Saints and Strangers: New England in British North America (Regional Perspectives on Early America)

249 Pages·2005·2.36 MB·English

by  Joseph A. Conforti

saints and strangers
Regional Perspectives on Early America
jack p. greene and j. r. pole, advisors
h
Saints and Strangers
new england
in british north america
Joseph A. Conforti
the johns hopkins university press
baltimore
©2006The Johns Hopkins University Press
All rights reserved.Published 2006
Printed in the United States of America
987654321
The Johns Hopkins University Press
2715North Charles Street
Baltimore,Maryland 21218-4363
www.press.jhu.edu
library of congress cataloging-in-publication data
Conforti,Joseph A.
Saints and strangers :New England in British North America /
Joseph A.Conforti.
p. cm. — (Regional perspectives on early America)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN0-8018-8253-2(hardcover :alk.paper) — ISBN 0-8018-8254-0
(pbk.:alk.paper)
1. New England—History—Colonial period,ca.1600–1775.
2. Puritans—New England—History. I. Title. II. Series.
F7.C742006
974—dc22 2005013362
A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
For Dorothy
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
prologue City upon a Hill 1
one Native New England:From Precontact
to Colonial Beginnings 5
two Puritan New England,1620–1660 33
three Beyond Puritan New England:Profane,
Maritime,and Dissenting Borderlands 67
four New England Besieged,1660–1700 98
five Saints and Strangers in the Eighteenth
Century 131
six Provincial New England:The Eighteenth-
Century Empire of Liberty,Commerce,and
Protestantism 163
epilogue From the City upon a Hill to Plymouth
Rock 200
Notes 207
Essay on Sources 215
Index 229
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Acknowledgments
T
his book examines colonial New England as a region
within British North America.It builds on the work of scores of
historians and other scholars who have made early New England
one of the most examined subjects of the American past.Robert J.
Brugger invited me to write this volume while I was finishing an-
other book on New England.He waited patiently for me to get
started and then offered much encouragement and advice.At the
Press Amy Zezula responded thoroughly and efficiently to my in-
quiries. Juliana McCarthy oversaw the transformation of the
manuscript into the book. I would like to thank Martin Schnei-
der for his superb copyediting.Robert Imholt read an early draft
of the manuscript and reminded me that it has been decades
since the publication of the last overview of colonial New En-
gland.
I completed this volume during a yearlong leave. I want to
thank the University of Southern Maine for awarding me the
annual Trustees’ Fellowship and a sabbatical. Interim Dean of
the College of Arts and Sciences, Luisa Deprez, approved the
funds that supported my research.Robin O’Sullivan,my gradu-
ate assistant, provided valuable help, from checking quotations
to working on maps. Two other graduate students, Rosemary
Mosher and Kirsten Boettcher,prepared the final version of the
maps. Without Madeleine Winterfalcon, departmental adminis-
trative assistant, this book would have progressed much more
hix