Massachusetts Bay Colony
The
Massachusetts Bay Colony (sometimes called the
Massachusetts Bay Company, for the institution that founded it) was an
English settlement on the east coast of North America in the 17th century, in
New England, centered around the present-day cities of
Salem and
Boston. The area is now in the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts, one of the 50
United States.
Caution: Some sources use Julian calendar dates before 1753.Given the overlapping
land patents that various colonial groups obtained from English kings and companies, and later consolidation of territory into the
Thirteen Colonies, several pre-existing groups would later become directly involved in the history of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
The
Virginia Company of Plymouth was granted land from the 38th parallel to the 45th as part of the
Virginia Charter in 1606. The only settlement, the
Popham Colony (at the mouth of the
Kennebec River in present-day
Maine) was abandoned 1608. Land south of the 41st parallel (south of about
Long Island Sound) was awarded to the sister
Virginia Company of London, which had previously held joint claim to this territory.
In 1620, the territory of defunct "Plymouth Company" was reorganized under the
Plymouth Council for New England.
King James I granted a charter for all the lands in America between 40° North and 48° N, "throughout the Maine Land from Sea to Sea." This included everything from the middle of present-day
New Jersey in the south to present-day
New Brunswick and
Nova Scotia in the north.
Later in 1620, a group of settlers who wanted to separate from the Church of England, now referred to as the
Pilgrims, sailed from
England on the
Mayflower and independently founded the
Plymouth Colony on land owned by the Plymouth Council. The first settlement of the colony is now the site of
Plymouth, Massachusetts.
The writing of the
Mayflower Compact and the founding of the
Plymouth Colony are taught in the United States as seminal events in the history of the nation. But it was the Massachusetts Bay Colony and its successors around the
Salem and
Boston areas which would come to dominate the New England region in population and economic strength. And it was Massachusetts Bay that would give its name to the
Province of Massachusetts when it absorbed Plymouth and other neighboring colonies in 1691-1692.
The
Province of Maine was granted a royal patent in 1622, which included the coast from the
Merrimack River (which is slightly south of the current Massachusetts-New Hampshire border) to the
Kennebec River (in the middle of the coast of present-day Maine).
The 1623
Sheffield Patent allocated
Cape Ann to Robert Cushman, Edward Winslow, and their associates. During the winter of 1623-1624,
John White and the
Dorchester Company settled on this land at Stage Point (present-day
Gloucester, Massachusetts). In 1625, they invited
Roger Conant to run the fishing colony.[
1]They were joined by some members of the
Plymouth Colony. [
2]By 1626, the attempted had failed. Most colonists returned to England, but Conant lead about 20 to Naumkeag[
3] (which was renamed
Salem in 1629[
4]), where they set up a trading post.
The bankrupt Dorchester Company (in 1627?) was then superseded by the
New England Company (which had overlapping membership).[
5] The Company received a land patent from the Plymouth Council for New England extending from the
Merrimack River to the
Charles River plus three miles on either side.[
6]
John Endicott led a group of
Puritan settlers to Salem, and served as governor from their arrival on
September 6,
1628.
The
Massachusetts Bay Company replaced both of these when the Puritans were able to convert the patents into a royal charter on
March 4,
1629, which styled them the "Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England".[
7]
The first 400 settlers under this new charter departed in April 1629. Most, but not all of the members of the Company were
Puritans, and events during the spring and summer of 1629 convinced them they could only remain
non-conformists in the
Church of England by getting out of England.
Charles I had dissolved the parliament, and
William Laud, the
Bishop of London, renewed his pressure on the separatist Puritans to conform with church practices. His harassment was a direct cause of the progressively larger emigration, also called the
Winthrop Fleet, over the next few years.
Perhaps by oversight, the company's charter made no mention of the location of its headquarters. On August 29, the shareholders who wished to move to America reached an agreement (
The Cambridge Agreement) and bought out those who wished to remain in England. So when
John Winthrop set out with the next wave of 700 settlers in March of 1630 (The
Winthrop Fleet of 1630), they carried their Charter with them, and Winthrop replaced Endicott as governor of the Colony.
When they reached their destination, the leadership and headquarters of the Colony and the Company were united in America.
Charlestown was the first capital of Massachusetts Bay, but the water there was inadequate, so it was moved across the Charles River to
Boston.
The idea that this colony was a community with a special covenant with God was laid out in Winthrop's sermon, "A
City upon a Hill." The idea that theirs was a holy community shaped life in the colony enormously, making it imperative that colonists legislate morality, enforcing marriage, church attendance, and education in the Word of God as well as relentlessly seeking out and punishing sin and sinners.
The colony celebrated its first
Thanksgiving Day on
July 8,
1630.
Massachusetts Bay continued its rapid growth, in spite of serious difficulties. During the first winter (1630-1631), over 200 died. When the next ships came, more chose to return to England. This was, in fact, the only tragic winter faced by the young colony. Since the pressures on the Puritan non-conformists at home continued, so did increasing and rapid immigration, and by the end of 1631 the colony numbered over 2,000. Over the next several years, as
Archbishop Laud continued to add
rigor to the Church hierarchy, the growth continued. Ministers rejected in England also made the trip with their flocks, so
John Cotton,
Roger Williams,
Thomas Hooker, and others became leaders of Puritan congregations in Massachusetts.
The colony's charter granted, to the
Massachusetts General Court, the authority to elect officers and to make laws for the colony. Its first meeting in America was held October of 1630, but was attended by only eight
freemen. They voted to grant all legislative, executive, and judicial power to a "Council" of the Governor's assistants (those same eight men). They then set up town boundaries, created taxes, and elected officers. To quell unrest caused by this limited franchise, the eight then added 118 settlers to the court as freemen, but power remained with the council. The first murmers against the system arose when a tax was imposed on the entire colony in 1632, but Winthrop was able to quiet fears.
In 1634, the issue of governance arose again, and a group headed by
Thomas Dudley demanded to see the charter that had been kept hidden from them. They learned of the provisions that the general court should make all laws, and that all freemen should be members. The group demanded that the charter be enforced to the letter, but eventually reached a compromise with governor Winthrop. They agreed to a General Court made up of two delegates elected by each town, the Governor's council of advisors, and the Governor himself. This Court was to have authority over "The raising up public stock" (taxes) and "what they shold agree upon should bind all." What Winthrop did not expect was that "binding" included the election of the governor, and Dudley was elected.
The first revolution was complete: a trading company had become a representative democracy. By 1641, the colony had added its first code of laws, the
Massachusetts Body of Liberties[
8], written by
Nathaniel Ward, based partly on John Cotton's draft (
Abstract of the Laws of New-England, As They Are Now Established), [
9] which specified required behavior and punishments by appeal to the Judeo-Christian social sanctions recorded in the Bible. It is worthy of note that these men did not see any tension between the kind of
theocracy they advocated and the type of
democracy that was taking shape; to the contrary, they even held that the one required the other. For example: "All magistrates are to be chosen. Deut. 1:13, 17, 15. First, by the free [people]. Secondly, out of the free [people]." (Cotton,
ibid., I.1, para. 1-2). Indeed, the first person to be executed in the colony was Margaret Jones, a female physician accused of being a "
witch"
[ Howard W. Haggard, Devils, Drugs, and Doctors: The Story of the Science of Healing from Medecine-Man to Doctor (1929; New York: Pocket Books, 1959, p.73) ISBN 0766135829 ].
The
Province of New Hampshire was part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony from 1641 to 1679, and again from 1688 to 1691.
In 1643, Massachusetts Bay joined
Plymouth Colony,
Connecticut Colony, and
New Haven Colony in the
New England Confederation, which became largely dormant into the 1650s. It was revived briefly in the 1670s during
King Philip's War.
From 1686, Massachusetts Bay was administratively unified by the English king with the other New England colonies in the
Dominion of New England. In 1688, the
Province of New York,
East Jersey, and
West Jersey were added. In 1689, the Dominion was dissolved with the overthrow of the king.
In 1691-1692, Massachusetts Bay was unified with
Plymouth Colony,
Martha's Vineyard,
Nantucket, the
Province of Maine and what is now
Nova Scotia to form the
Province of Massachusetts Bay.
*
Governor of Massachusetts, for a complete list of Governors from colonial times to the present.
