The records of the two colonies show the ample provision made for public schools, and indicate a project entertained by New Haven as early as 1648 to found a college,—a scheme not consummated, however, till a later period.
The Winthrop charter of 1662, which united the two colonies, is in Hazard, ii. 597, taken from a printed volume of Charters, London, 1766. It had been printed at New London in 1750, in a volume of Acts and Laws, and is in a volume by Samuel Lucas, London, 1850. The charter bears date April 23, 1662. In an almanac of John Winthrop, the younger, for the year 1662, once temporarily in my possession, and now belonging to the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, I noticed this manuscript note of the former owner, which I copied: “This day, May 10, in the afternoon, the Patent for Connecticut was sealed.” The orders, instructions, and correspondence relating to the procuring of this charter are printed in the Colonial Records, text and Appendix, and in Trumbull, vol. i., text and Appendix.[667]
The Restoration brought its anxieties as well as its blessings. The story of the shelter afforded to the regicides Whalley and Goffe, by New Haven, is an interesting episode. Dr. Stiles’s volume, A History of the Three Judges [including Colonel Dixwell] of King Charles I., etc. (Hartford, 1794), is a minute collection of facts, though not always carefully weighed and analyzed.[668]
The granting of the royal charter of 1662, which was followed next year by that to Rhode Island, brought on the long controversy with that colony as to the eastern boundary of Connecticut; and the revival of the claim of the heirs of the Duke of Hamilton—a claim more easily disposed of—added to the annoyances. The papers relating to these controversies may be seen in the Colonial Records of Connecticut, ii. 526-554, and of Rhode Island, ii. 70-75, 128.[669]
After the union, the earliest printed Book of General Laws for the People within the Jurisdiction of Connecticut was in 1673,—the code established the year before. It was printed at Cambridge.[670]
COLONIAL SECRETARIES.
[These secretaries held office consecutively: Steele, 1636-39; Hopkins, 1639-40; Wells, 1640-48; Cullick, 1648-58; Clark, 1658-63; Allyn, 1663-65.—Ed.]
The authorities for the history of Philip’s War—so disastrous to Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Rhode Island, but from which “Connecticut,” says Trumbull, “had suffered nothing in comparison with her sister colonies”—have already been given under the head of “Massachusetts.” Without citing special documents, it may be said that Trumbull’s History of Connecticut and Palfrey’s New England furnish abundant authority from this time down to the conclusion of the government of New England under Andros, and the narrative of each may be referred to as fitting, ample, and trustworthy. Trumbull’s History, as an original authority, may well compare for Connecticut with Hutchinson’s History for Massachusetts. The first volume (1630-1713) was published in 1797; and, although the titlepage to it reads “Vol. I.,” the author says in the Preface to vol. ii., first printed in 1818 (1713-1764), that he never had any design of publishing another volume. The first volume was reprinted in 1818 as a companion to vol. ii.[671]