Narragansett Bay

So we'll see how it goes.

So this is kind of neat because we have several, you're in Nantucket, I'm in Narragansett Bay.

So basically we're sort of close to each other.

Besides sailing, we have another sort of cross intersection here, entrepreneurship.

Let me first talk about where to keep the boat and then second, talk about the type of boat.

So number one for me was close to my son and his family because sailing with family is really important to me.

So I wasn't going to put the boat down in the Chesapeake Bay, which is better sailing than Narragansett Bay, at least in my opinion.

But it's too long a drive for everyone.

Pick up fees may apply.

the last of the rhode island settlements was at shawamet or warwick on the western mainland at the upper end of the bay there samuel gorton the mystic and transcendentalist one of the most individual of men in an era of striking individualities after many vicissitudes found an abiding place he was of london a clothier and professor of the mysteries of christ a believer in established authority as the surest guardian of liberty and an opponent of formalism in all its varieties arriving at boston in sixteen thirty seven at the height of the hutchinsonian controversy he had sought liberty of conscience first in boston then in plymouth and finally in portsmouth where he had become a leader after the withdrawal of coddington but in each place his instinct for justice and his too vociferous denial of the legality of verdicts rendered by self-constituted authorities led him to seek further for a home that would shelter him and his followers no sooner however was he settled at shawamet than the massachusetts authorities laid claim to the territory and it was only after arrest imprisonment and a narrow escape from the death penalty followed by a journey to england and the enlisting of the sympathies of the earl of warwick that he made good his claim gordon returned in sixteen forty eight with a letter from warwick as lord admiral and head of the parliamentary commission on plantation affairs ordering massachusetts to cease molesting him and his people and he named the plantation warwick after his patron samuel gordon played an influential and useful part in the later history of the colony and his career of peaceful service to rhode island belies the opinion based on winslow's partisan pamphlet hypocrisy unmasked and other contemporary writings that he was a blasphemer a crude and half-crazy thinker a proud and pestilent seducer and the most prodigious mentor of exorbitant novelties He preferred the university of human reason and reading of the volume of visible creation to sectarianism and convention.

No wonder the Massachusetts leaders could not comprehend him.

He questioned their infallibility, their ecclesiastical caste, and their theology, and for their own self-preservation they were bound to resist what they deemed his heresies.

thus rhode island at the beginning was formed of four separate and independent communities each an embryo a petty state no one of which possessed at first other than an indian title for its lands and a self-made plantation covenant as the warrant for its government to settle disputes over land titles and to dispose of town lands providence established in sixteen forty a court of arbitration consisting of five disposers who seem also to have served as a sort of executive board for the town in all outward relations she remained isolated from her neighbors pursuing a course of strictly local independence portsmouth and newport for the sake of greater strength united in march sixteen forty and a year later agreed on a form of government which they called a democratic or popular government in which none was to be accounted a delinquent for doctrine they set up a governor deputy governor and four assistants regularly elected and provided that all laws should be made by the freemen or the major part of them orderly assembled in the system thus established we can see the influence of the older colonies and the beginning of a stronger government but at best the experiment was half-hearted for each town reserved to itself complete control over its own affairs in sixteen forty seven portsmouth withdrew to be as free in their transactions as any other town in the colony and the spirit of separatism was still dominant but it soon became necessary for the four towns of what is now rhode island to have something more legal upon which to base their right to exist than a title derived from their plantation covenants and indian bargains massachusetts was extending her claim southward edward winslow was in england ready to show that the rhode island settlements were within the bounds of the plymouth patent and certain individuals traders and land seekers were locating in the narragansett country and taking possession of the soil to combat these claims roger williams who had so vehemently denied the validity of a royal patent a few years before but influenced now it may be by gorton's insistence that a legal title could be obtained only from england sailed overseas and secured from the parliamentary commissioners in march a charter uniting providence sportsmouth and newport under the name of providence plantations in the narragansett bay and granting them powers of government for the moment even this document had no certain value for in spite of the fact that the parliamentarians were at war with the king charles i was still sovereign of england and should he win in the civil war the title would be worthless however the patent was not put in force until sixteen forty seven after the victory of cromwell at naseby had given control into the hands of parliament and then a general meeting was held at portsmouth consisting of the freemen of warwick portsmouth and newport and ten representatives from providence the patent did not state how affairs were to be managed and the colonials meeting in subsequent assemblies worked out the problem in their own way they refused to have a governor and creating only a presiding officer with four assistants constituted a court of trials for the hearing of important criminal and civil causes no general court was created by law but a legislative body soon came into existence consisting of six deputies from each town before this portsmouth meeting of sixteen forty seven adjourned it adopted a code of laws in which witchcraft trials and imprisonment for debt were forbidden capital punishment was largely abolished and divorce was granted for adultery only in sixteen fifty two the assembly passed a noteworthy law against the holding of negroes in slavery but the new patent did not bring peace to the colony in sixteen forty nine roger williams wrote to governor winthrop our poor colony is in civil dissension their last meeting of the assembly at which i have not been have fallen into factions mr coddington and captain partridge etc are the heads of one and captain clark mr easton etc the heads of the other what had happened was this coddington representing the conservative and theocratic wing of the assembly and opposing those who were more liberally minded had evidently applied to massachusetts and plymouth for support in the effort to obtain an independent government for a quidneck this plan would have destroyed what unity the colony had obtained under the patent but coddington wished to be governor of a colony of his own both massachusetts and plymouth were favorable to this plan as they hoped to further their own claims to the territory of islands and mainland twice coddington made application to the newly formed confederation of new england for admission but was refused unless he would bring in a quidneck as part of massachusetts or plymouth the latter of which laid claim to it coddington himself was willing to do this but found the opposition to the plan so vehement that he gave up the attempt and went to england to secure a patent of his own after long negotiations he was successful in his quest and returned with a document which appointed him governor for life with almost viceregal powers but he had reckoned without the people whom he was to govern learning of the outcome of coddington's mission and hearing that he had had secret dealings also with the dutch at new amsterdam the inhabitants of the islands rose in revolt hanged captain partridge and compelled coddington to seek safety in flight williams again went to england in sixteen fifty one and procured the recall of coddington's commission and a confirmation of his own patent and coddington in sixteen fifty six gave in his submission and was forgiven the early history of rhode island thus furnishes a remarkable exhibition of intense individualism in things religious and a warring of disruptive forces in matters of civil organization connecticut was settled during the year sixteen thirty four to sixteen thirty six by people from massachusetts knowledge of the fertile connecticut valley had come early to the dutch who had planted a blockhouse the house of good hope at the southeast corner of the land upon which hartford now stands plymouth too in searching for advantageous trade openings had sent out one william holmes who sailed past the dutch fort and took possession of the site of windsor in the autumn of sixteen thirty four a certain john oldham trader and rover and frequent disturber of the puritan peace came with a few companions, and began to occupy and cultivate lands within the bounds of modern Wethersfield.

Settlers continued to arrive from Massachusetts either by land or by water, actuated by land hunger and stirred to movement westward by the same driving impulse that for years to come was to populate the frontier wherever it stretched.

the territory thus possessed was claimed at first by massachusetts on the theory that the southern line of the colony if extended westward would include this portion of the connecticut river it was also claimed by the group of english lords and gentlemen say and seal brooke and other puritans who as they supposed had obtained through the earl of warwick from the new england council a grant of land extending west and southwest from narragansett bay forty leagues these claims were of course irreconcilable but the english lords in order to assert their title sent over in sixteen thirty five twenty servants known as the styles party who reached connecticut in the summer of that year thus by autumn there were on the ground four sets of rival claimants the dutch the plymouth traders various emigrants from massachusetts chiefly from the town of dorchester and the styles party representing the english lords and gentlemen their relations were not harmonious for the dutch tried to drive out the plymouth traders and the latter resented in their turn the attempt of the dorchester men to occupy their lands the matter was to be settled not by force but by weight of numbers and soundness of title in sixteen thirty five a new and larger migration was under consideration in massachusetts prompted by various motives partly personal as shown in the rivalries of strong men in a colony already overstocked with leaders partly material as indicated by the desire for whiter fields for cultivation and especially good pasture and partly political as evidenced by the dislike on the part of many for the power of the elders and magistrates in massachusetts and by the strong inclination of masterful men toward a government of their own thomas hooker the pastor of the newtown church john haines the governor of massachusetts in sixteen thirty five and roger ludlow a former magistrate and deputy governor who had failed of election to the magistracy in the same year were the leaders of the movement and if we may judge from later events were believers in certain political ideas that were not finding application in the bay colony disappointed because of the rigidity of the massachusetts system they seemed to have waited for an opportunity to put into practice the principles which they believed essential to the true government of a people when the decision was finally reached and certain of the inhabitants of newtown watertown and roxbury were ready to enter on their removal the question naturally arose as to the title to the territory in june sixteen thirty five massachusetts had asserted her claim by exercising a sort of supervision over those who had already gone to connecticut but in october john winthrop jr the rev hugh peters and henry vane arrived from england with authority from the lords and gentlemen to push their claim and winthrop actually bore a commission as governor of the entire territory which included connecticut it is hardly possible that hooker and haynes would have ignored the demands of these agents and yet to acknowledge winthrop as their governor would have been to accept a head who was not of their own choosing in all probability some arrangement was made with winthrop according to which the englishman's title to the lands was recognized but at the same time the connecticut settlers were to have full powers of self-government and the question of a governor was left for the moment undecided winthrop confining his jurisdiction to saybrook the settlement which he was to promote at the mouth of the river this agreement was embodied in a commission which was drawn up by the massachusetts general court and issued in march sixteen thirty six on behalf of our said members and john winthrop jr and was to last for one year who actually wrote this commission we do not know but the connecticut men said afterwards that it arose from the desire of the people who removed because they did not want to go away without a frame of government agreed on beforehand and did not want to recognize any claims of the massachusetts jurisdiction over them by virtue of patent apparently the people going to connecticut wanted to get as far away from massachusetts as possible armed with their commission in the summer of sixteen thirty six members of the newtown church to the number of about one hundred persons led by thomas hooker their pastor and samuel stone his assistant made a famous pilgrimage under summer skies through the woods that lay between massachusetts and the connecticut river bearing mrs hooker in a litter and driving their cattle before them these courageous pioneers men women and children after a fortnight's journeying reached hartford the site of their future home already occupied by those who had foregathered there in number larger even than those who had newly arrived at about the same time william pinchin and others of roxbury acting from similar motives took the same course westward but instead of continuing down the connecticut river as the others had done stopped at its banks and made their settlement at agawam springfield where they built a warehouse and a wharf for use in trade with the indians the lower settlements hartford weathersfield and windsor became agricultural communities but springfield standing at the junction of indian trails and river communication was destined to become the center of the beaver trade of the region shipping furs and receiving commodities through boston either in shallops around the cape or on pack horses overland by the path the emigrants had trod pension settlement was one of the towns named in the commission and for the first year after it was founded joined with the others in maintaining order in the colony the commission government came to an end in march sixteen thirty seven and there is reason to think that during the last month an election of committees took place in hartford weathersfield and windsor which would show that the connecticut settlers were exercising The privilege of the franchise, more than a year before Hooker preached his famous sermon, declaring that the right of government lay in the people.

Step into the world of power, loyalty, and luck.

From them certain investigators have drawn conclusions differing greatly from the materialistic official verdict, but such speculations have little chance for belief among the conservative.

The case of these imaginative theorists has not been helped by the action of superstitious Dr. Dexter, who threw the curious box and angled stone, an object certainly self-luminous as seen in the black windowless steeple where it was found, into the deepest channel of Narragansett Bay.

Excessive imagination and neurotic unbalance on Blake's part, aggravated by knowledge of the evil bygone cult whose startling traces he had uncovered, formed the dominant interpretation given those final frenzied jottings.

These are the entries, or all that can be made of them.