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October 13, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

250 years Ago … Early Colonists Were Loyal to the King (1620 – 1775)

In the 1500s England broke away from the Roman Catholic Church and created a new church called the Church of England (sometimes referred to as the Anglican Church).

Although the new church had been founded by Henry VIII of England (r. 1509-1547 CE) during the Protestant Reformation in opposition to the Catholic Church, it still retained many aspects of Catholicism which some Protestants, derisively known by Anglicans as “Puritans” because they wished to purify the Church, objected to. (Joshua Mark, 2021)

King James I, the same who commissioned the famous King James Translation of the Bible, was the head of the Anglican Church, interpreted this criticism as treason, and authorized officials to fine, arrest, imprison and even execute dissenters. (Joshua Mark, 2021) Everyone in England had to belong to the Anglican Church. There was a group of people called Separatists that wanted to separate from that church.

The Early Colonists Wanted to Remain English, Even Though They Were Persecuted and Arrested

In 1607 CE, the Anglican Church became aware of the Scrooby congregation and arrested some, placing others under surveillance, and fining those they could. The congregation, under the leadership of John Robinson (l. 1576-1628 CE) sold their belongings and relocated to Leiden, the Netherlands, where the government practiced a policy of religious tolerance.

Between 1607-1618 CE, the congregation lived freely in Leiden. Bradford and Edward Winslow both wrote glowingly of their experience. In Leiden, God had allowed them, in Bradford’s estimation, “to come as near the primitive pattern of the first churches as any other church of these later times.” God had blessed them with “much peace and liberty,” Winslow echoed. (Joshua Mark, 2021)

However, after several years of living the Netherlands they cherished the freedom of conscience they enjoyed in Leiden, but the Pilgrims had two major complaints:

they found it a hard place to maintain their English identity (their children wanted to speak Dutch instead of English and they missed other things about English life) and
it was an even harder place to make a living.

In America, they hoped to live by themselves, enjoy the same degree of religious liberty and earn a “better and easier” living. (Robert Tracy McKenzie)

The Colonists were British Until the Declaration of Independence and Subsequent Revolutionary War

While the Mayflower Compact (signed in 1620) established a government for the Plymouth Colony, they still considered themselves loyal subjects of King James I and made that very clear in the text.

The first words of the Mayflower Compact confirm the Pilgrims’ loyalty to the king:

In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.

They concluded the Mayflower Compact with:

In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.

The rest of the Mayflower Compact bound the signers into a “Civil Body Politic” for the purpose of passing “just and equal Laws … for the general good of the Colony.”

In the 1600s and 1700s, Europeans came to North America looking for religious freedom, economic opportunities, and political liberty.

They created 13 colonies on the East Coast of the continent. Each colony had its own government, but the British king controlled these governments.

They believed that Great Britain did not treat the colonists as equal citizens. (US Citizenship and Immigration Services)

Colonists Were Loyal to the King During the First Continental Congress (1774)

At the end of the First Continental Congress, the delegates adopted a Petition addressed to “The King’s Most Excellent Majesty” on October 26, 1774. In part, it states,

WE your majesty’s faithful subjects of the colonies of New-Hampshire, Massachusetts-Bay, Rhode-Island and Providence plantations, Connecticut, New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, the counties of Newcastle, Kent and Sussex on Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North-Carolina, and South-Carolina,

in behalf of ourselves and the inhabitants of those colonies, who have deputed us to represent them in general congress, by this our humble petition, beg leave to lay our grievances before the throne. …

Permit us then, most gracious sovereign, in the name of all your faithful people in America, with the utmost humility to implore you, for the honour of Almighty God, whose pure religion our enemies are undermining ; for your glory, which can be advanced only by rendering your subjects happy, and keeping them united ;

for the interest of your family depending on an adherance to the principles that enthroned it ; for the safety and welfare of your kingdoms and dominions threatened with almost unavoidable dangers and distresses :

That your Majesty, as the loving father of your whole people, connected by the same bands of law, loyalty, faith and blood, though dwelling in various countries, will not suffer the transcendent relation formed by these ties, to be farther violated, in uncertain expectation of effects, that if attained, never can compensate for the calamities through which they must be gained.

We therefore most earnestly beseech your majesty, that your royal authority and interposition may be used for our relief, and that a gracious answer may be given to this petition.

That your majesty may enjoy every felicity, through a long and glorious reign, over loyal and happy subjects, and that your descendants may inherit your prosperity and dominions, till time shall be no more, is, and always will be, our sincere and fervent prayer.

A contingent was sent to England to present and discuss the Petition with the King. It was presented to the House of Commons by Lord North on January 19, 1775, as No. 149 of a set of papers, and to the House of Lords the next day. (Wolf) Franklin reported back that,

It came down among a great Heap of letters of Intelligence from Governors and officers in America, Newspapers, Pamphlets, Handbills, etc., from that Country, the last in the List, and was laid upon the Table with them, undistinguished by any particular Recommendation of it to the Notice of either House; and I do not find, that it has had any further notice taken of it as yet, than that it has been read as well as the other Papers.

No answer was ever made to the first attempt of Congress to appeal to the King. (Wolf)

Colonists Were Loyal to the King During the Second Continental Congress (1775)

Unwilling to completely abandon their hope for peace, the Olive Branch Petition was adopted by Second Continental Congress on July 5, 1775 to be sent to the King as a last attempt to prevent formal war from being declared. The Petition emphasized their loyalty to the British crown and emphasized their rights as British citizens.

We, your Majesty’s faithful subjects of the colonies of new Hampshire, Massachusetts bay, Rhode island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, on Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, in behalf of ourselves, and the inhabitants of these colonies, who have deputed us to represent them in general Congress, entreat your Majesty’s gracious attention to this our humble petition.

The union between our Mother country and these colonies, and the energy of mild and just government, produced benefits so remarkably important, and afforded such an assurance of their permanency and increase, that the wonder and envy of other Nations were excited, while they beheld Great Britain riseing to a power the most extraordinary the world had ever known. …

We, therefore, beseech your Majesty, that your royal authority and influence may be graciously interposed to procure us relief from our afflicting fears and jealousies, occasioned by the system before mentioned, and to settle peace through every part of your dominions …

That your Majesty may enjoy a long and prosperous reign, and that your descendants may govern your dominions with honor to them selves and happiness to their subjects, is our sincere and fervent prayer.

War and a Push for New Governance and Citizenship

By the time Congress met again, war was already underway, and thus the delegates to the Second Continental Congress formed the Continental Army and dispatched George Washington to Massachusetts as its commander.

Over one-hundred and fifty years after the Pilgrims landed and signed the Mayflower Compact in the New World, the subsequent colonists stated in 1776,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another …

… and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. …

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.

They concluded their Declaration stating,

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare,

That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States

that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The Declaration of Independence (1776) was designed for multiple audiences: the King, the colonists, and the world. It was also designed to multitask. Its goals were to rally the troops, win foreign allies and to announce the creation of a new country.

By issuing the Declaration of Independence, adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, the 13 American colonies severed their political connections to Great Britain. The Declaration summarized the colonists’ motivations for seeking independence.

By declaring themselves an independent nation, the American colonists were able to confirm an official alliance with the Government of France and obtain French assistance in the war against Great Britain. (National Archives)

However, King George III did not want to lose this valuable land, and so the colonies took to arms to defend their new country and rights in what is now known as the Revolutionary War.

Unfortunately, it took five long years of war before the British surrendered in October 19, 1781, and the United States of America could begin the business of becoming a nation. Later, when the colonists won independence, these colonies became the 13 original states.

Click the following link to a general summary about Early Colonists Were Loyal to the King (1620 – 1775):

Click to access Early-Colonists-Were-Loyal-to-the-King.pdf

January 12, 2023 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Growth of the Colonies

In the early 1600s, in rapid succession, the English began a colony (Jamestown) in Chesapeake Bay in 1607, the French built Quebec in 1608, and the Dutch began their interest in the region that became present-day New York.

Within another generation, the Plymouth Company (1620), the Massachusetts Bay Company (1629), the Company of New France (1627), and the Dutch West India Company (1621) began to send thousands of colonists, including families, to North America. Successful colonization was not inevitable. Rather, interest in North America was a halting, yet global, contest among European powers to exploit these lands. (LOC)

By 1650, however, England had established a dominant presence on the Atlantic coast. The first colony was founded at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607. Many of the people who settled in the New World came to escape religious persecution. The Pilgrims, founders of Plymouth, Massachusetts, arrived in 1620.

In both Virginia and Massachusetts, the colonists flourished with some assistance from Native Americans. New World grains such as corn kept the colonists from starving while, in Virginia, tobacco provided a valuable cash crop. By the early 1700s enslaved Africans made up a growing percentage of the colonial population.

Here is a list of the thirteen colonies (now states) with the year they were founded and some notes on their formation:

Virginia (1607) – John Smith and the London Company. This colony was named after Queen Elizabeth I, the “virgin queen” who married England instead of a husband. (West Virginia wasn’t a separate state until 1861.)

New Hampshire (1623) – The settlement of New Hampshire did not happen because those who came were persecuted out of England. It was named by John Mason after the county of Hampshire in England (home of Jane Austen and Charles Dickens).

Massachusetts (1630) – Puritans looking for religious freedom. It was named after an Algonquian tribe, the Massachusett, which translates to something along the lines of “people of the great hill” or “at the place of large hills,” referring to the famous Blue Hills southwest of Boston.

Maryland (1633) – George and Cecil Calvert as a safe haven for Catholics who were persecuted in England. Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, received a charter from Charles I of England and the colony was to be named after Charles’ wife, Queen Henrietta Mary (she went by Queen Mary).

Connecticut (1636) – The Dutch were the first Europeans to reach Connecticut in 1614. But there were already Native Americans in what would become the Nutmeg State. The name Connecticut is derived from the Algonquian word “quinnehtukqut” that means “beside the long tidal river.”

Rhode Island (1636) – Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano in the early 16th century referred to an island near the mouth of Narragansett Bay that he compared to the Island of Rhodes in the Mediterranean. Some suggest Dutch explorer Adrian Block named it “Roodt Eylandt” meaning “red island” in reference to the red clay that lined the shore.

Delaware (1638) – The New Sweden Company was chartered and, in 1638, established The Colony of New Sweden at Fort Christina, in what is today Wilmington, Delaware. British took over in 1664. The bay, river, colony and now state were named in 1610 by English explorer Samuel Argall (1580-1626) in honor of Virginia’s governor, Thomas West, Lord De La Warr.

North Carolina (1663) – Beginning in 1712, there were separate and distinct governments of the northeastern and southwestern parts of Carolina, and they were referred to as North and South Carolina. Each received separate royal colonies in 1729. Named after King Charles I. The Latin version of Charles is “Carolus,” from which “Carolina” is derived.

South Carolina (1663) – Beginning in 1712, there were separate and distinct governments of the northeastern and southwestern parts of Carolina, and they were referred to as North and South Carolina. Each received separate royal colonies in 1729. Named after King Charles I. The Latin version of Charles is “Carolus,” from which “Carolina” is derived.

New York (1664) – Originally founded by the Dutch (1614), it became a British colony in 1664. It was originally called New Netherland when the Dutch founded it — when the British took over in 1664 it received its present name that honors King Charles II’s brother, the Duke of York and Albany. (The word York comes from the Latin word for city.)

New Jersey (1664) – The Dutch, Swedes, and Finns were the first European settlers in New Jersey. First settled by the Dutch, the English took over in 1664. In 1664 the Dutch lost New Netherlands when the British took control of the land and added it to their colonies. It was named for the island of Jersey in the English Channel in honor of Sir George Carteret. (Carteret had been governor of the Isle of Jersey.)

Pennsylvania (1681) – The Swedes and Dutch were the first European settlers. In May of 1680, William Penn petitioned King Charles II for land in the New World. Penn wished to call the land “New Wales,” or simply “Sylvania,” Latin for “woods.” King Charles II insisted that “Penn” precede the word “Sylvania”, in honor of William’s late father to create “Pennsylvania”, or “Penn’s Woods.”

Georgia (1732) – In the 1730s, England founded the last of its colonies in North America. The four-fold purpose in founding Georgia were to provide relief of the poor; to build a buffer colony against the Spaniards in Florida and the French in Louisiana; to promote trade of Great Britain; and to provide refuge for persecuted Protestants (and carry Christianity to the ‘Indians’). Georgia is named for King George II. King George granted the charter in 1732, stipulating that the territory bear his name. (The -ia suffix means ‘state of’ and comes from the Greek language.)

Growth in the Colonies

It took from 1607 to 1630 to reach a combined estimated population of 4,646 in six colonies: Maine, New Hampshire, Plymouth, Massachusetts, New York, and Virginia.

By 1640, new settlements had been placed or developed in Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Maryland, bringing the colonial population to 26,634. It nearly doubled to 50,358 by mid-century, with one new colony established in Delaware.

During the next three decades, the colonies of Carolina, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania were established. Maine joined with Massachusetts. Total estimated population of the colonies reached 151,507 in 1680. Of these, Negroes numbered 6,971, of which some 3,000 were in Virginia. (The word “Negro” is used in the Census Bureau’s statistical tables.)

In the last two decades of the century, no new colonies were established. Plymouth merged with Massachusetts in 1691. The population of the colonies grew to 250,888 in 1700, of which Negroes numbered 16,729 (11.2 percent), as slavery provided labor for tobacco and other plantations.

The first American century consisted of coastal, sparsely populated settlements. For purposes of comparison with the mother country, the population of England in 1607 has been estimated at 4,303,043, rising modestly to 5,026,877 in 1700. During the 1600s, England encouraged migration to the colonies to help ward off French ambitions in the new world.

After an initial period of high mortality, the colonists soon acclimated to their new circumstances. Better economic conditions and the absence of wars and violent religious disputes attracted thousands of European migrants, freemen and indentured servants alike. The colonists enjoyed greater abundance and variety in their diets.

Low densities and dispersed settlements minimized the spread of communicable diseases and epidemics. Abundant forests provided heating fuel. Infant mortality rates quickly fell below those in Europe. A typical colonial family had eight children, double that of England and Europe. By 1700, colonial women routinely lived into their sixties despite risks of death in childbirth.

By the mid-1600s, the colonies were fast becoming lands of opportunity.

About three-quarters of the colonists were farmers. A typical farm often exceeded 100 acres. Farmers produced surpluses of grain that rivaled the output of tobacco. A colonial adult farmer consumed 150-200 pounds of meat a year; most corn was fed to livestock. Farm families supplemented agricultural work with handicraft production.

Most farmers owned their land. To encourage immigration, colonists often received free or almost free land. Land was readily available at low prices, and new land was accessible on the frontier. Many tenants acquired their own land after a short period of tenancy, a change in status that was virtually impossible in Europe.

In 1700, there were about 250,000 European settlers and enslaved Africans in North America’s English colonies.

By 1750, some 80 per cent of the North American continent was controlled or influenced by France or Spain. Their presence was a source of tension and paranoia among those in the 13 British colonies, who feared encirclement, invasion and the influence of Catholicism.

There was a huge increase in population in America during the 1700s

In 1700 there were 300,000 people in America; 20,000 blacks
By 1775 there were 2.5 million people in America; 500,000 were black
400,000 were new immigrants; an additional 400,000 were black slaves
The rest was due to the natural fertility of Americans; colonists doubled their numbers every 25 years

Click the following link to a general summary about Growth of the Colonies:

Click to access Growth-of-the-Colonies.pdf

May 9, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Thirteen Colonies

After numerous conquests by the Spanish and French, in 1578 Humphrey Gilbert, the author of a treatise on the search for the Northwest Passage, received a patent from Queen Elizabeth to colonize the “heathen and barbarous landes” in the New World which other European nations had not yet claimed. It would be five years before his efforts could begin. When he was lost at sea, his half-brother, Walter Raleigh, took up the mission.

In 1585 Raleigh established the first British colony in North America with a group of colonists (91 men, 17 women and nine children) on Roanoke Island off the coast of North Carolina. The first act was to restore to their friends the two Indians who had been previously taken to England.

The colony was later abandoned. Sir Walter Raleigh fitted out another colony, which sailed in the spring of 1587; the second effort also proved a failure. Mysteriously, by 1590 the Roanoke colony had vanished entirely. Historians still do not know what became of its inhabitants.

The failure that attended all these efforts of the hopeful and energetic Raleigh was probably due, if not wholly, to the fact that he did not himself accompany and command any of his expeditions. And, the main reason that he did not go with the ships was, that he was a great favorite with Queen Elizabeth, and she was not willing to let him risk himself in such adventures. (Johnson)

British First Success at Jamestown

It would be 20 years before the British would try again. This time – at Jamestown in 1607 – the colony would succeed, and North America would enter a new era. (Alonzo L Hamby)

The early 1600s saw the beginning of a great tide of emigration from Europe to North America. Spanning more than three centuries, this movement grew from a trickle of a few hundred English colonists to a flood of millions of newcomers. Impelled by powerful and diverse motivations, they built a new civilization on the northern part of the continent.

Most European emigrants left their homelands to escape political oppression, to seek the freedom to practice their religion, or for adventure and opportunities denied them at home.

In 1606, King James I divided the Atlantic seaboard in two, giving the southern half to the London Company (later the Virginia Company) and the northern half to the Plymouth Company.

Just a few months after James I issued its charter, the London Company sent 144 men to Virginia on three ships: the Godspeed, the Discovery and the Susan Constant. They reached the Chesapeake Bay in the spring of 1607 and headed about 60 miles up the James River, where they built a settlement they called Jamestown.

Then, the first English emigrants to what would become the New England colonies were a small group of religious separatists, later called the Pilgrims, who arrived in Plymouth in 1620 on the Mayflower to found Plymouth Colony.

Ten years later, a wealthy syndicate known as the Massachusetts Bay Company sent a much larger (and more liberal) group of Puritans to establish another Massachusetts settlement. With the help of local natives, the colonists soon got the hang of farming, fishing and hunting, and Massachusetts prospered. As the Massachusetts settlements expanded, they generated new colonies in New England.

Between 1620 and 1635, economic difficulties swept England. Many people could not find work. Even skilled artisans could earn little more than a bare living. Poor crop yields added to the distress. In addition, the Industrial Revolution had created a burgeoning textile industry, which demanded an ever-increasing supply of wool to keep the looms running. Landlords enclosed farmlands and evicted the peasants in favor of sheep cultivation. Colonial expansion became an outlet for this displaced peasant population.

Later, more came and expansion was occurring across the Eastern Seaboard.

In 1700, there were about 250,000 European settlers and enslaved Africans in North America’s English colonies. By 1775, on the eve of revolution, there were an estimated 2.5 million. The colonists did not have much in common, but they were able to band together and fight for their independence.

The American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) was sparked after American colonists chafed over issues like taxation without representation, embodied by laws like The Stamp Act and The Townshend Acts. Mounting tensions came to a head during the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, when the “shot heard round the world” was fired.

It was not without warning; the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770 and the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773 showed the colonists’ increasing dissatisfaction with British rule in the colonies.

The Declaration of Independence, issued on July 4, 1776, enumerated the reasons the Founding Fathers felt compelled to break from the rule of King George III and parliament to start a new nation. In September of that year, the Continental Congress declared the “United Colonies” of America to be the “United States of America.”

France joined the war on the side of the colonists in 1778, helping the Continental Army conquer the British at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781. The Treaty of Paris ending the American Revolution and granting the 13 original colonies independence was signed on September 3, 1783. (History-com)

Here is a list of the thirteen colonies (now states) with the year they were founded: Virginia (1607); New Hampshire (1623); Massachusetts (1630); Maryland (1633); Connecticut (1636); Rhode Island (1636); Delaware (1638); North Carolina (1663); South Carolina (1663); New York (1664); New Jersey (1664); Pennsylvania (1681) and Georgia (1732).

Vermont, which was not one of the 13 colonies, is named because, after seeing the Green Mountains, French explorer Samuel de Champlain referred to it as “Verd Mont” (green mountains) on a map in his native French.

Click the following link to a general summary about the Thirteen Colonies:

https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Thirteen-Colonies.pdf

January 24, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

American Postal Service

Benjamin Franklin and others in his era get lots of credit for the development of the American Postal Service; but, the early colonists should also be credited for the initial framework and early infrastructure for the system.

Early on, American colonists did not view an intercolonial mail system as a pressing need. The sparsely populated settlements along the Atlantic Coast corresponded more with England than with each other, and the few overland trails that existed did not encourage travel between the colonies. (Schurr)

That changed when England’s King Charles II wished his “American subjects to enter into a close correspondency with each other.” (Schurr)

A letter written in 1652, by Samuel Symonds of Ipswich, to John Winthrop, Jr., at Pequot, says: “I cannot say but its besides my intentions that I write not more frequently unto you; I can onely plead this for my excuse (soe farr as it will goe) … and the uncertainty when and how to convey letters.” (Woolley)

Until 1639 there is no trace of a postal system, but under the Massachusetts General Court Records, of that year (Nov. 5th), is the following entry:

“For preventing the miscarriage of letters, … It is ordered that notice bee given, that Richard Fairbanks, his house in Boston, is the place appointed for all letters, which are brought from beyond the Seas, or are to be sent thither;”

“ … are to be brought unto him and he is to take care, that they bee delivered, or sent according to their directions and hee is alowed for every such letter 1d. and must answer all miscarriages through his owne neglect in this kind; provided that no man shall bee compelled to bring his letters thither except hee please.” (Woolley)

The Routing of the Boston Post Road – “Ouer land to Connectecott”

In the earliest days of the New England colonies, towns were surrounded by wilderness. The only roads emanated from the meetinghouse. To the extent the towns were connected, they were connected by Indian trails – a foot-and-a-half wide in some places, across surging rivers in others. (New England Historical Society)

It became apparent that a road was desperately needed between New York and Boston.

Francis Lovelace, is credited with developing what would later be called the Boston Post Road – that led to the first formal postal service. Francis was appointed Royal Governor of New York by the Duke of York. (Chris Stevenson)

Each November Native Americans would “pave” the paths by a process the Dutch termed “bush-burning.” Setting fire to bramble, twigs, and underbrush ensured the paths would not be unpassable.

In choosing his route, he relied on Indian trails: the so-called Connecticut Path running west from Boston and the Bay Path heading into Springfield.

The Colony also grew along these lines: Watertown residents followed the Connecticut Path to establish Sudbury (now Wayland), and Worcester emerged from a request for a town “in the roade way to Springfeild.”

Three decades after his trip, when Winthrop Jr. was governor of Connecticut, he was asked to chart the Colonial mail route between Boston and Manhattan. He used those Indian paths as his blueprint for what would become the Post Road. (The King’s Best Highway, Eric Jaffe)

There are actually three Boston Post Roads, all of which merge in New Haven.

The Upper Road, or the Old Boston Post Road, runs from Boston through Worcester, Springfield and Hartford.

The Lower Road heads south from Boston through Dedham and Providence, then runs along the coast of the Long Island Sound.

The Middle Road, less used than the others, leaves Boston through Dedham, Medway, Uxbridge, Douglas, Pomfret and Coventry to Hartford, then to New Haven through Wethersfield, Berlin, Meriden, Wallingford and North Haven.

Much of the Post Road is now U.S. Route 1, U.S. Route 5, and U.S. Route 20. (New England Historical Society)

First Formal Mail Delivery System

Then, Winthrop’s son, John Winthrop the Younger (then Governor of Connecticut), and Francis Lovelace, Governor of New York formalized the first intercolonial postal system.

In December of 1672, they initiated a monthly post between New York and Boston, which Lovelace describes in a December 27, 1672 letter to Winthrop Jr,

“I herewith present you with 2 rarities, a pacquett of the latest intelligence I could meet withal, and a post … by the latter you will meet with a monthly fresh supply;”

“so that if it receive but the same ardent inclinations as first it hath from myself, by our monthly advisers all publique occurences may be transmitted between us, together with severall other great conveniencys of publique importance, consonant to the commands laid upon us by his sacred majestie, who strictly enjoins all his American subjects to enter into a close correspondency with each other …”

“this person that has undertaken the employment I conceaved most proper, being voted active, stout and indefatigable…. I have affixt an annuall sallery on him, which, together with the advantage of his letters and other small portable packes, may afford him a handsome livelyhood….”

“The maile has divers baggs, according to the towns the letters are designed to, which are all sealed up ’till their arrivement, with the seal of the secretarie’s office, whose care it is on Saturday night to seale them up.”

“Only by-letters are in an open bag, to dispense by the wayes….”

“I shall only beg of you your furtherance to so universall a good work; that is, to afford him directions where, and to whom to make his application to upon his arrival at Boston; as likewise to afford him what letters you can to establish him in that employment there.”

“It would be much advantageous to our designe, if in the intervall you discoursed with some of the most able woodmen, to make out the best and most facile way for a post, which in processe of tyme would be the king’s best highway; as likewise passages and accommodation at rivers, fords, or other necessary places.” (Woolley)

The First Mail Deliveries

The first postal run took approximately two to three weeks, as the rider – traveling 250 miles altogether along mostly desolate trails in the wilderness – made mail deliveries in such communities as New Haven, Hartford, Brookfield, Worcester, and Cambridge before finally reaching Boston. He and subsequent postal riders used axes to mark-up trees enroute to help guide others likewise delivering mail

The Boston Post Road was pivotal in more closely linking what had generally been isolated settlements in the northeastern region of the British colonies and paving the way for similar routes elsewhere along the eastern seaboard.

In the longer term, the segments that constituted the Boston Post Road evolved into several of the first major highways in the United States. (TransportationHistory-org)

Governor Lovelace found his “stout fellow, active and indefatigable” in Mathias Nicolls, whose departure from New York City on January 22, 1673 marked the first official post ride. Nicolls departed from the southern tip of Manhattan with explicit orders to stop at the home of John Winthrop Jr in Hartford en route to Boston for further instruction and to switch horses. (Jaffee and HistoryBandits)

Along the way, the post rider would mark trees to aid others using the path for their own travels. He would also scout good locations for inns and taverns along the way. Nicolls stored letters marked “post-paid” in separate saddlebags organized by destination.

At each stop, he would find the ideal place to deliver the mail while also informing locals of his estimated time of return. Nicolls arrived in Boston on February 11, 1673 before returning south to complete the second half of his journey. (HistoryBandits)

On the first Monday of every month, the postrider was to leave New York and return from Boston within the month.

The first mail was to leave New York on January 1, 1673. Lovelace waited, though, to send Winthrop the latest rumors about a convoy of Dutch warships. The postrider left on January 22, 1673. (New England Historical Society)

Boston Postal Road Mileage Markers

The New England Historical Society clarified that it is a myth that Benjamin Franklin either set out or ordered the Boston Post Road milestones.

Franklin is said to have measured the road himself with an odometer strapped onto his carriage wheel. One of Franklin’s granite milestones still survives on East Main Street – 33 miles from Boston.

The Historical Society says, “It never happened.”

In 1971, Leonard Labaree, editor of the Benjamin Franklin papers at Yale, set the record straight. Labaree wrote that after detailed study of the Franklin papers,

“Not one document in this very substantial mass of contemporary documents has been found to contain so much as a single reference to roadside milestones, erected by Franklin or by any other persons.”

Further, he wrote, Post Office officials had neither responsibility nor budget for building and maintaining roads, bridges, ferries and milestones. The editors of the Franklin papers concluded,

“Milestones were of no particular use to the postal service, for the postriders were thoroughly familiar with the roads they traveled.”

“The convenience of other travelers, on the other hand, was not the Post Office’s responsibility or concern. There seems to have been no good reason why Franklin should have spent time, energy, or Post Office money in erecting milestones, and…there is no documentary evidence that he ever did.”

It is not clear who put them there and when they did it. But many of them along the route continue to incorrectly reference Franklin.

Postal Service “Motto”

Oh, one more thing … the reputed Postal Service ‘Motto’ …

“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”

Again, it is not so. The U.S. Postal Service has no official motto. (USPS)

Those words are engraved on the front of the James A. Farley Post Office in NYC, set in stone by the architectural firm that built it.

William Mitchell Kendall was one of the architects. Kendall, who frequently read classic Greek literature for pleasure. He selected a passage (translated by Professor George Herbert Palmer of Harvard University) from book 8, paragraph 98, of The Persian Wars by the ancient Greek historian Herodotus (c 484–c 425 BCE). The Post Office Department agreed that Kendall’s slight modification of the original translation was suitable for the building, and approved it.

During the wars between the Greeks and Persians (500-449 B.C.), the Persians operated a system of mounted postal couriers who served with great fidelity. Herodotus wrote (of the Persians),

“While Xerxes did thus, he sent a messenger to Persia with news of his present misfortune.”

“Now there is nothing mortal that accomplishes a course more swiftly than do these messengers, by the Persians’ skillful contrivance. It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey.”

“These are stopped neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed. “

“The first rider delivers his charge to the second, the second to the third, and thence it passes on from hand to hand, even as in the Greek torch-bearers’ race in honor of Hephaestus. This riding-post is called in Persia, angareion.” (Herodotus)

January 17, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Pilgrims Were English and Loyal to the King

In the 1500s England broke away from the Roman Catholic Church and created a new church called the Church of England (sometimes referred to as the Anglican Church).

Pilgrims Wanted to Remain English, Even Though They Were Persecuted and Arrested

However, after several years of living the Netherlands they cherished the freedom of conscience they enjoyed in Leiden, but the Pilgrims had two major complaints:

they found it a hard place to maintain their English identity (their children wanted to speak Dutch instead of English and they missed other things about English life) and
it was an even harder place to make a living.

In America, they hoped to live by themselves, enjoy the same degree of religious liberty and earn a “better and easier” living. (Robert Tracy McKenzie)

Their leaders, William Bradford, Reverend John Robinson and several others worked out a plan to move the entire Pilgrim church group to America. That way they could still be English. (NPS, Cape Cod National Seashore)

The Leiden congregation were looking into some means of creating their own colony in Virginia when, in 1618 CE, one of their leading members, William Brewster (l. 1568-1644 CE), published a tract criticizing the Anglican Church and orders were given by the English officials for his arrest.

Brewster was hidden by his friends, but the congregation stepped up their efforts to relocate and contracted with Thomas Weston (l. 1584 – c. 1647 CE), who was a merchant adventurer who matched potential colonists with investors.

After deciding to leave, they settled on the New World as their destination due to its remoteness. Bradford went to the Virginia Company and asked them for permission to establish a new colony in Virginia.

Seeking the right to worship as they wished, the Pilgrims had signed a contract with the Virginia Company to settle on land near the Hudson River, which was then part of northern Virginia. The Virginia Company was a trading company chartered by King James I with the goal of colonizing parts of the eastern coast of the New World. London stockholders financed the Pilgrim’s voyage with the understanding they would be repaid in profits from the new settlement.

The Colonists were British Until the Declaration of Independence and Subsequent Revolutionary War

While the Mayflower Compact (signed in 1620) established a government for the Plymouth Colony, they still considered themselves loyal subjects of King James I and made that very clear in the text.

The first words of the Mayflower Compact confirm the Pilgrims’ loyalty to the king: “In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.”

They concluded the Mayflower Compact with: “In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.”

The Mayflower Compact stated principles of a self-governed body not completely separate from England. The colonists had no intention of declaring (and did not declare) their independence from England when they signed the Mayflower Compact.

As noted in the opening line of the Compact, both Pilgrims and “Strangers” refer to themselves as “loyal subjects” of King James, regardless his actions to persecute and exile the Pilgrims. They also identify him as their king not by virtue of their consent, but “by the grace of God.” This puts the Mayflower Compact closer to an affirmation of the divine right of kings than the right of self-rule.

The rest of the Mayflower Compact bound the signers into a “Civil Body Politic” for the purpose of passing “just and equal Laws … for the general good of the Colony.”

In the 1600s and 1700s, Europeans came to North America looking for religious freedom, economic opportunities, and political liberty.

They created 13 colonies on the East Coast of the continent. Each colony had its own government, but the British king controlled these governments.

They believed that Great Britain did not treat the colonists as equal citizens. (US Citizenship and Immigration Services)

Over 150-years Later, There Was a Push for New Governance and Citizenship

Over one-hundred and fifty years after the Pilgrims landed and signed the Mayflower Compact in the New World, the subsequent colonists stated in 1776,

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another …”

“… and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,”

“That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

“Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.”

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

“Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.”

“The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.”

They concluded their Declaration stating,

“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States”

“that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.”

“And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”

The introductory sentence states the Declaration’s main purpose, to explain the colonists’ right to revolution. In other words, “to declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” Congress had to prove the legitimacy of its cause. It had just defied the most powerful nation on Earth. It needed to motivate foreign allies to join the fight.

The most important and dramatic statement comes near the end: “That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States.” It declares a complete break with Britain and its King and claims the powers of an independent country. (National Archives)

However, King George III did not want to lose this valuable land, and so the colonies took to arms to defend their new country and rights in what is now known as the Revolutionary War.

Click the following link to a general summary about Pilgrims Were English and Loyal to the King:

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