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issue thereof, they did heartily and affectionately commend to their loving confederates, that such a compliance might be between them whereby the sad consequences that would inevitably follow upon their further contentions one with another might be prevented." And, "for the removing of obstructions," it was proposed that, if a union between New Haven and Connecticut should be consummated, two Commissioners should thenceforward represent the one Colony thus created, and that the consenting vote of four out of six members of the Federal Congress should thenceforward have the same conclusive force, as had been secured by the original Articles to a majority of six votes in eight. A vote that thenceforth the Commissioners should meet but once in three years, while it deferred the hard question respecting the relations between the western Colonies, was a significant symptom of the conviction which had grown of the decline of the power of the Confederacy.

Sept. 14.

Governor Leete convoked a General Court, and invited them to consider whether it was best for their constituents that the royal Commissioners, from whom a visit was presently expected, should find them. in their separate condition, or united to the neighbor Colony. "There was much debate, and divers spake, that to stand as God had kept them hitherto was their best way." The final surrender was still a measure too painful to be taken; "the Assembly was broke up, and no more done at this time."2 The General Court of Connecticut commissioned John Sherman and John Allyn to repair to the several towns of New Haven Colony, and, " in his Majesty's name, to require all the inhabitants to submit to the government established by his Majesty's gracious grant." They were further authorized to declare all the freemen of those

Oct. 13.

1 Records, &c., in Hazard, II. 496, 497; comp. N. H. Rec., II. 546, 547 N. H. Rec., II. 547, 548.

towns to be thenceforth freemen of Connecticut, when they should have taken the freeman's oath;-"to make as many freemen as they should, by sufficient testimony, find qualified;" "-to announce the appointment of Leete, Jones, Gilbert, and other principal citizens of New Haven Colony, to exercise "magistratical power" for Connecticut in their respective towns; and, in case any of the persons so designated should decline to act, then to select and establish suitable substitutes.

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and to New

To propitiate the royal Commissioners, an order was passed for making them a present of five hundred bushels of corn. Winthrop and Allyn, with three associates, were sent to argue before them at New York the question of the southern and western limits Annexation of the new Colony. Their decision was, that of Long Isl "the southern bounds of his Majesty's Colony York. of Connecticut is the sea, and that Long Island Nov. 30. is to be under the government of his Royal Highness the Duke of York;" and "that the creek or river called Momoronook, which is reputed to be about twelve miles to the east of West Chester, and a line drawn from the east point or side, where the fresh water falls into the salt at high-water mark, north-northwest to the line of the Massachusetts, be the western bounds of the said Colony." 2

To this there could be only one sequel, in respect to New Haven Colony. Another General Court was held. Milford and Stamford had now fallen off3 Only the towns of New Haven, Guilford, and Branford remained to represent the dismembered jurisdiction. "The freemen and other inhabitants," who were as

1 Conn. Rec., I. 437.

Trumbull, I. 525. · Connecticut had claimed the whole of Long Island, as being "one of those adjoining islands"

Dec. 13.

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sembled, passed the following votes:-"1. First, that by this act or vote we be not understood to justify Connecticut's former actings, nor anything disorderly done by our own people upon such accounts. 2. That by it we be not apprehended to have any hand in breaking or dissolving the Confederation. Yet in testimony of our loyalty to the King's Majesty, when an authentic copy of the determination of his Commissioners is published, to be recorded with us, if thereby it shall appear to our committee that we are by his Majesty's authority now put under Connecticut patent, we shall submit, as from a necessity brought upon us by the means of Connecticut aforesaid, but with a salvo jure of our former right and claim, as a people who have not yet been heard in point of plea."1

Dec. 14, 21.

1665.

Union of

and New Haven.

A letter was written to Connecticut; it brought out a reply; which was met by a rejoinder. These papers, amicable on the whole, though not without Jan. 5. a tinge of the recent bitterness, concluded the controversy;—and New-Haven Colony was no more. The General Court of Connecticut-now the government of the consolidated Colony- was constiConnecticut tuted on the new basis in the following spring. Deputies appeared from the towns of New Haven, Milford, Guilford, Stamford, and BranBranford, however, could not be brought to terms; and the inhabitants, with their minister, Mr. Pierson, presently removed to Newark, in what is now New Jersey. Leete, Jones, Fenn, and Crane, lately Magistrates of the disbanded Colony, were chosen Assistants of Connecticut; Gilbert, the Deputy-Governor, though proposed as an Assistant, was passed over; he was perhaps esteemed too impracticable.*

May 11.

ford.

Nicolls was detained at New York by the business

1 N. H. Rec., II. 551.

Ibid., 552-557.

Conn. Rec., II. 13; comp. I. 439. ✦ Ibid., II. 13, 14.

Royal Com

at Boston.

Feb. 4.

Feb. 15.

of his new government. Carr lingered by the Delaware, pursuing his own schemes, while the other two Commissioners, being without authority to transact alone the further business on their hands, were impatiently awaiting him in Boston. At length Meeting of he joined them; and, in an interview at the missioners Governor's house, they told the Magistrates that they were going for a little time to Plymouth, "and further signified their desire that order might be taken for the assembling of all the inhabitants at the day of the election, that so they might understand his Majesty's grace and favor to them; and that, at their returns, some might be appointed to go along with them, to show them the bounds of the patent. To the latter of which proposals the Magistrates promised a ready compliance.

But

To the former it was answered that all were at their liberty to come if they would; there was no prohibition;" but that the Magistrates "could not encourage to it, not only for the business of the season, but leaving a considerable part of the people, wives, children, and aged persons, to the rage of the natives. .. Colonel Cartwright replied, that the motion was so reasonable, that he that would not attend it was a traitor." this ill-temper availed nothing; and, as the next best way of obtaining the advantage of addressing an assembly of the whole people, - freemen and others alike, — the Commissioners distributed a circular letter in different parts of the Colony, inviting the persons addressed to be at Boston with their neighbors on the approaching day of annual election. They then set off for Plymouth.

1 O'Callaghan, Documents, &c., 83, General Assembly.

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Feb. 17.

I think

it will be best for us to take all the best courses we can, and I know none yet besides writing to several friends to desire all the country to come in

Death of

Governor

Endicott.

The Commissioners were to have no further dispute with Endicott. He was old, and had been for some months becoming infirm; and at the end of four weeks after this conference he died.1 Personally he was lamented with sincere affection. His honesty, frankness, fearlessness, and generous public spirit March 15. had won their proper guerdon in the general esteem. Thoughts at once tender and invigorating were awakened by his death; for he had been the contemporary of all who had created New England; he had been longer on the soil than any considerable person, not only among the associates of his last years, but also among those who had fallen by his side; during a long time he had been one of very few who could tell what their eyes had seen of the famine and sickness that had emptied the first dwellings raised at Salem. In some sense, he might fitly be called the father of Massachusetts rather than any other man. He it was that first engaged, in England, to plant a colony of Englishmen within her borders. He conducted to her shore the first band of emigrants that numbered so many as three scores of men. He drove Episcopacy from her domain, when the harboring of Episcopacy might have been fatal; and he took a decisive part in the

at the next Court of Election, which will be in the beginning of May, that we may communicate to them what the King hath given us in command, and then to deal with them as well as we may." (Letter of Cartwright to Nicolls, February 4, 1665, in O'Callaghan, Documents, &c., III. 87.) Maverick made himself particularly offensive at this time. In the Massachusetts Archives (CVI. 139) is an affidavit of Captain James Oliver and Mary his wife, in which they report some of Maverick's violent language; for instance, that he "said we were both rebels and traitors for minting money

and printing;" and that “ we should know that they [the Commissioners] were the men we were to obey." (Comp. Mass. Archives, CVI. 125.)

1 "15th of 1st, '64-5. Our honored Governor, Mr. John Endicott, departed this life;- -a man of pious and zealous spirit, who had very faithfully endeavored the suppression of a pestilent generation, the troublers of our peace, civil and ecclesiastical, called Quakers. He died poor, as most of our rulers do, having more attended the public than their own private interests." (Hull, Diary, in Archæol. Amer., III. 215.)

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