THE VOYAGE OF THE HECTOR

It was a great undertaking for the. company which gradually gathered around Davenport and the Eatons, to prepare for a voyage across the Atlantic, and a permanent residence in the New World. The ministers could perhaps embark, with their books and household-stuff, in a few days; but merchants engaged in foreign commerce needed several months, after deciding to emigrate, for the conversion of their capital into money, or into merchandise suitable for the adventure in which they were engaging. But this company projected something more than emigration. They were not to scatter themselves, when they disembarked, among the different settlements already established in New England, but to remain together, and lay the foundation 'of a new and isolated community. For this reason a more comprehensive outfit was necessary than if ,they had expected to become incorporated, individually or. collectively, in communities already planted. In addition to the stores shipped by individuals, there must be many things provided for the common good, by persons acting in behalf of the whole company. There is evidence, that, after the expedition arrived at New Haven, its affairs

were managed like those of a joint-stock association, and therefore some ground for believing, that, from the beginning, those who agreed to emigrate in this company, or at least some of them, associated themselves together as partners in the profit and loss of the adventure. Higginson, some years before, had advised emigrants that " it were a wise course for those that are of abilities to join together and buy a ship for the voyage;" alleging as a reason, that transportation was so dear as five pounds a man, and ten pounds a horse, and commonly three pounds for every ton of goods. " All that come," he says, " must have victuals with them for a twelvemonth." Still earlier, Winslow had written from Plymouth, "Bring good store of clothes and bedding with you. Bring paper and linseed-oil for your windows, with cotton-yarn for your lamps." These directions, intended in both cases for emigrants coming to join communities already established, illustrate the need of studious foresight and careful cooperation in a company of persons proposing not only to remove to New England, but to begin a new and independent plantation. Davenport and Eaton had learned by experience, in fitting out vessels for the Massachusetts Bay Company, what would be needed in a new settlement, and were as well qualified, perhaps, as any could be, to prepare a list of necessary articles. The Abigail, the first ship which came to' Salem, brought ten thousand bricks as ballast; and bricks with " London " stamped on them were found at the demolition of a very ancient house in

New Haven. It is not certain that the vessel in which Davenport and Eaton embarked, was, like the Abigail, ballasted with bricks; but the fact that bricks were sometimes brought from England illustrates the care with which emigrant-ships were fitted out. The Abigail brought also sea-coals, but all freighters must have soon learned that it was useless to carry fuel- to a country so well timbered as New England. An emigrant-ship was further ballasted with iron, steel, lead, nails, and other heavy articles of utility. The bulk of the cargo consisted of apparel, bedding, food, tools, arms, ammunition, and seeds. Neat-cattle and goats were usually taken, and sometimes horses. Thb Massachusetts Bay Company had a rule, that a ship of two hundred tons should not carry above one hundred passengers, and other ships were limited after the same proportion. In the summer of 1636, several vessels recently arrived from England being in the harbor of Boston, Thomas Miller, the master's mate of one of them, was apprehended and brought before the Governor and Council, for saying, to some who came on board, that the colonists were traitors and rebels because they did not display the king's colors at the fort. The ship on which this insufferable speech was spoken was the Hector of London, William Femes, master. Sailing from Boston in July, she was chartered after her arrival. The writer remembers to have seen some of these bricks taken from the Atwater house of which Dr. Dana in his Century Sermon speaks as built by Joshua Atwater, one of the emigrants. I think, however, that the house was built by a nephew of Joshua Atwater. Certainly Thomas Att-water (as he chose to write his name), who in Dr. Dana's time occupied the house, was not descended from Joshua Atwater, but from his brother David.

in London by the company whose origin has been related in the preceding chapter. While they were preparing her for another voyage to Boston, she was seized by the Lords of the Admiralty for the king's service, as will appear from the following petition without date, but indorsed, " Received January, 1637:" - " To the Right Honorable the Lords and other Commissioners of his Majesty's High Court of Admiralty :- "The humble petition of the Owners and Freighters of the good ship called the Hector of London, " Humbly showeth unto your honors that your petitioners having contracted for a voyage with the said ship from here to New England for a plantation there, and from there to divers parts in the Streights, the freighters have made ready all their provisions and passengers, fitting both for the said voyage and plantation, and most of them thereupon engaged their whole estates and paid part of their moneys. Since which agreement and preparation made, the said ship is impressed for his Majesty's service whereby she is hindered from proceeding on the said intended voyage. " Their most humble suit therefore is that in respect of the petitioners' great charges already arisen before the impressing of the ship, and her not proceeding on her voyage will tend to the great loss, if not utter undoing of divers of your honors' suppliants, and for that, if it pleased God the ship do safely returne, the Custom to his Majesty of the goods to be imported in her from the Streights hither will amount to .Ł3000 at the least, your Lordships would be pleased to give order and warrant for the release of the said ship from her impression that so she may proceed on her said voyage, " And they as in duty bound shall daily pray." This petition was supported by the following certificate, signed by Samuel Hutchinson, Richard Hutchin-son, and Arthur Hollingworth, who were perhaps the owners of the Hector:- " We whose names are hereunto subscribed do hereby certify that the good ship called the Hector of London was contracted for,

for a voyage, and that provision was made and provided before the said ship was impressed for the king's Majesty's service. In testimony whereof we have hereunder set our names the nineteenth of January A. D. 1637." On the 23d of the same month the Secretary of the Admiralty wrote to Sir .William Russell, through whom the petition, with others of like import, had reached them, as follows : - "Sir,- The Lords Commissioners for the Admiralty (having perused your letter of the 2ist of this month touching the merchant ships ordered to be taken up for his Majesty's service) have commanded me to signify to you that they think it not fit to release any of the said ships upon the pretences expressed in your letter (albeit the same may be true) in regard they perceive by your letter that there are not at present any merchant ships in the Thames fit to send in their places. But when you shall certify their Lordships that there are other merchant ships in the river of the like burden and force, fit for his Majesty's service that may be completely fitted and ready by the 2oth of April next, their Lordships will consider further of the allegations of the owners of the four ships mentioned in your said letter and declare their further pleasure thereupon." Not entirely discouraged by this reply, the captain of the Hector presented another petition without date, but indorsed, "1637, February 14:" - " To the Right Honorable the Lords and other Commissioners of the Admiralty : - "The humble petition of William Femes, master of the ship called the Hector, "Humbly showeth that whereas the petitioner hath been an humble suitor to your honors for the releasing of the said ship; for that there was a contract and provision was made for a voyage long before, which tends to the ruin of many, except your honors be pleased to give order for her discharge; for that there are

divers ships come in more fit and able for his Majesty's service, viz., the Vinty about 300 tons and 22 pieces of ordnance; the Royal Defence 300 tons and upwards, with 22 pieces of ordnance; the Pleiades 350 tons, 26 ordnance; Prudence 370 tons, 28 pieces ordnance; one whereof Mr. Wise is master, 350 tons and 24 pieces of ordnance; " His humble suit therefore is that your honors will please to give order that the said ship called the Hector may be discharged for the reasons aforesaid, that she may go on in her intended voyage, " And the petitioner with many others shall pray." Ultimately, the Hector was released; and from an order of the king in council, that the Pleiades, with other impressed vessels, should be ready for sea on the 25th of April, it may be inferred that she was substituted for the Hector. The reader will have noticed that the names of the freighters are withheld in all these negotiations for the release of their ship. It is alleged that many will suffer, and perhaps be undone, but there is nothing to call attention to any individuals as engaged in the enterprise. The lords of the council were not ignorant that considerable emigration to New England had already taken place, or that the exodus still continued; but they believed that those who went were for the most part poor and mean people, who would be of little advantage at home and might, if colonized, be of use by increasing foreign commerce. Moreover they were unaware how strongly this emigration was leavened with Puritanism. If they had known that several wealthy merchants of London, inclined to non-conformity, had embarked their whole estates in the Hector, and were intending to go to New England with their families to find there a permanent residence, they would have found means to

frustrate the undertaking. On the 30th of April proclamation was made, "that the king -being informed that great numbers of his subjects are yearly transported into those parts of America which have been granted by patent to several persons, and there settle themselves, some of them with their families and whole estates, amongst whom are many idle and refractory humors, whose only or principal end is to live without the reach of authority - doth command his officers and ministers of the ports, not to suffer any persons, being subsidy men or of their value, to pass to any of those plantations without a license from his Majesty's commissioners for plantations first obtained; nor any under the degree of subsidy men, without a certificate from two justices of the peace where they lived, that they have taken the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and a testimony from the minister of the parish, of their conformity to the orders and discipline of the Church of England." As the Hector arrived in Boston on the 26th of June, we may infer from the date of this proclamation that it was issued immediately after she had sailed, and that it was occasioned by the discovery of the true nature of an expedition in which several persons, being subsidy men, or of their value, had clandestinely left the kingdom and carried away their estates. If the ship was chartered by a joint-stock association, it does not follow that only shareholders took passage in her. The Massachusetts Bay Company had a regular tariff of rates at which they received all freight that was offered, and all passengers who were approved. Theophilus Eaton owned a sixteenth of the Arbella, which had been purchased expressly for that company's

service; and both he and Davenport, as directors of the company," had become familiar with its methods. The rates of that company were five pounds for the passage of an adult, and four pounds for a ton of goods. The association of adventurers which chartered the Hector would- naturally adopt similar methods and similar rates. Having secured accommodation for themselves and their families, and for the freight which belonged to the association and to the individuals composing it, they would receive persons not shareholders, at the regular rates. Some of the emigrants may have been precluded from taking stock in the association by the expenses of emigration; but the originators of the enterprise would naturally desire that all who were of sufficient ability should have a pecuniary interest in its welfare. There was at least one passenger who did not come as an emigrant. Winthrop writes in his journal, "In the Hector came also the Lord Leigh, son and heir of the Earl of Marlborough, being about nineteen years of age, who came only to see the country. He was of very sober carriage, especially in the ship, where he was much disrespected and unworthily used by the master, one Femes, and some of the passengers; yet he bore it meekly and silently."' ' Before the Hector sailed, the company which chartered her had so increased that it became necessary to hire another vessel to accompany her on the voyage; but the name of the vessel has not been preserved to us. This unexpected increase was due to the accession 1 Winthrop perhaps changed his mind about Lord Leigh, when that youth, having accepted the governor's invitation to a dinner-party made expressly to honor him, was persuaded by Harry Vane to absent himself.

of those who have been mentioned* as coming from Kent and from Herefordshire. Concerning the latter, we have no means of determining when Prudden began to negotiate with Davenport; but the men of Kent appear to have joined the expedition after the Hector was engaged for the voyage. Their departure was so hasty that many who. wished to go were forced to wait for another opportunity, and came out two years afterward in the first ship which sailed from England direct to the harbor of New Haven. No documents have yet been found which indicate the day when the Hector and her consort sailed from London, or the manner in which the officers of the port discharged their official duty in examining the certificates of the passengers. Similar requirements to those prescribed by the proclamation of April 50 had been made by a proclamation issued more than two years earlier, but were nevertheless insufficient to prevent the emigration of Puritans. Many found no difficulty in obtaining a bona-fide certificate of conformity, and it does not appear that any objected to the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. If unable to obtain a certificate from the minister of the parish where they had lived, they came, some clandestinely, and some under borrowed names and corresponding passports. It is said that John Aylmer, Bishop of London in Queen Elizabeth's time, and an exile for religion in Queen

Mary's reign, was so small of stature, that, when the searchers were clearing the ship in which he made his escape, the merchant put him into a great wine'-butt that had a partition in the middle, so that Aylmer was enclosed in the hinder part while the searchers drank of the wine which they saw drawn out of the head on the other part.' The Puritans of the seventeenth century were capable of exercising equal ingenuity when necessary ; but, in a ship full of his friends, a person obnoxious to the government might be secreted for an hour without so much trouble, even if the searching officer were in sympathy with the lords of .the Privy Council. In many cases, however, the searcher discharged his duty perfunctorily, and with no earnest desire to discover and arrest those who embarked without the required certificates. If ever lists of the passengers in the Hector and her consort should be discovered, they will probably not contain the name of John Davenport or of Samuel Eaton. Two months was perhaps the average time consumed in sailing from London to Boston in the vessels of that day. The Arbella, when she brought Winthrop and his company, was a little more than two months from Yarmouth to Salem; and there is no intimation in his journal that the voyage was unexpectedly long. Hig-ginson says, " Our passage was short and speedy; for whereas we had three thousand miles English to sail from Old to New England, we performed the same in six weeks and three days." A passage was indeed sometimes made in less time, but in other instances was protracted to three months. A vessel made but one round

trip in a year, leaving England in the spring and arriving home in the autumn. Crowded cabins rendered the passage uncomfortable, even when speedy; but a protracted voyage often induced not only discomfort, but disease. None of the passengers in the Hector, or in the vessel which accompanied' her, having supplied us with his journal, we must avail ourselves of diaries of contemporary voyages if we would see them in imagination pursuing - their way down the Thames, through the - A BARQUE OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. Channel, and over the Atlantic, Sea-sickness reigned supreme as they passed along the southern coast of their native island; but in the first pleasant weather after they had gained the open sea, they "fetched out the children and others, that were sick and lay groaning in the cabins, and, having stretched a rope from the steerage to the mainmast, made them stand, some on one side and some on the other, and sway it up and down till they were warm. By this means they soon grew well and merry." Afterward, "when the ship

heaved and set more than usual, a few were sick, but of these such as came upon deck and stirred themselves were presently well again; therefore, our captain set our children and young men to some harmless exercises in which the seamen were very active, and did our people much good, though they would sometimes play the wags with them." Once or twice during the voyage the wind blew a gale; and the passengers being confined to the cabin united in the observance of a fast with a protracted service of prayer, which, when the wind subsided, was followed by a service of thanksgiving. " We constantly served God morning and evening, by reading and expounding a chapter, singing, and prayer; and the sabbath was solemnly kept by adding to the former, preaching twice, and catechising. Besides, the shipmaster a'nd his company used every night to set their eight and twelve o'clock watches with singing a psalm, and prayer that was not read out of a book." Sometimes one vessel so far outsailed her consort, that she must take in some sail, and stay for her, lest the two should be entirely separated for the remainder of the voyage. " Our captain, supposing us now to be near the coast, fitted on a new mainsail, that was very strong and double, and would not adventure with his old sails as before, when he had sea-room enough." " This evening we saw the new moon more than half an hour after sunset, being much smaller than it is at any time in England." "About four this morning, we sounded, and had ground at thirty fathom; and, it being somewhat calm, we put our ship a-stays, and took, in less than two hours, with a few hooks, sixty-seven codfish,

most of them very great fish. This came very seasonably, for our salt fish was now spent, and we were taking care for victuals this day, being a fish day." "We had now fair sunshine weather, and there came a smell off the shore like the smell of a garden." Four days later, both the ships lay at anchor, and the weary voyagers, were on shore, some gathering store of fine strawberries, and others entertained in the houses of friends, who feasted them with "good venison pasty, and good beer."

Atwater, Edward, History of the Colony of New Haven; 1880. (pp 46-58)
(http://www.quinnipiac.edu/other/abl/etext/colony/colonycomplete.html)

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