New England
First encounter:
The area that we know as New England was still covered with ice at the time
southwestern Indians were learning to farm. As the ice receded in this part of the world,
the shore line became a marsh and some Indians began to move into this region. They
called this area Dawnland –a place where the sun rose- and they called themselves People
of the First Light. Most Indians in this region belonged to the Algonquin group.
Europeans had been visiting New England for at least a century. British fishing vessels
had reached Newfoundland in 1480. Indians had permitted foreigners to stop and trade
copper kettles, beads, hatchets, and knives for furs. The Indians living near the shore had
not permitted the inland Indians to trade with the foreigners so that they became the
economic middle-men. In 1501, the Portuguese had abducted 50 Indians from Maine. In
1614, Captain John Smith –a short redheaded privateer- had been whale hunting in the
area and mapping the coast line. (He named this region New England and gave many
other areas English names.) After Smith had left, his second in command, Hunt, had
captured an Indian by the name of Tisquantum (later Squanto) and 19 others and had
taken them to Europe. Tisquantum worked for several years in England and learned how
to speak the language and how to build ships; eventually he sailed home aboard an
English ship. He found his village gone. It seems that a French ship had stopped there in
1616 and the Indians had attacked it in retaliation for Hunt’s abductions and killed most
of the crew and burned the ship. The crew carried viral hepatitis which over the next
three years, killed 90 percent of the Indians along the shore but did not affect the inland
Narragansetts. The local sachem, Massasoit, was left with only about 1000 people.
Tisquantum entered Massasoit’s village where he was placed under “house arrest.”
In 1620, the “Pilgrims”, having been blown north of their original destination, landed in
this area. They found the land empty so they thought it represented the “Will of God” –
“Divine Providence.” They survived by robbing Indian graves and nearby Indian food
storage bins. Once again they called it the “Will of God.” Of the 102 that arrived that
winter, more than half died. Of the 102 passengers, 34 were children; one male child was
born in route –they called him Oceanus. Only 50 of the 102 passengers were “Puritans.”
Today about 1 in every 6 Americans has a relative who came over on the Mayflower –
famous descendants who became President are John Adams, John Quincy Adams,
Zachary Taylor, U.S. Grant, James Garfield. FDR, George H.W. Bush and George W.
Bush.
On March 22, 1621, after watching the Pilgrims all winter, Massasoit, Tisquantum, and
several others walked into Plymouth. Indian accounts tell of a people who were “short,
oddly dressed and often unbearably dirty; they had peculiar blue eyes that peeped out of
animal-like hair that encased their faces.” Pilgrim accounts say the Indians were tall and
well built; the men had shaved the front part of their hair from their foreheads and the rest
flowed down their backs and was often decorated; most men either had a three-inch wide
black stripe painted down the center of their faces or their entire face was covered with a
blue substance. (Insect repellant) Although both sides were distrustful, the Pilgrims
needed food from the Indians and the Indians needed an alliance with the Pilgrims against
the Narragansett. This alliance would secure the survival of the Pilgrims and eventually
seal the fate of the Indians.
After this brief encounter, Tisquantum decided to stay with the Pilgrims. He was a
valuable translator for both sides; however, he was an ambitious man. He first tried to get
some of the Indians to join with him –and the Pilgrims- in an attempt to get rid of
Massassoit. He told the Indians that the Pilgrims had buried some of the disease that had
killed so many Indians a few years before and that they would use it. Massassoit found
out and ordered Tisquantum killed. The Pilgrims protected him; however, a short time
later, while returning from a meeting, Tisquantum died. Most feel that he was poisoned.
The Indians’ and the Pilgrims’ peace lasted for 50 years; however, it was the sons of both
groups that would throw New England into war for nearly thirty years.
The real “Thanksgiving” occurred in the fall after the first meeting. Armed Indians and
armed Pilgrims sat down to eat local fare after firing off their weapons in a display of
bravado.
Societal organization:
Pilgrims are Separatists who arrived on the Mayflower in 1620 -10 years before the
Puritans. They came as families and before they had left the ship, they signed a document
of governance called the Mayflower Compact which became the first document of selfgovernment in America. They were under the leadership of William Bradford.
In 1630, Puritans –those who wished to purify the Church of England- arrived under the
leadership of John Winthrop. They came for economic and religious reasons.
Key Puritan beliefs and values:
 they were hard working, sober and responsible
 they believed that Catholicism had undermined the relationship between God and
the individual –the rituals and sacraments were administered by a powerful and
complicated hierarchy; the Church insisted on using Latin in their services; and
confession was only through a priest. Believed church hierarchy and ritual were
unnecessary.
 they believed in predestination –God chooses who is saved and who is damned.
No one can earn salvation through works; only through grace; doctrine of original
sin. Success and good works were possible signs of salvation but not its cause.
 the congregation of saints chooses its members, hires and fires its ministers, and
recognizes no other religious authority.
 worship should be plain, lack mystery, and be focused on God; no stained glass
windows, instrumental music or art; a yearning to approach God directly without
intermediaries.
 the Bible was to be read by everyone –in the 17th century, New England had a
literacy rate of over 70%.
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education was valued –each village with 50 or more residents had to provide for a
teacher; Harvard was founded in 1636 to train ministers.
they were intolerant –persecuted and expelled Anne Hutchinson because she held
religious meetings for women in her home where they discussed religious
doctrine; she criticized ministers for not preaching the covenant of grace; and
challenged the political and religious leadership of Massachusetts Bay; she and
her children were killed by Indians. Roger Williams also fell victim to intolerance
and was expelled for “new and dangerous opinions” –he preached complete
separation of church and state (no state should have any influence over a person’s
conscience); religious groups should be supported by voluntary tithes, not taxes;
Indians should be paid for their land; he established Rhode Island with complete
freedom of religion –Jews, Catholics and Quakers. Puritans expelled Baptists and
hung Quaker Mary Dyer because she preached “inner light” doctrines and
opposed religious authority.
Political life:
 freemen (adult male heads of households) ruled in church and town meetings;
believed in a social hierarchy
 they were a theocracy –Winthrop’s vision of a “City Upon a Hill.” Massachusetts
Bay was to be an example of how to purify the Anglican Church.
 they allowed a “Halfway Covenant” for unbaptized members to participate in
voting
 women were property of their husbands; matrimony was a contract rather than a
sacrament.
 men heads of households were responsible for the conduct of their family
members –one bad family could bring the wrath of God down on everyone
Economics:
 Originally, farmers lived in towns rather than on the land they farmed; common
pastures and woodlands could be used by any member of the community
 The rich had an obligation to assist the poor and that the poor had an obligation to
obey.
 Conflict arose between religious and profit motives; the original Puritan mission
was less important to second-generation Puritans as economic changes were
leading to declining church membership
Salem Witch Trials:
Origins: Exodus: Chapter XXII; Verse 18. God tells Moses: “Thou shall not suffer a
witch to live.” This biblical reference was often cited by witch-hunters.
Witchcraft was widespread in ancient times but was not always treated in the same way.
Persecutions within the Christian church took effect in December, 1484, when Pope
Innocent VIII issued a papal bull that made witchcraft heresy punishable by being burned
alive -in England and America most witches were hung. !00,000s of men and women
were put to death after being accused of witchcraft –mostly women.
Salem 1692:
Historian Mary Beth Norton contends that the dramatic events in Salem in 1692 can be
fully understood only by viewing them as intricately related to concurrent political and
military affairs in northern New England. The histories of King William’s War, King
Philip’s War and the Salem witchcraft crisis are intricately intertwined.
Early New Englanders envisioned themselves as residing in a “world of wonders” in
which the universe of invisible spirits surrounding them was as real as the ones they
could see, touch and feel. For them, visible and invisible realms coexisted and often
intersected. With very few exceptions, they believed in the existence of witches. When
they encountered harmful events that otherwise seemed inexplicable, New Englanders
often concluded that a malevolent witch had caused their troubles. And during the early
1690s, residents of the Bay Colony were experiencing many setbacks that needed
explanation.
Behind most events in the crisis lay gossip, which was the way news traveled from
person to person. Some interesting facts:
 There was an unusually high number of accusers and accused, and they came
from 22 different places –mostly Maine where the Indian wars had erupted.
 The key accusers were women and girls under the age of twenty-five who came
from lower ranks without power. They could have cared for others, but no one
would have cared for them.
 Unlike others, the key accusers were women who had never previously
encountered the people they said had been tormenting them.
 All defendants were convicted and executed.
In conclusion: The foundation of the witchcraft crisis lay in Puritan New Englanders’
singular worldview, one they had inherited from the first settlers of Massachusetts Bay
more than sixty years earlier. That worldview taught them that they were a chosen
people, charged with bringing God’s message to the heathen land previously ruled by the
devil. And in that adopted homeland God spoke to them repeatedly through his
providences –that is, through the small and large events of their daily lives. Remarkable
signs in the sky (comets, the aurora borealis), natural catastrophes (hurricanes, drought),
smallpox epidemics, the sudden deaths of children or spouses, unexpected good fortune:
all carried messages from God to his people, if only they could interpret the meanings
properly. New England’s Puritans, even in the third generation, believed themselves
surrounded by an invisible world of spirits as well as by a natural world of palpable
objects. Both worlds communicated God’s messages, because both operated under his
direction. Satan, whom they understood to be “the power of the air,” leader of the “evil
angels,” played a major role in the invisible world. Yet, because the devil was one of
God’s creatures even though he had revolted against divine authority, Puritans knew that
Satan could do no more than God allowed. To believe otherwise would be to deny God’s
omnipotence. Then in the last quarter of the seventeenth century, two successive,
devastating wars on the northeastern frontier together wreaked havoc with what had been
prosperous settlements along the coast northeast of Massachusetts. The continued and
unstoppable successes of the Indians and their French allies called into question New
Englanders’ ability to sustain the northern outposts that contributed to the prosperity of
their economy through the production of fish and timber. Many of the accusers were
children who lived in this war torn area and had fled to Salem Town. And because of
their social rank, no one would have paid them any attention –they came as mentally
tormented refugees. Could their “nightmares” coupled with the Puritan worldview and
gossips have created a climate in which the hysteria spread? It might be well to remember
that the leaders of these communities were men under whose leadership the towns had
fallen to the French and Indians. These trials would have shifted the responsibility of
their own inadequate defense of the frontier to the demons of the invisible world. People
would have accepted that. Then as quickly as the hysteria had gripped the town, it
disappeared leaving the innocent dead as sacrifices to superstition.
Pequot War:
 In 1633, the English Puritan settlements at Plimoth and Massachusetts Bay
colonies began to expand into the Connecticut River Valley to make room for
more immigrants from England. In their way stood the Pequots. This attempt at
expansion precipitated the first war between the regional Indians and the Puritan
settlers.
 Prior to this, in 1631, the Pequot divided into pro-English and pro-Dutch factions;
the pro-Dutch split and created a new group called the Mohegan. Then in 163334, a smallpox epidemic killed nearly half the Pequots –some 10,000. Couple this
with ongoing problems with other tribes; the Pequot became vulnerable to attack.
 Timeline:
 1630: Dutch kill Pequot sachem Tatobam
 1634: Captain John Stone killed by western Niantics.
 1634 –October 23: Pequots sent messengers bearing gifts and promises of
tribute to Roger Ludlow, deputy governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony.
 1634 –November 7: Second Pequot embassy. Pequot negotiators agreed to
hand over Stone’s murderers and to pay an indemnity of 250L sterling in
wampum and to cede Connecticut lands to the English. They agreed to
trade with the English and have disputes with the Narragansetts mediated
by the English. Then the Pequot council would not ratify the treaty.
 1636 -June: Mohegans tell the English that the Pequots plan to strike the
English.
 1636 –July: Indians attempt to come to consensus
 1636 –August: English settlers set out to confront Indians and burnt
Pequot houses and destroyed their crops.
 1636 –September: Pequots attack Fort Saybrook and put it under siege for
months.
 1637 –March: Narragansetts ally with the English
 1637 –April: Indians attack settlers in retaliation for land confiscation
 1637 –May: English attack Pequot fort at Mystic; set fire to fort; killed
600-700 Indians –men, women and children.
 1638 –September: Treaty of Hartford: Survivors divided as slaves among
other Indians
 Results:
 The balance of power shifted overnight from the Indians to the English.
 Until King Philip’s War no Indian tribes were able to confront the English.
 The annihilation of Indians would become the governments official Indian
policy until after the Civil War.
King Philip’s War:
In 1657, Governor William Bradford died and Massasoit, leader of the Wampanoag died
–the uneasy peace that had been in place died too. Wamsutta, son of Massasoit, succeed
him and died after being questioned by a Plymouth Court. Metacom (Philip), his brother
succeeded him. Amid continued conflict, Metacom organized Indian groups against the
English; many Indians who had converted to Christianity fought with the British. This
war was one of the bloodiest and most costly in history. In the end, “King Philip” was
killed and his body dismembered.
Results:
 Indians who fought with Metacom were sold into slavery.
 King James II revoked the colonial charters in the region and formed the United
Colonies of New England. The old Plymouth Colony was divided into counties.
In 1695, the English government under King William and Queen Mary wrote new
charters for the New England colonies but Plymouth was not given a new charter.
It was combined with Massachusetts Bay Colony and would eventually become
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. (Plymouth colony lasted only 72 years)
 This was the last major Indian war in New England.
Puritan contributions:
 Self-government and community responsibility:
 democracy in church rule led to democracy in town meetings
 all community members responsible for general conduct of citizens
 Education critical for individual and community success
 Hard work and thrift was demanded of all
 high standards of moral excellence and conscience
 the family is the central element of the community
Recommended Viewing:
 Three Sovereigns for Sarah –PBS
 Massacre at Mystic –History Channel (10 Days That Unexpectedly Changed
America)