Memorial of George Griswold and Jonathan Parsons

To the Honorable, the Governor and Counsel and Representatives assembled in General Court at Hartford the 9th of May instant,

The humble memorial of us, the subscribers, sheweth that, whereas, Your Honors’ memorialists, being ministers of the Gospel in Lyme in which town dwells about thirty families of Indians, Natives of New England called the Niantics, the most of which continue in their heathenism notwithstanding all the good laws already made for the Natives being Christianized, and of late some, but more especially the younger sort of them, seem desirous of learning and to be brought out of darkness to the knowledge of the Gospel, some of which do sometimes attend our Christian assemblies on the Lord’s Day, but yet we do behold, to our great regret, the most of them still continue heathens without the knowledge of the true God and his son Jesus

Christ and are like so to continue unless that something further could be done for their help, and we, being desirous that they might be brought out of darkness, converted to the knowledge of the truth that they might be brought to know Jesus Christ, to believe in and serve him that they might obtain eternal life by him. As we have had opportunity, we have endeavored to persuade them to attend the public worship of God’s house and to desire a schoolmaster to teach their children and youths to read and were ready to hope that God was about

to open a door for their conversion for we are of opinion that their prejudice against the Gospel is nothing so great as in time past.  With these views, we discoursed with the Reverend Doctor Colman of Boston, one of the trustees for the laying out of the money given by well disposed and religious persons in the other England for the Christianizing the heathen in America, who directed us to call the said Indians together to have a sermon preached to them and to see if that they were desirous to have a schoolmaster, which he encouraged us they should have it,  that they desired it this be looked on as a proper leading step to their being Christianized, and, accordingly, we assembled the said Indians and proposed it to them whether that they would hear a sermon and were desirous of a school.  Many of them seemed forward and desirous of a school and willing to here a sermon, but their chiefs told us that they would not be concerned with one religion or have a school unless that the English would deal honestly with them respecting1 their land (they having, as we understand, about three hundred acres of land sequestered to them in Lyme at a place called Black Point), 

the bounds whereof were lost or very uncertain, and they supposed that the English, their neighbors, had encroached on their property and withal they generally signified to us that if they could have the bounds of their land settled, they would willingly hear a sermon and were desirous of a school, and they alleged that if they had a school, they must all set down on their land to attend it, and that they could not possibly support their families unless that too were settled in the quiet and peaceable enjoyment of their land.  Whereupon, we applied ourselves to the overseers of said Indians to remove this block out of our way, and they, being desirous too, offered us what assistance they could in so good a design, sent to the Secretary’s Office to search for the record of the said Indians land, but after a first and second search in said office, nothing could be found about the said land, as we are informed.  Wherefore, we, your Honors’ memorialists, nothing doubting but that your Honors, being as desirous of the conversion of the heathen as ourselves and will be as ready to do what is proper for you to do in the case, as we could desire, therefore, humbly beg leave to lay before Your Honors our humble petition that Your Honors in your great wisdom would be pleased to interpose your authority and appoint a committee to examine into the respective rights of the said Indians and to settle them peaceably in the land that we understand they have possessed for more than twenty years, but we, not being statesmen, can’t pretend to direct Your Honors in their affair, but this we beg leave to say that we think the difficulty above-related is the only block that lies in their way of being desirous of a school, and we hope of the Gospel, too.  Wherefore, we pray that Your Honors would afford such relief in the premises as in your wisdom you shall think just, and Your Honors’ memorialists, as in duty bound, the most of them still continue shall ever pray,

• 1. The words the bounds of were crossed out in the original.