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Fundamental
Orders of 1639
For as much as it hath pleased Almighty God by the wise
disposition of his divine providence so to order and dispose of things
that we the Inhabitants and Residents of Windsor, Hartford and
Wethersfield are now cohabiting and dwelling in and upon the River of
Connectecotte and the lands thereunto adjoining; and well knowing where
a people are gathered together the word of God requires that to
maintain the peace and union of such a people there should be an
orderly and decent Government established according to God, to order
and dispose of the affairs of the people at all seasons as occasion
shall require; do therefore associate and conjoin ourselves to be as
one Public State or Commonwealth; and do for ourselves and our
successors and such as shall be adjoined to us at any time hereafter,
enter into Combination and Confederation together, to maintain and
preserve the liberty and purity of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus which
we now profess, as also, the discipline of the Churches, which
according to the truth of the said Gospel is now practiced amongst us;
as also in our civil affairs to be guided and governed according to
such Laws, Rules, Orders and Decrees as shall be made, ordered, and
decreed as followeth:
1. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that there
shall be yearly two General Assemblies or Courts, the one the second
Thursday in April, the other the second Thursday in September
following; the first shall be called the Court of Election, wherein
shall be yearly chosen from time to time, so many Magistrates and other
public Officers as shall be found requisite: Whereof one to be chosen
Governor for the year ensuing and until another be chosen, and no other
Magistrate to be chosen for more than one year: provided always there
be six chosen besides the Governor, which being chosen and sworn
according to an Oath recorded for that purpose, shall have the power to
administer justice according to the Laws here established, and for want
thereof, according to the Rule of the Word of God; which choice shall
be made by all that are admitted freemen and have taken the Oath of
Fidelity, and do cohabit within this Jurisdiction having been admitted
Inhabitants by the major part of the Town wherein they live or the
major part of such as shall be then present.
2. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that the
election of the aforesaid Magistrates shall be in this manner: every
person present and qualified for choice shall bring in (to the person
deputed to receive them) one single paper with the name of him written
in it whom he desires to have Governor, and that he that hath the
greatest number of papers shall be Governor for that year. And the rest
of the Magistrates or public officers to be chosen in this manner: the
Secretary for the time being shall first read the names of all that are
to be put to choice and then shall severally nominate them distinctly,
and every one that would have the person nominated to be chosen shall
bring in one single paper written upon, and he that would not have him
chosen shall bring in a blank; and every one that hath more written
papers than blanks shall be a Magistrate for that year; which papers
shall be received and told by one or more that shall be then chosen by
the court and sworn to be faithful therein; but in case there should
not be six chosen as aforesaid, besides the Governor, out of those
which are nominated, than he or they which have the most written papers
shall be a Magistrate or Magistrates for the ensuing year, to make up
the aforesaid number.
3. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that the
Secretary shall not nominate any person, nor shall any person be chosen
newly into the Magistracy which was not propounded in some General
Court before, to be nominated the next election; and to that end it
shall be lawful for each of the Towns aforesaid by their deputies to
nominate any two whom they conceive fit to be put to election; and the
Court may add so many more as they judge requisite.
4. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that no
person be chosen Governor above once in two years, and that the
Governor be always a member of some approved Congregation, and formerly
of the Magistracy within this Jurisdiction; and that all the
Magistrates, Freemen of this Commonwealth; and that no Magistrate or
other public officer shall execute any part of his or their office
before they are severally sworn, which shall be done in the face of the
court if they be present, and in case of absence by some deputed for
that purpose.
5. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that to the
aforesaid Court of Election the several Towns shall send their
deputies, and when the Elections are ended they may proceed in any
public service as at other Courts. Also the other General Court in
September shall be for making of laws, and any other public occasion,
which concerns the good of the Commonwealth.
6. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that the
Governor shall, either by himself or by the Secretary, send out summons
to the Constables of every Town for the calling of these two standing
Courts one month at least before their several times: And also if the
Governor and the greatest part of the Magistrates see cause upon any
special occasion to call a General Court, they may give order to the
Secretary so to do within fourteen days' warning: And if urgent
necessity so required, upon a shorter notice, giving sufficient grounds
for it to the deputies when they meet, or else be questioned for the
same; And if the Governor and major part of Magistrates shall either
neglect or refuse to call the two General standing Courts or either of
them, as also at other times when the occasions of the Commonwealth
require, the Freemen thereof, or the major part of them, shall petition
to them so to do; if then it be either denied or neglected, the said
Freemen, or the major part of them, shall have the power to give order
to the Constables of the several Towns to do the same, and so may meet
together, and choose to themselves a Moderator, and may proceed to do
any act of power which any other General Courts may.
7. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that after
there are warrants given out for any of the said General Courts, the
Constable or Constables of each Town, shall forthwith give notice
distinctly to the inhabitants of the same, in some public assembly or
by going or sending from house to house, that at a place and time by
him or them limited and set, they meet and assemble themselves together
to elect and choose certain deputies to be at the General Court then
following to agitate the affairs of the Commonwealth; which said
deputies shall be chosen by all that are admitted Inhabitants in the
several Towns and have taken the oath of fidelity; provided that none
be chosen a Deputy for any General Court which is not a Freeman of this
Commonwealth.
The aforesaid deputies shall be chosen in manner following:
every person that is present and qualified as before expressed, shall
bring the names of such, written in several papers, as they desire to
have chosen for that employment, and these three or four, more or less,
being the number agreed on to be chosen for that time, that have the
greatest number of papers written for them shall be deputies for that
Court; whose names shall be endorsed on the back side of the warrant
and returned into the Court, with the Constable or Constables' hand
unto the same.
8. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that
Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield shall have power, each Town, to
send four of their Freemen as their deputies to every General Court;
and Whatsoever other Town shall be hereafter added to this
Jurisdiction, they shall send so many deputies as the Court shall judge
meet, a reasonable proportion to the number of Freemen that are in the
said Towns being to be attended therein; which deputies shall have the
power of the whole Town to give their votes and allowance to all such
laws and orders as may be for the public good, and unto which the said
Towns are to be bound.
9. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that the
deputies thus chosen shall have power and liberty to appoint a time and
a place of meeting together before any General Court, to advise and
consult of all such things as may concern the good of the public, as
also to examine their own Elections, whether according to the order,
and if they or the greatest part of them find any election to be
illegal they may seclude such for present from their meeting, and
return the same and their reasons to the Court; and if it be proved
true, the Court may fine the party or parties so intruding, and the
Town, if they see cause, and give out a warrant to go to a new election
in a legal way, either in part or in whole. Also the said deputies
shall have power to fine any that shall be disorderly at their
meetings, or for not coming in due time or place according to
appointment; and they may return the said fines into the Court if it be
refused to be paid, and the Treasurer to take notice of it, and to
escheat or levy the same as he does other fines.
10. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that every
General Court, except such as through neglect of the Governor and the
greatest part of the Magistrates the Freemen themselves do call, shall
consist of the Governor, or some one chosen to moderate the Court, and
four other Magistrates at least, with the major part of the deputies of
the several Towns legally chosen; and in case the Freemen, or major
part of them, through neglect or refusal of the Governor and major part
of the Magistrates, shall call a Court, it shall consist of the major
part of Freemen that are present or their deputiues, with a Moderator
chosen by them: In which said General Courts shall consist the supreme
power of the Commonwealth, and they only shall have power to make laws
or repeal them, to grant levies, to admit of Freemen, dispose of lands
undisposed of, to several Towns or persons, and also shall have power
to call either Court or Magistrate or any other person whatsoever into
question for any misdemeanor, and may for just causes displace or deal
otherwise according to the nature of the offense; and also may deal in
any other matter that concerns the good of this Commonwealth, except
election of Magistrates, which shall be done by the whole body of
Freemen.
In which Court the Governor or Moderator shall have power to
order the Court, to give liberty of speech, and silence unseasonable
and disorderly speakings, to put all things to vote, and in case the
vote be equal to have the casting voice. But none of these Courts shall
be adjourned or dissolved without the consent of the major part of the
Court.
11. It is Ordered, sentenced, and decreed, that when
any General Court upon the occasions of the Commonwealth have agreed
upon any sum, or sums of money to be levied upon the several Towns
within this Jurisdiction, that a committee be chosen to set out and
appoint what shall be the proportion of every Town to pay of the said
levy, provided the committee be made up of an equal number out of each
Town.
14th January 1639 the 11 Orders above said are voted.
THE
PEQUOT WAR
Thirty
men went from Windsor to join in the fight against the Pequot
Indians in May 1637. Among them was Walter Fyler, afterwards
known as Lieutenant Walter Fyler.
*
This
year the trouble, which had been some time brewing, broke out between
the settlers of the Bay and the Pequot Indians. This tribe never
assimilated with their white neighbors-neither with the English on the
North East nor the Dutch on the West. About July, of this year, Capt.
John Oldham was murdered by the Indians at Block Island; and as he was
a man universally known both in the Plymouth and Massachusetts
colonies, it was resolved to put a stop to such proceedings, and punish
the aggressors. For this purpose, four companies were raised…This was
the first serious warfare that occurred after the settlement of the
colony, and the whole vicinity was deeply interested in the event.
This story starts before the English people arrive in Massachusetts.
During the 1620’s the Dutch Trading Post “House of Good Hope”
(Hartford) traded with the Indians of the area. The River Indians were
given preference, due to their location near the post. The Pequots were
taxed more and given lesser quality goods. This caused the Pequots to
raid the River Indians who came to the post, and demand a tax from them
to make things fair. They soon lost fear of the traders and would raid
the trading post as well.
In 1622, The Dutch West Indian trader, Jacques Elekens, seized a Pequot
sachem named Tatobem the Tyrant near the Dutch Trading Post “House of
Good Hope” on the Connecticut River in retaliation for Pequot raids on
the trading post. Elekens threatened to kill Tatobem unless he,
Elekens, received a "heavy ransom". The Pequots responded with a
tribute of one-hundred-forty fathoms of purple and white beads. Since
one fathom equals 240 to 260 beads, the total received by the Dutch
trader was approximately thirty-five thousand beads. Elekens killed
Tatobem anyway.
In autumn of 1636 the Pequots became bolder. The raids increased on the
settlers and Indians in the area. When chasing a local Indian they used
to stop at the door of a white man's house, not willing to anger the
settlers. But now they started raiding homes and killing lone
travelers, like Butterfield and Tilly. Mr. Tilly was master of a
fishing barque sailing upriver. He and Mr. Butterfield went ashore to
shoot fowl when several Pequots rose up and killed Mr. Butterfield.
They took Tilly and tortured him for three days until he died. In
another incident, John Oldham’s Pinnace was spotted off Block Island
with fourteen Indians on deck. When boarded, Oldham was found murdered
in his cabin. This caused John Endicott, (Salem Governor, and Mr.
Ludlow’s brother-in-law) to wipe out the Indian settlement on Block
Island. This in turn caused the Pequots to lay siege to Fort
Saybrook at the mouth
of the river. In February, Captain Gardiner, the fort’s commander, and
a logging party were ambushed. Two were killed and several injured
including Gardiner. Two others threw down their weapons and ran away.
These two were almost hanged for cowardice.
On April 23, 1637 Sessacus, the Pequot Sachem, ordered a raid on
Wethersfield in retaliation for the raid on Pequot villages by John
Endicott, who was not even from Connecticut. There were two hundred
Pequot warriors who attacked Wethersfield and killed six men, three
women, and twenty cows. Two young girls were kidnapped and later
spotted by Gardiner as they passed Fort Saybrook. A Dutch boat was able
to negotiate for the return of the two girls with help from the
Sachem’s squaw. Fort Saybrook was then reinforced with eighteen
soldiers from Massachusetts Bay in the command of Captain John
Underhill.
The Windsor settlers had built a palisade around some houses on the
high ground of the north bank of the "Little River". This was a
stockade fence to protect the houses from attack by Pequots. Just north
of the Palisade outside the fence is where the "Lords and Gentlemen" of
the Saltonstall party settled. It was their intention to build large
stately houses in the area thereby making it a civilized English
colony. But they were vulnerable to attack and so built a fort on the
Stoughton property where all could gather in an attack. The large oaken
door of the "Old Stone Fort" bore the scars of Pequot axes for 200
years hence until it fell in ruins.
On May 1, 1637, the ninth meeting of the Connecticut General Court
convened to discuss the Pequots. The first line of the court record
says, “It is ordered that there shall be an offensive war against the
Pequots.” They discussed gear for the soldiers, and what each town
would supply for the effort. They appointed John Mason to lead the
Army, Reverend Stone of Hartford was the Chaplin, Dr. Thomas Pell of
Saybrook would be the Field Surgeon.
As a result of the meeting, ninety soldiers were gathered; forty-two
from Hartford, eighteen from Wethersfield, and thirty from Windsor. The
three towns could not be left unguarded so thirteen of the ninety men
were assigned to guard the Colony. Seventy-seven soldiers mustered at
Hartford on May 10th 1637 by the River. Uncas the Mohegan offered
seventy more Warriors to our ranks. More soldiers would be gathered at
Saybrook. On the morning of May 11th, the new Army sailed south in
three ships, a Pink, a Pinnace, and a Shallop. Many Indian canoes went
along side and the whole armada made their way toward Saybrook. Uncas
and his men left the canoes and made the trip overland down to Saybrook
to secure the riverbank and keep the Pequots from seeing the army. They
killed seven Pequots and burned a spy who had been living among the
colonists.
Captain Gardiner was in command of the fort at Saybrook. They
had been besieged by the Pequots
for two months and had reinforced their group with soldiers from
Massachusetts Bay. They lent a fresh troop of eighteen seasoned
soldiers to Capt. John Mason to let some of the less able boys and old
men to go back to Windsor. Captain Underhill was commander of this
troop of soldiers.
Captain Mason standing in the open at the fort decided that they were
watched by Pequots in the woods, and so changed the plan. He sailed for
Narragansett instead of attacking them from the Pequot river. When the
ships passed the Pequot territory, the Indians were on the shore
laughing and jeering at them as they sailed past. They assumed Mason
was going on to Block Island to punish some other Indians. When the
ships arrived in Narragansett Bay, they had unfavorable winds and had
to wait two days to come ashore. They visited the Narragansett Chief
Miantonomoh to ask for help. He would only give permission to go
through
his territory. However, Uncas gave a speech to the tribe and convinced
about 200 warriors to follow as auxiliaries.
It was dawn on May 26th 1637, and after a two day hike through the
woods Captain Mason and his troops sneaked up the eastern side of the
hill while Captain Underhill and his troops sneaked up the western
side. On the crest of the hill stands the Pequot fort, a palisade about
half an acre around with an opening on each side.
The openings
were blocked with brush and bushes. The Pequots were inside still
asleep, unaware that the English who passed them by last week were at
their doorstep. They got within twenty feet when a dog started barking.
A Pequot was awakened and started shouting “Owanux! Owanux!”, the
Pequot word for Englishmen.
A volley was fired into the fort from all around it. Captain Mason and
his men came to the fortified entrance. Mason hopped over the brush,
while Lt. Seeley delayed to removed it. Mason saw rows of wigwams and
broke into the first one. In the small space he was beset with arrows
and close fighting. He held them off with his sword, and was relieved
by William Hayden. They both killed several Indians and leapt back
outside, following more Indians. Mason met Pattison and Barbour who
killed several more Indians. It was becoming difficult to fight in each
of fifty wigwams. The Pequots were shooting from the closed doors.
Mason had originally wanted to “take the fort and save the plunder”.
But now he saw that they were outnumbered and there was not enough
space for swords and muskets. He met Lt. Bull and Nicholas Olmstead out
of breath and bloodied. He decided on the spur of the moment that they
should burn the fort rather than lose many men in hand to hand combat
inside wigwams. The three took fire from a wigwam and set the thatch
roofs ablaze. They ran out of the fort but the Indians behind them were
not allowed to leave.
Mason’s men surrounded the fort and killed anyone who tried to leave.
About forty warriors rallied and gave fight with arrows, but they were
cut down by English muskets. Some surrendered but were killed. Those
that escaped were killed by Uncas’s men.
In half an hour the fort was burned down and 500 Pequots were burned to
death or killed while escaping the flames at the hands of the English
soldiers. Most of them were women and children. Only about 180 were
warriors. Seven were taken prisoner, and seven escaped. Underhill
wrote, ”Great and Doleful was the bloody sight to the view of young
soldiers that never before had been in war, to see so many souls lie
gasping on the ground, so thick in some places that you could hardly
pass along.” Even Uncas’s warriors could not believe the slaughter.
They were glad that their enemies were gone but not with such tragedy
of the women and children.
Two English soldiers were killed and twenty wounded. The Pequot’s
Mystick fort was gone and all the inhabitants dead. The Pequots at the
other fort at the mouth of the river came and were chased off by
muskets. When they found the ruined fort and piles of bodies they were
in extreme rage. They chased the soldiers who were almost to their
ships, but were fought off by the rear guard of about fourteen men and
their muskets. They continued to harass and ambush the soldiers, but
their arrows were of little effect.
The ships were supposed to meet them at the mouth of the Pequot river
but were delayed by unfavorable winds. They were nearby in a cove two
miles down the coast. From the Sloop came Captain Daniel Patrick with a
fresh company of soldiers from Massachusetts Bay. They came to rescue
Mason’s men from pursuit but were told there was no need. Mason wanted
Captain Patrick to use the barque to help the Narragansetts return home
under protection. Underhill would take the Pink and return the wounded
to Saybrook. Mason and his men would march to Fort Saybrook. Captain
Patrick wanted to walk to Saybrook with Mason’s company which was
unpopular. The soldiers didn’t want him to share in their triumphant
return. Patrick marched with them anyway.
Before they got to Saybrook they overran a small village of western
Niantics and ran them into a swamp. It was late Saturday and they
wanted to get to Saybrook before the Sabbath, so they didn’t pursue
them. At sunset they spotted the fort across the estuary and camped for
the night. On Sunday morning Captain Gardiner sent a ferry to bring the
men to the fort. There was a great feast of the remaining food stores
and celebration of the fight. On Monday morning, they set sail up the
river to return home. On Friday June 3rd the men put in first at
Wethersfield, then Hartford, then found the old trading post at the
mouth of their little river and poled up to the ferry landing by the
palisade. They were glad to be home.
Captain Israel Stoughton brought a new force of 120 men from
Massachusetts Bay to mop up the remaining Pequots. Captain John Gallop,
who had found John Oldham’s body in his boat a year before, took
Stoughton’s prisoners out to the sound and pitched them overboard.
Mason nicknamed Gallop’s sloop “Charon’s Ferry”.
May 27th was the last Pequot tribal council at the site of the burned
fort. They decided to burn their crops and villages and head back to
the Hudson River valley where they came from generations ago. About
eighty surviving warriors and their families followed Chief Sachem
Sessacus and Sachem Mononotto on a journey toward the Hudson. But
thirty men with eighty women stayed to try and survive. Stoughton’s men
found them and put twenty eight of the thirty men to death. Thirty
three women were given to the Narragansetts, and the rest were sold as
slaves to Massachusetts Bay.
Lt. Seeley and thirty men were ordered to “set down in the Pequot
country and river” as an occupation force. This became the town of
Norwich where Mason later retired after his command at Fort Saybrook.
Sessacus and his band crossed the river at Saybrook. Three white men in
a canoe were killed and hung in the trees, which prompted Mason to
extinguish them entirely.
While Mason’s men returned home, Mason took Underhill’s men and
Patrick’s men, and went with Israel Stoughton’s men along the sound in
a boat, giving chase to the survivors. Sessacus had to take the shore
route to dig shellfish. Uncas and his men tracked them all the way.
Near Guilford, Mononotto was found with some warriors. They were routed
out of the eastern side of the harbor and swam across to the west side.
Here, Uncas killed them and put Mononotto’s head in an old oak tree.
This cape is still known as Sachems Head.
Sessacus, a local sachem, and the main body had taken refuge in a swamp
near Greenfield Hill Mason had found their location by capturing a Pequot near
where Fairfield is now. Hiking a few miles northward, the men
surrounded the swamp. A call for surrender was sent in and the local
tribe accepted it. Many Pequot women and children also surrendered. The
swamp was now down to less then a hundred warriors who would rather die
than give up.
At dawn in the fog they rushed one corner of the swamp where Captain
Patrick’s men were. About seventy broke through before reinforcements
could muster. Sessacus was not found. He had been exiled by his own men
the day before. He and about thirty followers went for refuge in Mohawk
territory. The Mohawks knew they had been exiled by their tribe and so
killed them all and sent their scalps and Sessacus’s head to Hartford
to prove their alliance with the English.
All the Pequots were disbanded and sold as slaves. They were not
allowed to call themselves Pequots. The Mohegans and Narragansetts took
most into their tribe as slaves, where they were not allowed to have
children. The seventy that escaped the swamp fight were reported to
have gone south to the Carolinas. Forty years later they were gathering
an army to return and help King Philip, but when he
was killed they did not return to New England. The Paucatuck eastern
Pequots and the Mashantucket western Pequots eventually regrouped and
returned 350 years later. From The First Church in Windsor
History
The
Indian village in this case was so completely destroyed that for
many years the settlers had no further trouble with the Indians. Some
years later, the participants were given land grants. To quote from Dr.
Styles’ records in speaking of the first Indian war in New England: “The
danger was Imminent, and so complete the victory that is caused
universal rejoicing throughout New England, and a grant of land was
given each soldier and officer, and to this day the memory of and
ancestor who was in the Pequot fight, is and honorable heirloom in
every Connecticut family.
-Benson J. Lossing,
LL.D
Lieutenant
Walter Fyler received his rank and a plot of land in Windsor,
Connecticut for his service in the Pequot War.
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