw that the " little one should become a 
 thousand, and the small one a strong nation, and that the 
 Lord would hasten it in his time," when he so " peremp- 
 torily declared his mind to wait the providence of God in 
 that place where they now were, yea, though all the rest 
 should forsake him, not doubting but if they departed he 
 should soon have more company." ^ 
 
 ^ •• It is the sinfiillest thing in the world to forsake or desert a plantation once in 
 forwardness." Bacon. 
 
 - He was worthy of the elegant compliment of Dr. Pridcaux, of Exeter College, to 
 Dr. John Conant, while a student at Oxford — his namesake, and kindred in char- 
 acter as well as in blood, — " Conanti nihil difficile." This eminent Divine was 
 also of Devonshire, of an ancient family ; but probably not the one known to White, 
 as in 1623-4, he was but a youth of sixteen years, under the care of his uncle, Rev. 
 John Conant, who had a living at Lymington, in Somersetsliire. Middleton's Biog. 
 Evan. iv. C4 ; Biog. Diet. Lond. IT'Jb, iii. 186 ; Noucomfurmist's Mem, i. 2i!'J.
 
 CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 THE COLONY IN 1627 GOV. CONANt's CHARACTER AND SERVICES — ■* 
 
 WOODBERy's MISSION TO ENGLAND FINDS MEMBERS OF THE OLD 
 
 DORCHESTER C03IPANY A NEW COMPANY ORGANIZED A PATENT 
 
 OBTAINED THOMAS DUDLEY, ESQ. AND HIS FRIENDS BECOME INTER- 
 ESTED THE COMPANY HAD NO DEFINITE NAME HUMBLE BEGIN- 
 NING OF THE STATE RECORDS WOODBERY's RETURN TO THE COL- 
 ONY CHARACTER OF THE COMPANY IN ENGLAND JOHN ENDECOTT 
 
 ARRIVES AT SALEM AND SUPERSEDES CONANT NEW IMPULSE TO 
 
 COLONIZATION. 
 
 Such was Massachusetts in the year 1627 ; how hum- 
 ble, of how little moment can be its failure or success ! 
 Yet in the eye of history, beholding the vast results 
 emanating from this mere speck on the stream of time, it 
 is surrounded with a kind of moral grandeur, a sublimity, 
 that never elevated thrones, nor pertained to conquests. 
 
 Governor Conant, in his dignity, independence, recti- 
 tude, and trust in God, here shadowed forth the character 
 and future of New England as developed in and to her 
 children ; and it is pleasant to know that he lived to see 
 the hamlet expand into the most important colony ^ on 
 the American coast. 
 
 This was a sufficient, yet his only reward. In the 
 
 ^ The term " colonies " was retained in the Declaration of Independence, July 
 4th, 177G, and in use until the " people of the United States" established the Con- 
 slitulio/i. Miissachusetts was called a " Province " in the charter of 1(392.
 
 CONANT's RETROSrECT. WOODBERY, AGENT TO ENGLAND. 65 
 
 pride of strength and prosperity, he who had laid the 
 foundation of the state, and whose Christian faith and 
 courage had saved it in the hour of peril, was left in 
 neglect and obscurity. 
 
 Nearly half a century later, the venerable man, in the 
 evening of his life, thinking, perhaps, that posterity 
 might award to him the justice withheld in his life time, 
 drew up a memorial to the legislature, being, as he said, 
 " one of the first, if not the very first, that resolved and 
 made good any settlement, under God, in matter of plan- 
 tation, with my family in this collony of the Massachu- 
 setts bay, and have been instrumental both for founding 
 and carrying on the same, and when in the infancy there- 
 of it ivas in great hassard ofheing deserted^ I was a means^ 
 through grace assisting me, to stop the jiight of those feiv 
 that were heere with me, and that by my utter deniall to goe 
 away with them, who would have gone either for England, 
 or mostly for Virginia, hut thereon stayed to the hassard of 
 our lives" 
 
 After a residence in the country of about three years, 
 Mr. Woodbery, being familiar with their condition and 
 prospects, and possessing their confidence, was, as before- 
 named, deputed as their agent to England, with the im- 
 portant trust of perfecting the arrangements, on condition 
 of which, the colony was removed^ to Naumkeag, as 
 stated in the correspondence between Governor Conant 
 and the Reverend John White. 
 
 In the winter of the year 1621, Mr. Woodbery de- 
 parted on his mission, and, it will be inferred, on his 
 
 * I infer from Hubbard's account that Conant, having " made some inquiries " 
 about Naumkeak, proposed, on certain conditions named in the letter, " to liis 
 friends in England," to remove thither ; that in anticipution vf their accep1ance,\\e 
 did remove, and while there received White's letter, agreeing to the proposal : so 
 that the couditions were precedent to the removal. Hubbard's Hist, of N. E. 1U7, 
 lOd.
 
 56 PROCEEDINGS IN ENGLAND. THOMAS DUDLEY. 
 
 arrival in England, at once sought out Mr. White, and 
 disclosed to him the object of his \dsit. 
 
 They exerted themselves diligently in behalf of the 
 colonists to supply their present necessities, and to pro- 
 cure a patent for the territory, additions to their numbers, 
 and whatever pertained to the permanence of a colony 
 on the wild shores of the New World. It was found 
 that some members of the Dorchester Company " still 
 continued their desire to set forward the plantation of a 
 colony there,^ conceiving that if some more cattle were 
 sent over to those few men left behind, they might not 
 only be the means of the comfortable subsisting of such 
 as were already in the country, but of inviting some 
 other of their friends and acquaintances to come over 
 to them, and adventured to send over twelve kine and 
 bulls more ; and conferring casually with some gentle- 
 men of London, moved them to add unto them as 
 many more." 
 
 Among these gentlemen, WTre Sir Henry Eos well 
 and Sir John Young, Thomas Southcoat, John Hum- 
 phrey — whom we knew as treasurer of the old Dorchester 
 company — John Endecott and Simon Whetcomb, " who 
 presenting the names of honest and religious men, easily 
 obtained their first desires " of the council for New Eng- 
 land, who granted them about the end of the parliament 
 of the iii ^ of Charles First, on the nineteenth of March, 
 162^, "a patent of some lands in the Massachusetts 
 Bay." 
 
 About a year previous, Thomas Dudley, Esquire, and 
 some of his friends " being together,^ in Lincolnshire, 
 
 I Planters' Plea. 
 
 -" About the year 1627." — Dudley's Letter. Hubbard states this " not long 
 after" the Council's grant, which would be iu the year 1G28. Dudley is the best 
 authority.
 
 "the NEW ENGLAND COMPANY." A NEW CHARTER. 57 
 
 fell into some discourse about New England, and the 
 planting of the gospel there." They corresponded with 
 gentlemen in London, and members of the Dorchester 
 Company ; after some negotiation, these parties combined 
 their interests, and purchased all the Dorchester interests 
 and improvements in New England, including their pa- 
 tent from the council. Whether that instrument desig- 
 nated the grantees by any special name or title is 
 unknown ; ^ they styled themselves in official documents, 
 " The New England Company." Cape Anne was includ- 
 ed in this grant which superseded the patent from Lord 
 Sheffeild, that being void and " useless," ^ by non-fulfil- 
 ment of its conditions, and the land abandoned as un- 
 suitable to the design. These gentlemen adopted efficient 
 measures to strengthen the first settlement at Naumkeag, 
 and to establish another at Massachusetts, distant about 
 fifteen miles to the south-west. They purchased large 
 stores of apparel, provisions and arms. In a memoran- 
 dum of what they were " to provide to send for New 
 England," were mentioned, first "ministers," then the 
 " patent under seal, men skillful in making of pitch, of 
 salt, vine planters," culinary utensils, and seeds of a 
 variety of grains, fruits and vegetables. 
 
 » Previous to the fourth of March, 1629, they had no uniform designation. "Tho 
 Company of Adventurers for New England in America," " The Adventurers for 
 Plantacon intended att Massachusetts Bay in New England," '• The Company in 
 New England," " The New England Company," and other appellations were used. 
 If regard be had to 7iames ratlier than facts, it may safely be questioned whether 
 the colonial records, prior to the fourth of March, 1628, should be called the "Mas- 
 sachusetts Records ; " but this would be frivolous. Under all these phases and 
 names, we trace the history of one and the same colony, which in and after the 
 sixth year of its settlement, and by its second charter, was designated " Massa- 
 chusetts." The oath of Gov. Endecott was to maintain " the government and 
 company," etc. ; that of his council to maintain " the Crmmonwtalth and Corpo- 
 racon of the Governor and Company," etc. Felt, i. 51'1, 515. 
 
 2 Hubbard, 110.
 
 68 MASSACHUSETTS RECORD. WOODBERY's RETURN. 
 
 Such was the commencement of the records of the 
 State. They were begun by a few " honest and religious 
 men," meeting in an humble dwelling, in an obscure 
 street in London, to devise means of assistance to the 
 colony — the handfull of " planters " on the shore of 
 New England ; the next entries on its pages were of the 
 doings in the cabin of an emigrant ship, at anchor in 
 Massachusetts Bay, or in the solitary dwelling on the 
 neighboring shore of Mishawam.^ 
 
 Two hundred and twenty-five years afterward, by order 
 of their legal successors, — the legislature of Massachusetts, 
 • — assembled in Boston, the metropolis of New England, 
 they were published as the earliest extant ^ parliamentary 
 records of the Commonwealth ; a fitting tribute to the 
 memory of her founders. The contrasts at these two 
 periods of time, furnish a theme for the study of her sons, 
 full of instruction. 
 
 Mr. Woodbery left England in the next spring, with 
 his son Humphry, a youth of about twenty years of age, 
 and arrived at Naumkeag in the following June, with the 
 cheering intelligence of the new company and prepara- 
 tions in England. During his absence of about six 
 months, the colonists, who still called themselves the 
 " servants of the Dorchester Company," had made im- 
 provements at Naumkeag, and prepared the way for those 
 who might join them. 
 
 * Charlestown. 
 
 ^ It is equally probable that of both Conant's and Endecott's proceedings some 
 minutes or written records were kept, for the use of the companies in England ; 
 neither are preserved, though the latter are known to have existed. So small a 
 number would require only a few regulations — the rudiments of government. It 
 is certain that Conant and Endecott would use the authority they had ; the com- 
 plaint of ill government at Cape Anne, and the difficulties with the Brownes at 
 Naumkeag prove that they did, and '' Endecott's laws " are mentioned. Time ob- 
 literates the foot-prints, yet we know the intermediate steps were taken.
 
 ENDECOTT's arrival. THE DORCHESTER COMPATs'Y. 59 
 
 The company in England included men of rank and 
 wealth, and its affairs were conducted with an energy, 
 strength and harmony in marked contrast with those of 
 the council of Plymouth, whose leaders were dishearten- 
 ed, and whose authority was weakened by the difficulties 
 already referred to. They commissioned Captain John 
 Endecott " to carry on the plantation of the Dorchester 
 agents at Naumkeag, or Salem, and make way for the 
 settling of another colony in the Massachusetts." On 
 the twentieth of June, 1628, with his wife and a few 
 planters, Captain Endecott sailed from Weymouth, in 
 the ship Abigail, of which Henry Gauden was master, 
 bound for Naumkeag,^ where he arrived on the sixth 
 of September, at about the close of the first lustre of 
 the colonial history, and about two years and a half 
 after the removal from Cape Anne. 
 
 More than half a century afterwards, one of Ende- 
 cott's fellow passengers, Richard Brackenbury, related, 
 from memory, many interesting particulars of these 
 early days of the colony, some of which he had from 
 the lips of the old planters themselves, who declared 
 to their new associates that, " they came over upon 
 the account of a company in England, called by us," 
 Brackenbury said, "by the name of the Dorchester 
 Company, or Dorchester merchants," for whom they 
 had built many houses at Naumkeag and Cape Anne. 
 He added, that having waited upon Mr. Endecott, in 
 his attendance upon the company of the Massachusetts 
 patentees, when they kept their court in Cornewell 
 street in London, he understood that this company of 
 
 ' Neal, upon a careful examination, says they arrived at the place which Mr. 
 Conant and the Dorchester agents had marked out for them ; it was called by the 
 natives Neumlctak, but the new planters called it Salem. Hist, of N. E , i. 120.
 
 60 COLONIAL PROSPERITY. CONANT SUPERSEDED. 
 
 London had bought^ out the right of the Dorchester 
 merchants^ in New England, and "that Mr. Endecott 
 had power to take possession of their right in New 
 England, which Mr. Endecott did ! " Brackenbury was 
 an eye-witness to this, and, without doubt, he suited 
 the word to the action. 
 
 About the same year they took possession of the land 
 on the shore north of Salem, then " commonly called 
 the Cape Anne ferry," or side now Beverly, by dividing it 
 into lots for cultivation, and by cutting thatch for their 
 houses. 
 
 Governor Conant was of course superseded ^ by Gover- 
 nor Endecott, who, as the representative of the company, 
 assumed the control of the territory and improvements 
 made by the first planters during the five years they had 
 occupied it. The new official reported to England so 
 favorably, that there was soon no want of volunteers for 
 New England, and in reply he received letters adapted to 
 put new life into the colony. 
 
 ^ Hubbard's " Present State of New England," London, 1677, p. 4, says " pur- 
 chased." Hubbard's Hist, of N. E. 109; Archaelogia Americana, vol. iii. p. 53 ; 
 opinion of S. F. Haven, Esq. 
 
 2 Members of the old Dorchester Company were parties to the next enterprise. 
 John Humphries, treasurer of the Dorchester Company, was a member of the second 
 oi'ganization. Sir Henry Roswell and his five associates were residents of Dorches- 
 ter or its vicinity. 
 
 3 There is no reason to doubt that Conant continued in authority at the head of 
 the colony, until Endecott arrived ; this is generally conceded, nor do I find an ex- 
 ception to this opinion. Felt's Salem, i. 43 ; N. E. Hist. Gen. Reg. ii. 238 ; Sav- 
 age's Winthrop, 1853, ii. 200, n. 2.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 REASONS FOR OBTAINING THE KING's AFFIRMATION OF THE PATENT 
 
 DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE COMPANY IN ENGLAND AND THE 
 
 COLONY CRADOCK NOT GOVERNOR OF THE COLONY CHARTER 
 
 SENT TO ENDECOTT UNION OF THE OLD AND NEW PLANTERS 
 
 NAMES OF THE PIONEERS DISPUTES BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW 
 
 COLONISTS DANGERS OF THE COLONY OLDHAm's INTRIGUES 
 
 gorges' CONFLICTING PATENT GOVERNOR CONANT RESTORES PEACE 
 
 INJUSTICE TO CONANT AND HIS ASSOCIATES ALLEVIATING CON- 
 SIDERATIONS CHARACTERS OF CONANT AND ENDECOTT COMPANY'S 
 
 VINDICATION HARDSHIPS OF THE OLD PLANTERS. 
 
 The authority of the council for New England had 
 become so questionable, that after Endecott's departure, 
 the company obtained the royal confirmation of the 
 council's grant by letters patent, under the broad seal of 
 England, issued on the fourth of March, in the year 
 1621, and in that the colony was first legally designated 
 as " of the Massachusetts Bay." Before that time, Ende- 
 cott may or may not have exceeded ^ the authority incident 
 
 ^ As already shown, the council for New England had ample powers of govern- 
 ment ; it has been generally and confidently asserted that they passed only title 
 to land, in the grant of 1627, but this is erroneous, for, as appears by recital of 
 some of its provisions in subsequent charters, it conveyed not only the title, but 
 also the right of " planting, ruling, ordering and governing " in the territory con- 
 veyed, so that the king only confirmed the act of the council. Perhaps the enfeebled 
 condition of the council rendered any special exercise of authority inexpedient until 
 ratified by the king. Hutchinson says that " the patent from the council of Ply- 
 mouth gave no powers of government,'' but as that patent is not preserved, Hutch- 
 inson's assertion amounts to only an inference which the above authorities prove
 
 62 ENDECOTT T* GOVERNOR UNDER 2'' CHARTER. 
 
 to the ownership of the soil, but he was continued in 
 office, and enjoys the distinction of being the^ first Gov- 
 ernor in the colony under this the second or Massachu- 
 setts charter. 
 
 The pecuniary interests were managed by the corpora- 
 tion in England, of which Matthew Cradock was the first 
 Governor. Of him Mr. Savage" says, "he was long 
 honored in our annual registers as first Governor of the 
 colony ; yet, as he was in fact only the head of a com- 
 mercial company in England, not ruler of the people, his 
 services are adequately acknowledged without retaining 
 his name in that most respectable list." ^ 
 
 The terms of the charter provide for a " duplicate or 
 exemplification" of the instrument, both to be of equal 
 authority. One was sent to Endecott and is preserved at 
 Salem, where civil government was first exercised under 
 its warrant, and the other, brought over by Winthrop a 
 year afterwards, is in the Capitol. It was designed to 
 grant the same immunities that had been given originally 
 to the council for New England,'* and which were secured 
 to the Plymouth colonists, and the " Dorchester Com- 
 pany " under them, by the previous Cape Anne charter. 
 
 Upon Endecott's arrival, his own men being united 
 " with those which were formerly planted in the country 
 into one body, they made up in all not much above fifty or 
 
 to be incorrect. Hist, of Mass. 1795, i. 16, 17 ; Washburn's Judicial History of 
 Massachusetts, 10. 
 
 * Savage, in Winthrop, 1853, .vol. i. p. 30, note 1, says that Endecott's " commis- 
 sion from the Company to act as Governor, was, of course, superseded by the ar- 
 rival of Winthrop with the charter," thus recoa;iiizing his precedence; but by 
 the provisions of the charter itself, the one sent to Endecott was of equal authority 
 and dignity with that brought by Winthrop a year afterwards. 
 
 2 Winthrop, 1853, vol. i. p. 2, note 2. 
 
 ' The Massachusetts llegistcr for 1853, has an accurate table of the Governors, 
 except omitting Roger Conaut at its liead, prepared by N. B. Shurtlelf, M. D. 
 
 ''Chahner's Political Annals, i. 13!), 147.
 
 THE PIONEERS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 63 
 
 sixty persons." ^ There soon arose a controversy, exciting 
 great animosity between the old Dorchester planters and 
 their new agent, Mr. Endecott, and his company, and 
 with good reason. 
 
 They had acquired possession of the country, and sub- 
 dued it to their wants by years of toil, privation, and 
 hazard of life, under the guidance of their honored and 
 beloved Conant, .who was now summoned to surrender 
 the fruits of their labors, that others might reap where 
 they had sown. Let us do honor to this noble band of 
 pioneers. Verily, they were the Fathers of Massachu- 
 setts, and their names ^ deserve an honorable place in her 
 chronicles. 
 
 Roger Conant, Governor. 
 William Allen, John Balcii, 
 
 Thomas Gray, Walter Knight, 
 
 Richard Norman, Richard Norman, Jr., 
 
 Peter Palfray, John Tylly, 
 
 John Woodbery. 
 
 Several circumstances rendered this a peculiarly critical 
 period, which a mercenary man could have turned to his 
 own advantage. As early as the fall of the year 1622, 
 the Council for New England, " for and in respect of the 
 
 * Mr. Felt, who is good authority, says that in 1626, after Lyford left Salem for 
 Virginia, there "probably remained 30 souls of all ages." Coll. Amer. Stat. Ass. 
 i. 138 ; Hist. Salem, 43, 75-80. The names of some of them may be found in 
 Drake's History of Boston, p. 57. Josselyn found "not above twenty or thirty 
 houses " in Boston, as late <i9 1638. 
 
 2 This list is gathered from vol. i. 167-176, History of Salera by Mr. Felt, whose 
 diligence has rescued from oblivion probably all the names of that company which 
 can be discovered ; perhaps one third or one quarter part of the whole. Calvert, 
 Lord Baltimore's Colony in Newfoundland, in August, 1622, numbered only thirty- 
 two persons; the colony at Sagadahock, in 1607, consisted of forty-five persons; the 
 Virginia Colony was reduced to sixty persons in 1610. Plymouth Colony numbered 
 but fifty people in 1621. Sir Richard Grenvillc left at Roanoke, in 15S(1, only Jif teen 
 men. Bartholomew Gosnold, in his New England expedition of 1602, took out only 
 twelve to " remayne there for population."
 
 64 THE CRISIS. GOV. CONANT's INTEGRITY AND PRUDENCE. 
 
 good and special service done by Sir Ferdinando Gorges, 
 Knight, to the plantation from the first attempt thereof" 
 unto that time, and for £160 sterling paid by his son 
 Kobert, had issued to the latter a patent of the land 
 " knowne by the name of Messachustack," on the north 
 side of the bay, " knowne by the name of Messachuset," 
 and bounded on the coast by a direct line of ten English 
 miles to the north-east, and extending thirty miles into 
 the main land.^ Gorges had attempted to establish a 
 colony within the bounds of his patent, which he had 
 taken possession of in person, but was unsuccessful. 
 Probably some of the members of that plantation had 
 joined that at Naumkeag. At this juncture, John Old- 
 ham, whose character has been revealed to the reader,^ 
 held the Gorges patent which was included in and con- 
 flicted with the company's title. He could readily gain 
 from among the disaffected, adherents to his own in- 
 terests. The company in England were fearful that he 
 would " be ready to draw a party to himself there," and 
 wrote to Endecott " you may use the best means you can 
 to settle an agreement with the old planters, so as they 
 may not hearken to Mr. Oldham's dangerous, though 
 vain propositions to form a settlement in Massachusetts." 
 
 Hubbard says that the troubles were " quietly com- 
 posed by the prudent moderation of Mr. Conant, agent 
 he/ore for the Dorchester merchants ; that so tneum and 
 tuum, that divide the world, should not disturb the peace 
 of good Christians, that came so far to provide a place 
 where to live together in Christian amity and concord."^ 
 
 Governor Conant had before given distinguished evi- 
 
 » Gorges' Description of N. E. 34, 37. 
 
 2 Pages 2-4-27. 
 
 3 Hubbard seems to have understood that the new and old company were the 
 same ; this ia true, sub modo : the Dorchester interests constituted an important 
 portion of the new organization. Hist, of N. E. lOrf, 109.
 
 GOVERNOR CONANT AND THE NEW COMPANY. 65 
 
 dence of his peculiar qualification for his office, in allay- 
 ing the difficulty at Cape Anne, and in his success in 
 saving the colony from utter ruin in the removal to 
 Salem ; but here he developed his character in a nobler 
 view than ever before ; exhibiting a public virtue rarely 
 equalled, solicitous for the welfare of the colony alone, 
 and concealing his own sense of ingratitude and injustice, 
 he subdued the resentment of his associates, and by his 
 personal influence restored peace and safety.^ 
 
 The conditions on which he had agreed to remain were 
 " a patent for them, likewise whatever they should write 
 for, either men or provisions or goods wherewith to trade 
 with the Indians." 
 
 Evidently it was understood between Mr. White and 
 Governor Conant and his associates, that he should con- 
 tinue to superintend the colony, and that the additional 
 planters and facilities from England were to be under his 
 authority ; this opinion is confirmed by the general spirit 
 and tenor of the Company's proceedings with the old 
 planters, and explains their manifest anxiety regarding 
 them. Conant was notified of his summary removal from 
 authority by his successor Endecott, probably with honest 
 characteristic brevity rather than with any unusual degree 
 of suavity and delicacy. 
 
 Though the rapid development of the scheme for a re- 
 ligious colony in New England must have far exceeded 
 Mr. White's anticipations, and the sudden accession of 
 
 ' The superior condition of the persons who came over with the neiu charter cast 
 a shade upon Conant, and he afterwards lived and died in comparative obscurity. 
 He retained a conviction of the great injustice done to him, even in his old age, and 
 he could not refrain from reference to the neglect and ingratitude of " those in this 
 8oe famous a colony " who had " obtained much without hassard of life, or pi-efer- 
 ring the public good before their own interest, which " said he. with noble pride, 
 " I praise God I have done." Felt's Memoir of Conant in N. E. Hist. Gen. Reg. 
 1848 ; Hutchinson's Mass. 1795, i. 14. 
 
 9
 
 66 CHARACTERS OF CONANT AND ENDECOTT. 
 
 influence and wealth, created new interests, beyond his 
 control, and perhaps not bound by his personal agree- 
 ment with the planters, yet this could not soften the dis- 
 appointment and chagrin of Governor Conant and his 
 associates at the manifest injustice done to them. 
 
 Beside strict integrity, there was little common to the 
 characters of Conant and Endecott. Each was peculiarly 
 fitted for the duties and periods assigned to him, and had 
 the order been reversed, the result would have been fatal. 
 
 Conant was moderate in his views, tolerant, mild and 
 conciliatory, quiet and unobtrusive, ingenuous and unam- 
 bitious, preferring the public good to his private interests ; 
 with the passive virtues he combined great moral courage 
 and an indomitable will ; avoiding difficulty at Plymouth, 
 and without losing their esteem, he quietly withdrew to 
 Nantasket ; he was a minister of peace at the time of 
 Hewes' reprisal ; he inspired the planters with resolution 
 to remove to Naumkeag, and his integrity of purpose pre- 
 vented the utter dissolution of the colony there ; he was 
 the pacificator in the difficulties between the old and new 
 planters on Endecott's arrival, and then retired with noble, 
 Christian resignation to the privacy and industry of the 
 humblest planter. Governor Conant's true courage and 
 simplicity of heart and strength of principle eminently 
 qualified him for the conflicts of those rude days of peril, 
 deprivation and trial. He was at the head of the forlorn 
 hope ; he died victorious, but neglected, and neither 
 monument nor tradition tells of the place where he rests.^ 
 
 Endecott was the opposite of Conant ; arbitrary and 
 sometimes violent, he ruled with a determined hand and 
 can'ied the sword unsheathed ; quick to assert and ready 
 
 t " longa 
 
 Nocte, carent quia vate sacro." 
 
 Hor. Ad LoUium.
 
 WRONGS OF THE OLD COLONISTS. 67 
 
 to maintain his rights ; firm and unyielding, he con- 
 fronted all obstacles with a vigorous resistance ; a man of 
 theological asperity and bigoted, he was guarded against 
 every insidious foe ; these were the elements necessary to 
 the prosperity, and even the safety of the colony, from the 
 time of Conant's retiracy, crushing insubordination and 
 excluding every hostile element. He was chief magistrate 
 of the colony for more years than any of his successors. 
 
 As before said, the records bear evidence that the 
 " adventurers " were not unconscious of the wrong done 
 to the old colonists, perhaps, unavoidable in their judg- 
 ment, from the necessities of the case. The company for 
 their vindication, " as well to all the world as to the old 
 planters themselves," offered them a share of the privi- 
 leges under the royal charter, an admission to their soci- 
 ety, and the enjoyment of not only those lands which they 
 had cultivated, but such further proportion of land as the 
 council of twelve, in which the old planters had the offer 
 of two votes out of twelve, might think " fit for them or 
 any of them." 
 
 If under such conditions and such a fulfilment of the 
 agreement, Conant and his associates are " desirous to 
 live amongst us and conform themselves to good order 
 and government," said those who had taken summary 
 possession of the territory and of the improvements 
 thereon, we will permit them to remain. The legal title 
 was now in the new company, who, strong in wealth and 
 influence, were decidedly aggressive in spirit, and the only 
 alternative for these leaders in the forlorn hope, was dis- 
 persion and an abandonment of the now ripening fruits 
 of their labors. They submitted to the lesser evil ; but 
 historic impartiality, upon a survey of the facts, will yield 
 a verdict of exact justice, unvitiated by superior interests 
 and prejudices.
 
 68 UNION OF THE OLD AND NEW COLONISTS. 
 
 There was nothing to conciliate the old colonists, who 
 viewed their new associates as intruders ; and though a 
 political union was effected, the distinction of old and 
 new was not soon forgotten. On the thirtieth day of 
 June, 1629, at a general court convened by Governor En- 
 decott, they were by common consent " all combyned to- 
 gether into one body politique under the same governor," 
 — a consummation of the labors of Conant and White, 
 entitling them to our everlasting gratitude, and a loftier 
 fame than New England has yet awarded them.
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 RJiCAPITULATION THE HISTORICAL IDENTITY OF THE COLONY SERIES 
 
 OF GOVERNORS AND CHARTERS CHARACTER OF THE NEW ENGLAND 
 
 COLONISTS THE FATHERS QUOTED NEW ENGLAND SETTLED BY 
 
 FUGITIVES FROM OPPRESSION PRELACY DRIVEN FROM PLYMOUTH 
 
 AND FROM SALEM ITS BANISHMENT NECESSARY TO THEIR SELF- 
 PRESERVATION — VIEWS OF THE FOUNDERS OF NEW ENGLAND 
 
 TOLERATION NOT PROFESSED DANGER FROM POPERY THE PURI- 
 TANS ESTABLISHED THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION AND THE AMERICAN 
 REPUBLIC. 
 
 Among the late writers, Douglass has assigned to 
 Conant's colony most accurately and distinctly its true 
 relative position in history. He says, " Some adventur- 
 ers proposed to make a settlement on the north side of 
 Massachusetts Bay, Anno 1624 ; they began a small set- 
 tlement at Cape Anne, the northern promontory of this 
 bay, and are now (1749) become the most considerable 
 British American settlement, and by way of eminence is 
 commonly called New England." ' 
 
 Thus it appears that a society from the mother country 
 was established at Cape Anne, in 1624, under a charter 
 derived mediately from the king, through the council 
 for New England, to ShefFeild the grantor, whose title 
 and privileges were soon after ratified directly by the king 
 in council ; that this charter, so emanating from the 
 
 » Douglass' "Summary," i. 373, 407.
 
 70 THE HISTORICAL IDENTITY OF THE COLONY. 
 
 throne, authorized the organization of a body politic, 
 having laws, magistrates, and ministers ; that such officers 
 were appointed, and entered upon their duties at Cape 
 Anne, Eoger Conant being Governor ; ^ that in the fall 
 of the year 1626, the colony removed to the site of the 
 present city of Salem; that in the year 1628, John En- 
 decott, under authority of a new organization in England, 
 whose name is not preserved, but which had obtained 
 from the council of New England a charter superseding 
 that of Cape Anne, from Lord Sheffeild, arrived at Salem, 
 and abruptly assumed the government of the whole. The 
 mutations of the companies in England do not affect the 
 identity of the colony, nor the chronological order of the 
 incidents in its civil history, which may be considered in- 
 dependently of the authority under which they tran- 
 spired, and merely with reference to its internal ^ history. 
 In this view the reader will readily trace the series of 
 Governors, or Rulers of the people, from Roger Conant 
 to Endecott and Winthrop, down to the present day ; or 
 referring to the charters, that Roger Conant was not only 
 first in order of time, but the only Governor under the 
 
 ^ Very different were the colonists of New England from those described in 
 Dr. Donne's sermon before the Virginia Company, in 1622, already quoted. '• It 
 shall redeeme many a wretch from the javves of death, from the hands of the ex- 
 ecutioner." " It shall sweepe your streetes, and wash your doores from idle 
 persons and the children of idle persons, and employ them ; and truly if the 
 whole countrye were but such a Brideivell., to force idle persons to worke, it had a 
 good use." ♦« It is alreadie a spleene, lo drayne the ill humors of the body ; " 
 and August 18, 1627, the Rev. Joseph Meade wrote to Sir Martin Stuteville, 
 " there are many ships now going to Virginia, and with them some fourteen or 
 fifteen hundred children, which they have gathered up in divers places." " The 
 Court and Times of Charles the First.'' London, 1S48, i. 202. The royal charter 
 of J612 speaks of "divers and sundry persons " that "have been sent thither 
 as misdoers and offenders." Stilh's Virginia, 16G- 197. 
 
 * On this sound principle it is that Mr. Savage excluded Matthew Cradock 
 from the list of Governors, he being "in fact only the head of a commercial comr 
 pany in England, not ruhr of the peoph,^' (Winthrop, lb53, i. 2;) thereby re- 
 ducing thp iptjuiry to one of simple fact, as stated ip the text.
 
 ENDECOTT DIRECTED TO STRENGTHEN THE OLD COLONY. 71 
 
 first, or Cape Anne charter ; that under the second, or 
 Massachusetts charter, John Endecott was first appointed, 
 and then succeeded by John Winthrop, the third in order 
 of time ; and that Sir Wm. Phips was the first Governor 
 under the third, or Province charter, of 1692. 
 
 The design of the second company, formed in the year 
 1629 is stated by the fathers themselves. Governor 
 Thomas Dudley in his letter to " the Lady Bridget, 
 Countess of Lincoln," ^ one of the most precious docu- 
 ments in New England history,^ says: "We sent Mr. 
 John Endecott and some with him to beginne a planta- 
 tion [in Massachusetts! and to strengthen such as hee 
 should find there [at Naumkeag,] which we [were ?] ^ sent 
 hither from Dorchester, and some places adjoyning," 
 and this appears also in the letter of instructions to 
 Endecott,^ dated the seventeenth of April, 1629, wherein 
 he is directed to " send forty or fifty persons to Massa- 
 chusetts Bay, to inhabit there, and not to protract but to 
 do it with all speed." ^ This explains, and is corroborated 
 by, the concise statement in the " Planters' Plea," that it 
 was " to erect a new colony upon the old foundation." 
 Hubbard says it was " to carry on the plantation of the 
 
 ' Daughter of Sir William Fenys, Viscount Say and Scale, by his wife Elizabeth, 
 daughter of John Temple of Stow : she married Theophilus, Baron Clinton, ith 
 Earl of Lincoln. 
 
 2 Edited by John Farmer, Esq., in New Ilamp. Hist. Coll. iv. 229 ; also in Force's 
 Hist. Tracts. 
 
 3 I think that tve is an error for were, because Dudley's letter shows that he was 
 not connected with the enterprise till 1627, three years or more after the Dorchester 
 people were sent out ; next he lived in Lincolnshire remote from Dorchester ; and 
 lastly it avoids the evident anachronism, as it now stands. A parallel to this 
 occurs in the Boston edition of Hugh Peter's "Last Legacy," 1717; by a misprint 
 of he for u-c. Bishop Lake is represented to have had "the late king's gracious 
 Patent, License and Encouragement " to plant in New England. 
 
 ■* Charles M. Endecott, Esq., of Salem, has printed a valuable memoir of his 
 noble ancestor, the Governor. 
 * This was to anticipate Oldham's occupation under the Gorges charter.
 
 72 PRELACY EXCLUDED FROM NEW ENGLAND. 
 
 Dorchester agents at Naumkeag or Salem, and make way 
 for the settling of another colony in the Massachusetts." 
 These authorities show two distinct objects : to continue 
 and strengthen the first colony at Salem, and to begin 
 another ^ at the mouth of Charles River, now Charlestown 
 and Boston. 
 
 The members of the Massachusetts Company suffered 
 from the abuses or rather severities of the Episcopal 
 authorities ; but they cherished the hope of a reforma- 
 tion 2 in the church, and shrank from the absolute 
 separation of the Independents or Pilgrims — a position 
 held by thousands of the faithful and conscientious sons 
 of the church, until the act of uniformity, in 1662, 
 severed the bonds ; and from that date the Dissenters 
 rapidly increased in numbers and influence. 
 
 The attempt to introduce Prelacy into the Plymouth 
 Colony almost immediately resulted in the practical 
 question, whether the Pilgrims should banish or be 
 banished by the intruders. This was the alternative. 
 They sought, won, and defended an asylum for the 
 enjoyment of their own faith. It has been well said that 
 they sought " not religious freedom, but freedom to enjoy 
 their own opinions." ^ This act of self-preservation led, 
 as we have seen, to the establishment of the colony at 
 Cape Anne, afterwards removed to Salem. There the 
 same causes produced a like result, in the case of the 
 banished Browns ; and thus Prelacy was excluded from 
 
 " Five (lays after his arrival at Salem, June 17, 1630, Gov. Winthrop entered in 
 his journal, " we went to Massachusetts to find out a place for our setting downe." 
 Savage's ed. 1853, i. 32. 
 
 " " They were ratheif desirous of reforming the Church of England than of 
 
 separating from it>" * " a measure which would have broken the strength 
 
 of the Dissenters, as a body, to the eminent hazard of civil liberty." Sir James 
 Mackintosh. 
 
 3 Arnold's Discourse before the Rhode Island Hist. See, Jan. 7, 1853.
 
 THE BASTARD PAPACY IN ENGLAND. 73 
 
 the very colony which it had planted and nourished — a 
 joy to the Pilgrims. 
 
 The autobiography of Sir Simon D'Ewes, as cotcm- 
 porary with these movements, exhibits the views of the 
 Fathers of New England, respecting the tendency of 
 public affairs in Old England. He says : 
 
 " For men to call themselves Protestants, as Bishop 
 Laud,^ Bishop Wren, and their wicked adherents, to 
 swallow up the preferments of our church, to inveigh 
 against Popery in word only, and in the main to project 
 and plot the ruin of the truth and gospel, to maintain 
 and publish the most gross and feculent errors of the 
 Romish synagogue, to cause God's day to be profaned, 
 his public service to be poisoned by idolatry and super- 
 stition, his faithful and painful ministers to be censured, 
 suspended, deprived, and exiled, they do no less impu- 
 dently and furiously weaken and undermine the Gospel 
 of truth, than if they were hired by the Pope himself, at 
 great rates. 
 
 5» 2 
 
 1 Yet Laud's memory is precious, for the evil which he did has been prolific of 
 good. By his persecutions he "may be called the Father of New England." 
 Douglass' Summary, i. 367 ; Neal's N. E. 191, 192. He is credited with the good 
 service of reclaiming from the Romish Church, William Chillingworth, author of 
 the great argument "The Religion of Protestants." His victims used to say 
 " Great laud to the Lord — little Laud to the Devil ! " 
 
 " Did not the deeds of England's primate 
 First drive your fathers to this climate, 
 Whom jails and fines and every ill 
 Forced to their good against their will ? 
 Ye owe to their obliging temper 
 The peopling your new fangled empire. 
 While every British act and canon 
 Stood forth your causa sine qua iion.'* 
 
 M'Fingal, Canto ii. 
 
 Milton's "Reformation in England" best exhibits the facts and principles 
 leading to the settlement of New England. 
 
 ' " The sour crudities of yesterday's Popery, those constitutions of Edward VL" 
 being established in Elizabeth's reign: "from that time followed nothing but im- 
 10
 
 74 TOLERATION WOULD HAVE BEEN FATAL. 
 
 The Puritan founders of New England did not ^ pro- 
 fess toleration ; it would have been suicidal. Neither 
 justice nor equity required that they should receive or 
 re'tain any who were inimical to their adopted insti- 
 tutions; they well understood the truth, a few years 
 afterward spoken by John Pym,^ in his great speech in 
 
 prisonments, troubles, disgraces on all those that found fault with the decrees of 
 the convention, and straight were branded with the name of Puritans.^' Milton's 
 Prose Works, 1641, Bohn's ed. ii. 410, 374, 26. At the Hampton Court Confer- 
 ence, Thursday, 12 Jan. 1603, James said of the Puritans, " I shall make them 
 conform themselves, or I will harry them out of this land, or do worse," of which 
 Bancroft, the High Church Bishop of London, declared that he "was fully per- 
 suaded that his majesty spoke by the instinct of the spirit of God! " This " finished 
 specimen of all that a king ought not to be" compelled a union of the State and 
 Church Puritans, which party thenceforth included all who opposed the king, and 
 even Abbott, the Archbishop of Canterbury, was reckoned among them, because he 
 did not approve the Court maxims of the king's unlimited power." Rapin's Hist, 
 of Eng. ii. fol. 17G, 179, 214, 215, 222. 
 
 1 Governor Thomas Dudley's lines may be quoted : 
 
 " Let men of God in courts and churches watch 
 O'er such as do a Toleration hatch ; 
 Lest that ill egg bring forth a cockatrice, 
 To poison all with heresy and vice. 
 If men be left, and otherwise combine. 
 My epitaph 's I died no libertine!" 
 
 Rev. John Cotton and Rev. John Norton were equally intolerant; but these men 
 founded institutions whose strength is in freedom of opinion. Dr. Increase Mather, 
 in his election sermon. May 23, 1677, " concerning the Danger of Apostacy," says, 
 "that which concerns the magistrate's power in matters of religion," "is now 
 become a matter of scruple and distaste to some amongst us." The thii'd or Pro- 
 vincial charter of 1602, which was procured by Mather, tolerated " all Christians, 
 except Papists; " and here Mather seems to have Milton's authority, "Whether 
 Popery be tolerable or no? Popery is a double thing to deal with, and claims a 
 two-fold power, ecclesiastical and political — both usurped, and the one supporting 
 the other." In Holland, as early as 1573, " all restraint in matter of religion was 
 as detestable as the Inquisition itself; " but even there they were compelled to acts 
 of severity towards Popery, in consequence of her political machinations. Broad- 
 head's History of New York, 101, 103, 458, 559, 787. 
 
 " I am not of opinion," said Milton, in 1641, " to think the church a vine in tliis 
 respect, because, as they take it, she cannot subsist without clasping about the elm 
 of worldly strength and felicity, as if the heavenly city could not support itself 
 without the props and buttresses of secular authority." 
 
 2 Foster's Statesmen of the Commonwealth, New York ed. 166.
 
 SELF-PRESERVATION REPELLED OLD WORLD POLITIES. iO 
 
 Parliament, 1640, "T/^e prmciples of Poperie,'' said he, 
 " are such as are incompatible with any other religion. 
 There may be a suspension of violence for some time, by 
 certain respects; but the ultimate end even of that 
 moderation is, that they may with more advantage ex- 
 tirpate that which is opposite to them. Lawes will not 
 restrain them — oathes will not." 
 
 The heavy darkness of the Romish sway, which had 
 been penetrated by the glimmerings of the dawning 
 Reformation, seemed to be again fast gathering over 
 England. The Christian and Patriot now rose to the 
 death struggle for Religion and Liberty. While the 
 conflict raged in England, not less arduous was the 
 struggle for the possession of the New World in behalf 
 of the Rights of Man. Our fathers, driven from home 
 by oppression and cruelty, the legitimate offspring of the 
 Old W^orld polities, with the instinct of self-preservation, 
 repelled their intrusion ^ upon these western shores, amid 
 whose wilds and solitudes they seemed instantly to feel 
 the inspiration of the liberty which they sought. " The 
 English Puritans, the chief of men, whom it is the paltry 
 fashion of this day to decry, divided their vast inheritance 
 
 'Among the "General Considerations for the Plantation in New England" 
 stands this: "First, It Avill be a service to the church of great consequence, to 
 carry the gospell into those parts of the world, and to raise a bulwarke againste the 
 Kingdom of Antichrist, which the Jesuits labor to rear up in all places of the 
 world." Hutchinson's Collection, 27. 
 
 Dr. Donne, Dean of St. Paul's, in a sermon to the " Honorable Company of the 
 Virginian Plantation," Nov. 13, 1G22, said, " The Papists are sorrie wee have this 
 countrey, and surely twenty lectures in matter of controversie doe not so much vese 
 them, as one ship that goes and strengthens that plantation; ueyther can I recom- 
 mend it to you by any better rhetorique than their malice."' 
 
 In 1G48, the Rev. John Cotton, of liuston, said : " Some of the Jesuits at Lisburn, 
 and others in the Western Islands, have professed to some of our merchants and 
 mariners, they look at our plantations, (and at some of us by name.) as dangerous 
 supplanters of the Catholic cause." "Way of Congregational Churches Cleared." 
 London, 1648, p. 21,22.
 
 76 RELIGIOUS AND CIVIL LIBERTY INSEPARABLE. 
 
 between them in the reign of Charles I. One body 
 remained at home, and established the English Consti- 
 tution : one crossed the Atlantic, and founded the Ameri- 
 can Republic — the two greatest achievements of modern 
 times." 1 
 
 Distant by three thousand miles from Cathedral 
 shades, and the terrors of Spiritual and Star Chamber 
 powers, safe in the retirement of the forests of the New 
 World, wary by experience, elevated and enlightened by 
 the teachings of Christ, amid a combination of favorable 
 circumstances never previously known in the experience 
 of man, and which can never exist again, Freedom spon- 
 taneously developed her institutions in their simplest and 
 truest forms, and published to all the world the insepara- 
 ble bonds of religious and civil liberty. Under these 
 circumstances, and amid these influences, has been 
 originated and developed the true polity for an enlight- 
 ened and free people, containing within itself the recu- 
 perative principle of life, and the germ of kindred 
 institutions among all nations. 
 
 ' Edlubursfli Review.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. 
 
 Edmund, Lord Sheffeild — a prominent and influential statesman 
 or courtier of the times of Elizabeth, James, and Charles the First, 
 seems to have retained the royal favor more successfully than did 
 some of his cotemporaries. For this reason, perhaps, he occupies a 
 less conspicuous position in history, than belongs to others whose mis- 
 fortunes reflect lustre on their worth, and infamy on their sovereigns. 
 He was born of noble lineage, about 1566, and was early introduced 
 at Court ; for in 1582, he was one of those who, by command of 
 Elizabeth, attended her suitor, the Duke of Anjou, to Antwerp. For 
 his good service in the contest with the Armada, he was, three days 
 after, on the 26th of July, 1583, knighted by his uncle. High Admiral 
 Howard. After this he was for some years Governor of Briel, a forti- 
 fied seaport in the Netherlands, famous in her history, which England 
 held as security for loans in the war with Spain. Upon his return to 
 England he mingled in the affairs of state, and his name is frequently 
 associated with the Earl of Northampton. In 1612, they were both 
 seeking a place in the royal council, and there was a " flocking of 
 Parliament men " '■ in meetings and consultations with the Earl of 
 Southampton and Lord Sheffeild, at Lord Rochester's chambers." 
 About 1614, he obtained the presidency of the council of the north,
 
 78 APPENDIX. 
 
 an institution created by Henry VIII. at York, in 1537, after the 
 troubles which broke out in the northern counties, in consequence of 
 the suppression of the lesser monasteries, to administer justice and 
 maintain order in these counties, independently of the courts at West- 
 minster. The jurisdiction of the court, at first very limited, became 
 more extended and arbitrary under James I. and Charles I. The 
 office he held till January, 1618-19, when we find "my Lord 
 Scroop's patent is now drawing for the Presidentship of York. He is 
 to make up the sum already tendered to my Lord Sheffeild, .£4500 ; 
 and .£1500 is to be given elsewhere, by way of gratuity. My Lord 
 Sheffeild, at the resigning up of his interest, had this further testimony 
 of the King's favor, that at his request, his Majesty was content to 
 knight every one of the Council at York, before not knighted, which 
 were divers ; and thence accrues a further profit to his Lordship." 
 During the next month he was appointed Vice Admiral of the fleet 
 then fitting out, and on Tuesday, the 21st of this month, my Lord 
 Sheffeild " married a fine young gentlewoman of some sixteen years 
 of age. Sir William Irwin's daughter, and is (for the country's sake, 
 I suppose) highly applauded by the King for his choice. And surely 
 if it be true " Blessed is the wooing that is not long adoing," we must 
 give him for a happy man, since less than three days concluded 
 wooing, wedding, and bedding." 
 
 He became connected with American affairs in 1609, being one of 
 the patentees named in the charter of the Virginia company in that 
 year, and was, in 1620, one of a committee, with the Earl of South- 
 ampton, Sir Nicholas Tufton, and others, to propitiate the King's favor, 
 and in the same year he appeared in the party against the King's 
 favorite, Sir Thomas Smith ; but two years later, in 1622, he joined 
 the King's party, and so continued till after 1625, when he was created 
 by Charles I. Earl of Mulgrave. In April, 1628, when the Earl of 
 Arundel, in parliament, resolutely declared his purpose to maintain 
 popular liberty against the King's prerogative, Mulgrave sustained him. 
 He was one of the twelve eminent peers, among whom were Warwick, 
 Say and Seal, and Brook, all inclined to the popular party, who so- 
 licited from Charles I. the convocation of the constitutional parlianient
 
 A r r E N D I X . 79 
 
 of 1640, which assumed the sovereign power. From his disafTcction 
 to the Virginia company, it is reasonable to suppose that he had con- 
 siderable influence in procuring the patent to the Plymouth company, 
 of which he was an original member, and under which he issued the 
 patent of Cape Anne, thus rendering his name of permanent interest in 
 New England. He died in 1646. A fac-simile of his signature, and 
 his picture, are in Thane's Autography, vol. i. p. 17.^ 
 
 » Rapin's Englaml, ii. 115, 136; Collier's Dictionary; Hazard, i. 118; Stith's 
 Virginia, 180, 187, 220; Appendix, 16 ; Life and Times of James I., i. 83, 180, 
 17G, 333, 471 ; ii. 120, 136, 137, 145, 14R ; Davies' Hist, of Holland, ii. 175; 
 Guizot's Hist, of the English Rev. of 1640, Bogue's cd. 46, n. 1, 84 ; Purchas' 
 Pilgrims, vi. 1900-1005. 
 
 II. 
 
 " 16 : 12'""- : 1680. 
 
 Richard Brackenbury, of Bcuerly, in the County of Essex, in New 
 England, aged eighty yeares, testifieth that he the said Richard came 
 to New England with John Endecott, Esqr. late Gouernor in New 
 England, deceased, and that we came ashore at the place now called 
 Salem, the 6th of September, in the yeare of our Lord, 1628 : fifty- 
 two yeares agoe : at Salem we found liueing, old Goodman Norman, 
 & his sonn : William Allen & Walter Knight, and others, those owned 
 that they came ouer vpon the acco' of a company in England, calcd 
 by vs by the name of Dorchester Company or Dorchester marchants, 
 they had sundry houses built at Salem, as Alsoe John Woodberye, Af' 
 Conant, Pecter Palfcry, John Balch & others, & they declared that 
 they had an house built at Cape Ann for the dorchester company, & I 
 haueing waited vpon M'- Endecott, when he atended the company of
 
 80 APPENDIX. 
 
 the Massathusetts pattentees, when they kept theire court in Cornewell 
 Street in London I vnderstood that this company of London haueing 
 bought out the right of the Dorchester marchants in New Eng- 
 land, and that M"^' Endecott hat power to take possession of theire right 
 in New England, which M'- Endecot did, & in perticuler of an house 
 built at Cape Ann, which Walter Knight tSc the rest, said they built for 
 Dorchester men : & soe I was sent with them to Cape Ann to pull 
 downe the said house for M"^- Endecott's vse, the which wee did, & 
 the same yeare wee came ouer according to my best remembrance, it 
 was that wee tooke a further possession, on the north side of Salem 
 ferrye, comonly caled Cape an side, by cutting thach for our houses, ^ 
 and soone after laid out lotts for tillage land on the s"" Cape an side, & 
 quickly after sundry houses were built on the said Cape an side, and I 
 my selfe haue lined there, now for about 40 yeares & I with sundry 
 others haue beene subdueing the wildernes & improuing the feilds & 
 comons there, as a part of Salem, while wee belonged to it & since as 
 inhabitants of Beuerly for these fifty yeares, & neuer y' I heard of 
 disturbed in our possession, either by the Indians or others saue in our 
 late vnhappy warr, with the heathen, neither haue I heard by myselfe 
 or any other inhabitants with vs, for the space of these fifty yeares, 
 that M'- Mason or any by from or vnder him did take any possession or 
 lay any claime to any lands heare saue now in his last claime within 
 this yeare or two, : 
 
 Richard Brackenbury made oath to the truth of the above writ- 
 ten the 20th daye of January, L^Al before me, Bartholomew 
 Gedney, Assistant In the Collony of Massathusetts." 
 
 1 '« The roofe ouer the hall, I couered with Deale boords, and the rest with such 
 thatch as I found growing here about the Harbour, as sedge, flagges, and rushes, a 
 farre better couering than boords, both for warmth and titeness." — Letter July 28, 
 1622, from Edward Wynne, Gov. of Lord Baltimore's Plantation at " Ferryland,'' 
 Newfoundland.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 III. 
 
 81 
 
 "16: 12'"''-= 1G80. 
 William Dixy, of Beuerly in New England, aged about 73 yeares, 
 Testifieth that I came to New England & ariued in June 1629, at 
 cape an, where wee found the signes of buildings & plantation work, 
 6s saw noe English people soe we sailed to the place now caled Salem, 
 where we found Af' John Endecott, Governo' &- sundry inhabitants 
 besides : some of whom s'^ they had beene seruants to Dorchester com- 
 pany : & had built at cape an sundry yeares before wee came ouer, 
 when we came to dwell heare the Indians bid vs welcome & shewed 
 themselues very glad that we came to dwell among them, and I vnder- 
 stood they had kindly entertained the English y' came hether before 
 wee came, & the English & the Indians had a feild in comon fenced 
 in together, & the Indians fled to shelter themselues, vnder the English 
 oft times, Saying they were afraid of theire enemy Indians in the 
 Gentry : In perticuler I remember somtime after, wee ariued, the 
 Agawam Indians, complained to M'- Endecott that they weare afraid of 
 other Indians, caled as I take it, tarrateens, Hugh Browne was sent 
 with others in a boate to agawam for the Indians releife, & at other 
 times wee gaue our neighbour Indians, protection from theire enemy 
 Indians. 
 
 Taken vpon oath this 16"" February, 1680 : before me William 
 Browne &; Bartholomew Gedney, Assistants." 
 
 IV. 
 
 u 16 : 12™°- = 1680. 
 
 Humphry Woodberye, of Beuerly in New England, aged about 72 
 yeares. Testifieth, that when I liucd in Sumersetshire in England, I 
 remember that my father, John Woodberye, (since deceased) did about 
 11
 
 82 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 56 yeares agoe remooue for new England, & I then traueled with him 
 as farr as Dorchester, and I vnderstood that my said father came to 
 New England by order of a company caled, Dorchester Company, 
 (among whom M"'- White, of Dorchester in England, was an active in- 
 strument,) & that my father & the company with him brought cattle & 
 other things, to Cape Ann, for plantation work, & built an house & 
 kept theire cattell, & sett up fishing, & afterwards some of them 
 remoued, to a neck of land, since called Salem : After about 3 yeares 
 absence, my said father returned to England, & made vs acquainted 
 with what settlement they had made in New England, & that he was 
 sent back by some that Intended to setle a plantation about 3 leagues 
 west of Cape Ann, to further this designe, after about halfe a year's 
 stay in Ingland, my father returned to new England & brought me 
 with him, wee ariued at the place now caled Salem, in or about the 
 month of June 1628 : where wee found seuerall persons that said they 
 were seruants to the Dorchester company, & had built another house 
 for them at Salem besides that at cape Ann The latter end of that 
 sumer, 1628 : Joha Endecott, Esq'' came ouer gouerno'' declaring his 
 power, from a company of pattentees in or about London : and that 
 they had bought the houses boates and seruants, which belonged to the 
 Dorchester Company & that he s*^ Endecott had power to receiue them, 
 which accordingly he did take possession of: 
 
 When wee setled the Indians neuer then molested vs in our im- 
 prouemen" or sitting downe, either on Salem or Beuerly sides of the 
 ferry, but shewed themselues very glad of our company, & came & 
 planted by vs, &; often times came to vs for shelter, saying they were 
 afraid of their enemy Indians vp in the contry : & we did shelter them 
 w" they fled to vs, & we had theire free leaue to build & plant where 
 wee haue taken vp lands, the same yeare or the next after, wee came 
 to Salem wee cutt hay for the cattell wee brought ouer, on that side of 
 the ferry now caled Beuerly : & haue kept our possession there euer 
 since, by cutting hay or thatch, or timber & boards & by laying out 
 lotts for tillage, & then by peoples planting : & some time after, build- 
 inof and dwelling hecre, where I with others haue liucd about 40 
 yeares : In all this time of my being in New England I neuer heard
 
 APPENDIX. 88 
 
 that M'" Mason, took possession hcare, disbursted estate vpon or layd 
 any claime, to this place of ours, saue the discourses of a claime 
 within this yeare or two : 
 
 The testimoney within written is taken vpon oath this 16 : Feb- 
 ruary, 1680 : before William Browne & Bartholomew Gedney, 
 Assistants." 
 
 V. 
 
 "Gloucester, June 22d, 1854. 
 J. WiNGATE Thornton, Esq. 
 
 Dear Sir, ****** 
 
 On the north-west side of the outer harbor of Gloucester is a tract of 
 land, containing about one hundred acres, more or less, which, in our 
 early town-records, is called ' ffisherman's field.' It is mentioned 
 by that name in a grant to Rev. Richard Blynman, one of the company 
 who made the permanent settlement here in 1642. Commencing at 
 the westerly end of the beach, on the north side of the harbor, it 
 extends in a southerly direction, and on its westerly side is skirted by 
 the main road to Manchester, which separates it from a range of hills. 
 On the sea-ward side it has two coves, one of which is very small, 
 formed by the projection of a rocky bluff into the harbor. This bluff 
 is called Stage Head, and tradition affirms that this is the place where 
 the operations of the first fishing company at Cape Ann were carried 
 on. A breastwork was raised on this spot in the revolutionary war, 
 and Stage Fort has been its general appellation for many years. I 
 have met with nothing to show that this place might have derived its 
 name from its improvement for a fishing stage at any later period in 
 the history of the town, than that now under consideration. One of the 
 objects of the fishing company just mentioned, was to combine fishing 
 and agricultural employments; and for the latter no spot more favor-
 
 84 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 able than ' ffisherman's field ' could be found on our shores, as it is 
 less rocky than any other tract of equal extent on the borders of the 
 harbor. It was also convenient for their fishery. 
 
 Many of the first settlers of Gloucester who resided at the harbor, 
 received grants of land in ' flisherman's field ; ' finding probably in 
 its state of preparation for cultivation, a compensation for its incon- 
 venient distance from their homes. It may be suggested that these 
 grantors were fishermen, and that the spot derived its name from that 
 circumstance ; in answer to which it may be said, that none of them 
 are known to have been of that occupation, while it is certain that the 
 chief employment of most of the early settlers here was upon the soil, 
 and hot upon the sea. The records authorize an inference that many 
 of them were employed in the forest and the ship-yard. 
 
 Current tradition, then, and the names applied to that locality, leave 
 no room for doubt in my mind, that 'ffisherman's field' was the spot 
 occupied by the English at Cape Ann in 1624, and all who visit it may 
 find an interesting subject of thought, in reflecting upon the care that 
 nurtured and the heroism that defended the feeble germ there planted, 
 through every stage of its growth to a vigorous and happy maturity. 
 
 Yours, very truly, 
 
 John J. Babson."
 
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