USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina under the proprietary government, 1670-1719, V.1 > Part 17
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1 Blackstone's Com .. vol. I, 418.
2 Poyer's Hist. of Barbadoes, 53-55.
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tion, this act would have been set aside, but the benefits resulting to England from a system which accident and resentment. rather than any ideas of true policy. had sug- gested to Cromwell, soon put an end to any such hopes.1 The only material alteration made was to increase its rigor. By Statute 12 Car. II, c. 18, it was in addi- tion prescribed that the master and three-fourths of the mariners of every vessel importing goods into England or into any of its dependencies should also be English sub- jects.2 It was this law which Muschamp had now come to enforce upon this colony.
The Carolina colonists, following the line of their first strict constructionist, " Will Owen," who no longer, how- ever, appears in their Councils, took the position that their charter having been granted subsequently to the passing of the Navigation act, superseded that law in this province.3 Their resistance to the act, we may be sure, did not, however, rest solely upon this ingenious view. If it had not been suggested, the colonists would doubtless have done just as they did without this excuse. They disregarded Mr. Muschamp, and traded as they pleased. The point raised by the colonists seems, how- ever, to have given the government at home some con- cern. This reception of the King's officer by the colonists was at this time well calculated to give great anxiety to the Lords Proprietors, for James II wanted but an excuse to revoke their charter. He had. indeed, already deter- mined to suppress all the Proprietary governments ; had in- structed the Attorney General to proceed by que warranto against them ; and proceedings were actually pending at
1 Poyer's Hist. of Barbudoes. 77.
2 Blackstone's Com., vol. 1. 419.
3 Chalmers's Pol. Ann : Carroll's Coll., 322 ; Hist. Sketches (Rivers), 149.
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this time which resulted in the overthrow of the charter governments of New England. The Proprietors of Caro- lina, however, bent to the storm, and it passed over them for the time.1
The misfortunes of the Scotch exiles did not end upon their arrival in Carolina. It might have been supposed that the colony at Charles Town would have hailed with joy the establishment of another at Port Roval. if for no other than the selfish reason of the protection which such a colony would have interposed between them and the hostile Spaniards at St. Augustine. But, on the contrary, they received the Scotch exiles with little favor. Jealous- ies soon arose with regard to the political power of the new settlement. Lord Cardross claimed from his agreement with the Proprietors coordinate authority with the Goy- ernors and Grand Couneil at Charles Town. This was re- sented, and Morton and his Council continuing to exercise jurisdiction over persons within the territory given to Lord Cardross, his Lordship with Hamilton, Montgomerie, and Dunlop joined in a communication, which was taken by Dunlop in person to the Governor and Council at Charles Town; in which they with dignity and forbearance ex- postulated against this conduct, reminding them that both communities were under the same King and the same Lords Proprietors ; that it was against the interest of either to allow jealousies, especially at a time when they had ground to apprehend a Spanish invasion. Dunlop would inform them - they wrote - of the " sinistrous dealings " of two noted Indians, Wind and Antonio, who were insti- gating the In lians around to hostilities among themselves, and against their settlement. and were entertaining a spy from St. Augustine or St. Mary's. They requested the
1 Chalmers's Pol. Ann. : Carroll's Coll. 323 : Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 149; Colonial Records of Vn. Ca, vol. 1, 852, 858.
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Governor and Council at Charles Town to deliver to Dun- lop six guns the Lords Proprietors had promised them. These overtures met with a rude repulse; the Grand Council persisted in their complaints - they even went further and summoned Lord Cardross before them, as if to answer for some high misdemeanor; and when he did not come, they affected to treat his failure to appear as a contempt, though his Lordship, overcome by the heat of a climate to which he was not accustomed, lay at Port Royal prostrate with fever.1 Another instance is here presented of the ill-judgment and impracticability of all the Proprietors' schemes. Two jurisdictions were set up without a clear line of demarcation between them. and with doubtful and conflicting powers. Lord Cardross, disgusted with his arrest and ill-usage, abandoned the struggle and, fortunately for himself, retired before the blow fell upon the colony, of which his associates and himself had in vain warned the Governor and Council at Charles Town. He returned to Scotland and took an active part in the political revolution which was then at hand.2
The two Dunlops, William and Alexander. who came out with Lord Cardross, were both men of influence, and became of considerable temporary consequence in the colony. William, who bore the communication to the Governor and Council, did not get the guns for which he applied : but on the 18th of November the Proprietors wrote that they had appointed Alexander Dunlop sheriff of Port Royal, and directed the guns to be delivered to him or to Lord Cardross.3 They at the same time recom-
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 142, 143; Appendix, 407-409; Howe's Hist. Presh. Ch .. 81. 85.
" Ilist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 140 ; Okmixon, Carroll's Coll., 411.
3 Coll. Hist. Soc. of So. Ca., vol. I, 116.
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mend William Dunlop to the consideration of the Gov- ernor and Council at Charles Town, and on the 23d of that month he appears as a deputy among them.1 It is probable that it was through his influence the act was passed attempting to provide for the better security of the province against Spanish invasion. But, beside the passing of the acts which recognized a state of war as actually existing between the Spaniards and the Caro- linians, nothing was done to meet the threatened emer- gency.
Lord Cardross had warned Governor Morton and his Council of the threatened invasion, but in vain. They would not even send him the dismounted and useless guns lying at old Charles Town, which had been prom- ised by the Proprietors, until ordered to do so by their Lordships in November. 1685. The Scotch colony at Port Royal was utterly destroyed in consequence, but it did not suffer alone. The Governor himself was made to feel the blow.
In the summer of 1686 the Spaniards appeared.2 They came suddenly with three galleys, -a hundred white men, with an auxiliary force of Indians and negroes, - and landed on the Edisto. They sacked the houses of Governor Morton and of Mr. Grimball, the Secretary of
1 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. II, 9. After remaining in the colony for some years and taking an active part in its affairs, William Dunlop re- turned to Scotland in 1690, and became principal of the University of Glasgow. Howe's Hist. Presh. Ch .. 117.
2 The exact date of the appearance of the Spanianls is nowhere given. Chalmers states that it was " towards the end of the year 1686." But it certainly took place before October, for the Parliament was assembled, and passed an art in consequence of it, on the 15th of October. It was certainly later than March, as Edward Randolph refers to it as hop- pening in 1686, by the old style the year beginning in March. The calling of the Parliament, the appeal to the Lords Proprietors, etc., which took place, would indicate that it must have been some time before October.
:
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the province, who were at Charles Town, and pillaged them to the value of $3000 sterling, carrying off money, plate, and thirteen slaves of the Governor, and murdering his brother-in-law. They then turned upon the Scotch settlers at Port Royal, but twenty-five of whom were in sufficient health to oppose them. The Spaniards killed some, took others captive, whom they whipped in a barbarous manner, and plundered and utterly destroyed the settlement. The few who remained of this unfortu- nate company found refuge in Charles Town.1
Party strife was now forgotten in the excitement. An appeal was made to the Lords Proprietors, and in the memorial sent they were prayed to represent the matter to his Majesty.2 But the Carolina colonists did not wait for an answer to this appeal, which could not reach them for months. They determined to take the matter into their own hands, and to give the Spaniards a lesson which would deter them from any repetition of insult and invasion. Unable to defend the wide extent of their territory at all points, they determined that the best measure of defence was boldly to strike at the heart of the enemy. The Governor and Council countenancing the scheme, a Parliament was summoned, and on the 15th of October an act passed for the immediate invasion of the Spanish territory. An assessment of £500, equiva- lent probably to about $10,000, was made, and Joseph Pen- darvis and William Popell were appointed Receivers of the moneys raised. All the powers of the Grand Council were vested for the time in the Governor and any four of the Council. Preparations were all completed. Two vessels were fitted out, and four hundred men were ready to sail for the conquest of St. Augustine, when the ex-
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 143, 144; Appendix, 425, 443. 2 Ibid.
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pedition was suddenly stopped by the arrival from Bar- badoes of James Colleton, brother of the Proprietor. who had been created a Landgrave, and brought with him a commission as Governor of Carolina. He threatened to hang any of the colonists who persisted in their project, and they reluctantly abandoned it.1 This was the un- fortunate beginning of a weak and disastrous rule.
James Colleton was one of the distinguished family of Colletons from Barbadoes. Like his father, Sir John, and his brother. Sir Peter, he had occupied a prominent posi- tion there. and had been a member of the Assembly of that island from the parish of St. John's. To his dignity of Landgrave, 48,000 acres of land were inalienably annexed under the Constitutions. In an old map of 1715 Colleton's baronies are put down as covering most of what is still known as St. John's Parish, Berkeley.2 and we may safely assume that in laying out and naming the parishes in 1706. that parish, as well as the parish of St. John's, Colleton. received their names from the old home of the family in Barbadoes. Unfortunately, James Colleton possessed neither the address nor abilities of the other members of his family. His career in Carolina began most unhappily. His conduct from the outset aroused the deepest resent- ment of the colonists.
The Proprietors. threatened at this time with the quo warranto proceedings and the forfeiture of their charter, - subservient to the Royal humor, which was now intent upon preserving a nominal peace with Spain. -- promptly approved the action of the new Governor. While the colonists were burning with indignation at so unexpected and unworthy a termination of their efforts, the Lords Proprietors wrote to Colleton: "We are glad that you
1 Hist. Sketches of No. Ca. (Rivers). 144 ; Statutes of So. Ca., vol. II, 15.
2 Year Book City of Charleston (Courtenay ), 1886.
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have stopped the expedition against St. Augustine. If it had proceeded, Mr. Morton, Colonel Godfrey, and others might have answered it with their lives."1 They proceed meanly to justify the raid of the Spaniards upon the ground that the colonists had harbored pirates who were warring on them, and to argue " that every rational man must have foreseen that the Spaniards thus provoked " (i.e. by the harboring of pirates ) would assuredly retaliate ; that the clause in the patent (i.e. the Royal charter) that had been relied on to justify the measure " meant only a pursuit in heat of victory, but not a deliberate making of war on the King of Spain's subjects within her own terri- tories, nor do we claim any such power. No man," they wrote, "can think that the dependencies of England can have power to make war upon the King's allies without his knowledge or consent."2 This angry message on the part of the Proprietors, manifestly prepared rather for the political atmosphere of London than with regard to the interests of the colony in Carolina, was. to say the least, a most disingenuous statement of the case. The Proprietors had apparently forgotten that, but a short time before, the Earl of Craven had written to the Board of Trade. specifically denying that the Carolinians had ever harbored pirates.3 The cause of the intense hostility of the Spaniards to the Carolinians was far deeper and more abiding. It had its origin, as we have seen, in the charters under which the Proprietors claimed. The long-threatened attack was made because the Spaniards claimed the land upon which Lord Cardross's colony was settled, and re- garded the colony as another encroachment on their terri- tory. It is true that the Governor of St. Augustine
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers). 111.
2 Chalmers's Pol. . Inn .; Carroll's Coll., vol. II, 319, 320. 3 Ante, 200.
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disowned the invasion, and declared that it was made without his orders; but it is equally true that he, at the same time, refused to give up the slaves taken by the raiders without an order from the King of Spain.1 If the King of Spain could thus connive at the war made by his subjects upon the English colonists, were the colo- nists to remain supine and passively await their own de- struction. while the Proprietors, three thousand miles away, were consulting the diplomacy of the court of St. James whether or not to permit retaliation ?
But the provision in the charter upon which the colo- nists relied explicitly justified their conduct. The fif- teenth clause recited and provided : " And because that in so remote a country and scituate among so many barbarous nations as well of savages as other enemies pirates and robbers may probably be feared," authority was expressly given to the Proprietors " by themselves or their captains or other officers to levy muster and train up all sorts of men of what condition so ever, or wheresoever born, whether in the said province or elsewhere, for the time being to make war and pursue the enemy aforesaid, as well by sea as by land, yea, even without the limits of the said prov- ince and by God's assistance to vanquish and take them and being taken, to put them to death by the law of war," etc .? There is nothing in the grant of sovereign power to the viceregal government of the Proprietors restricting it to "only a pursuit in heat of victory "; the power given was "for the time being to make war" and to pursue the enemies beyond the limits of the province. The plea, therefore, of the want of authority to allow the colonists to strike a manly blow in their own defence was a paltry
1 Edward Randolph to Board of Trade, Appendix Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. ( Rivers), 143, 444.
2 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. 1, 39.
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excuse to propitiate the King, whose displeasure had arisen from other causes.
The Proprietors ordered "a civil letter" to be addressed to the Governor of St. Augustine inquiring by what authority he acted.1 Thus, it will be observed, they them- selves regarded the attack as no mere raid of unauthor- ized pillagers, but an invasion sanctioned by the Spanish Government: a view which, as we have seen, was subse- quently sustained by the action of the Spanish Governor in spite of his denial. In further confirmation of this, a new Governor having come to St. Augustine, he dis- patched a friar to Charles Town to treat with the gov- ernment here upon the subject.
And now fresh cause of offence was given by Colleton to the people, and grave suspicion aroused as to the honesty of his conduct. He refused to consult with the "commoners" in his Council, as the representatives of the people were termed, and only mentioned the Spanish messenger to them when he had to ask their consent to his maintenance out of the public treasury. Passing by "the bloody insolence the Spaniards had committed." Col- leton, who could not pursue them in war, without the King's consent, now enters into a treaty of commerce with their agent, the friar. In pursuance of this agreement, the Spanish Governor sent what he considered the actual cost of the plunder which had been carried off ; but would not return the captured negroes, who were actually employed in building a fort near St. Augustine. The colonists com- plained bitterly of the Governor's conduct. He had acted, it was said, contrary to the honor of the English nation, and for a little filthy luere had buried in silence atrocities upon Englishmen who wanted not courage to do them- selves honorable satisfaction.2 They were, no doubt, all 1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 145. 2 Ibid., 145; Appendix, 425.
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the more chagrined when they afterwards learned that the Spaniards, upon hearing that they were coming to avenge their wrongs. had left their town and their castle and Hed into the woods to save themselves. The expedi- tion against St. Augustine was stopped for the time. But it was only postponed. The rupture between England and Spain in a few years allowed its renewal : but without the success which would probably have been attained at this time.
This excitement had not yet abated when Mr. Mus- champ, in April, 1687, seized a vessel for violating the revenue law, upon the ground that four-fifths of the crew were Scotchmen and not Englishmen - the Navigation act not permitting Scotchmen the benefit of its provisions. The evidence. upon the trial. Muschamp had to admit, was not very clear ; but the colonists disdained to rest the case upon the failure of proof. The court released the vessel and distinctly intimated, it is said, that had the evidence been ever so clear, the decision would not have been other- wise, as the charter gave the colonists. the right to trade with Scotland and Ireland, and that they had the right to transport their own product in ships navigated by Scotchmen. Mr. Muschamp's report was referred to Powis, the Attorney General of England, who gave it as his opinion that the trade, i.e. that to Scotland and Ireland, was most directly contrary to the acts of Parlia- ment; and though the charter of the colony was subse- quent to the navigation acts, there was no color for the claim that it superseded those statutes unless it was so expressly provided. Upon the point whether it was so expressly provided in the charter, he gave no opinion, but advised that the charter should be inspected, and if it should appear that the charter did exempt the colonists from its operation, he would then be prepared to give his
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opinion whether an act of Parliament could be overridden by a charter.1
The Proprietors were not slow in perceiving the drift and intimation of this opinion and were prompt in dis- claiming any right to exemption from the navigation laws, which, they humbly conceived, " must be the discourse of ignorant and loose people only and not of any concerned . in the government." They had no doubt but that the ship seized by Mr. Muschamp would have been condemned if there had been sufficient proof. They did not know, they said, what encouragement any ships from Scotland or Ireland could have to trade at Carolina, the inhabitants having hardly overcome their want of victuals, and having nothing to export but a few skins and a little cedar, both of which did not amount yearly to £2000.2
A large majority of the representatives of the people had, as we have seen, refused their assent to the act of the Fundamental Constitutions of 1682 which Governor West had been instructed to have subscribed, and which in- structions Governor Morton had attempted to enforce. The refractory commoners had been excluded from the House, and, returning to their homes, spread disaffection everywhere. The dissenters, observes Rivers, who had left England in considerable numbers, driven by their apprehension of persecution under the coming reign of James II, had at first, in changing from a worse to a bet- ter condition, naturally supported the submissive party in the colony. In particular, Joseph Blake, whose daughter Morton had married, added his influence in checking and allaying "the extravagant spirit" of the discontented. But the more extravagant spirit of the instructions sent to Carolina threw the majority of the people, however,
1 Chalmers's Pol. Aun. ; Carroll's Coll., 342, 345. 2 Ibid.
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differing in their principles on some matters, into the ranks of the opposition party.
The Proprietors had hitherto been greatly disappointed in the character of their Governors, who had generally, as they considered, opposed their views or exerted them- selves in too feeble a manner to promote them. Sayle
had been a good man, but a weak Governor. Yeamans had proved ambitious and selfish, and inclined to make the interest of Carolina subservient to that of Barbadoes. West had been wise and prudent, but he had not had the force-if he had the will -to meet and encounter the party who were beginning to demand constitutional liberty under the charter, and to refuse to be governed except under its provisions. Then they had tried Morton, -a new man, unconnected with the early disputes in the colony, and who, for the substantial civil and religious liberty he was to enjoy, was willing to accept the forms of the Fundamental Constitutions, especially when flat- tered with the dignity of a Landgrave under them. The Proprietors soon, however, found that Morton's principles inclined him to their opponents rather than to themselves. But in Landgrave Colleton they reposed entire confidence, expecting much from his talents and still more from his attachments. He built himself a fine mansion at old Charles Town. received from the Parliament an ampler support than had been enjoyed by former Governors, and, secure of the good will of the Proprietors through the influence of his brother, he no doubt looked forward to prosperity and happiness in the new home to which he brought his family. The Proprietors, indeed, had never been more faithfully represented.1 It might have been better for them had Colleton's devotion to their interests less blinded him to that of the province, which was, in
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 151.
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fact. inseparable from their own. His instructions required him to punish the former Governor and officers for various offences, to execute the law against pirates with rigor, and to put down the faction consisting of men of various views and avowing different principles ; " Sprang up as we are assured." said the Lords Proprietors, "as rampant as if the people had been made wanton by many ages of prosperity." 1
The Proprietors, in their zeal to appease the Royal au- thorities, had sneered at the commerce of their province, and yet out of the seven acts passed during Colleton's ad- ministration before his rupture with the Parliament, five of them relate to the commerce of the place, indicating that notwithstanding all the troubles of the colony its business was steadily increasing. The acts passed were (1) "For servants hereafter arriving without indentures or con- tracts "; (2) " For the preventing seamen from contracting great debts " ; (3) " For regulating the entryes of vessels." etc .; (4) "For the tryall of small and meane causes"; (5) "For the levying an assessment of eight hundred pounds "; (6) "To ascertain the prices of commodityes of the countryes growth"; (7) "To ascertain damages upon protested bills of exchanges." 2
The last of these statutes was passed on the 23d of July, 1687. There were no other enactments during Colleton's administration, nor was there any other legis- lation for three years. During this time fierce contests distracted the several parliaments that were held. In 1687 a committee, consisting of the Governor, Paul Grim- ball and William Dunlop, deputies. Bernard Schenkingh. Thomas Smith, John Farr, and Joseph Blake, commoners, were appointed to consider whether the Fundamental Con- stitutions might be modified in any way to make them ac-
1 Chalmers's Pol. Ann., 323, 324. 2 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. II, 80-38.
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ceptable both to the Proprietors and to the people. "The work grew voluminously." it was said, and was then aban- doned amidst angry discussions; the people declined to regard any other set but that sent out with Governor Sayle in 1669.1 At length Colleton, on the 14th of February, 1687-88, in some passion produced a letter from the Proprietors, dated March 3. 1686-87, in which they " utterly denied the Fundamental Constitutions of July, 1669, declaring them to be but a copy of an imperfect original." As the Proprietors manifestly did not know their own minds, the delegates of the people, naturally impatient and indignant at this trifling with their inter- ests and their rights, and never having assented to any set as required by the charters, " unanimously declared that the government is now to be directed and managed wholly and solely according to the said charters." They then went a step further and "denied that any bill must necessarily pass the grand council before it can be read in parliament." During two sessions the Governor and the deputies of the Proprietors insisting on proceeding according to the Fundamental Constitutions, and the dele- gates of the people refusing to do so, all legislative pro- ceedings were blocked; not even the militia act was passed which was necessary for the safety of the colony. The delegates proposed, for the maintenance of peace
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