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CHAPTER V

KING’S COUNTY, THE PATRIARCHAL CONDITION. 1641-1751

The southwestern portion of our mainland contained the larger part of the Narragansett nation. Roger Williams, whose instincts for business were better than his political understanding, early saw the economic importance of the Narragansett¹ Country, and he built a trading-house near the present Wickford. It is claimed by some² that his adventure was even earlier than that of the actual settler, Richard Smith, who afterward added Roger Williams’ possessions to his own, when the proprietor needed the funds for his expenses in London, as he was getting the first charter.

About 1641, Richard Smith, who had been a resident of Taunton, bought land from the sachems and began “Howsing lands and meadow.” In the words of Francis Brinley, “among the thickest of the Indians (computed at 30,000) he erected a house for trade, and gave free entertainment to travelers; it being the great road of the country.”² The “Pequot Path” became a bridle path in the seventeenth century; in the eighteenth it was a link in the “Post Road,” then the most traveled way between Boston and New York. Smith’s settlement did not attain a permanent character, until the Pettaquamscutt purchase made by John Hull and others of Boston in 1658.

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The next year Major Atherton and his partners acquired the second purchase, covering Quidnesset and Boston Neck, the southeastern corner of our mainland.

Richard Smith deserves notice from his association with Roger Williams, and in that he was an important pioneer in the settlement of Rhode Island. In the words of his memorial tablet, “He lived near Wickford at Cocumscussuc commonly called Smith’s Castle and there Roger Williams often preached to the Indians and William Blackstone held the first regular services in the colony of Rhode Island.”⁴

At this period, contemporary with the coming of numbers of Quakers to Newport, our colonists were firmly established in the Narragansett country, until the Indian war of 1675 and 1676 should harass and interrupt them for a time. The “Swamp Fight” abolished this constant if latent source of peril. The Narragansetts were destroyed as an organized nation or political force, though the individual barbarians lived alongside our colonists. This early interim of occupation—peaceful so far as the red proprietors were concerned—did not mean that aggressive Puritans would leave the government of Rhode Island in peaceful possession. Massachusetts reached through Warwick, and down to Pawcatuck, arresting the citizens, Burdick and Saunders, for imprisonment in Boston in 1661. On the other side, the strong colony of Connecticut claimed jurisdiction by the King’s grant as far eastward as Narragansett Bay. John Crandall and others were seized and imprisoned in Hartford in 1671.

Misquamicut or Westerly had been purchased from Sosoa, chief of the Niantics, in 1661 by William Vaughn Stanton and others of Newport.

Proprietors from Newport bought lands across the

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Bay, and the estates improved under their care developed a social atmosphere differing from that of other parts of the colony. The merchants—as in the fable of Antæus—enjoying their return to mother earth were not quite like citizens of towns struggling to establish a new civic life. We shall see early in the eighteenth century how this social life affected the community at large.

Along with this patrician culture, there was another element in the life of the Seventh Day Baptists, a denomination very strong in Hopkinton and Westerly. The meeting of John Clarke and of Henry Collins, who was called a “Medici,” waned in Newport, in the latter eighteenth century; but it waxed strong in the western towns and by emigration into western New York. Seven persons seceded from the First Baptist Church at Newport in 1671 and organized the first Sabbatarian Church. A few of these soon joined the first freemen at Westerly. Their first meeting house was built about 1680, between Shattuck’s Weir and Potter Hill in the present town of Hopkinton.

When Mr. Prince of Cambridge visited Westerly in 1721, he reported “the Sectaries here are chiefly Baptists that keep Saturday as a Sabbath.” They were very liberal and catholic in their treatment of Prince. Earnest and conscientious, excellent citizens, the main tenet of this division of Baptists was separative rather than conciliatory, and they were protestants of the Protestants, tending toward isolation.

The Indian and negro population—well mixed after the abolition of slavery—was a drag on the best life of the time. Some colored families emerging from the mass, became landowners or mechanics and were most helpful citizens.

When Winthrop and Clarke negotiated in London for

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agreement in securing the charters of both colonies, the latter obtained a favorable position for Rhode Island, which Winthrop undoubtedly yielded lest he might lose the Connecticut charter altogether. Connecticut claimed that he exceeded his powers and asserted her sovereignty over the Narragansett country as has been noted. Twenty of her armed men crossed the Pawcatuck. On her part, Rhode Island seized John Greene of Quidnesset, who favored Connecticut, and carried him to Newport, threatening others with arrest.

The Narragansett proprietors, including Richard Smith and Increase Atherton, met July 2, 1663.⁵ They recorded that as “Poynt Juda” had no harbor and could not be improved for farms and plantations, for the present it should lie common to the twenty-two proprietors for their “Drye Cattle” and that two houses should be built. The next day they voted to place themselves under the protection of Connecticut Colony in preference to that of Rhode Island.

King Philip’s War in 1675 and 1676 laid waste the dwellings of the Narragansett Country, but the settlers soon recovered from these disasters. Industries were started in Westerly on the Pawcatuck River before the eastern part of the county had advanced so far. Joseph Wells at that point, built vessels for buyers in Connecticut as early as 1681.

We have details of the schooner “Alexander and Martha,” built by him and which sailed from New London, and the builder was to own at least one-eighth part. She was forty feet long, her deck falling by the wain mast, and had a cabin, cook room and forecastle.⁶

Revocation of the Edict of Nantes sent out an emigration,

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which became an important element in the population and in the life of America. No community then existing more effectually developed arts and crafts with corresponding culture than the Huguenots. Rhode Island gained much thereby and might have profited more had not the turbulent neighbors oppressed the first Huguenot settlers. In 1686, some forty-five of these French families settled in northern Kingston and southern East Greenwich, buying a large tract of the Atherton proprietors.⁷ Unfortunately this land was claimed by adjoining English settlers, with some show of right. In 1687, these contestants carried off forty loads of hay from the meadows of Frenchtown, as the hamlet was called. Governor Andros could not finally adjudicate the matter, and ordered a division of the hay, half to the English and half to the French. Two dozen dwellings had been occupied and a church built. Such oppressive treatment crushed this settlement and scattered the inhabitants. The Ayraults went to Newport. Many of the names, slightly Anglicized, remained in the South Country, and we may note the Mawneys (LeMoines), Chadseys, Tourgees, Tarboxes, Frys, and Nicholses. Remains of the original French orchard on the Mawney farm were visible in the nineteenth century.⁸ Current tradition attributed to the French the introduction of many fine varieties of the apple, pear, peach, plum and cherry and of choice flowers. The influence of these interesting pilgrims was an abiding one.

A horse-ferry was established between Kingstown and Conanicut, continuing to Newport in 1700. A new ferry from Kingstown to Conanicut was instituted in 1707. The Queen’s, afterward the “Post Road,” was laid out

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about 1703. It was still a bridle path when Madam Knight went over it in 1704. This indicates the settlement and improvement of the South County. The first bridge over the Pawcatuck at the old ford “Shaw’s” on the “Indian Trail” was built by contribution about 1712; the next in 1735, was one-half at the charge of the Rhode Island colony, and one-half was paid for by the town of Stonington. The fact that Stonington did so much, shows how important was this communication with New York and Boston.

Proprietorship in lands by the seashore influenced the community and carried it along lines differing somewhat from the ordinary town in New England. The Puritan element existed, but it proceeded differently. Prior to 1700, there came to this region, families attached to the worship of the Church of England. They were few in number, but “They were very earnest”⁹ for that faith. According to Doctor MacSparran, Trinity Church was built at Newport in 1702, and St. Paul’s, his own, in Narragansett in 1707.¹⁰ The first existing record of the latter is dated April 14, 1718,¹¹ and Gabriel Bernon was a vestryman. He was a Huguenot refugee from Rochelle and, soon removing to Providence, became very prominent in founding King’s or St. John’s Church there. He possessed a keen intellect, was liberal minded for his time and a firm believer in self-government. His positive views were formulated according to the time, but they were explicitly free and adumbrated the modern citizen. “Roger Williams and all those, that have settled in our Providence town, have been persecuted, bruised and banished out of Massachusetts government, for not submitting

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themselves to the arbitrary power of the Presbytery and we fear nothing more than this arbitrary power of the clergy. Power before Popery did ruin the world, and, since Popery, the arbitrary power of the clergy hath ruined Europe.”¹² An early effort to aid the woollen industry dates from 1719, when Col. George Hazard gave Thomas Culverwell one-half acre of land for a fulling-mill for “Promoting ye Wooling Manufactuary which may be for my benefit and the Publick Good.”¹³ The land was to be “drowned” in making the dam. These central fulling mills were essential for converting the homespun fabrics into substantial cloth. A fulling mill was established at Hamilton, then Bissell’s Mills, in 1720.¹⁴

One of the earliest inventories recorded is that of George Cook Feb. 3, 1703-4.¹⁵ His wearing apparel and arms stood at £14. Of the great household staple, the feather bed, he had two at £40, together with one silk grass and one wool bed at £.. Six pair sheets and one pair pillow beers at £6.10. One dozen napkins and one table cloth were appraised at £1.10. Brass, iron and pewter appropriated £8. In silver plate there was one cup and six spoons at £4.6. A fair line of cattle and sheep with ten of horsekind worth £40.16 comprised his stock; cared for by one negro at £30. The personal estate was £342.19.

There seemed to be a large proportion of horses in the different estates, caused by the demand for export probably. James Wilson with personal property at £367.7, in the following year had 31 horsekind at £74. Cattle and sheep at £187.5. He spent £20 on wearing apparel,

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while his household furnishing was narrow; the pewter, earthern ware and three candlesticks being worth only £3.10. One negro woman £15.

Robert Hannah in 1706 held the same tenets concerning corporeal immortality, we have noted elsewhere in the colony. “Nothing doubting but at the general Resurrection I shall receive the same (my body) again by the mighty power of God.” He was a thrifty man with £378.12 personal estate, and having left his sons provided with lands, cattle and negroes. His stock was worth £157.14. A negro woman and five children were valued at £110; three feather beds and one flock with furniture £26.

Almost everybody had spinning wheels and cards or combs, for woolen, worsted or linen yarns. There were many personal estates about £360 to £375. Young negroes appear to have been valued at prices relatively low. In 1710, one negro of 17 years, one boy of 4 years, one girl of 2 years, were lumped with a cart; yokes and tools at £98.18. A different class of society is represented in the property of Bethiah Collvill, widow, altogether £28.15. Her cow, swine, mares and eight sheep were worth £16.17. She had one bed and 7s. in pewter; two wheels and one pair cards at 8s. And in 1718, Katharine Bull had one new “sute uper clothing” £4.12. In head linen and rest of the wearing apparel £7. In pewter and tin £1.14, in iron and brass 9s., in wooden ware, etc., 7s. Her total personal estate was £30.16.

There were very few books mentioned. Rowse Helme in 1712, with personal estate of £284.17.1, had one bible and small books at 10s. His outfit indicates the slightly better style of living which was creeping in. Four feather beds, bedsteads and furniture stood at £30.9. One table cloth, 7 napkins, 1 sheet were valued at £1.11; nineteen

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napkins and two table cloths at £1.7, one bolster and nine pillow cases at £1. In pewter there was £4.1. There was £1.17.6 in 12½ yards new “flannen” and some cotton and woolen yarn. A negro man at £30, a woman at £15.

Samuel Perry in the year 1716¹⁶ marks a social lift in the various items of his personal estate £730.16. He not only dressed better but he displayed a watch and cane in his outfit of £53. The household furnishing was decidedly better; five feather beds and hangings with furniture at £100, one flock bed and fittings at £6, three beds and bedding for servants at £13.10. In cattle and cows £129.10. In horses, one three years old, five two years old and a yearling represented £62, with six mares and three colts at £52. The table and cooking service showed considerable betterment; £6.11 in tin ware, £11.5 in pewter, in brass ware including a warming pan £2.8; a bell metal skillet, a teapot and quart pot in copper £1.10; four brass candlesticks and snuffers £1.16. A chafing dish with box iron and heaters. One chest “draws” one “ovel” table (so much prized in Providence) all at £5.10. Chairs, two tables, joynt stool £2.16. One clock £18, (the first mentioned). One dozen silver spoons 8s. All his books £7. Smith’s “voyce and gleaszer’s” tools £5.5. Two negro slaves £130.

Perry was a considerable manufacturer for the time, having 8 looms and tackling at £20; two coppers one pair clothier’s shears, two press “plaits” and press papers, all at £21.15. If we compare the style of living indicated here, with that prevailing in Providence at the same period, we shall find it similar except in the table service of china and glassware.

Rowland Robinson, the father of Governor William,

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was a large landholder in the tract extending from Sugar Loaf Hill to the present Narragansett Pier and into Point Judith Neck. His house was on the site now occupied by Mr. Welch as “Shadow Farm” easterly from Wakefield by “Kit Robinson’s Pond.” The Robinson inventory was dated in 1716, the will having been made in 1712. He bequeathed his wife for life the house and 80 acres of land. To three married daughters he gave £40 each in money.

At his home farm, there were 462 sheep, 266 lambs, valued at £304.12. Fifty cows and a bull at £254, four oxen at £27. Horsekind worth £142, and 53 swine at £33.5. At the Point Judith farm there was £304.2 in cattle, sheep and horsekind. Nine negroes at £875, furnished the labor.

The feudal proprietor dressed about as well, expending £31.19, as the incipient manufacturer Perry, though he did not affect a watch and cane. The house furnishing was moderate, in four feather and two wool beds and furniture £47.6, in servant’s bedding £7. In table linen £4.18, and £24.19 for 21 sheets and 21 bolster and pillow cases. £5.9 was in 12 chairs, 1 table, I wheel, etc. Again 6 chairs stood at 14s. and one looking glass at 8s. There was an entire absence of the better class of furniture appearing elsewhere in the estates of wealthy men. In pewter ware, there was the respectable and usual sup-ply, costing £10.16, and there was £5.12 in silver spoons. The great bible, other books and a desk were appraised at £2.16. The total personal estate was £2166, the largest recorded as yet.

Robert Hazard in 1718, left a personal estate of £748.9, and had expended £17 for wearing apparel. There were the usual moderate comforts.

In the case of Nathan Jakwise, 1722, we have an example—

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difficult to trace—of the laborer’s condition in an estate of £28.19. Wearing apparel was 12s., about the lowest recorded. A woolen wheel 9s., a linen do. 7s., and one pair of cards 2s. A beetle ring indicating a chopper’s work out of doors 12s. Some wool and 8s. in woollen yarn. In linen he had 4s., and £2.14 in pewter; £1.13 in iron ware, and 10s. in wooden vessels. He had one cow at £5 and thirty bushels of Indian corn at the same value.

Ephraim Smith in 1722 left a moderate estate and farming outfit. He had one loom and tackling at £1.15. Looms were not as common as spinning utensils. Though he had expended only £13. in wearing apparel he had 11 oz. of plate at £4.8, in buttons, buckles and money. He enjoys the distinction of wearing the first recorded silver shoe buckles. Most people had a few silver spoons and 1718-9 there appears a silver drinking cup and spoons at £8.7. Another cup is found in 1721.

There were records duly kept of ear marks of cattle, and of births and deaths among the people. The wearing apparel of the citizen—excluding laborers generally—ran from £10. to £20., with an occasional outlay of £30. to £40. We have not enough data to average the expenditure of the fair sex, even if such mathematical adjustment were proper.

Slavery was closely intertwined with life on the plantation or farm, and with domestic service. About every person living comfortably had more or less slaves, if only one woman. There were a few independent white laborers, and we have cited some instances, but the work—especially out-of-doors—was done by slaves The average price of a mature and able negro man was about £50.; of a woman, about £40. The largest number no far was the nine men owned by Rowland Robinson. Probably

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he had given away his women slaves. There were all sorts of fractional ownerships and time valuations. The service of a negro boy for six and a half years was appraised at £19.10. Three Indian children servants were worth £23. Two-thirds part of a negro boy was put at £15. Indian slaves appear under various conditions, and they must have been descended from the captives in King Philip’s War.

This period in Narragansett corresponds with the third social condition in Providence, though nearly a score of years behind in its development. Necessaries in the colonial home were served by means of earthen ware and wooden trenchers; comforts by the useful pewter; luxuries came in with silver, china and glass. There were few forks used until after 1700. In the seventeenth century a family beginning to live comfortably increased its sup-ply of napkins.

Madam Knight in 1704 complained of the familiarity with slaves along the Connecticut shore.¹⁷ The horse-woman struck the poorest homestead¹⁸ at Shaw’s Ford, now Westerly, “This little Hutt was one of the wretchedest I ever saw a habitation for human creatures.” It was clapboarded, with no windows and an earthen floor. No furniture, but a bed with a glass bottle hanging at the head, an earthen cup, a small pewter “bason.” A board “with sticks to stand on” served for a table, and a block or two for chairs. This was a poor evolution from a loghouse. “Notwithstanding both the Hutt and its

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Inhabitance were very clean and tydee.” The philosophical traveler depicted in verse the relative lot of mortals:

Dr. MacSparran settled at Narragansett in 1721, was a man of parts and of ardent Celtic temperament, a strong ecclesiastic. He was not as considerate of the unchurched at Newport or Providence, as Rev. Mr. Honeyman, of Trinity, or Gabriel Bernon; but he was much respected as a man, and was quite a factor in the life of early Narragansett. Mr. Updike considered him “the most able Divine sent over to this country by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.”

In 1722, Mr. MacSparran was sent for to visit twelve men of the Church of England imprisoned by the Bay Government at Bristol for refusing to pay rates for support of the Presbyterian minister.¹⁹ Bristol, R. I., was then under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. This year the worthy rector confirmed and extended his social opportunities by marrying Miss Hannah Gardiner, of a large and influential family in South Kingstown, allied to the Robinsons and Hazards. She was beautiful and her spouse enthusiastically characterized her as “the most pious of women, the best of wives in the world.” Among his early converts the rector baptized in 1724, Thomas Mumford, of Groton, Conn., and Captain Benoni Sweet, of North Kingstown. The captain had been in the British army, was well informed and polished in manner. He was reputed a “natural bonesetter,” and his descendants practiced

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largely in repairing dislocations. Colleges of physicians have never recognized this sort of heredity, but numbers of people in southern Rhode Island and eastern Connecticut trusted it implicitly for a century and a half.

An effort in 1726 was made to maintain a parish school at St. Paul’s Church. The London Society for Propagation of the Gospel sent out Mr. James Delpech, paying him a salary of ten pounds to serve as schoolmaster of the Society. Such schools hardly met the colonial spirit, and this lasted only about two years.²⁰

An epoch in the history of Narragansett occurred when Dean Berkeley in 1729 or soon after his arrival in Newport, began his visits to the Glebe-house. He preached for Doctor MacSparran once by record, and quite likely at other times. Familiar intercourse with the Dean and his accomplished fellow-travelers was one of the forming influences of the period in the society about Pettaquamscutt. It gave a cosmopolitan outlook to the quiet neighborhood. It would be superfluous to dilate upon the influence of such a man as Berkeley. Among his companions was Smibert, the founder of portrait painting in America; and he painted Doctor MacSparran and his wife. Perhaps Smibert, when depicting the ladies of Narragansett, did not contribute much to ethnographic science, but he must have intensely stimulated the gossip of the neighborhood when he recognized the Indians around Tower Hill as veritable descendants of the Siberian Tartars, transposed by the way of Behring Strait. While in Italy Smibert had drawn the Tartars from original pictures belonging to Peter the Great. The imagination of the artist could easily transport the Tartar lineaments and locate them anew in Narragansett. With the Dean came Peter Harrison, assistant architect

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of Blenheim Palace. He built the Redwood Library and other notable buildings.

The Doctor built the “Glebe House” on Pettaquamscutt or Narrow River, accessible from, but not near, St. Paul’s Church. The church has been removed to the village of Wickford, and is a most interesting memorial of the times. The parsonage was of good size, two-storied and gambrel-roofed, with a narrower wing on the southern end. There was a long family room, where Sunday services were held in very wintry weather.

Host and hostess, both social and hospitable, though without children of their own, gathered young people about them. In the “Great Room” on a rainy day of October the Doctor would busy himself with writing, while his wife put her “Rev. Durance petticoat” into the frame, which was a most necessary domestic equipment. Here she quilted, assisted by her niece, Miss Betty Gardiner. Robert Hazard, her nephew in another line, was “reading Physic,” as faithfully as the distractions of such agreeable company would allow. The Doctor favored marriage and domestic life. Out of his respectable and useful library, he loaned Christopher Fowler a volume on “Religious Courtship.” It would seem that Venus must be approached and sued in an ecclesiastical way.

The life was plain, but generous and comfortable. The occasional discomforts of crowds of guests show the pleasures of a hospitable household. Once when more than fifty years old he named a full dozen of visitors “all here at once.” Weary for the moment, he remarked, “so much Company fatigues me at one time.”

The Quakers were strong socially and absolutely opposed to an ordained and settled ministry. Some Baptists and Congregationalists partook of this feeling. Our priest went to the other extreme. Like all functional wits,

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he was sometimes upset by an opponent and prostrated among his own witticisms. A poor Quaker neighbor was a famous preacher, who maintained himself by labor of his hands, and at the time was laying stone-wall. The Doctor elate at least, if not inflated, from his easy seat on horseback said, “Well, James, how many barrels of pudding and milk will it take to make forty rods of stone wall?” James dropped his stone into place, looked squarely at his bumptious questioner, answering, “Just as many as it will take of hireling priests to make a Gospel minister.” If the answer was not Homeric, it was because Homer did not know priests who preached.

Like many of the most useful missionaries in various parts of the world, our rector ministered to the body as well as the spirit. He often acted as physician in this new country, where such service was in demand.

North and South Kingstown were set off from the original town in 1722. The western territory of the county was divided as settlement moved forward. Charlestown being taken from eastern Westerly in 1738. The new town, in its turn, lost Richmond on the north in 1747. Hopkinton, the northern part of Westerly, was made a town in 1757.

The great estate of the Champlins, originally coming from Newport, fell into Charlestown. There were 2000 acres and the homestead farm contained seven or eight hundred. The proprietor kept thirty-five horses, fifty-five cows, six hundred to seven hundred sheep, and slaves in proportion. A large mansion-house stood well into the nineteenth century. Captain Christopher Champlin and Hannah, the daughter of Captain John Hill, were married by Doctor MacSparran in 1750. Their son Christopher, born at the homestead, went to Newport to become an enterprising and successful merchant. He was president of the Bank

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of Rhode Island and the first Grandmaster of the Masonic Fraternity in the State.

Colonel Daniel Updike, the son of Lodowick and grandson of Richard Smith, spent his youth at Cocumscussuc or Smith’s Castle. He removed to Newport, where he practiced law and was Attorney-General of the colony twenty-four years. He was county attorney for Ring’s, the present Washington County; and was prominent in founding the Literary Society at Newport. The relations between the Colonel and the Dean were most friendly and cordial; on the departure of the latter for Europe, he gave his friend an “elegantly wrought silver flagon,” now in the possession of Daniel Berkeley Updike. Though strict in some ecclesiastical canons and practice, the Doctor was liberal in administering baptism. He immersed Colonel Updike and frequently used that form of the rite. Moses Lippet, of Warwick, he dipped “above his own Mildam.” In another account he says, “at the Tail of his Grist Mill,” showing that facts are difficult as well as doctrine in ecclesiastical history.

The Updike library, descending from Daniel to Wilkins,²¹ is of interest. The collection was strong in Latin classics, with Hesiod in both Latin and Greek, and rendered into an English translation. All the good readers had Pope’s Iliad. Books on law were represented, as a matter of course. Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary, Dryden’s Plays, with Defoe’s History of the Devil, indicate some variety of culture. Leslie against the Deists would confirm the orthodoxy of these good Episcopalians, if such support could be needed. According to Hallam the Short and Easy Method was as able as it was popular. Erasmus’s “Colloquia Selecta” was considered by the author “a caprice of fortune” in being his most popular

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work, “full of foolish things and bad Latin.” But in our generation it would pass for a learned book. Young’s Night Thoughts was a frequent book in those days. The works of Nicholas Rowe found place, and Molière relieved the somewhat somber shelves. The collection was considerable and we have given but few titles.

Matthew Robinson, born in Newport, studied law in Boston and practiced in Newport. He removed to South Kingston in 1750 and bought a large farm west of the present station of Kingston, naming his residence Hopewell. His legal practice was extensive, and he was a student and zealous antiquarian. “He had a large and well-selected library in law, history, and poetry, probably the largest of any individual in the colony at that time.”²²

The drawing of portraits introduced by Smibert was kept up among the wealthy families. Later in the century Copley practiced his art, and put the stately dames of Narragansett and Newport on his excellent canvas.

There were many notable families in this precinct, which included the Champlins in Charlestown and the Wards of Westerly. Locally, the Browns, Hazards, Robinsons, Willets have been well known. The Gardiners became famous in Boston and in Maine, while the sea-going and mercantile Minturns were transferred to New York.

In the middle eighteenth century, the estates of the large landholders were extensive and deserved their local designation of plantation, though the system of farming by slaves was unlike that practiced in the South. Ordinary farms contained about three hundred acres; the plantations coming over from the seventeenth century were much larger.²³ Robert Hazard owned sixteen

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hundred acres on Boston Neck and about Pettaquamscutt.

The wealthy Robert Hazard, father of College Tom, made a will, though he did not execute it, in 1745.²⁴ It shows the way of living, especially in the provisions for his dearly beloved wife. Fifty pounds a year, four cows to be kept through each year. A negro woman Phebee. One riding Mare, the best, with new saddle and bridle. Wood, beef and pork; the beef to be dressed and brought into her house. Fowls and geese. One feather bed and six chairs, two iron pots, one brass kettle, two pair pot-hooks, two trammels. Pewter dishes and platters, basins and silver spoons. One piece “Camblitt,” one of linen called the “fine piece.” Forty pounds wool yearly, two wheels linen and woolen. She was to have two rooms, one “a fire room, the other a bed room such as she shall chuse in either of my two Houses.” The improvement of a quarter acre of land. The upper part of the Neck, occupied by the Willets, was the home of Canonicus and Miantonomi. Colonel Joseph Stanton’s property in Charlestown was said to be four and one-half miles long by two miles wide. Governor William Robinson’s land on upper Point Judith was subdivided and inherited by descendants. Samuel Sewall, son of the Judge, succeeded to the John Hull purchase on Point Judith, of sixteen hundred acres, finally divided into eight farms.

The number of slaves, generally overestimated, was 1000, according to Updike in 1730, and it was about equal to that of the horses employed in tilling the land. The Indians settled through these districts and most numerous around the reservation in Charlestown were valuable auxiliaries, especially in haying and other periods requiring extra labor. Corn, tobacco, cheese and wool

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were the chief staples sustained by hay; and horses were exported largely. Vessels were despatched from the South Ferry direct for the West Indies. They were loaded with cheese, grain, beef, and pork in the hold, and with horses on deck.

Douglass in 1760²⁵ says, “Rhode Island Colony in general is a country for pasture, not for grain; by extending along the shore of the ocean and a great bay, the air is softened by a sea vapour which fertilizeth the soil; their winters are shorter and softer than up inland; it is noted for dairies, whence the best of cheese made in any part of New England is called (abroad) ’Rhode Island Cheese.’ The most considerable farms are in the Narragansett country. Their highest dairy of one farm, ordinarly milks about one hundred and ten cows, cuts two hundred loads of hay, makes about thirteen thousand pounds of cheese, besides butter, and sells off considerable in calves and fatted bullocks. In good land they reckon after the rate of two acres for a milch cow.”

Fortunately, Doctor MacSparran left a Diary and Letter Book for the years 1743-1751, which has been amply edited by Doctor Goodwin. We may cite some facts and matters of experience, which will serve to illustrate the general accounts of Narragansett life, which will follow.

Though the worthy parson was strictly ecclesiastical, severe in any point of discipline, separative where any difference obtained with “the Conventicle which is the sink of the church,”²⁶ he was reasonable in the substantial practices of religion. For example, he occasionally preached at Conanicut. July 5 he did not go, as the “drought and worms” compelled the farmers to attend

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to their harvest even on Sunday. Wheat was still raised now and then in the Colony of Rhode Island. July 19th, “with moonlight” the Doctor’s two negroes and his brother-in-law’s oxen, mare and cart, carried the wheat into the barn. A pretty pastoral picture. The threshing and winnowing was quite a circumstance in farm life. August 8th, he turns the cows into the “after feed” and sends Stepney to Town (Newport) with a packet of letters and to buy nails and salmon, likewise a pound of chocolate. The latter was a frequent necessity at the Glebe house.

Our diarist’s duties extended as far as Providence sometimes. He went to Moses Lippet’s in old Warwick in “the great tempest” to marry his daughter Freelove to Samuel Chase in the midst ,of the storm. Moses was grandson of John Lippet, an original settler in Providence.

The “Great Awakening” under Whitefleld’s preaching excited New England and penetrated this corner of our colony. In 1750,²⁷ the “Hill Church” in Westerly and the Indian Church were formed, largely under this influence. Now in 1748,²⁸ our Doctor labored with one Avery “& a new light,” saying something to “do him good.” We may well imagine this wholesome counsel contained no heresy.

We may sympathize with the parson and the head of a family in the complicated duties June 25, 1745. Harry was hilling corn. George Fowler was bled by the amateur surgeon. He gave Maroca (a negro girl, who had had two illegitimate children), one or two lashes for receiving presents from Mingo. But the sequel was worst of all.²⁹

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“I think it was my duty to correct her, and w^tever Passion passed between my wife and me on y^s occasion, Good L^d forgive it.”

Our worthy parson was like many who have been seriously affected by dreams. He frequently underwent nocturnal imaginary perils in boats, and always regarded such conceptions as warnings of accidents to come by water. Perhaps the experience in 1751, to be cited, carried an absurd dream as far into historical exegesis as was ever done. He had been reading a tale and next morning he sets forth his “ugly dream” with a full diagnosis as follows: “I believe y^t reading the Life of Cleave-land nat¹ son to Cromwel gave me all y^se Distresses. The whole is certainly a Fiction, y^re never having been such a man, nor such occurrences as it relates. I believe it is wrote to blacken y^e Stuart Family, to raise men’s Esteem of y^e Revolution w^ch seems now to be sinking; But Romance can’t, ought not to discredit Realitys.”³⁰ The Doctor’s high Tory proclivities shine forth admirably. But how imagination by night or day runs riot; while romance and reality dance in and out!

It might have been fancy farming, but “my two Negro’s” were plowing in buckwheat in 1751, for manure for English wheat.³¹ MacSparran was more practical in teaching morals to the negroes by admonition and by lash than in inveighing against lay-reading in the church. He writes freely against this practice, which he abhors. “Peter Bourse read Prayers and preached in y^e c^hh there (Newport) last Sunday w^tht any kind of ordination. May God open y^t young man’s eyes y^t he may see y^t he has, transgressed against y^e Lord in offering up y^e Publick Prayers, w^ch is y^e Same in y^e Xⁿ Ch^h y^t offering Incense

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on y^t Altar was in y^e Jewish.”³² On the next Sunday, he preached against this irregular practice. He then regaled himself with “suckatash” or succotash, also in Indian msick quatash, the excellent corn and beans adopted from the natives. A comber was at the house, for all these small proprietors combed or carded, spun and wove at home. The cloth was scoured, fulled and pressed at a fulling establishment. Sheep marks were recorded as for example: “Crop the right Ear, and a gad under the Left Ear.”

Hanibal was a most obstinate and intractable servant; finally sold, after domestic discipline had been exhausted. Rising early, the master found Hannibal “had been out,” and stripping, whipped the negro. In this case feminine sympathy did not affect Mrs. MacSparran, as in the case of Maroca, for as the man was being untied “my poor passionate dear,” saying he had not had enough gave him a lash or two. He ran away and two chasing him, brought him home at night, having put “Pothooks” about his neck. “So y^t it has been a very uneasy Day with us o y^t God would give my Servants—the Gift of Chastity.” With such real troubles abounding in daily life, one would think lay-reading might be let alone. The worthy parson’s relations to negroes were both clerical and patriarchal. He tried to do his full duty. It was his custom to catechize them and once there were present fully one hundred. It seems eccentric to baptize Phillis, the daughter of his slave, before selling her, but that was incidental to the social situation. On more than one occasion he records attachment to Stepney, drowned in Pettaquamscutt Pond, “the faithfullest of all servants.” The baptism of one Freelove, “a Mustee by colour and her child Katharine Lynalies Gardner” is

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recorded with the note that Gardner was the master’s name³³.

There were more Irishmen among the settlers of New England than is generally estimated. Doctor MacSparran was Irish and at the harvest in September he mentions Johnson and Kerigan, two young helpers. Next day “y^e 3 Irishmen took y^eir leave”; two were going to South Carolina, but Kerigan intended to stay and peddle. Another day one Shirley, an Irish peddler, called. There are many indications of good relations and pleasant living with the slaves in the harvest time.” I gave 4 of Bro^r Jn^o’s negro’s 10^s among them, and 2^s between Pompey and Jemmy Smith.”

Travel by land was not easy, and it was worse by water. The Doctor late in October, 1751, went by the Conanicut ferry to Newport, and by Borden’s or Bristol ferry to Bristol to preach. Fearing a storm he hurried home, though the ferries were troublesome. Next day he records “Cold and windy with y^e wind at Northwest. I thank God I came yesterday since I could not have crossed y^e Ferrys with so much wind ag^st me.” November 1st he notes for a fine day, “but I fear a weather breeder, as y^e wild Geese flew to Day.”

The wife of Richard Smith, the first settler, brought from Gloucestershire to Narragansett, the recipe for making the celebrated Cheshire cheese, hence the quality and just repute of our product. Rents of farms were payable in produce. From the time of the French Revolution to the general peace after Napoleon, the United States were the neutral carriers for Europe. This favorable position gave great advantage to our farm products. Cheese brought ten dollars per hundred, with corn, barley, etc., in proportion³⁴

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The Narragansett pacer, exported so freely to the West Indies, should be noted. According to Mr. Isaac P. Hazard, “Governor Robinson imported the original stock from Andalusia, Spain. The breeding extended, and the horses being greatly appreciated in the West Indies were regularly sent out; Robert Hazard exporting about one hundred annually. Their gait was marvelous, affording comfort in the saddle, which we can hardly conceive. The purely bred could not trot at all. According to authorities of the eighteenth century, the horse’s backbone moved in a straight line, without swaying to either side, as in the pace or racking gait of this day. We have Mrs. Anstis Lee’s account³⁶ of a journey into Connecticut in 1791, when she rode the last mare “of pure blood and genuine gait.” She went thirty miles, lodging at Plainfield, next day forty miles to a point near Hartford, where she stopped for two days. Then she made forty miles to New Haven, thence forty miles (sic) to New London, and forty miles more to reach her home in Narragansett. Such endurance, whether in horse or rider, has gone out of fashion.

There might have been some local exaggeration, but the remarkable powers of the horse are well attested. They were obtained for racing in Philadelphia. In South Kingstown they raced on Little Neck Beach, and Doctor MacSparran said they went with great “Fleetness and Swift Pacing.” From any point of view we may wonder that such valuable powers in a horse could have been allowed to pass away and disappear. Mr. I. P. Hazard said a chief cause proceeded from the extraordinary West Indian demand. Sugar brought sudden wealth, and the planters could not get pacers fast enough for their wives

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and daughters. An agent stayed at Tower Hill, and from season to season he would never “let a good one escape him.” This affected the general breeding. Also, they were not adapted to draught and farm work. Losing the jennet descended by crossing from a Barbary horse was an incident in the passage from slave-holding habits to the more moderate ways of a farming people.

Old Narragansett was famous for its hospitality. Inns were poor, as Madam Knight depicts in her journey in 1704, and they continued relatively the same through the century. Strangers and gentlemen traveling were introduced by letter and they were welcomed as guests by the free living residents of the country. Doctor Franklin, a frequent traveler, always arranged to spend the night with Doctor Babcock at Westerly. “Well-qualified tutors emigrated to the colonies, and were employed in family instruction, and to complete their education the young men were afterwards placed in the families of learned clergymen.³⁷ Doctor MacSparran received young gentlemen into his family to be instructed. Thomas Clap, the able president of Yale College, was a good example of his work. Doctor Checkley, a graduate of Oxford, located as a missionary, taught several sons of Narragansett. Residence in such families was an excellent school in manners, as well as for improvement of the intellect. Young ladies were taught by tutors at home and “finished” at schools in Boston. Books were not common in those days, but there were good private libraries, as we have cited; and paintings, if only portraits, indicate culture.³⁸

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We have cited freely from Professor Channing, for it illustrates completely from another point of view the essential character of this society, “an anomaly in the institutional history of Rhode Island,” as he terms it in another connection. The same cause produced the aristocracy³⁹ of Narragansett, the ultra-democracy of early Providence, and the modified representative government of Newport. That great cause was freedom. The privilege granted by Charles II. was developed by Roger Williams and John Clarke into power to make a free man into a political being —a citizen. A new political entity was born into the world, as European scholars are coming to recognize.⁴⁰

For further elucidation, compare Doctor MacSparran’s view in the opposite direction in America Dissected. The Doctor in the eighteenth century shows by his shadows⁴¹ deep-drawn of the body politic, the features which have become the high lights of history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The ecelesiast, by his own showing,

³⁹ Aristocracy and democracy, as usually held, are conventional expressions. I knew a sagacious old son of Rhode Island, a Jacksonian and democratic follower of Dorr. Arguing with him on some political matter, I used the first term when he answered emphatically, “Aristocracy! a woman who seeks work with her own wash-tub is one thing, she who washes clothes in somebody else’s wash-tub is another thing—that is aristocracy!” My friend personally was an aristocrat, Doctor Eliot was a democrat.

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had neither lungs nor gills and could not breathe on land or water that was free. He could not conceive of religion without some sort of worship on Sunday.⁴²

The franklins and manorial gentry of Narragansett were a picturesque feature in the more sober life of New England. Rowland Robinson,* father of the “unfortunate Hannah,” in the middle eighteenth century, was a type of these citizens. When in full dress he usually wore a dark silk, velvet or brown broadcloth coat, light yellow plush waistcoat, with deep pockets and wide flaps resting partly on the hips, short violet colored breeches buckled at the knee, nicely polished boots with white tops, or silver-buckled shoes, a fine cambric shirt profusely ruffled at the bosom and wrists, with silk neck-tie to match. On his head was set a looped-up triangular hat, and in hand he carried a stout gold-headed cane.

Dr. MacSparran visited England in 1754 with his wife, where she died of small-pox. He was much affected by the loss of this “most pious of all women, y^e best wife in y^e world.” He came back to his home in 1756, his health broken and his constitution failing under his sorry bereavement. He performed his clerical duties as far as he could. He died in December, 1757, and was buried under the Communion Table of the church he had created. “There was Rings mourning weeds & Gloves gave to y^e Paul Bearers.” While rector he had baptized 538 persons,

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besides receiving many from other churches. For thirty-seven years he served the parish faithfully; while he led in spirit, he ministered in all ways of living to his trusting followers. Southern Rhode Island will always hold his memory dear.

Going back to the beginning of the second quarter of this century, we find the comforts of living enlarging as the county improved its agricultural condition. Samuel Tifft,⁴³in 1725, with a personal estate of £947. 12., is a typical example. Wearing apparel at £27. 19., his gun, sword and razor stood at £1. 11., his saddle, bridle and male pillion at £1. 10. The household furnishing included the feather beds and furniture at £58. 12., one old flock bed and furniture £1. 2. and 13 chairs at £1. 14. Of the desirable warming pans, he had two at £1. 10., in other brass ware £1. 12., in pewter £7. 1. 8., in silver plate £5. 12. and bottles were frequently valued in the various estates. In the humble tin ware there was 1s. 2d. and the early wooden trencher was still used to the number of two dozen, valued with other pieces at 6s. Books were represented by two old bibles at 4s. and a moderate farming outfit nourished the family. More or less butter and cheese—the latter in larger quantities—was in the inventories. He had cards, spinning wheels and worsted combs; and as an example of home industry 20¾ yards “whome spun” broadcloth at £10. 7., 29½ yards cotton cloth and linen cloth at £6. 10., 3 yards linen do at 9s. and 20 yards “corse” cloth at £3. 15.

Stephen Hazard was slightly better off, as befitted an owner of £2760. 15., in personal property. His best suit was adorned with silver buttons and he wore a beaver hat—all costing £19. 5., while his wear for every day stood

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at £10. 5. In a pair of silver shoe buckles and two buttons there was £1. 3. 6. and in a silver seal 5s.; 4 silver spoons were valued at £5. 8. 2. Mr. Hazard owned the first silver tankard on record, costing £24. 18. 8. One case bottles and metheglin was appraised at £1. 10. There were 36 milch cows at £193., 4 working oxen at £35., besides 22 fat Cattle on Great Island. He had 29 yearling neat cattle at £72. 10., 32 two and three years old £144, turkeys and fowls at 6s., with 24 geese at £.8. Geese were very common.

Caleb Hazard lived on 160 acres land, valued with his dwelling at £1400. He had moderate stock and furnishing out of doors and within. Two small tables and a high candlestick were valued at £1.; a case of drawers with the inevitable oval table £6. 15.; one looking glass £5. 10., another £4. 10. A linen wheel employed the feminine spinners. For kitchen and table service there was iron ware £3. 1. Tin do., £1. 4. A brass kettle, skillet and pepper box £6. 2. 6., a slice, chafing dish, etc., £4. 12. 10., wooden ware and trenchers 6s., pewter platters and other ware £6., 5 silver spoons £3. 16. He worked his farm with one old negro at £20., a better one at £70., a young negro girl at £35., two Indian boys at £20. and £15. His wearing apparel cost £23. 11., and he was a type of the smaller land holders to come in a generation or two later.

Another class in society was represented by N. Osborn, dressed in wearing apparel at £7. 1. 6., and with a personal estate of £64. 12. 6. This included one feather bed (not the best of the time) at £17. 26.; tin and brass ware with pepper box at 2s. 6d. and a warming pan at 5s., one knife with fork and tobacco box at 2s. He was a spinner and shoemaker.

Daniel Landon was a working carpenter, possessed of

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£22. 14. in personal estate. His woollen clothing and hat were worth only £1. 15., a very low outlay for any man. A “whone, razor “and penknife were 11s., wooden ware 6s. 6d., pewter and earthen ware 14s., five old chairs 10s. No books and they were rare generally; in another case the library was valued at 10s., in yet another 14s. There was often a family bible, but it was not as general as in Providence. The old-fashioned joynt stool was often used, and razors had become almost universal in this century.

It was not often that feminine dress had developed to its proper superiority over the male. In 1730 Josiah Sherman, with a personal estate of £188. 9., expended £17. 8. on his clothes. His wife was allowed £26. 8., an appropriate difference, further accentuated by a gold ring and three ribbons, costing £1. 4.

Gold Rings were becoming common, as in 1732 Thomas Raynolds had three at £3. He was a tailor probably, having a goose and shears, a thimble and needles. Expended moderately in clothing £17. 11., including gloves and garters and a “Rokelo.” We should not neglect one silver buckleband and a bottle at 11s. or two links of silver buttons at 6s.

Wm. Gardner was of another class, with £897. 4. in personal property in 1732. He walked bravely, clad at a cost of £33. 16., carrying a cane and a gold ring. His riding horse, saddle and bridle, holsters, pistols and powder flask were worth £40. Knives and forks at 15s., tin ware at 11s. 6d., silver plate £7. 5. His farming outfit was small, worked by a negro woman at £90, a boy at £80. and two girls at £65. and £45. In books he had £3. 5.

A still is mentioned valued at £11. Christopher Helme Yeoman from a personal estate of £1274. 19. had expended

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£87. 9. for his wearing apparel. His cattle and swine were worth £497. 1., and his four negroes £195. This title of yeoman was occasionally used; if used at all, why should it not have been used more frequently?

Wm. Gardner, of Boston Neck, had the large personal estate of £4945. 17., as well as his valuable lands. Dr. MacSparran married into this family. Mr. Gardner’s clothing was valued at £78. 10., and his “Rought plate” £92. 8. Three beds and furniture at £40., one warming pan at £8. Pewter at £13. 7. There were spinning and linen wheels—no loom—and a large number of cattle, sheep and horses. The force of slaves was large, three Indians at £175., six negroes at £470., three negro women at £420.

Occasionally we get the details of a funeral. Caleb Hazard’s was in 1725-6, and the cost of the coffin was £1., with stones to mark the grave at £2. The expenditure for rum at the ceremony was £1. 10. His son died soon after and the expenses were very closely scaled to mark two ranks of men. For the young man’s coffin they paid 17s., and for the gravestones £1. 5. For rum to ameliorate the condition of the sympathizing neighbors, the family allowed only 6s.

Silver plate was becoming diffused among people of moderate means. The majority of inventories had a few spoons. In 1733, Jeremiah Clark, in a personal estate of £285. 10., had a small farming outfit, a loom and a spinning wheel, £8. 10. was in pewter. In plate, there were 10 silver spoons, a silver cup, one piece silver, two pieces gold (possibly coin), all valued at £20. The most expensive silver seal at a cost of £14. was worn by George Belfore. He was a trader, having £1350. in shop goods, in a personal estate of £4499. 9.

The widow Knowles, of moderate circumstances in 1734,

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allowed herself £25. 16. in linen and woollen clothing and In three beds with furniture £48. 14. In table linen and pewter ware there was £. 6. 6., in iron ware £5. She had a large bible at £2. 19., and her personal property was £167. 5. Bibles were becoming more frequent; in another case in 1734, there was £4. 5. in a. bible and other books. Probably Doctor MacSparran would have said this improvement was due to the good influences of St. Paul’s Church.

It is interesting when we can get at the details of a personal wardrobe. In 1735, George Webb⁴⁴ had a suit of “full cloath” at £5. 10., a suit of Duroy £4. 10. and other apparel costing £18. 10. In five pairs of shoes and one pair old boots, there was a value of £2. 13. His large bible was £3., but he was a citizen of the church militant, having two old cutlasses, a pistol and two guns. His personal estate was £253. 18.

Josiah Westcott, in a personal estate of £548. 16., had carpenter’s and glazier’s tools. With moderate furnishing in his house, he kept one cow and one mare without. He expended £40. upon his wardrobe, and better £5. for books.

Charles Higinbotham in 1736 varied somewhat from the customary dress of the small proprietors. To his apparel at £30. he added a hat and cane at £3., a pair of spectacles “sliper” and boots at 15s. He possessed the first recorded wig at £1. His riding horse, saddle and bridle were appraised at £25. and there was added £1. for portmanteau and bridle bitts. Knives and forks were 15s. He had £36. in 36 ounces of silver plate and £8. 10. in books, a respectable library for the time. Notwithstanding a comparatively small personal estate of £446. 2. he had in slaves a mulatto woman at £70., a “mustee” boy

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at £30., a similar girl at £20. Robert Hannah sported a watch at £10. He had silver plate, gold and silver buttons and shoebuckles, with a snuff box. There were four negroes at £225. in the personal property of £1207. 15.

John Smith, of the universal name, was evidently a poor person, though he lived in comfort on personal property of £55. 10. His apparel cost £2. 10., a small amount even for a laborer, and he had £3. 3. in pewter. One cow, four pigs and poultry afforded the basis of a good living, while two spinning wheels gave employment.

Elizabeth Gardner in 1737, a modest widow with property of £111. 17., expended on her wardrobe only £11. In pewter she had £2. and in one bible £3.; in an old settle 12s., in a spinning wheel £1. There were four cows and one heifer at £44., and three mares, old and young, valued at £5. Mary Bunday’s was one of the smallest estates recorded, with wearing apparel at £2. 16., buckles at 5s. and a testament at 4s.

In 1738 we have John Jullien, with a personal estate of £1605. 18. He had a watch and cane with hatter’s “utentials” at £16. 1s.

Honorable George Hazard in 1738, with a personal estate of £6288.16., brings us back to the semi-feudal proprietors. His house, built about 1733, was at the “Foddering Place” on the northeast shore of Point Judith Pond. Existing until a generation ago, it was a type of the good houses of that period. It was two stories high on the front of fifty feet, slanting to one story at the rear. Over the entrance was a fan light and above this a large arched window, giving light to the hall. This square hall had a handsome staircase of oak and a balustrade. At the south end was the parlor, a very large room with the favorite Colonial buffet, where the silver

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plate was displayed. In the better houses these buffets were ornamental as well as pretentious, scrolled at top and back with quaint carvings. The house was given to his son George, Mayor of Newport.⁴⁵ One suit of his clothes cost £61. 5. and other apparel £71. 2., while a sword, cane and horsewhip stood at £12. 10. Hazard was generally the name best dressed. In silver plate he was well supplied, including a tankard at £30., two porringers, salt cellar and 11 spoons at £49. 10. Of pewter articles he had the value of £8. 18., and in 11 silver buttons there was £1. 16. The clock was valued at £35., thirteen chairs, the first mentioned of leather, were £27., two oval tables £5., the inevitable joynt stool £1., a high case of drawers £9., a looking glass £6., and two more at £3. The general housefurnishing was ample. The first specified “drinking glasses” stood at 13s., with other glasses at the same rate. “Pipes and glasses also were 3s. Five punch bowls were £1. 15. Glasses again and stone ware were £3. 9. Teacups and saucers 10s. Bohea tea 14s. The honorable gentleman had books at £38. 6., as he should have had. A sailing boat and canoe were appraised at £41. There was a large supply of cattle, sheep and swine. Eight acres in corn stood at £44., one acre in wheat at £8., nine acres in oats at £27. In slaves there were four negro men at £440., one girl at £90., the time of a “mustee” boy at £25., do. of an Indian boy £28.

Betty Heeth, 1738-9, owned a pair of worsted combs at £2. 5., without spinning wheels. Evidently she combed and carded; if she spun also, she used her employer’s wheel. In another case a spinner and weaver with linen wheel at £1. 10. and loom at same price, owned a “natural pacing” mare and colt at £26., a low price. Her wearing apparel cost £15. 7. Silver shoe buckles and buttons,

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as well as the “wigg,” were common, and punch bowls went along with tea cups and saucers. Ichabod Potter in 1739 had a fancy for “lingomvata,” for a punch bowl of this with a sugar box was only 5s., while the two regular punch bowls were at £1. He had the favorite mortar of the same hard wood costing 15s.

A large bible with “y^e Hypocriphy,” one colony laws and other small books were worth £5.

Elizabeth Tefft, in 1740, with personal estate of £401. 12., was a typical woman in moderate circumstances. Her wearing apparel with two beds and bedding at £30. 10., showed that she cared more for silver than for dress and furniture. For in silver plate there was 7 oz. 3 pwt. 7 grains at £9. 17. 10., while in gold not specified there were 52 grains at £1.6. In brass ware she had £6.3., in iron £9. 11., in pewter £6. 11. Her stock comprised four cows and a calf at £51., one mare and yearling colt at £45., and three swine at £4. 5. She was a sensible and economical manager.

In 1738, we noted the effects of Hon. George Hazard, his elegant attire as he walked abroad; his fine display of punch bowls and drinking glasses at home; with a library suitable for a gentleman. Sarah his widow died in 1740 and her equipment was worthy of her station and her personal estate of £5334. 12. The comparative wardrobe of this husband and wife, enjoying what they wanted, shows clearly that the men dressed better than the women. Mrs. Hazard’s clothing at £59. 12. was less than half the value of her husband’s. In jewelry she excelled, though the outlay was not excessive. Her geld necklace and locket cost £10. These gold beads—afterward so common in women’s wear—were the first recorded. A gold ring, jewels and snuff box stood at £6. 10. Apparently gold rings were more often worn by

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man than by women. The snuff box was a necessity; for nearly a century ago everybody, men and women together, took snuff. The lady’s riding hone, saddle and bridle cost £70. 12.

At the same time Toby Champlin, “an Indian man,” stood at the other end of the social scale with effects at £36. 13. It was the humblest sort of an outfit, including scythes, tools, fishing gear, oyster tongs and an old horse at 5s. Ann Kelly was not as provident as Elizabeth Tefft, for in an estate of £16. 16. 6., she left £12. 7. 6. in wearing apparel. In 1741 a negro girl about two years old was valued at £40. In most cases the fair sex took care of their persons, though they were relatively more moderate than the wealthy men. In 1743, Mary Vileat,⁴⁶ single, invested 183. 16. in her wardrobe from an estate of £113. 4. In one case we find 2160 lbs. of cheese at £135. The proprietor had 12 negroes. A negro boy nine years old was worth £70. Hour glasses appeared occasionally. In 1744 a chamber pot was appraised with a warming pan at £1. 7. It does not appear whether the convenience had changed from pewter to white stone ware, as was occurring elsewhere. A silver watch comes in at £25., with a pocket compass at £1. In 1746, Simon Ray was recorded “Gentleman” with one of the largest collections of books worth £82. 18. Courtesy treated him more kindly than circumstance, for his estate was only £74. 9. A clock at £55., with a better looking glass at £18., shows an advancing scale of housekeeping. Silver buttons increase, and were needed to match the shoe buckles. And wigs were well established. Silver plate was the frequent luxury turning into comfort, just as pewter was two generations previously.

In 1746-7 Jonathan Hazard Yeoman, with an estate

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of £7971. had £78. in wearing apparel, while “the weoman’s” was £22. 8. Only £2. for the bible and other books. He had twelve negroes to do his work and stored £100. worth of cheese in his “Great Chamber bedroom.” In another inventory we may note the first definitely indicated white “stone chamber pot” at 5s., about one-quarter or one-fifth the value of the article in pewter. A small farmer wearing silver shoe buckles had £40. in carpenter’s tools. In 1748, Benjamin Perry, with estate of £2935., gets a detailed record of his wardrobe, the first whole suit standing at £39. 10., the second at £32. 10., the third at £20. 17., with a pair of boots at £2. His walking stick was ornamented with an ivory head, and cost him 5s. His riding mare, saddle and bridle were £60., and his hunting saddle and bridle £5. There was a set of glazier’s tools and “a still which goes by the name of Limbeck” at £10. Equipped with silver spoons, he had the somewhat unusual earthen-porringer, three at 3s., and a wooden candlestick at 3s. His were the first noted “beaker” glasses, two at 4s. Altogether, his life was out of the common way of a Narragansett proprietor.

In another case, the estate was £9943., the wearing apparel £142., with one looking glass at £20., another at £15. There were earthen cups and saucers and other articles, including porringer, at 16s. Here was found the first recorded “Chany” ware, four bowls, four saucers, seven cups at £8. 10. Silver, as usual, with books at £3. Earthen ware in some degree took the place of pewter; very likely it served for the slaves, of whom there were seven in this instance. Wm. Gardner Yeoman had an estate of £1604. in 1749, while Ebenezer Nash Labourer had £48. 9. Another laborer was well to do with an estate of £310., of which £41. 8. was in his wardrobe, £9. 11. in carpenter’s tools, and £1. 10. in a linen

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wheel. John Taulbary, mulatto, left estate of £35. 17. distributed in a significant manner. Against a gun at £4. 10. may be set two wheels at £2. A bedstead and bedding at £3., made him comfortable, as it was reinforced in cold weather with a warming pan, which was valued with “a how” at £2. 10. A fiddle at 10s., a teapot and drinking glasses at £1. 10., provided for the æsthetic sense of a lone darky, who was probably not lonesome.

After studying these varying grades of social development we rise to Governor William Robinson. His life was the culmination of the mid-century system of living in this nook of Rhode Island. Quaker by connection, born in 1693, dying in 1751, he inherited land and bought largely, leaving some 1385 acres to be divided among his sons. He had previously given them farms at their majority. In public life for 24 years he held responsible places; being Speaker of the House for four years and Deputy-Governor 1745-1748.

Hon. William Robinson⁴⁷ inventoried a personal estate of £21,578. 5. to his widow and executrix Abigail. Here were large affairs entrusted to a woman. He dressed well for a Quaker from a wardrobe at £130., though not as well as his neighbors, the Hazards, such as were not Friends. His large house was on the site of the Welch villa just east of Wakefield. On the first floor were the great-room, great-room bedroom, dining-room, dining-room bedroom, store bedroom, northeast bedroom, Kitchen, closet, store-closet, cheese-room, milk-room, etc. There were sleeping-rooms corresponding above, but from the number of these accessible bedrooms, we may perceive, that our ancestors did not like to climb stairs. In the open attic, weaving and spinning were carried on. There was

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ample bedding, and two beds and bedding at £150. stood in the “Great Room Bedroom.” A clock at £145. and a large looking glass at £45. 14 chairs at £20. helped the furnishing. The silver plate “in the bowfatt” of the Great Room was worth £374. 8., the largest so far recorded. The table outfit was sufficient, but not equal to that of the better sort of neighbors. “Chime” ware £25. Pewter plates £36. 10. Knives and Forks £4. Tin ware £1. 10. Iron £22. Earthen £5. Note four “small mapps” and one set “bruches” at £3., while the library and an old desk were appraised at £5. Evidently this planter and statesman did not trouble himself with book learning.

There were 4060 lbs. of cheese at £558. 5. and a good line of cattle and horses in the stables. He bred the pacers largely and always rode one when he superintended his farming. These fleet creatures took water readily. There were many streams to be forded, and after a storm the Pettaquamscutt especially would change its fords. If a slave could not find a safe footing, a good woman rider would swim the turbid stream. The Governor had 20 negroes, the largest number found in King’s or the South County. The highest value for a negro was £500., and two more were £450. each, the highest woman stood at £320. There were debts on his books due him for £1316. The funeral charges of this magnate were £269. 17.

The wearing apparel of the respectable citizen in 1725 to 1750 cost from £14. to £40. in the depreciating currency. It very rarely dropped below the first sum. As prices expanded under the inflation the amount went up to £75. and £95.; for the Governor £130. and two of the well-dressed Hazards appropriated £142. and £184. The women dressed less expensively, expending generally less

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than £25. The most extravagant only spent £59. and £70. We have noted the estates of George Hazard and his widow, for relative expenditure of the man and woman. This outlay for dress was materially lower than that prevailing in Providence at the same time. Books were scarce and little used among the people at large.

The price of slaves in King’s County responded to the inflation of the paper currency in the second quarter of the century, quite as rapidly as any kind of property. There were more men than women enslaved, and descendants of the old Indian captives often appear. The rough average value of men and women was curiously equivalent, running from £107. to £105. for either sex. The number of slaves has been greatly exaggerated by tradition. Mr. Updike⁴⁸ says about 1730, “families would average from five to forty slaves each.” The greatest number I have found in any inventory was twenty—in Governor Robinson’s. Other wealthy estates had about a dozen each, never more.

The whole scale of living in the Narragansett country at this period has been equally exaggerated by tradition. They hunted foxes occasionally, raced their pacers on the smooth beaches and had good times as compared with Puritan colonists. They lived handsomely, even luxuriously, if we consider other agricultural communities in New England. But tradition has outrun the facts. Mr. I. P. Hazard and Shepard Tom having a fine romantic vein in their imagination, sketched freely. We should imitate their admirable romantic spirit, as far as we are able, in contemplating this interesting social period. But for digits and calculations, we must study the inventories and such absolute facts as remain.

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