Kent Island seized by Calvert.
It was in December, 1637, during Harvey's second administration, that the Kent Island troubles were renewed. After Claiborne's victorious fight at Great Wighcocomoco, in May, 1635, he retained undisturbed possession of the island, but a quarrel was now brewing between himself and his London partners, Clobery & Company. They were dissatisfied because furs did not come in quantities sufficient to repay their advances to Claiborne. The disputes with the Marylanders had sadly damaged the business, and the partners sent over George Evelin to look after their interests, and armed him with power of attorney. They requested Claiborne to turn over to him the island, with everything on it, and to come to London and settle accounts. Claiborne tried to get a bond from Evelin not to surrender the island to Calvert, but that agent refused to give any assurances, except to express in strong language his belief that Calvert had no just claim to it. Nothing was left for Claiborne but to leave Evelin in possession. He did so under protest, and in May, 1637, sailed for England, where Clobery & Company immediately brought suit against him. Evelin then went to Virginia and attached all of Claiborne's property that he could find. Presently, whether from policy or from conviction, he changed his views as to the ownership of Kent Island and invited Leonard Calvert to come and take it. After some hesitation, in December, 1637, Calvert occupied the premises with forty or fifty armed men and appointed Evelin commandant of the island. Forthwith so many people were arrested for debts owed to Clobery & Company that an insurrection ensued, and in February, 1638, Calvert had to come over again and enforce his authority. Among his prisoners taken in December was Thomas Smith, the victor in the fight at Great Wighcocomoco, who was now tried for piracy and hanged, while the Maryland assembly passed a bill of attainder against Claiborne, and all his accessible property was seized for the benefit of Lord Baltimore's treasury.
Decision is given against Claiborne.
Soon afterward the final and crushing blow was dealt in London. A Board of Commissioners for the Plantations had lately been created there, a germ that in later years was to develop into the well-known body commonly called the Lords of Trade. To this board the dispute over Kent Island had been referred, and the decision was rendered in April, 1638. In the decision the claims of Virginia were ignored, and the matter was treated like a personal dispute between Claiborne and Lord Baltimore. The latter had a grant of sovereignty under the seal of England, the former had merely a trading license under the seal of Scotland, and this could not be pleaded in bar of the greater claim. Kent Island was thus adjudged to Lord Baltimore. Crestfallen but not yet conquered, the sturdy Claiborne returned to Virginia to await the turn of Fortune's wheel.
Puritans in Virginia.
In curious ways the march of events was tending in Claiborne's favour. At first sight there is no obvious connection between questions of religion and the ownership of a small wooded island, but it would be difficult to name any kind of quarrel to which the Evil One has not contrived to give a religious colouring. By the year 1638 the population of Virginia had come to contain more than 1,000 Puritans, or about seven per cent. of the whole. They had begun coming to Virginia in 1611 with Sir Thomas Dale, whose friend, the Rev. Alexander Whitaker, the famous "Apostle of Virginia," was a staunch Puritan, son of an eminent Puritan divine who was Master of St. John's College, Cambridge. The general reader, who thinks of Whitaker correctly as a minister of the Church of England, must not forget that in 1611 the Puritans had not separated from the Established Church, but were striving to reform it from within. As yet there were few Separatists, save the Pilgrims who had fled to Holland three years before. The first considerable separation of Puritans occurred when the colony of Massachusetts Bay was founded in 1629. The great gulf between Puritans and Churchmen was dug by the Civil War, and the earliest date when it becomes strictly proper to speak of "Dissenters" is 1662, when the first parliament of Charles II. passed the Act of Uniformity. In the earliest days of Virginia, Puritan Churchmen were common there. When in 1617 the good Whitaker was drowned in James River, he was succeeded by George Keith, who was also a Puritan.[143] Under the administration of Sandys and Southampton many came. Their chief settlements were south of James River, at first in Isle of Wight County and afterwards in Nansemond. Among their principal leaders were Richard Bennett, son of a wealthy London merchant and afterwards governor of Virginia, and Daniel Gookin, noted for his bravery in the Indian massacre of 1622.
Act of Uniformity, 1631.
Puritan ministers from New England.
New Act of Uniformity, 1643.
An act of the assembly in 1631 prescribed "that there be a uniformity throughout this colony both in substance and circumstances to the canons and constitution of the Church of England." This legislation probably reveals the hand of William Laud, who had three years before become bishop of London; and it may be taken to indicate that a large majority of Virginians had come to disapprove of Puritanism. Probably the act was not vigorously enforced, for Governor Harvey seems to have looked with favour upon Puritans, but it may have caused some of their pastors to quit the colony. In 1641 an appeal for more ministers was sent to Boston, and in response three clergymen—William Thompson of Braintree, John Knowles of Watertown, and Thomas James of New Haven—sailed from Narragansett Bay in December, 1642. Their little ship was wrecked at Hell Gate and their welcome from the Dutch at Manhattan was but surly; nevertheless they were able to procure a new ship, and so, after a wintry voyage of eleven weeks, arrived in James River.[144] They brought excellent letters of recommendation from Governor Winthrop to the governor of Virginia, but might as well have thrown them into the fire, for the new governor of Virginia, who arrived in 1642, was the famous Sir William Berkeley, a Cavalier of Cavaliers, a firm believer in the methods of Strafford and Laud, an implacable foe of Puritanism and all its advocates. At the next meeting of the assembly, in March, 1643, the following act was passed: "For the preservation of the purity of doctrine and unity of the Church, it is enacted that all ministers whatsoever, which shall reside in the colony, are to be conformed to the orders and constitution of the Church of England, and not otherwise to be admitted to teach or preach publicly or privately, and that the Governor and Council do take care that all non-conformists, upon notice of them, shall be compelled to depart the colony with all convenience."[145]