The Flushing Remonstrance (1657)

In 1645, Flushing, then a town called Vlissengen, was granted a charter by the Dutch West India Company and became a part of New Netherlands. It was settled largely by English families, similar to English settlements at Gravesend, Hempstead, and Jamaica, Long Island.

A respected Flushing colonist, Henry Townsend, held a Quaker meeting in his home and was fined and banished. Flushing citizens protested, and in 1657 they wrote a demand for religious freedom that is today known as the Flushing Remonstrance. Today, the Flushing Remonstrance is regarded as the precursor to the U.S. Constitution’s provision on freedom of religion on the Bill of Rights.

The Flushing Remonstrance was signed on December 27, 1657. None of them were Quakers. The Remonstrance ends with:

The law of love, peace and liberty in the states extending to Jews, Turks and Egyptians, as they are considered sonnes of Adam, which is the glory of the outward state of Holland, soe love, peace and liberty, extending to all in Christ Jesus, condemns hatred, war and bondage. And because our Saviour sayeth it is impossible but that offences will come, but woe unto him by whom they cometh, our desire is not to offend one of his little ones, in whatsoever form, name or title hee appears in, whether Presbyterian, Independent, Baptist or Quaker, but shall be glad to see anything of God in any of them, desiring to doe unto all men as we desire all men should doe unto us, which is the true law both of Church and State; for our Saviour sayeth this is the law and the prophets. …

Signers

Written this 27th of December in the year 1657, by mee.

The 30 signers were:

1. Edward Hart, Clericus
2. Tobias Feake
3. Nathaniell Tue
4. The marke of William Noble
5. Nicholas Blackford
6. William Thorne, Seignior
7. The marke of Micah Tue
8. The marke of William Thorne, Jr.
9. The marke of Philip Ud
10. Edward Tarne
11. Robert Field, senior
12. John Store
13. Robert Field, junior
14. Nathaniel Hefferd
15. Nich Colas Parsell ~• [https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/LBWP-D5R/nicholas-parcell-161... Nicholas ? (1614-1691)
16. Benjamin Hubbard
17. Michael Milner
18. The marke of William Pidgion
19. Henry Townsend
20. The marke of George Clere
21. George Wright
22. Elias Doughtie
23. John Foard
24. Antonie Feild
25. Henry Semtell
26. Richard Stocton ††
27. Edward Hart
28. Edward Griffine
29. John Mastine
30. John Townesend
31. Edward Farrington √

Hart signed first as clerk of the group; each of several other signers wrote an X that is labeled as their mark.

Other Figures

1. John Bowne ; see also in wikipedia and wife Hannah

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”Its Dutch character is one reason why New York grew into a vibrantly multiethnic culture: one reason why New York became New York. The English of New England undeniably gave us their language and many aspects of government, but they were at this time in American history very far from enunciating such an ideal of religious freedom. What we see in the Flushing Remonstrance is a fledgling American colony applying hard-won rights from the Old Country to a New World setting, where they would flourish in an entirely new way. The mixed peoples who founded New Netherland would become a wellspring of American religious liberty, and also a source of America’s notion of equality.”

Excerpted from “The Importance of Flushing” by Russell Shorto in New York Archives (Winter 2008).

See also: History of the City of New York in the Seventeenth Century (1909) By Mrs. Schuyler Van Rensselaer aka Mariana Alley Van Rensselaer . This book is on Googleplay https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=y6sBAAAAMAAJ&pg=GBS.PA26&hl=en ; see page 26 for John Bowne

References

• “The Flushing Remonstrance, 1657.” Historical Society of the New York Courts. From the 2009 Society program: “Before New York, There was New Netherland: Our Dutch Heritage, 1609-2009.” < link >
• “Flushing Remonstrance” Wikipedia
  • Document: The Flushing Remonstrance, 1657 < link >
• “This Day In History › Flushing Remonstrance.” Mysticstamp.com < link >
• Flushing Meeting - Religious Society of Friends. < link >
• “The Flushing Remonstrance” by Michael D. Peabody. Liberty Magazine, November/December 2005. < link >
• “Colony with a Conscience” nytimes.com By KENNETH T. JACKSON Dec 27, 2007. < link > “… The Bowne house is still standing. And within a few blocks of it a modern visitor to Flushing will encounter a Quaker meeting house, a Dutch Reformed church, an Episcopal church, a Catholic church, a synagogue, a Hindu temple and a mosque. All coexist in peace, appropriately in the most diverse neighborhood in the most diverse borough in the most diverse city on the planet.”
• “The forgotten story of the Flushing Remonstrance.” by Wei Zhu (January 15, 2014) < link >
• https://www.mygenealogyaddiction.com/post/the-flushing-remonstrance re. Feake, Fones, and Underhill families
• ” Profiles of the Flushing Charter Signers: An Introduction.” Bownehouse.org (June 7, 2020) < link >
  • Full text of the Flushing Charter (1645) < PDF >
• Hanson, R. Scott, 'Religion in Vlissingen (Flushing) from 1645 to 1945', City of Gods: Religious Freedom, Immigration, and Pluralism in Flushing, Queens (New York, NY, 2016; online edn, Fordham Scholarship Online, 19 Jan. 2017), https://doi.org/10.5422/fordham/9780823271597.003.0002, accessed 18 Dec. 2022.
• “Important NYC Dates.” NYC Dept. of Administrative Services. < link >
• https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=y6sBAAAAMAAJ&pg=GBS.PA26&hl=en History of the City of New York in the Seventeenth Century (Van Rensselaer; 1909)