Herodias Gardiner | |
---|---|
Born | c. 1623 England |
Died | after 1674 |
Other names | Herodias Long Herodias Hicks Herodias Porter Horrod/Harrud...etc. |
Occupation(s) | Mother, missionary |
Spouse(s) | (1) John Hicks (2) George Gardiner (3) John Porter |
Children |
|
Herodias Gardiner (c. 1623 - after 1674), born Herodias Long, was the wife of three early settlers of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and was also a zealous Quaker evangelist who was whipped in Massachusetts for sharing her religious testimony with others in her former home town of Weymouth. She married at the age of 13 or 14 in London, she was unhappily brought to the American colonies by her first husband, John Hicks, where they settled in Weymouth. The couple had two known children, and moved to the Rhode Island Colony, but she soon separated from her husband, and looking for maintenance, settled in Newport with George Gardiner, with whom she lived for about 20 years as his common-law wife.
In 1658 she and a friend made a difficult journey to Massachusetts to present their Quaker message, and they were brought before the Governor, then whipped and imprisoned. A few years later, in 1665, Herodias left Gardiner, and went to live with prominent and wealthy John Porter in the Narragansett country west of the Narragansett Bay. She left behind many court records documenting her marital turmoils. She had nine known children with her first two husbands, and has many descendants.
Herodias Long was born in England about 1623, but her place of nativity is not known. She may be the Odias Longe who was left a legacy of five pounds in early 1639 by John Ayshford, who owned land in 'Little Ockenbury' and in the Barbadoes. [1] According to her testimony in court many years later, she was sent to London following the death of her father, and here, unknown to her friends, she married John Hicks. [2] She was 13 or 14 years old when they were married at Saint Faith's Church ("under Saint Paul's"), and their marriage licence was dated 14 March 1636/7. [3] Shortly after their marriage, to her "great grief," they immigrated to New England, and settled in Weymouth in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. [4] Here they lived until about 1640, when they moved to Aquidneck Island, probably settling in the town of Newport. They had two children together, but soon after moving to Rhode Island differences arose between them, and Herodias separated from Hicks, and consummated a relationship with George Gardiner, with whom she lived for the next 20 years as his common law wife. Hicks went off to live with the Dutch, and was in the process of obtaining a divorce from her in Rhode Island in December 1643, when he sent a letter from Flushing, New Netherland to Rhode Island magistrate John Coggeshall. [5] Hicks also eventually obtained a divorce from her in New Netherland, charging her with adultery. [5]
It appears that Herodias had been in an abusive relationship, based on a 7 March 1644 court case where John Hicks of Newport was "bound to the Peace by the Governor [sic], Mr. Easton, in a bond, for beating his wife Harwood Hicks..." [4] (Easton was actually an Assistant, not the Governor.) In her later testimony, Herodias states "...that the authority that was then under grace, saw cause to part us, and ordered that I should have the estate which was sent me by my mother, delivered to me by the said John Hickes; but I never had it, but the said John Hickes went away to the Dutch, and carried away with him the most of my estate; by which means I was put to great hardship and straight." [4] In his letter to Coggeshall, dated 12 December 1644, John Hicks wrote, "...the Knott of affection on her part have been untied long since, and her whoredome have freed my conscience on the other part, so I leave myself to yor advice if there may be such a way used for the finall parting for us." [6]
Soon after her break with Hicks, Herodias lived with George Gardiner and spent the next 20 years with him raising a family of seven children, the oldest five of whom were boys, and the two youngest girls. [7] During this time, Herodias became an avid Quaker convert, and she once again stepped into public view in May 1658. She, "with her babe at her breast" (her daughter Rebecca), and her friend Mary Stanton made a difficult journey through 60 miles of wilderness from Newport to her former hometown of Weymouth to deliver her religious testimony. [2] For this, she was taken before Governor John Endecott in Boston, and she and her companion were sentenced to be whipped with ten lashes. [2] Following the whipping, with a three fold knotted whip of cords, Herodias was jailed for 14 days. [2]
Herodias once again appeared in the public record in 1665 when she appeared in court, asking for a separation from Gardiner, relating that she had earlier "joined up with George Gardiner for her maintenance but was never properly married to him." [8] However, testimony of George Gardiner's friend, Robert Stanton, declared that one night at his house both George and Herodias did say before him and his wife that they took one another as man and wife. [2] Herodias now desired of the Assembly that the estate and labor that Gardiner "had of mine, he may allow it me, and house upon my land I may enjoy without molestation, and that he may allow me my child to bring up, with maintenance for her, and that he be restrained from troubling me more." [2]
While the reasons that Herodias chose to leave Gardiner were not made apparent in her testimony, a major part of the reason was playing out in court across the Narragansett Bay. [9] In May 1665, at the same time that George Gardiner appeared before the Assembly in Newport to answer the petition of Herodias, an "ancient woman" named Margaret Porter complained to the Assembly in Kings Town that her husband, John Porter, had left her, leaving her in such a necessitous state that she had become dependent on her children for her daily support, "to her very great grief of heart." [10] Porter was a very prominent and wealthy citizen of Portsmouth, who was one of the five original purchasers of Pettaquamscutt from the Indian sachems, a huge tract of land that would later become South Kingstown, Rhode Island. [10] Porter's estate, both real and personal, was secured by the Assembly until he made adequate compensation to his wife, which he did the following month, apparently to her satisfaction, and he was thus released from the restraint. [10]
Soon, Herodias was living with Porter, initially under the pretense of being his house servant. [9] In October 1667 an indictment was made "against Mr. John Porter of Narragansett in the King's Province and Harrud Long alias Gardiner for that they are suspected to cohabit and so to live in way of incontinency." [11] The following May, Porter appeared in court and was acquitted, and the next October Herodias was similarly charged, and acquitted as well. [11] According to most writers on the subject, Porter eventually married Herodias, and she co-signed several deeds with him in 1671. [10] In the early 1670s Porter made large conveyances of his Pettaquamscutt lands to the Gardiner children of Herodias, and also made a conveyance to Herodias' son Thomas Hicks of Flushing, New York. [12]
The death date for Herodias is not known. Miller and Stanton say that she survived John Porter, but Porter's death date is also unknown. [13] He was still alive on 25 April 1674 when he was involved in a land deed, [14] but was called deceased many years later, on 8 April 1692, when the children of Herodias appeared at a meeting of the Pettaquamscutt purchasers as "the assigns of John Porter, deceased." [13]
Herodias had two known children with her first husband, John Hicks: Hannah and Thomas Hicks, and seven more children with her second husband, George Gardiner: Benoni, Henry, George, William, Nicholas, Dorcas and Rebecca Gardiner. [5]
John Clarke was a physician, politician, and Baptist minister, who was co-founder of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, author of its influential charter, and a leading advocate of religious freedom in America.
Samuel Gorton (1593–1677) was an early settler and civic leader of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations and President of the towns of Providence and Warwick. He had strong religious beliefs which differed from Puritan theology and was very outspoken, and he became the leader of a small sect known as Gortonians, Gortonists, or Gortonites. As a result, he was frequently in trouble with the civil and church authorities in the New England colonies.
William Hutchinson (1586–1641) was a judge at Portsmouth in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. He sailed from England to New England in 1634 with his large family. He became a merchant in Boston and served as both Deputy to the General Court and selectman. His wife was Anne Hutchinson who became embroiled in a theological controversy with the Puritan leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony which resulted in her banishment in 1638. The Hutchinsons and 18 others departed to form the new settlement of Pocasset on the Narragansett Bay, which was renamed Portsmouth and became one of the original towns in the Rhode Island colony.
John Coggeshall Sr. was one of the founders of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations and the first President of all four towns in the Colony. He was a successful silk merchant in Essex, England, but he emigrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1632 and quickly assumed a number of roles in the colonial government. In the mid-1630s, he became a supporter of dissident minister John Wheelwright and of Anne Hutchinson. Hutchinson was tried as a heretic in 1637, and Coggeshall was one of three deputies who voted for her acquittal. She was banished from the colony in 1638, and the three deputies who voted for her acquittal were also compelled to leave. Before leaving Boston, Coggeshall and many other Hutchinson supporters signed the Portsmouth Compact in March 1638 agreeing to form a government based on the individual consent of the inhabitants. They then established the settlement of Portsmouth on Aquidneck Island, one of the four towns comprising the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
John Cranston (1625–1680) was a colonial physician, military leader, legislator, deputy governor and governor of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations during the 17th century.
William Russell Sweet was an early American artist, painter and sculptor.
Obadiah Holmes was an early Rhode Island settler, and a Baptist minister who was whipped in the Massachusetts Bay Colony for his religious beliefs and activism. He became the pastor of the Baptist Church in Newport, Rhode Island, a position he held for 30 years.
Jeremiah Clarke (1605–1652) was an early colonial settler and President of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Born into a prominent family in England, he was a merchant who came to New England with his wife, Frances Latham, and four stepchildren, settling first at Portsmouth in 1638, but the following year joining William Coddington and others in establishing the town of Newport. Here he held a variety of civic positions until 1648 when Coddington's election as President of the colony was disputed, and Clarke was chosen to serve in that office instead. He was the father of Walter Clarke, another colonial governor of Rhode Island, and also had family connections with several other future governors of the colony.
William Robinson was a deputy governor of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
John Gardner served for more than eight years as the deputy governor of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and was also a Chief Justice of the colony's Superior Court.
Samuel Wilbore was one of the founding settlers of Portsmouth in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. He emigrated from Essex, England to Boston with his wife and three sons in 1633. He and his wife both joined the Boston church, but a theological controversy began to cause dissension in the church and community in 1636, and Wilbore aligned himself with John Wheelwright and Anne Hutchinson, signing a petition in support of dissident minister Wheelwright. In so doing, he and many others were disarmed and dismissed from the Boston church. In March 1638, he was one of 23 individuals who signed a compact to establish a new government, and this group purchased Aquidneck Island, then known as "Rhode Island", from the Narragansett Indians at the urging of Roger Williams, establishing the settlement of Portsmouth.
John Porter was an early colonist in New England and a signer of the Portsmouth Compact, establishing the first government in what became the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. He joined the Roxbury church with his wife Margaret in 1633, but few other records are found of him while in the Massachusetts Bay Colony until he became involved with John Wheelwright and Anne Hutchinson during what is known as the Antinomian Controversy. He and many others were disarmed for signing a petition in support of Wheelwright and were compelled to leave the colony. Porter joined a group of more than 20 men in signing the Portsmouth Compact for a new government, and they settled on Rhode Island where they established the town of Portsmouth. Here Porter became very active in civic affairs, serving on numerous committees over a period of two decades and being elected for several terms as Assistant, Selectman, and Commissioner. He was named in Rhode Island's Royal Charter of 1663 as one of the ten Assistants to the Governor.
William Dyer was an early settler of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, a founding settler of both Portsmouth and Newport, and Rhode Island's first Attorney General. He is also notable for being the husband of the Quaker martyr Mary Dyer, who was executed for her Quaker activism. Sailing from England as a young man with his wife, Dyer first settled in Boston in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, but like many members of the Boston church, he became a supporter of the dissident ministers John Wheelwright and Anne Hutchinson during the Antinomian Controversy, and signed a petition in support of Wheelwright. For doing this, he was disenfranchised and disarmed, and with many other supporters of Hutchinson, he signed the Portsmouth Compact, and settled on Aquidneck Island in the Narragansett Bay. Within a year of arriving there, he and others followed William Coddington to the south end of the island, where they established the town of Newport.
John Throckmorton, Gent. (1601–1684) was an early settler of Providence Plantation in what became the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and he was one of the 12 original proprietors of that settlement. He emigrated from Norfolk, England to settle in Salem in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, but religious tensions brought about his removal to Providence.
George Gardiner, sometimes spelled Gardner, was an early inhabitant of Newport in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and one of the original settlers of Aquidneck Island. He held some minor offices within the colony in the early 1640s, shortly after which he began a common-law marriage with Herodias (Long) Hicks, who came to live with him after separating from her first husband. This relationship lasted for nearly 20 years, after which Herodias petitioned the court to have Gardiner leave her alone, and she left Newport to go west of the Narragansett Bay and live with John Porter, a land-rich settler who was one of the original purchasers of the Pettaquamscutt lands.
Frances Latham (1610–1677), was a colonial American woman who settled in Rhode Island, and is known as "the Mother of Governors." Having been widowed twice, she had three husbands, and became the ancestor of at least ten governors and three deputy/lieutenant governors, and is related by marriage to an additional six governors and one deputy governor.
Samuel Wilbur Jr. was an early settler of Portsmouth in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and one of seven original purchasers of the Pettaquamscutt lands which would later become South Kingstown, Rhode Island. His father, Samuel Wilbore, had been an early settler in Boston who was dismissed from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for supporting the dissident ministers Anne Hutchinson and John Wheelwright, becoming one of the signers of the compact that established the town of Portsmouth. The subject Samuel was willed his father's Rhode Island lands, and appears to have lived in Portsmouth most of his life. He married Hannah Porter, the daughter of another signer of the Portsmouth Compact, John Porter. Beginning in 1656 Wilbur held a number of important positions within the colony, including Commissioner, Deputy to the General Assembly, Assistant to the Governor, and Captain in a Troop of Horse. He wrote his will in August 1678, though it was not probated until more than three decades later. Wilbur was held in high esteem within the colony and was one of a small group of men named in the Royal Charter of 1663, signed by King Charles II of England, and becoming the guiding document of Rhode Island's government for nearly two centuries.
Richard Scott (1605–1679) was an early settler of Providence Plantations in what became the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. He married Katherine Marbury, the daughter of Reverend Francis Marbury and sister of Puritan dissident Anne Hutchinson. The couple emigrated from Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire, England with an infant child to the Massachusetts Bay Colony where he joined the Boston church in August 1634. By 1637, he was in Providence signing an agreement, and he and his wife both became Baptists for a time. By the mid-1650s, the Quaker religion had taken hold on Rhode Island, and Scott became the first Quaker in Providence.
Charles Handy Russell was a prominent American merchant and banker with the National Bank of Commerce in New York.