Curiosities of History: Boston, September Seventeenth, 1630-1880

The charter goes on to give authority to commanders, captains, governors, and all other officers for the time being, “to correct, punish, pardon, govern and rule all such the subjects of us, our heires and successors, as shall from tyme to tyme adventure themselves in any voyage thither or from thence, or that shall at any tyme hereafter inhabit within the precincts and parts of New England aforesaid, according to the orders, lawes, ordinances, instructions and directions aforesaid, not repugnant to the laws and statutes of our realme of England as aforesaid.” And in order to make the laws of these officers known, it is provided, as printing would not be practicable, that they shall be “published in writing under theire common seale.”

But it would seem, notwithstanding, that the authority exercised by the company was at first executive rather than legislative; and Mr. Savage remarks, that the body of the people “submitted at first to the mild and equal temporary usurpation of the officers, chosen by themselves, which was also justified by indisputable necessity.” The first “Court of Assistants” was held at Charlestown, Aug. 23, 1630; and the first thing propounded was, “how the ministers shall be maintained,” and it was determined, of course, at the public charge. Gov. Winthrop, Lieut.-Gov. Dudley, and the assistants were present; and this body carried on the government—what there was of it—“in a simply patriarchal manner,” until “the first General Court or meeting of the whole company at Boston, 19 October,” 1631, and this was held “for the establishing of the government.” It was now determined that “the freemen should have the power of choosing assistants, and from themselves to choose a Governor and Lieut. Governor, who with the assistants should have the power of making laws and choosing officers to execute the same.” This is the brief history of the origin of a local government in the colony of Massachusetts Bay, if it may be so called. It was autocratic for the first year and afterwards, although fully assented to by a general vote of the people.

At first, of course, there were no laws; and punishments were adjudged and inflicted, under the authority of the charter, not only for trivial matters, as they would be now considered, but for very questionable, if not ludicrous, matters,—and all this, it would seem, without respect of persons: for, as early as Nov. 30, 1630, at a court, it was ordered that one of the assistants be fined five pounds for whipping two persons without the presence of another assistant, contrary to an act of court formerly made; so that this very early exercise of authority was not under a law made after the fact. At the same court another person was sentenced to be whipped for shooting a fowl on the sabbath day; and this, probably, was ex post facto. In 1631, a man was fined five pounds for taking upon himself the cure of scurvy by a water of no value, and selling it at a dear rate; to be imprisoned until he paid the fine, or whipped. In 1632, the first thief was sentenced to lose his estate, pay double what he had stolen, be whipped, bound out for three years, and after that be dealt with as the court directs. Other offences, or what not, were punished by “taking life and limb, branding with a hot iron, clipping off ears,” &c. Indians also were proceeded against, in many cases by fines, penalties, and punishments.

John Legge, a servant, was ordered “to be whipt this day [May 3, 1631] at Boston, and afterwards, so soon as convenient may be, at Salem, for striking Richard Wright.” Richard Hopkins was ordered to be severely whipped, and branded with a hot iron on one of his cheeks, for selling guns, powder, and shot to the Indians. Joyce Bradwick was ordered to pay Alexander Beck twenty dollars for promising marriage without her friends’ consent, and now refusing to perform the same. This was in 1632, and is undoubtedly the first breach-of-promise case that had occurred in the colony.

It was ordered if any one deny the Scriptures to be the word of God, to be fined fifty pounds, or whipped forty stripes; if they recant, to pay ten pounds, and whipped if they pay not that. A man, who had been punished for being drunk, was ordered to wear a red D about his neck for a year.

The case of one Knower, at Boston, 1631, is spoken of as curious, showing that the court, usurper and tyrant as it was, had no intention of being slighted, underestimated, or intimidated. “Thomas Knower was set in bilbows for threatening the Court, that if he should be punished, he would have it tried in England, whether he was lawfully punished or not.” And for this he was punished.

1631.—Philip Radcliffe, for censuring the churches and government, has his ears cut off, is whipped and banished.

1636.—If any inhabitants entertained strangers over fourteen days, without leave “from those yt are appointed to order the Town’s businesses,” they were made liable to be dealt with by the “overseers” (before there were selectmen) as they thought advisable.

In 1637, “a law was made that none should be received to inhabit within the jurisdiction but such as should be allowed by some of the magistrates; and it was fully understood that differing from the religions generally received in the country, was as great a disqualification as any political opinions whatever.” On this subject Judge Minot says, “Whilst they scrupulously regulated the morals of the inhabitants within the colony, they neglected not to prevent the contagion of dissimilar habits and heretical principles from without.... No man could be qualified either to elect or be elected to office who was not a church member, and no church could be formed but by a license from a magistrate.”

In 1640, in the case of Josias Plaistow for stealing four baskets of corn from the Indians, he was ordered to return eight baskets, “to be fined £5, and to be called Josias, and not Mr. Josias Plaistow, as he formerly used to be.”

A carpenter was employed to make a pair of stocks; and, it being adjudged that he charged too much for his work, he was sentenced to be put in them for one hour. A servant, charged with slandering the Church, was whipped, then deprived of his ears and banished. This punishment was deemed severe, and excited some remarks upon the subject.

A Capt. Stone was fined one hundred pounds and prohibited from coming into Boston without the governor’s leave on pain of death, for calling Justice Ludlow a “just-ass.” Another party, for being drunk, was sentenced to carry forty turfs to the fort; while another, being in the company of drunkards, was set in the stocks.

But finally the Court of Assistants began to make laws, or lay down rules of some sort. As for example: Every one shall pay a penny sterling for every time of taking tobacco in any place. In Plymouth Colony the law was less stringent: there a man was fined five shillings for taking tobacco while on a jury, before a verdict had been rendered. Absence from church subjected the delinquent to a fine of ten shillings or imprisonment. Any one entering into a private conference at a public meeting shall forfeit twelve pence for public uses. 1642, Mr. Robert Saltonstall is fined five shillings for presenting his petition on so small and bad a piece of paper; and this, it seems, was after it had been determined “that a body of laws should be framed which would be approved of by the General Court and some of the ministers as a fundamental code.” Notwithstanding this, in all cases, like the above, where there was no law, one was made, or inferred, to meet the case; so that, after the establishment of a “fundamental code,” there was about as much ex post facto law as before. Among the laws or orders of the “fundamental code” was one, “that no person, Householder or others, shall spend his time unprofitably under paine of such punishment as the court shall think meet to inflict;” and “the constables were ordered to take knowledge of offenders of this kind,” and, among others, especially tobacco-takers. Another was, “that no person either man or woman shall make or buy any slashed clothes, other than one slash in each sleeve and another in the back; also all cuttworks, imbroidered or needle workt caps, bands, vayles, are forbidden hereafter to be made or worn under said penalty—also all gold or silver girdles, hatbands, belts, ruffs, beaver hats, are prohibited to be bought or worn hereafter, under the aforesaid penalty,” &c. The penalty is such punishment as the Court may think meet to inflict.

In addition to these, the code went still further in regulating the dress of women: “4th of 7th month [September, as the year began with March, until 1752], 1639, Boston. No garments shall be made with short sleeves, whereby the nakedness of the arm may be discovered in the wearing thereof;” and, where garments were already made with short sleeves, the arms to be covered with linen or otherwise. No person was allowed to make a garment for women with sleeves more than half an ell wide, and “so proportionate for bigger or smaller persons.”

In the matter of currency, it was ordered, in 1634, “that musket balls of a full boar shall pass currently for farthings apiece, provided that no man be compelled to take above 12 pence at a time in them.”

It would seem that some of these decisions, or the general character of the government, had caused some remark, as it was “ordered that Henry Lyn shall be whipt and banished the Plantation before the 6th day of October next, for writing into England falsely and maliciously against the government and execution of Justice here.” “Execution of justice” is good, we should say.

Ward, in his “Trip to New England,” a very coarse and abusive paper, published in London, in 1706, in a book called “London Spy,” says, in Boston “if you kiss a woman in publick, tho’ offered as a Courteous Salutation, if any information is given to the Select Members, both shall be whipt or fined.” He relates, that “a captain of a certain ship, who had been a long voyage, happen’d to meet his wife, and kist her in the street, for which he was fined Ten Shillings, and forc’d to pay the Money. Another inhabitant of the town was fin’d Ten Shillings for kissing his own wife in his Garden, and obstinately refusing to pay the Money, endur’d Twenty Lashes at the Gun, who, in Revenge for his Punishment, swore he would never kiss her again either in Publick or Private.”

John Dunton, in his famous work, “Dunton’s Life and Errors,” speaks of the government, when he was in Boston, in 1686. He says, “Let it be enough to say, The laws in force here, against immorality and prophaneness, are very severe. Witchcraft is punish’d with death, as ’tis well known; and theft with restoring fourfold, if the Criminal be sufficient.—An English woman, admitting some unlawful freedoms from an Indian, was forc’d twelve months to wear upon her Right arm an Indian cut in red cloath.”

The “Body of Liberties,” as it was strangely called, contained an hundred laws, which had been drawn up pursuant to an order of the General Court, by Nathaniel Ward, pastor of the church at Ipswich, who had been formerly a practitioner of law in England; and this book was printed by Daye, the first printer, at Cambridge in 1641. (Thomas, p. 47.)

There was also published in 1649 a “Book of General Laws and Liberties, concerning the Inhabitants of Massachusetts.” By these, gaming by shuffle-board and bowling at houses of entertainment, where there was “much waste of wine and beer,” were prohibited under pain for every keeper of such house twenty shillings, and every person playing at said games, five shillings. For “damnable heresies,” as they were called, banishment was the appropriate punishment.

Oldmixon mentions a singular law. He says, “The goodness of the pavement may compare with most in London: to gallop a horse on it is 3 shillings and four pence forfeit.” This was more than a hundred years after the settlement of the town, and less than forty years before the commencement of the revolutionary war.

A letter from London, from Edward Howes to his relative, J. Winthrop, jun., dated April 3, 1632, says, “I have heard divers complaints against the severity of your government, especially Mr. Endicott’s, and that he shall be sent for over, about cutting off the lunatick man’s ears and other grievances” (Savage’s Winthrop, p. 56, vol. 1).

In respect to the levying of fines, Gov. Winthrop, who was accused of not demanding their payment in some cases, remarked, “that in his judgment, it were not fit in the infancy of a Commonwealth to be too strict in levying fines, though severe in other punishments.”

It has been well said that “religion and laws were closely intertwined in the Puritan community; the government felt itself bound to expatriate every disorderly person, as much as the church was bound to excommunicate him. They were like a household. They had purchased their territory for a home; it was no El Dorado; it was their Mount of Sion. With immense toil and unspeakable denials, they had rescued it from the wild woods for the simple purpose that they might have a place for themselves and their children to worship God undisturbed. They knew nothing of toleration. Their right to shut the door against intruders seemed to them as undoubted and absolute as their right to breathe the air around them.”[2 - The New England Tragedies in Prose, by Rowland H. Allen.]

This is the sum and substance of the Puritan government as long as it lasted. Under the charter, or without the charter, they made such laws as they pleased, before or after the occasion. They punished every thing which they thought to be wrong, or which did not conform to their notions of propriety or their practice, and this, too, without consistency or discrimination.

In 1639, Winthrop says, “The people had long desired a body of laws, and thought their condition very unsafe, while so much power rested in the discretion of the magistrates. Divers attempts had been made at former courts, and the matter referred to some of the magistrates and some of the elders, [the church and state, in such cases, were invariably united,] but still it came to no effect, for being committed to the care of so many, whatsoever was done by some, was still disliked or neglected by others.” So that it is doubtful if they ever really had a set of laws that were relied upon; that limited the discretion of the magistrates, or was ever reasonably and impartially enforced. If the law failed to be adequate, it seemed to be proper for the magistrate to make it so; and he not only supplied the deficiency, but occasionally coined or misconstrued a law for his purpose. Such a government might well be considered “unsafe.”

V.

THE NARRAGANSETT INDIANS

VISIT TO BOSTON

The Narragansett Indians were one of the largest, if not the very largest, tribe in New England, at the time of the arrival of the Puritans; and they were especially friendly to the settlers. They lived along the coast, from Stonington to Point Judith, on Narragansett Bay. “They consisted,” says Hutchinson, “of several lesser principalities, but all united under one general ruler, called the Chief Sachem, to whom all others owed some kind of fealty or subjection.” The Nianticks were considered as a branch of the Narragansetts, having very likely been conquered by them, and brought under their subjection.

A letter of Roger Williams, who was intimate with, and a strong friend of, the Narragansett Indians, says they were “the settlers’ fast friends, had been true in all the Pequot wars, were the means of the coming in of the Mohegans, never had shed English blood, and many settlers had had experience of the love and desire of peace which prevailed among them.”

In October, 1636, after the murder of Mr. Oldham, Gov. Vane invited their sachem, Miantonomo, to visit Boston, which he soon after did, bringing with him another sachem, two sons of Canonicus, and about twenty men. The governor sent twenty musketeers to Roxbury to meet them and escort them into town. The sachems and their council dined together in the same room with the governor and his ministers. After dinner a friendly treaty was made with Miantonomo, and signed by the parties; and, although at this time the English thought the Indians did not understand it, they kept it faithfully; but the English, who were afterwards instrumental in the death of Miantonomo, did not. The Indians were subsequently escorted out of town, “and dismissed with a volley of shot;” and the famous Roger Williams was appointed to explain the treaty to the Indians.

In this treaty, Canonicus, who was the chief sachem of the tribe, and is said to have been “a just man, and a friend of the English,” was represented by Miantonomo, his nephew, whom Canonicus, on account of his age, had caused to assume the government. The deputation that Gov. Vane sent to the Narragansetts in the matter of the murder of Mr. Oldham, speak of Canonicus “as a sachem of much state, great command over his men, and much wisdom in his answers and the carriage of the whole treaty; clearing himself and his neighbors of the murder, and offering assistance for revenge of it.” Johnson represents Miantonomo “as a sterne, severe man, of great stature and a cruel nature, causing all his nobility and such as were his attendants to tremble at his speech.”

INDIAN ART.—CURIOUS MARRIAGE

The Narragansetts not only coined money (wampumpeag), but manufactured pendants and bracelets,—using shells, we presume, for these purposes. They also made tobacco-pipes, some blue and some white, out of stone, and furnished earthen vessels and pots for cookery and other domestic uses,—so that they had several approximations, in these respects, to civilization and art, not so distinctly manifested by other tribes. They had, in fact, commercial relations with other people and distant nations, and, it seems, were sometimes sneered at on account of their disinclination for war,—preferring other service.

There is evidence, also, that they considered themselves—in some respects, at least—superior to other Indians; and this is illustrated by a very curious piece of history, said to be “the only tradition of any sort from the ancestors of our first Indians.” It seems that the oldest Indians among the Narragansetts reported to the English, on their first arrival, “that they had in former times a sachem called Tashtassuck, who was incomparably greater than any in the whole land in power and state.” This great sachem—who, it would seem, had the power to elevate, and, in some respects, enlighten his race—had only two children, a son and daughter; and, not being able to match them according to their dignity, he joined them together in matrimony, and they had four sons, of whom Canonicus, who was chief sachem when the English arrived, was the eldest. There is no reason to doubt that the marriage was a happy one, agreeable to the parties, satisfactory to the parent, and certainly famous in its progeny.

INTERMARRIAGE AMONG THE EGYPTIANS

This probably is the only record of such a marriage in this country. The form of family marriage, however, it is a matter of history, was common among the Egyptians, and probably has been practised more or less among all the savage nations of the earth. Cleopatra, the daughter of Ptolemy Auletes, on the death of her father, was married, according to his will, to Ptolemy XII., his eldest son, and ascended the throne; both being minors, Pompey was appointed their guardian. In the wars which followed, her husband was drowned, and she then married her second brother, Ptolemy (Necteros), a child seven years old. Afterwards she became the mistress of Cæsar, and subsequently poisoned her boy-husband, when at the age of fourteen, because he claimed his share of the Egyptian crown. So that, in fact, she made war against her first husband, and poisoned her second,—a result very different from that recorded of the Narragansett intermarriage.

MURDER OF MIANTONOMO

In a subsequent Indian war, 1643,—brought about, it is said, by Connecticut, between the Narragansetts and the Mohegans,—Miantonomo, by some strange accident, fell into the hands of Uncas, who, for fear of retaliation, instead of taking his life, sent him to Hartford. The Connecticut people, in their turn, sent him to Boston, to be judged by the Commissioners of the United Colonies; and these commissioners, “although they had no jurisdiction in the case, nor any just ground of complaint against the sachem,” came to the conclusion “that Uncas would not be safe if he were suffered to live.” Drake says, “Strange as it may seem, it was with the advice of the Elders of the Churches” (Winthrop says five of the most judicious elders) that it was determined Uncas might put Miantonomo to death,—a piece of barbarism and injustice hardly matched by any conduct of the Indians. He was taken back to Uncas “with a guard of English soldiers,” and Uncas readily undertook the execution of his victim. When he arrived at a place appointed, a brother of Uncas “clave his head with a hatchet.” “Thus inhumanly and unjustly perished the greatest Indian chief of whom any account is found in New England’s annals.” Canonicus, it is said, was greatly affected by the death of his nephew, in whom he always had the utmost confidence, and regarded him with the fondness of a father. Canonicus died in 1647. After the death of Miantonomo, the Narragansetts were never on very good terms with the English, who had suspected them once or twice unjustly. Hutchinson says, “The Narragansetts are said to have kept to the treaty until the Pequods were destroyed, and then they grew insolent and treacherous.” It certainly appears that they were not well used by the English settlers, and it is not surprising that they should grow “insolent and treacherous;” for the treachery appears to have been first against them.

VI.

NAMES OF PLACES, STREETS, ETC

As a matter of course, some of the early names of places in and around Massachusetts Bay were Indian names or corruptions, until others were applied, as Shawmut, Mishawam, Mattapan, Winnisimmet, and others. The name of Plymouth, of course, the Pilgrims brought with them, as the Puritans did the name of Salem and of Boston. But just how the name of Massachusetts originated is not so well known. It was no doubt of Indian origin; and if derived from the “greatest king of the Indians,” Massasoit, or, as Hutchinson says, Massasoiet,[3 - In the first interview between Governor Carver of Plymouth and the Indian Chief Massasoit, “after salutations, the Governor kissing his hand and the king kissing him, the Governor entertains him with some refreshments, and then they agree on a league of friendship.” March 22, 1621.] it is well that it has been so preserved and perpetuated. Among the earliest English names, besides these mentioned, were the names applied to the islands, as Noddle’s Island, which possibly was given to it by Maverick, and Bird Island, in 1630; Lovell’s Island, in 1635, and several others. The names of Blackstone, Maverick, and Walford,[4 - Walford Street, in Charlestown, we believe, has been cut off by the Eastern Railroad freight tracks and likely to be lost.] the original settlers of Boston, Noddle’s Island, and Charlestown, have all been preserved in the names of streets, banks, &c., although two of them (Blackstone and Walford) were driven away, and the third, though living almost alone on Noddle’s Island, being an Episcopalian, was rather severely treated in the general persecutions of the time. Of the Indian names, only a few of them have been preserved, and are in common use, and among them Shawmut, Mishawam, Winnisimmet, and possibly one or two others. In the list of nearly two thousand names of streets, places, &c., only three Indian names are to be found, namely, Shawmut, Oneida, and Ontario.

But perhaps the most curious peculiarity prevailed with regard to the naming of streets, places, taverns, trades, &c., in Boston, before King Street and Queen Street had been named, and after they had passed away. King Street gave way to State Street; Queen Street, which at an earlier date had been called Prison Lane, gave way to Court Street: still some of the old English names remain. Marlborough, Newbury, and Orange, all English names, gave way to that of Washington, and this street has now been extended, under its latest name, from Haymarket Square (Mill Creek) to Brookline (Muddy Brook). Formerly it extended from the Gate at the Neck to Dock Square, and bore the name of Orange Street from the Gate to Eliot’s Corner (Essex Street); Newbury Street from Eliot’s Corner to Bethune’s Corner (West Street); Marlborough Street from thence to Haugh’s Corner (School Street); and Cornhill from thence to Dock Square.

LANES AND ALLEYS

The first mention of any alley is that of Paddy Alley[5 - William Paddy died in 1658, and the alley (now North Centre Street) bore his name for more than a hundred years. When some changes were made in the Old State House, in 1830, to accommodate the Boston Post Office, a stone was dug up which proved to be his grave-stone, though it is a little difficult to tell how it came there. On one side of it was the inscription, “Here lyeth the body of Mr. William Paddy, aged 58 years. Departed this life August—, 1658.” And on the other side,—“Here sleaps thatBlessed one whose liefGod help vs all to liveThat so when time shall beThat we this world must liefWe ever may be happyWith blessed William Paddy.”It may be concluded, we judge, that Paddy’s Alley was well named.] (after a resident), running from Ann to Middle Street, 1658, but whether so named before or after the streets which it connects is not known. Rawson’s Lane, afterwards Bromfield’s Lane, and now Bromfield Street, 1693; Black Horse Lane, part of what is now known as Prince Street, 1698; Beer Lane, part of Richmond Street; Blind Lane, part of Bedford Street; Elbow Alley, which was in the form of a crescent, from Ann to Cross Street; Pudding Lane, part of Devonshire Street—all mentioned in 1708, when a list of the names of the streets, lanes, &c., was prepared and published by the Selectmen. Among these were Frog Lane, Hog Alley, Sheafe Lane, Blind Lane, Cow Lane, Flounder Lane, Crab Lane, &c. Probably all these lanes and alleys were laid out or established, at a much earlier date than that mentioned. Sheep Lane was first called Hog Lane, in 1789; Turn-again Alley, at an early date, was near Hamilton Place.

The first lanes and possibly alleys, it has been said, were probably cow-paths or foot-paths, but at the end of seventy-eight years, in 1708, they had undoubtedly all received names, peculiar as some of them were. Most of these lanes—not all of them—were named after residents or owners in the neighborhood. The alleys were each named after some citizen, excepting where there might be some local name or peculiarity, as Board Alley, Brick Alley, Crooked Alley; and so of some of the lanes and streets, as Bog Lane, Marsh Lane, Well Street, Bath Street, Grape Place, Granite Place, and some others.

NAMES OF CORNERS

One of the most curious collections of names in the list of 1879, is that of “Corners,” not now recognized, and, we think, never before recorded, though occasionally used in defining the limits of streets. Over one hundred corners are named in this list, of which about eighty of them bear date of 1708 and 1732. All these are named after persons occupying the corners, and among them are the following: Antram’s Corner, Ballantine’s, Barrill’s, Bill’s, Bows’, and Bull’s Corners; Dafforne’s, Frary’s, and Frizzel’s Corners; Gee’s, Meer’s, Melynes’, Powning’s, Ruck’s, and Winsley’s Corners, and there were five Clark’s Corners in different parts of the town, in 1708-32. At the present time, as in the early time, the corners of streets may be spoken of and referred to, but are not recognized as local names of record.

NAMES OF STREETS, ETC