USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at the end of the century : a history, Volume 1 > Part 16
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73
This statement was decidedly untrue, since Nichols and his associates merely revoked their order requiring the Narragansett proprietors to quit their habitations, and not the important order giving the control of Narragan- sett to the Rhode Island magistrates. (R. I. C R. ii, 94.) The fact that Nichols was not present when these orders were made in 1665 was merely an infor- mality, and consequent reports confirming the orders were signed by the whole body of commissioners (R. I. C. R. ii, 127), as well as accepted without question by the King.
2The documents illustrating the action of the Commissioners in R. I. are in R. I. C. R. iii, 139-149, 174; Ct. Rec. iii, 320, 324. Cranfield's letter to Jen- kins, Oct. 19, 1683, is in Cal. of State Papers, Colonial, 1681-1685, p. 521.
137
FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS.
shire into a royal province in 1679, and the later frequent complaints were all made with this end in view. In 1684, the first blow came. The simple trading charter which Massachusetts had so long been permitted to enjoy, was annulled, and the colony became an absolute royal possession.
The most important step having been taken, it was merely a question of time when the other colonies would be visited with the same mis- fortune. As Cranfield said, in one of his usual vituperative letters : "The temper and methods of government in Connecticut and New Plymouth is the same as in Boston, as corrupt but more ignorant. If the King take them into his hands as well as Boston, it will effect a general reformation. There is matter enough to furnish the attorney- general with grounds for cancelling their charters. If the King knew what a mean and scandalous sort of people the Rhode Islanders are, I doubt not that he would prosecute their charter also".1 Plymouth, though Cranfield does not seem to have been aware of the fact, was without any charter or constitution, and lay entirely at the King's mercy. The turn of Rhode Island and Connecticut was soon to come.
Randolph, whose duties as informer against the colonies occupied more of his time than his business of collecting customs, had long urged that all the charters should be annulled, and in May, 1685, the Lords of Trade ordered him to "prepare papers containing all such particulars upon which writs of Quo Warranto might be granted against Connecticut and Rhode Island". Such a command was very acceptable to this energetic official, and he immediately set about gath- ering information whereby these two less offending but likewise valu- able colonies might, like Massachusetts, be garnered in for the crown interests. In a short time he had collected the following "articles of high misdemeanor" against Rhode Island, which, with those exhibited against Connecticut, be sent over to England :
"1. They raise great sums of money upon the inhabitants of that colony, and others by fines, taxes and arbitrary imprisonment, con- trary to law, and deny appeals to his Majesty.
2. They make and execute laws contrary to the laws of England.
3. They deny his Majesty's subjects the benefit of the laws of England, and will not suffer them to be pleaded in their courts.
4. They keep no authentic records of their laws, neither will they suffer the inhabitants to have copies of them.
5. They raise and cancel their laws as they please, without the consent of the general assembly.
1Cal. State Papers, Colonial, 1681-85, p. 521.
. 138
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
6. Their Governor, Deputy-Governor, assistants, deputies, and other officers for the administration of justice, as well as juries and witnesses, are under no legal oaths.
7. They violate the acts of trade, and have taken from Franeis Brinley, Esq., his late Majesty's commission, appointing the said Brinley and others to administer an oath to the Governor of that eo]- ony, for his duly putting in execution the aet of Trade and Naviga- tion, made in the twelfth year of his late Majesty's reign; the Gov- ernor of that eolony not having taken the said oath these three or four years last past, as is required in the said aet".
These charges were ehifly trumped up for the oeeasion, the last, for instanee, being direetly disproved by the records, and were never fur- nished with proof. They were sufficient, however, for the purpose desired, and in July were sent by the Committee for Trade and For- eign Plantations to the Privy Couneil with the recommendation that the Attorney-General should bring writs of Quo Warranto against both colonies. The royal order to this effeet was soon given, but for some reason the writs were not immediately prosecuted. Randolph, who was in England at the time, anxiously urged that they be entrust- ed to his care, and on October 6, the writs were aeeordingly issued.1 With these instruments of colonial destruetion in his hands, he soon sailed for New England, where the colonists were despondently await- ing the King's deeision.
The Narragansett country, in the meanwhile, was rapidly being drawn into the English seheme of colonial dependenee. The King had no intention of heeding the prejudieed report of the commissioners in favor of Connecticut, sinee he now proposed to inelude this territory in his contemplated New England provinee, to the exelusion of Rhode Island and every other elaimant. As soon as the Massachusetts ehar- ter was eaneelled, it was planned to ereet Massachusetts, New Hamp- shire, Maine and Plymouth into a royal provinee under the leadership of Colonel Perey Kirk, and on November 17, 1684, the Narragansett country was added to this dominion.2 But upon the death of King Charles, in February, 1685, and the consequent aeeession of James II, these plans were changed and a slightly different poliey adopted. All these provinees exeept Plymouth, were placed under a President and
"For the proceedings in procuring the writ, see R. I. C. R. iii, 175-178, and also the various references to R. I. in the five volumes of Randolph Papers issued by the Prince Society. No copy of the writ itself can be found, the date being ascertained from the record of reception (see R. I. C. R. iii, 190), and from the notification of issue. (Arnold i, 482.)
"For this proposed province under Kirk, see Palfrey, iii, 395, 482; and R. I. H. S. Publ. vii, 198.
139
FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS.
Council until a Chief Governor should be sent over. Although the representative system by towns was not allowed, yet the limitation of the Council's power and the appointment of the moderate Joseph Dudley as President showed that the new King did not intend to sub- jugate the colonies too abruptly. In May, 1686, Dudley established himself at Boston, and on the 28th made proclamation concerning Narragansett Country, erecting a Court of Record, appointing justices and constables, and forbidding all governments to exercise jurisdic- tion there. In the following month, the Council held session at Kings- ton, where they provided for two annual Courts of Pleas, changed the town names-Kingston to Rochester, Westerly to Haversham, and Greenwich to Dedford-and made many minor provisions, all contrib- uting toward a more permanent establishment of the King's rule.1
Randolph arrived from London with the writ of Quo Warranto against Rhode Island in May, 1686, and on June 22 delivered it to Governor Walter Clarke. Although the time for the return of the writ had expired, the assembly voted "not to stand suit with his majesty, but to proceed by our humble address to his Majesty to con- tinue our humble privileges and liberties according to our charter, formerly granted by his late Majesty, Charles the Second, of blessed memory". They realized the folly of opposing the royal will, even if the altered conditions were sure to be distasteful, and wisely accept- ed the inevitable. In this their last assembly for several years, they took the precaution to preserve as much liberty as they could by mak- ing detailed provision for the separate towns to conduct public busi- ness. Thus, with a strong supreme authority to protect them from their neighbors, they had only to fall back upon their original town governments to secure as much tranquillity as they could have other- wise had.
Finally the assembly addressed a letter to the King in which they narrated their action and beseeched his favor, and appointed an agent, John Greene, to carry the same to London. As if to show that no unified or corporate action could be taken by Rhode Island, this ad- dress was followed within a few months by no less than six memorials, each representing different factions. Certain inhabitants of Narra- gansett and Newport, who disliked the Quaker Rhode Island govern- ment, and welcomed the coming of royal authority, protested against the assembly's expressed desire for a continuance of charter privileges and against the appointment of a London agent. Randall Holden
1For Dudley's rule in Narragansett, see R. I. C. R. iii, 195-203.
140
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
wrote to complain of the inroads of Massachusetts inen in Narragansett country, while the land owners of that country and the proprietors of Pawtuxet, fearing that John Greene might attempt to invalidate their titles during his stay in England, sent letters to counteract his influ- enee at Court. The Quakers also sent an address, begging that their views in regard to oaths and warfare might be respected, and some, signing themselves as of Providenee Plantations, wrote disowning the assembly's address and asking to be annexed to the general New Eng- land government.1 These various memorials do not indieate a serious division among the eolony's authorities, but are rather the expressions of individuals who feared that their interests might be compromised by a sudden change in government.
On June 3, 1686, the provisional government of New England under Dudley was abolished by appointing Sir Edmund Andros Governor in Chief of all those provinees. Upon receiving the address of Rhode Island, voting not to stand suit and eonsigning her welfare to the King's pleasure, the royal authorities placed the colony under the government of Andros, and requested him to demand the surrender of the eharter. The King, furthermore, assured the "good subjeets of our Colony and Plantation aforesaid, of our Royal eountenanee and protection in all things, wherein our service and their welfare shall be concerned".2 This was under date of September 13, 1686. By royal command Rhode Island's corporate existenee was not longer to be allowed. She was heneeforth to be but a county, so to speak, in a great royal provinee, in which the colonists themselves had no privi- leges whatever exeept what they eould persuade the royal governor to give them.
If Rhode Island's history were to be divided into three periods, the first would extend to the establishment of the Andros rule, the second to the American Revolution, and the third to the present time. In 1686, Rhode Island was a far different structure from what Roger Williams had imagined when he planted the first seeds of settlement on the banks of the Mooshassuek. In any retrospeet of her history from one date to the other, two feelings are inspired, satisfaction and surprise- satisfaction that she grew and waxed strong from sueh seattered and unprofitable beginnings, and surprised that she should have managed to escape the continued inroads of her neighbors. Indeed, this latter achievement is one of the miraeles of Rhode Island's entire early his-
1These different addresses are in R. I. C. R. iii, 194, 208, 209; Cal. State Papers, Colonial, 1685-88, no. 819, 829; and Palfrey, iii, 506n.
"The commissions to Andros are in R. I. C. R. iii, 212, 218.
.
141
FROM KING PHILIP'S WAR TO THE COMING OF ANDROS. -
tory. Time and again other colonies obtained a foothold within her borders from which it seemed almost impossible to dispossess them, but her unwearied persistence, aided by the justice of her claims and by good fortune, enabled her in the end to maintain her territory intact. Yet the onus of blame for this aggression upon her lands- and this fact most historians of Rhode Island have cither failed or been unwilling to note-should be visited upon her own disloyal in- habitants rather than upon her grasping neighbors. The submission of the Arnolds to Massachusetts in 1642 first gave that colony a pre- tence of control over Rhode Island territory and was the chief cause of the early troubles at Providence; the scheming of Coddington to erect a monarchy or to ally the Island with a foreign jurisdiction to the exclusion of Providence and Warwick, kept the colony in an un- settled and defenseless state for several years; the reproachful and entreating letters written by Richard Smith and his companions to Connecticut kept that government constantly awake to the urgency of striving for Narragansett lands ; and the existence of a strong royalist party who disliked the authority of Rhode Island and strove to replace it with a government more akin to them in religious and political thought, was a continued source of annoyance even after the passing of the Andros rule. In view of such repeated concessions to outside jurisdictions, it is little wonder that Massachusetts and Connecticut were able to make such vigorous invasions as they did upon Rhode Island's territory. Although most of those who disparaged her au- thority may have thought that they had sufficient cause for dissatis- faction, yet had they exerted themselves to amend these faults instead of complaining of them to other colonies, it would have been much better in the end for all parties concerned. We may not be justified in branding these symptoms of contempt with the name of treachery, since Rhode Island was at first a problem rather than an established fact in the line of governments ; but inasmuch as all these malcontents, with scarcely an exception, had formerly signed compacts of loyalty and union and had accepted the jurisdiction of Rhode Island so long as became their ends, we are surely safe in asserting that their homage to other colonies, generally with mercenary aims, was a breach of trust and fidelity. The chief obstruction to Rhode Island's progress during the first century was not foreign aggression, but internal disloyalty.
In spite of the disaffection of her subjects and the incursions of her neighbors, Rhode Island had managed not only to survive, but also to better her material condition to a notable degrec. From a few scat- tered settlements, despised and abused by the adjacent colonies, to
142
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
whose persecution they owed their existence, she had grown to become a prosperous plantation which compelled recognition and was counted a factor in New England's economic and political life. Her popula- tion, which was nearly cqual to that of Plymouth, amounted in 1686 to about 4,000 souls, with perhaps 2,500 on the Island, 600 in Provi- dence, and the rest scattered throughout the other towns.1
The chief occupation of the colonists was agriculture, the majority "living comfortably by improving the wilderness". The royal com- missioners, in their report on New England sent home in 1666, said that in Rhode Island were "the best English grass and most sheep, the ground very fruitful, ewes bringing ordinarily two lambs, and corn yielding eighty for one": and this fact of sheep-raising is cmpha- sized when we note that William Brenton alone in 1673 owned over 1,500 head of sheep.2 Shipping, as yet, contributed but very slightly to the colony's prosperity. Although Massachusetts possessed a com- merce of perhaps cight hundred vessels, large and small, Rhode Island had to acknowledge to the Board of Trade that "we have no shipping belonging to our Colony, but only a few sloops".3 Her favorable situ- ation, however, near good harbors, together with the inclinations and activity of the more youthful portion of her population, was soon destined to give her a standing in trade rivalling any other colony in New England.
'The various early estimates of population vary somewhat, but the above is approximately correct. Callender ( Hist. Discourse in R. I. H. S. Coll. iv, 149,) says that in 1658 "perhaps there were fewer than 200 families in the whole colony". Cartwright, in 1671, estimates that there were 1,000 men in R. I. able to bear arms ( Palfrey, iii, 36), and it is usual to reckon five persons for every man of military age. William Harris, in his Plea of the Pawtuxet Purchasers, 1677, alludes to Providence as a town of "about five hundred souls" (R. I. II. S. Publ. i, 195), and a Providence taxlist of 1679 records about 125 taxpayers (Prov. Rec. xv, 187). Sanford, in his reply of 1680 (Arnold, i, 490) says that "for planters we conceive there are about 500 and about 500 men besides". He also notes that there are about 200 births and fifty marriages a year, and 455 burials in seven years last past-doubtless partially. due to the effects of Philip's war. The population of R. I. in 1708, the date of the first census, was 7181.
2Hutchinson's Coll. of State Papers, p. 416, and Austin's Geneal. Dict. p. 254.
3Sanford further says that "as for goods exported and imported, which is very little, there is no custom imposed"; that "the principal matters exported are horses and provisions, and the goods chiefly imported is a small quantity of Barbadoes goods for supply of our families"; and "the great obstruction concerning trade is the want of merchants and men of considerable estates amongst us". (This document is in Arnold, i, 488.)
CHAPTER X.
ANDROS AND THE ROYAL GOVERNORS, 1686-1701.
The rule of Andros was looked forward to with less fear in Rhode Island than in any other colony. The establishment of this new authority in New England meant, first of all, the transference of all political power from the hands of the colonists to Andros and his council. Laws could be made from which there was no appeal, financial systems altered, and taxes levied by strangers who little understood local wants and requirements. The provision in Andros's commission allowing him to grant land upon payment of quit-rents was also fraught with much danger, particularly in this country, where soil was the chief item of wealth. But the most hated attack upon New England's institutions was the establishing of tolerance in religion. In order to obtain a foothold for the Church of England, Episcopal forms and rites were introduced and the Baptist, Quakers, and other despised sects were elevated to influence at the expense of the Puritan church. It was not liberty of conscience as a principle, but it signified the downfall of theocracy. All these invasions of former rights were felt most in Massachusetts, the especial object of royal interference, and least in Rhode Island. In the latter colony there was little commerce to lay duties upon, the collecting of any tax whatever was sure to be attended with considerable difficulty, and there was no established church to feel the effects of Andros's attitude on religion. The coming of the new rule meant that Rhode Island was guaranteed protection against the oppressions and incursions of her neighbors, and was destined to enjoy a longer period of repose than had ever been her privilege before.
Andros arrived at Boston on December 19, 1686, and immediately established himself in office. The first news Rhode Island received of his coming was in the form of an official letter, dated December 22, stating his authority to demand her charter, and appointing seven of her inhabitants as members of his general council. He also wrote a friendly letter to Gov. Walter Clarke to acquaint him of his arrival.
144
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
Rhode Island, although she had no particular antipathy against the Andros rule, had no intention of parting with her charter except as a last resort, and replied that it "was at their Governor's house in Newport, and that it should be forthcoming when sent for, but in regard to the tediousness and bad weather, it could not then be brought ".1
Andros held his first council meeting at Boston, on December 30, 1686, at which five of the seven Rhode Island members were present. The colony was henceforth governed by this body, although her members do not seem to have taken enough interest to attend further meetings. The minor details of administration were cared for by a local court called "The General Quarter Sessions and Inferior Court of Common Pleas holden at Newport, Narragansett, and Providenee Plantations". Of this eourt Francis Brinley was chairman and judge, and the royalist, or Narragansett, element generally predominated.2 Although the Rhode Island authorities had intended that all public business should be transaeted by the towns, there seems to have been little done in this direction.3 The only business apparently done was the occasional and irregular election of town officers and a few spasmodic attempts to collect the tax rate ordered by Andros. It was chiefly in this latter respect that Rhode Island was made to feel the effect of Andros's rule. One of the first acts of his council was to require the towns to appoint assessors for a property tax. The apparent disregard of the order by the towns and the constant refer- ence made by the local court to this neglect show that Rhode Islanders suffered little loss in this way. Another attempt to raise revenue was
1R. I. C. R. iii, 219, and Jour. of Andros's Council in Am. Antiq. Soc. Proc., n. s., xiii, 242.
2The proceedings of the Court, from June, 1687, to December, 1688, are in R. I. C. R. iii, 229-248. Brinley, Peleg Sanford, Richard Smith, and John Fones were the leading members of the Court. When, in December, 1687, the building of new court-houses was suggested, Brinley and Sanford "judged it convenient" that one be erected in Newport and the other in Rochester, for- merly Kingston. (R. I. C. R. iii, 228.) Warwick quickly protested, advancing her claim as a more central site than Rochester. (Ext. from Mass. MSS., ii, 72, in R. 1. H. S. Lib'y. ) .
"Newport had only one town meeting during the Andros period, on April 6, 1687, when one was called by warrant from the treasurer to choose selectmen to assess the rate of one penny to the pound on each inhabitant's estate. (Newport MS. records of Town Meetings, 1682-1739, p. 48.) Staples says that "little transpired in the concerns of Providence, that can now be gathered from the records". (R. I. H. S. Coll., v, 177.) Similar conditions seem to have existed in the other towns.
145
ANDROS AND THE ROYAL GOVERNORS, 1686-1701.
by farming out the exeise on liquors, and by allowing quit-rents, but neither of these means seem to have yielded much return.1
Rhode Island, although she had voted not to stand suit with the king and was praetically under the government of Andros, had not yet vaeated her charter by actual surrender. In the spring of 1687 the king in couneil made several orders for the prosecution of the writ of quo warranto against Rhode Island, and in November, Andros, while on a visit to Newport, again demanded the eharter. Governor Clarke, forewarned of his eoming, had sent the precious doeument to his brother, with the request that it should be concealed. After the departure of Andros the eharter was returned to the governor, who retained it until the revolution of 1689 permitted a resumption of government under it.2 The colony seal, however, was produced and broken by Andros.
Andros's sole authority for governing Rhode Island was eontained in that document which empowered him to obtain her charter and to exereise a like control over her as over the other New England eolonies. On April 7, 1688, the king sent out a new commission to Andros, in which it was stated that since theissuing of the first commission of June, 1686, it had been thought "neeessary for the serviee and for the better seeurity of the King's subjeets in those parts, to join and annex to the said government the neighboring eolonies of Rhode Island, Con- neeticut, the Province of New York, of East and West Jersey", ete.3
Searcely had the new instructions arrived when there eame the report of a great politieal upheaval in England. In April, 1689, a messenger landed at Boston, telling of the revolution, the flight of James, and the invasion of William, Prince of Orange. Without waiting for further news, the colonists uprose, seized Andros, eom- pelled the royal fort and eastle to surrender, and formed a provisional government with the aged Bradstreet as governor. As soon as Rhode Island was informed of these proceedings, she took immediate aetion
1Nathaniel Byfield, of Bristol, was appointed by John Usher, treasurer of the Providence, to be farmer of excise in the Rhode Island district, as appears by an original warrant, July 8, 1687, in his name to John Whipple "to receive the whole excise of all sorts of drink that shall be sold within the township of Providence by retail", for one year. ( Quoted in Arnold i, 503, from a MS. in Prov. Town Papers, No. 0500, and see Cal. State Papers, Col. Ser., 1685-88, No. 1093.) The only recorded introduction of quit-rents was in the case of Rich- ard Wharton, who was granted about 1,700 acres in Narragansett for an an- nual rent of ten shillings. (Idem, No. 1414; R. I. C. R. iii, 225; and Palfrey, iii, 529n.)
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.