USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina under the proprietary government, 1670-1719, V.1 > Part 12
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On the 20th of January following, 1671-72, Joseph Dal- ton, Secretary of the colony, writes to Lord Ashley : " By our records it appears that 337 men and women 62 children or persons under 16 years of age is the full number of persons who have arrived in the country in, and since the first fleet out of England to this day, whereof 43 men 2 women 3 children are dead, and 16 absent so as there now remains 263 men able to bear arms 69 women. 59 children or persons under 16 years of age." 2
With the Temporary Laws, a model of a town was also sent, referring to which Oldmixon. writing in 1708. causti- cally observes : " It will be well if the people of Carolina
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 100.
2 Calendar State Papers, Colonial, London, 1889, 736 ; Year Book City of Charleston (Courtenay), 1953. 870 ; Hist. Sketches ( Rivers), 100.
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are able to build 100 years hence; but the Proprietaries as appears by their constitutions and instructions to the Gov- ernors thought itwas almost as easy to build towns as to draw schemes." 1 Paying no attention to the model, and not even regarding the instructions of the Proprietors to the Governor and Council that in the first town the houses should be built so that the guns of the fort might com- mand all the streets, it appears that the land was promis- cuously taken up and occupied as a town without any regard to its form or convenience. As early as the 1st of November. 1670. Lord Ashley wrote to West that he was to take notice that Ashley River had been so named by Sandford, and was still so to be called, and that the town as now planted out is to be called " Charles Town." But it was not until the 1st of September, 1671. that the name appears to have been adopted.2
In order to provide for the accommodation of the newly arrived emigrants, the Governor and Council, on the 5th of September, 1671, directed the Surveyor General to lay out a town on Stono Creek, adjoining land of Mr. Thomas Gray, near Charles Town, containing twenty-five acres, of which five acres were to be reserved for a churchyard. For the Dutch from New York. on the 20th of December, a town was ordered to be laid out on a creek to the south of Stono, to contain thirty acres. The place was soon abandoned. the settlers spreading themselves over the neighboring country. Lands were soon taken up on the east side of the Ashley, and settlements were formed in
1 Oldmixon. Carolina (Carroll's Coll.). 405.
2 Calendar State Papers, Colonial. London. 1889, 124, 195, 255, During the Proprietary Government the name of the town was written thus, Charles Town. During the Royal Goverment it was written Charlestown; and since the incorporation of the city, after the Revo- lution (1783), it has been written Charleston.
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various parts of the neighborhood. On the 24th of October commissioners were appointed by the Grand Council to examine the banks of the Ashley and the Wando, or Cooper, River, "and to make a return of what places might be most convenient to situate towns upon, that the same might be wholly reserved for these and other like uses." And again. January 13, 1671-72, Captain John Godfrey, Captain Thomas Gray, and Mr. Maurice Mathews were appointed to so view Wando River and there to mark such place or places as they should think most convenient for the situation of a town or towns, and to report thereof with all convenient speed ; and it was ordered that no person should run out or mark any lands on the Wando or any of its creeks until such report should be made. The colonists were thus exploring and examining the country around before they finally settled upon the per- manent location of the town.1
While they were thus engaged, the Indians began to be troublesome. The tribe of Kussoes, inhabiting northeast of the Combahee River. were the first among the neigh- boring tribes to assume an attitude of open hostility. They and their confederates in the small tribes began in the summer of 1671 to withdraw themselves from their usual familiar intercourse with the colonists, and to dis- courage other Indians who were friendly and in the habit of visiting the town for the purpose of traffic. The Kus- soes declared themselves to be in favor of the Spaniards, with whose aid they intended to destroy the English settlements. Day by day their behavior became more insolent, and on every slight occasion they threatened the lives of the whites, whose property and provisions they looked upon as objects of plunder. Every unguarded farm suffered from their nightly depredations. More 1 Dalcho's Ch. Hist., 12, 13.
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open acts of hostility were only prevented by the constant vigilance of the settlers.
On the 27th of September the Governor and Council declared war against the Kussoes and their confederates. Commissions were granted to Captain Godfrey and. Cap- tain Gray. Two Kussoes who were then in town were immediately seized and placed in custody. So accus- tomed. says Rivers, were the colonists to be on the alert and to bear weapons in hand to protect themselves from surrounding dangers that within seven days com- panies were formed, the enemy's country invaded and surprised ; many of the Indians were taken captive and ordered to be transported from Carolina, unless the remain- ing Kussoes sued for peace and paid such a ransom for the prisoners as should be thought reasonable by the Grand Council.1
In the winter of 1671 a scarcity of provisions rendered it probable that the settlers would suffer great distress. Governor West wisely ordered that all the supplies in the store of the Proprietors should be frugally distributed to the needy; that all occupations, except those of carpenters and smiths, should be suspended for the planting and gathering of a crop of provisions ; that in future no one should be entitled to assistance from the public stores who had not two acres well planted with corn or peas for every person in his family ; and that slothful and loitering per- sons should be put in charge of the industrious planters for the purpose of working for their own maintenance and the benefit of the community.
It will serve, says Rivers, to exhibit the condition and progress of the colony during West's first administration to notice the legislative measures taken by him with the Grand Council.
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca., 106.
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October, 1671. The regulation of the secretary fees ; the rates and "scantings" of merchantable pipe staves. requiring the appointment by Council of one or more " viewers " to examine all pipe staves when " any difference should happen upon payment or exchange between party and party in the province of Carolina," and fees allowed for the performance of such duties ; the modelling of the proceedings of Council in the determining of differences between party and party.
December. 1671. Acts relating to masters trading with servants and servants purloining their masters' goods ; prescribing how long servants coming from England were to serve, and how long servants coming from Barbadoes were likewise to serve from their respective arrivals : that none may retail any drink without license; for the speedy payment of the Lords Proprietors' debts ; and pre- scribing " at what rates artificers and laborers shall work therein." i.e. the province.
This last is the first act of Parliament we find to be rati- fied by the Proprietors in England.1 No courts were yet established, nor were there any lawyers in the colony, but litigation had already begun, and justice was roughly ad- ministered by the Grand Council. Each member of this body was required to swear that as a councillor he would assist the Governor to the best of his skill and ability : that he would do equal justice to the rich and to the poor ; that he would " not give or be of councill for favor or affec- tion in a difference or quarrell " before the Council. but in all things demean himself as equity and justice required, observing the rules and directions of the Lords Proprietors and the laws of England and of the province ; and that he would not communicate the secrets or transactions of the Governor and Council without authority.2
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 106, 107. 2 Ibid .. Appendix, 370.
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The first case of litigation in the colony of which we have a record was that upon the petition of John Norton and Originall Jackson against Mr. Maurice Mathews, Mr. Thomas Gray. and Mr. William Owen. On August 28. 1671, it was ordered that the petitioners should appear before the Governor and Council upon Saturday, Sep- tember 9, peremptorily to prosecute the complaint against the defendants. When that day came. upon hearing the petition. both parties having referred themselves to the determination of the Governor and Council, it was de- cided that the said John Norton and Originall Jack- son should have sixteen pieces of cedar timber desired and one piece of cedar timber more claimed by the defendants. The Governor and Council heard another case this day and decided that Henry Hughes should pay one bushel of corn to Robert Donne for his labor and pains on the plantation of the said Henry Hughes. Having settled these cases, the Council took up the ad- dress of two servants of Mr. John Manerich (Maverick ?), and considering how industrious and useful these servants had been to the colony, for their encouragement ordered that each of them should have ten acres of land near the town. In November Mr. Anthony Churne has a complaint against the now notorious Mr. William Owen. but the difference is referred by the Grand Council to the arbi- tration of Mr. Edward Mathews and Mr. John Culpepper. Mr. Henry Hughes is also again in court ; this time with a serious complaint against Thomas Sereman. gentleman, "for that the said Thomas Sereman upon the -- of Oeto- ber 1671 at Charles Town did felonionsly take and carry away from the said Henry Hughes. one Turkey Cock of the price of tenn pence of lawful money contrary to the peace of our sovereign Lord the King," ete. It is to be observed that in this the first indictment in the Pala-
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tine province of Carolina the offence is laid as contra pacem domini regis, and not against the peace of the Palatine, as might have been under such a government.1 The Grand Council found gentleman Soreman guilty, and without jury adjudged him to be stript naked to the waist and to receive nine lashes by a whip, to be admin- istered by the hand of Joseph Oldys, "who is adjudged by the Grand Council," the sentence proceeded. "to be stript naked to his waist to perform the same for that the said Joseph Oldys knowing of the felonious act aided said Screman and endeavored to conceal the offence." But the Council did not stay its hand here. It turned out in the evidence that Robert Donne, who had come out as a servant to Stephen Bull. but who had been one of those elected as a member of the Council at Port Royal, and to whom Henry Hughes had two months before been required to pay a bushel of corn for services rendered and now a Captain Lieutenant, had nevertheless been "comforting aiding and assisting the said Sereman to commit the said fact"; whereupon the Grand Council ordered him to appear on the - of December at the head of the company whereof he was Captain Lieutenant, with his sword on. and there to have his sword taken from him by the Marshal, and to be cashiered from his command. Dennis Mahown, servant to Mr. John Cole, for having twice run away from his master, attempting to escape to the Spaniards, was ordered to receive thirty-nine lashes upon his naked back. Captain Thomas Gray makes complaint against Sir John Yeamans, Baronet, "for felling and carrying away severall quantityes from a certaine parcell of land neare the Towne belonging to him the said Capt. Gray. It is also ordered by the Grand Councill aforesaid that an injunction be issued out under the Governor's 1 Blackstone's Com., vol. I, 117.
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hand," etc.1 Thus were equity and law, civil and criminal proceedings, promiscuously administered and perhaps with as much substantial justice as could have been by a regularly organized court.
It had been rumored, even before Sayle's death, that Sir John Yeamans would be appointed Governor by the Lords Proprietors, and the report was received with great disfavor. The day before the Governor's death. West writes to Lord Ashley that he lies in a very weak con- dition. and past all hope of recovery. He hopes that an honest and able Governor may speedily be sent over- one that desires to serve God above all worldly interest. " If Sir John Yeamans comes amongst them again. it is to be feared a hopeful settlement will soon be elapsed." 2 The Council wrote on the 4th, announcing Sayle's death and informing the Proprietors of their choice of Joseph West to be Governor until they learn their Lordships' pleasure, and add that it had been hinted that their Honors had designed to commissionate Sir John Yeamans again as Governor ; they had good reason to believe the contrary. " for it doth breed a very great dissatisfaction to the people." 3
Sir John, having abandoned the colony at Cape Fear. and having again abandoned the colony destined for Port Roval and left it at Bermuda. had now come to Carolina and was at present on the Ashley, felling timber. He had brought with him from Barbadoes his negro slaves. - the first introduced into Carolina, - and had built a house in the town. We shall soon see how his presence affected the condition of the colony : for the present the extracts we have given from the records of the Grand Council enables us to gauge somewhat the material and social condition of the colony at this time.
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers). Appendix, 371, 877.
- Calendar State Papers, Colonial (Sainsbury). London, 1889, 428. 3 Ibid., 493.
CHAPTER VII
1671-74
IT was the observation of a great political philosopher that so deeply seated is the tendency to conflict between the different interests or portions of a community. that parties would be formed, even though it would be possible to find a community where the people were all of the same pursuits, placed in the same condition of life. and in every respect so situated as to be without inequality of con- dition or diversity of interest.1 The truth of this was singularly illustrated in the planting of Carolina. It might have been expected, observes another writer, that these adventurers, who were all embarked on the same design, would be animated by one spirit and zealous to maintain harmony and peace among themselves, for they had all the same hardships to encounter and the same enemies to fear; yet the reverse took place.2 But while there doubtless existed the strongest motives to unity and harmony among these pioneers in the province, - motives of interest and of apprehension of danger which pressed on all alike. - unfortunately there was added to the natural tendency to the formation of parties in all communities. the irresistible influence of the extraordinary forms of government under which they had embarked.
Not only were the Governor and Council sworn to the 1 A Disquisition ou Government, Calhoun's works, vol. I, 17.
2 Hewatt, vol. 1. 75.
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observance of the instructions of the Lords Proprietors and to the enforcement of the Fundamental Constitutions, as far as practicable, but these Constitutions, as the unalterable form and rule of government, had been engrossed on parchment and after having been signed and sealed by the Governor, were required to be subscribed by-every person before he was admitted to take up lands in the province.1 These instructions to the Governor and Coun- cil, as well as the Fundamental Constitutions so solemnly adopted, upon the test of actual experiment were found to be utterly impracticable in application. Here in the very beginning of the colony was there an artificial as well as natural foundation of two parties. What more certain cause of difference could there be than a written constitution incapable of enforcement ? Poor old Gov- ernor Sayle, weak in mind as well as body, accustomed only to the command of a ship under instructions from his employers, finds himself confronted by the first " striet constructionists " of Carolina, pointing out to him the inconsistencies and absurdities of his orders. Sayle suc- cumbed to the burden, physical and mental. but the ques- tions brought over from Whitehall remained.
Two parties had already been formed. The Council - the government party - finding their instructions impracticable, and yet with the responsibility of the government upon them, for the present, at least, more concerned for the immediate safety and welfare of the colonists than for the maintenance of the wild schemes of the Proprietors, were inclined to stretch their powers. The Owen and Scrivener party on the other hand, from whatever motives actuated, were endeavoring to hold the Governor and Council to a strict compliance with the terms
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), Appendix, 418. 2 Ibid., 105.
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of the parchment they had been required to subscribe. These divisions had already arisen among the colonists from England. There was another element in the com- position of the colony now asserting itself. of which the Governor was very jealous, i.e. the Barbadian immi- grants, bringing with them as they did colonial experi- ence, habits, and customs, which had grown out of. and were more practically adapted to. the condition of colonial society - rather than the fine-spun theories and grand governmental structures of a philosopher and doctrinaire. The immigrants from England were all strangers to the business of settling plantations in the new country. The Colletons. Sir John Yeamans, Captain Henry Braine, Dr. Henry Woodward, Captains Godfrey and Gray, old colo- nists. looked down upon the new-comers to America as novices in colonial life and government. and were dissatis- fied with their management of the colony. It was by the Governor and the Council's "ill contriving," they said. "that neither Mr. Rivers nor the rest had been brought away from " St. Augustine.1 Braine had written before Sayle's death that he would pawn his life that Sayle "is one of the unfittest men in the world for the place," and " his being Governor keeps our settlement very chargeable to their Lordships. But though the Governor is crazy yet if there were a wise Council, or three or four men of reason, planters, who knew what did belong to settle such a country, it would be to the good of the country and their Lordships' interests."
We do not know exactly when Sir John Yeamans arrived in Carolina. On the 15th of November. 1670. he writes from Barbadoes to the Lords Proprietors. sending " 12 cedar planks as the first fruits of that glorious prov- ince." i.e. Carolina. He was still there in the early part
1 Calendar State Papers. Colonial (Sainsbury ), London, 1889, 843, 345.
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of the year 1671, superintending the transportation of the immigrants he had secured. And Lord Ashley addressed him there in April. thanking him "for the first fruits of their plantation at Ashley from his hands."1 As late as May the Proprietors instructed Captain Halsted if he traded at Barbadoes to consult Yeamans there.2 .It ap- pears, however, from a letter of Governor West to Lord Ashley that he had arrived in the colony, at the latest, early in July, and had expected to have been at once recognized as Governor by reason of his being a Land- grave. West writes that within two or three days of his arrival Sir John retired to his country house disgusted "that the people did not incline to salute him Governor." He says that as more people had arrived, on the 8th of July, he. West, had summoned all the freemen and re- quested them to elect twenty persons to be of the Parlia- ment, which was done in three days; that Sir John was chosen Speaker, but that a dispute arose about choosing a clerk, and whether West was made Governor according to the Lords Proprietors' directions. Sir John also made the point. he said, that there must be three deputies be- sides the Governor, and that it would be in vain for them to proceed unless West would surrender his power as Governor and make the third deputy. It will be remem- bered that the five original deputies were West. Scrivener. Bull, Bowman, and O'Sullivan. Bowman had not come out, and the Council had suspended Scrivener, so that to comply with the Proprietors' instructions requiring at least three deputies to constitute a quorum. West must be counted as well a deputy as Governor. West would not adopt Sir John's view, but dissolved the Parlia- ment ; Sir John and his party went away much dissatis-
1 Calendar State Papers, Colonial (Sainsbury), London. 1889, 492. 2 Ibid., 516.
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fied. West writes that Yeamans's conduct was much resented by the people, who began to murmur that " Sir John intended to make this a Cape Fear settlement." 1
Five days after, West summoned the Parliament again to elect five councillors ; when Sir John, says West, preached the doctrine that in all elections those who will stand at the greatest distance from the Governor should be chosen.2 We have the record of this Parliament, the first held in the province. It was held on the 25th of August. 1671. at Charles Town. upon Ashley River, and the five persons chosen to represent the people were Mr. Thomas Gray, Mr. Maurice Mathews, Lieutenant Henry Hughes. Mr. Christopher Portman, and Mr. Ralph Mar- shall. These were presented to the Governor and the Lords Proprietors' deputies as members of the Grand Council for the people. At a meeting of the Governor and Council on the 28th, there were sitting and present the Governor, Sir John Yeamans, Captain John Godfrey, Mr. William Owen, Mr. Thomas Gray, Mr. John Foster. Mr. Maurice Mathews, Mr. Henry Hughes, and Mr. Ralph Marshall.3 The Barbadians had already acquired position. Sir John Yeamans appears as deputy for Lord Berkeley. John Godfrey for Earl Craven, and Thomas Gray represents the people in the Council. John Coming, Halsted's mate, writes to Sir John Colleton that the Barbadians endeavor to rule all.+ They had joined Owen. Mathews, and Sullivan against Governor West.5 Lord Ashley was the recipient of complaints from all parties. West. Bull, Braine. Godfrey, and Dalton all complain of O'Sul-
1 Calendar State Papers, Colonial (Sainsbury), London, 1889, 612. - Ibid.
3 Dalcho's Ch. Hist .. 11.
+ Calendar State Papers, Colonial (Sainsbury), London, 1889, 277, 664.
5 Ibil., 279.
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livan as incompetent as a Surveyor ; some of them object to his conduct.1 Yeamans charges that West is proud and peevish, and will not call a Parliament for fear his election or actions should be questioned.2 Halsted says that West is a person faithful and stout, but no good Governor; that Yeamans is disaffected and too selfish.3 Gray accuses West of turning Scrivener and Mathews out of the Coun- cil, and declaring he cared not what became of the govern- ment. Lord Ashley replies to them all, addressing each as his "very affectionate friend." John Locke's con- nection with Carolina was not only as the author of the Fundamental Constitutions, but it is well known that he took a deep interest in the settling of the colony. Living at Exeter House with Lord Ashley as his secre- tary, he continued to attend to its affairs, and took great part in its management during Shaftesbury's rule. Many of the letters in the letter book of the Shaftesbury col- lection are in his handwriting, and it may be inferred that these of Lord Ashley were all written by him.+
The Fundamental Constitutions provided that the eldest of the Lords Proprietors who should be personally present in Carolina should, of course, be the Palatine's deputy; and if no Proprietor be present, then the eldest of the Landgraves. Sir John Yeamans now asserted his right under this provision. At a meeting of the Grand Council on the 14th of December he claimed that as he was a Land- grave -and the only Landgrave present. - he was there- fore Vice Palatine, and consequently Governor of the province ; 3 it does not appear, however, that he could get 1 Calendar State Papers, Colonial (Sainsbury), London, 1889, 259, 278, 329, 472, 736.
2 Ibul., 278, 664.
3 Ibid., 278.
+ Ibid., Preface, xxi.
5 Ibid., 281.
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even the support of the Barbadians in the Council for the claim, which was certainly not without foundation. On the contrary. the Council "resolved and advised (nemine contra dicenti) that it is not safe or warrantable to re- move the government as it is at present, until a signal nomination from the Palatine or further orders or di- rections be received from the Lords Proprietors." 1
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