USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at the end of the century : a history, Volume 1 > Part 14
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For over a year several fruitless attempts at arbitration were made. Connecticut's feeble claim was still further weakened by the firm and
mundson; The Truth Exalted, Memoirs of J. Burnyeat; and the volumes men- tioned in the text above. See also Narr. Club. Publ. vi, 357-362, and Prof. Diman's excellent introduction to the reprint of Williams's treatise in v. 5 of Narr. Club Publ. In the R. I. Hist. Soc. MSS. i, 18, 21, is a paper written July 25, 1672, to Thomas Olney, jr., and John Whipple, jr., entitled "George Fox's Instructions to his Friends", and also a lengthy and condemnatory reply made by Olney in a paper called "Ambition Anatomized."
1R. I. C. R. ii, 227. The complaint concerning Crandall is in Idem, p. 226. 2Idem, p. 230.
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honorable position taken by Governor Winthrop, who in a letter to his assembly, May 17, 1670, publicly voiced his "dissent from exerting power of jurisdiction over the people of the cast side of the Paweatuck River and Narragansett Country, until his Majesty's pleasure be fur- ther known".1 But Connectieut was now firmly deeided upon en- foreing her elaim, and made ready for the approaching meeting of agents at New London, on June 16, 1670. The proceedings of this meeting, which at the suggestion of Rhode Islanders, were conducted entirely in writing, oeeupied three days and ineluded seventeen letters and replies. Connecticut claimed the Narragansett country since her prior charter of 1662 granted territory as far east as the Narragansett River or Bay. Rhode Island replied that the King, in her charter of 1663, had expressly determined that the Pawcatuck River should be the westerly bounds of Rhode Island, and had especially vetoed the elause in the Connectieut eharter by referring to the Winthrop-Clarke agreement. The whole argument for the two days was given over to a discussion of the exact meaning of the term "Narragansett River", and sinee neither colony would yield an inch and Conneetieut would not recognize the decision of the royal commissioners, it was but nat- ural that the results of the conference should be absolutely fruitless.2
The Connecticut authorities then publicly proclaimed their author- ity at Wickford and Westerly, meeting with little opposition. The Rhode Island assembly immediately met in special session and took measures to defend their colony against the invasions of Connecticut. The issue was now fairly joined. The display of arms, the arrest of Westerly offieers, and the threats of violence, drew forth from Gover- nor Arnold a long and dignified letter to Governor Winthrop, in which he urged moderation and requested that Connecticut should forbear jurisdiction east of the Pawcatuek until the whole matter should be settled by the King. Sueh high-handed aetion, indeed, was frowned upon by many high in Conneetieut authority. Winthrop had already dissented, and now, on August 3, 1670, Lieutenant-Governor John Mason wrote to the agents, counselling an "agreement in some rational way", and questioning whether the territory in dispute was worth the expense of trying to acquire it.3
1R. I. C. R. ii, p. 311.
2The details of the conference, together with much previous and subsequent correspondence, are in R. I. C. R. ii, 309-328.
3His letter (in R. I. C. R. ii, 348) was written as a result of a letter from Roger Williams (in Narr. Club Publ. vi, 333, 1 Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. i, 275, and elsewhere). Williams told Mason that the cause of the trouble was, first, "a depraved appetite after great portions of land in this wilderness", and, second, "an unneighborly and unchristian intrusion upon us, as being the weaker, contrary to your laws, as well as ours."
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FROM THE CHARTER OF 1663 TO KING PHILIP'S WAR.
The whole affair now settled down to a stubborn struggle. Every fresh act of violence would call forth a complaint and reply, and then each colony would appoint a new commission of arbiters, whose work was sure to be in vain. In one of her letters, Rhode Island said, "to be plain and clear, in few words, we must tell you that we have no power to alter, change, or give away any part of the bounds prescribed and settled by his Majesty in his gracious letters Patents". Connecti- cut quickly replied, "We must needs say, if in your former you had dealt as plainly, we should never have given ourselves the labor and trouble we have had on that account".1 With such an unyielding spirit shown on both sides, it is no wonder that arbitration was futile.
Connecticut had now a powerful ally in Rhode Island in the person of William Harris. In a letter to the general assembly, which seems to have come to their notice in February, 1672, he strongly opposed the sending of an agent to England, and then proceeded to give copious reasons why Rhode Island's claim to the Narragansett country should not be pressed. His long arguments in favor of Connecticut so angered the Rhode Island authorities who were striving to keep the lands as bounded by the terms of their charter intact, that they had Harris haled before the Court of Justices at Newport, where they committed him to prison without bail, upon the charge of speaking and writing against the charter. But upon the advent of the Quakers to supremacy as a political party, in April, 1672, Harris was released and later restored to office.2 His arguments, fortified with much show
1R. I. C. R. ii, 422, 432, under dates of Nov. 4, 1671, and Jan. 29, 1672.
2Harris's document is filed in the Ct. Rec. under the apparently wrong date of Oct. 1666. (See copy in Extracts from Ct. MSS. i, 49-67, in R. I. H. S. Library.) An original draft in Harris's handwriting, in the R. I. H. S. MSS. i, 17, is followed by a copy of the order for his arrest dated February 24, 1671- 72, and is endorsed "This the copy of that for which I was imprisoned and tried for my life". Harris's action in the matter is open to much doubt and controversy. There were many in Rhode Island, to be sure, who favored his views, as may be shown from the course of events. On Sept. 25, 1671, the assembly, strongly pro-Rhode Island, appointed John Clarke to go to England on the Narragansett business and levied a rate of £200 for his expenses. Then came Harris's protest, and his consequent arrest and imprisonment for trea- son, Feb. 24, 1672. In April, the assembly met, refused to receive a paper from Harris, renewed the tax for Clarke, and passed a high-handed act, order- ing that all who opposed any rate laid by the assembly should be bound over to the Court of Trials for "high contempt and sedition". (R. I. C. R. ii, 411, 429, 435, 439.) The following month, there came a great political upheaval. Easton was chosen governor in place of Arnold, Smith and Brinley were elected assistants from Narragansett, and scarcely a member of the former assembly was retained. It was an alliance of the moderate Quaker element with the pro-Connecticut element in Narragansett. They immediately pro- ceeded to undo the work of their predecessors, repealing the sedition act and the rate for Clarke, and writing a conciliatory letter to Connecticut. (Idem, p. 450-461.) The spirited protests, however, sent in by the people of Warwick
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of legal reasoning, brought about a more conciliatory attitude toward Connectieut, prevented the immediate sending of an agent to London, and undoubtedly did much to hinder the settlement of the Narragan- sett controversy in Rhode Island's favor. The whole dispute, how- ever, was temporarily obscured by the preparations for King Philip's War, after which, under somewhat ehanged conditions, it again broke forth, to annoy both colonies for a long series of years.
CHAPTER IX.
FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS, 1675-1686.
Rhode Island was about to enter upon a period that was to affect her prosperity and retard her economic growth more than any other series of events in her previous history. The fear of an Indian upris- ing, so long dreaded, yet scarcely expected by the colonists, was soon to be realized. As the English increased in numbers and hewed their way further and further into the forests, establishing boundaries for large tracts of land, and introducing a new civilization, the Indians saw their tribal lands rapidly disappearing, their favorite fishing- places invaded by the saw-mills and grist-mills of the settlers, and their barbarian means of subsistence supplanted by a mode of living that they would neither understand nor adopt. Under such social eondi- tions a collision was inevitable. Many disputes and altercations arose,
and by others (see Copies of Warwick Rec. p. 25-26 in R. I. H. S. Library) prevented this reaction from going too far. Subsequent assemblies, more patriotic in their make-up, showed no intention of acceding to the intrusion of Connecticut. The whole series of events would seem to show that Harris, whatever may have been his motives, was considered a traitor only by the party that opposed him. Williams's recorded opinion, though perhaps prej- udiced, is of much importance in this connection. Harris, he says, "not find- ing that pretence, nor the people called Baptists (in whom he confided) serv- ing his ends, he flies to Connecticut Colony (then and still in great contest with us) in hopes to attain his gaping about land from them, if they prevail over us. To this end he in public speech and writing applauds Connecticut's Charter, and damns ours, and his royal Majesty's favor also for granting us favor (as to our consciences) which he largely endeavors by writing to prove the King's Majesty by laws could not do. Myself ( being in place) by speech and writing opposed him, and Mr. B. Arnold, then Governor, and Mr. Jo. Clark, Deputy-Governor, Captain Cranston, and all the Magistrates. He was committed for speaking and writing against his Majesty's honor, prerogative, and authority. He lay some time in prison until the General Assembly, where the Quaker (by his wicked, ungodly, and disloyal plots) prevailing, he by their means gets loose". (G. Fox digged out of his Burrowes, p. 206-7.)
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FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS.
which were generally settled by imposing some new restraint upon the Indians. But this state of affairs could not continue long. The sav- age, haughty, incapable of reasoning, repelling this assumed author- ity over him, bided his time and waited for revenge. It needed only a leader who could unite the tribes to cause this smoldering hate to burst forth into a flame that might endanger the very existence of New England.
The outbreak of King Philip's war cannot be ascribed to any one cause. It arose from a variety of causes and from a succession of events that can be but briefly alluded to in this chapter. Upon the death of Massasoit the old sachem of the Wampanoags, his elder son, Wamsutta or Alexander, became chief of the tribe. In 1662 the Governor of Plymouth, suspecting that Alexander was plotting rebel- lion, ordered that he be seized and brought to Plymouth. Through a display of armed force, this was done; but on the way to their desti- nation, he suddenly became sick and died. The mysterious manner of his death when in English hands had much effect upon his brother Philip, who succeeded him as sachem, and was never forgotten. For a few years there was a period of comparative quiet, a suspected out- break being punished by a partial disarming of the Indians. At length, in September, 1671, various reports as to Philip's behavior caused him to be summoned to Plymouth, where he acknowledged his complete subjection and promised to pay a fine of £100 and a yearly tribute, to submit to the judgment of Plymouth Courts, and neither to make war nor sell land without the Governor's approbation. This forced treaty gave a sense of security to the English, that was, how- ever, but fancied and temporary. It served to lower the savage in the white man's estimation, and inspired in the Indian's breast a hatred that could only be appeased by revenge. The traditionary reply of Philip to a friendly interposition for peace shows better than any other quotation the wrongs with which the Indians considered themselves oppressed : "By various means they [the English] got possession of a great part of his [Massasoit's] territory. But he still remained their friend till he died. My elder brother became sachem. They pretended to suspect him of evil designs against them. He was seized and confined, thereby thrown into sickness and died. Soon after I became sachem, they disarmed all my people. They tried my people by their own laws; assessed damages against them, which they could not pay. Their land was taken. At length a line of division was agreed upon between the English and my people, and I myself was to be answerable. Sometimes the cattle of the English would come into
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the eornfields of my people, as they did not make fenees like the Eng- lish. I must then be seized and confined, till I sold another tract of my country for satisfaction of all damages and eosts. Thus, traet after traet is gone. But a small part of the dominions of my aneestors remains. I am determined not to live till I have no country".1
During the period of ealm that followed the treaty of 1671, Philip and his chiefs laid their plans for a general destruction of the English. In June, 1675, through information from eertain friendly Indians, the colonists learned of the existence of a deep laid plot against them, and immediately took aetion toward breaking up the design. They sent an embassy to the Narragansetts, who were greatly feared on aeeount of their fighting ability and supposed strength, to demand that that nation should break off all negotiations with Philip and give whatever intelligenee they eould of the plot. The commissioners were instrueted to visit Roger Williams at Providenee to obtain his assist- anee and adviee. Within half an hour, he was with them on his way to Narragansett, where the Indians asserted their entire innoeenee and gave lavish assurances of their fidelity and good-will. But raee hatred was too far ineuleated in their hearts to allow these degenerate sons of Canonieus to remain any longer as allies. Two days later, Williams wrote to Governor Winthrop of his suspicion that "all the fine words from the Indian saehems to us were but words of poliey, falsehood and treachery ; especially sinee now the English testify, that for divers weeks, if not months, eanoes passed to and again, day and night, between Philip and the Narragansetts, and the Narragansett Indians have committed many robberies on the English houses".2 Intervention, as he suspected, was hopeless. When the Narragansetts decided to take up arms with Philip, it meant mueh to Rhode Island, which otherwise would seareely have been invaded. Williams realized this and did all that he eould to prevent hostilities. "My old bones and eyes," he says, "are weary with travel and writing to the Gover- nors of Massachusetts and Rhode Island". But the Narragansett saehem, although revereneing the friend of his father, told him that the youth of the tribe, who were eager for war, could not be controlled. In the midst of these fruitless negotiations, the warning note of hos- tilities had sounded from Swansea, where on June 24, 1675, a number of the inhabitants were massaered. A struggle was begun, in which the English, through underestimating the strength and ability of their
1R. I. H. S. Coll. vii, 91. The grievances of the Indians are still further detailed in the Narrative of John Easton, published from the MS. in 1858. 2Narr. Club Pub. vi, 366, 370.
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FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS.
savage opponents, were to suffer losses of a most serious and lasting nature.
While the Plymouth authorities, accustomed to despise their oppo- nents, desired to force the Indians into subjection, the Rhode Island attitude was one that strongly favored arbitration-real arbitration- and not the compulsory signing of treaties in which the Indians were made to acknowledge the most abject servitude. The government, furthermore, was in the hands of the Quakers, whose religious doc- trines inclined them toward a peaceful solution of all matters. Short- ly before the outbreak of hostilities, a delegation of Newport men held a conference with Philip, in which they tried to persuade him to lay aside his warlike intentions. They agreed that "all complaints might be righted without war", and suggested an effective arbitration be- tween an Indian sachem and Governor of New York. The Indians, says the narrator of this conference, "owned that fighting was the worst way . seemed to like the idea and said we spoke honestly". It appears probable that if this course had been properly proposed to them by the people of Plymouth, that the war might have been prevented ; but no steps toward it appear to have been taken, and the subject began and ended in this conference.1
With her government in the hands of Quakers, and with the other colonies indifferent as to her welfare, Rhode Island was in fair way to suffer exceedingly in case the war should be waged in her territory. Since the attack at Swansea, the Indians had visited their fury upon the towns in Massachusetts and Plymouth. But the general retreat to Narragansett toward the close of 1675, and the consequent decision of the United Colonies to attack them in winter quarters caused the fighting to be transferred to Rhode Island soil. The Narragansetts were now openly allied with Philip, and this attack upon them in their stronghold was made in order to prevent the joining of forces in the spring. But the decision, strange to say, was made without even con- sulting Rhode Island, although it was expressly ordered in her charter that the other colonies should not molest the native Indians "without the knowledge and consent of the Governor and Company of our col- ony of Rhode Island". As Arnold justly says, it "was a direct viola-
'The author of this narration was John Easton, a Newport Quaker, and later a governor of R. I. The learned antiquarian, S. G. Drake, says that "he was, from his locality, and social and political standing, in the way of being better informed than all or any of those who have left narratives or relations of the circumstances. His relation cannot fail always to excite a deep inter- est, especially as it was evidently dictated by simplicity and honesty". (See Drake, Old Indian Chronicle, p. 112-113; also Easton's Narrative, p. 8.)
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tion of the royal order, an unscrupulous disregard of the rights, and a wanton act of indifference to the welfare of a sister colony, which no exigency of State could excuse".1 Although her soil, through the acts of another colony, was thus exposed to the horrors of Indian war- farc, Rhode Island sent many volunteers to join the army, which, under the command of Governor Winslow, marched toward Narragansett over a thousand strong. The details of the terrible battle that took place on December 19, 1675, in the heart of the Narragansett Country, and which is known to history as the "Swamp Fight", cannot be entered into at the present place.2 This bloody conflict, in which the victorious English suffered almost as great a loss as the Indians, weak- encd the power of the Narragansetts forever, but did not by any means put an end to the war. The guerilla method of Indian warfare made it possible for depredations and massacres still to continue, while the fugitive Narragansetts now felt no hesitation in treating Rhode Islanders as their avowed enemies. The month of March, 1676, was a sad one for the mainland towns of Rhode Island. Wickford, War- wick, Pawtuxet and Providence were attacked in rapid succession, and the crops destroyed, the cattle killed, the houses burned and the few remaining inhabitants driven for their lives.3
Rhode Island had indeed suffered most fearfully from the effects of a war which the decision of other colonies had visited upon her, but the immediate disaster that happened to her mainland towns was due chiefly to causes that need especial explanation. At the breaking out of the war, the political control of Rhode Island was in the hands of the Newport Quakers, with the aged William Coddington as Governor. Secure in their isolation and the strength of their garrisons, and cher- ishing no especial affection for the straggling little towns on the main, to which they had formerly been united against their will, these Islanders had not the least intention of spending their energy in aid of
1Arnold, i, 402.
2The details of this battle and of other conflicts on Rhode Island soil are more thoroughly entered into in the chapter on Wars and the Militia. See also G. M. Bodge, The Narragansett Fort Fight, 1886.
3For the burning of the Smith house at Wickford, see Drake's Indian Chronicle, p. 216, 244. For the burning of Warwick, on March 17, see Drake, 217, 244; Hubbard, 66, add. p. 3; Mather 24; and Fuller's Warwick, 76. For the attack on Pawtuxet, Jan. 27, see Drake, 196, 212, 244, 302; and Hubbard, 60. For the burning of Providence on March 29, see Drake, 223, 244, 254; Hubbard, 67, add. p. 4; Mather 26; Backus, i, 424; Nile's History in 3 Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. vi, 183; and Stone's "Burning of Prov." in Prov. Jour. Apr. 10, 1876. The fight of July 2, 1676, near Wolf's Hill in Smithfield, and not in a cedar swamp in Warwick, as Arnold says, is alluded to in a letter from Major Talcott. (Ct. Rec. ii, 459. See also Drake's edition of Mather, p. 39.)
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FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS.
their fellow settlers. To a petition of October, 1675, that the colony should be put in a suitable posture of defense for "the safety and satis- faction of all", the assembly, composed almost entirely of Island men, voted that each town council should provide for its own military affairs. In March, 1676, Providence and Warwick directly petitioned that colony garrisons should be established in their towns. The as- sembly appointed a committee which soon decided that the colony was not sufficiently able to maintain garrisons in the out-plantations and deemed it best that the inhabitants of those towns should give up the contest and repair to the Island for safety.1 Under such circum- stances a general flight to the Island was the only alternative, although a few of the bravest of each town remained behind, determined not to resign their homes without a struggle. A few days later the Indians fell upon the defenseless towns, and they were compelled to submit to a destruction of houses and property, which the toil of two generations could not replace. There is every reason to believe that had garrisons been placed at the colony expense in these two towns, they might both have been saved from their terrible fate. Nor do the excuses of inabil- ity and inadvisability which Newport was later forced to make show any reason why the Island, with five times the population of Provi- dence and more than secure in her own position, could not have done this. Whatever may have been their motive in deserting the main- land towns-whether it was political enmity, Quaker antipathy against war in general, or a selfish desire to preserve only their own homes- such action is worthy of decided condemnation and did much to foster an alienation between the mainland and the Island which hindered a united colony growth for many years.2
1R. I. C. R. ii, 531, 533. Richard Smith says that the Narragansett propri- etors also sent in a petition to the government of Rhode Island for "protection and defense, which was absolutely denied them, the then Governor of Rhode Island being a Quaker, and thought it perhaps not lawful either to give com- mission or take up arms; so that their towns, goods, corn, cattle were by the savage natives burned and totally destroyed". (R. I. C. R. iii, 51.)
2The May election of 1676, which resulted in the choice of Walter Clarke, as Governor, did not promise much more hope for the mainland. Now that the chief danger was over and the devastation already wrought, a small colony garrison was ordered for the protection of Providence, which, however, was not sustained. Clarke's weak letter of apology for not carrying out this order concludes with the consoling information that "the Lord's hand is against New England, and no weapon formed will or shall prosper till the work be finished". (Prov. Rec. xv, 160.) To the credit of some of Newport, be it said that Edmundson in his Journal (p. 81) records that "the people that were not Friends were outrageous to fight, but the Governor being a Friend (one Walter Clarke) could not give commissions to kill and destroy men". In the May election of 1677, the war party finally triumphed, re-established the gar- rison at Providence, and thoroughly revised the militia law.
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