{"id":424,"date":"2019-06-11T19:07:40","date_gmt":"2019-06-12T02:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/arthursattic\/?p=424"},"modified":"2026-04-08T13:11:50","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T20:11:50","slug":"the-teenage-travels-of-henry-vane-a-seventeenth-century-transnational-statesman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/arthursattic\/2019\/06\/11\/the-teenage-travels-of-henry-vane-a-seventeenth-century-transnational-statesman\/","title":{"rendered":"The teenage travels of Henry Vane, a seventeenth-century transnational statesman"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Imagine being a teenager entrusted with top-secret government intelligence and embarking on state-sponsored travels beyond your homeland. This was the reality for Henry Vane the younger (1613-1662), an aristocratic English sixteen-year-old who would eventually become a politician, a theologian, and the sixth governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.[1]<\/a> Held today at Santa Clara University\u2019s Archives & Special Collections (and pictured above), a parchment letter created in 1629 provides a fascinating look into Vane\u2019s first voyage beyond England and which set him on a lifelong journey of religious controversy and political engagement.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Transcription of Travel Permit for Henry Vane<\/a>Download<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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High res image of Travel Permit for Henry Vane
<\/a>Download<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Signed by King Charles I (faintly, at the very top), this official document grants the young and socially privileged Vane permission to travel beyond England and into the European Continent. Addressing any admirals, captains, and representatives of the law that Vane might encounter during his voyage, the letter clarifies that Vane has the right \u201cto passe out of this our Realme into the parts beyond the Seas,\u201d and specifically \u201cfor the space of three yeares.\u201d Vane did not embark on his travels alone, for the letter also mentions \u201cAndre Trunchen, and Gameliel hawkings his Servants\u201d; we also learn that the young man carried with him fifty pounds and other necessaries for his journey. These costs added up; apparently, Vane\u2019s father (also named Henry) wrote that \u201cI have bred my eldest son and six others beyond seas, which has been very chargeable to me\u201d \u2013 that is, burdensome and financially costly.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vane\u2019s travel authorization had some strings attached, however. After all, his journey was state business. The letter stipulates that the young man must not<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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haunt or resort into the Territories or domynions of any forraine Prince or Potentate, not being wth <\/sup>in league or Amity, nor yet wittingly keepe Company wth<\/sup> any person or psons departed out of this our Realme wth<\/sup>out our license, or that contrary to the same, doe yet remaine on the otherside of the Seas; And that he vse not the Company of any Iesuite, Seminary, preist, or otherwise evill affected pson to our State.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Clearly, there were limits to where Vane could travel and with whom he could associate. Strictly off-limits are foreign rulers opposed to the English crown (lacking \u201cAmity\u201d with Charles), Englishmen who have gone abroad without permission or overstaying their voyage\u2019s agreed-upon terms, or religious clergy supposedly inimical to the English people. This, significantly, includes Jesuits, and it is most likely for this mention of the Society of Jesus that Vane\u2019s travel permit was selected for SCU\u2019s library collections. (Brief summaries about SCU’s Jesuitica and Jesuits in Fiction collections can be found on the department website<\/a>.) Less than a decade before Vane\u2019s birth, in 1605, a Catholic plot to blow up the English Parliament set all of London on edge, and the English Jesuit Henry Garnet was known to have something to do with it.[4]<\/a> Surely Vane should avoid these sorts of \u201cevill affected\u201d characters, suggests this official document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we see in this letter offers a first look into the travels that would come to define Vane\u2019s career in theology and politics. Once on the Continent, Vane traveled through major Protestant intellectual centers of France, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, where he studied. By 1631 he had reached Vienna, for some of his letters from his journeys survive; interestingly, they are written in French and cipher, a kind of secret code, and treat of politics in Europe. Vane returned to England briefly after the interval specified in this travel permit, where he was commended for his \u201cGreat improvement\u201d; the same account states that \u201chis French [is] good, his discourse discreet, his fashion comely and fair.\u201d[5]<\/a> Perhaps \u201cAndre Trunchen,\u201d the servant mentioned in the royal travel permit, was a Frenchman entrusted with the young Henry\u2019s linguistic cultivation. Only four years prior, after all, the eminent scholar Francis Bacon recommended \u201cThat Young Men trauaile vnder some Tutor, or graue Seruant . . . So that he be such a one, that hath the Language, and hath been in the Country before.\u201d[6]<\/a> In spite of Vane\u2019s evident \u201cimprovement,\u201d religious disputes caused him to voyage to North America, where \u2013 at only twenty-three \u2013 he became the sixth Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. This position suited Vane\u2019s puritan beliefs, which conflicted with those of his father and the Caroline court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vane\u2019s tenure as colonial governor was fraught with religious, political, and military difficulties. His support for the establishment of Rhode Island and his friendship with the Narragansett advocate Roger Williams made him out to be a somewhat equitable figure. At the same time, Vane\u2019s support for the religious reformer Anne Hutchinson alienated many would-be allies, and he also authorized a military campaign to eliminate the Pequot tribe in present-day Connecticut. As Michael Winship has discussed, Vane was generally skeptical of clerical power, and radicalist tendencies manifested in his dealings both in New England and during his return to England.[7]<\/a> The statesman\u2019s participation in religious and political reform in England helped strengthen the English Commonwealth, a project led by Oliver Cromwell, and his involvement with the Commonwealth ultimately resulted in his execution after the Restoration in 1662. (Vane’s activity during the Interregnum is a lengthy and complex subject, and this brief account only scratches the surface.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vane\u2019s travel permit is written in\nan elegant secretary hand, a type of early English handwriting that is\ndifficult for the modern reader to decipher. I\u2019ve prepared a near-complete\ntranscription for anyone curious about the details of its contents. At 390\nyears old, this unique document attests to the early stages in the life of one\nof seventeenth-century England\u2019s most interesting political reformers, a figure\nwho made his name and attracted trenchant criticism in both Europe and North\nAmerica.
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\"Handwritten<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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[1]<\/a> For an overview of Vane\u2019s\nlife and for further reading, see Ruth E. Mayers, \u201cSir Henry Vane the younger\n(1613-1662),\u201d Oxford Dictionary of\nNational Biography<\/em> (Oxford, 2004).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[2]<\/a> DA397.C4 Env. Sec.A, Archives and\nSpecial Collections, Santa Clara University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[3]<\/a> Charles Dalton, History of the Wrays of Glentworth,\n1523-1852<\/em>, vol. 2 (Aberdeen, 1881), 112.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[4]<\/a> An account of this episode and its\ntumultuous fallout appears in James Shapiro, The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606<\/em> (New York, 2015), 119-34.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[5]<\/a> Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, Volume 5:\n1631-1633<\/em>, ed. John Bruce<\/em> (Nedeln, 1967), 294.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[6]<\/a> Francis Bacon, \u201cOf Trauaile,\u201d\nin The essayes or councells, ciuill and morall<\/em> (London, 1625), sig. O2v.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[7]<\/a> Michael Winship, Making Heretics:\nMilitant Protestantism and Free Grace in Massachusetts, 1636-1641<\/em>\n(Princeton, 2002), 245.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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