Roger Williams Founded Providence Here - Providence, Rhode Island - Rhode Island Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

A two-sided monument with cast bronze plaques denotes the place where Roger Williams founded Providence, Rhode Island. The block of polished granite is about four feet square and one foot thick. The plaque on the eastern side faces North Main Street; the opposite, Roger Williams National Memorial park. The marker visible from the road reads:

ROGER WILLIAMS
FOUNDED PROVIDENCE
HERE IN
1636

In much smaller type, which I noticed only after going through my photos, runs the entire length of the bottom edge: "This plaque, a reproduction of the original, was donated by the Roger Williams Family Association in honor of the 375th anniversary of the founding of Providence." Though it is not listed here, that would have been in the year 2011.

The park-side plaque reads:

The Spring of clear cold water
located thirty feet west of this
point led Roger Williams to
found Providence here in the
year 1636 from which center it
has developed in four directions.

Roger Williams, born in London, seeking religious freedom and facing prosecution -- banishment from Salem of the Massachusetts Bay colony -- during the especially cold Winter of 1635-36, fled south on foot. The Wampanoag chief sachem Massasoit sheltered Williams through the season at his home near what is now Bristol, Rhode Island.

Williams had previously established trading with local Indigenous people; he offered English goods and they furs and food in return. Based on those good relationships, Massasoit granted Williams a tract of land along the Seekonk River (in now East Providence) in the Spring of 1636.

Next, some of William's followers left Salem to join him. Following a scouting expedition by canoe south along the Seekonk River, around present day Fox Point, up the Great Salt River, to the confluence of the Moshassuck and Woonasquatucket Rivers, where the water opened up to a large cove, Williams built his house near a fresh water spring on the west side of a trail around the cove.

"Roger negotiated a deal for the land that was to become Providence with the Narragansett Sachems Cononicus and Miantonomo. In return for the land, Roger would allow the Sachems to come and take whatever English trade goods they wanted from him."(1)

The first settlers were given six-acre tracts of land that stretched from the cove up a hill to the east. Unlike Plimoth, Boston, and Salem, the place had no documentation for governing. Instead, the property owners met every two weeks to discuss issues and make consensus decisions relating to civil matters. Religious issues were left to individuals.

Source:
(1) National Park Service: "Roger Williams: Founding Providence"

Related Website: [Web Link] Organization that Placed the Marker: Not listed Year Marker was Placed: Not listed

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