Portsmouth Compact
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The Portsmouth Compact was a document signed on March 7, 1638 that established the settlement of Portsmouth, which is now a town in the state of Rhode Island.
The document was written and signed in Boston by a group of men who followed Anne Hutchinson and were ready to move to Aquidneck Island to set up a new colony. They had been disarmed by the Puritan leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
The purpose of the Portsmouth Compact was to set up a new, independent colony that was Christian in character but non-sectarian. It has been called "the first instrument for governing as a true democracy." [1]
The text [2] of the Portsmouth Compact:
- The 7th Day of the First Month, 1638.
- We whose names are underwritten do hereby solemnly in the presence of Jehovah incorporate ourselves into a Bodie Politick and as He shall help, will submit our persons, lives and estates unto our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, and to all those perfect and most absolute laws of His given in His Holy Word of truth, to be guided and judged thereby.
In the margin are the following Bible citations:
It is signed by the following men:
- William Coddington
- John Clarke
- William Hutchinson, Jr. [husband of Anne Hutchinson]
- John Coggeshall
- William Aspinwall
- Samuel Wilbore
- John Porter
- John Sanford
- Edward Hutchinson, Jr. Esq.
- Thomas Savage
- William Dyre [Dyer, husband of Mary Dyer ]
- William Freeborne
- Phillip Shearman [ Philip Sherman ]
- John Walker
- Richard Carder
- William Baulston
- Edward Hutchinson, Sr.
- Henry Bull
- Randall Holden
