** Edward Winslow was born in Worcestershire, England, in 1594. While traveling on the Continent, he became acquainted with Mr. Robinson at Leyden, joined his congregation, sailed to America in the May Flower, and was one of the party that first landed on Plymouth Rock. He made Massasoit a second visit, and found the sachem very sick, but by means of medicine restored him to health. Grateful for his services, the chief revealed to Winslow a plot of some savages to destroy a small English settlement at Weymouth. Winslow went to England that fall, and in the spring brought over the first cattle introduced into the colony. He was appointed governor in 1633. He was very active in the colony, and made several voyages to England in its behalf. In 1655 he was appointed one of the commissioners to superintend the expedition against the Spaniards in the West Indies. He died of fever on his passage, between Jamaica and Hispaniola, May 8th, 1655, aged sixty years. His body was cast into the ocean.
*** Miles Standish is called the "Hero of New England." He served for some time in the English army in the Netherlands, and settled with Robinson's congregation at Leyden. He was not a member of the Church—"never entered the school of Christ, or of John the Baptist." He came to America in the May Flower, and was appointed military commander-in-chief at Plymouth. His bold enterprises spread terror among the Indians, and secured peace to the colony. In allusion to his exploit in killing Pecksnot, a bold chief, with his own hand, Mr. Robinson wrote to the governor, "O that you had converted some before you killed any!" Standish was one of the magistrates of the colony as long as he lived. Ho died at Duxbury in 1656, aged about seventy-two years.
**** The Peninsula of Shawmut included between six and seven hundred acres of land sparsely covered by trees, and nearly divided by two creeks into three islands when the creeks were filled by the tides. From the circumstance of the three hills, the English called the peninsula Tri-mountain, the modern Tremont. These three eminences have since been named Copp's, Fort, and Beacon Hills. The name of Tri-mountain was changed to Boston, as a compliment to the Rev. John Cotton, who emigrated from Boston, in Lincolnshire, England.
Settlement of Endicott and others at Salem.—Arrival of Winthrop.—Founding of Boston.—Progress of free Principles
In 1628 a company, under John Endicott, settled at Salem (Na-nm-keag), and were joined by a few emigrants at Cape Ann, sixteen miles northward. They received a charter from the king, and were incorporated by the name of the "Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England."
In 1630 about three hundred Puritan families, under John Winthrop, arrived, and joined the Massachusetts Bay colony. They established themselves at Dorchester, Roxbury, Watertown, and Cambridge. A spring of pure and wholesome water induced some families, among whom was Mr. Winthrop, to settle upon Shawmut. Winthrop was the chosen Governor of the colony of Massachusetts Bay; the whole government, including Plymouth, was removed to the new settlement, and thenceforth Boston became the metropolis of New England.
I have thus traced, with almost chronological brevity, the rise of the Puritans in England, their emigration to America, and the progress of settlement, to the founding of Boston in 1630. It is not within the scope of this work to give a colonial history of New England in all its important details, and only so much of it will be developed as is necessary to present the links of connection between the early history and the story of our Revolution. That Revolution, being a conflict of principle, had its origin more remote even than the planting of the New England colonies. The seed germinated when the sun of the Reformation warmed the cold soil of society in Europe, over which the clouds of ignorance had so long brooded; and its blossoms were unfolded when the Puritans of England and the Huguenots of France boldly asserted, in the presence of kingly power, the grand postulate of freedom—the social and political equality of the race. These two sections of independent thinkers brought the vigorous plant to America—the Puritans to New England, the Huguenots to the Carolinas. The Covenanters of Scotland, and other dissenting communities, watered it during the reigns of the Charleses and the bigot James II.; and when the tactics of British oppression had changed from religious persecution to commercial and political tyranny, it had grown a sturdy tree, firmly rooted in a genial soil, and overshadowing a prosperous people with its beautiful foliage. The fruit of that tree was the American Revolution—the fruit which still forms the nutriment that gives life and vigor to our free institutions. * 1