The Fathers of New England: A Chronicle of the Puritan Commonwealths

On December 20, Andros, his officers, and guard, clad in the brilliant uniforms of soldiers of the British establishment, landed at Leverett's wharf and marched through the local militia up King's Street to the Town House, where he read his commission and administered the oaths. Except for the royal commissioners of 1664, no British officer or soldier had hitherto set foot on the streets of Boston. Redcoats had been sent to New York and Virginia, but never before had they appeared in New England, and this visible sign of British authority must have seemed to many ominous for the future.

Andros's early impressions of what he saw were not flattering to the colony. He found the people still suffering from the devastating effects of the late war and further harassed by bad harvests, disasters at sea, and two serious fires which had recently done much damage in the city. He found the fortifications in bad repair, almost all the gun-carriages unserviceable, no magazines of powder or other stores of war, no small arms, except a few old matchlocks, and those unsizable and in poor condition, no storehouses or accommodations for officers or soldiers, and no adequate ramparts or redoubts.

Now the work that Andros had come over to perform, and that which was most important in his eyes, was the defense of New England against the French. The contest between the two nations for control of the New World had already begun. The territory between Hudson Bay and the St. Lawrence and that between the Penobscot and the St. Croix were already in dispute, and New Englanders had taken their part in the conflict. When Governor of New York, Andros had become aware of the French danger, and his successor Dongan had proved himself capable of holding the Iroquois Indians to their allegiance to the English and of extending the beaver trade in the Mohawk Valley. But at this juncture reports kept coming in of renewed incursions of the French, led by the Canadian nobility, into the regions south of Lakes Erie and Ontario, and of new forts on territory that the English claimed as their own. There was increasing danger that the French would embroil the Indians of the Five Nations and, by drawing them into a French alliance, threaten not only the fur trade but the colonies themselves. The French Governor, Denonville, declared that the design of the King his master was the conversion of the infidels and the uniting of "all these barbarous people in the bosom of the Church"; but Dongan, though himself a Roman Catholic, saw no truth in this explanation and demanded that the French demolish their forts and retire to Canada, whence they had come. Just as this quarrel with the French threatened to arouse the Indians in northwestern New York, so it threatened to arouse, as eventually it did arouse, the Indians along the northern frontier of New England. To the authorities in England and to Andros in America, this menace of French aggression was one of the dangers which the Dominion of New England was intended to meet, and the substitution of a single civil and military head for the slow-moving and ineffective popular assemblies was designed to make possible an energetic military campaign.

Andros had no sooner organized his council and got his government into running order than he began to prosecute measures for improving the defenses of the colony. He sent soldiers to Pemaquid to occupy and strengthen the fort there, and himself began the reconstruction of the fortifications of Boston. He turned his attention to Fort Hill at the lower end of the town, erected a palisaded embankment with four bastions, a house for the garrison, and a place for a battery; later he leveled the hill on Castle Island in the harbor, and built there a similar palisade and earthwork and barracks for the soldiers. He took a survey of military stores, made application to England for guns and ammunition, endeavored to put the train-bands of the colony in as good shape as possible, and in 1688 went to Pemaquid to inspect the northern defenses as far as the Penobscot. He kept in close touch with Governor Dongan, and promised to send him, as rapidly as he could, men and money in case of a French invasion.

To make his work more effective he took steps to bring Connecticut immediately under his control. Rhode Island had already submitted and had sent its members to sit with the council at Boston. But Connecticut had avoided giving a direct answer, although a third writ of quo warranto had been served upon her, on December 28, 1686. Consequently Andros wrote to the recalcitrant colony, saying that he had been instructed to receive the surrender of the charter. To this letter, the Governor and magistrates of Connecticut replied that they preferred to remain as they were, but that, if annexation was to be their lot, they would be willing to join with Massachusetts, their old neighbor and friend, rather than with New York. Dongan, perplexed by the heavy expenses involved in the military defense of his colony and wishing to have the use of additional revenues, had hoped that he might persuade the Connecticut Government to come under the control of New York, but Connecticut preferred Massachusetts and had stated this preference in her letter. Andros and the Lords of Trade deemed the reply favorable, although in fact it was ingeniously noncommittal, and they took steps to complete the annexation.

On receiving a special letter of instructions from the King, Andros set out in person for Hartford, accompanied by a number of gentlemen, two trumpeters, and a guard of fifteen or twenty redcoats, "with small guns and short lances in the tops of them." He journeyed probably by way of Norwich, crossing the Connecticut River at Wethersfield, where he was met by a troop of sixty cavalry and escorted to Hartford. There, on October 31, 1687, the Governor, magistrates, and militia awaited his coming. Seated in the Governor's chair in the tavern chamber where the assembly was accustomed to meet, he caused his commission to be read, declared the old Government dissolved, selected two of those present as members of his council, and the next day appointed the necessary officials for the colony. Thence he went to Fairfield, New Haven, and New London, commissioning justices of the peace for those counties and organizing the customs service. No resistance was made to his proceedings, though it was generally understood in the colony that the charter itself had been spirited away and hidden in the hollow of an oak tree, henceforth famous as the Charter Oak.

Connecticut and the other colonies became for the time being administrative districts of the larger dominion. Their assemblies everywhere ceased to meet, that of Rhode Island for five years. Courts, provided by the act of December, 1687, were, however, generally held. The superior court for Connecticut sat four times in 1688 and the county courts, quarter sessions and common pleas, where appeared the newly appointed justices of the peace, sat for Hartford County, the one ten times and the other thirteen times during 1688 and 1689. But the surviving records of their meetings are few and references to their work very rare. The ordinary business of everyday life was carried on by the towns alone, which continued their usual activities undisturbed. In Connecticut, before Andros arrived, the assembly had taken the precaution to issue formal patents of land to the towns and to grant the public lands of the colony to Hartford and Windsor to prevent their falling into the hands of the new Government. This act may at the time have seemed a wise one, but it made a great deal of trouble afterwards.

The Dominion of New England, which now extended from the Penobscot to the borders of New York, was organized as a centralized government, with the old colonies serving as counties for administration and the exercise of justice. But as plans for an expedition against the French began to mature, it became evident that, if the French were to be successfully met, a further extension of territory was necessary; so in April, 1688, a second commission was issued to Andros, constituting him Governor of all the territory from the St. Croix River to the fortieth parallel, and thus adding to his domain New York and the Jerseys. Delaware and Pennsylvania were excepted by special royal intervention. Dongan was recalled, and Francis Nicholson was appointed lieutenant-governor under Andros, with his residence in New York.

Thus on paper Andros was Governor-General of a single territory running from the Delaware River and the northern boundary of Pennsylvania northward to the St. Lawrence, eastward to the St. Croix, and westward to the Pacific. There was an attempt here to reproduce, in size and organization, the French Dominion of Canada, but the likeness was only in appearance. To organize and defend his territory, Andros had two companies of British regulars, half a dozen trained officers, the local train-bands, which were not to be depended on for distant service, and a meager supply of guns and ammunition. Instead of having under him a body of colonials, such as were the belligerent gentlemen of Canada, who were eager to take part in raids against the English and who led their savage followers with the craft of the redskin and the intelligence of the white man, he had many separate groups of people. Averse to war and accustomed to govern themselves, most of these distrusted him and wanted to be rid of him, and desired only the restoration of their old governments without regard to those dangers which they were fully convinced they could meet quite as well themselves.

Though Andros's authority stretched over such an enormous territory, his actual government was confined to Massachusetts and the northern frontier. He paid very little attention to Connecticut, Plymouth, and Rhode Island. With but two or three exceptions, the meetings of his council were held in Boston; the laws passed affected the people of that colony; and the complaints against him were chiefly of Massachusetts origin. Massachusetts was his real enemy, and it was Massachusetts that finally overthrew him. Andros was a soldier who never forgot the main object of his mission, and it is hardly surprising that he showed neither tact nor patience in his dealings with a colony that did little else but check and thwart the plans that had been entrusted to him for execution. The people of Massachusetts charged him with tyranny and despotism. Their leaders, many of whom were members of his council, complained of the council proceedings, which, they said, were controlled by Andros and his favorites, so that debate was curtailed, objections were overruled, and the vote of the majority was ignored. There is much truth in the charge, for Andros was self-willed, imperious, and impatient of discussion. On the other hand the Puritan leaders inordinately loved controversy and debate. If Andros was peremptory, the Puritan councillors were obstructive.

A more legitimate charge was the absence of a representative assembly and the levying of taxes by the fiat of the council. But Andros had no choice in this matter: he was compelled to govern according to his instructions. Not only was his treasury usually empty, but he was always confronted with the heavy expense of fortification and of protecting the frontier. He does not appear to have been excessive in his demands, and in case of any unusual levies, as of duties and customs, he referred the matter to the Crown for its consent. But, as Englishmen, the people preferred to levy their own taxes and considered any other method of imposition as contrary to their just rights. Andros consequently had a great deal of trouble in raising money. Even in the council, tax laws were passed with difficulty, and the people of Essex County, notably in town meetings at Topsfield and Ipswich, protested vigorously against the levying of a rate without the consent of an assembly. John Wise, the Ipswich minister, and others were arrested and thrown into jail, and on trial Wise, according to his own report of the matter, was told by Dudley, the chief-justice, "You have no more privileges left you than to be sold as slaves." Wise was fined and suspended from the ministry, and it is possible that his recollection of events was affected by the punishment imposed.

In the matter of property, land titles, quit-rents, and fees, the colonists had warrant for their criticism and their displeasure. Many of those whom Andros associated with himself were New Yorkers who had served with considerable success in their former positions, but who had all the characteristics of typical royal officials. To the average English officeholder of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, office was considered not merely an opportunity for service but also an opportunity for profit. Hitherto Massachusetts had been free from men of this class, common enough elsewhere and destined to become more common as the royal colonies increased in number. Palmer, the judge, Graham, the attorney-general, and West, the secretary, hardly deserve the stigma of placemen, for they possessed ability and did their duty as they saw it, but their standards of duty were different from those held in Massachusetts. People in England did not at this time view public office as a public trust, which is a modern idea. Appointments under the Crown went by purchase or favor, and, once obtained, were a source of income, a form of investment. Massachusetts and other New England colonies were far ahead of their time in giving shape to the principle that a public official was the servant of those who elected him, but to such men as Randolph and West and the whole office-holding world of this period, such an idea was unthinkable. They served the King and for their service were to receive their reward, and such men in America looked on fees and grants of land as legitimate perquisites. In New York they had been able to gratify their needs, but in Massachusetts such a view of office ran counter to the traditions and customs of the place, and attempts to apply it caused resentment and indignation. The efforts of these men, among whom Randolph was the prince of beggars, to obtain grants of land, to destroy the validity of existing titles, to levy quit-rents, and to exact heavy fees, were a menace to the prosperity of the colony; while the further attempt to destroy the political importance of the towns by prohibiting town meetings, except once a year, was an attack on one of the most fundamental parts of the whole New England system. Andros himself, though laboring to break the resisting power of the colony, never used his office for purposes of gain.

That the Massachusetts people should oppose these attempts to alter the methods of government which had been in vogue for half a century was inevitable, though some of the means they employed were certainly disingenuous. Their leaders, both lay and clerical, were unsurpassed in genius for argument and at this time outdid themselves. When Palmer was able to show that, according to English law, their land-titles were in many cases defective, they fell back on an older title than that of the Crown and derived their right from God, "according to his Grand Charter to the Sons of Adam and Noah." More culpable was the revival of the unfortunate habit of misrepresentation and calumny which had too often characterized the treatment of the enemy in Boston, and the spreading of rumors that Andros, who spent a part of the winter of 1688-1689 in Maine taking measures for defense, was in league with the French and was furnishing the Indians with arms and ammunition for use against the English. Such reports represent perhaps merely the desperate and half-hysterical methods of a people who did not know where to turn for the protection of their institutions. A wiser and shrewder move was made in the spring of 1688, when a group of prominent men determined to appeal to England for relief and sent Increase Mather, the influential pastor of the old North Church, across the ocean to plead their cause with the Crown.

But relief was nearer than they expected. On November 5, 1688, William of Orange, summoned from Holland to uphold the constitutional liberties of Protestant England, landed at Torbay, and before the end of the year James II had fled to France. Rumors of the projected invasion had come to Boston as early as December, and reports of its success had reached the ears of the people there during the March following. Finally on April 4, John Winslow, arriving from Nevis, brought written copies of the Prince's declaration, issued from Holland, and two weeks later, on April 18, the leaders in the city, including many members of Andros's council, supported by the people of Boston and its neighborhood, rose in revolt, overthrew the government of Andros, and brought tumbling down the whole structure of the Dominion of New England, which had never from the beginning had any real or stable foundation. Having armed themselves, they seized Captain George, commander of the royal frigate, the Rose, lying in the harbor, as he came ashore to find out the cause of the noise and the tumult. Then they moved on to Fort Hill, where Andros, Randolph, and others had taken refuge. Here they defied the soldiers, who refused to fire, captured the fort, and carried their prisoners off to be lodged in private houses or the common jail. On the following day, they forced the Castle Island fort in the harbor to surrender and then imprisoned its commander; they demanded of the lieutenant in charge the delivery of the royal frigate and carried off the sails; and as nothing would satisfy the country people who came armed into the town in the afternoon but the closer confinement of Andros, they removed him from the private house where he had been lodged to the fort in the town. So excited was the populace and so serious the danger of injury to those in confinement, that West, Palmer, and Graham were sent to the fort on Castle Island for protection; Andros, after two futile attempts at escape, was lodged in the same quarters, while Randolph, as deserving of no consideration, was thrust ignominiously into jail. On the third day a council of safety, consisting of thirty-seven members, with the old Governor, Bradstreet, eighty-six years old, at its head, was organized to prepare the way for the reëstablishment of the former Government. The council summoned a convention which, after hesitation and delay, authorized elections for a House of Representatives and the resumption of all the old forms and powers. On June 6, the assembly met, and to all appearances Massachusetts was once more governing herself as if the charter had never been annulled.

The other colonies followed the example of Massachusetts, and miniature revolutions took place in Plymouth, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, where the Andros commissions offered few obstacles to the renewal of the old forms. In a majority of cases the old officials were at hand, ready to take up their former duties. Plymouth, having no charter, simply returned to her old way of life, precarious and uncertain as it was; but Rhode Island and Connecticut took the position that as their charters had not been vacated by law, they were still valid and had not been impaired by the brief intermission in the governments provided by them. In this opinion the colonies were upheld by the law officers in England. Before the middle of the summer, practically all traces of the Andros régime had disappeared, except for the prisoners in confinement at Boston and the bitterness which still rankled in the hearts of the people of Massachusetts. There was no such intensity of feeling in the other colonies, where the loss of the assembly was the main grievance, though in Connecticut the resumption of authority by the old leaders roused the animosity of a small but energetic faction which said that the charter was dead and could not be revived, and demanded a closer dependence on the Crown. Henceforth, that colony had to reckon with a hostile group within its own borders, one that deemed the institutions and laws of the colony oppressive and unjust, and that for a time resisted the authority of what its leaders called a "pretended" government. During the years that followed, these men made many efforts to break down the independence of the corporate government, and to this extent the rule of Andros left a permanent mark upon the colony.

CHAPTER XI

THE END OF AN ERA

But the future of the New England colonies was to be decided in England and not in America. If the orthodox leaders in the colony thought that the new King had levelling sympathies or would thrust aside the policy already adopted by the English authorities for the defense of the colonies and the maintenance of the acts of trade, they greatly misjudged the situation. King William, though a Protestant, was no lover of revolution, and, though he had himself engaged in one, he could assert the dignity of the prerogative with as much vigor as any Stuart. He was not a politician, but a soldier, and he was quite as likely to see the necessity of organizing New England for defense against the enemy as he was to listen favorably to appeals from Massachusetts for a restoration of her charter.

Increase Mather had gone to England in 1688 to petition James II for relief from the burdens of the Andros rule. His impressive personality, his power as a ready and forcible speaker, his resourcefulness and energy, and his acquaintance with influential men in England, both Anglicans and Dissenters, made him the most effective agent who had ever gone to England in the interest of the colony. He was able to bring the grievances of Massachusetts to the personal attention of James II; and he had received hope of a confirmation of land titles and permission to call a general assembly, when the flight of the King brought his efforts to naught. He then turned to the new Parliament, hoping to save the colony by means of a rider to the bill for restoring corporations to their ancient rights and privileges; but the dissolution of this body ended hopeful efforts in that direction also. A year's "Sisyphean labor" came to nothing. No remedy remained except an appeal to the new King, and during 1690 and 1691, the reconstruction of Massachusetts became one of the most important questions brought before the Lords of Trade. William III and his advisers were agreed on one point: that Massachusetts should never again be independent as she formerly had been, but should be brought within the immediate control of the Crown, through a governor of the King's appointment. They took the ground that, with a French war already begun, it was no time to discuss colonial rights and privileges, for the demands of the empire took precedence over all questions of a merely local character in America.

Andros was now recalled and instructions were sent to Massachusetts to release all her prisoners. With their arrival in England in February, 1690, the debate before the committee went on in a new and livelier fashion. Randolph renewed his complaints in every form known to his inventive mind; Andros presented his defense and was relieved of all charges of mal-administration; Mather and others contested every move of their opponents and sought to obtain as favorable terms as possible for Massachusetts; while Oakes and Cooke, sent over by the colony as its official agents and representing the uncompromising Puritan wing, hindered rather than helped the cause by insisting that no concessions should be made and that Massachusetts should receive a confirmation of all her former privileges. Mather's success was noteworthy. He could not prevent the appointment of a royal governor or the separation of New Hampshire from Massachusetts, nor could he obtain the right of coinage for the colony; but he did secure the permanent annexation of Maine and the Plymouth colony, and a large measure of appointive power and legislative control for the people. In some ways most significant of all, he obtained from the Crown the noteworthy concession that the council of the colony should be chosen by the general assembly and not be appointed from England, as was the case with all the other royal colonies. Even New Hampshire eventually had the same governor as Massachusetts, thus preserving a union for all central and northern New England, which was destined to last for forty-four years.

The charter of 1691 was a compromise between the old government which had existed in Massachusetts since 1630 and that of a regular royal colony, and as such it satisfied neither party. It was greeted in Massachusetts with vehement disapproval by the old faction, who charged Mather with flagrantly deserting his trust; and in England it was viewed as a shameful concession to the whims of the Puritans. This yoking together of parts of two systems, corporate and royal, was to give rise in Massachusetts in the succeeding century to a struggle for control that deeply affected the course of the colony's later history.