another minister, Samuel Skelton, he drew up a confession of faith, which, as some of the passengers were episcopalians and some congregationalists, took a middle course regarding differences in creed, and caused the framers to be accused of anabaptism. Soon after their landing a church was formed at Salem or Naumkeag, when Skelton was chosen minister, and Higginson his assistant. On account of their ignoring the Book of Common Prayer, and their strictness in discipline, troubles arose, and complaints were made to the governors. Higginson was required to answer the charges against him, which he appears to have been successful in doing. The unhealthy atmosphere of the place and the fatigues consequent on the formation of the settlement caused Higginson to contract a hectic fever, from the effects of which he died on 6 Aug. 1630, leaving a widow and eight children. Higginson was a puritan of the most severe type, but upright, conscientious, and unselfish, an able scholar, and an excellent preacher.
He published, besides the confession before mentioned, ‘New England's Plantation. Or a Short and Trve Description of the Commodities and Discommodities of that Countrey. Written in the year 1629 by Mr. Higgeson, a reuerend Diuine, now there resident,’ 3rd edition, London, 1630, 4to, 25 pp.; the first edition had appeared in the same year without the author's name; it is reprinted as chap. xii. of Young's ‘Chronicles of the First Planters.’ This tract was a continuation of ‘A True Relation of the last Voyage to New England, declaring all circumstances, with the manner of the Passage we had by Sea … and what is the present State and Condition of the English people that are there already. Written from New England, July 21, 1629.’ This latter was printed for the first time in Young's ‘Chronicles,’ chap. xi., where another letter by Higginson is also printed (pp. 260–4).
Higginson, John (1616–1708), eldest son of the above, was born at Claybrooke 6 Aug. 1616, and went to New England with his father. On his father's death he maintained his mother by teaching at Hartford; afterwards he was chaplain successively at Saybrook and Guilford, where he married a daughter of the Rev. Henry Whitfield. In 1659 he sailed for England, but putting in at Salem he accepted an invitation to preach there for a year, and eventually became regular pastor of the church which his father had planted. He published various sermons, and was author of an attestation prefixed to Cotton Mather's ‘Magnalia.’ John Higginson died at Salem 9 Dec. 1708; he had several children, a notice of whom will be found in the collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society (3rd ser. vii. 196–222), where a number of letters written by him and his sons are printed.
Francis Higginson's second son, Francis (1617–1670), returned to England, and after studying at Leyden entered the church of England, and became vicar of Kirkby Stephen, Westmoreland. He published in 1653 ‘A Brief Relation of the Irreligion of the Northern Quakers,’ 4to, to which ‘A Reply,’ &c., appeared next year.
[J. B. Felt's Life of F. Higginson; Morse and Parish's Hist. of New England, i. 52; Mather's Hist. of New England, i. 18, 19, iii. 71, 75; Young's Chronicles of the First Planters; Massachusetts Hist. Soc. Collections, 1st ser. vol. i., 3rd ser. vol. vii.; Massachusetts Papers, pp. 32, 46; Morton's New England Mem. pp. 76, 77; Brook's Hist. of the Puritans, ii. 369; Palmer's Nonconf. Mem. i. 336; Neal's Hist. of the Puritans, ii. 205; Nichols's Leicestershire, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 426.]
HIGGONS, BEVIL (1670–1735), historian and poet, was born at Kezo in 1670, being the third son of Sir Thomas Higgons [q. v.], by his second wife, Bridget, daughter of Sir Bevil Grenville, and relict of Sir Simon Leach of Cadleigh, Devonshire. In Lent term 1686, when aged 16, he matriculated as a commoner at St. John's College, Oxford, but not long afterwards migrated to Trinity Hall, Cambridge. His first production in print was a set of English verses addressed ‘to the queen on the birth of the prince,’ which as a fellow-commoner of Trinity Hall he wrote for insertion in the university collection of congratulatory poems, entitled ‘Illustrissimi principis ducis Cornubiæ genethliacon.’ On leaving the university—the statement that he obtained a fellowship at Trinity Hall does not seem to be correct—he was entered as a student of the Middle Temple, but probably paid little attention to the study of law. His family was in sympathy with the exiled Stuarts. His uncle, Dean Denis Grenville [q. v.], had accompanied James II to France. Higgons followed them, and remained there for some years, keeping, as is specially noted, his wit and good humour unimpaired in adversity. After he was allowed to return to his own country he and his two brothers were suspected in 1695 of knowledge of the conspiracy against the life of William III, but Bevil was said to have dissuaded his brother Tom from joining the plot, ‘declaring it was an assassination’ (State Trials, xii. 1313–15). A proclamation for the arrest of George Higgons and his two brothers was issued by William on 23 Feb. 1695–6 (ib. xiii. 192,
