[652] [Block, in 1614, had been the first to explore the river for the Dutch; and both O’Callaghan (New Netherland, i. 169) and Brodhead (New York, i. 235) set forth the prior right of the Dutch; cf. N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., vi. 368.—Ed.]
[653] [Roger Wolcott celebrated Winthrop’s agency in London, in 1662, in a long poem, which was printed in Wolcott’s Poetical Meditations, London, 1725, and in Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. Cf. Carter-Brown Catalogue, iii. 369; Brinley Catalogue, no. 2,134.—Ed.]
[654] It had been printed by Trumbull in 1797, in the Appendix to the first edition of his History, i. 528-533; and is repeated in the second edition, 1818; cf. Dr. J. H. Trumbull’s Historical Notes on the Constitutions of Connecticut, 1639-1878, published in 1873. Hinman published a collection of Letters of the Kings of England to the Successive Governors (1635-1749).
[655] Douglass’s Summary, ii. 160; Neal’s New England, 2d ed., i. 163; Trumbull’s 2d ed. 1818, i. 21; Hubbard, p. 310.
[656] Trumbull, i. 28, from manuscripts of President Clap. This old Connecticut patent has always been a mystery. Some of the colonists of the Winthrop emigration to Massachusetts in 1630 were unfavorably impressed on their arrival with the place selected for a plantation. The sad mortality of the preceding winter was appalling, and they began to cast their thoughts on a more southerly spot than Massachusetts Bay. In a letter of John Humfrey, written from London, Dec. 9, 1636, in reply to one just received from his brother-in-law, Isaac Johnson, from the colony, he says, in speaking of Mr. Downing: “He is the only man for Council that is heartily ours in the town; and yet, unless you settle upon a good river and in a less snowy and cold place, I can see no great edge on him to come unto us.” Further on he says, “My Lord of Warwick will take a patent of that place you writ of for himself, and so we may be bold to do there as if it were our own.” (4 Mass. Hist. Coll., vi. 3, 4.) No further hint is given as to the location of Warwick’s intended grant, and we have no contemporaneous record of any patent having been taken by him at this time or later. The Earl was a great friend of the Puritans. It was through him that the Massachusetts patent was obtained; and the patent to the people of Plymouth was signed by him alone, but in the name of the Council, and sealed with their seal.
The title to Connecticut was contested. On the grand division of 1635, James, Marquis, afterward Duke, of Hamilton, received for his share the territory between the Connecticut and Narragansett rivers, and a copy of his feoffment was cited by Chalmers, as on record bearing date April 22, 1635, that being the date which all the grants of that final division bore. From a copy on the Connecticut files Mr. R. R. Hinman, Secretary of State, published the deed in a volume of ancient documents, at Hartford, in 1836. On the Restoration the heirs of the Duke, in a petition to the King, asked to “be restored to their just right,” and their claim was, in 1664, laid by the King’s commissioners before the Connecticut authorities. These in their answer set up, in the first place, the prior grant of Lord Say and Sele and others, which Connecticut, as they alleged, had “purchased at a dear rate,” and which had been recently ratified and confirmed by the King in their new charter; then, secondly, a conquest from the natives; and, thirdly, they claimed thirty years’ peaceable possession (Trumbull, i. 524, 530). At a period still later, the Earl of Arran, a grandson, applied to King William for a hearing; and when in a formal manner several patents were exhibited on the part of Connecticut, the Earl’s final reply was, “that when they produced a grant from the Plymouth Council to the Earl of Warwick, it should have an answer.” (Chalmers, pp. 299-301; Trumbull, i. 524.)
Some entries in the recently recovered records of the Council for New England tend to deepen the suspicion that the Earl of Warwick never received the alleged grant from that body. It is true that the records as preserved are not entire, and do not cover the year 1630, and for the year 1631 they begin at November 4. But some later entries are very significant. Under date of June 21, 1632, which is three months after the date of the grant to Lord Say and Sele and associates, is this entry: “The Secretary is to bring, against the next meeting, a rough draft in paper of a patent for the E. of Warwick, from the river of the Narrigants 10 leagues westward. Sir Ferd. Gorges will forthwith give particular directions for the said patent.” At the next meeting, June 26, “The rough draft of a patent for the E. of Warwick was now read. His Lordship, upon hearing the same, gave order that the grant should be unto Rob. Lord Rich and his associates, A, B, etc. And it was agreed by the Council that the limits of the said patent should be 30 English miles westward, and 50 miles into the land northward, provided that it did not prejudice any other patent formerly granted.” A committee was appointed to take further order respecting this patent, and there is no evidence that it was ever perfected or issued. This proposed grant, it will be seen, covered in part the same territory previously included in the grant above cited to Lord Say, Lord Brook, Lord Rich, and others by the Earl of Warwick himself.
Three days afterward some very singular orders were adopted by the Council, indicating that there had been a serious disagreement with the Earl, or that a feeling akin to suspicion, of which the Earl was the object, had found a lodgment in that body. The Earl being president, the meetings for some years had been held at “Warwick House in Holborne.” At a meeting on the 29th of June, at which the Earl was not present, “It was agreed that the E. of Warwick should be entreated to direct a course for finding out what patents have been granted for New England.” (Did not the Council keep a record of their grants?) Also, “The Lord Great Chamberlain and the rest of the Council now present sent their clerk unto the E. of Warwick for the Council’s great seal, it being in his Lordship’s keeping.” Answer was brought that as soon as his man Williams came in he would send it. It was then voted that the meetings of the Council, which for some time, as I have already said, had been held at Warwick House, should hereafter be held at Captain Mason’s House, in Fenchurch Street. But the seal was not then sent, and during the next five months two other formal applications were made for it. In the mean time and thence after the records indicate the Earl’s absence from the meetings, and finally Lord Gorges was chosen President of the Council in his place.
The patent to Lord Say and Sele, it may be added, was never formally transferred to Connecticut. In the agreement of 1644/45 Fenwick conveyed the fort and lands on the river, and promised to convey the jurisdiction of all the lands between Narragansett River and Saybrook Fort, “if it come into his power,”—which he seems never to have done, though the authorities of Connecticut claimed that they had paid him for it. For a long time the Connecticut authorities appear to have had no copy of this patent, for they were often challenged to exhibit it, and were not able to do so; though they say that a copy was shown to the commissioners when the confederation of the colonies was formed,—then of course in the possession of Fenwick; and in 1648 it is referred to as having been recently seen. (Hazard, ii. 120, 123.) A transcript of this patent was found in London by John Winthrop, among the papers of Governor Hopkins, who died there in 1658. See Connecticut Colonial Records, pp. 268, 568, 573, 574.
[657] First edition, vol. i. Appendix v. and vi. See also Ibid., i. 149, 507-510, edition of 1818, with which compare Connecticut Colonial Records, pp. 568, 573, 585.