Volume 2: The Office Takes Root An old English office arrives in a new world. As Massachusetts Bay's early settlements took shape, colonists were building more than homes and towns. They were establishing government, law, and public offices carried from English tradition. Among them was the constable. In Volume 2: The Office Takes Root, discover some of the earliest recorded Massachusetts constables and see how an ancient English office became part of the developing government of Massachusetts. The settlements were new. The office was not.
The constable did not originate in Massachusetts. The office had centuries of history in England before English settlers crossed the Atlantic and began establishing new communities along Massachusetts Bay.
Volume 2 of Before the Badge explores how the constable took root during the earliest years of colonial Massachusetts. Surviving records identify constables serving communities including Salem and Dorchester, while Charlestown's early history records Ralph Sprague as its first constable in 1630.
As the colony grew, Massachusetts began developing its own institutions and body of law. The Body of Liberties of 1641 and Laws and Liberties of 1648 marked important stages in that development, while the constable became part of the system of local government operating within the growing colony.
This volume isn't yet about everything constables did. Those individual responsibilities have stories of their own.
Instead, The Office Takes Root tells how an old English public office became part of Massachusetts history and establishes the foundation for what comes next.
An old English office begins its Massachusetts story.
Before the Badge is a historical mini-series from The Constable Files, exploring the history and evolution of the Massachusetts constable.
