But we must know something of a people to whom such doctrines were
preached--of a people capable of receiving and applying such truths. It
is said that three kingdoms were sifted to furnish the men who settled
New England, and it may also be said that the Massachusetts Colony was
sifted to supply the Connecticut settlers. Three of the eight
Massachusetts towns, Dorchester, Watertown, and Newtown (now Cambridge),
were not in full agreement with the other five, especially on the
fundamental feature of the Massachusetts polity, the limitation of
office-holding and the voting privilege to church-members. At first the
majority were unwilling to grant the minority “liberty to remove.” John
Haynes was made Governor of Massachusetts in 1635, probably with the
hope of retaining his friends in the Colony. But their desire to leave
was too strong; small parties of emigrants made their way to the banks
of the Connecticut during the year 1635, but the main body of the
colonists did not leave until the spring of 1636. Dr. Benjamin Trumbull,
the first historian of Connecticut, writing more than one hundred years
ago, says:
“About the beginning of June Mr. Hooker, Mr. Stone, and about a
hundred men, women, and children took their departure from
Cambridge, and travelled more than a hundred miles thro’ a hideous
and trackless wilderness to Hartford. They had no guide but their
compass; made their way over mountains, thro’ swamps, thickets, and
rivers, which were not passable but with great difficulty. They had
no cover but the heavens, nor any lodgings but those which simple
nature afforded them. They drove with them a hundred and sixty head
of cattle, and by the way subsisted on the milk of their cows. Mrs.
Hooker was borne through the wilderness upon a litter. The people
generally carried their packs, arms, and some utensils. They were
nearly a fortnight on their journey.”
Trumbull adds: “This adventure was the more remarkable, as many of this
company were persons of figure, who had lived in England in honor,
affluence, and delicacy, and were entire strangers to fatigue and
danger.” When dismissing these colonists Massachusetts sent with them a
governing committee, or commissioners, as they were called. At a meeting
of these commissioners, held February 21, 1637, the plantation, which
had been called Newtown, was named Hartford. As Governor
[Illustration: OLD CENTER BURYING-GROUND.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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