Settlers in New Hampshire

Meanwhile, Gorges and Mason had projected plans for a very extensive colonization. They obtained a patent for the country along the coast of New England between the Merrimac and Kennebec Rivers, and back to the St. Lawrence, under the title of the "Province of Laconia." It was represented to be a terrestrial paradise in beauty and fertility. Settlements at various points were projected and attempted, but none seem to have become permanent until about the year 1630. Mason and Gorges had agreed to divide their territory at the Piscataqua River, and in 1629 the former obtained a patent for the country between that river and the Merrimac, and gave it the name of New Hampshire. He built a house at the mouth of the Piscataqua, in 1631, and named the spot Portsmouth. He had been governor of Portsmouth, in Hampshire county, England, and these names he transferred to his new territory and first permanent settlement. Four years afterwards he died. His widow tried in vain to manage his large landed estate profitably. It passed into the possession of his retainers in payment for their services. These settlers were now left to themselves to fashion an independent state, but it was of slow growth. There was then only one agricultural settlement in all New England, excepting in Massachusetts, and scarcely the germ of a state had appeared. The colonists were mostly squatters, and moved frequently from place to place. They were chiefly hunters and fishermen, and cultivated the soil only for the production of a few vegetables and a little maize or Indian corn. Their huts were scattered along the harbors; and when some families came to Maine to establish a farming community, they were laughed at by the older residents as visionaries, and they went to the Plymouth colony. The whole enterprise was unprofitable to the proprietors. From the beginning the expenses had been greater than the receipts, and now the jealousy of different parties threatened the Company with utter ruin, whilst the French, resolved to maintain their hold upon New France, were building huts at the mouth of the Penobscot, and threatening to seize the territory between that river and the Kennebec. The Indians, too, were showing restlessness.

In this unpromising state of the affairs of the Plymouth Company, Gorges was again summoned before the House of Commons to show cause why the charter should not be revoked. The merchants were restive under the restrictions of the monopoly; the Commons regarded it as a royal instrument; churchmen looked upon it as a foe to prelacy, because Puritans were sheltered on its domain; and the new king, Charles (whose father had died in 1625), suspected the New England colonists were enjoying liberties inconsistent with the royal prerogative. Charles was as bigoted a believer in the divine right of kings as his father, and that belief manifested in practice proved his ruin.

Gorges defended the Company against the various charges with vigor, but he and his associates perceived that further contention for its existence would be useless. Therefore they prepared for its dissolution by dividing North Virginia into twelve royal provinces, assigning each to persons named; and at their last meeting in April, 1635, they caused to be entered upon their minutes the following record: "We have been bereaved of friends; oppressed by losses, expenses and troubles; assailed before the Privy Council again and again with groundless charges; and weakened by the French and other foes without and within the realm, and what remains is only a breathless carcass. We, therefore, now resign the patent to the king, first reserving all grants by us made and all vested rights--a patent we have holden about fifteen years."

The king appointed eleven of his Privy Council a "Board of Lords Commissioners of all the American Plantations," and committed to them the general direction of colonial affairs. Gorges, then sixty years of age, and robust in mind and body, was appointed Governor-General over New England. A ship-of-war was in preparation to bring him to America, but was broken in the launching, and the baronet never crossed the Atlantic Ocean. His nephew, William Gorges, was sent over as his lieutenant, to administer the government. He made his headquarters at Saco, where he found about one hundred and fifty inhabitants governed by a voluntary social compact. There he established a regular government on the 28th of March, 1636, the first within the State of Maine. Soon afterward a royal charter made the elder Gorges lord proprietor of a large territory in that region, called the "Province or County of Maine." Gratified by this mark of royal favor, he began energetically in his old age to devise laws for his palatinate, such as a soldier and royalist would be likely to conceive, but they were little heeded in America. Gorges lived eight years in the enjoyment of his vice-regal honors, and soon after his death his province passed under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts.

Feeble and scattered settlements grew in New Hampshire, and in 1641 these formed a union with the flourishing Massachusetts colony, and remained a part of that province until 1680, when the king ordered their separation, and the more feeble partner became a royal province. Its first governor (John Cutts) was appointed by the Crown, who was assisted by a council also made by royal appointment; and there was a house of representatives elected by the people. Then was laid the foundation of the Commonwealth of New Hampshire.