CHAPTER XVIII

THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION

(1643-1654)

These Dutch settlements brought about a political union of the New England colonies, although the first cause of the New England confederation was the Indian tribes who lay between the Dutch and the English. In August, 1637, during the war with the Pequots, some of the Connecticut magistrates and ministers suggested to the authorities at Boston the expediency of such a measure. The next year Massachusetts submitted a plan of union, but Connecticut demurred because it permitted a mere majority of the federal commissioners to decide questions. Thereupon Massachusetts injected the boundary question into the discussions, and proposed an article not relished by Connecticut, that the Pequot River should be the line between the two jurisdictions.[1 ] Thus the matter lay in an unsettled state till the next year, when jealousy of the Dutch stimulated renewed action.

In 1639 John Haynes, of Connecticut, and Rev. Thomas Hooker came to Boston, and again the plan of a confederation was discussed, but Plymouth and Massachusetts quarrelled over their boundary-line, and the desirable event was once more postponed. Nearly three more years passed, and the founding of a confederacy was still delayed. Then, at a general court held at Boston, September 27, 1642, letters from Connecticut were read "certifying us that the Indians all over the country had combined themselves to cut off all the English."

At this time the war between De la Tour and D'Aulnay was at its height, and the Dutch complaints added to the general alarm. Thus the Connecticut proposition for a league received a more favorable consideration and was referred to a committee "to consider" after the court. At the next general court which met in Boston, May 10, 1643, a compact of confederation in writing was duly signed by commissioners from Plymouth, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Haven.[2 ] The settlement of Gorges and Mason at Piscataqua and the plantations about Narragansett Bay were denied admission into the confederacy—the former "because they ran a different course from us both in their ministry and administration,"[3 ] and the latter because they were regarded as "tumultuous" and "schismatic."

After a preamble setting forth that "we live encompassed with people of several nations and strange languages," that "the savages have of late combined themselves against us," and that "the sad distractions in England prevent the hope of advice and protection," the document states that the contracting parties' object was to maintain "a firm and perpetual league of friendship and amity, for offence and defence, mutual advice and succor upon all just occasions both for preserving and propagating the truth and liberties of the gospel, and for their own mutual safety and walfare." It then declared the name of the new confederation to be "the United Colonies of New England," and in ten articles set out the organization and powers of the federal government. The management was placed in the hands of eight commissioners, two for each colony, "all in church-fellowship with us," who were to hold an annual meeting in each of the colonies by rotation, and to have power by a vote of six "to determine all affairs of war or peace, leagues, aids, charges, and number of men for war, division of spoils, or whatever is gotten by conquest," the admission of new confederates, etc. All public charges were to be paid by contributions levied on the colonies proportioned to the number of inhabitants in each colony between sixteen and sixty; and for this purpose a census was to be taken at stated times by the commissioners. In domestic affairs the federal government was not to interfere, but each colony was guaranteed the integrity of its territory and local jurisdiction.

Two defects were apparent in this constitution: the federal government had no authority to act directly upon individuals, and thus it had no coercive power; the equal number of votes allowed the members of the confederation in the federal council was a standing contradiction of the measure of contribution to the burdens of government. The confederacy contained a population of about twenty-three thousand five hundred souls, of which number fifteen thousand may be assigned to Massachusetts, three thousand each to Connecticut and Plymouth, and two thousand five hundred to New Haven. Massachusetts, with two out of eight commissioners, possessed a population greater than that of the other three colonies combined.

There was really no Indian combination in 1643 against the colonists, but the rivalry between the Narragansetts and the Mohegans gave grounds for uneasiness. After the death of Miantonomoh, under the circumstances already related, the fear of an Indian attack was temporarily removed. But the Narragansetts were grief-stricken over the loss of their chieftain and thought only of revenge upon the hated Uncas and his Indians, at whose door they laid all the blame. To give opportunity for intended operations, they made Gorton and others intermediaries for a complete cession of their country to the king of England in April, 1644. Then, when summoned by the general court of Massachusetts to Boston, Canonicus and Pessacus, the two leading chiefs, pleaded the king's jurisdiction and declined to appear.[4 ] Two envoys sent by the general court in May, 1644, to the wigwam of Canonicus, were compelled to stay out in the rain for two hours before being admitted, and Pessacus, instead of giving them satisfaction, persisted in his threat of hostilities against Uncas, agreeing only not to attack Uncas "till after next planting-time," nor then till after due notice given to the English.[5 ]

The truce did not restrain the Narragansetts, and in the spring of 1645 they attacked the Mohegans and defeated them, and thereupon the federal commissioners, in July, 1645, met at Boston, and upon the refusal of the Narragansetts to make peace with Uncas they made preparations for war. A force of three hundred men was raised, one hundred and ninety from Massachusetts, forty each from Plymouth and Connecticut, and thirty from New Haven.

Upon the question of appointment of a commander-in-chief colonial independence came in conflict with federal supremacy. In 1637 Massachusetts was the champion of the principle that all questions should be decided by a simple majority vote of the commissioners; but now the Massachusetts general court asserted that no appointment of a commander should be valid without their confirmation. The federal commissioners stood stoutly for their rights, and the issue was evaded for a time by the appointment of Major Gibbons, who was a citizen of Massachusetts.

The report of these warlike preparations brought the Narragansetts to terms; but uneasiness still continued, and the subsequent years, though free from bloodshed, were full of rumors and reports of hostilities, compelling frequently the interference of the commissioners in behalf of their friend Uncas. In all these troubles[6 ] the question is not so much the propriety of the particular measures of the federal commissioners as their conduct in making the confederation a party to the disputes of the Indians among themselves. The time finally came when Uncas, "the friend of the white man," was regarded by his former admirers as a hopeless marplot and intriguer.

More commendable were the services of the federal commissioners with the Indians in another particular. One of the professed designs of the charter of Massachusetts was to Christianize the heathen savages, but more than twelve years elapsed after the coming of Winthrop and his colonists before New England was the scene of anything like missionary work. Then the first mission was established in 1643 by Thomas Mayhew at the island of Martha's Vineyard, which was not included in any of the New England governments and was under the jurisdiction of Sir William Alexander. In 1651 Mayhew reported that one hundred and ninety-nine men, women, and children of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket were "worshippers of the great and ever living God."

His example was followed by John Eliot, the minister of Roxbury, in Massachusetts, who learned to speak the Indian tongue, and in 1646 preached to the Indians near Watertown. The Massachusetts general court a week later endorsed the purposes of Eliot by enacting that the church should take care to send two ministers among the Indians every year to make known to them by the help of an interpreter "the heavenly counsel of God." In four years two colonies of Indians were established, one at Nonantum and the other at Concord. But the converts were still under the influence of their sagamores, who were hostile to Eliot's schemes, and in 1651 he removed his Indians to Natick, on the Charles River, where they might be free from all heathenish subjection.

In the mean time, the intelligence of what was taking place was communicated to Edward Winslow, the agent of the colony in England. He brought the matter to the attention of Parliament, and July 19, 1649, an ordinance was passed incorporating "the society for the promoting and propagating of the gospel of Jesus Christ in New England." This society selected the federal commissioners as the managers of the fund which flowed into them from persons charitably inclined, and in seven years the sums which were remitted to New England amounted to more than £1700. The commissioners laid out the money in paying Eliot and Mayhew and other teachers, in printing catechisms in the Indian language, and providing the Indian converts with implements of labor. By 1674 the number of these "praying Indians," as they were called, was estimated at four thousand.[7 ]

The commissioners also rendered many services in the domestic affairs of the colonies. In order to secure the claim which she had advanced in 1637 to the Pequot River as her southern boundary, Massachusetts in 1644 authorized John Winthrop, Jr., to plant a colony on Pequot Bay at a spot called Nameaug, now New London.[8 ] The Connecticut government protested against the authority of Massachusetts, and in 1647 the commissioners decided that "the jurisdiction of the plantation doth and ought to belong to Connecticut."[9 ] This decision, however, only settled the ownership of a particular place, and the exact southern and northern boundaries of Connecticut remained for several years a matter of contention.

In another matter of internal interest the influence of the confederacy was manifested. Among other considerations for the cession of the Saybrook fort, Fenwick was promised the proceeds for the term of ten years of a duty on all corn, biscuit, beaver, and cattle exported from the Connecticut River.[10 ] March 4, 1645, the general court of Connecticut passed an act to carry out their promise; but as the law affected the trade of Springfield on the upper waters of the Connecticut River as much as that of the Connecticut towns, Springfield protested, and appealed to the protection of Massachusetts. Thereupon the general court of that colony lodged a vigorous complaint with the federal commissioners, and the cause was patiently heard by them at two separate meetings. Massachusetts had, doubtless, the right on her side, but the Connecticut contention rested on what was international usage at the time.

The result of the deliberation of the commissioners was a decision in July, 1647, in favor of Connecticut. This was far from satisfying Massachusetts, and she reopened the question in September, 1648. To enforce her arguments, she offered certain amendments to the confederation, which, if adopted, would have shorn the commissioners of pretty nearly all their authority. But the commissioners stood firm, and declared that "they found not sufficient cause to reverse what was done last year."[11 ]

Feeling on both sides had now become quite embittered. At a special meeting of the federal commissioners in July, 1649, Massachusetts renewed her objections, and during the discussions her commissioners produced an order,[12 ] passed two months before by their general court, which, reciting the decision against Springfield, laid a tax upon all articles imported to Boston from any one of the other three confederate colonies, or exported to them from "any part of the Bay." This proceeding was justly interpreted by the federal commissioners to mean not only a retaliation upon Connecticut for the Saybrook tax, but a punishment upon the other two colonies—Plymouth and New Haven—for taking her side in the court of the confederation.

The commissioners acted with dignified firmness, and forwarded to Massachusetts a remonstrance in which they pointedly desired "to be spared in all further agitations concerning Springfield."[13 ] Massachusetts reluctantly yielded and the next year repealed her impost,[14 ] while Connecticut continued to tax the trade of Springfield till the ten years expired. Whether the tax imposed by Connecticut was right or not, Massachusetts had, nevertheless, gone dangerously near to nullification in these proceedings.

Not less interesting is the history of the dealings of the commissioners with the French and Dutch. Encouraged by the favor which had been extended to him in Massachusetts, De la Tour arrived in person in Boston, June 12, 1643, to crave assistance against D'Aulnay, his rival. As, notwithstanding the French king's order of the previous year, he showed a commission from the vice-admiral of France which styled him as lieutenant-general of Acadia, Governor Winthrop, influenced by the merchants of Boston, whose cupidity was excited by the valuable fur trade of Acadia, permitted him to hire both men and shipping in Massachusetts. When his preparations were completed he sailed away, accompanied by a fleet of four ships and a pinnace, the property of two intimate friends of the governor—Major Gibbons and Captain Hawkins—the latter of whom went along in charge of the Puritan contingent.[15 ]

In permitting this expedition Winthrop not only violated the articles of confederation and the laws of neutrality, but exposed himself to the reproach of Endicott and some of the more straitlaced elders, that he consorted with "idolators" and "antichrists," as Puritans chose to call Roman Catholics. It seems that Winthrop and his Boston friends did not intend to do more than to restore De la Tour to St. Johns, which D'Aulnay was then besieging. But the original wrong had its natural result. When D'Aulnay saw his rival's formidable fleet approaching he promptly raised the blockade and made haste to get under the protection of his stronghold at Port Royal. De la Tour followed and attacked, and, though he failed to dislodge his enemy, with the assistance of the Boston men he killed several of D'Aulnay's soldiers, burned his mill, and did much other damage.

After this, while D'Aulnay went to France to get fresh orders from the king against his rival, De la Tour came to Massachusetts in May, 1644, in hopes of again interesting the Puritans there in his fortunes. But John Endicott had been elected governor in the place of Winthrop, and all the cheer De la Tour could get in return for permitting free-trade was the promise of a letter addressed to D'Aulnay urging peace with De la Tour and protesting against the capture of Massachusetts' trading vessels.[16 ]

In September, 1644, the federal commissioners met at Hartford, and showed dislike of the conduct of ex-Governor Winthrop by passing a resolution to the effect that "no jurisdiction within this confederation shall permit any voluntaries to go forth in a warlike way against any people whatever without order and direction of the commissioners of the other jurisdictions." In the mean while, D'Aulnay came back from France with fresh orders from the king for the arrest of De la Tour, and in October, 1644, sent to Boston an envoy with the new credentials. The Massachusetts authorities were reluctant to abandon De la Tour, but seeing no alternative they made a treaty for free-trade, subject to confirmation by the federal commissioners.[17 ]

Still the ties that bound the Boston merchants to De la Tour were not wholly dissolved even now. They gave an asylum to De la Tour's wife at Boston, and sent her with supplies to his fort at Port Royal; and when the fort succumbed under D'Aulnay's attack they fitted her husband out with a ship and truck for trading. At last De la Tour's dealings thoroughly opened their eyes. When the ship came to Cape Sable, De la Tour and his Frenchmen suddenly arose against the English crew, put them out in the woods, and seized and appropriated the vessel and cargo. Prominent among those who had lent money and influence to De la Tour was Major Edward Gibbons, who lost upward of £2500.

D'Aulnay retaliated and took a ship belonging to Massachusetts, and in September, 1646, a new treaty was made with him by envoys representing the confederacy. The English made a formal acknowledgment of error, and the French accepted in full satisfaction a present to D'Aulnay of a sedan-chair, which had been sent as a present by the viceroy of Mexico to his sister, but was captured in the West Indies by Cromwell and given by him to Governor Winthrop.[18 ]

In 1648 the colony of Massachusetts applied to the French officials at Quebec for a reciprocity of trade. As the Iroquois had proved very destructive to the French and their Algonquin and Huron allies, the French governor caught at the plan of granting the desired privileges in return for military aid. Accordingly, in 1650, the French governor, D'Aillebout, sent the Jesuit father Druillettes, who had acted as missionary among the Algonquins of Maine, as envoy to Boston to negotiate a treaty.[19 ] But Massachusetts did not repeat the error of former times, and would do nothing without consent of the federal commissioners. To them, therefore, the matter was referred, with the result that the commissioners declined to involve the confederacy in a war with the Iroquois by authorizing any assistance to be given the French privately or officially.[20 ]

In the relations with the Dutch the temperate and conservative force in the confederacy was Massachusetts, who took steady ground for peace and opposed hostile measures. In doing so, however, she went the whole length of nullification and almost broke up the confederacy. William Kieft, the governor of New Netherland (1637-1647), seemed to recognize at once the significance of the confederacy as well as the importance of making friends with Massachusetts; and in July, 1643, before the commissioners had time to hold their first meeting, he wrote a letter of congratulations to Governor Winthrop, which he loaded, however, with complaints against Connecticut for intruding upon the land of the Dutch fort at Hartford. Governor Winthrop in reply assured Kieft that the influence of Massachusetts would be on the side of peace, for that "the ground of difference being only a small parcel of land" was a matter of too small value to cause a breach between two people so nearly related as the Dutch and English.

When the federal commissioners met in September they showed a hostile spirit, and addressed vehement letters to the Swedish and Dutch on account of their "foul injuries" offered the New Haven settlers on the Delaware. In March, 1644, letters came from the Swedes and Dutch full of expressions of regard for the English and "particularly for Massachusetts." They promised to refrain from interfering with visitors who should bring authority from the commissioners, which so encouraged some Boston merchants that they sent to the Delaware a pinnace to search for a great lake reported to be its source. But when they arrived at the Delaware, the Swedish and Dutch governors, while telling the captain that he might go up the river as far as he chose, prohibited him from any trafficking with the Indians, which caused the return of the pinnace to Boston. After this the war which Kieft provoked with the Indians so occupied the Dutch that for two years they had no time to give attention to their English neighbors. So hard pressed were they that, instead of making further reclamations on New Haven, they earnestly but unsuccessfully solicited her aid. After great losses to both the Dutch and the Indians the Mohawks intervened as arbitrators, and brought about a peace in September, 1645.[21 ]

In 1646 the men of New Haven set up a trading-house near the mouth of the Housatonic, and thereupon Kieft wrote to the commissioners, who met at New Haven in April, 1646, a blustering letter of which the following is a good sample: "We protest against all you commissioners met at the Red Mount (New Haven) as against breakers of the common league, and also infringers of the rights of the lords, the states, our superiors, in that you have dared, without our express and especial consent, to hold your general meeting within the limits of New Netherland."[22 ] At the close of Kieft's administration in 1647 the whole province of New Netherland could furnish not more than three hundred fighting-men and contained a population of not more than two thousand. Compared with the population of New England these figures seem insignificant enough, and render highly improbable the story popular with some New England historians that the Dutch were enlisted in a great scheme of uprooting the English colonies.

In 1647 Peter Stuyvesant was sent over as governor. He had the sense to see that the real safety of the Dutch consisted not in bluster, but in settling a line between the possessions of the two nations as soon as possible. The charter of the West India Company called for the territory between forty and forty-five degrees north latitude, but to assert the full extent of the patent would have been to claim the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. Accordingly, Stuyvesant, soon after his arrival, addressed a letter to Governor Winthrop, asserting the Dutch claim to all the land between the Connecticut and Delaware and proposing a conference. But it is evident that in claiming the Connecticut he was actuated more by a hope of deterring the further aggressions of English settlers than otherwise. The federal commissioners returned a polite reply, but showed no anxiety to come to an accommodation. Soon after a fresh quarrel broke out with New Haven, and in March, 1648, Stuyvesant wrote to the governor of Massachusetts offering to submit to him and the governor of Plymouth the matter in dispute. He then wrote home for instructions, and as diplomatic relations between England and Holland were suspended, the West India Company bade him make such terms as he could with his English neighbors.[23 ]

Accordingly, in September, 1650, Stuyvesant visited Hartford while the federal commissioners were in session there. The discussions were carried on in writing, and Stuyvesant dated his letter at "New Netherland." The federal commissioners declined to receive this letter, and Stuyvesant changed the address to "Connecticut." This proving satisfactory to the commissioners, Stuyvesant set out his territorial claim and the imputed wrongs suffered by the Dutch from the English, and the federal commissioners rejoined in a similar manner. Then Stuyvesant proposed to refer the question in dispute to four arbitrators, all Englishmen, two to be appointed by himself and two by the federal commissioners.

The offer was accepted, and after a full hearing by these arbitrators, Thomas Willet, George Baxter, Simon Bradstreet, and Thomas Prince, declined to decide upon the wrongs complained of by either party and rendered an award upon the territorial question only. They decided that the Dutch should retain their fort on the Connecticut, and that the boundary should begin at a point on the west side of Greenwich Bay, about four miles from Stamford, and run due north twenty miles. From that point it should be extended as the Dutch and New Haven might agree, provided that the line should not come nearer the Hudson River than ten miles. The English obtained most of Long Island besides, for in that quarter the line was declared to be a meridian drawn through the westernmost part of Oyster Bay.[24 ] If these terms subjected Stuyvesant to severe criticism at New Amsterdam, it was really a stroke of statesmanship to obtain, even at a sacrifice, what was for the first time an international barrier to English intrusion.

The southern flank of New Netherland was left unprotected, and in 1651 New Haven once more endeavored to plant a colony on the Delaware. The failure of the former attempt bore heavily upon the wealthy merchants of the town, and they had ill luck in another adventure. In January, 1646, they sent an agent to England to solicit a charter from the English government. The ship in which he sailed carried seventy other prominent citizens of the place and a cargo valued at £5000. A great storm ensued after the ship's departure and she was lost at sea.[25 ] So disheartening was this misfortune that many at New Haven entertained the idea of removing to the West Indies or Ireland.

Now, in 1651, under a commission from Governor Eaton, fifty men from New Haven prepared to sail for the Delaware.[26 ] Their ship touched at New Amsterdam, and Stuyvesant arrested both passengers and officers, and only released them on their promise to return home. The adventurers appealed to the commissioners, and these officials wrote a letter to Stuyvesant protesting against his course.[27 ]

Next year war broke out between Holland and England, and the war spirit spread to this side of the ocean. Rumors got afloat that the Dutch and Indians had conspired against the English, and Connecticut and New Haven became hysterical for war; while Rhode Island commissioned John Underhill, lately escaped from the Dutch, to take all Dutch vessels he could find.[28 ] Stuyvesant indignantly denied the charge of conspiring with the Indians, and proposed to refer the examination of the facts to any impartial tribunal. Nevertheless, all the old complaints were revived.

In 1652 the federal commissioners resolved on hostilities,[29 ] but the Massachusetts general court, which had all along taken a position in favor of peace, refused to be bound by a vote of six commissioners representing Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven.[30 ] On the other hand, the commissioners of the three smaller colonies protested against the conduct of the court of Massachusetts as violating the confederation.[31 ] New Haven and Connecticut took measures to wage war on their own account,[32 ] and in April, 1654, Connecticut sequestered the Dutch fort at Hartford.[33 ]

When, in June, 1654, a fleet despatched by Cromwell, in response to appeals made to him, appeared in Boston harbor, Connecticut and New Haven were overjoyed, and proceeded with alacrity to make arrangements for an attack on the hated Dutch. Massachusetts refused to raise troops, although she gave her citizens privilege to enlist if they chose. Yet her policy of peace prevailed in the end, for before the preparations described could be completed a stop was put to them by the news that a treaty of peace had been signed between England and Holland April 5, 1654.[34 ]

Massachusetts had successfully nullified the plain provisions of the articles, and for a time it looked as if the dissolution of the confederacy would be the consequence. New Haven voted at first not to choose commissioners, but finally decided to do so,[35 ] and meetings of the commissioners went on apparently as before. Nevertheless, the effect of the action of Massachusetts was far-reaching—from that time the respective colonies diverged more and more, till the hope of a permanent intercolonial bond vanished.