DR from рымонти ramme to help. BOOK I. were visited with uncommon sickness and mortality. Of the company who came with Mr. Endicott the last year, eighty were in their graves before governor Winthrop arrived. He found the colony in very miserable circumstances. Many of those who were yet living, were in a weak and sickly condition. The people had scarcely a sufficiency of provisions for their subsistence fourteen days. Besides, they had sustained a capital loss in their servants. They brought over with them a hundred and eighty. These cost them more than three thousand pounds sterling. But they were so straightened for provisions, that they were necessitated to give all those who survived the sickness, their liberty, that they might shift for themselves.* 1630. Famine, Many of the ships which arrived this year, had a long passage of seventeen or eighteen weeks; in consequence of which, numbers had the scurvy, and came on shore in a sickly condition. By reason of wet lodgings, in cottages and miserable huts, for the want of fresh food and other conveniences, this sickness increased. Other diseases also, soon attacked them with violence; so that, in a fortnight or three weeks, the sickness became general. In a short time, so many fell sick, that the well were not sufficient properly to attend them, and bury the dead. Great numbers died, and were buried on Charlestown hill.† The sickness and mortality greatly retarded the necessary labours and affairs of the colony; so that many of the people were obliged to lie in tents, or miserable huts, during the winter. By the next spring, a hundred and twenty, or more, were among the dead. Of this number were Mr. Johnson and Mr. Rossiter. The charming lady Arabella, celebrated for her many virtues, died before her husband. She was sister to the earl of Lincoln; and, for the sake of religion, came from a paradise of ease, plenty, and delight, in the house of a renowned earl, into a wilderness of toil, disaster, and misery. About a hundred of the people were discouraged, and returned to England; two hundred were dead, and some went to Piscataqua. About seventeen hundred remained; a little more than a hundred and eighty persons, or thirty families, on an average, to each town. The greatest numbers fixed themselves at Boston and Watertown. In these towns, there were, probably, nearly sixty families in Charlestown and Dorchester, about forty; and in the other towns, not more than fifteen or twenty families.‡ In addition to all the other calamities, with which these * Prince's Chron. p. 209, 210. + Ibid. p. 242. Ibid. part ii. p. 1 and 31. plantations had been visited, they, this year, experienced Book I. the distress of famine. By the beginning of February, bread failed in every house, except the governor's, and even in this the family were reduced to the last loaves. Such were the necessities of the people, that they fed on clams, muscles, ground-nuts, and acorns. Indeed, in the winter season, it was with great difficulty that the people procured these poor articles of subsistence. The governors foreseeing, in the fall, that they should want provisions, dispatched a ship to Ireland to procure them a supply. Her happy arrival on the 5th of February, prevented their perishing with famine. The return of health in the spring, the arrival of other vessels, with provisions, afterwards, and a plenteous harvest, gave the affairs of the colony a more prosperous appearance. While affairs were thus transacting in the colony, the violent persecution of the puritans in England made great numbers look towards America as the only safe retreat from the impending storm. This, annually, occasioned a large accession of new planters to the settlements in NewEngland. In 1630, the Rev. Mr. Thomas Hooker, a gentleman of great abilities, and a famous preacher, at Chelmsford, in the county of Essex, was silenced for non-conformity. To escape fines and imprisonment, he fled into Holland. He was held in such high and universal esteem among his acquaintance, that forty-seven ministers, in his vicinity, petitioned the bishop of London in his favour. These were all conformists, and witnessed for Mr. Hooker, that they esteemed him, and knew him "to be, for doctrine orthodox, for life and conversation honest, for disposition peaceable, and no wise turbulent or factious." However, as he was a non-conformist, no personal or acquired excellencies, no testimonials of his good conduct, nor prayers of his friends, could save him from prosecutions and deposition. He was so esteemed as a preacher, that not only his own people, but others, from all parts of the county of Essex, flocked to hear him. The noble earl of Warwick, though he resided at a great distance from Chelmsford, was so delighted with his public performances, that he frequently attended them. Great numbers not only attended his ministry, but experienced its salutary effects, and found themselves willing to emigrate into any part of the world, to enjoy the happiness of such a pastor. No sooner, therefore, was he driven from them, than they turned their eyes towards New-England. They hoped that, if comfortable settlements could be made in this part of America, they D 1632. Book . might obtain him for their pastor. Therefore, in 1632, a large body of them came over and settled at Newtown, since called Cambridge, in Massachusetts. Numbers of them, it seems, came over at an earlier period, and began to settle at Weymouth, but, this year, they all removed to Newtown. They had expressed their earnest desires to Mr. Hooker, that he would come over into New-England, and take the pastoral charge of them. Mr. Hook 1633. At their desire he left Holland, and having obtained Mr. er arrives, Samuel Stone, a lecturer at Torcester, in NorthamptonSept. 4th, shire, for an assistant in the ministry, took his passage for America in the Griffin, a ship of 300 tons, and arrived at Boston, Sept. 4th, 1633. With him came over the famous Mr. John Cotton, Mr. John Haynes, afterwards governor of Connecticut, Mr. Goff, and two hundred other passengers, of importance to the colony. 1633. Messrs. and Stone Oct. 11th, 1633. Mr. Hooker, soon after his arrival at Boston, proceeded to Newtown, where, finding himself in the midst of a joyful and affectionate people, he was filled with joy himself. He embraced them with open arms, saying, in the language of the apostle, "Now I live, if ye stand fast in the Lord."* These were the pious people who afterwards settled the town of Hartford. Soon after Mr. Hooker's arrival, he was chosen pastor, and Mr. Stone teacher of the people at Newtown. On the 11th of October the church was gathered, and, after solemn fasting and prayer, the pastor and teacher were ordained to their respective offices. The church at Watertown, had Mr. Phil- been gathered before, on the 27th of August, 1630, and Mr. lips ordain- Phillips ordained pastor. Thus, the three churches of Windsor, Hartford, and Weathersfield, were gathered anAug. 27th, tecedently to their settlement in Connecticut, and it does 1630. not appear that they were ever re-gathered afterwards. ed at Wa tertown, * Magnalia B. III. The Life of Hooker. BOOK I. CHAPTER II. The patent of Connecticut. The situation, extent, bounda ries, and area of the settled part of the colony. The discovery of Connecticut river; a description of it, and the signification of its name. The colony derives its name from the river. Description of other rivers. Plymouth and Dutch houses. Prospects of trade upon the river. T HE great Plymouth company wished to make grants of their lands as fast as they could find purchasers; and conformity was so pressed, and the times grew so difficult in England, that men of quality, as well as others, were anxious to provide, for themselves and their friends, a retreat in America. Another patent, therefore, containing a large tract of country in New-England, soon succeeded that of Massachusetts. 1631. On the 19th of March, 1631, Robert, earl of Warwick, Old patent president of the council of Plymouth, under his hand and of Conseal, did grant and confirm unto the honourable William necticut, Viscount Say and Seal, Robert Lord Brooks, Robert Lord Rich, Charles Fiennes, Esq. Sir Nathaniel Rich, Sir Richard Saltonstall, and others, to the number of eleven, and to their heirs, assigns, and associates, for ever," All that part of New-England, in America, which lies and extends itself from a river there, called Narraganset river, the space of forty leagues upon a strait line near the sea shore, towards the south-west, west and by south, or west as the coast lieth towards Virginia, accounting three English miles to the league, and all and singular the lands and hereditaments whatsoever, lying and being within the bounds aforesaid, north and south in latitude and breadth, and in length and longitude of, and within all the breadth aforesaid, throughout all the main lands there, from the western ocean to the south seas; and all lands, grounds, soil, wood and wood lands, ground, havens, ports, creeks and rivers, waters, fishings and hereditaments whatsoever, lying within the said space, and every part and parcel thereof; and also, all islands lying in America aforesaid, in the said seas, or either of them, on the western or eastern coasts, or parts of the said tracts of land, by these presents to be given or granted."* The council of Plymouth, the preceding year. 1630, granted this whole tract to the earl of Warwick, and it had been confirmed to him by a patent from king Charles the first. See this patent in the Appendix, No. 1. Book I. Extent of necticut patent. This is the original patent of Connecticut. The settlers of the two colonies of Connecticut and New-Haven were the patentees of Viscount Say and Seal, lord Brook, and their associates, to whom the patent was originally given. President Clap describes the extent of the tract, conveythe Con- ed by this patent, in the words following: "All that part of New-England which lies west from Narraganset river, a hundred and twenty miles on the sea coast; and from thence, in latitude and breadth aforesaid, to the south sea. This grant extends from Point Judith, to New-York; and from thence, in a west line to the south sea: and if we take Narraganset river in its whole length, this tract will extend as far north as Worcester: it comprehends the whole of the colony of Connecticut, and much more."* Neal, Douglass, Hutchinson,† and all ancient historians and writers, have represented all the New-England grants as extending west from the Atlantic ocean to the south sea. Indeed the words of the patent are most express, declaring its extent to be south west or west, towards Virginia, to be in length and longitude throughout all the main lands to the south 1631. sea. The colony of the Massachusetts, and the commissioners of the united colonies of New-England, understood the patents in this light, and hence extended their claims to the westward of the Dutch settlements. The Massachusetts, in the year 1659, made a grant of lands, opposite to fort Aurania, upon Hudson's river, to a number of principal merchants, in the colony, who were planning to make settlements in those parts. The same year, the commissioners of the united colonies asserted their claim of all the western lands to the south sea. In a letter to the Dutch governor, September 1st, 1659, they write, "We presume you have heard from your people of the fort of Aurania, that some of our people, the English, have been lately in those parts, upon discovery of some meet places for plantations, within the bounds of the patent of the Massachusetts colony; which from the latitude of 42 degrees and a half, or 42 degrees and 33 and a half minutes, and so northerly, extends itself from east to west, in longitude through the main land of America, from the Atlantic ocean to the south or west sea." The patents to Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia, have ever been understood to have the same westerly ex* Manuscripts of president Clap. + Neal's history N. E. vol. i. p. 148. Douglass, vol. ii. p. 90 and 160; and Hutchinson vol. i. p. 64 and vol. ii. p. 203. Hutchinson vol. i. p. 159. |