Among these, I meet with Josiah Southwick, (whose father and mother, Lawrence and Cassandra, had been of the first that were banished from Boston because of their religion, as hath been said before; and whose brother and sister had been ordered to be sold for bound slaves,) who, having been in Old England, and had found himself obliged notwithstanding the severe law, to return to Boston, was sentenced to be whipped at a cart’s tail, first at Boston, and then at Rocksbury and Dedham, when with out-stretched arms, he said to those who sentenced him, ‘Here is my body; if ye want a further testimony of the Truth I profess, take it, and tear it to pieces; it is freely given up; and for your sentence, I matter it not:’ adding further, ‘it is no more terrifying unto me, than if ye had taken a feather and blown it up in the air, and had said, take heed it hurt thee not: for surely tongue cannot express nor declare the goodness and love of God to his suffering people.’ Then he was stripped and tied to the cart’s tail in Boston, where the hangman scourged him with what vehemency he could. It is remarkable that the whip used for those cruel executions, was not of whip-cord, as those in England, but of dried guts, and every string with three knots at the end, which, being fastened to a stick, the hangman many times laid on with both his hands, which must cause violent torture to the body. But all this cruelty was not able to make Josiah faint; for as he was led through the streets of Boston at the cart’s tail, he sung aloud, and was heard to utter these words: ‘They that know God to be their strength, cannot fear what man can do.’ The same day he was whipped also at Rocksbury, and the next morning, it being very cold, at Dedham, where he was discharged and turned into the wilderness; for so inhuman were these furious New England professors, that they seemed to think that whatever it was, there was nothing done amiss to the Quakers. Nay, it hath happened that being shut up with thieves, and endeavouring to turn them from their wicked lives, they have been ill-treated on that account, and the thieves set at liberty, lest they should turn Quakers.

At Dover, in New England, Anne Coleman, Mary Tomkins, and Alice Ambrose, were sentenced to very cruel whipping, only for being come there: the warrant was as followeth:

‘To the constables of Dover, Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Rowley, Ipswich, Wennam, Linn, Boston, Roxbury, Dedham, and until these vagabond Quakers are carried out of this jurisdiction.

‘You and every of you, are required in the king’s majesty’s name, to take these vagabond Quakers, Anne Coleman, Mary Tomkins, and Alice Ambrose, and make them fast to the cart’s tail, and driving the cart through your several towns, to whip them upon their naked backs, not exceeding ten stripes apiece on each of them, in each town; and so to convey them from constable to constable, till they are out of this jurisdiction, as you will answer it at your peril; and this shall be your warrant.

Per me,
RICHARD WALDEN.’

At Dover, dated December 22, 1662.

Cruel indeed was this order; because to whip these three tender women through eleven towns, with ten stripes apiece at each place, through a length of near eighty miles, in bitter cold weather, would have been enough to have beaten their bones bare, and their lives out of their bodies.

Now in a very cold day the deputy Walden, at Dover, caused these women to be stripped naked from the middle upward, and tied to a cart, and then whipped them, while the priest looked on, and laughed at it; which some of their friends seeing, and taking notice of Walden’s cruelty, testified against him; for which Walden put two of them in the stocks.

The women being thus whipped at Dover, were carried to Hampton, and there delivered to the constable, William Fifield, who having understood by the constable of Dover what work he had in bringing them through a deep road, thought to have daunted them, and said, ‘I profess you must not think to make fools of men.’ To which they answered, they should be able to deal with him as well as the other. This constable the next morning would have whipped them before day, but they refused, saying that they were not ashamed of their sufferings. Then he would have whipped them on their clothes when he had them at the cart; but they said, ‘Set us free, or do according to thy order;’ which was to whip them on their naked backs. He then spoke to a woman to take off their clothes; but she said she would not do it for all the world. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘I profess I will do it myself.’ So he stripped them, and then stood trembling with the whip in his hand, and so he did the execution, though at first he professed himself so stout. Then he carried them to Salisbury, through dirt and snow, half the leg deep, and here they were whipped again. Among the rest of the spectators, Edward Wharton accidentally passing along that way, came to be one; and beholding this whipping, one Thomas Broadberry, clerk of the courts of Salisbury and Hampton, said to him, ‘Edward Wharton, what do you here?’ ‘I am here,’ answered he, ‘to see your wickedness and cruelty, that so if ye kill these women, I may be able to declare how ye murdered them:’ for indeed their bodies were so torn, that if Providence had not watched over them, they might have been in danger of their lives. But it fell out so that they were discharged: for the constable at Salisbury, who must have carried them to Newberry, was desired by one Walter Barefoot, to make him his deputy, who thus receiving the warrant, set them at liberty; though John Wheelright, the priest, advised the constable to drive on, as his safest way.

These three women being thus unexpectedly released, went to New Quechawanah, where they had a meeting, and Shubal Drummer, the priest of the place, came also thither, and sat quiet. And the meeting being ended, he stood up and said, ‘Good women, ye have spoken well, and prayed well; pray what is your rule?’ They answering, ‘The Spirit of God is our rule, and it ought to be thine, and all men’s, to walk by:’ he replied, ‘It is not my rule, nor I hope ever shall be.’ A clear evidence how prejudice may bias even discreet people; for being prepossessed thereby, men will speak sometimes rashly, without considering what.