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.