USA > New Hampshire > History of New Hampshire, Volume I > Part 7
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Again the Quaker women with others returned to Dover Neck and passed over to Oyster River, where on the first day of the week they went to Priest Hull's place of worship. This was the Rev. Joseph Hull, and his meeting house, built in 1656, stood on the south side of the river, three miles below the Falls. He was saying something against women's preaching when he fell into confusion, and Mary Tomkins rose up and declared the truth to the astonished congregation. Just here John Hill, of whom it is not recorded that he ever showed religious zeal on any other occasion, "in his wrath thrust her down from the place where she stood, with his own hands, and the priest pinched her arms," whereupon the Quakers were had out of the meeting house. But in the afternoon they had a meeting, attended by most of Hull's congregation. Pinching and rough handling seem to have answered all the requirements of this occasion, and the next year Edward Wharton appeared to trouble
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the magistrates, Thomas Wiggin, Richard Walderne and William Hathorne. "Thomas Wiggin, Thomas Wiggin," said the dauntless Wharton, "Thou shouldst not rage so; thou art old and very gray, and thou art an old persecutor ; it's time for thee to give over, for thou mayst be drawing near to thy grave." Whereupon Wharton was ordered to be tied to a cart's tail and whipped through three towns, ten stripes in each town. It was fourteen miles to the next town and Wharton was too weak to walk it; so they put him in prison till he somewhat recovered from his first beating, and then the rest of the sentence was executed,-in obedience to law.
The conduct of the Quakeresses may appear to us now like a wilful disturbance of public worship, but we must remember that they, in common with all Quakers, had been taught to keep silence and to speak, according as the Spirit moved. They had the example of the apostles in the temple, speaking "as the Spirit gave them utterance," and of the early Christians of Corinth, as described in the fourteenth chapter of St. Paul's epistle to that church. They used the liberty of prophesying, as it has been exercised in recent times by members of the congregation, after the minister had finished his discourse; and such "prophesying" has been welcomed when there was an evident outburst of the heart. A controversial utterance would not be so well received in any age. We shall see later on that a prominent abolitionist adopted the same method of expressing his conscientious convictions and with similar reaction upon himself. In both cases persecution was invited for the purpose of awakening the public mind. When the moral reformer has made somebody mad and got the whole town talking about it, he has half won his case.
At another time five more Quaker preachers came to Dover, including Ann Coleman, the irrepressible. They went to the place of worship, on the height of Dover Neck, and were promptly sent to prison by Major Walderne. There they were detained almost two weeks, "though he confessed that for aught he knew they might be such as were spoken of in the 11th of Hebrews, yet he must execute the law against them, and so set them at Liberty. The people promised that the priest Rayner should give them a fair reasoning when his worship was done; but he broke his word and packed away; and though
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the women followed him to his house yet he would not turn, but clapt to his door, having taken out the key and turned Anna Coleman out of the house." After this some of the people of Dover, especially in the Oyster River parish, were fined for being absent from meeting and attending Quaker worship and entertaining Quakers, among whom were William Roberts,. William Williams, William Follet, James Smith, John Goddard, Thomas Roberts, James Nute, Mary Hanson and the wife of Richard Pinkham, who sat in the stocks because her husband would not or could not pay a fine of sixty-five shillings.
"Truth crushed to earth shall rise again"; so it did in Dover, and a Quaker meeting house was built, and a company of godly men and women gathered in it. The children of some of the persecutors were converted to the views and practices of the Friends, and to this day the Quaker church in Dover lives, and their house of worship stands as a monument to the noble army of those who had the martyr spirit. This disgrace of persecuting the Friends in New Hampshire was due to the Puritan rule of Massachusetts for a time therein.
When New Hampshire was swallowed up by Massachusetts the formation of a new county became expedient. Norfolk County was formed May 10, 1643. It consisted of the towns of Salisbury, Hampton, Haverhill, Exeter, Dover and Straw- berry Bank, or Portsmouth. The early judges and associates were Francis Williams, Thomas Wiggin, George Smyth, Samuel Dudley, Robert Clements, Ambrose Lane, Brian Pendleton, Henry Sherburne, Major Richard Walderne, Major Robert Pike, Edward Hilton, Richard Cutt, Valentine Hill, and Reynold Fernald. Usually the associates were chosen by the towns and confirmed by the General Court, while judges were sent by the Massachusetts Bay Colony to hold the principal courts, such as Major William Hathorne of Salem, ancestor of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Richard Bellingham, afterward governor of Massa- chusetts, Simon Bradstreet and Gen. John Leverett, both governors a little later, Major Humphrey Atherton, Captain Daniel Gookin and William Stoughton. Norfolk County ceased to exist September 18, 1679, when New Hampshire was made a separate royal province. The records of the courts held at Portsmouth and Dover are carefully preserved and well indexed at Concord; those of courts held elsewhere may be seen at
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Salem, Massachusetts. Many abstracts from the latter have been published in the Essex Antiquarian.
Massachusetts, following the example of Christian nations of Europe and basing her criminal code on the Mosaic law, had a law that condemned witches and wizards to death. The first execution for witchcraft in New England was that of Margaret Jones of Charlestown, who seems to have practiced medicine to some sleight degree as a quack and to have said and done some things not easily explained. The habit of the age and of all preceding ages was to refer all things mysterious to either God or the devil for their origin. A number of respectable persons testified that in their opinion goodwife Jane Walford of Ports- mouth was a witch. This was in 1656. Jane vanished out of sight in the shape of a cat. She brought strange disease upon a certain person, whose back became as a flame of fire. She touched the breast of another and he was in great pain till the next day. She even was thought to bewitch cattle. A yellowish cat seen in a garden grew to be three cats, all somehow identified with Jane Walford. One witness said there were three witches at Strawberry Bank; "one was Thomas Turpin, who was drowned accidentally; another was old Ham; and the third should be nameless because he should be blameless." The case against goodwife Walford was dropped and she brought action for slander against one person who called her a witch, sueing for one thousand pounds and getting a verdict in her favor for five pounds and costs of court. Later, in 1680, a coroner's jury in Hampton found in their verdict "grounds of suspicion that the child was murdered by witchcraft" and Rachel Fuller was thought by many to be the witch. She acted in some respects like a crafty maniac, and it was testified that she declared there were eight women and two men who were witches and wizards in Hampton, among whom was Eunice Cole. The latter had been whipped in 1656 and then imprisoned in Boston for twelve years, on charge of witchcraft. In 1672 she was again arraigned on the old charge of witchcraft and it was testified that she appeared at times as a woman, a dog, an eagle and a cat. The court at Boston adjudged her not guilty and at the same time declared that there was "just ground of vehement suspissyon of her haueing had famillyarrty with the deuill." Whittier has
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made us familiar with her in his poem, the Wreck of River- mouth. She was thought to have had the power of drowning persons with an invisible hand.
In 1682, Naomi Daniel of Oyster River was presented at court for slander in saying that her brother-in-law and her sister, Benjamin Mathes and wife, were wizard and witch, in that they had bewitched her cow into the mire twice. She herself had been accused of bewitching a sick child, but she affirmed that others had bewitched the child and accused her only to hide their own roguery. 8
The same year goodwife Jones of Portsmouth was charged with witchcraft and she had retaliated on George Walton by calling him a wizard. Samuel Clark, son of John Clark of Great Island, mariner, "testifieth and saith that he was present when Goody Jones and George Walton were talking together, & he heard the said Goody Jones call ye said Walton wizard & that she said if he told her of her mother she would throw stones at his head. And this was on Friday ye 25th of August, 1682." Elizabeth Clark, aged forty-two, testified that "she heard George Walton say that he believed in his heart and Conscience that gammer Jones was a witch and would say soe to his diinge day." This was on the 3Ist of August, 1682. Others testified that stones flew in a mysterious manner about Walton, as he and others were unloading hay from a boat, and that some of the stones hit him. Goody Jones was suspected, although nobody saw her. Walton's fence had been torn down, and this was charged against Goody Jones the witch, which she denied. It seems to have been the habit of the times to call an offending person by the damaging name of witch or wizard. It was the easiest way of accounting for wrong-doing, and it vented the spite of accusers. We do not read of any conviction and penalty, except in the case of Eunice Cole. The jurisdiction of Massa- chusetts over New Hampshire had ceased before the height of the witchcraft craze in Salem and Boston, and the executions there found no response on the Pascataqua. There is no men- tion of witchcraft after the year 1682, though the statute law still remained, that witches and wizards should not be suffered to live.9
8 Hist. of Durham, N. H., Vol. II, p. 223.
9 N. H. Court Files, Vol. VI, pp. 379-381.
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An item of some importance in the early history of New Hampshire has been overlooked by historians. This was the bringing in, as servants, of some Scotchmen, who had been taken prisoners by Oliver Cromwell in the battle of Dunbar, September 3, 1650, and the battle of Worcester, just one year later. One hundred and fifty from Dunbar were sent to Boston in the ship Unity and there sold to pay their passage money of twenty pounds apiece. They were forced to work as appren- tices from six to eight years, after which they had their liberty and received grants of land in towns where they chose to settle. Two hundred and seventy-two more prisoners came over from the battle of Worcester in the ship John and Sara. A score or more of these Scots were employed in the sawmills at Oyster River and Exeter, that then included Newmarket, and some became permanent settlers in those places. Among them were Walter Jackson and William Thompson's son John at Oyster River, John Hudson of Bloody Point, and John Sinclair, John Bean, Alexander Gordon and John Barber of Exeter. The descendants of these include some of the leading men in the state.
It is interesting to know that when in 1669 it was desired to substitute at Harvard College a new brick building for the old wooden one, that was then in a state of decay, the citizens of Portsmouth pledged sixty pounds per annum for seven years, and the town later by vote endorsed the pledge. Dover gave thirty-two pounds and Exeter ten pounds for the same purpose.
The Rev. Joshua Moody began his ministry in Portsmouth in 1658, but was not ordained till 1671. Then a church was regularly gathered, consisting of nine members, Joshua Moody, John Cutt, Richard Cutt, Elias Stileman, Richard Martyn, Samuel Haynes, James Pendleton, John Fletcher and John Tucker. A new meeting house was built about 1657. The election of Mr. Moody as pastor and teacher was approved by the General Court and Governor Leverett was present at his ordination. In 1672 it was voted that if any shall smoke tobacco in the meeting house at any public meeting, he shall pay a fine of five shillings for the use of the town. In those days all town meetings were held in the customary place of worship, and the place was considered sacred on all days.10
10 See The Four Meeting Houses of the North Parish of Portsmouth, by Charles A. Hazlett, in Granite Monthly, XXXVIII, pp. 37-44.
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Reserving for a separate chapter some account of the first Indian war we pass in review the facts pertaining to the Masonian claims that led up to the end of the jurisdiction of Massachusetts over New Hampshire. Captain John Mason, who died in 1635, left all his property in New England to his wife, Ann Mason, and ultimately to his grandson, Robert Tufton, on condition of his taking the surname Mason. Mrs. Mason died in 1654, and Robert Tufton Mason in 1659 petitioned Parliament for a committee to adjudicate his claims under the original grants made to his grandfather. We have seen that commissioners, Carr, Cartwright and Maverick, came over in 1665 and were opposed by the government of Massachusetts. They were impowered by the king to use their discretion in the settlement of conflicting claims, and they partially heard the case of Mason's heirs at Portsmouth. The rulers of the Bay Colony warned the people of New Hampshire not to obey the commissioners and claimed that their charter from the king gave them right of jurisdiction that could not be interfered with by any commissioners. If chartered rights could be thus easily set aside or interfered with by men sent over from England to act at their discretion, this would be equivalent to a revoca- tion of the charter and the destruction of civil liberties. They had claimed and enjoyed almost complete independence too long to now give it up without a decided protest. They even threat- ened to abandon the colony and go elsewhere rather than yield to the commissioners. The king commanded Massachusetts Bay Colony to send over four or five agents, that he might listen in person to their claims and arguments. Meanwhile the best legal authorities in England had pronounced in favor of the claims of the heirs of Mason to the soil, but not to the jurisdiction of New Hampshire. These legal opinions were rendered by Sir Goeffrey Palmer in 1660 and by Sir William Jones, Attorney General, and others in 1675. The judges also reported that Massachusetts had no just claim to territory north of three miles north of the Merrimack river and consequently no jurisdiction.
Meanwhile efforts and propositions had been made by the heirs of Mason to sell the province. On the thirteenth of November, 1671, Robert Mason proposed to the king, that "if his Majestie shall please to grant unto Robert Mason the
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Importation of three hundred Tonns of ffrench Wine free of all Customs in consideration thereof he will sell to his Majtie his Patent of New Hampshire in New England."11
Surely this was a small price and it indicates how dis- couraged the heirs of Mason then were. Colonel Robert Pike of Salisbury wrote to Robert Mason, November 19, 1672, saying that the magistrates of Massachusetts "have requested mee to write unto you, earnestly desiring that all former disputes and differences may be forgotten and a happy agreement made, to which end if you shall be pleased to joyne your province to this as to government they will add their authority to your right, whereby you may have what reasonable acknowledge- ment you please of every Inhabitant in your province, and if you shall please to come and live in these parts, you will find that due honor and respect shewed you, as the memory of your Noble Grandfather deserves and your own great worth and meritts may challenge, for doeing soe meritorious a worke as the happy uniting of these two provinces under one government, wherein your advantage will be equall to theirs & nothing shall be imposed upon you in relation thereunto, but shall seem both reasonable and honorable unto you, whereby all animosityes will cease and there will be no need of engaging higher powers in these concernes."12
Evidently the intention of Massachusetts had been noised abroad, for August 9, 1662, Francis Champernowne, and Henry Jocelyn wrote to Robert Mason, dissuading him from accepting the offer of Massachusetts. Thus it is seen that for the sake of enlarging and confirming an assumed jurisdiction the magis- trates of the Bay Colony were willing to join with the heirs of Mason in demanding rents and payments for land of every settler in New Hampshire. They seem to have cared not at all for the rights and liberties of others, while so assertive and tenacious of their own.
Another attempt was made to sell the province to the king. On the twentieth of March, 1673-4, William, Earl of Sterling, Ferdinando Gorges, Esq., and Robert Mason proposed to the king to surrender their patents in consideration of "new Grants from your Majty of one third part of all the Costomes, Rents,
11 Copy of Colonial Papers, Vol. XXVII, No. 43, N. H. Hist. Society. 12 Colonial Papers, Vol. XXVIII, No. 67.
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ffynes, and other profits which shall be made in the said Provinces, or such other reasonable compensacon in Lieu thereof as yor Majesty shall think fitt." This proposal was signed by Robert Mason alone.13
These attempts to sell the province having failed, the claims of the heirs of Mason were renewed and in 1676 the king, Charles II, sent a letter to the government of Massachusetts, the bearer thereof being Edward Randolph, a kinsman of Mason. The letter ordered that agents be sent to England within six months to hear and answer the claims and representations of Robert Mason and Ferdinando Gorges. The letter was to be read publicly before the General Court and in the presence of Randolph, who was to return their answer to the king. Copies of the camplaints accompained the king's letter, all of which were read as ordered and the only answer was that they would consider it. The leaders in Boston did not hesitate to tell Randolph that they considered him Robert Mason's agent. Randolph made a journey into New Hampshire and evidently conversed with many who sided with Mason because of their opposition to the rule of Massachusetts. In his report to the king Randolph stated "that he had found the whole country complaining of the usurpation of the magistrates of Boston, earnestly hoping and expecting that his Majesty would not permit them any longer to be oppressed, but would give them relief according to the promise of the commissioners on 1665." Herein he echoed the wishes of such men as Walter Barefoot, Abraham Corbet and many others, but this was not the senti- ment of the majority of the voters of New Hampshire. Randolph's letter has been called a "Lying report." It was rather a true but prejudiced report of information gained from partial judges. The following year, 1677, four separate petitions were sent to the king from the four towns of New Hampshire, asking that they be continued under the government of Massa- chusetts. The petition from Dover was signed by twenty-nine persons, certainly not the majority of voters, and Major Richard Walderne and Elder William Wentworth were the leading spirits. Doubtless a counter petition would have been signed by as many others, for then as now few would resist the solicita-
13 Colonial Papers, Vol. XXXI, No. 22.
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tions of influential acquaintances. The petition from Exeter has thirty-two signers, headed by the Rev. Samuel Dudley, John Gilman and Robert Wadleigh, men of note. The petition from Portsmouth has fifty-six signatures, and we recognize the familiar names of the political leaders of that time, William Vaughan, Thomas Daniel, Samuel Haines, Brian Pendleton, John Pickering, the Rev. Joshua Moody, Elias Stileman, Richard Martyn, Nathaniel Fryer, Robert Eliot, Tobias Leare and John Sherburne. Hampton's petition was signed by fifty, among them being William Sanborn, the Rev. Seaborn Cotton, Christopher Hussey, Andrew Wiggin, John Sanborn, Nathaniel Weare and the Rev. Samuel Dalton. Thus it appears that a large per- centage of the leading men of New Hampshire were in favor of continuing under the jurisidiction of Massachusetts, and it can not be doubted that their motive was, that they would thus be better protected against the claims of Robert Mason to their estates. Indeed this motive was openly declared in town meeting at Dover, when Major Richard Walderne was appointed to petition the king to interpose his authority in their favor, "that they might not be disturbed by Mason, or any other person, but continue peaceably in possession of their rights under the government of Massachusetts."
At about the same time Randolph freed his mind to Governor Winslow of Plymouth, who in reply expressed his dislike of the way the authorities at Boston were conducting themselves. On the sixth of May, 1677, Randolph made a long report on the state of affairs in New England, in which he wrote, "Matters of fact concerne as much his Majesty as Mr. Mason and Mr. Gorges, and against the government of Massa- chusetts these following articles will be proved :
I. That they have noe right either to land or to Government in any part of New England and have always been usurpers.
2. That they have formed themselves into a Commonwealth, deneying any appeals to England and contrary to other Plantations doe not take the oath of Allegiance.
3. They have protected the late King's Murtherers, directly contrary to his Majties Royall Proclamation of the 6th of June 1660, and of his letters of 28th June 1662.
4. They Coine money with their own impress.
5. They have put his Majties subjects to death for opinion in matters of religion. 1
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6. In the year 1665 they did violently oppose his Majties Commissioners in the settlement of New Hampshire and in 1668 by armed forces turned out his Majties Justices of the Peace in the Province of Maine in Con- tempt of his Majties Authority and Declaration of the 10th of Aprill 1666.
7. They impose an oath of fidelity upon all that inhabit within their Territoryes, to be true and ffaithfull to their Government.
8. They violate all the acts of Trade and navigation by which they have impressed the greatest part of the West India Trade, where his Majtie ยท is damaged in his Customs above 100,000 pounds yearly and this Kingdom much more.
The reasons stated by Randolph for a speedy hearing and determination of the matters involved in his report were as follows,-
I. His Majesty hath an opportunity to settle that Country under his Royall Authority with Little charge, Sir John Berry being now at Virginia not far distant from New England, and it lyes in his way home, where are many good harbours free from the worme, convenient Towns for quartering of Souldiers, and plentifull Accomidations for men and shipping.
2. The earnest desire of most and best of the Inhabitants (wearied out with the Arbitrary proceedings of those in the present Government) to be under his majties Government and Laws.
3. The Indians upon the Settlement of that Country it is presumed would Unanimously Submit and become very Serviceable and usefull for improving that Country, there being upward of Three hundred Thousand English inhabitants therein.
Then Randolph adds his proposals for the settlement of New England, which if adopted would probably lead to peace and prosperity.
I. His Majties Gratious and General pardon, upon their conviction of having acted without and in contempt of his Majties Authority, will make the most refractory to comply to save their estates.
2. His Majties declaration of confirming unto the Inhabitants the Lands and houses they now possess upon payment of an Easie Quit rent and granting Liberty of Conscience in matters of Religion.
3. His Majties Commission directed to the most eminent persons for Estates and Loyalty in every Colony to meet, consult and act for the present peace and Safety of that Country during his majties pleasure, and that such of the present Magistrates be of the Councill as shall readily comply with his Majties comands in the Settling of the Country, and a pention to be allowed them out of the publique Revenue of the Country with some Title of Honour to be conferred upon the most deserving of them, will cause a general Submission.14
14 Colonial Papers, Vol. XLIX. No. 67.
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The conduct of Edward Randolph earned for him the epithets, "Messenger of death," "the evil genius of Massachu- setts," "the general enemy of American liberty." Dr. Increase Mather called him "a child of the Divill," while the Rev. Cotton Mather was content to speak of him as "a blasted Wretch, followed with a sensible Curse of God, wherever he came; Des- pised, Abhorred, Unprosperous." Thus the Puritans and those who have felt bound to defend them in all their unjust claims and doings have been inwardly moved to speak of the man who differed from them in public policy, who discerned and reported to the king the growing disloyalty of his subjects in Massachu- setts, and who had little sympathy for the arrogant clerical leaders there. Yet he seems disposed to treat them with more justice and forbearance than they evinced toward him. Later he would have been called a Tory. His reports are based upon the representations of many wise and good people in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. He saw that a different spirit prevailed in Massachusetts, an exaggerated demand for independency and Home Rule, intolerance and persecution of heretics, that did not prevail in other colonies. He thought that the clerical party in Massachusetts ought to be governed rather than governors. He was hated because he opposed their desires and schemes and by his plain talk did perhaps more than any other to bring about the revocation of the king's charter and the downfall of Puritan rule. Yet nothing could be said against his sincerity and honesty as a messenger of the king and a public official for many years; neither was he lacking in mercy, though he may have been in charity, while his opponents were wanting in both these virtues. Most historians have followed the leading of the condemnatory writers of that early time, when hearts were hot with political hatred and baffled ambition, and have had little but evil to say of Edward Randolph. Candor needs to modify their rancorous accusations. Randolph's opinion respecting the disloyalty of the Massachusetts leaders and their ready followers in New Hampshire agreed quite well with the reports of the commissioners of 1665. Subsequent agents sent to New England, after a little experience, came to share the same conclusions.
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