The Supreme Court of Maine. volume of the Maine Historical Collections. We do not know what courts were estab lished, or what laws were enacted. No record of them remains. Mr. Thornton, however, contributes to history the valuable infor mation that Abraham Shurt, agent of the proprietors, is the author of the brief and comprehensive formula by which the ac knowledgment of deeds in Maine and Mas sachusetts has ever been certified. He cites as proof the certificate of Shurt to the deed of the Indian sachems of the Pemaquid ter ritory to John Brown, dated July 24, 1626. A few other facts in the history of Pema quid will serve our present purpose. In 1632 a charter was granted by the council of New England to Aldworth and Elbridge of Bristol, England. This passed, in 1650, from their heirs, and became in after years the subject, together with other titles derived from the Indians, English patentees and possessory rights, of a furious and bitter controversy, which was only settled by the interference of Massachusetts, and then by compromise, in 18 12. The commissioners of Charles II visited the province in 1664. They reported : " The people for the most part are fishermen, and never had any gov ernment among them." In 1673, when the government of New York was granted to James, Duke of York and brother of the king, Pemaquid became an appendage to the colony of New York, and was represented in its General Assembly. June 24, 1680, courts were established by the council sitting in New York. The noted Sir Edmund Andros was governor at this time, and, as such, issued a commission to Henry Josselyn, who had formerly been one of Gorges' commissioners, residing at Scarboro', and others, to be a court of session, and, " to act according to law and former practice." This court held its sessions in June and November. Justices of the peace were also appointed from time to time, with authority to hear and determine civil and criminal causes. Thomas Gyles lived, at the
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time of the first Indian war, at Merry Meet ing Bay; he afterwards settled at Pemaquid, and was made chief justice of the court there. He was killed by the Indians in 1689. John Jordan, of Cape Elizabeth, was ap pointed by Governor Andros a special jus tice for the province, which then acquired the name, County of Cornwall, the principal place being Pemaquid and made a port of entry and shire-town. In September, 1686, the Duke of York, who had now become James II, transferred the jurisdiction of his eastern territory to Massachusetts, which immediately assumed the government over it, and she lost no time in giving stability to the institutions in her new acquisitions. The second Indian war, which broke out soon after, 1689, interrupted her plans, and instead of establishing a peaceful govern ment, she was called upon to defend the territory, and to rescue the inhabitants from imminent peril, and before it was over the new charter of 169 1 was granted, which united with the old Bay Colony that of Plymouth, the whole territory of Maine, and also Nova Scotia.
III. It is worthy of note that the political status of the Province of Maine, during the fifty-two years briefly sketched above, was that of a palatinate, of which Gorges was lord palatine; his royal judicial powers are found recited at large in the curious Palati nate of Maine; and is the only instance of a purely feudal possession on this continent.1 Under the charter of 1691, above named, granted upon the accession of William and Mary, occurred the second important period in the courts of Maine, when there was established a system which, with few changes, continued for the next one hundred 1 Ex-Gov. Gen. J. L. Chamberlain's Centennial Address, I'hila. Nov. 4, 1876.
