USA > New Jersey > Essex County > Newark > First church in Newark : historical discourses, relating to the First Presbyterian church in Newark; originally delivered to the congregation of that church during the month of January, 1851 > Part 2
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* Trumbull, vol. 1, chap. xii ; see Winthrop's Letter, p. 520.
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8
INVITING ASPECT OF NEW JERSEY.
peaceful way to rid themselves of all grievances, and were soon found making their plans to depart, with all their families and goods, out of the jurisdiction.
It so happened, that just at this juncture, the Pro- vince of New Jersey was opening an inviting field, and seeking for settlers from the Colonies of New Eng- land. The Duke of York, afterwards James II of Eng- land, having received a grant from his royal brother, Charles II., of all the land comprehended between the rivers Connecticut and Delaware, claimed by him in the right of discovery, but most of which was then in the possession of the Dutch, had dispatched Col. Richard Nichols, whom he invested with the powers of government, to take forcible possession of it in his name; and shortly afterwards, before posses- sion was actually acquired, sold, and by deed conveyed to John Lord Berkley and Sir George Carteret all his interest in that part of his royal grant comprehended within the present limits of the State of New Jersey. Immediately the new Proprietors took measures to se- cure the settlement of their new domains. Proposals were drawn up and signed by them, entitled " The CON- CESSION and AGREEMENT of the Lords Proprietors of the Province of NEW CAESAREA or NEW JERSEY, to and with all and every the Adventurers, and all such as shall settle or plant there ;" and Philip Carteret, a brother of Sir George, was by them constituted Governor of the Province, and sent hither with instructions to carry into effect [the provisions of the Concessions. Mean- while, however, Col. Richard Nichols, having received a surrender from the Dutch, had granted lands to a
9
THE CONCESSIONS.
few intended settlers, in the name of the Duke of York, and hence a conflict of titles subsequently arose, especially in Elizabethtown, where a few families, at most four in number, had actually settled. Philip Carteret, accompanied with thirty men, gentlemen and their servants, landed at Elizabethtown in the month of August, 1665; and having made such agree- ments with the settlers then in possession, as were prob- ably satisfactory to all parties, and supposed to be within the limits of his authority, purchased the claim of one of them, and became himself a settler. Soon after this-it does not appear how soon-the Governor sent messengers to New England to publish the Con- cession and Agreement of the Proprietors, and invite new settlers to his Province.
The Concessions, which became in fact the funda- mental Constitution of the Province, contained provis- ions highly congenial to the spirit of New England men. The largest liberty of conscience was guaran- teed, with the assurance that the settlers should never be disturbed or disquieted for any difference in opinion or practice in religious concernments, " any law, usage or custom in the realm of England to the contrary not- withstanding." * A General Assembly was provided for, one branch of which was to consist of representa- tives chosen by the inhabitants in their respective par- ishes or districts, empowered to appoint their own time of meeting, constitute Courts, levy taxes, build fortresses, make war, offensive and defensive, natural- ize strangers, allot lands to settlers, provide for the
* Grants, Concessions, &c., pp. 14-24.
10
DETERMINATION TO EMIGRATE.
support of the Government, and ordain all laws for the good of the Province, not repugnant to the laws of England, nor against the Concessions of the Proprie- tors and their interest. Liberal offers were also made of lands for settlement, proportionate to the numbers of those who should come and occupy them, with only the reserve of a small quit-rent of a half-penny per acre, to be paid annually on and after the twenty-fifth day of March in the year 1670 .* The climate, moreover, was mild in comparison with their own, and the lands were represented as fertile.
Hither, therefore, did a considerable number of the disaffected from the towns of Milford, Branford, Guil- ford and New Haven, all within the limits of the for- mer Colony of New Haven, with individuals from other towns, determine to remove. Accordingly, very early in the following Spring, or perhaps earlier, a commis- sion, of whom Robert Treat was one,t came and made preparations for the settlement of a tract of land on the Passaic river; and before the end of May in that same year, a company, amounting, it is said, to thirty families,¿ "from Milford and other neighboring plant- ations thereabouts,"§ were already on the ground, and busily engaged in laying plans for their future perma- nent abode.
Meanwhile, however, a new class of claimants to the lands made their appearance. Treat had supposed that, in accordance with the instructions of the Pro- prietors, given to their Governor at his appointment,
* Grants, Concessions, &c., pp. 14-24. # Whitehead, p. 45.
+ Bill in Chancery, p. 118. Robert
§ Newark Town Records.
Treat's affidavit.
11
PURCHASE FROM THE INDIANS.
" not in anywise to grieve or oppress" the native in- habitants, " but treat them with all humanity and kindness," measures had been taken already to satisfy all their demands, and give to him and his associates quiet possession. But this, though promised as he alleges, was not done; and hence no sooner had the company arrived and landed some of their goods, than a party of the Hackinsack Indians warned them off the ground, saying the land was theirs and it was unpurchased .* Determined at all events not to invade any of the rights of their savage predecessors-a rule to which their mother Colony had always adhered as fundamen- tal-the new comers put their goods immediately back into the vessel which brought them, and were on the point to return ; when, being dissuaded by the Gover- nor, and the Indians showing a disposition to sell the lands, they concluded they would make a fair purchase of the Indian title, and took a " bill of sale" under the Governor's advice and approbation. The amount paid cannot now be exactly estimated, but it was of suffi- cient importance to be distributed to each settler in exact proportions to the land occupied, and to be men- tioned in all the grants and conveyances of land for several years afterwards.+
* See Treat's affidavit, Bill in Chancery, p. 118.
+ The purchase was made in the first instance in the year 1666, by Robert Treat and Samuel Edsal, as agents for the town. John Capteen, a Dutchman, acted as in- terpreter, and the principal Sagamore who negotiated the bargain was Perro, who acted with the consent and approba- tion of an aged Sagamore named Oraton, at that time unable to travel. (See affi-
davits of Treat and Edsal, Bill in Chance- ry, pp. 117-18.) The bill of sale bears date July 11th, 1667, and is signed by Obadiah Bruen, Michael Tompkins, Sam- uel Kitchel, John Brown and Robert Denison on the part of the town, and Wa- pamuck, Harish, Captamin, Sessom, Mam- ustome, Peter, Wamesane, Wekaprokikan, Cacnackque and Perawae on the part of the Indians. The witnesses were Samuel Edsal, Edward Burrowes, Richard Fletch-
1
12
FIRST TOWN MEETING.
The preliminary town meeting, the first of which there is a record, was held on the 21st of May, 1666, when "friends from Milford and the neighboring plantations thereabout" were the actual inhabitants ; and agents sent from Guilford and Branford met them "to ask, on behalf of their undertakers and selves, with reference to a township" to be occu- pied together by the two parties. At this meet- ing the grand object of the settlement was distinctly recognised. "It was agreed upon mutually, that the aforesaid persons from Milford, Guilford and Branford, together with their associates being now accepted of, do make one township; provided, they send word so to be any time between this and the last of October next ensuing, and according to fundamentals mutually agreed upon, do desire to be of one heart and consent, [that] through God's blessing, with one hand, they may endeavor the carrying on of spiritual concernments, as also of civil and town affairs, ACCORDING TO GOD AND A GODLY GOVERNMENT there to be settled by them and their associates."* Then they chose a committee of eleven men, taken from both companies, viz: Captain
er, Classe and Pierwim the Sachem of Pan. This purchase extended to the foot of the mountain, and the price paid for it was in articles as follows : "Fifty double hands of powder, one hundred bars of lead, twenty axes, twenty coats, ten guns, twenty pistols, ten kettles, ten swords, four blankets, four barrels of beer, ten pair of breeches, fifty knives, twenty hoes, eight hundred and fifty fathom of wam- pum, twenty ankers of liquors or some- thing equivalent, and three troopers' coats." It seems plain from the words "something equivalent" that the pur- chasers did not intend to pay any part in liquors if they could satisfy the Indians
without it. However, by a subsequent deed, dated March 13, 1677-8, the limits were extended to the top of the mountain for " two guns, three coats, and thirteen cans of rum." The agents chosen by the town to make this purchase were Mr. Ward, Mr. Johnson, Samuel Harrison, and [Thomas] Richards ; and John Curtis and John Treat were chosen to run the west line with the Indians and to meet with Edward Ball and Daniel Dod, who were also chosen to run the north line with the Indians and meet with the others on the mountain. See Whitehead, p. 43. E. J. Re- cords. Newark Town Records, pp. 66, 69. * Newark Town Records, p. 1.
1
13
BRANFORD EMIGRANTS.
Robert Treat, Lieut. Samuel Swaine, Mr. Samuel Kitchel, Michael Tompkins, Mr. [Thomas] Morris, Ser- geant Richard Berkly, Richard Harrison, Thomas Blatchley, Edward Riggs, Stephen Freeman and Thomas Johnson, " for the speedier and better expedition of things there emergent to be done," of whom any six or more, if there should be so many on the ground, or at the least not less than five, might act for the settle- ment of the place until another like committee should be chosen.
The agents from Guilford and Branford having re- turned and made report of their commission, a large number of the people of Branford held a meeting on the 30th of October, 1666, "touching of the intended design." These men had been among the most deter mined opposers of the union of the Colonies, and their hearts were still set upon the favorite scheme of found- ing a pure Church and a Godly Government in the wilds of America. A portion of them, with their most en- terprising and truly apostolic pastor had once begun the experiment twenty years before," on the eastern shores of Long Island, where after a few years of hopeful effort, they had left their homes and come to Branford, for the same reasons which now seemed to call for a new removal; and it was just like that sturdy old Puritan, Abraham Pierson, not to abandon a purpose which he believed wise and capable of good, so long as there was land enough unoccupied in all the wilderness on which to complete the experiment. Ac- cordingly, at this meeting two articles were adopted,
* Thompson's Hist. L. I., vol. 1, p. 336. Trumbull's Hist. Conn., vol. 1, pp. 143, 144
1
14
FUNDAMENTAL AGREEMENT.
and received the signature of twenty-three principal men of the town, as "THE FUNDAMENTAL AGREEMENT" on which they would engage in the new settlement- of which one was a promise "to provide with all care and diligence, for the maintenance of the purity of religion," and the other carefully restricted all civil power to those who should be members of some one or other of the Congregational Churches. When the report of this procedure reached the new settlement in November following, it was unanimously assented to by the inhabitants; and at a public meeting, held on the 24th of June, in the year 1667, about the time, prob- bably, of the arrival of the Branford company, they all subscribed their names to the agreement, to the number of forty, making in the whole, with those who had subscribed before, sixty-three .*
* This venerable document deserves a others admitted to be planters, have right permanent memorial in connection with the history of this Church. It stands as follows, with the signatures attached, on the Records of the Town of Newark.
OCTOBER 30, 1666.
At a meeting touching the intended de- sign of many of the inhabitants of Bran- ford, the following was subscribed :
Deut. i. 13; Exod. xviii. 21; Deut. xvii. 15; Jerem. xxxvi. 21.
1. That none shall be admitted freemen or free Burgesses within our town upon Pas- saic river, in the Province of New Jersey, but such planters as are members of some or other of the Congregational Churches, nor shall any but such be chosen to mag- istracy, or to carry on any part of civil ju- dicature, or as deputies or assistants to have power to vote in establishing laws, and making or repealing them, or to any chief military trust or office; nor shall any but such church members have any vote in any such elections; though all
to their proper inheritances, and do and shall enjoy all other civil liberties and privileges according to all laws, orders, grants which are, or shall hereafter be made for this town.
2. We shall, with care and diligence, provide for the maintenance of the purity of religion professed in the Congregational Churches.
Whereunto subscribed the inhabitants from Branford --
Jasper Crane, Abra. Pierson, Samuel Swaine, Laurence Ward, Thomas Blacth- ly, Samuel Plum, Josiah Ward, Samuel Rose, Thomas Pierson, John Ward, John Catling, Richard Harrison, Ebenezer Can- field, John Ward, Sen., Ed. Ball, John Harrison, John Crane, Thomas Hunting- ton, Delivered Crane, Aaron Blachthly, Richard Laurence, John Johnson, Thom- as Lyon, [his L. mark].
And upon the reception of these letters and subscriptions, the present inhabitants in November following, declared their
15
PURPOSE OF THE SETTLERS.
The settlement of Newark, in the years 1666 and 1667, was probably the last attempt to realize the noble dream of the old Puritan emigrants .* The re- strictions they adopted, with all their measures con- sequent thereon, betray no particle of the spirit of bigotry and fanaticism. They were measures, not of oppression, but of simple self-protection ; and as we hear of no dissentient voices in the whole band, it may fairly be presumed that they were equally in accord- ance with the views of those who were excluded from the power of government, as of those who were in- cluded. The simple design of their authors, was to prevent an enterprise on which they had set their hearts, and for whose success they were willing to make large sacrifices, from being frustrated in the beginning, by passing under the control of those who
consent and readiness to do likewise, and at a meeting, the 24th of the next June following, in 1667, they also subscribed with their own hands unto the two funda- mental agreements expressed on the other side their names, as follows :
Robert Treat, Obadiah Bruen, Matthew Camfield, Samuel Kitchell, Jeremiah Peck, Michael Tompkins, Stephen Freeman, Henry Lyon, John Browne, John Rogers, Stephen Davis, Edward Rigs, Robert Kitchell, John Brooks, [his B mark], Robert Lymens, [his V mark], Francis Linle, [his F mark], Daniel Tichenor, John Bauldwin, Sen., John Bauldwin, Jr., Jona. Tomkins, George Day, Thomas Johnson, John Curtis, Ephraim Burwell, Robert Denison, [his R mark], Nathan- iel Wheeler, William Camp, Joseph Wal- ters, Robert Dalglesh, Hans Albers, Thom. Morris, Hugh Roberts, Ephraim Pennington, Martin Tichenor, John Browne, Jr., Jona. Seargeant, Azariah Crane, Samuel Lyon, Joseph Riggs, Ste-
phen Bond. See Newark Town Records, p. 2, * What Cotton Mather says, in his quaint way, of the object of Pierson and his associates in their first enterprise at Southampton, may serve to illustrate the views and hopes with which he and his church came to Newark. After mention- ing that they formed themselves into a body politic, before they left Massachu- setts, " for the maintaining of government among themselves" in their new home, he adds, "thus was there settled a church at Southampton, under the pastoral charge of this worthy man, where he did, with laudable diligence, undergo two of the three hard labors, Diocentis et Regentis, to make it become what Paradise was called, an Island of the Innocent !" Without supposing that these views were realized, either there or here; this we may say, few communities have approached nearer to the mark, than did the town of Newark during the continuance of that same old Puritan regime.
16
PENALTIES FOR THE REFRACTORY.
could have no sympathy with its aims. Hence, while they confined the power of office, and even the elective franchise to church-members, they added in the very same instrument, "though all others, admitted to be planters, have right to their proper inheritances, and do and shall enjoy all other civil and religious privi- leges."
As to any who might be refractory, the bill of pains and penalties in force among them, shall be allowed to tell its own story. It is as follows :- "It is agreed upon, that in case any shall come in to us, or arise amongst us, that shall willingly or wilfully dis- turb us in our peace and settlements, and especially that would subvert us from the true religion and wor- ship of God, and cannot or will not keep their opinion to themselves, or be reclaimed after due time and means of conviction and reclaiming hath been used; it is unanimously agreed upon, and consented unto, as a fundamental Agreement and Order, that all such per- sons so ill-disposed and affected, shall" -- O what !- some direful penalty may be anticipated !- visions of fines, and prisons, and stocks, and whipping-posts rise before us! but let us hear-" shall, after due notice given them from the town, QUIETLY DEPART THE PLACE SEASONABLY, the town allowing them such valuable considerations for their lands or houses as indifferent men shall price them, or else leave them to make the best of them to any man the town shall approve of."
The fundamental agreements, in both articles, every man who took up land within the Newark purchase, must first subscribe, with this additional one, equally
17
LAW AMONG THEMSELVES.
·characteristic of the men who made it, " as their joint covenant one with another," and that at a time when there had been no legislative assembly convened, and of course no laws "settled in the Province;" that " they will from time to time all submit one to another to be led, ruled and governed by such magistrates and rulers in the town, as shall be annually chosen by the friends, from among themselves ; with such orders and laws whilst they are settled here by themselves, as they had in the place whence they came; under such penalties as the magistrates upon the nature of the offence shall determine.
It may be asked whether the settlers had the au- thority to establish such rules in regard to the terms of office and suffrage. In answer to this question it must be remembered, that they had purchased their lands at a fair price of the aboriginal claimants, and obtained as full a title as those claimants were capable of giving. They had also commenced their settlement with the approbation of the Proprietors' government, and held themselves obligated to the discharge of all their legal demands. True it is that purchase does not give the right of government, and the Concessions whose validity as law they did not dispute, make no mention of such authority. But neither do they mention the authority to establish Town Courts* which however the inhabitants erected, nor again to enact laws for the
* Town Meeting, January 1, 1668-9- dict of a jury of six men ; and one of the " Item. The town hath agreed that there shall be two Courts in our town yearly, to hear and try all causes and actions that shall be necessary and desired within our compass, and ACCORDING TO OUR ARTICLES ; and that the same shall pass by the ver-
times is to be the last fourth day of the week, commonly called Wednesday, in the month of February; and the other is the second Wednesday of the next follow- ing month of September." Newark Town Records, p. 11.
2
18
THE ARTICLES.
regulation of their own internal affairs, which yet they did enact constantly.
The truth is, that besides the Concessions, there were in the beginning, distinct ARTICLES OF AGREE- MENT between the government and the settlers in the different towns .* Those with Woodbridge and Piscataway are still extant, and contain several
of the same special privileges which Newark is known to have exercised. Those with Newark, fifteen in number, have long since been lost, but there is evi- dence sufficient that they once existed, and were en- tered into by the parties about the time of the arrival of the first company.+ These articles the people of Newark constantly referred to as the basis of their rights,¿ and, from the history of their formation, only one thing appears to have been asked by the settlers and denied by the Governor, and that was some abate- ment in the required quit-rents. In this, he said, he was not authorized to vary from the Concessions. Ac- cordingly the quit-rents never were refused by New- ark; but who can doubt that, while they yielded this pecuniary claim, the firm and honest old puritans took care to insert an article, indulging them at least, in the
At a town meeting in January, 1669, 770, these articles were ordered to be "co- pied out at a town charge." See Newark Town Records, p. 24.
t In a statement of the Council of the Proprietors, made Sept. 14, 1747, that body pledge themselves to prove the existence of these articles, and say of them, that they " were settled with long thought and deliberation, and corrections and altera- tions mutually made, proposed and agreed to in them ; and that Captain Treat and Mr. Gregory, their agents in this affair, did read
the Concessions, and that one alteration proposed, was concerning the quit-rent of a half-penny sterling per acre, to which Governor Carteret answered, 'I cannot grant any exemption from the payment of the half-penny per acre, it being all the advantage that the Lords Proprietors re- serve to themselves,' &c. To another al- teration he said, 'as for the purchasers being out of purse, I cannot help them therein,' " &c. (See Appendix to Bill in Chancery, p. 31.)
Į Newark Town Records, passim.
19
DISTRIBUTION OF LAND.
execution of their "fundamental agreement ?" How otherwise shall we account for the fact, that they still continued to practice on that agreement directly under the eye of the Governor, and never had their authority to do so called in question ? The truth is that in the religious liberty guaranteed by the Con- cessions, "avarice," as it has been justly said, "paid its homage to freedom."* But then the avarice, getting its own ends fully answered, cared but little it is proba- ble beyond that, how the freedom might be exercised.
It may be proper however to add here, that the · restriction referred to does not seem to have been kept in force much beyond the life of the oldest men then on the stage; nor was it long before all parties seem to have been convinced that such a restriction could not be of permanent utility.+
The next thing to be agreed upon was the assign- ment to the several settlers of their respective places of residence, for, it seems, almost all affairs were con- ducted by " agreements," among this rigid and exclusive band of Puritan sectaries. They had come chiefly from two pairs of contiguous towns, lying on opposite sides of a small bay and river, and their exclusiveness
* Bancroft's Hist. U. S., vol 1, p.
+ The first indication of a departure from it is to be found in the record of a town meeting held March 1, 1777-8, a few months before the death of the elder Pierson, which is as follows : " It is voted, as a town act, that all and every man that improves lands in the town of Newark shall make their appearance at town meet- ings, and there attend to any business that shall be proposed, as any of the planters do, and be liable to any fine as others, in case of their absence, &c., and also that
the Clerk is to set their names in a list and call them as others are called." Yet, after this, I find the fundamental agree- ment recognized as if still in force, or not formally abrogated ; for in the month of August, 1685, "William Camp and John Baldwin, Jr., are chosen to go from house to house of those as have not sub- scribed to our fundamental covenant, and return their answer to the town." (See Newark Town Records, pp. 68, 105.) This is [the latest recognition of it which I have been able to discover.
20
NEIGHBORLY AFFECTION.
here found a curious manifestation; for having tasted of the sweets of good neighborhood in the old mother Colony, they were not ready yet to forego its special privileges in their new wild home. So it stands on record, that the one company "desired liberty to take up their home lots and quarters in a quarter together, for their better security and neighborhood," "which motion of theirs" the other company immediately "as- sented to." Then the lines having been drawn for the two broad streets, crossing each other at right angles in the centre of the town, it was again agreed that each party of "neighbors" should take up their home lots in the quarters where, as chance was, they had already begun to occupy. But first of all, in testimony of their respect and gratitude to the gallant leader of the little Colony, "the neighbors of Milford and New Haven," to which party he belonged, " freely gave way, that Captain Robert Treat should choose his lots" be- fore the rest made any division. This done, and eight acres being assigned to him as his home lot, whereas the rest had six, the remainder of the party cast lots for their several portions, " after due preparation and solemnization," the matter having been first "submitted to the Lord for His guidance.""
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