Eleutheran Adventurers

Last updated March 18, 2024

The Eleutheran Adventurers were a group of English Puritans and religious Independents who left Bermuda to settle on the island of Eleuthera in The Bahamas in the late 1640s. The small group of Puritan settlers, led by William Sayle, were expelled from Bermuda for their failure to swear allegiance to the Crown and left in search of a place in which they could freely practice their faith. This group represented the first concerted European effort to colonize the Bahamas.

Background

The mid-17th century was a period of destruction and turmoil in England, culminating in the English Civil War. The first part of the conflict was fought between King Charles I and the Parliament of England and led ultimately to the Protectorship of the Puritan General Oliver Cromwell. This conflict spread to Bermuda, where a period of civil strife resulted in a victory for the supporters of the royalist party, known as Cavaliers. The struggle eventually led to the expulsion of the colony's Puritans and independents to the Bahamas, which the English had laid claim to in 1629 but had not permanently settled. Earlier in 1644, the Bermudian independent Puritans had sent an expedition to explore these new islands.

Establishment of the colony

Sometime between spring 1646 and autumn 1648, Sayle took 70 people to settle in the Bahamas. They made landfall on the island called Cigateo, which they named Eleutheria, from the Greek word for "freedom", although the name later became Eleuthera.^[1] The island's original inhabitants, the Lucayans, had been decimated through the slaving activities of the Spanish and the numerous European diseases, especially smallpox, that followed.

Sayle and his assistant Captain Butler were the persons who began a voyage to The Bahamas in two different vessels. Sayle's vessel was called the William. During the voyage Butler and Sayle had an argument with each other about what religious freedom means. As a solution to this problem, Sayle left Butler and went forward to reach the Bahamian Islands. The settlers ran into trouble before they even landed, when they encountered a storm and their ship ran aground onto rocks, later called the Devil's Backbone, north of Spanish Wells. The adventurers found their way ashore and took refuge in what was later called Preacher's Cave, where a religious service was held every year for the next 100 years on the anniversary in thankfulness for their survival. However, although the settlers had shelter, they had lost their provisions so they had no food.

Sayle took eight men in a small boat and went to Virginia to find help, where he got a ship and supplies and went to relieve the others.^[2] More colonists expelled from Bermuda arrived in 1649 and also faced the predicament of inadequate supplies. This time it was the sympathetic Puritans of New England who rallied to their cause and collected £800 for all the supplies they needed, allowing the colony to survive. The Eleutheran people showed their thankfulness by sending the ship back to Boston filled with Braziletto wood, with instructions to sell it and donate the proceeds to Harvard University.^[3]

Another source of trouble for the colony was dissent within its ranks from the beginning. Before they had even landed, Butler made so many problems by refusing to accept authority, that Sayle and others were obliged to find another island. They named the island they moved to Sayle Island, which was later renamed New Providence.^[4] The colony was not an immediate success in economic terms. Its soil yielded little production, and the settlers barely got by during their first years, being obliged to live by salvaging what they could from shipwrecks. Sayle was able to secure supplies from the mainland colonies. Despite this, the colony did not do much better in the following years, and in the end only a few hardcore settlers from the original Eleutherans were left.

Sayle went on to become governor of South Carolina, but he continued to have a vested personal interest in Eleuthera. He used this influence to secure some trade for the island and so helped the community through its infancy. This episode is thought to be the historical source of Andrew Marvell's poem "Bermudas," written in praise of the Puritan settlers of the New World, and one of the earliest statements of the so-called "American Dream". According to the Norton Anthology of English Literature (7th ed., p. 1686), "The poem was probably written after 1653, when Marvell took up residence in the house of John Oxenbridge, who had twice visited the Bermudas."

Articles of 1647

The colony was to be governed by the Articles and Orders of 1647, drawn up by Sayle. The articles reflect the ambiguities of the English Civil War taking place at that time between Cavaliers and Roundheads. Therefore, while the preamble refers to the Raign of our Soveraign Lord Charles, by the Grace of God, King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland; Defender of the Faith, &c, the articles make clear that the new settlement was to be effectively independent, making no further mention of the Crown. On the contrary, the articles speak of the rules governing the Members of the Republick and the Magistracie or officers of the Republicke. The articles established freedom of religion and opinion, three hundred acres of land per settler, governance under a governor and twelve councillors chosen from a senate composed of the first 100 settlers, and humane treatment of any indigenous people still on the island. It has been noted that if Sayle's settlement had been successful, then he would have created in the Bahamas "the first democratic state in the New World", some 130 years before the American Revolution.^[5]

Related Research Articles

The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and 88% of its population. The archipelagic state consists of more than 3,000 islands, cays, and islets in the Atlantic Ocean, and is located north of Cuba and northwest of the island of Hispaniola and the Turks and Caicos Islands, southeast of the U.S. state of Florida, and east of the Florida Keys. The capital is Nassau on the island of New Providence. The Royal Bahamas Defence Force describes The Bahamas' territory as encompassing 470,000 km² (180,000 sq mi) of ocean space.

The earliest arrival of people in the islands now known as The Bahamas was in the first millennium AD. The first inhabitants of the islands were the Lucayans, an Arawakan language-speaking Taino people, who arrived between about 500 and 800 AD from other islands of the Caribbean.

Bermuda was first documented by a European in 1503 by Spanish explorer Juan de Bermúdez. In 1609, the English Virginia Company, which had established Jamestown in Virginia two years earlier, permanently settled Bermuda in the aftermath of a hurricane, when the crew and passengers of Sea Venture steered the ship onto the surrounding reef to prevent it from sinking, then landed ashore. Bermuda's first capital, St. George's, was established in 1612.

The British colonization of the Americas is the history of establishment of control, settlement, and colonization of the continents of the Americas by England, Scotland and, after 1707, Great Britain. Colonization efforts began in the late 16th century with failed attempts by England to establish permanent colonies in the North. The first of the permanent English colonies in the Americas was established in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. Approximately 30,000 Algonquian peoples lived in the region at the time. Colonies were established in North America, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. Though most British colonies in the Americas eventually gained independence, some colonies have remained under Britain's jurisdiction as British Overseas Territories.

The Restoration of the Stuart monarchy in the kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland took place in 1660 when King Charles II returned from exile in continental Europe. The preceding period of the Protectorate and the civil wars came to be known as the Interregnum (1649–1660).

The Colony of Virginia was an English, later British, colonial settlement in North America between 1606 and 1776.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">London Company</span> Division of the Virginia Company

The London Company, officially known as the Virginia Company of London, was a division of the Virginia Company with responsibility for colonizing the east coast of North America between latitudes 34° and 41° N.

The Wars of the Three Kingdoms, sometimes known as the British Civil Wars, were a series of intertwined conflicts fought between 1639 and 1653 in the kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland, then separate entities united in a personal union under Charles I. They include the 1639 to 1640 Bishops' Wars, the First and Second English Civil Wars, the Irish Confederate Wars, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland and the Anglo-Scottish War of 1650–1652. They resulted in victory for the Parliamentarian army, the execution of Charles I, the abolition of monarchy, and founding of the Commonwealth of England, a unitary state which controlled the British Isles until the Stuart Restoration in 1660.

Eleuthera refers both to a single island in the archipelagic state of The Commonwealth of the Bahamas and to its associated group of smaller islands. Eleuthera forms a part of the Great Bahama Bank. The island of Eleuthera incorporates the smaller Harbour Island. "Eleuthera" derives from the feminine form of the Greek adjective ἐλεύθερος (eleútheros), meaning "free". Known in the 17th century as Cigateo, it lies 80 km east of Nassau. It is long and thin—180 km long and in places little more than 1.6 km wide. At its narrowest point, The Glass Window Bridge which has been called the narrowest place on earth, Eleuthera stands 30 feet wide. Its eastern side faces the Atlantic Ocean, and its western side faces the Great Bahama Bank. The topography of the island varies from wide rolling pink sand beaches to large outcrops of ancient coral reefs, and its population is approximately 11,000. The principal economy of the island is tourism.

Captain William Sayle was a prominent British landholder who was Governor of Bermuda in 1643 and again in 1658. As an Independent in religion and politics, and an adherent of Oliver Cromwell, he was dissatisfied with life in Bermuda, and so founded the company of the Eleutheran Adventurers who became the first settlers of the Bahamas between 1646 and 1648. He later became the first governor of colonial South Carolina from 1670 to 1671.

Bahamian culture is a hybrid of African, European, and other cultures.

The governor of Bermuda is the representative of the British monarch in the British overseas territory of Bermuda.

Virginia Cavaliers were royalist supporters in the Royal Colony of Virginia at various times during the era of the English Civil War and the Stuart Restoration in the mid-17th century.

The term British West Indies refers to the former English and British colonies and the present-day overseas territories of the United Kingdom in the Caribbean.

Spanish Wells is a district of the Bahamas. The settlement consists of a medium-sized town on the island of St. George's Cay 610 m (2,000 ft) wide by 2,860 m (9,380 ft) long, located approximately 500 m (1,600 ft) off the northern tip of Eleuthera island. According to the 2022 census, it has a population of 1,608 residents.

The Somers Isles Company was formed in 1615 to operate the English colony of the Somers Isles, also known as Bermuda, as a commercial venture. It held a royal charter for Bermuda until 1684, when it was dissolved, and the Crown assumed responsibility for the administration of Bermuda as a royal colony.

Richard Norwood was an English mathematician, diver, and surveyor. He has been called "Bermuda’s outstanding genius of the seventeenth century".

Between 1639 and 1651 English overseas possessions were involved in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, a series of civil wars and wars that were fought in and between England, Scotland and in Ireland.

The English overseas possessions, also known as the English colonial empire, comprised a variety of overseas territories that were colonised, conquered, or otherwise acquired by the former Kingdom of England during the centuries before the Acts of Union of 1707 between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland created the Kingdom of Great Britain. The many English possessions then became the foundation of the British Empire and its fast-growing naval and mercantile power, which until then had yet to overtake those of the Dutch Republic, the Kingdom of Portugal, and the Crown of Castile.

The Providence Island colony was established in 1630 by English Puritans on Providence Island, about 200 kilometres (120 mi) east of the coast of Nicaragua. It was founded and controlled by a group of English investors, the Providence Island Company.

References

↑ "Eleuthera Island :: History Notes". eleuthera-map.com. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
↑ "Articles and Orders, Bahamas 1647". jabezcorner.com. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
↑ "Cast Your Bread". Harvard Magazine . May 2010. Retrieved 24 May 2016.
↑ BHC Staff (6 January 2017). "The Commonwealth of Bahamas History" (PDF). London: The Bahamas High Commission (BHC). Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 March 2016. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
↑ Riley, Sandra (2000). Homeward Bound: A History of the Bahama Islands to 1850 with a Definitive Study of Abaco in the American Loyalist Plantation Period. Miami, FL: Island Research. ISBN 0-9665310-2-7 . Retrieved 6 January 2017.

External links

Articles and orders of 1647 of the Eleutheran Adventurers

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[1] "Eleuthera Island :: History Notes". eleuthera-map.com. Retrieved 6 January 2017.

[2] "Articles and Orders, Bahamas 1647". jabezcorner.com. Retrieved 6 January 2017.

[3] "Cast Your Bread". Harvard Magazine . May 2010. Retrieved 24 May 2016.

[4] BHC Staff (6 January 2017). "The Commonwealth of Bahamas History" (PDF). London: The Bahamas High Commission (BHC). Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 March 2016. Retrieved 6 January 2017.

[5] Riley, Sandra (2000). Homeward Bound: A History of the Bahama Islands to 1850 with a Definitive Study of Abaco in the American Loyalist Plantation Period. Miami, FL: Island Research. ISBN 0-9665310-2-7 . Retrieved 6 January 2017.

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