Providence Plantation
Substate | Defunct
1636 CE to 1663 CE
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Showing 10 events out of 24 total
Europeans will often be offered fur, food or other items as gifts when they first encounter a tribe.
The Europeans do not understand they are supposed to take on an alliance with the natives, including helping them against their enemies.
Native tribes regularly practice gift giving as part of their social relations.
Because the Europeans (or most of them) do not, they are considered to be rude and crude.
After observing that Europeans want to trade goods for the skins and other items, natives enter into that commercial relationship.
As a consequence, both sides become involved in the conflicts of the other.
The Europeans in New France, Carolina, Virginia, New England, and New Netherland become drawn into the endemic warfare of their trading partners.
English theologian Roger Williams, a notable proponent of religious toleration and the separation of church and state and an advocate for fair dealings with Native Americans, has secured land from Canonicus, a chief of the Narragansett, and established a settlement with twelve "loving friends" (several settlers had joined him from Massachusetts since the beginning of spring).
Williams' settlement is based on a principle of equality.
It is provided that "such others as the major part of us shall admit into the same fellowship of vote with us" from time to time should become members of their commonwealth.
Obedience to the majority is promised by all, but "only in civil things."
The Pequot are broken by the destruction of their people and the village of Mystic.
The English victory has also deprived them of their allies.
Forced to abandon their villages, the Pequot flee—mostly in small bands—to seek refuge with other southern Algonquian peoples.
Those who survived the massacre are enslaved, with some forced to become household servants of the Puritan English.
More are sent to the West Indies.
Many are hunted down by Mohegan and Narragansett warriors, enemies of the Pequot who have allied themselves with the English colonies.
The largest group, led by Sassacus, are denied aid by the Metoac (Montauk, or Montaukett) from present-day Long Island.
Sassacus leads roughly four hundred warriors west along the coast toward the Dutch at New Amsterdam and their Native allies.
When they cross the Connecticut River, the Pequot kill three men whom they encounter near Fort Saybrook.
A Puritan minister named John Davenport had led his flock from exile in the Netherlands back to England and finally to America in the spring of 1637.
The group had arrived in Boston on the ship Hector on June 26, but decided to strike out on their own, based on their impression that the Massachusetts Bay Colony is lax in its religious observances.
That fall, London merchant Theophilus Eaton had led an exploration party south to the north shore of Long Island Sound in search of a suitable site.
He had purchased land from the natives at the mouth of the Quinnipiac River.
The group of five hundred colonists had set out in the spring of 1638, and on April 14 they had arrived at their 'New Haven' on the Connecticut shore.
The site seemed ideal for trade with a good port between Boston and New Amsterdam and access to the furs of the Connecticut River valley.
However, while the colony success as a settlement and religious experiment, its future as a trade center is some years away.
The colonists adopt a set of Fundamental Articles for self-government in 1639, partly as a result of a similar action in the river towns.
A governing council of seven is established, with Eaton as chief magistrate and Cunningham as pastor.
The articles require that "...the word of God shall be the only rule..." and this is maintained even over English common law tradition.
Since the Bible contains no reference to trial by jury, they have eliminated it and the council sits in judgment.
Only members of their church congregation are eligible to vote.
The colony's success soon attracts other believers, as well as those who are not Puritans.
The New Haven colonists have expanded into additional towns (called plantations): Milford and ...
...Guilford in 1639, ...
...Stamford and ...
...Southold across Long Island Sound to the south on the North Fork of Long Island in 1640 forming the original component of the confederation which calls itself "The United Colonies of New England."
Thirty-nine freemen, expressing their determination "still to hold forth liberty of conscience," sign another agreement in 1640.
Thus a government unique in its day is created—a government expressly providing for religious liberty and a separation between civil and ecclesiastical authority (church and state).
The colony is named Providence Plantation, due to Williams's belief that God had sustained him and his followers and brought them to this place.
When he acquires the other islands in the Narragansett Bay, Williams names them after other virtues: Patience Island, Prudence Island and Hope Island.
Quinniapac's theocratic government and nine square grid plan are in place by 1640, and the town is renamed Newhaven.
The settlement becomes the headquarters of the New Haven Colony.
At this time, the New Haven Colony is separate from the Connecticut Colony which has been established to the north focusing on Hartford.
One of the principal differences between the two colonies is that the New Haven colony is an intolerant theocracy that does not permit other churches to be established while the Connecticut colony permits the establishment of other churches.