American History Series: Race Relations In Colonial New England

Speaking of the Christian Question, I am reading a book now on the cultural history of Colonial New England, which I will be reviewing here in a few days.

The following excerpts come from Joseph A. Conforti’s book Saints and Strangers: New England in British North America:

“Strangers to Puritanism participated in the creation of colonial New England. In Puritan usage, stranger might identify someone as non-English, non-Christian, non-Protestant, or non-White. Most commonly, stranger referred to all non-Puritan inhabitants, whether white, black or Native American …”

“English newcomers viewed aboriginal people as savages. Indeed, the fear of “Indianization” imposed limits on cultural exchange, including foodways. Dread of Indianization shaped public policies, which included banning intermarriage and laws, like the one passed in Connecticut in 1642, that established severe punishments for “persons [who], depart from amongst us, and take up their abode with the Indians, in a profane course of life …”

“New England authorities and settlers typically welcomed the extermination of Indians as God’s handiwork that served the biblical command to multiply and subdue the earth …”

“Colonial New Englanders attributed the Indians’ fate to providential design. “It pleased God to visit these Indians with a great sickness,” noted Governor Bradford with gratitude. A Puritan poet boasted that epidemics constituted God’s “fatal broom” that provided his people with “elbow room.” This providential explanation for what historians define as ecological imperialism was not confined to Puritan New Englanders. Thomas Gorges, the Anglican deputy governor of Maine, found coastal Natives cooperative because “the Lord sent his avenging Angel and swept the most part away.” Disease, land hunger and religious triumphalism propelled colonial settlement of native land. …”

I found that interesting and revealing.