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CHAPTER V

COLONIAL POLICY DURING THE INTERREGNUM

The period of twenty years which passed between the beginning of the Civil War and the restoration of the kingship falls into two parts of equal length. The first comprised the eleven years between the opening of the struggle and the establishment of the Protectorate. The second—somewhat shorter than its predecessor—coincided with the Protectorate itself and with the collapse of that institution, followed, as it was, by the return of the survivors of the Long Parliament and by the changes which preceded the recall of Charles II. When the measures and policies which characterized those two intervals of time are compared, a marked distinction between them will appear. The former may be roughly characterized as destructive, the second as constructive. The first decade was occupied with the Civil War in England, with the reduction of Ireland and Scotland, with the abolition of the kingship and of the House of Lords, with the early and crude efforts of the Rump Parliament to conduct the business of the nation alone. This was the destructive stage of the Puritan revolution. By it the continuity of English administration was broken. The plans of the king and his ministers were interrupted. The English executive, as it had been organized of old, fell into ruin. Administration, so far especially as it affected foreign and colonial affairs, was relaxed. The attention of all parties was for the time concentrated on the great struggle which was in progress at home. Many of the old ruling families were thrust into the background. New men rose to prominence and strove eagerly for place and wealth. It was a time of change, of unwonted freedom of movement, in both the economic and political spheres.

But after the king and his supporters had been humbled and the enemies of parliament in all the three kingdoms had been subdued, the necessity of welding the fragments

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together into a new and, if possible, a permanent governmental structure became apparent. Then began the constructive period of the revolution. As an incident of the struggle, the first stage of which was just closing, the parliament had been changed almost beyond recognition. Now it needed thorough reform. A new executive must be also developed to take the place of the king and of the various officials who surrounded him. And, finally, the executive and the parliament must, if possible, be made to work together harmoniously. The institution which was developed to meet this need was the Protectorate. It was a reorganized executive, created to fill the void left by the fall of the kingship and to give that degree of unity and permanence without which government is not possible. The personality of Oliver Cromwell found expression in the Protectorate, as it had done in the later stages of the Civil War. With the support of army and navy he, as far as it was possible, gave inspiration to the executive, conciliated the national spirit by means of a succession of parliaments, and laid the foundations of a foreign and colonial policy. Only a beginning was made; after his death the structure which he had labored so heroically to raise fell to pieces. Certain elements, or suggestions, however, survived. These, when viewed in connection with Cromwell’s immediate projects, enable us, especially in colonial relations, to distinguish the Protectorate from the decade which preceded and to connect it also with the period that followed. In the present chapter an effort will be made to exhibit in their relations the chief features of colonial development during the transition period of twenty years, which is perhaps best described by the single word Interregnum.

During the early years of the period the parliament was the immediate source of authority and was universally recognized as such. It assumed the functions which had been discharged by the king, while it also retained its accustomed legislative powers. This affected its relations with the colonies equally with those it bore to the realm. The parliament, whether in the form of two houses as they existed during and after the war, or as the later Rump, was now not

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merely the source of statute law, so far as it affected the colonies, but of executive action and control as well. The administrative officials and boards now became directly or indirectly the appointees of the parliament, and the way was opened for a more continuous and intimate relation between that body and the colonies than had previously existed. The reception which this change met in the colonies, as well as its bearing on their fortunes, varied with the attitude which the colonists bore toward the parties that were contending in England. The first act of the Long Parliament which affected the colonies was the appointment, in November, 1643, of six lords and twelve commoners as a board¹ of commissioners for plantations. At the head of this board, with the title of governor-in-chief and lord high admiral of the plantations in America, was the Presbyterian peer, Robert, Earl of Warwick, who since the previous summer had been admiral of the fleet. He was the same Warwick who, years before, had been so deeply concerned in the affairs of the Virginia company. Prominent among his associates were the Earl of Manchester, Viscount Say and Sele, Philip Lord Wharton, the younger Vane, Hazlerigg, Pym, Cromwell, and Samuel Vassall. This body took the place which had been held by the king’s board of commissioners, with the archbishop of Canterbury at its head. The powers which were given by ordinance to this board were by no means equal to those which had been held by the commission of 1634, yet they extended to the appointment and removal of governors, councillors, and other officials, as well as the securing of information concerning the colonies by means of testimony and the use of colonial records. The commissioners were also authorized, when fit occasion arose, to transfer some part of their authority to the officials who were appointed by the proprietors of the colonies or chosen by their inhabitants. Of this in some cases they availed themselves, when the disturbed conditions in England dictated; and, as a result, the colonies enjoyed unusual freedom.

Especially was this true of New England. The leading members of the new plantation board, especially the peers,

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stood near to the Puritan colonies and were disposed to lend a ready ear to their demands. The comfortable assurance of this fact was felt in New England, as the issue of the Body of Liberties by Massachusetts and the formation of the confederacy testified. England and New England were now moving in nearly parallel lines, and a spirit of sympathy existed between the dominant parties in each. At the same time the Puritan colonies were ready now, as ever, to stand on their chartered rights, as was evidenced by the attitude of Massachusetts on two occasions, in 1644, when conflicts were threatened in Boston harbor between vessels which bore respectively the colors of parliament and of the king. In the former instance a Bristol ship was taken by one Captain Stagg, who, for his act, showed a commission from the lord high admiral, the Earl of Warwick, reciting also an ordinance of parliament authorizing him to take prizes. In the second instance the Massachusetts officials took a Dartmouth vessel under protection to save it from capture, alleging that the captain who sought to take it had no right to do so because his commission, though granted by Warwick, mentioned no ordinance of parliament, and was not under the great seal. These cases, especially the former, provoked considerable discussion, the clergy participating. The magistrates and elders concluded not to compel Captain Stagg to restore his prize, because, by so doing, Massachusetts might lose the support of parliament, which was its only friend in Europe, and also because through the burgesses of East Greenwich they were represented in parliament, and, if they denied the authority of parliament over them, they would be denying the foundation of their government by patent. Though not subject to appeals, they admitted that they were not absolute without parliament, nor free “in point of state.”¹

Virginia and some of the island colonies took the opposite attitude of pronounced hostility to the new régime. But until comparative quiet came in England, they were left as free in their hostility as New England was in its sympathy.

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It was during these years that the natural tendency, already operating, to trade freely with the Dutch and other foreigners, both in America and in Europe, was strengthened; while the spirit of colonial independence bore fruit in the issue of the Massachusetts coinage.

The outbreak of the Civil War checked a large flow of emigration to New England, while it attracted back to England some of the colonists who were ready to serve parliament either in war or in civil pursuits. In the autumn of 1642 the peers who later became members of the plantation board, with a considerable number of members of the commons and ministers, had written to the clergymen,¹ Cotton, Hooker, and Davenport, urging them to return with all speed to England to assist in the “seatlinge and composing the affaires of the church.” Though the Westminster Assembly did not meet until the following July, plans for such a work as it undertook were already under discussion. No one of the New England clergy risked the peril of becoming entangled in English ecclesiastical politics by accepting this invitation. But as soon as the board of commissioners for plantations had been appointed, Peters and Welde, who for two years had virtually been acting as agents of Massachusetts, attempted to procure for that colony the grant of the Narragansett region, to which reference has already been made.² But the scheme failed, and in March of the following year, in response to the petitions of Roger Williams, the commissioners granted their first charter to the Narragansett plantations.

The service which Williams rendered during this visit to England was far greater than any duty which was immediately connected with his position as agent. It made his agency unique, for by it the liberalizing tendencies of the old and New World were for the moment brought into cooperation, and some of the highest products of Puritan literature owed their existence to the union. Williams made the acquaintance of Cromwell and Milton, while he helped permanently to strengthen the interest of Vane in

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the fortunes of the struggling settlements about Narragansett bay. With these men Williams joined in a common effort to advance the cause of liberty both within the Westminster Assembly and outside. He published at this time his Bloody Tenent of Persecution and Queries of Highest Consideration, in which his views on the subject of soul liberty for the first time found full expression. The reply of the Massachusetts Puritans to all utterances and movements of this kind was made in part by the publication of the official account of the Antinomian controversy under the title of A Short Story of the Rise, Reign and Ruine of the Antinomians.¹ In this they tried to show by a conspicuous example the baleful effects of dissent, and of its attempted toleration.

After the death of Miantonomi and the release of the Gortonists from imprisonment in Massachusetts, the Narragansett chiefs, Pessicus and Canonicus, as we have seen, in April, 1644, signed a paper declaring that they put their tribe and the entire Narragansett country under the protection of the king of England. In the course of 1645 Gorton, Holden, and Greene appeared in London for the purpose of securing a hearing before the commissioners in reference to the conflicting claims to the Narragansett country. In this they were successful, and Holden returned to New England with an order that they should be permitted hereafter to dwell quietly at Shawomet, and that the region about Narragansett bay lay wholly outside the bounds of the Massachusetts patent. The commissioners also required that the Gortonists should be given free passage through Massachusetts on their return. This favor was grudgingly conceded by the authorities at Boston.²

This message at once set the general court of Massachusetts deliberating over the question, whether or not it was under the jurisdiction of the commissioners and should give them their title. As usual, the ministers were consulted, who expressed themselves as opposed to acknowledging the title

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of the commissioners or the right of hearing appeals which it implied. They would not submit to hearings in England “further than in a way of justification of our proceedings questioned, from the words of the patent.” “No appeals or other ways of interrupting our proceedings do lie against us.” If the parliament should be less inclinable to them than this implied, then the colonists “must wait upon Providence” for the preservation of their just liberties.¹

At the time when Gorton was making his appeal to England, Dr. Child and his Presbyterian friends were attempting to do the same. Massachusetts, as has been shown in a previous volume, not only denied their right to do this, but did all that she could to thwart them. The sharp controversy which was then in progress between the Presbyterians and the Independents in Old as well as New England, and the fact that for the time the Presbyterians controlled parliament, doubtless increased the natural reserve of the Puritan colonies. But the combined efforts of Gorton and the Presbyterians forced the colony to depart somewhat from its proud isolation and from the declaration of principles which has just been referred to. Massachusetts appointed Edward Winslow as her agent in England to assist in counteracting their plans.² Winslow went fully commissioned and instructed, both as to the claims which Massachusetts advanced to Shawomet as the consequence of Pumham’s submission, and concerning the nature of Massachusetts government as the leaders of the colony understood it to be. It was Winslow’s second journey across the ocean as agent, and from it he never returned to New England.

When, in 1647, Winslow arrived in England, Gorton had been there for more than a year. He had just published his Simplicitie’s Defence, which contained his account of his own conduct and his arraignment of Massachusetts. To this Winslow issued a reply under the title of Hypocrisie Unmasked, and this he dedicated to the commissioners. He requested them never to permit Gorton to return to New England. He also urged that they should not entertain appeals from New England, and that they would confirm

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Plymouth in the right which by patent it claimed to Shawomet. Though these demands were not granted, the commissioners declared that they did not intend to encourage appeals and would not limit the due and legal freedom of any of the New England colonies. As the result of a hearing the commissioners rejected the appeal to interfere authoritatively on behalf of the Gortonists. They also ignored the arguments of Massachusetts which had their origin in the alleged heresy of their opponents. Pending an ascertainment on the spot of the boundaries of the disputed tract, they contented themselves with an injunction that the Gortonists be permitted to live where they had settled, so long as they conducted themselves peaceably.¹ Under this guaranty Gorton returned in 1648 to New England, and was allowed without molestation to pass through Massachusetts to the Narragansett country.

These were the only dealings of importance which the New England colonies had with the authorities created by parliament until after 1650. They concerned chiefly the Narragansett settlements. This reveals the fact that those settlements, largely because of the conflicting territorial claims which had arisen to the country, were a centre of disturbance that might at any time call for the interference of the home government. They furnished one of the avenues by which the crown and its officials were likely to gain access to New England.

The outbreak of the Civil War, on the other hand, furnished the occasion for the renewal of disturbances in Maryland. The enemies of the Calverts availed themselves of the precarious hold which, as Catholics, Lord Baltimore and his family in those disturbed times had upon their province, to advance their claims. The conflicts which resulted brought the affairs of Lord Baltimore repeatedly before the home government, in the form of suits before the admiralty court and in many other ways. The sympathies of the family were naturally with the king, and Governor Leonard Calvert, who returned on a visit to England in 1643, was charged with having received a commission from the king

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at Oxford to seize¹ the persons and ships of the parliamentarians. But their position made it necessary that the Calverts should be very cautious, and they were careful to avoid coöperation with either one of the English parties. Their province, however, was not saved by this caution from serious disturbances, in the course of which the proprietors’ authority was for a time suspended.

Early in 1644, while Governor Calvert was still absent, Richard Ingle came with a merchant ship to load at Saint Mary’s. Because of alleged treasonable utterances of his against the king, Ingle was arrested. But Thomas Cornwallis soon interfered, caused the release of Ingle, and the latter sailed away, though without paying his debts. For the assistance which they rendered him, Cornwallis was fined and another councillor was removed from office. The next year Ingle appeared again, and offered security for his appearance to answer all charges against him. But again he got clear, this time taking Cornwallis to Europe with him. Cornwallis never again returned to Maryland.²

Meantime Claiborne, who had been appointed treasurer of Virginia by the king, was secretly trying to recover possession of Kent island. The province was full of disquiet. Governor Calvert returned in the autumn of 1644, and attempted to restore peace. But before anything decisive had been accomplished Ingle appeared again, this time with authority of some sort from parliament, which he said was embodied in letters of marque. He also brought goods to the value of £200 which belonged to Cornwallis. These Ingle sold and pocketed the returns. He then joined with Claiborne in an attack on Saint Mary’s. Governor Calvert was forced to flee to Virginia. The province fell into the hands of the insurgents and remained under their control for two years. Cornwallis’s plantation, the finest in Maryland, was plundered, and many other outrages were committed. In 1646 the affairs of Ingle and his relations with Cornwallis came before the house of Lords, and an ordinance passed that house to make void. Baltimore’s patent. There is no proof, however, that it passed the Commons.

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But Ingle, it seems, appeared before a committee of parliament in opposition to the continuance of government in the hands of Baltimore. Baltimore, however, again recovered possession of the province, and after the death of his brother Leonard, the elements of opposition were for a time quieted by the appointment, in 1648, of a Protestant, William Stone, as governor. Thus affairs rested until the authorities in England seriously took in hand the settlement of relations between the colonies at large and the new government.

With the execution of the king and the establishment of the Commonwealth came a great change in the organization of the executive boards in England. Then it was that the spirit of the innovators fully triumphed. The privy council, with the office of secretary of state, had already disappeared. The council of state, consisting of about forty members, was now created by parliament and intrusted with executive power. As the standing executive council, subject to periodical renewal,¹ it bore a relation to the whole sphere of administration, the colonies included, which was similar to that of the privy council. It was, however, immediately responsible to the parliament, and, so long as the Rump Parliament existed, the relations between it and the council of state were especially close. But the most striking change which followed the advent of the Commonwealth was the increase in the number and activity of committees. The parliament had several standing committees, those of foreign affairs, on Irish and Scotch affairs, on America, on trade and plantations. Special and more temporary committees were appointed to consider the affairs of Newfoundland, of the Somers islands, and later the affairs of Jamaica; to purchase supplies for the fleet, to specially consider trade and navigation. The council of state, which was made up chiefly of members of parliament, also did its business largely through committees, standing and special. Among its committees appear that on the admiralty, on trade, on plantations, on

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trade and foreign affairs, on trade, plantations and foreign affairs combined. The business of the latter, which was active during the later months of the Commonwealth, was voluminous. On a few occasions, in 1650 and 1651, the whole council, or any five of them, was declared to be a committee for trade and plantations.

With the establishment of the Protectorate, at the close of 1653, the title council of state was dropped and that of lord protector’s council was assumed, to be changed later to privy council. With the collapse of the Protectorate and during the few months before the Restoration the name council of state reappears. But under the Protectorate the committee system was somewhat curtailed, and did not again reach the dimensions which it assumed during the Commonwealth.¹ Under the Protectorate the council seems to have made use of special committees, as did the privy council under the monarchy, and probably in greater number; but they did not keep separate minutes and therefore in their case business seems more closely bound up with that of the council. The executive or monarchical element in the constitution was again being strengthened. Parliament again fell relatively into the background. A colonial policy was developed, which was the result of the thought and activity of Cromwell and his immediate advisers. This phenomenon was in marked contrast to the mere drifting of the previous decade, and serves to bring the Protectorate into intelligible relations with early Stuart and Elizabethan times on the one side and with the period of the Restoration on the other.

The news of the execution of the king was received in some of the colonies, notably in Virginia and Barbadoes, with declarations of abhorrence or preparations for revolt. In the former province there was naturally a considerable body of colonists who sympathized with the cause of parliament. But the volume of loyalist feeling, which was always strong, had been increased by the arrival from England of

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refugees of the Cavalier party, whose social rank might easily give them greater influence than their numbers would entitle them to. In Accomac the royalists were especially strong, and their presence led to action of a most interesting character, when the body of the province resolved to submit to parliament and keep the peace. This in the end proved to be the feeling of the mass of Virginia people. It was felt that the province could not afford to become involved in the conflict. The assembly of Virginia, however, at first forbade the use of argument in any form in defence of the execution of the king. In the earnestness of their loyalty they acknowledged the young Charles Stuart as the rightful successor to the throne, and a commission¹ for a new council was secured from him. In Barbadoes, under the lead of the proprietor, Lord Willoughby of Parham, the new government in England was defied, the young prince was acknowledged as king, conventicles were suppressed, supporters of the Commonwealth were banished or otherwise punished, freedom of trade with all nations was claimed, and it was charged that a plan was entertained to make the colony² a free state. In Antigua and the Bermudas³ similar conditions existed, accompanied in the case of the latter colony by much internal strife. Because of misgovernment and an inclination to invite over Charles Stuart, the governmental powers of the Somers islands company were temporarily suspended in 1653. These events show that in colonies whose sentiments were strongly royalist the tendency toward independent action was strengthened by the Civil War and the establishment of the Commonwealth. Among their population the spirit of revolt against Puritan control was strong, and it was made stronger by the arrival of fugitive Cavaliers. It was for this reason that the condition of these colonies soon demanded the attention of the Cromwellian government, while New England received the most friendly assurances from the Protector.

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Early in 1649 the condition of Virginia, as well as that of the other colonies to which reference has been made, came before the council of state. The mention of Virginia almost necessarily suggested Maryland, and, had there been danger of its being forgotten, the persistent remonstrances of Ingle would have made such neglect difficult, if not impossible. It was before the committee of the admiralty, of which Sir Henry Vane, the younger, was the head, that the affairs of all these colonies came; while a committee of merchants who were engaged in American trade stood ready with information and advice. A letter of inquiry from the council of state to Governor Berkeley in reference to the banishment of the Puritans of Mr. Harrison’s flock from Nansemond county furnishes an express reminder, if such were needed, that religion also played its part among the issues.¹ On December 28, 1649, and again on the 9th of the following January, the admiralty committee listened to Maurice Thompson, Benjamin Worsley, William Penoyer, and other merchants, and considered their representations, along with other papers relating to Virginia and Maryland. The wisdom of appointing a commission to reorganize the government of Virginia on the basis of fidelity to the Commonwealth became at once apparent, and the attorney general was asked to draft a grant in which the ancient limits of Virginia should be expressed. This seemed to imperil the existence of Maryland. But Lord Baltimore was active, and during a succession of hearings and postponements the affairs of that province were kept at intervals before the council and committee till the beginning of May. Then Mr. Worsley was ordered to go to the attorney general and ask him for the patent or commission relating to Virginia which he was requested to prepare. Three weeks later we are informed that the draft of an act for the settlement of the affairs of Virginia was to be presented to the council of state and by it to be laid before parliament.²

But before further steps affecting Virginia were taken, reports came that Barbadoes was being put into a posture

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of defence against the Commonwealth. The attitude of Virginia also seemed so hostile, that ships were allowed to go thither, only on their masters and owners giving bond that, while there, they would not place themselves under the command of any fort or castle or in any way serve the enemies of the Commonwealth. On August 30 the committee of admiralty ordered Dr. Walker to take the papers concerning Barbadoes into consideration and prepare a bill to be introduced into parliament for the prohibition of trade to that island. A plan was also to be reported to the council of state for an armed expedition to Barbadoes and the appointment of a commission for its regulation. Meanwhile all ships going thither were stayed, and somewhat later that order was extended to ships bound for the Caribbean islands, the Bermudas, and Virginia. A similar extension was also made of the provisions of the proposed bill, and before it was ready for introduction in parliament, it was considered by President Bradshaw, Lord Commissioner Lisle, the judges of admiralty, and others. The bill passed parliament, October 3, 1650.¹

The act of 1650 prohibited trade with Barbadoes, Antigua, the Bermudas, and Virginia, because of their rebellious attitude toward the Commonwealth government in England. Though the provisions of the act were in their nature temporary and were intended to apply to only a few colonies, the declaration of power in the preamble was general. In the clearness and fulness of its statement of the right of parliament to legislate for the colonies it is comparable with the acts of 1696 and 1766 relating to the dependencies and to that of 1719 relating to Ireland. Its language was: “Whereas the islands and other places in America, where any English are planted, are and ought to be subject to and dependent upon England and both ever since the planting thereof, have been and ought to be subject to such laws, orders and regulations as are and shall be made by the

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parliament.” It declared those who had been concerned in acts of rebellion to be traitors and forbade them to have commercial relations with any part of the world. It also empowered the council of state to send ships to any of the plantations aforesaid, commission such persons as it saw fit, and through them enforce the obedience of all who stood out in opposition to parliament. Pardons might also be granted, and the said colonies preserved in peace until the parliament should take further order. Under the authority of this act Sir George Ayscue, Daniel Searle, and Captain Michael Pack were appointed commissioners for reducing the island of Barbadoes, with additional instructions for the reduction of the other colonies which were found to be in revolt. Virginia and, as the event proved, Maryland were thus included in the general scope of the commission.¹ Four men of war and three armed merchantmen were put under the command of Ayscue for the expedition. After some resistance, followed by an agreement with Lord Willoughby, the island was reduced to submission. Searle, after the departure of Ayscue, became governor. At the time of the reduction Colonel Thomas Modyford, a Barbadian, member of the governor’s council and afterwards himself governor, made the interesting suggestion that the island might be represented in parliament.² As parliament was then admitting representatives from Scotland and Ireland, the suggestion was timely, if ever it could be so. But the articles of surrender were approved by parliament, and Modyford’s idea, after appearing for a moment on the surface of things, straightway sank again into the limbo of the impractical.

In connection with the reduction of Virginia, William Claiborne found his last and greatest opportunity. Ingle had failed by his complaints to convince the parliament that Lord Baltimore’s powers of government should be withdrawn. But what Ingle failed to do Claiborne accomplished. He secured an appointment with Captain Robert Dennis, Richard

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Bennett, and Thomas Stagg,¹ as a member of the commission for reducing Virginia to obedience.² In the instructions the designation of Virginia was broadened into “all the plantations in the Bay of Chesapeake.” This brought Maryland within the purview of the commissioners. As provided in the instructions which were given to Ayscue, they might use force, if it was necessary, in the reduction of the provinces, going so far as to raise troops in the colonies at large for the purpose. They were to administer the engagement of fidelity to the Commonwealth of England, and were to proclaim as in force in the colonies the several acts of parliament against the king and house of Lords, as well as those for the subscription of the engagement and for the repeal of the acts which required the use of the Book of Common Prayer. Those who had taken the engagement might be elected burgesses and hold office. The commissioners should cause all writs and processes to run in the name of the Keepers of Liberties of England. Bennett and Claiborne, the only two commissioners who concerned themselves much with either Virginia or Maryland, were not slow to take possession of Lord Baltimore’s province. Provision was made in the commission that, if Ayscue should finish his affairs in Barbadoes in time, and arrive at Virginia while the other commissioners were occupied there, he should take his place at the head of the board. But he did not appear. It was also provided that if, for any reason, Captain Dennis—who seems to have been intrusted with the command of the vessels—should be unable to act, Captain Edmund Curtis should take his place. As Dennis and Stagg perished before reaching Chesapeake waters, Curtis acted there in the place of the former, and in conjunction with Bennett and

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Claiborne.¹ The fact that, a few years before, Bennett as a fugitive Puritan from Virginia had been received and entertained by Maryland, seems not to have operated as a restraint upon him in his treatment of the latter province.

The arrival of the act of parliament of October, 1650, prohibiting trade with the colonies which showed signs of revolt, though no special provision, except the sending of the commissioners, was made by the English government to enforce the embargo, had greatly exasperated the ruling class in Virginia. We are told that Governor Berkeley exerted himself vigorously to arouse the people to resist the parliament, and that he called its leaders bloody tyrants.” He assured himself of the support of a large part of the militia; he sought the aid of the Indians. With the support of the clergy and the help of stories to the effect that the royal cause would soon triumph again in England, the governor sought to bring the population of Virginia to the point of resistance. Under his leadership the entire legislature in a spirited address² repelled the charge that they were rebels or traitors, and spoke of the act of 1650 as if it made slaves of them. They were quick to make an express reserve of the right to resist by force any law which was intended to take away their lives or substance. If the expenditures which the company had made on behalf of the province in its infancy—and which were now cited as a justification for a stricter obedience—were to be used to make slaves of themselves or their posterity, they declared that they would have avoided such gifts as they would shun poisonous serpents. As to allegiance, they did not conceive that it was due to every faction which might possess itself of Westminster Hall. “In a condition so dubious and uncertain, . . . we desire them to permit us, simple men, to take leave to follow the perspicuous and plaine pathes of God and our laws, and that they would

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be pleased to remember that good charitable Axiome in them, That none should be condemned till they were first Heard.”

Respecting the details of the surrender of Virginia to the commissioners of parliament we have little knowledge. When the commissioners, with their two armed vessels, arrived in Virginia, Berkeley is said to have collected a body of about one thousand armed militia at Jamestown. As usual, he blustered, calling the commissioners, or those whom they represented, pirates and robbers, and predicting that Virginia would soon be subjected to the control of a company of grasping merchants. But the commissioners, by circulating their commission, a declaration, and other mild statements concerning their errand, soon counteracted the influence of Berkeley’s statements. Moreover, resistance to the power which had brought Charles I to the block was something which the governor and council of Virginia, even with the Cavalier backing which they had, were far from being prepared to undertake. Therefore “mutual engagements” passed between the commissioners and the governor and council. The militia were sent home and a call was issued for a meeting of the general assembly. This occupied the time from January till March, 1652.

When the general assembly met, the submission of the province was made without a struggle or the shedding of a drop of blood. The articles¹ of surrender were signed on the 12th of March. They consisted of two parts, one containing an agreement with the province as represented in the general assembly, and the other with the governor and councillors, the object of the whole being to make the change as easy as was practicable. The submission was declared to be a voluntary act, and not the result of conquest. The former government was declared to be at an end, but, so far as it was possible for the commissioners to do so, the property rights of the colonists, the succession of assemblies, and the preservation of the former limits of the province were guarantied. It was declared that Virginia should be free from all taxes except those levied under the authority of its assemblies, and that no forts or garrisons

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should be maintained in the province without its consent. Freedom of trade should be enjoyed, subject to the laws of the Commonwealth. The use of the Book of Common Prayer, with the exception of the passages which related to the kingship, was to be permitted for one year; and in fact its use was never forbidden.

For the ease of the governor and council it was agreed that they might be excused for a year from taking the engagement of fidelity to the Commonwealth, and during that time they should not be censured if they prayed for or spoke well of the king in their own houses or to friends. Their property should be secure, the debts due them should be paid and they should have liberty, if they chose, to dispose of their estates and leave the country. An act of indemnity, covering all that had been done in support of the royal cause, was issued under the seals of the commissioners, and all who refused to submit to the government of the Commonwealth were given a year in which to remove from the province.

Among the articles of agreement with the assembly were two, the principle of which the English government never accepted. Those were the two which set forth the claim on behalf of the assembly to the exclusive right of taxation, and the claim to the restoration of the original boundaries of the province. We know that Lord Baltimore¹ submitted arguments in England against the latter proposition and in defence of the integrity of his own province, arguments which were forced from him as well by the doings of Bennett and Claiborne in Maryland as by the insistence of the Virginians on the restoration of their former bounds. In his statement on the subject, Baltimore called attention exclusively to the advantages which might be supposed to come to England from the existence of two provinces rather than one in the region of the Chesapeake. The caution with which he spoke at the same time betrayed a full sense of the weakness of his position as a Catholic proprietor. But the proposal to strengthen royalist Virginia by adding Maryland to it could scarcely meet with the approval of

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Cromwell and his advisers. They might be willing to suspend the governmental powers of Baltimore, but the restoration of his territory to Virginia would be decidedly inconsistent with the policy and interests of the Protector. It was even less likely to find favor with him than with the Stuarts themselves.

In Virginia itself events which occurred immediately after the submission to the parliamentary commissioners indicated that this was not to involve the direct appointment of the officials of the province by the English government, though it is almost necessary to suppose that in the case of important officers the choice of the assembly was approved by the Protector and his council. About a month after the submission a new assembly was elected.¹ This body, together with the commissioners of parliament, after long debate decided that Richard Bennett should be governor and William Claiborne secretary. A council was also designated, and at the head of the list of its members stood the names of Captain John West and Colonel Samuel Mathews. The appointment of other officers was for the time being intrusted to the governor and commissioners, but it was declared that hereafter their choice should belong to the burgesses as representatives of the people of the province. It was specially stated that commissioners of the counties should be selected in this manner. As had previously been the case, the governor and council were to have seats in the general assembly, while it was also provided that they should execute the laws and administer justice in accordance with the laws of England, the instructions from parliament, and the acts of the assembly.

We are informed that these acts were submitted to parliament and that they were considered; but of decisive action either for or against them, the extant records afford no evidence. Their effect, however, so far even as the executive was concerned, was to transfer the centre of gravity more completely from England to Virginia. The general assembly had been made the source of power, holding as it did both the right of appointment and that of legislation. A change

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had been wrought in Virginia government similar to that which Fendall, a few years later and perhaps in imitation of this very event, attempted in Maryland. The form which Virginia now assumed was the same as that under which West Jersey existed at a still later time, and was much the same as that of the corporate colonies of New England. It meant a very large degree of independence, and, as a phenomenon, was to reappear when, at the beginning of the Revolution, one province after another dispensed with its royal executive and organized government under officials of its own choice.

That the change met with the approval of the great body of Virginians there can be no doubt. The royalists who otherwise would have stood by the old executive favored it, because it gave them the largest possible independence of that parliament and protectorate which had been built up on the ruins of the kingship. The minority who were in sympathy with parliament would naturally incline to a large degree of colonial independence. Bennett, the Puritan, and Claiborne, the trader and adventurer, would find their interests best served by a settlement such as this. A Virginia thus organized would be quite as likely to support their plans in reference to Maryland, as it would be were it placed under the continuous and direct control of parliament. Under this constitution, with Bennett as governor, and, after his return to England, with Edward Digges and Samuel Mathews as deputy governors, Virginia continued peaceful for the next eight years. In 1658 a controversy arose between the burgesses and the governor and council over the right of the latter to dissolve the assembly. The burgesses, notwithstanding some threats on the part of the council to refer the dispute to the Protector, maintained their claim to exclusive control over their sessions, and at last the council quietly acquiesced.¹ Under this system of consistent

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self government Virginia pursued its uneventful course till news came from Europe of the approach of the Restoration.

When the commissioners, having received the submission of Virginia, reached Maryland, they required that all the inhabitants of the province should subscribe the engagement to the Commonwealth, and that all writs, warrants, and processes should run in the names of the Keepers of the Liberties of England. But these requirements necessarily involved results more important than the performance of the same acts in Virginia. Though Maryland had been peacefully disposed and its proprietor had striven to maintain a neutral attitude toward the contending parties in England, Bennett and Claiborne were now proceeding to take from him his rights of government and to place the province directly under the control of parliament and the council of state. The religion of the proprietor and of a part of the colonists, the large powers which had been bestowed in the Maryland charter, and the charge that the king had been misled in making the grant, were used as arguments to justify the step which was now to be taken. A few months later they were urged by Bennett and Samuel Mathews in England.

But, since Governor Stone and the other Maryland officials were bound by oaths to the proprietor, they at first refused to obey the requirements of the commissioners. Governor Stone was therefore suspended by the commissioners.

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A new council was named by them, of which Robert Brooke was the leading member. The authority of the proprietor was then suspended by the enforcement of the command that the engagement should be taken to the Commonwealth, and that legal process should run in the name of the Keepers of the Liberties of England.¹ Governor Stone remained out of office from March until June, 1652, the government of Virginia in the meantime being changed as already described and Bennett securing election as governor. As things were at that moment, the executives of Maryland and Virginia were fast becoming the same, and an important step was taking toward the union of the two provinces.

But in June, on the return of the commissioners to Maryland, an agreement² was reached between them and Governor Stone, Secretary Hatton, and the leading councillors. According to this Stone and Hatton resumed the administration of the government in coöperation with the councillors who had been appointed by the commissioners. But the governor and others who had scruples on the subject were excused from taking the engagement, and continued to act under their oaths to Lord Baltimore until the pleasure of the English government should be known. Government was now administered in the name of the proprietor, but with express recognition of the Keepers of the Liberties of England.

On the very day of the reinstatement of Governor Stone, a committee of Puritans from Providence—later Annapolis—with Commissioner Bennett at its head, was appointed to treat with the Susquehanna Indians.³ They were also to inquire into alleged abuses said to have been committed by Robert Vaughan, the commander of Kent island, and, if they saw cause, they might remove Vaughan from his office. In this affair the hand of Claiborne becomes clearly evident when, in the treaty which was soon concluded with the Susquehannas, the statement appears that Kent island and Palmer’s island belonged to him. There is, however, no

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evidence that the charges against Vaughan came to a hearing, or that Claiborne attempted to exercise authority within the islands.

Meantime, in the summer of 1652, the case of Lord Baltimore and his controversy with Virginia came up before parliament and the council of state in England. Samuel Mathews represented Virginia as its agent, and Lord Baltimore pleaded his own case, using the arguments to which reference has already been made. We hear that the case was before the committee of parliament on petitions and before the committee of the navy, and that the latter body reported in favor of the validity of Baltimore’s grant, though in their opinion the proprietor had done some things which were not conformable with the laws of England.¹ For this reason the clause in the agreement with Virginia which provided for the restoration of the original bounds of that province was not confirmed. But the question of government within Maryland itself was not decided when, in April, 1653, the Long Parliament was dissolved.

No further progress was made until after the institution of the Protectorate, at the close of 1653. Then Mathews renewed his petition² for the recognition of the government which the commissioners had set up in Virginia and Maryland. Thereupon the council of state ordered that the papers connected with the dispute between Lord Baltimore and Virginia should be sent for; that they should be considered by Mr. Strickland and Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, who should call before them Edward Winslow, Colonel Mathews, and such others as were acquainted with the affairs of the provinces concerned, and that a report on the whole matter should be laid before the Protector. On January 12, 1654, at the request of Lord Baltimore and others, Cromwell wrote to Richard Bennett, the governor of Virginia, requiring him and the officials under him to refrain from all violent interference

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with the affairs of Maryland while the case was pending before the council in England.¹

Baltimore, in spite of the precarious tenure by which at this time he held his rights, still had reason for some confidence. He therefore, early in 1654, not only ordered Governor Stone to continue the granting of land and the administration of the oath of fidelity in the proprietor’s name, but to issue writs in his name as well.² Three months later the Protectorate was proclaimed in Maryland. The object of this act, as shown by the language of the proclamation and by subsequent events, was to push the commissioners one side and to place the colony, with its proprietor, in direct relations with the Lord Protector. Governor Stone also proclaimed a general pardon, excluding, however, from its benefits those whom, like Claiborne and Ingle, the proprietor had not pardoned, and those who had engaged in any combination, conspiracy, or rebellion against the person or rights of Lord Baltimore. Some of the leading Puritans, notably Robert Brooke, were also removed from the council. Finally, on July 4, 1654, the governor issued a proclamation in which the commissioners and those who had supported them were charged with leading the people away into rebellion against the proprietor, whereby their estates and lives were made liable to forfeiture at his pleasure.³

These acts were interpreted to mean an intention on the part of the proprietor and governor to nullify the settlement which had been made by the commissioners, and the suspicion roused the Puritan party within the province to action. The last proclamation revealed to them also the danger to which they were exposed. It was felt that the proprietor and governor were violating the spirit of the Protector’s letter, which was to the effect that the status quo should be maintained

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until the controversy could be settled in England. As soon as the proclamations concerning writs and the oath of fidelity had been issued, two petitions were sent to the commissioners, asking them to interfere. Bennett and Claiborne in reply advised the petitioners to refuse obedience to the new orders.¹ Nothing more was done until the issue of the proclamation in July, which seemed to imperil the property and lives of Lord Baltimore’s opponents.

At this juncture Bennett and Claiborne, claiming that their authority had been duly recognized by the Protector and that Stone was violating the terms of the “settlement” and was disobedient to the Commonwealth, again visited Maryland, and demanded that the governor should surrender his commission. This was on July 15, 1654. Stone at first made some show of resistance, but very soon agreed to meet the commissioners and discuss the matter. But, apparently before the meeting occurred, Stone was moved by fear of an attack from Virginia to make a full surrender of his authority into the hands of the commissioners.² They then established a council, composed wholly of Puritans, to govern the colony. At its head was Captain William Fuller, and with him were associated Richard Preston, William Durand, Edward Lloyd, Leonard Strong, and others. They were empowered to call an assembly; but from the body itself, as well as from the right to vote for its members, all Catholics should be excluded.

The assembly met at Patuxent on October 20, 1654,³ and by sixteen members, one-half of whom were councillors. Preston, a councillor, was chosen speaker. Job Chandler and Thomas Hatton, who had been returned from Saint Mary’s county, refused to sit because of their oath to the proprietor. They were dismissed as “delinquents” and a new election was held to fill their places. This assembly enacted many

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laws, introducing them with a solemn declaration that no authority should be recognized in Maryland except such as proceeded directly from the Commonwealth of England. It was also enacted that the Roman Catholic religion should no longer be tolerated in the province. The proprietary rights of Lord Baltimore were further assailed by an enactment, that all who transported themselves into the province, by virtue of that fact alone had a right to occupy land without taking any oath to the proprietor. The records of the province were taken possession of by the new government and carried to Patuxent.

On hearing of these events, Lord Baltimore wrote to Stone, blaming him for his weak submission.¹ Luke Barber, in a letter to Cromwell, dated Maryland, April 13, 1655,² states that Stone learned from Eltonhead, who had just come from England, that Baltimore’s patent had not been taken from him. That Baltimore wrote to Stone about his submission is made certain by references in other papers; but the letter itself has been lost. This roused Stone to action, and early in 1655 he resumed the duties of governor at Saint Mary’s. He first succeeded in regaining possession of the records. He then fitted out an expedition of about two hundred men, on board twelve small vessels, and started with them to overawe the Puritans of Anne Arundel county. They secured the aid of a merchant ship, the Golden Lyon, which lay at anchor in the Severn and was under the command of Roger Heamans. Though Stone’s friends afterward affirmed that it was not his intention to attack the Puritans, but only to bring them to terms by an armed demonstration, as soon as they appeared Heamans opened fire on them. An engagement followed³ in which the force of Stone was completely defeated, March, 1655. Nearly all

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who were not slain were taken prisoners. At first a general proscription of the leaders was proposed, but, largely through the intercession of the women, all except four of the survivors escaped with their lives. An order was issued that the estates of those who participated in the expedition should be sequestered; but in the end fines only were levied on the property of the accused, to meet the cost of the expedition.

The Puritans were now left in control for several months, during which time the missionary operations among the Indians were brought to an end and the extension of Virginia to its original bounds was much discussed. Meantime the struggle between the proprietor and his opponents was transferred to England. Petitions and statements from both sides were submitted to the Protector and his council. Both Bennett and Claiborne went to England and urged the claim of Virginia to the peninsula of Accomac. They sought to justify their course as commissioners, and to show that Lord Baltimore’s policy, both in Maryland and at home, had been so opposed to that of England, that his grant should be declared forfeited. Baltimore, in his petition, laid stress on the alleged violent character of the proceedings of the commissioners in Maryland.¹ He secured a special reference of the case to Lords Whitelocke and Widrington, who reported to the council of state, and then the entire question was referred back to the committee of foreign plantations, with instructions to speak with the parties and report what they thought fit to be done. This they did, but the report has been lost.

So occupied were Cromwell and his council with weightier matters, that no decision of the Maryland dispute was ever reached by them. But without a positive verdict in its favor the Puritan régime in that province could not be maintained. It had been established as the result of encroachments which were begun when Maryland was brought within the purview of the commissioners. Therefore Baltimore, relying on the favor with which his claims were regarded in England, in July, 1656, appointed Josias Fendall² governor with the usual

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powers, and afterward sent over his brother, Philip Calvert, to be secretary, to sit in the council, and to attend specially to the proprietor’s interests. In November, 1657, an agreement¹ was concluded between Baltimore on the one side and Bennett and Mathews on the other, the terms of which were, that proprietary rights should be left to be determined as the Protector and his council should direct, that no lands should be forfeited because of opposition to the proprietor, that those who desired might remove from the province within one year, and that religious toleration should continue as it was before the last assembly. After brief opposition this agreement was accepted by the Puritans of the colony, and their officers yielded to those who had been appointed by the proprietor. Thus the long struggle between Maryland and Virginia was brought to an end, and Lord Baltimore to all intents and purposes was reinstated in his rights.

But before this narrow and local issue had been adjusted events of wide-reaching importance had occurred in the West Indies. In connection with these events it became increasingly apparent that the government of the Protectorate was beginning to develop a colonial policy and that the suspension of activity in those lines which had been necessitated by the Civil War was coming to an end. Indications of the same thing had already been given by the passage of the acts of 1650 and 1651 affecting trade and by the reduction of Barbadoes and Virginia. The colonizing, as well as the conquering, energy of the new republic was also showing itself in Ireland, though under peculiar and exceptional conditions.

That such an outburst of national energy as was indicated by the Puritan Revolution would be followed by an increase of colonial and maritime activity was almost inevitable. That Revolution, in fact, was a result of the abounding national life which began its pulsation when the new western world was discovered, when the remote East was opened up by European voyagers; when, too, Greek and Roman antiquity had its new birth and the northern nations became more than ever impatient of papal control. It was genuinely Elizabethan in its origin. The revolutionary and destructive

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course which it took was due to the fact that Elizabeth in her later days, and after her the Stuarts, had attempted to dam up the national energy in certain directions, until at last it burst through their obstructions and overwhelmed them in its flood. Cromwell, who was brought to the front by the Revolution, was akin to the Elizabethans in some of his ideals and most cherished policies. Puritanism emphasized the national trend toward the Protestant faith. Under its lead the old antipathy toward Spain attained again its free and unobstructed course. As in the sixteenth century, so now, this feeling was closely connected with the motives which led to colonization. They were all patriotic, commercial, and religious in character, the relative strength of these varying with each successive age; and one of their chief objective points was to secure for England the largest possible share of that new world which Spain was too weak to grasp.

But the Commonwealth first found itself involved in war with the Dutch, the outgrowth of its assertion of the right of search, of its claim to sovereignty over the four seas, of the commercial rivalry between the two nations which had been increasing since the beginning of the century.¹ An incident of this war, which occurred near its close, was the despatch of Robert Sedgwick and John Leverett, with a few vessels, to dislodge the Dutch from New Netherland. Both Sedgwick and Leverett were residents of Massachusetts and they were instructed to secure recruits among the New England colonies for their expedition. Connecticut and New Haven, because of the peculiar hostility which they then felt toward the Dutch, quickly responded. Massachusetts followed with some reservation. But, just as the required number of troops were assured, in June, 1654, news came of the conclusion of peace between England and Holland. The enterprise against the Dutch was dropped; but, to the gratification of the New Englanders, Sedgwick entered with a part of his vessels on a cruise against the French settlements to the eastward. La Tour’s fort at St. John, the post at Port

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Royal, and the fortified trading settlement at Penobscot which years before the French had taken from the Plymouth people, were now without difficulty reoccupied. Sedgwick then returned to England, and though he had temporarily broken the hold of the French on Acadia, the friendly relations which then existed between the two powers were not disturbed by the event.¹

Although at the outset it seemed not unlikely that hostile relations might develop between France and the English republic, it soon became evident that it was for the interest of both Cromwell and Mazarin to keep the peace. The war between France and Spain, which the negotiations of Westphalia had failed to conclude, was still in progress and was to continue till the peace of the Pyrenees in 1659. This, combined with the internal strife occasioned by the Fronde, forced Mazarin to maintain a conciliatory attitude toward England and to overlook much which in itself was irritating. It also gave him a positive interest in furthering the projects of Cromwell against Spain, especially in so far as they concerned Dunkirk. This also was directly favorable to the commercial policy which England was then pursuing against the Dutch.

As the war with Holland approached its close, the policy of Cromwell toward Spain began to assume definite form. Since the settlement of English colonies in the West Indies and the development of permanent trade relations there, a long series of outrages on British subjects and their vessels had been committed by the Spanish. These things they had done in their efforts to uphold the monopoly which had originated in the papal grant, an act the binding force of which the English did not recognize, but called instead “a certain ridiculous gift.” As many of these losses had in recent years been suffered by those who were going to and from their own colonies, the grievance seemed in British eyes to be intensified. In fact war between the subjects of Spain and England had existed continuously in the West Indies for two generations, and now the question was, whether

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it should become open and outbreaking and involve the two states¹ in Europe as well.

There is evidence that in 1651 or 1652 Cromwell began to consider the advisability of an attack on the Spanish power in the West Indies. John Cotton, an occasional correspondent of the general, suggested it. Roger Williams, when on his last visit to England, in conversations with Cromwell learned that he had “strong thoughts of Hispaniola and Cuba.” Thomas Gage, a converted Jesuit, who had lived many years in Spanish America and was unusually well informed, influenced Cromwell, by his arguments, to prove the wealth of the Spanish colonies and the inability of their inhabitants to defend them. Colonel Thomas Modyford, governor of Barbadoes and also a hater of the Spaniard, was consulted. While Gage recommended the seizure of some of the islands, Modyford urged the occupation of a part of the Spanish main. In the winter of 1654-1655 the advice thus given took practical shape in the expedition against Hispaniola under the command of Penn and Venables. Edward Winslow, of Plymouth fame, accompanied this expedition as one of the commissioners who were appointed to take charge of such experiments in colonization as might result; and like hundreds of others he succumbed to tropical disease before his errand was much more than begun. Owing to mismanagement, both on the part of the officials in England who provided the equipment and supplies for the troops and on the part of the commanders themselves, this effort failed of its immediate object. But a check was administered to illegal trade with the Dutch at Barbadoes, and the island of Jamaica, which was held by only a weak Spanish force, was occupied. War with Spain followed, but Jamaica remained permanently in the hands of its conquerors.²

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The conquest of Jamaica immediately raised questions which for a time threatened to modify seriously the fortunes of the New England colonies. The necessity for peopling the island was imperative, for only in that way could it be made English and preserved against successful Spanish attack. To the mind of Cromwell it apparently seemed easy to transfer a body of colonists from one part of the dominions to another; and something at least to be ventured, if by means of it the cause of English Protestantism could be strengthened. The policy of the nation in Ireland was just then making it familiar with wholesale removals of a subject people even from its ancestral home. Cromwell regarded the New Englanders as an exceptionally valuable body of colonists. Wherever they might settle, a society after his own heart was sure to develop. But both the climate and the soil of New England were rugged and inhospitable. For a period, also, after the emigration thither had been checked by the outbreak of the Civil War, times had seemed hard to the colonists, though after a few years prosperity revived. With it came contentment, interrupted though it was by now and then a hard season.

But during the interval of depression Cromwell had received from his New England correspondents hints of a willingness to remove to some more inviting country. This feeling seems to have been especially strong in the colony of New Haven, which at the time was planning a settlement on the Delaware. In that colony, especially at Guilford, were ministers and magistrates who, either directly or through Samuel Desborough, were in communication with Cromwell. Letters also on the subject were now and then exchanged with friends in other colonies. John Winthrop, Jr., and Roger Williams exchanged views about it. Hugh Peters, as usual, interested himself, though in England.¹

Cromwell had already suggested the removal of some of the New Haven people to Ireland and their settlement near Galway. But the plan to which he soon after committed

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himself much more fully was the wholesale removal of New Englanders to Jamaica. In the autumn of 1655 he sent Daniel Gookin to New England with special instructions to lay before the colonists, especially those of New Haven, the attractiveness of Jamaica as a place of settlement and his desire to plant there a body of God’s people. If a sufficiently large number would remove, land and a place of settlement should be assigned under most favorable conditions. The churches should be protected and large privileges of self-government be enjoyed. But Cromwell reserved the right of appointing the governor, which would have placed the colonists under a provincial form of government. This of itself would have operated as a deterrent to many of the New Englanders. But before Gookin was able to deliver his message, news had arrived of the sickness which prevailed among the troops in Jamaica and of the generally unhealthy conditions which existed there. The report had come from Major Sedgwick, who, after his return to England, had been sent with supply ships to the West Indies, and from Barbadoes had followed the army to Jamaica. His letters, especially to England, sufficiently revealed the despair which there existed among the troops. General Fortescue, Thomas Gage, and presently Sedgwick himself, died at their posts. This convinced the great body of the colonists that the plan of removal, extremely doubtful at best, must prove ruinous if attempted under such conditions. The general court of Massachusetts firmly, though in conciliatory phrase, declined the offer of the Protector. New Haven sent an agent to Jamaica to investigate, and the town of New Haven seemed inclined to accept, but the general court refused its consent. Plymouth and Connecticut took no official action, and the invitation was probably not extended to Rhode Island. Gookin, therefore, had to report, as the result of some eight months of effort, that only three hundred persons had indicated their willingness to go, and they were mostly young, many of them young women. Thus Cromwell was forced, though unwillingly, to abandon the plan, which curiously illustrates the superior interest which even a Puritan like Cromwell felt in the fate of the island colonies, as compared

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with those on the continent, especially of New England.¹ This, however, was an opinion which the progress of the French war in the next century tended to modify. Throughout the colonial period the island colonies were especially valued by England because of the tropical character of their products. These were not such as could be produced at home, and the control over their supply was one of the chief prizes for which English merchants contended. The products of the northern colonies, on the other hand, were similar to those of the British Isles, and, if produced in sufficient quantities, would naturally come into competition with them. This was the economic reason for the preference that was widely felt for the island colonies and for the larger share of attention which was paid to them.

But there was another reason for this phenomenon—one which was derived from the position of the island colonies with reference to the frontier and their relation to the general problem of defence. Viewing the subject from the purely imperialist standpoint, the British frontier in America in the seventeenth century extended from Newfoundland to Trinidad, and was susceptible of further extension at both its northern and southern ends. If one were treating of colonial administration alone, without particular reference also to the institutions of the United States, he would take his stand in England and trace the development of the system wherever it appeared along the entire American coast. The plan of these volumes is somewhat more restricted than this and limits our attention chiefly to the middle section of that great arc. But the existence of the frontier as a whole, and of colonies within it which did not become parts of the United States, must not be forgotten. Account now and then must be taken of their influence upon the system as a whole and upon the continental colonies in particular. With the advent of the Interregnum, and especially with the conquest of Jamaica, the influence of the

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island colonies appears with special clearness, and from that time was continuously felt.

Those colonies and the seas which surrounded them became at that time the seat of war. They had been so before, but now the fact appeared with especial clearness. It now became perfectly evident that, in a naval and military sense, the West Indies were the most important part of the frontier. Thenceforth this fact was never lost sight of, though at a later time the Gulf of Saint Lawrence rose to something like a corresponding importance. But among the West Indies were Spanish, Dutch, and French possessions, territories which belonged to each of the states of which England was a rival or with which it was often in hostile relations. When, therefore, England was at war, the West Indies were almost sure to be a scene of activity. During the wars of the Restoration period and of the eighteenth century fleets and armies very frequently came and went between that region and Europe. The British admiralty, the privy council, and all the officers of state who had to do with diplomacy and defence were always concerned with relations in that quarter. Frequent exchanges or other transfers of territory occurred there.

In other words, administrative control by the British government over the island colonies became at an early date continuous and vigorous. From the time of Cromwell the correspondence which passed between them and the home government was increasingly large and important. After the Restoration the system of royal government was rapidly extended over those colonies; royal appointees of all sorts were sent among them, not a few being commissioners for special purposes. Elaborate sets of instructions were given to the governors, those which were prepared for Jamaica serving in some cases as models for later instructions to the governors at large. It is true that royal government was first applied on a considerable scale in Virginia. But life in that province moved quietly and required little vigorous attention from the home government. Its defence did not present questions of great difficulty. Until the close of the seventeenth century the same was true of all the continental

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colonies. Hence it was that the precedents which were favorable to active imperial administration were first established on a large scale in the government of the island colonies. The system was most thoroughly tested there.

Soon after the occupation of Jamaica by the English, Thomas Povey, supported by Lord Willoughby of Parham and a group of merchants and others who were or had been officers in the army, submitted to the protector and council a remarkable series of proposals. They expressed the desire to pursue colonization by encroaching further on Spanish territory in South America, Mexico, and Florida, and asked for incorporation as a West Indies company. They also proposed the creation of a council for America, whose membership should include at least one principal councillor and a secretary of state. The duties of this body should be to improve the colonies which had already been secured and to plan new undertakings. They were to let the colonies understand that they were parts of “one embodied commonwealth whose head and centre is here [i.e. in England].” The council should be authorized to require from every governor an exact account of the government and laws of his colony, the number of men, its forts and means of defence. Information merely should not be sought, but the parties concerned should be roused up and advertised that his Highness was watchful for their general good and had further designs. The commissions of governors should be reviewed and they should all be made dependent on his Highness, be paid from a fund in England and be constantly accountable to England. The proprietary colonies should be reduced as near as possible to the same method and all made to conform to one model. Let correspondence, they said, be free and constant, and all be united into one commonwealth and regulated on common and equal principles. The colonial policies of other states were to be inquired into, the Spanish Council of the Indies being referred to as specially worthy of imitation. The colonies, if possible, were to be induced to raise a revenue of £10,000 or £20,000, to be lodged in the English treasury on their account, and disposed of by the council for America in the service of the colonies.

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These proposals are of great interest, for they reveal the ideas on the methods and objects of colonial policy which in 1656 and 1657 were gathering headway in England and were forcing themselves on the attention of the Protector.

Those who advocated them—Thomas Povey, Martin Noell, John Mills, Tobias Bridges, John Lymbery, and others—appear on the committee of the council for Jamaica and for America and were interested in trade to the West Indies. The plans which they suggested reappear in almost identical form after the Restoration, thus establishing the connection between the period of origins and that of the full development of British colonial administration.¹ Numerous references appear in the Colonial Papers during and after 1655 to the activity of Noell, Bridges, Lymbery, and others as traders and members of committee for Jamaica or for the island colonies generally. Thomas Povey, of whose papers the above proposals probably form a part, was apparently much occupied with questions of trade and colonization. He was thus prepared for the continuance of his work and its development as an office holder after the Restoration.

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