tter had to
leave Massachusetts. They settled on the island of Rhode Island (1637).

[Sidenote: The Connecticut colonists.]

[Sidenote: Founding of Connecticut, 1635-36. _Higginson_, 71-72.]

51. The Connecticut Colony.--Besides those Puritans whom the
Massachusetts people drove from their colony there were other settlers
who left Massachusetts of their own free will. Among these were the
founders of Connecticut. The Massachusetts people would gladly have had
them remain, but they were discontented and insisted on going away. They
settled the towns of Hartford, Windsor, and Weathersfield, on the
Connecticut River. At about the same time John Winthrop, Jr., led a
colony to Saybrook, at the mouth of the Connecticut. Up to this time
the Dutch had seemed to have the best chance to settle the Connecticut
Valley. But the control of that region was now definitely in the hands
of the English.

[Sidenote: Destruction of the Pequods, 1637.]

52. The Pequod War, 1637.--The Pequod Indians were not so ready as
the Dutch to admit that resistance was hopeless. They attacked
Wethersfield. They killed several colonists, and carried others away
into captivity. Captain John Mason of Connecticut and Captain John
Underhill of Massachusetts went against them with about one hundred men.
They surprised the Indians in their fort. They set fire to the fort, and
shot down the Indians as they strove to escape from their burning
wigwams. In a short time the Pequod tribe was destroyed.

[Illustration: JOHN WINTHROP, JR.]

[Sidenote: The Connecticut Orders of 1638-39.]

53. The First American Constitution, 1638-39.--The Connecticut
colonists had leisure now to settle the form of their government.
Massachusetts had such a liberal charter that nothing more seemed to be
necessary in that colony. The Mayflower Compact did well enough for the
Pilgrims. The Connecticut people had no charter, and they wanted
something more definite than a vague compact. So in the winter of
1638-39 they met at Hartford and set down on paper a complete set of
rules for their guidance. This was the first time in the history of the
English race that any people had tried to do this. The Connecticut
constitution of 1638-39 is therefore looked upon as "the first truly
political written constitution in history." The government thus
established was very much the same as that of Massachusetts with the
exception that in Connecticut there was no religious condition for the
ri