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colonial history

New England’s First Newspaper Lasted for Just One Issue

New England’s first newspaper came about in 1690, a period of political turmoil in Massachusetts. News of the overthrow of James II of England in the Glorious Revolution had reached Boston. The king’s governor, Sir Edmund Andros, had been overthrown in 1689 and Gov. Simon Bradstreet was returned, temporarily, to power.

Governor Bradstreet put an end to New England’s first newspaper.

Perhaps Benjamin Harris expected that the change meant a more open approach to government. Perhaps he thought no one would bother to stop him. Whatever the case, he launched a newspaper on September 25, 1690, Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, without government approval.

New England’s First Newspaper

Harris had to pay a fine in England for sedition when he published an anti-Catholic pamphlet opposing James II’s coronation. With James gone, he determined to pick up where he left off, only this time in the colonies.

His newspaper reported on the capture of two children from Chelmsford by American Indians. It also included the suicide of a newly widowed man in Watertown, a report of a fire in Boston and an update on ongoing smallpox outbreaks.

18th-century printing press.

When it strayed into national affairs, however, the newspaper got into trouble.

For starters, the newspaper published some gossip about the French royal family. Perhaps Harris assumed that Louis XIV was fair game since his cousin, James II had gone.

“(The King of ) France is in much trouble (and fear) not only with us but also with his Son, who has revolted against him lately, and has great reason, if reports be true, that the Father used to lie with the Son’s Wife,” the newspaper reported. “He has got all the Huguenots, and all the dissatisfied Papists, with the great force of the Duke of Lorraine, and are now against him, resolving to depose him of his life and Kingdom.”

Harrison also took the opportunity to criticize Fitz-John Winthrop, an Andros ally dispatched to fight the French in Acadia. Winthrop’s company had captured some prisoners, “whom they used in a manner too barbarous for any English to approve.”

Again, with Andros out, Harrison may have thought criticizing the treatment of prisoners was fair game. He was wrong.

Governor Bradstreet and the executive council immediately issued an order banning the newspaper from publishing:

“The Governour and Council having had the perusal of the said Pamphlet, and finding that therein is contained Reflections of a very high nature and also sundry doubtful and uncertain Reports, do hereby manifest and declare their high Resentment and Disallowance of said Pamphlet, and Order that the same be suppressed and called in; strictly forbidding any person or persons for the future to Set forth anything in Print without License first obtained from those that are or shall be appointed by the government to grant the same.”

It would take a few more decades for an active press to survive.

This story updated in 2022.

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Martha Hilton Wentworth Chooses a Husband

Colonial Governor Benning Wentworth of New Hampshire assembled the cream of Portsmouth society for a dinner in March of 1760, and he had a surprise in store. For his maid to enter the room wouldn’t be surprising, exactly. Except she wasn’t there to serve the meal, she was there to get married — to the governor — and become Martha Hilton Wentworth.

Martha Hilton Wentworth

Governor Wentworth, at 64, already attained the status of widower and his two sons had died. He hoped to produce an heir. Martha, 23, decided the crotchety, portly, gout-beset Wentworth was husband material and the two tied the knot right there in the midst of the high society of the colony. For 10 years, the couple remained married until, in 1770, the governor died — still without an heir.

Martha Hilton Wentworth Stuns

Given the stiff class structure of the day, Martha struggled to transition from servant to the upper reaches of Portsmouth society. One story holds that one of her servants refused to take an order from her because of her recent position. But she made her way, until an even bigger scandal enveloped her.

When Benning died, his descendants discovered he had made a will that dramatically altered the disposition of his estate. His nephew John, who would go on to be governor after Benning’s death, had expected to inherit. Instead, Martha inherited all of the dead governor’s property.

Soon after, John set out to strip his aunt of much of her wealth. Benning had reserved for himself a choice plot of land in every town where he granted a charter. That land now belonged to Martha. As governor, John declared the grants of land that Benning had made to himself illegal, and he granted the land to new parties. His goal, he said, was to put it in the hands of people who would farm it.

Fight For The Estate

John Wentworth’s actions were swiftly challenged, and the case was taken back to England for the king and his court to decide. The Wentworths were a well-connected clan among the British aristocracy, both in the new world and the old. After a surprisingly up-and-down battle, John Wentworth won the right to dispose of Benning’s grants and Martha lost much of the property.

But if revenge tastes best when served cold, Martha had a tasty and very cold dish in November of 1789. She would host George Washington in Benning Wentworth’s former mansion in Portsmouth and even escort the newly sworn-in president to church services in the newly liberated country.

The wedding would remain the talk of New England for more than a century. Poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow would even revive the story in a poem, Lady Wentworth, that he wrote in 1863.

This post updated in 2023.

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Remembering the Great Colonial Hurricane of 1635

The Great Colonial Hurricane, possibly the strongest storm in New England’s history, struck on Aug. 25, 1635. The Rev. Richard Mather and Anthony Thacher had the misfortune of being on board ships that day.

The James unloading after a somewhat more serene trip than it had during the Great Colonial Hurricane of 1635.

Mather, father to Increase Mather and grandfather to Cotton Mather, had been suspended by the Church of England for failing to conform to church expectations in conducting services, particularly in his dress. With his prospects limited in Britain, Mather decided he had better opportunities in the New World.

He set out on his journey to Boston with his wife, father-in-law and four children in June 1635. They were among 100 passengers on the James, one of five ships carrying Puritans during the Great Migration. Three smaller ships on the journey crossed quickly and landed safely.

The James (at 220 tons) and the Angel Gabriel (at 240 tons) were slower and crossed together for most of the trip. During early July they parted company, with the James moving somewhat faster.

Both arrived in the teeth of the hurricane, however. Both ships had to wait out the storm off the coast. The Angel Gabriel was able to send most of its passengers ashore at Pemaquid in Maine, and they slept as guests of the villagers already living there while their ship rested at anchor in the harbor.

Great Colonial Hurricane

Richard Mather

By morning, the storm tore the Angel Gabriel from its anchor and reduced it to rubble. The several crew and passengers who stayed on board were lost and the remaining passengers were left to recover what they could of their belongings from the surf.

Farther south down the coast, the James had its own problems. The captain tried to find a safe harbor at the Isles of Shoals, but lost all his anchors in the effort as none of his cables were strong enough to withstand the storm.

On board, the passengers feared the worst as the wind and 20-foot storm surge began pushing the ship steadily toward the rocks. Waiting and watching as the ship edged nearer to calamity, the crew finally rejoiced when storm moved northeast. The hurricane winds reversed and began pushing the ship away from the islands.

Now, however, the ship faced the danger of crashing onto the rocks on land. With a careful deployment of a storm sail, the crew managed to direct the vessel into Hampton Harbor, where it finally found refuge. The James limped into Boston, its sails in tatters.

Mather described the passengers’ feelings in his diary:

When news was brought to us in the gun room that the danger was past, oh how our hearts did then relent and melt within us! And how we burst into tears of joy amongst ourselves, in love onto our gracious God, and admiration of his kindness in granting to his poor servants such an extraordinary and miraculous deliverance.

Watch and Wait

The news was not so good even farther to the south. Anthony Thacher and his cousin Avery had packed up their families and one family friend – 19 in all – and boarded a small ship, the Watch and Wait. They left for a journey that would take them from Ipswich, Mass., out around Cape Ann, and into Marblehead, where the families planned to relocate.

Together with four sailors, the hurricane caught the two families on board their vessel off Gloucester, Mass. The sailors made what seemed a sensible decision to try to ride out the rough weather at anchor.

Thacher Island today

But in the winds of the hurricane, it was a fatal choice as no anchor would hold. The wind and waves tossed the ship until it came crashing upon the rocks of an island off shore. The roiling sea smashed apart the small boat.

As the mariners were washed into the sea, Thacher bemoaned the ship’s fate, close to land but hung up on the rocks. He later wrote, “O cousin, it hath pleased God to cast us here between two rocks, the shore not far from us, for I saw the tops of trees when I looked forth.”

Resigned to his fate, he said to his cousin, “I am willing and ready here to die with you and my poor children. God be merciful to us and receive us to himself!”

The waves crashed over the boat, carrying Thacher and all his family into the sea. For a time, they managed to cling to a rock, but soon the storm swept them away. The waves carried Thacher and his wife to safety on the island. All the rest drowned.

The Damage Done

The Thacher monument. Photo courtesy Boston Public Lilbrary.

The Thacher monument. Photo courtesy Boston Public Library.

On land, the damage was staggering. The tides at Narragansett Bay were reported at 20 feet higher than normal. Unknown numbers of Native Americans caught in the surge drowned. Buildings in Plymouth and Bourne blew down and flooded. The storm damaged Boston less than Providence, but downed trees throughout the colony.

William Bradford, in Of Plymouth Plantation 1620-1647, called it “a mighty storm of wind and rain.” None living in these parts, either English or Indians, ever saw anything worse, he wrote. Indians climbed into trees for their safety.

“It blew down many hundred thousands of trees, turning up the stronger by the roots and breaking the higher pine trees off in the middle,” he wrote. “And the tall young oaks and walnut trees of good bigness were wound like a withe, very strange and fearful to behold.”

Legacy

Bradford predicted the marks of the great colonial hurricane would remain for a century.

Though the storm was noted in the records of the Virginia colony at Jamestown, it was not recorded as a major event, probably because it didn’t make landfall. When it hit New England, it was probably what today we would call a category three or four storm, with winds well over 100 miles per hour. Meteorologists reckon it the strongest storm to hit north of North Carolina.

Diarists noted as late as 1685 that they could still see damage from the storm. Thacher Island in Rockport, Mass., granted by the General Court to Anthony Thacher after the storm, still bears his name. It’s now home to twin lighthouses. Thacher ultimately settled in Yarmouth, Mass., where he is buried near a monument named after him.

This story was updated in 2023. Images: Thacher Island By Tim Pierce – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11761953.

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