While in Prison for Preaching without a license from the Government, John Bunyon Publishes “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” a World’s Best Seller for Hundreds of Years.
The English Civil War took place 1642 to 1651 between Royalist Anglican supporters of King Charles I and the Puritan Parliamentarian supporters led by Lord Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell. The Puritans won, and Oliver Cromwell had Charles I beheaded. Anglican ministers were demoted, including Rev. Lawrence Washington, the great-great-grandfather of George Washington. This led Rev. Lawrence Washington’s son, John Washington, to become a merchant and sail ...
John Winthrop gave his ‘Little Speech On Liberty’
In 1645, while he was deputy-governor of Massachusetts, John Winthrop and his fellow-magistrates had interfered in a local election of a militia officer. When the dispute flared into a war of words, the magistrates bound over some of the dissidents to the next court and summoned others to appear. In this controversy the magistrates were accused of having exceeded their powers, and Winthrop was impeached. After ...
The Articles of Confederation of the United Colonies of New England
The Articles of Confederation between the Plantations under the Government of the Massachusetts, the Plantations under the Government of New Plymouth, the Plantations under the Government of Connecticut, and the Government of New Haven with the Plantations in Combination therewith: Whereas we all came into these parts of America with one and the same end and aim, namely, to advance the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus ...
King Charles Delivers the ‘Answer to the Nineteen Propositions’ to Parliament
Two of Charles I advisers drafted and persuaded the king to issue a document, His Majesty’s Answer to the Nineteen Propositions of Both Houses of Parliament, in which the king, eager to dismiss his image as a monarch, declared that England was a mixed government and not a condescending monarchy. The Answer was a critical turning point in constitutional history because in it the king proclaimed that ...
John Lilburne was Arrested for Printing and Circulating ‘Unlicensed Books’ Critical of the King Charles I’s Monarchy
In 1638, John Lilburne was arrested upon his return from Holland and put on secret trial by the Star Chamber of Charles I. His crime? The writing and distribution of seditious pamphlets that skewered the legitimacy of the monarchy and challenged the primacy of the high prelates of the Church of England. He was promptly convicted of publishing writing of “dangerous consequence and evil effect.” For ...
Rev. John Lothropp Arrives in Boston, Massachusetts
John Lathrop was born December 20, 1584 in Etton, Yorkshire, England. It is said the ancestral home of the Lathrop family is Lowthrope, England. He was baptized in Etton, Yorkshire England December 20, 1584 and died in Barnstable, Mass November 8, 1653. The name was sometimes written Lathrop, other times Lothrop and originated in the town of Lowthrope, England. John Lathrop was born in Yorkshire England. He ...
The ‘Petition of Right’ Approved by King Charles I in England
The Petition of Right (see document) is a statement of the objectives of the 1628 English legal reform movement that led to the Civil War and deposing of Charles I in 1649. One of England's most famous Constitutional documents, it expresses many of the ideals that later led to the American Revolution. It was written by Parliament as an objection to an overreach of authority by King ...
Indenture between the four Adventurers and Robert Coopy of North Nibley
When the Virginia colony was founded in 1607, the majority of unfree laborers in the colony were indentured servants, men and women who signed a legal contract called an indenture that bound them to work for a certain individual for a certain number of years, in exchange for which they received room, board, and some type of education or training. During their indenture, the servant was ...
“Speech to the Troops at Tilbury” by Queen Elizabeth I of England
The Speech to the Troops at Tilbury was delivered on 9 August Old Style, 19 August New Style 1588 by Queen Elizabeth I of England to the land forces earlier assembled at Tilbury in Essex in preparation for repelling the expected invasion by the Spanish Armada. Prior to the speech the Armada had been driven from the Strait of Dover in the Battle of Gravelines eleven ...
St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre
(Image) One Morning at the Gates of the Louvre, The day after St. Bartholomew’s Eve On this day commenced this diabolical act of sanguinary brutality. It was intended to destroy at one stroke the root of the Protestant tree, which had only before partially suffered in its branches. The king of France had artfully proposed a marriage, between his sister and the prince of Navarre, the ...
